Hello all! I've had a pretty wonderful weekend so far. I am officially on vacation. I know...I just got here, but the French have a delightful two week vacation for All Saint's Day in October. So...after bball practice on Friday, I was invited to go watch a handball match in Saintes the following night. I had my first intro to handball the previous day when I dropped in on the BTS PE class. It's nothing like handball in the US. It's a mix between ultimate frisbee rules played with a mini soccer ball on an indoor court with the physicality of rugby. Frankly, it's lots of fun. So, I woke up on Saturday morning, saw that it was sunny and reasonably warm, so I took a sheet and my ipod out to the courtyard where I basked in the sunshine for a couple of hours. I then biked into town, bought some Orangina (I'm quickly becoming addicted) and returned to have some baguette with camembert with lemon sorbet for dessert. I love french food. I then read Mark Twain for an hour or two, and then it was time to go to the match. So, I caught a ride to Saintes and proceeded to watch my first handball match. We had seats right on the floor and it was fantastic. Very violent and fast paced. I loved it! All the while the fans are crazy. Our side had a drum and the fans were chanting the entire match. "Allez, allez, allez!!" They kept playing snatches of Queen's "we will rock you" and for some reason "cotton-eyed joe". If you want to have a good time, I suggest you listen to a gym full of French people sing along to We will Rock you. It's fantastic. The home team ended up winning. I actually felt kind of sorry for the losing team. I kind of wished they would have won. But if I had voiced those sentiments, I probably would have been skewered on the spot.
After the match, the team went bowling. We didn't begin to bowl until after midnight. These french people stay up so late! Now, I have discovered that I don't particularly enjoy bowling. It hurts my fingers. And the game isn't enjoyable enough for me to want to hurt my fingers...kind of the way I play bball even though it shreds my knees. Also, if you know me, you know that after about 1 in the morning, I shut off. There's an automatic feature that just turns off late at night. Consequently, its difficult to get me to do much...much less speak coherently in another language. So...I was doing decently until about 1 am...then I began to suck extraordinarily. To make a long story short, I didn't get home until 3 am...waaaay too late for me. But it was fun to hang out with the basketball team and get to know them better. As a "welcome to the charente-maritime" they gave me two small bottles of Pineau. Haven't decided what to do with them yet... Anyhoo, as a result of staying up so late, I slept in until noon. I then woke up, showered, and made french toast while listening to Jimmy Eat World. A good morning. And now, I'm going to meet Beatrice and spend the afternoon with her. So...I had better get going! I'll talk to you all soon!
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What's Orangina, exactly? Another thing I've always kinda wondered... is French Toast considered a French food, or is it one of those misnomers like French Fries?
You should totally save the bottles for christening a boat! That, or you could probably try and do some marinated cooking with them (depending on the flavor, I suppose).
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