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Ahhh Friday- FINALLY :D

I've been looking forward to Friday all week. Not only does it mean that I get to sleep in (not that I've been able to do that recently, what with waking up at 4/5/6 AM every day this week) but it also means I get to explore the city a bit.

I also need to shop if only for the shear fact that I'm running out of clothes to wear and I don't have a laundry card yet to do laundry. I also want to fit in with the locals.

While out tomorrow, I have plans to take pictures of the city. Something I haven't been able to do yet for many reasons (forgot the camera, bad weather, passing out after class etc.). Hopefully the weather wont be too bad tomorrow.

Today has been an excellent day. I made an 8 on my French test (an 8 in Switzerland/Europe is really good. 10 is the highest you can get. This is according to Susanna, one of my roommates who is from Spain). After class, I went window shopping downtown and found a lot of stores I would like to check out tomorrow. While shopping, I stopped in a store called Globus and accidentally discovered that it was a grocery store- and a good sized one at that! FINALLY!
I bought some much needed breakfast foods (miniature liquid yogurts just weren't cutting it for me) as well as a few dinner items.

I would like to state for the record that food in Switzerland is expensive. Clothes and lodging are pretty much the same as the United States- it all depends on where you shop at or what district you live in- but food... man they kill you on the food. Coming from Texas where "Everything is Bigger" and then living in a place where you're not getting as much bang for your buck feels like highway robbery. Not only are the quantities small here, but they cost more. I don't think I've been this thrifty with food since college. I kind of like it :)

When I finally returned to the apartment at 2, I ran into Susanna. I had completely forgotten that she had mentioned getting lunch today. I felt awful and apologized and asked if she would like to get lunch tomorrow instead. I'm pretty sure she agreed. There's a definite language barrier between us. It's not huge, but it's enough to cause confusion. She then said that she was going to watch a movie in the common room and I asked her if I could join. She smiled and said yes and 20 minutes later, I was in the common room watching Braveheart in Spanish with English subtitles :)

It was a neat bonding experience. I like her. We practice our French on each other and giggle a lot :P

At the end of the movie, Susanna had to leave to meet up with a friend and I retreated back to my room. Around 7/8PM my other two roommates Elnour and Ibrahim (both from Turkey) came home and had brought a friend with them (who's name I cannot remember). Ibrahim asked me if I would like to join them for dinner (pizza!) and I agreed. While dinner was cooking, I talked to their friend a lot about Texas. He had gone to Austin a while back and we both started to talk about the Bats and then about Texas in general.

When dinner was ready, the four of us sat around the kitchen table and talked about Texas, Turkey, vegetarianism/veganism, Michigan (where Ibrahim and his friend studied) and FEMA. I explained to them what my job was and then briefly talked about Hurricane Katrina and how the Disaster response system works on the government level. It was a really interesting and fun conversation filled with laughter. I feel closer to those roommates now :)

I needed tonight. I'd been feeling very disconnected from everyone at Planete Bleue. A part of that is because some days no one would leave their room, while other days I would take extremely long naps after class and just missed everyone. In the past I've realized that if I go long periods (maybe just 2/3 days) without human interaction I get kind of down. I guess I just need to talk to people to make me happy :P