You Know You Are in France When...

You can’t find cupcakes. Anywhere. This can be slightly frustrating when all you want is a really good chocolate and vanilla jumbo cupcake, but I guess a hot Nutella Panini makes up for it... or a Nutella crêpe... or anything else that includes Nutella.

I wonder how many kilograms of Nutella the French consume per year? It’s probably some ridiculously astronomical amount.

But anyway, these past two weeks have been a bit crazy what with orientation, placement tests, and starting classes. I’ll try to recount the most important details.

The first day of orientation took place on the day after we arrived in Rennes—no jetlag excuses to miss school—where we talked about the city in general and what we were to expect. We got the bus and subway map for Rennes along with our KorriGo card that we swipe to go on the bus or metro—which is just another great thing about Rennes. They have a metro!!! I love taking it because it is clean, fast, and super safe. The buses are also very clean but they can get a bit interesting on the narrow cobblestone streets.

After our first weekend with our host families (I went to the beach at St. Malo for a day! See above picture) we had placement tests for math and French classes. Not too interesting. After eating lunch at the public school (we ate at the private school the previous Friday) we had a short meeting and then were let out from school.

During that short meeting we discussed how there was a massive transportation strike planned for the next day all over France. Since most everyone takes the metro or bus to school, it was decided that school should be cancelled for everyone’s convenience! No school because of a strike? Only in France! Most of us met up the next day in Centre Ville to go shopping, see the protest, and hang out with friends. It was difficult to find a bus, but it was well worth the time spent walking to get to know the city better.

The next day we had a scavenger hunt all throughout downtown Rennes which meant asking many store owners for directions (in French, of course!) to monuments and important buildings. It was incredibly fun and tiring at the same time. The above picture is of a beautiful building in downtown Rennes that is hundreds of years old!!

That Thursday and Friday we began classes, but the class schedules had to undergo some changes first.

The next post is for my recount of the first full week of classes… oh the woes of block scheduling.