I'm here in Lyon, alive after one week (barring the crazy homeless and sketchy types on our side streets), homesick and mlehh.

Oh and hating my FLS homework. I could definitely do without a good deal of the assignments we have. (I'm working on the vocab which is taking a while since she, the prof from the UofO with us, wants a whole bunch of specifics and such and it's a bit too much what with all the other assignments she's given us and the big three projects we have for the Lyon II professors)

So far, my French has died more times than I'm comfortable with, I go out on my own (sometimes go out with others but not really), have been followed by homeless types, gotten into "Montreal isn't the dirtiest city on Earth and Ottawa isn't the cleanest and has more homeless people wandering about downtown than you can count" debates with one person (didn't really escalate but she's anti-Montreal and I ended it there and then--she refused to tell me what she found made Montreal dirty), have had deep conversations with women in their late-60s about childhood, walked more than I ever have in a single day, explored the métro and tramway system, procrastinated (though not really), been homesick, scared, somewhat overwhelmed with brief periods of emo and have been near more Olympique Lyonnais soccer merchandise than you can shake a stick at (might be getting a long-sleeved t-shirt)

Oh and have seen the word: (forgive me for using it but oh well) nègre twice. One as graffiti on some guy's car, and another time today at a mall as part of the name of a café.

And through all of this, I forgot it was Mother's Day yesterday. But that's okay, May is a month filled with terrible days I wish never happened the way they had. Second worst month after December with November and January in tow. Notably grad.

At risk of this degenerating into an angsty post, Lyon has been great so far. Some people are nice, and some aren't. I've found stores that I want to go to again, but have to pay in cash as my card doesn't work (or I haven't found stores that I would go to that accept Cirrus/Maestro cards). Professors at Lyon II are amazing so far, FLS prof from the UofO, not so much.

At the end of this week, I'm going to Paris for the weekend. Should be fun.

Back to 20-word vocabulary list with quoted sentences, specific contexts, definitions and conjugations if they're verbs that was due on Sunday for FLS