ahhh, I officially love this cat! She is super friendly, lets me pick her up and carry her around, and is just an all-around awesome cat. Right now as I am typing this she is on the desk, rubbing up against my laptop, walking around, purring, letting me pet her. Plus she's named after an Egyptian goddess (Isis). WHAT A GREAT CAT :D

ANNNND... my Métro station that I'll be using to get to IES every day (Trocadéro)? Totally in front of the Eiffel Tower. So I saw it today, and I will see it every day! :DDD You know... it's smaller than Tokyo Tower. Actually, smaller than I expected in general! But yes, the Eiffel Tower is within walking distance of where I live. :D

Métro!! is so cool. And different, but the same, but different. It's so... funky... It closes at 1 a.m. ish to reopen at 5:30 a.m., just like Japan! Except you're not even supposed to take the Métro home that late anyway, it's dangerous and all. blah blah... though I do miss the safety of Japan. Girls were warned about two things today: 1) don't talk to strange men, 2) don't stumble around drunk in the streets. Hahaha! But yeah, I love trains, and so I love the Métro. From here to IES it's a straight shot, no transfers, taking about 15-20 minutes, so not very long at all, which is almost disappointing. What's weird is that one ticket gets you anywhere... no different tickets depending on where you're going. So strange to me...

The people here (at least in the L-Z orientation half) are like 2/3 girls... but that's kind of as I expected. I talked to some of them during the break, they seem cool... but just like I thought, these are different types of people than Tokyo people. hmmm...

Another different thing is that inside the IES center, it is 100% French. Even amongst ourselves. We were all exhorted on how important that is to learning French, which is "why we're here, isn't it?" That's pretty hardcore, makes Tokyo seem lazy in comparison... but then again, there's a minimum of semesters of French required to come here, whereas in Japan everyone's levels fluctuated wildly, and some had none at all. It just wouldn't have been possible there, I guess.
I can't WAIT until brush-up classes (or "propédeutique" hee) start next week. Ooh, we also got a Louvre pass!! It's good for a whole year and pretty much I can go any day I want for free, no waiting in line. There's other advantages too. THIS ROCKS!! :D

Oh... my god. My host mom told me this morning we were going to have dinner together. IT IS NOW 7:45 AND WHERE IS THE FOOOOOOD?? I didn't really eat lunch (just a few croissants during our break) so I AM STARVINGGGGGGG, ahhhhhhh... is this a French thing, eating so late? WHAT IS GOING ONNNNNNNNN