La vie dans la campagne

This is going to be a short post without photos because we are now in Angouleme at Muriele's house (my 2nd host mom) and I am having a hard time using her computer.  I can't upload photos and the French don't use qwerty keyboards, so it is taking me forever to type this! :)

We finished up our last few days in Paris just strolling around different neighborhoods...le Marais, St-Michel, Montmartre and Chinatown.  It was nice having a few slower days after doing all of the main tourist sites the first 4 days!  We were able to see Sylvestre again and spent most of the day Thursday with him.  We hung out at his flat for a while and got to meet one of his roommates, so that was a lot of fun...and it was great for LeederD to see real life in Paris instead of the hustle and bustle of being a tourist.  Thursday night we went to a true Parisian cabaret show, so that was quite entertaining too!

Now we are just enjoying life in the countryside for a few days.  We arrived in Angouleme yesterday afternoon, walked around town for a while and had a cafe with Murièle and my host sister Audrey.  LeederD got to see my old stomping ground...the houses I lived in, the cafés and bars I frequented and where I went to school.  Murièle lives about 25 minutes outside of town now in a little village called Nonac, so we are here just loving the peace and quiet after a week in Paris.  My host sisters are all here with their boyfriends and babies and it is so nice to see everyone.  LeederD is managing just fine with the language barrier, but I forgot how exhausting translating can get by the end of the day.  C'est dur!  We had a great dinner last night (la raclette) and tonight we get to eat foie gras and some other specialties of the region.  So yummy!!  We headed over to Cognac this afternoon and went on a tour at the Martell distillery, then drove through the countryside and tried to take in all of the scenery.  Tomorrow we are heading to Gille and Mireille's house (my 3rd host family) and spending the whole day with them.  We will post again after we arrive in Amsterdam, probably on Tuesday or Wednesday.  So for now, we're going downstairs to drink our aperitif before dinner...shoot, such a hard life this week. :)  Gros bisous à tous!