Almost at the mid-mark...

Something that I learnt in my first two years of University, a mid-first year, mid-essay and mid-'what the hell am I doing here?' type epiphany if you like, was that if you want something done, then you have to do it for yourself. In life no one is going to spoon feed you information or knowledge until the point where you think, ah! that's it... In fact, I've come to realise that if you want something then you have to just get off your behind and do it. You're in it for yourself I'm afraid! The reason behind my brutal revelation, my friends, is because I am well and truly stuck in limbo, and as much as I would like for a handsome bearded man with a face like Ben Dalhaus to come and pull me out and buy me a mojito, I just have this feeling it's not going to happen any time soon.

I've been here in Aix for exactly 11 weeks and 4 days, that's almost 3 months of being stranded in a foreign country... and I've absolutely loved every minute of it! NB: minus the hour or so of dread I experience every week before my French language class, in which the teacher almost resembles a french and much sassier version of Smaug (words hurt more than fire, I can tell you that) and the last 2 hours of my German class in which I contemplate all possible ways to hurt myself so that I can leave... but apart from that, it's been great. But 11 weeks and 4 days in and I'm now 38 days from going home for Christmas, and maybe, just maybe, the countdown app I installed on my phone was a bad idea because now I feel that I've maybe got to the point where I've lost interest and maybe a teeny bit of enthusiasm, and I'd quite like to go home and have a nice Costa. NB#2: I hate all of you evil people who are positing pictures of Christmas coffee cups on social media. Did anyone ever tell you that you probably descended from the Devil? No? Ok, well you probably descended from the Devil.

Things I have decided that I am too English to live without:

1. Milk. So in France, drinking fresh milk is just not a thing and apparently UHT is totally a thing. I personally like my milk fresh from the cow and not nuked.

2. Superdrug. No I don't want to pay 20 euros for a nail polish that I would pay £2.99 for in England. I'd even settle for Boots, despite it being on average 50p more expensive than Superdrug, and has a lot less BOGOF deals. Can you see how desperate I am now?!?

3. Bacon. You can buy bacon here, but they're evil little round pieces of 'bacon' which are so thin that I think it might be Facon. Nobody should be subjected to eating bad bacon.

4. A good old pub. I miss cider. It doesn't exist here, and I can't help but feel a little bit sad and disgusted when someone doesn't know what Rekorderlig is.

5. Maybe I will be judged for this, but coffee. Perhaps we've become too Americanised and drinking an XL Americano would be sacrilege to an Italian, but I like to enjoy a coffee which I can't accidently swallow the whole of in one mouthful. Caffé Nero, our reunion is going to be beautiful.

    vs.   

I am the worst type of putter-off-er, and so despite having an oral exam and a translation exam to revise for, all I seem to be doing is listening to She & Him's Christmas album, moaning at my friends for not wanting to watch Elf with me, and eating too much chocolate (and boiling and re-boiling water in my new 10 euro kettle) Note: If you're coming to France for a Year Abroad, then be prepared to have to boil your water in the microwave if you want tea, to then put the tea bag IN the boiling water and then drink the most disgusting cup of tea you have ever made. Absolute sacrilege to all tea drinkers. Back to procrastination- my Countdown App likes to inform me every day of the fact that it's one less day until I go home (genius, these things) and then I get a bit over excited and decide not to do any work and search instead on ASOS for something to wear for New Years Eve. This happens every-single-day. Every day! It's a vicious circle. Therefore this limbo I mentioned seems to be a state  of being in France, but not really being in France. I seem to have gone from being super excited to be able to talk to people, to realising that it's actually pretty hard and not every one wants to talk to you, and then maybe sort of giving up a little bit (?) Only a little bit...

I think it's a point that every student studying abroad reaches, and I think it might be this 'brick wall' that people talk of.  The enthusiasm of being abroad and being somewhere new starts to falter, and the panic of actually being here for a reason (that being to learn French, not eat as many different types of pastry as humanely possible) kicks in and you realise that in fact a year isn't a long time to master a language, and you're already almost a whole semester through and then you start to convince yourself that you can't even speak French at all. I've done this many a time whilst writing an essay for English, but it's a whole new kettle of fish when you're in a country trying to master fluency in a language. But hey, who doesn't like a challenge. It's challenging at times and a bit terrifying too, but I've managed so far to stay alive, only injure myself a few times and to complete almost a whole semester of lessons taught only in French, and I guess that's a pretty big achievement.

It's the unexpected things which seem to test your ability in a language the most, and after the exciting arrival of my mum and sister a few weeks ago just before we headed off to Barcelona and Rome, typically their baggage went missing and we had to embark on a French mission to try and locate it. In French. Actual French. We managed, and it turns out their baggage was left in London (thank you, Easyjet) but really it was kind of a godsend because realising you can converse with someone in an unexpected situation like that really does give you a bit of a confidence boost. Above all else of course, it was lovely to see both my sister and mum, and with a visit from the parents comes being fed by the parents (and probably having put on around 10lbs), but it was a damn good few days of food.




Just an update on my terribly stressful- who am I kidding, I have one oral exam and I suddenly decide all hell has broken loose- my bloody great, but a wee bit stressful life. Posts on Barcelona and Rome and the most increds mid-term break of my life to follow, but I currently have about 1,000 photos to sift through as to not bore you all with a million and one photos of buildings and pretty doors.

A x