Mai
I know this one is a little late, sorry about that, I just wanted to include the Rotary weekend too which was from the 2nd to the 3rd of June.
The main improvements I have made this month are with my host family and friends at school. Now that my French has improved to the point where I can speak it confidently (even if I am making mistakes) and that has meant that, instead of just sitting quietly, I can actually input into conversations. Which, of course, has given me a much better opportunity to get to know people.
There’s not too much I can expand on regarding that topic so I’ll move onto the Rotary weekend. It started Saturday around midday, everyone getting together at the “Mer de Bretagne” for a picnic lunch. We split up into groups to do some adventurous activities. For me it was canoeing/kayaking. This was so, so much fun. With a relatively warm day and a lovely fresh water lake we had the most perfect conditions for a afternoon out. We played a few games, found a little beach, went swimming, tried to tip each other’s kayaks/canoes and worked out so much we could barely move our arms by the end of it. Saturday night was a “Fest Noz”, which is the traditional dance festival of my region Bretagne. It’s sort of hard to explain so you might just have to Google it. It’s much more tiring than it looks, honestly, mainly because the songs last for forever and there is no such thing as air conditioning in this country. Sunday morning it was time for our second activity, rock climbing. And it was actual rock climbing. I thought I was going to die a few times, it was so high up and I was balancing on tiny little rocks. After doing all of the different courses, I was absolutely stuffed. I’m still aching now, and it’s been more than a day. After lunch time we met the outbounds from 1650. They are so French, I don’t think I could have picked a bunch of more French teenagers myself. It’s definitely a good thing, as they’ll be the ones representing the country. Turns out the way things work in this district with inbounds and outbounds is a little different to back home. For every inbound from a certain country, they get to send one there. So because there was only 1 Australian sent this year, only one person gets to go there. Her name is Alizée Roussin and she’ll be hosted by Newcastle (they didn’t specify which club of Newcastle exactly). I’m so happy for her as Newcastle is a wonderful place and so different to Bretagne. Although she speaks very little to no English.. I wonder how that’s going to work out.
The goodbyes at the Rotary weekend were hard. Even though I’ve only known them for 6months, it feels like so much longer. When I got home around 4pm I went straight to bed and sort of sobbed for a good couple of hours, reading the lovely messages everyone had written for me. I know missing these people will be so much harder than missing everyone at home. Purely because this was a real goodbye. One of those “Have a nice life” goodbyes. I’m sure I’ll visit a few of them in the future, but it will never be the same as before. At least we all still have the memories and the photos to go with them. It’s been a pleasure to know them all.
Only 8months left.
À bientôt.
Susannah Fuller.