Well, I survived the full day of travel and have arrived in Nantes! The plane ride to Paris was shorter than I was anticipating, and I was able to watch the movie Easy A and two episodes of How I Met Your Mother on my own personal TV screen on the headrest of the seat in front of me. I chatted a bit with the couple next to me--they're on vacation to Paris and saving money on housing by couch surfing at a stranger's house. Sounds like a good idea in theory, but I think I'd be too nervous to do it myself. After getting off the plane, I met a couple IES students in line to go through customs. It was nice to have someone to maneuver the large airport with. After walking far too long with our cumbersome luggage and taking to tram to a different part of the airport, we finally found the TGV station, where we needed to catch our train to Nantes. My new friend left on the earlier train, but I waited for the rest of the IWU students to arrive. Soon I found Kathryn, Laura, Devin, Sam, Katie, and Courtney, along with some other IES students they had found. I can't really remember most of the train ride, because I slept most of the time, but from what I can tell the French countryside is quite beautiful. When we arrived in the train station in Nantes, there weren't any IES staff members (like they said there would be in the welcome packet), so we figured out all by ourselves how to catch a taxi to the IES center. At the center, we mingled a bit with the other participants, but soon host parents started showing up to pick us up. It was so nerve-wracking waiting for my name to be called to be whisked off to my new home. By the time it was my turn, there were only four of us left at the center. I recognized my host mother immediately from the picture she sent me of the family. She hugged me and kissed me on the cheek and we were off to the Le Roux home! I'm running out of time for this post, so I'll explain the family and house in a later post, but just know they are wonderful!
I'm off to Tours until Sunday for off-site orientation :)
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