You've got red on you

It has been nicer weather here in the last week though it is supposed to be quite nasty again soon. This is from the lookout point 5 mins from my dorm overlooking Rouen



It is very fallish out my window all the trees are changing and loosing their leaves. This is my first real "Fall" in some time.

Every week in Ango (my dorm) a continent prepares food traditional to their personal country. Last week was Europe and this week was North America (minus Mexico because they decided to cook with Latin America). Since Thanksgiving is a week away Laine and I decided to cook traditional Thanksgiving food. May I make a note that all we have is a single hot plate and nothing more, on top of that my hot plate doesn't really get hot. Another hitch was that I didn't have a recipe because all I found were in American measurements and needed fancy things to complete it. But I decided to soldier on and basically make it up as I went along and just try to channel the power of Julia Child. Here is the Result:

I bought a loaf of hardy French brioche type bread and cut it up into cubes and toasted them




Then in a very French manner I made a mirepoix which is equal parts onion celery and carrots in French cuisine, and cooked it in butter

Then I added seasonings like salt and pepper of course and several cubes of bouillon cubes since the French don't have chicken stock available to buy in the stores. After that I added the toasted cubes of bread and mixed it all together and added a tiny splash of water



It weirdly tasted really good since I was making it up as I went along. It did leave quite a bit of mess however, here is half of the mess:

There was a wide range of American and Canadian foods. Jeanna made chicken nuggets, I made stuffing and Laine made mashed potatoes. There was also chili, ribds, PB&Js, Poutine (fries with cheese and gravy on them, Pizza, French toast and pancakes, etc...


I didn't eat any of the food because there wasn't very much and it is all things that I eat rather normally back at home so I thought I'd leave it to the non NAs to eat it all.


It was one heck of a party that was a lot of socializing and catching up with people who have been traveling and/or studying for exams etc. The weirdest part of the night was my friends Anna and Magda met this guy in Amsterdam (he's British) just showed up in Rouen to see them and ended up coming to the party. He stayed the night in Anna's room and Anna stayed with Tytti it was really odd. But now he's gone because everyone left for Budapest this morning.

Some of the Canadian boys decided to make it what's called a Graffiti party where you wear a white t shirt that everyone can write messages on and it is like a memento from the party. I however did not have a white t shirt that could be written on so my friends decided to write on me instead. I gathered messages in the languages of: English, French, Spanish, Brazilian Portugese, Polish, Finnish, and Japanese. Here are a few photos of the damage. During this time I have also managed to learn basic Finnish phrases and every swearword, including some in Polish from Magda.

The heart with L+L is from Laine (Laine + Lauren) then the second is in Portuguese from Alexandre from Brazil

This one is on the top a Canadian guy, Brian, wrote I'm magnificent in French, then below it is my friend Corey who was beyond the ability of writing anything of sense.

This says I love you in Finnish and it's from Anna

One of them just said Carlos Rabasso who is one of my professors here. I had a presentation in his class this week and after while I was packing up my stuff I was explaining to him how I still dance and that I'm Basque (He's from Barcelona) and he was apparently really impressed by me and told his other class (which all of my friends are in) about me. It was really funny.



This morning when I woke up I took a shower and tried to scrub off the writing, it is almost gone though I still have a reddish tint to my skin. Oh well it was funny and totally worth it.

I've been working on 2 more dance videos I still have some work to do but look for them to be up soon. Tomorrow I think I'm headed to Paris and next weekend I signed up for a school trip to Chateau Loire where we will see 3 castles in 2 days. It was only 100 euro for transport, entrance to the castles, 1 night in a hostel, food and a soirée.

Well I'm off to clean my apartment and do some work on my presentation for next week.


*UPDATE* I still have red on my arms and back, thanks Laine and Dan, but it is almost gone!

Obsessions of the moment:

• my version of a grilled cheese- french bread, mozzarella, chevre, garlic cheese spread thing, lettuce, tomato, and herb de provence
• stagevu.com because I can watch movies and tv shows in really good quality since hulu doesn't work here and it's FREE
• kalimotxos
• boys! I have so many cool guy friends here I love hanging out with them and all their ridiculousness. There are also lots of cute foreign boys here as well
  
• The Finnish language
  
• yoga, pilates, and ballet in my TINY apartment (it is quite comical but I try to work out every day)
• thekitchn.com it has amazing cooking, kitchen, food realted articles that are so useful and interesting I LOVE it
  
• Top Gear season 13 - I just finished it yesterday and it is an AMAZING season everyone should go watch it it is worth 7 hours of your life trust me (unless you don't like laughing or cars then don't bother)

There is SO much more but I'll stop myself there. I'm off to Paris in the morning with a bunch of friends I'm not sure what we'll do but it will be fun no matter what. Next week is a school soiree and then the weekend is the Chateau Loire trip.

classes are almost over I only have a few left which is a weird feeling this morning one of my friends informed me he is leaving exactly 1 month from today. It was probably the most depressing sentence I have ever heard. I don't want to leave Ango and all my crazy friends.