Hello from Les Andelys!

So, after a crazy time moving into my apartment in Rouen and the 4-hour round-trip commute to school every day, I decided to move out to Les Andelys where my school is. Daniel, a new teacher at the school from Martinique (he teaches "carrosserie", or auto body repair, with the vocational school students) was offered an apartment on campus, and as it had three bedrooms, he decided to share the apartment with me and David, the school's Spanish teaching assistant from Spain. I couldn't be having a better time! I am platonically in love with both of them, and they have both expressed that they would do absolutely anything for me. David left last night (we've got a two week vacation, so he's back in Sevilla until we start school up again), but right up until he left, he'd been making us dinner every single night. He said that he used to be a chef in Spain but didn't like cooking for work, but now he loves making meals for the people he cares about. And oh my gosh, it is so wonderful. He made his own pate the other day, and I'm still dreaming about the zucchini and roquefort potage that he made (his grandmother's recipe). It has been an interesting adjustment from basically eating vegetarian to now living with some serious meat-eaters. As we were driving David to the airport last night and passed lots of cows in fields, I would coo over them and David would say, "Non 'awww', 'mmmmmm! yum yum!'" They are goofy guys, and I love them.

I really don't know what I would've done without them- after I informed my landlord that I decided to move out to Les Andelys, he let me know the next day that he had found someone to live in my apartment and that I'd have to vacate ASAP! I had about 45 minutes' warning before I literally packed up all of my things, handed over my keys, and headed out. Luckily for me, David, Daniel, and our friend Rafa were all in Rouen with Daniel's car, so they all helped me move everything into my car, drop off Rafa at his house in Rouen, and headed back to Les Andelys (and only momentarily stalled out a couple of times! I can't believe all of the things I have now, thanks to all of the things that Sylvie's graciously given me). It is a lot of stuff, but I'm happy for all of it, especially all of the kitchen stuff, which both David and I are so enjoying! It's hard getting used to only having a hot plate and a microwave to work with, but we're getting used to it. I'm excited to make Ceilidh's avocado and orange salad and some stir fry with peanut sauce tonight!

It's just me and Daniel for today, though Daniel is heading out tonight, so I'll probably invite Chloe over. She lives "in town", which is about a half hour walk from our high school, and she works at the middle school out there. I'm definitely spoiled with the nicest company, and I just don't know how I got so lucky as to be surrounded by such lovely people.

School is also going very well. I only just started working in the classroom yesterday, and it's taking some getting used to. I think I just need to strike a good balance between friend and teacher, since I'm not officially a teacher and I'm really just there to get them comfortable speaking in English. Just need to hearken back to my days in Anouk's classroom and authentic communicative experiences going!

For the vacation, I'm excited to do lots of laundry, probably head into Rouen tomorrow to pick up my bank card from the bank out there, going to Disneyland on Tuesday, and headed to Paris for a couple days to see my friends out there at some point. Am I really living this? Is this really happening? I am just so happy!