Last night in Angers...

It's very bittersweet to be leaving. Obviously I can't wait to be home, but I have really grown to love it here, as well. I think I'm happier to be going home than I am sad to be leaving. Does that make sense? I'm just ready to see my sister, and then finally Cody.

My parents' visit has been amazing. Today, we went to my bank appointment, walked all over the center of town (aka shopping), had a delicious lunch at a nice restaurant, went to the cathedral and castle, came back to finish packing and cleaning my apartment, went out for crepes, and finally a beer at a local bar. It was awesome. :) Now I just can't wait to see Stephanie on Sunday!!!! Hopefully I can blog at least once more, but if not... SEE YOU IN THE STATES!!!!

Love,
Dena

Patience is a virtue...

.... that I clearly do NOT have!

I'm waiting for it to be time to go pick my parents up from the train station. Their train arrives in about 68 minutes. So, I can leave in about 30 (I have some errands to do along the way).

I cannot wait to see them!!!!

Last night, we had a final going away party. It was soooo much fun! It seemed like almost all of the international students showed up. I am really going to miss this place and all of the wonderful people I have met along the way. :( I'm probably more excited to be getting home, though.

Lists

My parents are in Paris!! Woohoo!! Not really sure what they are up to today, but they are safe. :)

I figured now would be as good of a time as any to make a couple of lists. One is a list of the things I will miss about Angers/France, and the other it things I will either not miss... or I really just miss about home. So, here it goes.

Things I will miss:

• Kebab- SO yummy!
  
• Neil Thomas- my marketing professor. He liked to wear vests.
  
• Shopping
• Mims, Bershka, Zara- a bunch of French stores
  
• Having one class a day... in the middle of the afternoon
• Cheap shoes
• Soldes- the sales all over France
  
• Seeing Chateau D'Angers every day
• My computer (RIP)
• International friends
• Gardens
• Lion Candy Bars
• Sending letters/postcards
• Improving my French- obviously I will still be improving by taking classes, but it just won't be the same as actually being in France
  
• Walking everywhere

Things I will not miss:

• Public Transportation
• ESSCA's crazy class schedule
• Carrefour- ugh the lines are worse than Walmart!
  
• Not being about to speak English outside of school and my apartment
• Being so far away from family and friends
• Smelly French people- only 70% of French women wear deodorant!
  
• BNP Paribas- my French bank
  
• MagicJack- my "phone" that is on my computer. I can't hear the person I am talking to half of the time
  
• No rootbeer
• Not having an oven or dishwasher
  
• Not having my phone
• Paying for laundry/the dryer/the dryer not actually working- so my in my apartment next year, I will have to pay for laundry again, but I have a bunch of friends who have free laundry so I'll probably just go visit someone once a week :)
  
• Cultural differences/communication problems

Some Nice Pictures

We took a tourist bus ride around Nice. I just couldn't get over the square head. I think there might be an office building inside of it.



Monaco Grand Prix!



Cannes Film Festival!



Be on the beach in Nice. It was so nice. :) Haha. Pun intended.


My parents leave for Paris today!!!!!! Then I will finally see them on Thursday after they arrive tomorrow. Then I will see Stephanie on Sunday. I am so excited! Then time to go home. :) Finally.

Dena

Nice time in Nice

I'm off to Nice early in the morning! Too bad it is supposed to rain the entire time I am there. :( But I will also be going to Cannes, and possibly Monaco. It will be fun!

Be back Saturday.

XOXO,
Dena

Rainy Saturday

I LOVE RAIN!... just sayin

Today, Ashley and I had a few errands to do, but only one of them got accomplished. We needed to go to the CAF office, buy escargot, eat lunch, and go grocery shopping.

CAF: I had to go to the doctor for a physical last week (in Nantes), then I filled out a bunch of forms, then I turn them in at the CAF office. After I do this, they will help me pay for my rent! Since my rent is already mostly paid, though, my landlord will put the extra money in my bank account. But the office was not open since it is Saturday. We'll have to go on Monday after class.

Escargot: The typical way someone makes escargot is in an oven, but we found a recipe to make it on the stove. And when in France, right? So we went to the Saturday market, and we couldn't find any. Usually there is a bunch! Very strange.

Lunch: This is the only thing that got accomplished. We ate kebabs at our favorite stand. I will miss that so much!!

Grocery store: For some reason the buses aren't running today! We had to use the Sunday bus to get from CAF to the market. We walked everywhere else. So therefore, we have no way of getting to Carrefour. So we decided to just go to Marché Plus (which I have been pronouncing wrong the entire time I've been here). But of course it had to be closed. So we'll have to go on Monday. The tiny grocery store is open, but I'm sure I can scrounge around today and tomorrow for food from my fridge.


Oh, so my roommate has been MIA the last two weeks, and she finally came back last night. Then her parents came today and she moved out. She'll have to come back though in a few weeks to check out with the landlord... so I'm not sure if I'll ever see her again. She left me a note because I didn't see her last night or today. That was nice.

Now I will continue to enjoy my rainy day :)

XOXO,
Dena

London... a tad late

I am so bad with updating!! I was really good about it in the beginning. I will make up for it by posting a ton of pictures!



Big Ben and Parliament!! BB was much taller than I expected, actually.



The London Eye. It was so amazing to go to the top. Thanks, Stephanie, for practically making me do it! I hate heights, but it wasn't scary at all. I could see all of London from the very top, or so it seemed.



Fish n' Chips... of course. It was delicious! I got it two nights for dinner. This is a lot coming from me, considering I don't generally enjoy fish. I loved it though, so maybe I am turning over a new leaf and becoming less picky of an eater?



Buckingham Palace. We went and saw the changing of the guards. Honestly it was just boring to watch. Haha. It was basically the same as the changing of the guards in Monaco, only it lasted longer and there were more guards. Of course I had to take tons of pictures of the guards in funny hats, but they were all turned wrong, and I'm not sure how to rotate pictures on here.



Tower of London Bridge. It is often confused as being London Bridge. We took a nice boat ride, which went under both bridges, and I didn't even take a picture of London Bridge because it looked so boring! It was just a boring old bridge. This one was much much cooler.

More London Pictures

Me, riding on the London Eye. You can see Big Ben, Parliament, and Westminister Abbey behind me. The Eye was probably my favorite part of London. It was so much fun!!!



This is the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Park. It took forever to find because the directions kept steering us in the wrong direction!! It was well worth it. This is one of the things I really wanted to see.



Of course I had to take a picture with a telephone booth!!! And I even used one. :)



This is in front of Shakespeare Globe theater. This is one of the other places I really wanted to go. I'm sad that it isn't a very good picture. :( We could not take pictures inside the theater because they were actually doing rehearsals. It was very neat to see that being done. I would have loved to see the show, but they were opening the same day we left.



Yummiest Mexican food EVER!!!! And by ever, I mean, since I have been in Europe.