Parting is such sweet sorrow -

Somehow it is already that time. I would like to believe that someone has just been stealing pages from my calendar and it's really only January and not halfway through May. On August 31st I believed that nine months was going to feel like forever, and that I would never actually make it back home. Now, on May 16th, I feel like I barely scratched the surface of time and leaving Chambéry is something that I'm finding very hard to do.

I've never lived anywhere other than home for any period of time. Sure, I've lived on campus, but that was a 30 minute drive to my house and inaccessible during the holidays. I've never lived somewhere on my own like this before. Chambéry is the only other place that I have ever been able to call home. I keep getting really bummed out that I'm leaving, but then I remember that everything that makes this place home will be gone too. All my friends are leaving and without them, it's just like starting over somewhere new. But that still doesn't make it any easier to give all this up.

Lemon tarts, Moroccan pizza, caramel ice cream, raspberry macarons, speculoos everything, fondu, and all things French. Just a few of the things that I'm leaving behind and am unsure of when I will return to.

I'm all packed up now and I'm laying in an empty room, my empty room in Comte Vert B14D, for the last time. Tomorrow I will be checking out of my room, going to the post office to ship some things home, and then going to the Challes-les-eaux train station for the last time. I'll get in Paris tomorrow afternoon and I'll spend my day cramming every last minute souvenir shopping and sightseeing that I can, and then I'll be heading to the airport and crashing there until my plane leaves on Tuesday to take me back to the good ole U.S. of A.

Bittersweet has never more appropriately described my life. Maybe when I get home I'll write a whole blog about my reverse culture shock. I already feel it.

Thank you Chambéry, thank you France, thank you all who have been a part of this experience. It was absolutely worth it.

Finals in France

For those who don't already know, it's that time of the semester for finals. The only difference now is that my finals are all in French. It's right about now that I'm starting to question what madness led me here in the first place. I always knew this would happen. I haven't had to do anything but show up to all my classes all semester. It was inevitable that the day where I was put to the epic test would get here.

So here's what it's like. I studied all weekend for my medieval history final. I could tell you all about the Vikings, the Hundred Year's War, the Crusades, and bits and pieces of other events. Better yet, I could tell you all about those things in French. But then I get to the final and the question is about the State in France and how it was constructed.

...

Let's just hope I'm as good at BSing in French as I am in English, because that's pretty much what I did. The final itself was a little weird too, at least compared to America. First of all, there were only 2 questions and you chose one to write a dissertation on. Second, we were placed in the sports hall with everyone else. We were divided into sections for our subject, but there were psychology finals, history finals, and who knows what other kinds of finals going on in there. A little different from our structure in America, but I rolled with it.

I have a few more finals coming up, and what I've learned is - whatever I think is going to be on the final, won't be. So I should study the things I find irrelevant because that's what I'll be asked. I have 2 more written finals and one oral final. I'm kind of freaking out about the oral final, but at this point...I kind of just have to roll with it, right?

Here's to hoping I pass, even if it's just barely scraping by. I'm already working on arranging the retake tests in June in the event that I do fail. Cover all my bases so I don't cry too much.