FRANCE!

I really want to tell everything I've seen and done since I got here on Wednesday, but that would result in pages and pages worth of reading, and then nobody would ever visit my blog again. Instead, I'm just going to post a bit about my home, some oddities (to me) of France, and maybe some photos, if I can figure out how to shrink them.

Merci pour venir!

Ma Maison
I live in what Mme. Bouhet calls a typical "maison angevine," you enter the front door and there's a living room and dining room on the right side of the house, and a little kitchen at the back. Up the stairs are 2 bedrooms and a large bathroom, and on the third floor are 2-3 bedrooms. She says that the rooms may be bigger or smaller from house to house, but that the layout is pretty much the same. My house was built around 1870.
My room is on the third floor, very spacious, with a skylight and occasional visits from a 3-legged cat. On the 31st, I should have two new American housemates. Once they arrive, there will be 7 people in the house (4 family, 3 students), 2 cats, and one bathroom. Some wonderful person installed a deadbolt on the bathroom door, something that I would like to establish in my American home.



Oh, la France.
*fancy doors have knobs in the center
*teenagers hang out in doorways, kind of like homeless people in Chicago, except they can afford more cigarettes
*in the country, French people really seem to like sheds
*not that people didn't tell me this, but everybody here dresses better than you. everybody. even people who are helplessly dorky in America, like middle schoolers and the elderly. I wore my favorite outfit that my mom's just bought me, and was a total hobo in comparison. It bothered me the first two days, but then I remembered that I'm not a la mode at home, either, so it really doesn't matter.
*French dogs are cuter, too. and they're everywhere. on the train, in the grocery store, just hanging out.
* some places, it costs money to pee
*ATMs are quite literally on every corner
*food is expensive. no, you don't understand, food is EXPENSIVE.
*Not only is there a 2 euro coin, but there is a 2 cent coin. I think this is a prank.
*People only buy about a couple of days' worth of groceries at a time. as such, the grocery store was tiny, the basket was tiny, and the fridge that supports 7 people is tiny.
*there is something in the bathroom that looks like a toilet, but has a spout, drain, and hot/cold water handles like a sink. it's either a bidet, or a cat washer.
*every single store I went into today (10+) played American pop music. Being in France doesn't make Ke$ha sound any better.
*cars are more likely to run over pedestrians, but pedestrians are less likely to die because all the cars are compact.