Je suis en France!!

Ahhh!, I am finally here, in Angers, France living with two wonderfully nice host parents and attending this school:

L'Universite Catholique de L'Ouest

That is the view of the main building of my school from where I get off the bus :) 

So I live in Les Ponts de Ce which is a suburb on the outskirts of Angers. It is about a 10 minute walk and then a 20 minute bus ride to get to school. I have purchased a bus pass for all the months I will stay here and feel ready and prepared to start my courses. The only thing is I don't get to choose them or even start them until Monday. So until then I am participating in my most challenging course so far, living with complete french speakers!! I have been speaking french and only french to my host family Odette and Francis. They also have three children, all in their 30's and 40's that have kids. Their daughter lives down the street from us so I get to see her children very often. She has three children, Marie, Jean, et Jules. Marie is 13 years old and I have so far spent a lot of time with her, and it is making me learn french quickly! She talks very fast, like all teenagers, so I have to keep up with her en francais!!! My host family makes me dinner almost every night, and it is always delicious! Soup and bread to start, then some sort of entree with bread, then cheese and bread, and to finish, dessert and bread! It's all i could ever ask for! :) 

But when I'm not at my host family's house I get to spend my time in this beautiful city that I promise I will take better pictures of, but to start I have these....

This is the Chateau d'Angers, it's extremely old and has a beautiful garden where the moat used to be!

Here it is!, You have to look at it sideways though... I couldn't get it right side up...

And this is the Maine river, and the houses you can see on the other side, and all the other roof tops resemble the houses of basically the entire city.

So after probably about another week here I will be able to have some more time to take beautiful pictures of the windy streets, gardens, doorways, little cars, food, and whatever else I come across that seems interesting!

But for now I am extremely exhausted from literally speaking french from the minute I got here 4 days ago until now, so although it is only 3:41 in the states right now, I have to go to sleep!!

You'll hear from me soon...

-Ashley :)