Day 2 in Pau.
Since I arrived I've been bombarded with new information, directions, schedules, phrases, people...it's too much and too many little things to write down, yet I have the feeling I'm going to unintentionally end up alone downtown with no idea how to get home at 2:00 a.m. some night, having forgotten the buses stop running at 9:00 and no cell phone to contact anyone.
So far, this trip has completely crumpled my organized personality and tossed it in the trash. I come home from school at 5:00 with a zillion different papers, maps and brochures thrown in my backpack and nothing written in my planner. No to-do lists (those of you that know me well will think this is very odd). I probably should have gotten lunch stuff at the grocery store yesterday, but I didn't think about it at the time, and now the effort to go back and get it just seems out of the question.
There are so many things to do in town, so many buses to take, so many ways to get lost.
On a happier note, my host sister/cousin Magali came home today. Her family lives in Bordeaux but she goes to school here and thus lives with my host family during the school year. I was invited to have dinner with the family again, but they all speak so fast to each other that I had trouble keeping up with the conversation and spent most of the meal just listening quietly...I hope that didn't come across as rude. I realize now that they probably speak slower and more simply to me.
I'm going out to a bar with Magali and Charles tonight. I'm trying to accept every invitation my host family makes for meals and outings. The sooner I get totally fluent in French, the better. I'm already sick of this adjustment phase, when everything is overwhelming and confusing. And I haven't even been in Pau for a week yet; how can I possibly cram this much new information into my brain every day?
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