Sunday, 13 December 2009

a few things worth mentioning

hello
of late there hasn't been very much to say, studying and revising have actually taken up a fair amount of my waking hours. there have been a few of those days where i go crazy from being in my room for hours upon end, other days where i reach 4pm and realise that i haven't used my voice yet, some days i revise with Emma or Sabine and we keep each other from going insane, those are good days.
but nevertheless there are one or to other things maybe worth telling from the last couple of weeks:
  • i spent a lovely evening at the home of some Romanian friends from church, their mum made all this traditional romanian food for us to taste. yum :)
  • took part in Vélorution Montpellier. like critical-mass, a hilariously irritating environmental protest by cyclists which happens in many cities. the best part was when everyone stopped in the middle of one of the busiest roads to dance and clap along to a band that were playing outside a cafe. oh, did the car drivers get upset!
  • last weekend we had a mini-christmas at Hrönn's place with raclette and glüwein (with raisins and spices and blackcurrent liqueur) and tangerines which still had their leaves on.
  • we've been singing carols at church, we're going friendly-neighbourhood-carol-singing on wednesday :)
  • i got an lovely letter from Jo with a dvd FULL of music, WOOP! YEY! thanks Jo!
  • i finally joined the bike-workshop and mended my bike, yipee! (then i had a nasty collision with the back of a van the following day, i hurt my shoulder and my knee and disgruntled my handlebars but thankfully there was not too much damage done, i was wearing my helmet and not going to fast. sadly i don't have any bruises to show how much it HURTS!)
  • i made no-need-to-bake oaty chocolate peanut-butter cookies and chocolate truffles, if you don't have an oven you just have to make do.
  • i was sucked into a very heated game of couchsurfing assassins, it was boys vs girls so it got pretty heated. flat keys were stolen, bikes were sabotaged, hostages were taken, workplaces were besieged. it was dramatic stuff. i had declined to play this round but my friend Triin, who lives in the building opposite me, was often in need of a bodyguard (you're protected if there is another couchsurfing witness present), which made for some funny emergency messages along the lines of, "come quickly, the boys are after me again!"...
  • yesterday i got a lift to the foothills of the provincial alps, because clearly the most clever thing to do the week before all my exams is escapade across the country to the goodbye party of someone i'd only met once! It was fun. highlights include, banter in the orange van with Luic (FR, who lives in the van) and Alice and Jesus (UK/SP, two fellow couchsurfers), singing along to 'the no smoking orchestra', having fun with toilet roll confetti in the high winds at the motorway toilets, stopping for a very wet snowball fight, teaching french people to ceilidh at the party (with a very merry Luic playing the fiddle), playing clapping games so enthusiastically that we all ended up with blood blisters on our thighs. We hitch-hiked home again today in the cold, people are very lovely to hitchhikers here, or maybe they just love my bright orange jacket, who knows.
  • here olives come on trees as well as in jars :)
  • sometimes there are oranges on trees too!
some vocab to keep you on your toes (it's keeping me on mine!):
stitch (knitting) - maille
wool - laine
to score (a point/a basket) - marquer
guidons - handlebars
prise (de courant) - electric socket
fog - brouillard
demeurer - to stay/to remain/to live

that's all for now folks.
lots of love.
over.

Monday, 7 December 2009

an ode to couscous

dear gentle readers,
ok, so I hate to be a one to be forever sprouting excuses but what a week it's been!
4 days sans electricity and (just when the electricity came back) 4 days sans internet, now the fuse in the cuisine has blown, again.
^%&*@^*!!!!
huff.
rant over.
I'm off to borrow someone's kitchen.
more soon.

ps/ couscous is AWESOME. over.