Photo Bombing

On Sundays basically everything is closed in France, so we decided to create a new tradition for our Sunday mornings. Avignon is a big tourist city because of the Palais des Papes and on the weekends all of the tourists come out. Along with tourists come cameras, which means numerous opportunities for photo bombing. Now let me give y'all some background information. My roommate, Leslie, likes to take very creative pictures and she will go to any length to get the perfect angle. She recently started a few new albums on Facebook that capture the essence of her picture-stalking abilities. My personal favorite is entitled "Jean on Jean." People in France LOVE to wear jean on jean so it has been her mission to get as many pictures as possible of French people in this attire. Laura and I have become pros at calling it out and Leslie will literally run after these people to get the picture. Today alone she got 10 pictures of 10 different people in double-denim. We even got pictures of the same lady on different days, she can't fool us. All of the tourists in Avignon inspired her newest album, "Photo Bombing." The point of this album is to creep in as many pictures as possible. It's a bit more tricky than simply getting pictures of other people because it requires at least 2 of us: one to creep in the background of someone else's pictures and one of us to take the picture (which must include three things - the photo bomber, the tourist in the picture and the tourist taking the picture). We made 2 successful attempts today and have decided to dub Sundays as our weekly photo bombing days.

Blog Discovery

I've been searching around Pintrest lately and I came across a recipe from this woman's blog. So naturally I started looking through her recipes and I found myself drooling the entire time. She has some great looking recipes and I was inspired to share it with y'all.

Something Swanky

Check it out, you know you want to!

Le Thor & Isle-sur-la-Sorgue

Today we ventured to Le Thor and Isle-sur-la-Sorgue to see Leslie's schools. She really lucked out because these two villages are BEAUTIFUL! I am not-so-secretly jealous. The Sorgues river runs through both of the towns and it seems to be a cleaner part of the river in these 2 towns as compared to my town (Sorgues). We started off at Le Thor (not to be confused with Chris Hemsworth in "Thor") and wandered around the town for a bit. Laura and I waited out in the parking lot for Leslie while she met with the director of her school. We creeped on some French middle school boys who were obviously showing off on their mo-peds for us. How endearing.

We then took the bus to the next village along the Sorgues called Isle-sur-la-Sorgue. OH MY WORD it is just so lovely. It reminds me of a smaller version of Aix, with a river rather than fountains. The river runs through the main part of town and the street along the river is lined with cafés. Some of them have built bridges that cross the river with extra seating. There are several water wheels along the river too. I think they are more for looks because they were turning at an extremely slow pace, almost as slow as the pace of life here. We wandered the streets and came across several boutiques filled with the typical provencal goodies - hand made soap, brightly colored fabric and lavender - and we stopped outside of candy stores drooling as we looked through the windows. Since the weather was perfect, we decided to grab lunch at a boulangerie and eat along the river. I was trying to limit my intake of bread and cheese today but considering I ordered a friand fromage I already failed. I wasn't actually planning on achieving this goal considering cheese is basically my favorite thing ever and it's super cheap here. We sat by the river for awhile enjoying our lunch and the scenery, and we explored more of the town before coming back to Avignon. It was a fun little adventure and it has inspired me to discover more of the little villages in the south of France.

roomie bonding.

i'm so glad that i found 2 other assistants to live with. basically they rock. for the past week we've pretty much been with each other 24/7 and we havent killed each other, but i doubt that will ever happen. since we don't start teaching until october 8, we all wanted to take this week to figure out the bus route to each of our schools and visit them. they so graciously came with me to Sorgues where my 3 schools are located. the bus route was easy enough and finding my 3 schools turned out to be a lot easier than i had expected.

we ended our lovely little trip with a quick stop at the market back in Avignon to do our weekly grocery shopping. our basket consisted mainly of fruit, salad fixings, cheese and bread, all of the necessities. our next adventure of the day was opening our bank accounts. i was the guinea pig and had my appointment first which was kinda nerve racking because i haven't even opened an account in america, let alone in france! everything turned out okay and i understood most of the forms that i signed. the lady was super nice and made sure to explain everything to me. before dinner we decided to have what id like to call, a "trust test." i think the pictures will explain:

Laura's wasn't as drastic as mine but i think she was a bit more nervous that i was. maybe i was too trusting of leslie but i figured it's just hair and it will grow back shortly. plus i wanted a new do. being a perfectionist, it took leslie like 2 hours to fix me up and we were starved by that point. we whipped together some pan-seared salmon with sautéed garlic, mushrooms, carrots and spinach and served it over a bed of pasta. naturally it was accompanied with our new selection of cheeses, brie, chèvre and edam. it was glorious and now our entire apartment smells like garlic, love it. 

Video Tour

I took some videos of the street that we live on and our lovely new apartment! Enjoy :)

the prettiest place on earth

i am continually amazed at how beautiful a city Avignon is. we've been staying in a cheap (very cheap) hostel just outside of the city walls until we find a permanent apartment. in order to get inside the city walls we have to walk across a bridge that overlooks the rhone and we have a wonderful view of the palais de papes. even though it doesn't quite compare to Aix, this is a pretty great city and i am so privileged to have the opportunity to live here. so far, i have successfully eaten at least one serving of cheese a day which is now a staple to my diet, as well as sat at a cafe every afternoon for a pick-me-up. yesterday, we discovered the cutest cafe, mainly because the only was super nice and they had mini-sandwiches. i'm hoping she will take me under her wing and teach me how to bake. the other assistants are brillant (as the English ones say) and i am so excited to finally move into an apartment with my 2 roomies (who are equally as brillant)! we had 2 viewings yesterday, one far surpassed the other, and we have 2 more today. we loved the first place we saw yesterday and we are most likely going to live there. it is off a beautiful cobblestone street (the owner promises it is the most beautiful street in Avignon) and has a sweet water wheel across from it. if only there was a goat farm next to it, then it'd be perfect. more pictures to come!

Slightly overweight

It's here! I cannot believe I am moving to France for 9 months, eek!! I'm ready to embark on this new adventure, but first I have to get there with all of my luggage. I decided it would be a great idea to leave all of my packing for the night before, terrible decision and so uncharacteristic of me. Thankfully, I had my own personal packing elf (shout out to Caroline, BIFF) who managed to fit all of my junk into 1 giant suitcase and a travel backpack. After hours of cramming and shoving clothes, shoes and books, we zipped the last of the zippers. Unfortunately, fitting everything wasn't the biggest problem, fitting everything AND being under 50 pounds was the more daunting task at hand. I was already prepared to pay the extra fee for my overweight bag. Come to find out, there is a maximum weight of 70 pounds. My smart mother decided to bring a second suitcase just in case I was over the max limit. I am so glad I decided to keep her around because not only was it overweight, but it was 30 pounds overweight, weighing in at a grand total of 80 pounds. Who knew clothes could weigh so much. So I had to decide if I wanted to pay a $200 fee for the 80 pounds or check at second bag for only $60. The cheaper fee seemed a little more appealing to me than a bag busting at the seems that cost me $200. So now I am sitting in Charlotte with my travel backpack and giant purse relieved to have the 2 bags checked and stowed...for now. Once I get into Paris, I'll have to retrieve my 2 suitcases and lug them onto the TGV train then onto 2 separate buses before I reach my final destination. It's safe to say that I am slightly nervous, but I'm still praying and I know that God will get me there safely.