Bonne Année!
Happy New Year!
It has come to my attention that I have not written a blog post for a while so I will attempt to update you all on everything that has been going on since my last post.
The Christmas lights and decorations went up around the city around the end of November (and still haven’t come down!) We kicked off the festive celebrations with the official turning on of the lights which involved a fireworks display to the tune of drumming which was a bit bizarre partly because the fireworks were so close to the Palais des Ducs which rose health and safety questions in my head but the French didn’t seem to mind. Also it was pretty hard to see the fireworks once they got more than about 10 foot in the air because the sky was so grey. However it was lots of fun and we mainly just drank vin chaud and looked round the small but still plenty of fun Christmas market that Dijon has got going on.
The weather has been added to the festive feeling as we had temperatures as low as -6 and a lot of snow. It was very exciting to have proper snow for such a long period of time (although the cold did get to me as I did not pack for such Arctic temperatures). But, now, come January the snow has turned to rain, which does at least mean its above zero!
In the weeks before the Christmas holidays I managed 2 trips. One to Lyon to see the Illumination Festival and one to Strasbourg for the Christmas markets. Lyon was wonderful, as ever (probably my favourite French city) and provided a great opportunity for me to hangout with my flatmate and her friend, and therefore speak lots of French! Strasbourg was awesome and it was really interesting to be in a French city with such a German influence.
Then after rolling out a fairly successful lesson on the topic of Christmas it was time to go home for my Christmas holidays. I spent the first 3 days on my university campus, staying in my brother’s halls which was lots of fun and I managed to catch up with some familiar faces and to meet some new ones and just generally have a great time partying in London. And then it was time to go home home, and after a slightly stressful trek across London and a delay at Victoria Coach station me and my brother made it back to Bristol. And a few days later (after delayed planes) my grandparents joined us from Cyprus and my Dad came back from Australia. Christmas was wonderful and it was lovely to be with my family and friends and to speak English again. It was also, of course, my 22nd birthday. But shortly after the New Years Eve celebrations it was time to come back.
It was weird at first as I kept thinking people in the street were speaking English, when obviously they were speaking French but as my French flatmate greeted me at the door and we exchanged notes from the holidays I was relieved to find that I can speak French!
My flatmates are both at home this weekend so I was concerned I would be bored/lonely but on Friday Julie (the other assistant at my school) came round for lunch and then we met up with some other assistants for free tea and coffee at Ikea, yesterday it was the birthday of one of the American assistants so we all went out to a bar and I think everyone got drunker than they intended! And then today despite my hangover I cooked a Sunday roast (with trifle for dessert) for a few friends and then we watched a film – a lovely lazy Sunday! And tomorrow both my flatmates come back, yay!
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