LIVE from France

Since I have my iPod with me and this new app to write blogs, I figured I'd try writing bits and pieces this weekend as I go. Effectively it's a live blog! Woooo!

I'm on the bus to Bordeaux watching the rain pour down outside (thanks Bretagne). The forecast isn't looking too good, but I'm still excited to see a little bit more of France. From now til mid May it's nothing but travel travel travel...

Also, the bus has started dripping rain on me (thanks Bretagne).

It's funny how music can take you back...trip down memory lane. I'm listening to the Kooks and I can just remember exactly the first time I saw them in concert in Milwaukee. Everytime I listen to Red Hot Chili Peppers I can't help but imagine myself in Jake Edwards' basement junior year of high school. Queen's Don't Stop Me Now reminds me of a certain evening three years ago when I watched the stars from the roof of my high school with some amazing friends. I've decided math is not the international language, it's gotta be music. When you can have French teenagers singing Bob Marley at their friend's house at the same time as a man in Florence plays it in front of El Duomo, and they both play with the same feeling (whether or not they really get the lyrics...), it's pretty cool.

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So. Go France. We arrived in Nantes no problem. Ran into two CIEE kids too! Awesome. Then we notice our train car isn't listed on the board. Hmmmmm. Sali and Eduardo have tickets that make them take buses and other trains. Hmmmmm. They were told there were issues with this train. Hmmmmmm. We asked a worker if there was a problem with the train. "Nope." Cool. We look at the board. No stop at Bordeaux St. Jean. Hmmmmmm. We ask another worker. "I don't know, ask someone else.". Thanks SNCF. We finally got help from a nice little old French lady who told us that part of the line was down due to storms a little while ago. We're taking a train to La Rochelle and getting off. We don't have tickets for all of this but oh well. So, we're just going to have to follow the crowd and hope there's place on the bus at La Rochelle. From there we'll have to ride to some random town and take another train to get down to Bordeaux. Great.

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Currently on the last train of the day, about an hour from Bordeaux. So the SNCF didn't plan for the huge surplus of people needing to take the random train down to Bordeaux because of the rail problems and there aren't enough seats for everyone. Not even close. There are people standing in the aisles, in the doorways...people are pissed. Some guy was yelling about how it's scandaleuse. Way to go SNCF, way to go. Positive thoughts....

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It's Monday and we're heading back to Rennes in about an hour. We have to make the same train bus crazy stuff on the way back. Should be fun. This has been a good weekend, except for the rain. The first day we explored a bit on our own until it was time to meet up with Tristan (Taylor's friend). His roommate made us Iron Chef inspired cheesburgers and we hung out for a bit. Then Tristan took us out to his favorite bar in Bordeaux, Calle Ocho. Him and his roommate have been going there for years, so we got lots of free mojitos and shots up the wazoo. The bar played lots of Latin music and there was lots of dancing. It was a really great time!!!

The next day we went on a little tour of Bordeaux in the rain. It's a really nice town with lots of open green space. It also has the longest pedestrian street in France. The weather cleared up in the afternoon, we ate some cannelé, a traditional snack from Bodreaux and wandered over to La Locale. Tristan is a member of Ultramarines, the fan club for Bordeaux's soccer team and la locale is kind if like their headquarters. It's where they organize andmake banners and such. It kind of reminded me of a frat house basement. From there we went to the game. we were interviewed by some random press dude that ambushed us before we got into the stadium and asked questions about Yoann Gourcuff (about his looks more specifically). I responded with a "he's so sexy!" Maybe i got on the radio lol. There was a great ambience for the majority of the match, a lot of cheers led by the ultramarines and some good soccer. At the end, Nancy scored a second goal and Bordeaux fell apart. They lost 2-1. Sad.

The next day Tristan drove us out to St Emillion which is a town super famous for it's wine. We took a free tour of a wine cave and attempted to have a wine tasting...except I think the owner of this place had been having his own wine tasting all day. He was nuts. The man was speaking some bizarre franglais poured us a little bit of wine and then disappeared. We got ignored for awhile and then just decided to leave. The town itself was super cute and old and cobblestoney. After walking around a bit we left and Tristan showed us his grandpa's winery. It was outin the country and really pretty. Tristan's mom is American so when we went tibia parents house she chatted with us for awhile. It was a nice relaxing day. When we got back to the apartment we watched some CSI and went to bed.

Now it's back to Rennes for three days of school and then off to Brussels on Friday! It's the start of our two week spring break. Wow.
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