Bonjour from France!

Hi everyone! This is my first blog from France. Everything went very smooth as far as travel goes. The plane to Philadelphia was a snap. I read my book (Message in a Bottle by Nicholas Sparks) and listened to music on my iPhone. Then Ashely and I had a 4 hour layover (plus a one hour plane delay), so we decided to get a Philly Cheese Steak. I'm sure that it wasn't as good as getting one outside of the airport, but it works! Once we got on the plane from Philly to Paris, we found out that Ashley weren't sitting together. :( But we got the man that was supposed to sit next to me to switch with Ashley. Thank goodness! I would have gone crazy if I were sitting next to him. Let's just say that he was not skinny... haha. I watched The Time Traveler's Wife on my personal video screen, and then went to sleep for about 3 hours. I've been dying to see that movie! We got to Paris at about 10:30 in the morning (France time), and our train was scheduled to leave at 1:16. We both got our luggage fine (thank goodness!) and then went in search of the train station, which luckily was in the airport. We weren't really sure what to do in while waiting, so we just sat. We needed to go to the bathroom, but it cost .50 euro, so we just waited until we got on the train. Then it was free. I'm thinking about making that my first article for The University News at SLU. Any thoughts or ideas?
Once, we got off the train, two students from ESSCA, Caroline and Paul, were waiting for us. We were so excited when we found them because we weren't exactly sure where to look find them. They brought us to our apartment and then basically left us. I won't go into that though. It made me very very upset! I'm also a little sad to say, also, that my first meal in France was at Subway. But it definitely didn't taste as good as the American Subway! We were way to tired and upset that the students left us to venture out on our own to look around and find food, so we just ate there because there is one right by my apartment building. After that we came back to our apartment, unpacked, showered, spoke to everyone on the phone/skype, watched a movie, and went to sleep. We wanted to feel refreshed in the morning.
Unfortunately, we never saw the morning though. My alarm clock that I brought with me got fried, even though I used an adapter!! I'm also afraid that my flat iron got fried, too. :( It made a buzzing noise when I plugged it in so I unplugged it and probably won't plug it in ever again!! Anyway, so we didn't wake up until 3pm! While that was 8 hours after we planned on waking up (wow!), it was definitely good that we slept, and it definitely made me feel better about the whole situation of being here. So we got dressed and headed out. We stopped in Subway for drinks, and he told us where the cheapest electronic store was so Ashley could buy an Ethernet cord. We also bought a new alarm clock for 15 euros. It has a projector! It's really cool. Maybe I'll use it when I get back to the states. Haha. We only bought one. I'm staying in her room right now anyway, so it's fine. Plus I'm hoping my phone will still work as an alarm too. Then we went to a photo store and Ashley used a kiosk to print some photos. Then we got a sandwich (ham and butter), croissant, and drink for only 3 euros! It was so good! My picture is me eating my sandwich. :) Then we went grocery shopping and got a few things for the next few days. On the way back we stopped at a grocery store that was a bit closer to the apartment to get drinks because they would be too heavy to carry from where we were. There was also an H & M by the grocery store and electronic store we went to! We'll go shopping this weekend, maybe. :) Who knew all of my H & M clothes would come in handy?? Haha. I should have Cody bring me the rest of them.
So, we got back to our apartment and just hung out because it was starting to drizzle and get chilly outside. A couple of hours later, we were hungry so we went out exploring again for food. We found a little restaurant, and I had a chicken panini, fries, and a drink... for only 5,50 euros! Everything feels so cheap, but I guess that is close to 7 dollars. I guess I can stop talking about food now, but it's all so yummy! Plus it's just part of my day, and I really want to share everything. It's almost 10pm here, so I'll probably shower soon and try to sleep. Hopefully I'll be able to, even though I've only been up for about 7 hours! The shower will make me tired, and I'll probably take some benadryl. :) That always helps. But I absolute cannot sleep late tomorrow because I need to leave my apartment by 8:45 just to make sure I make it to meet my bus at 9:01. Orientation at school starts tomorrow at 9:30. Oh! I met my roommate. She is French, and seems very nice! She came in and spoke with me and made sure I knew how to do everything to get to school tomorrow.
I hope everyone has a fabulous rest of the day. It's still weird to think that it is only about 4pm there!
Love from France,
Dena