Back to school + Poitiers

2 weeks left here in France! I will be very happy to see my family and friends back home, but it's still hard to believe that I'm so close to the end of this adventure. I've been dreaming, thinking, planning, anticipating, and living this for a whole year now, and in two weeks I'll be remembering.

Last weekend was our last weekend of vacation and last week was the first week of school in 2013. Last weekend I made up a calzone recipe for my hostfamily: eggplant-cheese scones with tomato sauce. Yum!



On Monday it was back to school with a test on Voltaire's Candide. On Tuesday I had tea with my hostgrandparents, who came by in the afternoon with the usual provisions from their stock of food that they grew in their garden last summer. On Thursday I got out of school at 3:30 because my English teacher wasn't there, so I came home and made crepes.



On Friday Alice and I both finished early so we went downtown to go shopping because they have this thing called "soldes" where starting last Wednesday all the stores have complete liquidation, with everything that's been there for over a month up to 70% off, for 5 weeks. Awesome!

So yesterday I took the train to Poitiers with Michela and Elizabete.



Clara, our German friend, met us at the train station, and we met up with Stormie, another American, at the bus stop.



We bought lunch at the market (Stormie and I were super excited to find a stand that was selling hummus)and then bought juices at a cafe so that they would let us eat our lunch there.



After lunch, we met up with the AFS volunteers and most of the people from our region. We split up into teams,



and went on a sort of scavenger hunt for historical information that took us all around Poitiers.





Then we met back up and went to eat the galette des rois, which is a French tradition for the Epiphany. It's a cake, either a brioche or puff pastry with marzipan, and they hide a little toy or statuette inside. This was my 6th galette des rois, and I found the toy for the first time!



So, following tradition, I was crowned queen of the Epiphany!!! (it's a good thing that I'm leaving soon, because whoever is king or queen has to buy the next galette!)



After the galette we still had a while before we had to be at the train station. Lots of people went shopping, but Michela, Marta, Clara and I didn't really feel like it, and since it was our last day all together we decided to hang out at a cafe instead.



It was really a lovely day, and I'll never forget all of the amazing friends that I've made here...