21.10.10

So....I finally have a laptop of my own! I couldn't take it anymore and decided to go to the FNAC store. It cost me 499,90€ but i think perhaps it's worth it just to be able to skype and blog freely!

Anyway....there is a lot going on:

1. Les manifs. I tried to get my French friends to explain the politics of this, and from what I understand, Sarkozy wants to change the age of retirement from 60 to 62. This has everyone up in arms; the old people don't want to work anymore, the young people want to have jobs upon graduating college, so now we have strikes every few days. At Commerce in Nantes it got a bit violent; some people's cars were burned. At the university, there were some blockades. Courses were cancelled, but of course not my 8am! Also, I am still trying to figure out how this relates, but the petrol ports are blocked as well; there are three major ports in France (Marseille, Le Havre, and Saint Nazaire, which is close to Nantes). This means that people are driving around hopelessly looking for a gas station that isnt closed! Luckily I take public transport, which is usually pretty reliable when there isnt striking going on!

2. My visit to Paris. I went to Paris to see my father during the weekend of the 10th. We did a lot of touristy stuff: mainly eating at restauraunts. Now I know which ones are legitimately good and which ones are tourist traps! I will put up pictures of that visit in my next entry!

3. My visit to Dublin. I am actually going to Dublin tomorrow morning at 7am with three friends I met here in Nantes. Zsuzsanna (Zsuzsi) from Hungary, Stefan from Germany, and Lauren from Illinois (such an exotic combination). We are taking Ryanair from Nantes to Dublin and staying in a hostel for 5 nights. then we are going to Paris for 2 nights and then returning to Nantes. I'm pretty thrilled about this trip! I will definitely have pictures of this one up as soon as I get back!

4. Thoughts in general. I am really loving study abroad so far. True, it is not 100% easy to get used to some of the things here (especially that construction site outside my window), but I fully recommend this experience to anyone! It's also a good way to learn that the U.S. is not the only country in the world! :P I have met some cool foreign exchange students in the past few weeks, and it's far more interesting to learn new things from them than to remain in the "American bubble" that I have seen some people here unfortunately stuck in. (That is to say, those Americans who only hang out with other Americans).

And with that, off to bed I go to rest up for tomorrow's Ireland trip!