Hello Everyone,

This update is long overdue - but alas our internet in the residence has been down since Thursday morning. Of course you may be asking yourself why it was that I couldn't have found an internet café in which to blog, well the answer is that since Wednesday we've had a pretty full schedule. Wednesday night we ate out at Les Agapes, Friday evening was "Casino Night" and then we headed off to the beach at La Ciotat on Saturday.


Here are Caity, Rachael, Katharina, Dominique, Caroline, Hannah and Sarah enjoying our group dinner on Wednesday - the Nougad Glacé seemed to be the biggest hit (at least at my table).


Tiffany and Tara are trying their luck at the poker table. They did well, but at the end of the night it seemed as if Allie was really the one that had a bright future as a profession gambler. I'm glad to report that nothing got out of hand thanks to the watchful eye of our bouncer Andrew.


This is part of the view from the beach at La Ciotat - in fact the island that you see is the one to which a group of the students and staffed kayaked. The rest of us spent a relaxing day on the sand, wading into the Mediterranean when the spirit moved. As many of the students discovered, La Ciotat has a great deal on desserts - 3E for roughly 200 Churros.

This week wasn't just fine dining, gambling and tanning. For cultural activities on Wednesday and Thursday everyone chose between going to the Fondation Vasarely - a modern art museum; Musée Granet - one of the many museums in Aix that displays the work of regional artists; hand-making lavender pouches; heading to FNAC (France's Barnes&Noble/Best Buy) to get a chance to sample French music and literature; or to learn a little bit of Arabic and Franco-Maghrébine culture in France. The non-cultural activity days were spent playing tennis, doing Henna with Vidya and prepping the decorations for the Casino (thanks to Dominique, Joe, Chanlder and Racheal).

As for our cooking groups, Thursday night was Steak with Bordelaise sauce, sautéed zucchinis and garlic mashed potatoes (I can vouch for the fact that Katie Baxa has a bright future in the mashed-potato-making field). Friday night was Napoléon salads and pasta with sun-dried tomatoes and herbs de provence - judging by the fact that my group had an entire pot of pasta left, I might have bought a little too much. Better too much than too little, though!

Well, that takes you up today - Sunday. The odd thing about today, though, is that it's a "Monday" for us. Everyone is taking classes this morning and we're treating it as a normal weekday. Tonight we'll have pizza in our cooking groups and then head out as a group to the cinéma. The reason this "Sunday" is a "Monday" is because we'll be heading off to celebrate the 14th of July in Cassis tomorrow - a long day at the beach followed by fireworks at night. It's a rough life.

Barring any further technical complications, you'll have a new post in a few days!

Take care,
Zach

Julie, Maeve & Angela were thrilled to find that the candy store they fell in love with in Paris is actually a chain with a franchise in Aix!