The Club

For Nicola

2010-02-10T22:33:00.015+11:00

So you wanted a cartoon and you wanted me to draw you so I did both! I drew you IN some cartoons, sorry they are not very good, and if you click on them they get bigger like MAGIC because like normal I made them TOO BIG FOR BLOGGER, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY, go and buy a scratchie.

Number 1!

And here is the second one, which Caitlin thought of, and helped with, because I couldn't think of ANYTHING, and it is the most effort I have ever put into one cartoon and it was totally worth it just to be able to tell people that I stayed up until 1 in the morning trying to make a fish look like Will Smith (he still does not look much like Will Smith, shhhh)

Clearly the places I imagine your parties to be held at are bizarre and stripey or eye-burningly colourful, like somebody puked up a packet of crayons. Parties!

--Emma

History.

2009-09-24T21:05:00.006+10:00

So can anyone like Facebook this to Elena or something for me? I don't know how Facebook works but I thought I would make people do things for me, like slaves. Only click on it so it is bigger... slave.

I have never eaten a bagel. They look gross.

English?

2009-09-12T22:28:00.006+10:00

Today is the first day of the holidays. Today is, therefore, the first day of studying.

...Drawing counts as study.

Simba doesn't look like Simba when he has glasses and a beard!

I need more music...

2009-09-08T18:45:00.002+10:00

This is what two and a half thousand songs in two and a half days looks like.

--Caitlin

Numbers are Fun!

2009-08-27T17:23:00.001+10:00

Doesn't everyone love maths jokes?

Outrageous!

2009-08-15T18:18:00.003+10:00

And then there was that time my brother turned evil and tried to kill me. I call THAT one "The Time My Brother Turned Evil and Tried to Kill Me"

Unleash the Batbutt!

Look at him go

2009-08-10T18:05:00.002+10:00

Possibly one of the greatest moments of television history.

I mean, Christian Bale couldn't do this.

And he could certainly never pull off the costume, either.

--Caitlin

Ow.

2009-08-01T16:57:00.003+10:00

My legs and arms hurt from rockclimbing. My back hurts from drawing (how does this work? I DON'T EVEN KNOW) I am a walking ball of pain and I have some party tonight and some concert tomorrow night and all I want to do is lie on the couch and do nothing.
Buuuuuuuhhhhhhhhh
--Emma

Maybe he is a lion.

2009-06-21T14:58:00.003+10:00

Dear everyone:

I am submitting it for House Art and Craft. Just thought I should give you a heads up so you'll know how insignificant all YOUR entries are.

--Emma

I hate 'Under the Sea'.

2009-05-30T19:05:00.003+10:00

Damn you, little mermaid! Damn you to hell!

Never want to go back there again. Ever.

--Caitlin

You Spoony Bard!

2009-05-17T18:14:00.002+10:00

Yes! In your face, Zeromus!

That's what you get for making me travel down to the centre of the moon- you get a face full of Meteor.

--Caitlin

They've been stolen!

2009-04-25T18:21:00.003+10:00

Woo! Just finished watching D.N.Angel! Finally!

...

Except for the fact that I'm missing the last two episodes. Damn. Can anyone help with that?

--Caitlin

Fush 'n Chups

2009-04-15T19:11:00.011+10:00

Hide the vomit stains, clean the beer cans off the front lawn and pretend you never had that bitchin' party, because we're back from NZ and ready to confuse you for another while, at least until we kill each other in a well-meaning but nonsensical manner.

Looks good, doesn't it? Want to bathe in it, don't you? WELL YOU CAN'T IT'S A MILLION DEGREES CELSIUS

While you were all having a nice, long sleep-in after Lorne, we were getting up aaround 3 o'clock Saturday morning, having to be at the airport at 5:15. Emma didn't lose anything this time, it was quite awesome. We even found ourselves a little Peach kart to accompany us on our travels. We raced it across the airport; perhaps then was when Mrs J started to have doubts. Or perhaps it was later, when we demanded she listen to a recording of what Caitlin dubbed as "a cat being drowned by a baby." We shall never know.

Mrs J seeks refuge in a fush 'n chup store.

After a brief time looking around Auckland, we headed to Rotorua, having to deal with fitting two double basses at the back of the bus and the fact that the airport people broke Caitlin's cello case, which wasn't even hers. We did some fun stuff and laid down some funky beats and got off the bus at the Kingsgate Hotel, where we realised that New Zealand smells, and where Ash realised that being stuck in a room with both of us for 6 nights was perhaps not so great. Extend your sympathies to poor Ash, peoples, she had to put up with many a soft-toy battle.

Do New Zealanders do this often enough to warrant a sign? It would not surprise me.

On Sunday, we sight-saw (is that a verb?) around Rotorua and discovered Mrs Hewison's previously unknown love for corn, which transcended all boundaries of race and nationality. We also discovered that Western Rambo is actually a very funny movie, and that watching Sweeney Todd twice in one day can have serious consequences. Somewhere along the way we actually performed some things, but it is possible that the smell acts as a powerful drug, as I remember nothing. However, as I am Emma, this is quite normal.

Uncle Sam was right!

Monday we left Rotorua (much to the delight of all involved; the smell was something most foul) and headed for Hamilton. During the week, we'd normally have a couple of performances at schools during the day, then something fun at night, before returning to our tiny little box in the caravan park for the night, where Ash would sit outside and whittle, and we would fend off attacks from giant mosquitos, have midnight see-sawing expeditions, and freak out Swedish people by singing Wicked louder than is humanely possible. We got to see a NZ version of High School Musical, complete with a totally weak version of I See Red; we got to go bowling (where everyone was beaten by Emily, despite the severe handicap of not actually playing) and we even got to go frolicking in various parks and playgrounds. Caged children asked us for our autographs and Emma got a double bass bow to the head in the middle of a piece. It was also discovered that elevators are death traps and that pajamas tucked into boots with a beret is just about the Hot New Style; Caitlin should not be allowed to touch a musical instrument again for the safety of the entire planet, though she does make a mighty fine alarm clock - by the time you turn it off, you're laughing too hard to go back to sleep.

Rambo in the TV guide. Clearly marked in the synopsis is: "In Thailand, John Rambo joins a group of human rights missionaries." You will be pleased to know that we went through the entire guide with the hotel pen, replacing the word "John" with "Western"

By the end of the tour Emma couldn't feel her right forearm and Caitlin was having breathing difficulties, and both went home with half the other's suitcase. We watched Zac Efron in a corridor, we watched Kung Fu Hustle, we watched half an episode of The Mighty Boosh and went through the airport singing "Duhn duhn daaaaah.... Peacock Dreams." We all drank lemonaaaaaaade... The End

APB

2009-03-28T09:22:00.001+11:00

Anyone have a copy of the Lion King on DVD? It's urgent. Don't make us march on Disneyland in desperation.

The prodigal son has returned!

2009-03-06T10:03:00.005+11:00

Hooray! Apollo's back!

The christmas present my parents sent me while I was in France has finished its journey and returned home. It took more than two months, but oh well.

In other news, the master Mozart is a repititious little fellow.

--Caitlin

Oh, Sunkist...

2009-03-05T20:23:00.007+11:00

I am going to post this here before I talk myself out of it.

EDIT: Wow, uh, blogger really seems to hate this picture. Or at least seems set on making it as gigantic as possible. Assuming that no-one wants a close-up of a foot and some Sunkist, I've gotten rid of it and here's the link instead. http://i276.photobucket.com/albums/kk9/land_of_junk/OhSunkist.jpg

Merry Pete-mas, Nicola.

Faaaaaaster!

2009-03-04T19:39:00.004+11:00

Well everyone, I did it. But now I have a question for you all - Did anyone else find the last episode of Death Note immeasurably hilarious?

RE: That Matt Guy That I Was Bugging Everyone About All Last Night, I looked him up on Wikipedia and apparently he's like L's 3rd-in-line successor or something, like, after Mello and Near. He likes video games and probably pina coladas and getting caught in the rain... OH WELL HE DIED.

Smoking kills, kids.

It's dangerous to go alone! Take this!

2009-03-01T20:11:00.001+11:00

Get Funky! He's Rasta!

--Caitlin

Gratuitous Butt Shot #34

2009-02-21T21:35:00.002+11:00

I am highly amused at the amount of times Channel Ten can show close-ups of Andrew Macleod's shorts.
--Emma

Prosecutor Edgeworth Chooses Chicken

2009-02-16T14:22:00.003+11:00

Charlie Chapple-in and Winston Pearhill, the vaudeville act of the century, invite you to turn over a new leaf... of justice!

QUICKLY, WE MUST ACT NOW, BEFORE DOWNTOWN TOKYO IS DESTROYED BY COMRADE PRINGLE, WITH HIS LASER EYE BEAMS.

THE LUNAR WHALE SHALL EAT US ALL!

NOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOM.

So bored.

2009-02-14T17:05:00.015+11:00

And this is what happens when you let me and Caitlin sit together during a boring speech, and when you let my sketchbook into Further Maths afterwards.

Here's a fun fact: In the original sketch Mrs. Scanlon looked very much like the illegitimate love child of Mr. Hanekoma and Joshua. Try not to think about the logistics of that one too much.

I don't know why I drew this and then foisted it upon you guys when I hate internet memes so much. I'll delete it later when I'm not so desperate for things to do. Before Caitlin sees it and is all like "Do this again and I'll tell the world about that picture of Scanlon you keep in your wallet"

But it's OK, Scanny. No-one will ever know of our forbidden love.

--Emma

And here we go again

2009-02-07T13:16:00.011+11:00

Just what you always wanted. More photos.

Check out all the white sand and blue sea you guys missed out on. And all the canoe. Canoe canoe canoe?

The burying that didn't quite work out due to my unfortunate breathing habit. I can't be bothered rotating it. Turn your head.

I will give a million dollars to whoever can guess who this is supposed to be.

Awesome hat.

Helping Elena practice being a free spirit for House Swimming.

Devon tries to cover up at the Open. While wearing a tennis ball hat.

Having 5 people on one guitar is not the easy way out, apparently. It also appears to freak Elena out. Although maybe that was CGI Ozzie Osbourne.

STUPID BLOGGER

2009-01-24T20:05:00.020+11:00

That was a message from Caitlin; Blogger wasn't letting her upload photos. She's sent me a few to post which are downstairs at the moment; I'll stick them up later. For the time being, I'm going to be lazy and just post a few photos from House Swimming. You have NO IDEA how hard these were to get up here, there's a problem with the folder, which for some reason won't let me move/delete it. Not even my dad can fix it; that's how bad it is.

Sim and Elena try on every costume at once

Pacmen. Pacwomen? Be careful, one of them is a leper.

Tetra. I mean, er, genies voiced by Robin Williams, and occasionally Dan Castellanetta.

Backstroke! Woooooooooo

One of these days I am going to steal your sunglasses, Jess. Seriously.

The first march of The Very Hungry Caterpillar. This is what King Kong would be like if Eric Carle wrote it.

Let's have a big hand for feet (with-out yer shoes on!)

Costuming during the spare. Also, proof of Marnie wagging. Look at her, eating her watermelon when she should be at physics. Shame.

My vote goes to Nicola's suggestion for Locksley's next costumes "Can you go as whitegoods? Please dress as a fridge"
House swimming was awesome fun. Seriously, we should be in Year 12 more often.

U R MR GAY

2009-01-16T22:56:00.003+11:00

MY CATS ARE SICK

CLAIMED BY BOOGIE FEVER

THE ONLY CURE IS THE JUICE OF THE JUN-JUN FRUIT, FOUND ONLY IN DEEPEST SIBERIA

WITHOUT IT, THEY SHALL PERISH AND I SHALL BE FORCED TO DANCE ALONE FOREVERMORE

IS THERE NO HOPE FOR MY CATS? SHALL THEY BE FORCED TO SUFFER THE ETERNAL TORTURE OF THE ACCURSED ONES?

ONLY TIME WILL TELL.....

SHALL THE HYLIAN SHIELD DEFEND US?

Pho-toss!

2009-01-15T18:33:00.011+11:00

So I thought I should post some photos or something. But most of my photos have taken up perpetual habitation in the memory card of my camera and are refusing to move, so you just can't have them. Seriously, they've got wigwams in a little circle and a Chief Shaman. You don't wanna mess with them.

At Disneyland! Mathilde, Penguin, Juliette, Penguin, Penguin.

Mathilde and Solveig, the adorable baby

Me, Louis and Juliette at Montmartre

The photo of Amelie in the restaurant from Amelie

Photos courtesy of Juliette

And! A vague not-held-back-by-15-minutes-internet-time-at-an-airport summary of the last few days of the 5 weeks! Aren't you pleased? If you're not, you should be. Turn that frown upside down. Alternatively, turn it 90 degrees, and you'll have a right parenthesis!

That's a smile, not an upside down frown!

Better.

First of all, plane flight update: We finally got to watch Sin City, and our reaction at the end was something like this - ???
Why is this so? I dunno. Was it the yellow man chasing Jessica Alba? Was it the plots that did not relate as far as we could see? Was it Not Matt Damon running around on rooftops killing red ladies for no adequately explained reason? Was it the guys who didn't die even though they had gun barrels sticking out of their head? Was it the fact that Elijah Wood ate hookers in a barn? Yeah, I think that may have contributed a little.
It was testament to how bizarre the film was that I didn't even blink at the last one. Oh, but I did laugh because he looked like Harry Potter. You know, evil satanic Harry Potter.

And the rest of the plane trip is blank for me, possibly because that is getting into "Have not slept in 22 hours" territory. I remember Italian Talon and quite a lot of glaring, the reason for which I cannot recall. We landed, we went through customs, we marvelled at the guys in the line behind us in boardies and thongs and singlet tops. We kept singing GCN Rainbow Road. Normal stuff.

Hell, that plane trip was nine hours and Sin City went for 2. What on earth did we do? That's going to bug me for ages now. Oh well. Onto... Wednesday?

The Chateau was full of allll the paintings we got in History, including the "Why the long face, Marie Antoinette?" "The peasants are revolting!" paintings. The guards must have thought I was crazy giggling to myself when I saw these, but, whatever, they get to sit in a giant-ass castle all day so that is their comeuppance. And then we went shopping. Shopping involving strange comic books, French Alice Munro, and the Best Thing Ever for one euro, which came with the World's Hugest Bag, which sent us into hysterics every five seconds, causing more French people to think we were crazy. And we bought chocolate. And then we went to see French Twilight, getting very confused by the ads ("Oh, this is that Largo Winch thing, it's like a cross between James Bond and Alex Rider. Gee it really looks like Terminator. See look, right there, Largo Winch is the Terminator. They're just copying this whole plot off Terminator! Oh, wait, it is Terminator") and the movie ("So has it started yet or is this an ad for the live-action Bambi?") and also getting highly distressed by my ringtone (she told me to turn it off. So what do I do? I say "I hope it doesn't, listen to how annoying it is" and then I forget to turn it off. And then I get a call. In the middle of the movie). I got really late home, but it was OK because we were going to get pizza. Juliette then decided she didn't want pizza, so we went to the Chinese place next door, Mathilde telling me that "If my dad asks, we didn't get pizza because you don't have Chinese food in Australia and you wanted to taste it." So I ate Chinese for the first time in my entire life. Cough.

Juliette's dad on the way to the airport spent the entire time telling me off about how I didn't immerse myself enough because I talked to my friends sometimes on MSN in English. The power of the remark was just a teensy bit lost because of the fact that he was speaking to me in English, like he always did (especially when Juliette wasn't looking). Oh well. If I gained nothing language-wise like he thinks, now at least I have a french SIM card that calls me at 5 every morning without fail to tell me how to call France. I think perhaps France is having separation issues. I'm sorry, honey, I'm married to the sea.

Miss you Juliette :)

Flying south for the winter!

2009-01-09T11:13:00.003+11:00

We're totally in Singapore now and struggling immensely with qwerty keyboards. The asterisk does not have its own key! It's blasphemy!
We both had to get up at 6:15 this morning to meet at the airport at nine. And now it is 1:15pm Paris time (8:10 Singapore time). And we haven't slept a bit.
On the flight:
We concerned people. Emma especially. I talk too loud...
Watched X-Men for the shots of Hugh Jackman in stupid tight-fitting singlet tops. And Scrubs, My Name is Earl, The Simpsons, and tried to watch Sin City but failed.
Spent about half an hour in hysterics over The Kraken, and, er... saliva?
Drew on some converse canverse.
Discussed camel hats
Yesterday I (Emma) came back from meeting up with Caitlin (French Twilight!) and found Juliette in a neck brace from acrosport (acrobatics/gymnastics). Evidently I cannot leave her alone for a day, even if it is to go and buy a Hylian Shield. We heart Hylian Shield.
And I (still Emma) totally haven't lost anything yet. Oh, except for my passport, and the tickets right after I got them... I found them later though. Oh, and my sanity. Arguably we both lost that a long time ago though. Oh well. It makes things funnier.
Prepare yourselves, we're almost home. Go hide in the bunkers. Save the children!
BTW (Caitlin here) I totally got my Brownie yesterday. Mission complete.
--Emma and Caitlin

Self-Explanatory

2009-01-07T03:11:00.006+11:00

Click and then click again and it gets to its proper size. I'm not used to such a small screen, pixel size kinda went out the window.

Stop asking.

Seriously.

I have Snowflakes in my Eyes

2009-01-05T19:33:00.003+11:00

You better all be enjoying your holidays, cause it's back to school day in France. And isn't it lovely, the day we go back, it starts to full on snow. If there's one thing worse than leaving the house in the dark to go to school, it's leaving the house in the dark and the snow. Just hope I don't break a leg or something.

Sorry for not posting for so long (I'm sure you're all dying to know what I'm up to anyway), but it was hard to get on a computer during the holidays. It's in Marine's room, and she was working most of the time. I can't believe how much holiday homework they were given.

Anyways, last week we went into the Louvre. It was awesome, we were walking around for hours and still didn't see the whole thing. Afterwards we went out for dinner to a restaurant in Paris. It was, like, 10 pm and I was starving. The menus were weird, they were printed in english on the back, and down the bottom they had the "win of the day". I wonder if they even really get that many english customers. We had crepes with nutella for desert, man were they good.

I must say that Emma's family seems to eat very differently to mine. We have never had crepes for dinner (or even at all, at home), and no caramel either. And half the time we have fruit for dessert as well. That being said, yesterday we had the Galette du Roi, which is this cake, with a little thingie inside. Whoever gets the thingie in their slice is the king or queen, and they get to wear a paper crown. The little boy in the family, Jean-Edouard, was so excited about it, he kept asking everyone if they'd finished their dinner yet, so we could start the cake.

Apart from trips to various places around Versailles and Paris, most of my holidays were spent reading and playing Wii. I've now read the first three Harry Potters in french. I can't get over the fact that Fawkes the Phoenix (that's his name, right?) is called Fumseck. It cracks me up as much as that Super Mario Galaxy thing. Yes, Emma, I know it's dumb. I spent yesterday playing like ten rounds of Wii bowling with Jean-Edouard, because he was trying to get up enough points to be at the Pro level. As it turns out, I seem to have a knack for the hula hoop game on Wii Fit. Which is probably for the best, I need to work off all the french chocolates I've been eating. Their grandparents gave me a box of them for christmas, they're so good. I've also been trying to help them play Wii boxing, but I'm not sure how to properly explain how to dodge. It's hard to talk with Jean-Edouard, because if I'm saying something that's only vaguely correct, it's harder for him to guess what I'm trying to say.

Well, there's only three days left, and then we're heading home. I know, just as you were enjoying being well shot of us, too. But if we stay here much longer, I actually think we'll see another ice age.
--Caitlin

It's a world of lau-ghter...

2009-01-05T03:15:00.002+11:00

Disnélond!
That is how they pronounce it here. We (Me, Juliette, Mathilde and their friend Phillipe) finally got there despite the snow on Friday, the metro accident blocking the route today and the Noticeable Lack of Bus.

But, before that, I shall just state for the record that sushi (yes, maki, Juliette) tastes nowhere near as bad as I thought it would. It actually tastes pretty good. We had Japanese last night, and we got served the maki by a Japanese lady (Asian count = 6 now!) in little wooden boats. Very cool.

So! Disneyland!

We went of Space Mountain twice, and the Indiana Jones ride (on which we put our hands in the air on all the downhill bits until we realised they were crap. And now I think I have frostbite on my ungloved hand) and It's a Small World, which cracked me up so hard. The freaky dolls! The annoying song! The aborigine hitting the dingo on the head with a boomerang! Steve Irwin!
Evidently the makers of the ride never learnt from Naomi Robson that dressing things up as Steve Irwin is Not Okay.
We took pictures with like 20 Disney characters in costumes as well, but not Donald, because Donald had a bodyguard, an angry British woman who jumped in front of him like she was taking a bullet everytime anyone got too close, yelling "GET BACK" in cockney french and english like we were fat people at boot camp and Donald was chocolate. I think she made some little kids cry. All they wanted was Donald's autograph!
I was going to buy my brother an ugly Goofy (here called "Dingo") hat but then I saw an even uglier one. So now his Christmas present is a 'coon hat, for whenever he feels like looking at home in a log cabin in early America. With pilgrims. On a prairie.

Breaking news!
Yesterday the two (one?) of us met up with the express purpose of eating Tim Tams. It is sunny, it is 4 o'clock, we have the entire of Paris at our disposal! So what do we do? We put Vegemite on a crèpe with a phone card.
Mmm.

--Emma

Emma+Juliette= ♥

2009-01-03T06:08:00.002+11:00

Emma, I loooooove you (l)
&don't delete that post

Or,i'll kill you

I like to move it...

2009-01-03T03:54:00.006+11:00

You thought I'd forgotten, Sim. But I keep my promises. Even if there was a slight technical problem of Flash not working off my USB anymore.

YOUR MAGNIFICENT PICTURE

Happy birthday!

Don't worry, I have your proper picture all drawn out and ready to put into Flash when I get it working again.

Last night we had CREPES for "dinner" as Juliette's aunt, uncle and three little cousins were over. The two eldest were about the same age as Little Caitlin, and they sat in my room for hours asking me questions and not-so-subtly hinting that they wanted my Australian money. And the littlest one took all my valuables and dismantled/hid them in various ways before taking the pot pourri and spreading it in the corridor. Surely this is why the sports textbook tells us that corridors are a source of danger. Little kids speaking French is like the most adorable thing ever though.
We were going to go to Disneyworld today but when we woke up it was mega-snowing. So no Disney for me until Sunday. It had better not be mega-snowing Sunday. Instead we went to a cinema, and saw one of 'em gosh-darned fillumajigs Mr. Hutchison's always talking about.

Australia had stupid session times (the word for session here is séance, which I must admit had me slightly concerned for a while until I figured it out) so we went to see Madagascar 2. Before the film started we went outside and ran into one of Juliette's friends. The conversation went something like "Hey, what are you doing here, COME AND SEE MADAGASCAR WITH US" which he agreed to. Then we ran into another of her friends and had the same conversation. He did not wish to come and see Madagascar with us. Man was that film such a Lion King rip. If Dreamworks had have made Lion King jokes it would have made the Lion Kingness more acceptable, but all was quiet on the Western Front. I saw the trailer to Despereaux and The Half-Blood Prince in French. That's, er, Despereaux and The Half-Blood Prince. Not the two together. That would be a disturbing film.

I badly want to go see French Twilight.

Cham-paggin?

2009-01-01T22:52:00.007+11:00

It's been a while since I last posted so this post is going to be long, but will not include Year In Review like Caitlin Nimoy over there because I am lazy. Luckily for you I have forgotten stuff. Again. If you're not used to it by now...

VAGUE SUMMARY OF SOME DAYS

On Monday we met up with Juliette's "aeroplane friend" Louis at Montmartre. We had lunch in the restaurant Deux Moulins, which was in Amelie. And boy are they capitalising on it. Lunch for the three of us cost 140 Australian. And I just had badly microwaved vegetable "casserole." Someone really needs to teach them that pears are not a vegetable. Afterwards we went back to the apartment and played Interactive Qui Veut Gagner Le Million (Who wants to be a Millionaire?) and when that kept stuffing up we watched half of the remake of The Amityville Horror. Now Juliette and I really want to watch the rest but we can't find it. But I totally know the twist.
I went to two museums, Quai Branly, a museum of tribal history, and... another one, which was showing an exhibition of paintings by Anton van Dyck. The Another Museum is one of those old mansions from the Ye Olde Days that audioguides describe as "subtle and refined" but are covered in enough gold leaf and gigantic paintings by Venetian gods-of-art to pay the US Defense budget for a year. On the way back from Quai Branly I bought a packet of green tongue peas and 5 carrots. Mmm. And it snowed too. FRANCE IS TWO UP ON YOU, JESSICA CHARLESWORTH.
Yesterday we went to an ice rink which we later found out was a plastic rink, and no amount of salt baths will ever clear us of the shame. Quotes aside, the ice was synthetic and even the people who knew how to skate were having trouble, so we only stayed about 5 minutes. I didn't fall over though!

For New Years we went to an awesome party at Juliette's friend's house. And god, if Mrs. Smale would have had a field day at the last party, she would have exploded at this one. Actually physically exploded. But I really do not like the taste of alcohol (And it makes you thirsty! What is the point of a drink that makes you thirsty?) so I had my awesome cool rave party glass of water. And Pringles! People kept throwing lightswitch raves downstairs. Lots of fun. It was absolutely freezing cold though; whoever's idea it was to make people wear dresses to parties in effing EUROPE was an idiot. Ye Olde Dressmakers, I'm looking at you. And also whoever invented my stupid, stupid black shoes should probably get shot too. Juliette and her sister looked like friggin' supermodels though.

Being Australian starts the most in-ter-esting conversations:

(English)"Oh, you're Australian? So do you speak really good English, or...?"

"Oh, you're Australian? So what language does you speak? Canadian?"

(English)"Hey, could you take a photo for us? I love America!"
"She's Australian, she understands french"
(More English)"Oh, Australian? I love Barack Obama! Barack Obama is my god!"

And, everyone's favourite drunk french guy who sat down next to me and consistently started edging closer and closer until he eventually had his head on my shoulder. Extract from conversation:
Me: "But I don't get jetlag, so it's OK"
Him: "Don't get what?"
Me: "Jetlag"
Him: "What?"
Me: "Jetlag"
Him: "Jetlad"
Me: "No, jetlag"
Him: "Jetlag."
Me: "Yes."
Him: "What?"
Me: "JETLAG"
Him: "Jetlag?"
Me: "JETLAG!"
Him: "Oh, jetlag! Why didn't you say so?"
Me: "I did. Lots."
Him: "I'm sorry, I'm a bit drunk"

We all got shepherded outside at 5 to midnight for the actual ticking over, but they didn't do a countdown, only showered everyone in champagne. This I was not expecting at all and I happened to be standing in just the right spot to get the majority of it all over me. I was texting my family to say Happy New Year at the time and my text went something along the lines of "Happy French New Year... f***, I have champagne in my EYE"
I've taken a myspace picture of my morning-after hair with the camera on my phone and I'll upload it when I get back. It is quite disgusting.

Speaking of disgusting, I really, really pity whoever had to clean up afterwards.

At about one o'clock I started to get really tired (I was up half the night before, too) which was fixed for about an hour by a phone call from Caitlin, for which I had to lock myself in a bathroom to be able to hear. Halfway through some guy came in and threw purple up in the sink. There were guys playing guitar downstairs which we all listened to, and I closed my eyes to listen like I often do but 10 seconds later had someone patting me on the face telling me in English to "Wake up, you." I told them the proper phrase was "Wake up, Jeff." From then on I played with my phone whenever I started to get tired, which worked to a degree. There were lots of people smoking in the room though. My clothes smell like grandmas.

More things about France I have noticed. You are probably sick of these, but TOO BAD, because my New Year's resolution was that you all have to do what I say.

Patriotism. History here is the history of France. Once there was a map of Italy on the board but only for 5 seconds and then it was back to the map of France. People have the Declaration of the Rights of Man hung in their bathroom. Drunk people go on tirades against other countries.
Never dance with someone who has a cigarette. I have a burn on my arm and it hurts :(
They aaallll do stuff for New Years. No-one stays home to watch the fireworks like half of Australia does.
The French have good taste in english music. You don't hear Hotel California, the Beatles, Fleetwood Mac, the Rolling Stones, the Beach Boys etc. being played at raves here.
There is a concert on TV every New Years Day with the Viennese Philharmonic playing lots of Strauss and Radetsky and stuff and little boys dressed up like total tools doing ballet. One of the guys credited in the... er... credits... was called "Will Willerton." This is the world's second best name, the first being Mr. Shenanigans.

--Emma

A World in White Gets Underway

2009-01-01T03:04:00.008+11:00

Greetings from the past! It's still 2008 here. All of you 2009 people are just jumping the gun. Ah, 2008, we shall miss you. You were a year of many funny things, which I shall not talk about for ages and ages and ages, because there were a lot of them. But there were things like these:

But why am I telling you these things? You were all there for them. I should probably bring some fresh news.

Okay, after all the massive Christmas shopping and feasting was over, we went into the Grand Chateau de Versailles. I've been into the park like four times now, it's so massive. But this time we were seeing the main bit. Man, were those people rich. Every ceiling is painted with some mythological figure, there's a massive chandelier in every room, everything is painted in gold leaf, it's insane. Right now, there's also an art exhibition there of this dude, Jeff Koons, who does all these weird statues. Like this, for example.That is a porcelain statue of Michael Jackson and his monkey, in the middle of the Grand Chateau de Versailles. The majority of Versaillians hate the exhibition. I can see where they're coming from, giant stautes of pink balloon dogs don't really match the decor.As I mentioned last time, I went to the Eiffel Tower. Apparently, at this time of year, and in this part of the country, the temperature is usually around 5-10 degrees. It is extremely rare for it to be as cold as it is now, where it is consistently between about -2 and 3 degrees. Lucky us. It is also extremely lucky that we decided to buy tickets that only let you use the stairs of the Eiffel Tower, and not the elevator, as the tickets were cheaper and the line was shorter. So we climbed all the 668 odd steps to the second storey. It was just about the coldest I've ever been. Especially since the sun was setting. Pretty, though. But it was too cold to keep climbing, so we snuck onto the elevator going down. We planned to pretend to be Finnish if they checked our tickets. Not my idea. Luckily they didn't.
We also went to see Australia the other day. Without subtitles, I didn't quite get the entire plot, I was just muchly amused to watch David Wenham and Hugh Jackman talk, with french coming out. Also, the number of times people kept syaing "Mrs Boss" with a french accent was funny. And the french voice-over lady trying to imitate Nicole Kidman trying to sing 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'. Oh, David Wenham, why you gotta be so shifty? It would've been nice to hear some good old Strine, but oh well.

The kids here got a Wii for Christmas. Some friends lent them some games, too. I come halfway around the world, and what do I do? I play Brawl.

We're going off to a NYE party tonight in Paris, man, it's going to be so freaking cold. But who knows, maybe they'll have brownies.
--Caitlin

What is up. Doc.

2008-12-29T04:26:00.003+11:00

Mmm. Right on cue, I am suffering from Holiday Syndrome!

Like last time - the world trip - Holiday Syndrome has struck after three weeks of eating abnormally, and, also like last time, I now have an extreme aversion to pastry. Hell, at the moment I have problems being in the seem room as cooked pastry. Holiday Syndrome can be classified as thus - Not Enough Vegetables, characterised by cravings for said vegetables and also fresh fruit. To top it off I am extremely tired all the time, which didn't happen last time, probably because last time I at least got some large servings of vegetables. But right now I really want to go and sit in a greengrocer's and eat all their carrots like some kind of mutant Bugs Bunny.

Today we had Christmas - and hence huge family dinner - Number Three (one with Juliette's mum's family, one with Juliette's family, and one with Juliette's dad's family) and I felt really rude because I was so tired and also couldn't stand the sight of food that wasn't the clementines at the end. I forced myself to eat a bowl of soup (Which was, by the way, the best. Soup. Ever. Tasted like Vegemite. Vegemite soup.) and tried to keep from throwing up, which made me feel even worse because they'd gone to so much effort to make a really nice meal. Similarly, I didn't go to Juliette's friend's party last night because I was feeling so bad and didn't believe one whit that loud music and smoke and staying up really late would help the situation, but I'm pretty sure she thought I just didn't want to go, even though it was one of the big things we were going to do together (the others being New Years and Disneyworld, which I had better be better for). I am the world's worst correspondant. But Juliette's cousin has a room full of kick-arse composing equipment and he and Juliette's uncle jammed along to Coldplay and also the cousin did magic tricks. That was pretty cool.

I'm very sorry for being so whingey. French people don't seem to understand this and I have no-one else to tell at the moment. They just think I need to eat meat, that I need to wear more clothes (??? I was cold for like one day out of the 21 so far) or that I'm anorexic, which makes me upset. Don't worry, I'm still having a good time. We're going to Montmartre tomorrow.

--Emma

Translation Help?

2008-12-27T23:10:00.003+11:00

How do you say "I feel like crap" in French? Touching anything, even tablecloths, makes me cold, I'm wearing a ridiculous amount of clothes, I can't get rid of this vague headache, my back hurts, I feel slightly sick but not like throwing up and I have lost all appetite for anything except for fresh uncooked vegetables or fruit, of which there are NOT ANY. Thinking about pastry or bread or cheese makes me gag. I want a tomato. That is all.

Waah.

--Emma

French chocolates are good...

2008-12-27T22:04:00.002+11:00

Man, christmas is busy in France. We've been wandering around for the last few days, shopping, visiting relatives, eating, going shopping again...We didn't get our white christmas in Versailles, but we got the next best thing; the sun! It's actually been vaguely sunny here the last few days, it's amazing. Still not warm though.

I beg to differ as to Emma's observations on the subject of fruits and vegetables here. Apparently, here, clementines are the christmas fruit, so we've been eating them non-stop. I think the fruit and vegetables matter is just your family.

I too saw a sign for an english school, but this one said "Make the Difference". I'm not sure what kind of english they teach there.

Yesterday, because it was 'such a nice day' (basically sunny, yet also 0°), we went for a walk around the gardens at the Chateau de Versailles. People say Marie Antionette was decadent. They'd be right. They have the "English Garden", which is just a park, basically, then they have the Queen's Hamlet, which was her private peasant village playground, complete with rabbits, geese and cows. Then they have the "French Garden" where everything is symmetrical. All the flowers are planted in the flower beds, but in pots at the same time. This is because Marie Antionette liked roses, and so it was some poor dude's job to go around every night; take out the flowerpots and put in pots of roses instead. Each night he'd change the colour of the roses. He could've just painted them, really...

We're going out to Paris today, we might be going to visit the Eiffel Tower. Check the news tommorow for any stories about someone trying to climb on top of it.

Maybe there are brownies in Paris...
--Caitlin

COLD.

2008-12-26T22:39:00.003+11:00

So I am in Normandy now, not Brittany, and it is BLOODY FREEZING COLD. We went to visit an abbey at like 8 o'clock in the morning and it was also BLOODY FREEZING COLD but more so because it was 8 o'clock in the morning and also by the seaside. I love the seaside.

And I remembered some things Katharine and I did on Friday, and will also recount some things from Brittany. I will not recount lots because this post will be too long and Nicola's brain will explode. So! Highlights of Friday That I Haven't Already Told You Guys.
- Walking past the Eiffel Tower and seeing a chicken cross the road. We couldn't catch him to ask him why, though.
- Crossing said road at the same time as some army guys drove past, which sent all the guys selling crappy souvenirs illegally out front skedaddlin'. There were like 50 of them running across the road with arms full of jingling Eiffel Towers, yelling "Bling bling!"
- Random men trying to draw your picture. Their starting line is invariably "BRITISH PERSON!" in a bizarre accent
- Katharine's pole fetish, which entailed her taking photos of me in front of various lightposts and such.

Brittany Things That I Can Remember. Dammit Voldemort.
- Adorable baby! Who speaks adorable baby french! She stole my phone and wandered holding the wrong side to her ear, saying "Coucou?" and babbling in baby language. SO CUTE.
- They put caramel on their bread. CARAMEL, PEOPLES. It is the best thing ever, maybe, except for cough drops.
- I got caramel spread for Christmas. A large jar. It's going straight to my thighs, and no-one else's.
- Devon, they do SO have Lord of the Rings here. It is called Le Seigneur des Anneaux.
- For Emma G: HURDY GURDY PLAYER. I gave him a coin, too! But he was not drunk, er, unfortunately?
- Manon des Sources was on TV last night.

Strange things about France:

Fruit & Veg
They do not eat these things. They are too busy eating pigeons to eat these things. They eat potatoes, and occasionally mandarins, and sometimes they mush lots of vegetables together with salt and eat that. But I remain eternally puzzled as too how they get their 3 serves of fruit and 5 serves of vegetables a day. And what about their 3 serves of dairy? They do not drink milk!

People
THEY DO NOT AGE. Well, most of them do, but there is an alarming number of people here who are 17 or so and look 12. It is highly confusing.

Uno
This they play with points. And you cannot put Draw 2 cards on top of other Draw 2 cards. And they say "Against us!" instead of "Gotcha!" which I find incredibly amusing. AGAINST US.

TV
All their dubbed TV shows are from the 80s. Without exception. Many star David Hasselhoff and Chuck Norris. I saw one last night called Las Vegas which was a crime show with some cops. They weren't very good cops because Somehow and for Some Reason people kept stealing the bodies from the autopsy room. Or burning them.

Alan Rickman
Alan Rickman is extremely hard to recognise without being able to hear his English voice. Caught some of Robin Hood: King of Thieves last night and spent most of it going "Is that Alan Rickman? It IS Alan Rickman! Wait, no it's not. No it is. Or maybe..."

Signs
Signs that say "Learn English today!" in English. These amuse me also.

I am out of phone credit again which is annoying because people keep sending me messages I cannot reply to and also I could not call Caitlin and tell her it was Al-most Christ-mas. Yes, phones are just as annoying as I thought they would be, and no, you cannot have my number. Ringtones are annoying things. My ringtone at the moment is called "Private Eye." I hope no-one calls me as it is annoying. Annoying annoying annoying.

I will add to this later. I should probably let internet-deprived Juliette have a go.

"They actually felt physically ill"

2008-12-22T21:06:00.004+11:00

Yes, so as Caitlin said, Brittany hasn't invented the internet yet, so you can just deal with her for a while, like I always have to. But right now, I am in their cousin's base, stealing their internets.
On Friday, me and Katharine went sight-seeing again and we saw things that I don't remember what they were. One of them was Ms. Lavigne in a boulangerie, which was pretty freaky. And afterwards, a party at which Mrs. Smale would have had a field day. I spent most of it being a wallflower (everyone who was dancing was dancing with someone, and I didn't know anyone) and telling people over and over again that yes, there are kangaroos in Australia. Also I told about 7 people (they kept asking me) about dangerous Australian animals like dingoes and magpies and drop bears. Highlights included: Some guy doing some random striptease dance; another getting almost lynched when he turned off "I kissed a girl"; and walking back and being able to hear the music halfway down the next street. I could only find one of my gloves at the end but it's not so bad because I have recently gotten into the habit of only wearing the left one. I guess it's just the Michael Jackson in me.
Juliette beats Marine, Caitlin. She had two whole days of 3 or 4 hour tests, including an english exam which had the essay questions "How can you account for the popularity of Harry Potter?" and "Are you a Harry Potter addict?" This made me laugh a lot. It did not make Juliette laugh a lot as she has not read Harry Potter.
I could only find one of my gloves at the end but it's not so bad because I have recently gotten into the habit of only wearing the left one. I guess it's just the Michael Jackson in me.
And Devon, what part of "my camera keeps screwing up" and "I left my camera cord in Australia" do you not understand? No photos. Deal.
Brittany is pretty cool even if there is nothing to do but play Boggle. Juliette's Grandpa has the most amazing moustache.
Also, philosophical question: As a vegetarian, can I eat snails and caviar? I don't want to, but could I? Since they are insects/eggs and all.

"Because we are a rock and roll band"

2008-12-22T06:46:00.010+11:00

Emma's gone off to Brittany for a week or so, where interwebs seem few and far between. So guess what, you're stuck with me until she comes back. I know, I'm sorry.

Anyway, yesterday we had a big 'going-out-and-doing-stuff' day. Marine, Clémence and I went out to La Musée Grévin, this waxwork museum in Paris. It was awesome, I took heaps of photos. Only downside was that most of the sculptures (is that what you call them?) were french people, so they were all like "do you know such-and-such? They're really famous.", and I'm just like 'Ummmmm....'.

After that, we went off to a concert. After standing outside the venue and eating some little cakes for dinner, we got to go in. The band was this german punk-rock group called the Killerpilze (translation: Killer Mushrooms). They were good, though I didn't understand the songs. Mostly cause they were in German, which I know maybe ten words of. Still lots of fun though. It was the drummer's birthday (he's only 16), so everyone kept singing Happy Birthday in french and english. They played a bit of SexyBack for some reason, I was cracking up. They said their guitarist was the best rock guitarist in the world, and I'm all like "nuh-uh". They got up to all the usual band shenanigans, throwing towels and water at the audience, getting them to jump and raise their hands, getting them to promise to come back next year and buy their album, handcuffing themselves to members of the audience dragged on stage.

And then, after such a busy day, we all slept in this morning and did nothing all day. It's the first time since I got here that we haven't gone out somewhere. Okays, photos! Hold on to your hats, there's a lot.

Seem familiar to you, Janet?
Marine and I with the Les Choiristes guy

I'm not sure why they have a sculpture of Lara Croft. She's not even French.

Neither is Spiderman. It's kinda cheating to make a waxwork of a fictional character.

Seems like someone's been eating too many cookies...

Hey hey, check it out...
Clint Eastwood. 'Nuff said.
Heh, heh heh heh, heh heh, Liza Minelli.
Voltaire eyeing up Marylin Monroe.

Incredible, how you can see right through him.

I quite like how this photo turned out.

This one doesn't look lifelike at all. Which makes it very realistic.

Thanks for da shave.

A shop we passed. Best.

Though you can't see it in the photo, there's also a crocodile with a rugby ball at this place.

The Killpilze. I quite like their logo up the back there. Such a Mario rip.

There, I think that'll do for now. Sorry about that.
Preparing to go brownie hunting
--Caitlin

You Spoony Bard!

2008-12-20T18:09:00.003+11:00

Ah, I love this game. I don't see why Rosa can't just heal herself though, she is a white mage.

Nayways, we've been here for two weeks now, though it doesn't feel like it. And we're finally on holidays. Actually, Marine had school this morning, but I stayed here to call home, and check in on the big Christmas party they're having. She only has one class anyway. And it's economics, which I don't even get in english.

Yesterday after lunch, Marine had a FOUR HOUR PHILOSOPHY TEST, so I made my own way home instead. I'm not sitting in the library for four hours. Be proud of me, I didn't get lost. Clémence (Marine's sister) and I went out to La Defense for some shopping. It's in Paris, so we took the train in. There's this station here called 'Saint Cloud', I've seen buses headed there too. Very interesting...

I was looking for some jumpers or something, but everything is so expensive here. Graamph. Stupid Euros. I need some new gloves too, mine are coming undone at the thumb.

Everyone here must think I'm so rude. That I only came here to eat all their jam and delicious biscuits. I spend most of the time after school in my room (Cause Marine's homeworking), and I read in pretty much all of the classes (Cause I don't get what's going on). I even read when they had a guest speaker yesterday (though to be fair, it did go for more than an hour, it was about economics and unemployment, and I was falling asleep). Maybe I should try saying 'thank you' more often or something.

Nothing can stand between me and a brownie. They must be here somewhere.
--Caitlin

That man is a bad hat.

2008-12-19T03:27:00.005+11:00

* *! Ugh. We really should just stop hanging out. But a dawn duel is easily arranged, it's not dawn until like 10 o'clock.

So I'm on holidays now... again! Juliette still has two days of solid tests though, that go for about 3 or 4 hours each. Poor Juliette.

YESTERDAY!
The history teacher stopped me after school and asked me what my first name was. I told her, and she stood there for a while looking confused, and then said "As in Emmanuelle?" I said no, just Emma, and she looked even more confused, then asked me the origins of the name. I said I thought it was Irish, which is not true. It seemed to keep her happy. I used the word "mec" (slang for "guy") while talking to Juliette's dad, and he said "that's slang. It's like you say in Australia, 'fox'. Do you say that in Australia, 'Come here, fox'?" pronouncing 'fox' with a strong American accent, like 'fawks'. No. No-one in Australia tells people to come here fox.
I am down to my last packet of Tim Tams, which I have promised to Caitlin and so won't open yet. Tim Tams are awesome comfort food. Juliette has conceded "one point to Melbourne" for our delicious biscuits, but still says that Paris is better because it has hot guys.

TODAY!
So this being our day off and Katharine's last few days, we went out touristing and getting lost on public transport. I was supposed to call her when I got to her house in the morning, but:-
1. Public phones don't take coins, only phone cards.
2. I went and bought a phone card but it wouldn't work.
3. I tried to ask someone about this but she was South African and didn't know. She was nice though.
4. Tried again and couldn't get international dialing to work.
5. Turns out you need a different phone card for international calls even if the phone is 50 metres away which it was.
6. I was so desperate I went and bought a SIM card.
7. The little jingle the phone plays when you turn it on makes me laugh, so I turned it on and off many times.
8. A nice lady voice on the phone told me how to do international dialing.
9. Still couldn't get Katharine's number to work. Went home to try.
10. Finally figured it out two hours after I was supposed to meet Katharine, by trying to remember what Caitlin'd told me on the plane.
Katharine's frenchie's mum told her that yesterday there was a bomb threat on the Metro and that some lines were closed, so we took buses everywhere, which are much slower and more confusing. We went to see Notre Dame and tried to figure out how the people up the top got there but got distracted. I had the world's hugest crépe for lunch, during which Katharine pronounced loudly (full of Parisians was this café) "French people really piss me off... Oh, crap". We kept getting approached by strangers who would say things like "Hello ladies, how are you? *eyebrow wiggle*" and "Latin? LATIN?" Afterwards, we spent forever on a bus plotting things, more forever looking in shops, and about an hour running along the Seine looking for the bridge that Madeleine fell off and got saved by Genevieve. We found it, too.

And you will totally never guess who I ran into. But no seriously. Guess.

On the way back we decided to walk for a couple of ks because the buses were being incredibly slow because of all the traffic. After seeing inordinate amounts of gendarmerie and national police all day, and arriving in a street where we were getting warned away from the Metro by randoms and everyone in the street seemed to be standing still and talking on mobiles, we were getting kinda creeped out. Sure enough, the Metro station was surrounded by riot police and there were about 30 armoured vans with lights and sirens out the front labeled National Security. Woo bomb threat. On a happier note we decided that this is appropriate subject for Katharine to mention to her parents when she shows them her 600 dollar phone bill. "Hey mum and dad, there was a bomb threat right near us today, PHONE BILL, but aren't you glad I'm safe?"

Also, my camera keeps screwing up, which is just great for touristing, you see. And my cold is miraculously better. I think my body must have used up its snot reserves yesterday when I went through almost an entire box of tissues.

--Emma

David Bloody Lean

2008-12-18T20:40:00.004+11:00

It would seem to me that the only way to settle this is a breadstick duel at the Eiffel Tower at dawn. You gonna get stabbed.

Nayways, I'm hanging out for the holidays. During school time, Marine is ALWAYS working, it's incredible. Hopefully when the holidays roll around, we'll get to do some fun stuff. And I'll get to sleep in some more. I'm constantly yawning in the middle of classes.

You know what's fun? Two hours of sport outside is fun. Yesterday we went out to some random oval to play soccer. And they gets marks for P.E., it counts towards the BAC. It was freezing when we left, but I tried to think positivley, that we'd be running around, playing soccer, it'd be fine. After getting changed into hoodies and tracksuit pants (I was wearing so many layers, I must've looked like a snowman), we went out onto the oval to do some warm-ups. You know when you stub your toe and it's cold so it hurts even more? Imagine that, but worse, cause you're kicking a ball around, and it's the middle of winter. Painful. It probably didn't help that there was fog everywhere. They started doing this exercise, but what the purpose or rules were I had no idea. Then we played some mini matches before we finished. By the time we actually got home, I couldn't feel my fingers or my toes at all.

Today in english we started watching a movie, Ryan's Daughter. Directed by the great David Lean, of course. So I start laughing, and look crazy. I probably looked even more crazy when I started cracking up cause Robert Mitchum was in it. I'm not really sure what the point of it is, but they're in Ireland during WWI, and Robert Mitchum is the middle-aged school teacher marrying the bartender's somewhat annoying daughter. He'd so get arrested for it today. We were watching another film in spanish the other day, about mexian refugees trying to get across the border. One of the people smugglers called this old woman a 'fat cow' and the whole class thought it was hilarious.

I don't care what you say, I still really want a brownie.
--Caitlin

Bring it.

2008-12-17T02:37:00.008+11:00

DAMMIT SUBCONSCIOUS COPYING. But yes. I'm going to beat you up with a baguette so hard that I'll be able to spread you on it afterwards and sell it in the street. You're going to meet my friend pain.

Hee hee hee.

Asides aside, we got to sleep in today because there was no sport. I kept having strange dreams about missing train stops on the City Loop and also that I got Sim a carrot for her birthday. No more Starbursts before bed for me. But sleeping in was good. Why is there no sport today every day?

Yesterday after school we went to Phillipe and Thibault's house again to decorate their giant-ass Christmas tree while pumping songs such as ABBA and Mambo No. 5 and various French songs I didn't know at full volume from their stereo. The tree was so giant-ass that we had to throw tinsel at it and wrap the lights around with a two metre long extendable hedge cutter from the second floor. And there were enough lights to drown a horse (Mmm, mixed metaphor). I was rather amused by a collection of bear ornaments which had all broken and looked exceedingly demonic. I found their collection of Wii games and kept laughing at Twilight Princess in French. Phillipe said it was his favourite game and I said I thought Ocarina of Time was better, which caused him to amusedly say "Ocarina of Time" over and over again until Mathilde told him to shut up, at which point he said "We're talking about Zelda. Please." and went back to repeating "Ocarina of Time" with a couple of "Super Smash Brothers Brawl"s chucked in there for good measure. And people here know Muse! This is such a nice change from my mum's "What's Muse?" and my brother's "What the hell is Muse?" and my sister's "What's a muse?"

I do not understand I word of eco. The teacher wrote what I thought was "walrus" on the board, but that only counted as a word I understood of eco until Juliette told me it was "Walras" and that Walras was a neo-classical economist. Not even she knows what this means. In English we watched a video on the stolen generation (the literal french translation of this is "stolen babies") which would have been fine if it hadn't had this irritating happy marimba tune that kept playing. I'm pretty sure I (not Juliette, she was timetabled differently) wagged history today, but screw that, because it's boring and French-centric (Frenchric?). Instead we went to see her friend Quentin again at his school in Rich Land. They had Nooi for lunch. Nooi is like the best idea ever. Also, the dorms at his school smell like the shops in Maling Road. Fun fact: The name "Quentin" does not amuse me here because it is pronounced Kon-ta.

Florent (Unfortunately his name is not Florence! This makes me sad) the thinks-I'm-pretty class nerd guy came up to me today as I was trying to leave and said in very deliberate and accented english "Because I don't get many chances to practice my English, is it OK if I give you my address?" and I was like "Uuuuuuhhhhhhh...?" I think my face when I came out of the classroom must have been pretty damned funny 'cos I was so confusedly freaked out and at the same time highly amused. Juliette has told me to tell him that I am here to speak french. At least I only have one day left of classes before we go to Brittany, where he cannot wait after class to ask me if I am going to the mass (???)

I think I have a cold. This is not surprising as every day seems to be colder than the last. Juliette keeps saying she's cold. EVEN THE LOCALS ARE FREEZING. WHY WOULD YOU LIVE HERE? WHY NOT DRAG THE COUNTRY SOUTH SOMEWHAT? I miss being able to feel my nose.

--Emma

* * !

2008-12-16T19:08:00.005+11:00

No, no you are not going slighty music crazy, because that's what I said to you the other day, word for word. You wanna take this to the snow?

Anyways, guess who slept in this morning? When I woke up, Marine had already left for school. Oops. She comes home for lunch, so I can go with her then. But now everyone else has gone to school/ work, so I'm kinda the only one in the house. Oh well, I might as well upload some photos then. Oh crap, the phone's ringing, am I supposed to get it? This is worse than that time at Nicola's house. Because it's in French.

By the way, my phone is finally fixed now, yays.

Nayways, photos:

As promised, the crazy french keyboard. It's not qwerty, it's azerty

Though I really am quite a fan of this little guy

The snow. It felt like a Charles Dickens novel. But in France.

The gardens at the Chateau de Versialles. MASSIVE.

One of the bedrooms at the Grand Trianon. For when the King was tired after his lavish party and couldn't be bothered going all the way back to the Palace. It is a long way.

Me out the front of the gardens. To prove I'm still alive.

There's some guy here whose whole job is just to keep all the clocks at the palace (and there are heaps) running right and at the right time. That's all he does.

Can you imagine? Napoleon! Playing pool!

I couldn't resist. Me, taking MySpace mirror pictures, at the Chateau de Versailles.

What'd you reckon, nice place for the formal?

Remember, this isn't even the main palace.

THIS PLACE HAS ITS OWN SHEEP.

Marie Antionette had her own little farming village built out here. For fun.

Still have a massive hankering for Brownies.
--Caitlin

* *!

2008-12-15T08:34:00.004+11:00

No Gossip Girl. No Desperate Housewives. No Asians. No Dragon Ball Z, and certainly no brownies! Get. Your. Own.

To those of you who have no idea what that was about, Caitlin got to berate me in her last post and now it's my turn. Hmmph. Don't think I haven't forgotten Aerobidorf, Caitlin. He's going to get his second coming if things keep going on like this. I mean it.

In other news, I think I'm getting slightly better! I managed to argue philosophy with the dad yesterday (he is obsessed with my vegetarianism, being a doctor, and keeps coming up behind me and saying "It is ridiculous!") I swear, Juliette must think I'm the world's quietest person because I don't say anything except for "Oui" "Non" "OK" and "Cool" because I don't know how. Curse you, banal learning topics. I can talk about the weather fine. Still can't follow conversations though.

I think I may be going slightly music crazy. I woke up today with "Bob the Kelpie," a song from a video we had when we were little, in my head and it will not stop. This would not be so bad if the lyrics didn't keep cracking me up during class. They go something along the lines of "Oooohhh, sheep are cute, sheep are beaut, sheep are soft and curly" and Don Spencer and his guitar continue to pop up and say things like "C'mon Bob!" at rather regular intervals. Now there are sheep (correction: Sheeeeeeeeeeep) all over my economy notes. And I started playing bass on my scarf without realising. I want my bass.

Spanish today amused me somewhat, because they had to do an oral in which they went to a fortune teller. This resulted in a lot of people wearing shawls on their heads, and lots of "oohhh... oohhhh"ing from whoever was playing the fortune teller. Oh, and French guys are crazy. One of them wears silver nailpolish and another stole my Flower Clock watch off my desk when I was in the corridor, put it on, and then asked me the time. Then, everyone must think I'm crazy, with the don't like coffee, non-smoking, don't eat meat, don't like alcohol, don't wear makeup thing I've got going. Man, when I put it like that, even I think I'm weird. Juliette tried to teach me how to put on eyeliner today and I failed miserably, looking vaguely like a goth who hadn't slept in weeks, 'cos I kept rubbing my eyes.

My mum sent through my report today. The comments for english, french and history made me snicker, and I don't know how I got that smart-ass prize with marks like that. But why come no Lit? Is it a Year 12 thing? Do Year 12s not get reports?

Also, after conversing with Marnie, I wish to have a Boonie doll here. That is all.

--Emma

City of Blinding Lights

2008-12-15T07:49:00.003+11:00

Emma, stop noticing what I'm noticing. The lack of asians here is indeed disturbing. But I saw one today! She asked me to take a picture of her with her camera, and I'm all like 'finally!'. Other things that are weird here, people are always walking around with baguettes, I'm freaked out by the number of people in shorts, everyone rides bikes without helmets, there are grown men riding around on those push scooters, and everyone writes using fountain pens. Also, Dragon Ball Z has to be the funniest show ever in french. I'm glad no one else was in the room, I was cracking up.

Nayways, yesterday we had a christmas party at Marine's grandparents house, cause we're spending actual christmas with her other Grandparents. They live in this really fancy appartment in Paris. After lunch (which was huge), Marine, her sister Clémence and I went out to a nearby shopping strip. There are boutiques everywhere. There seems to be this one shop that's their favourite, everyone keeps talking about it.

Last night, two of Marine's friends came over to watch a movie. You know what we watched? Star Wars. They're all like "Do you know it?", and I'm just like "Oh, yeah, I know it. Very well.". We even watched it in english, with english subtitles. I ended up having to translate gungan into french. They thought Jar Jar was funny. Phsst. They also reckoned Anakin was really cute, and I'm like "But they sense the fear in him!".

Then today, the mum and dad took me to see a part of the Chateau de Versailles. I say a part, because the whole thing is brain-bustingly massive. As in, they have their own sheep massive. We didn't go to the main building, we went into one of the smaller houses, used for parties and stuff. Even still, it was pretty big. The gardens are massive. Photos still coming, I haven't got time to upload them now. The whole thing is so lavish, no wonder thsoe peasants were so pissed off. That plus the fact that it's really cold. They were talking on the news today about all the snow storms around France.

I dreamed I was making brownies last night. Now I really want brownies.
--Caitlin

"Chuck Norris fait pleurer les oignons"

2008-12-14T23:28:00.004+11:00

We have passed the one week mark. The point of no return, if you will. And Nicola: this post is short because I have been relaxing.

Yesterday we went to Juliette's friends Phillipe and Thibault's (spelling?) house and played, as she put it, "4 hours of false guitar and false drums" which can be roughly be translated as "Guitar Hero World Tour". They must be gluttons for punishment 'cos Juliette kept making me sing - the word "wail" is more accurate, I think - I am very sorry for what I did to your songs, Paramore and Survivor. And I think I gave myself RSI from playing Hey Man Nice Shot on difficult. Ow.

As Caitlin said, French TV is full of awesome leftovers from the 80s. Today I watched some of Walker, Texas Ranger, which is like Baywatch set in the South but with lots of shots of Chuck Norris glaring at things, and one particularly awesome scene where shots of guys running around with guns shooting things were interspersed with this one close-up shot of a manatee's face and another of a gorilla eating a banana. I asked them if they had Chuck Norris jokes here and they said no, but I think they thought it was a TV show. Wouldn't that be amusing. He could be like Kochie.

Two strange things I have noticed:
1) There are no Asians here. I have seen like 3. It's bizarre.
2) French people like to ask you how good you are at things. It's all the public-report thing's fault!
Speaking of reports, I still haven't heard anything about mine. Hmph. I want to see what Hutchie says. Oh, and good luck to everyone for... today? Tomorrow? Whatever. Bet I forget.

I'm going back to reading now even though I'll get cuffed on the back of the head again for reading in English. Renesmée Carlie Cullen is like the stupidest name for a baby ever, apart from Albus Severus.

--Emma

"...A Short and Jocular Conversation..."

2008-12-13T05:58:00.010+11:00

Mmm. Double bass porn.

English gets more and more weird. I corrected some of the essays during Bio and they were so cute: one of them finished by saying they thought I seemed cool, and another contained the sentence "she likes music therefore her favourite song is Beds Are Burning by Midnight Oil." The teacher is so shocked that I'm completely fine with us talking about the stolen generation for 2 hours - she keeps apologising every two minutes for "dishonouring" my country and I keep telling her Australians are probably the world's least patriotic people and no-one cares, but this doesn't seem to be getting through. She didn't believe me when I said Australia was a continent. This got argued for quite a while before I gave up and blamed the Australian school system for biasing us and let that be the end of it. Also apparently Aborigines wear mud to protect them from dingoes, and they have "scarrification" across their chests (it was OCHRE, but I didn't feel like arguing another point with her). She played a tape of a woman with an American accent going on and on about the shame caused by her ancestors in her country of Australia. And the photocopies (pronounced Frank-style, according to the teacher) are awesomely outdated and funny and have bad pictures of Peter Garrett on them. In the spare period we called Kathryn/Catherine's boyfriend to ask if Australia was a continent or not. I think we put him off slightly by the fact that we were in hysterics and kept asking "but where's New Zealand?" and also the fact that it was 1 in the morning in Australia. But it is a continent.

Did you know: In France, there are lots of different flavours of Fanta, and some are inspired by the fun of Mexico (that's what it said on the can)? Normal Fanta is yellow and tastes almost the same but a little more... natural. Also sandwhiches are big. Like, whole baguette big. AND THEY EAT BOAR. Unless they were just teasing me, drop bear style. I still want them to roast a boar though. With an apple in its mouth. "Are you still going to donate that million dollars, sir?"

The class scandal of today is that one of the guys (class nerd) apparently thinks I'm pretty. This was the source of much attention during English, where everyone kept asking me questions about him which I barely understood and would answer, then they'd all explode with excited talk, and I'd have to demand they explain to me precisely what I'd said yes or no to. I hope no-one brings it up tomorrow, it's highly embarrassing. But they so will. And Marnie, you are hearby warned.

Me and Kathryn/Catherine went back to the Champs Elysées after (technically during, since we sort of left when we felt like it and not when we were supposed to) school, and went and bought stuff just 'cos we could, even though it's super expensive. We found this hyper-stylish shop that had a corner filled with hot pink tutus for 85 euros (170 Aussie dollars) which I kind of felt like buying because that was the kind of mood I was in. Run-into-Harrods-and-buy-a-300-thread-count-linen-set-for-
-no-reason type mood. Luckily I didn't. Nespresso has a huge shop on the Champs Elysées, with a doorman. We had chestnut soup (yes, it is soup made from chestnuts) for dinner. And we went to see Juliette's dance lessons again. Ballet is pretty :)
--Emma

Oh AND, because I said I would: Juliette is not terrible. She is, in fact, very nice. And she eats rubbers

TGIF?

2008-12-12T23:29:00.002+11:00

Marine was amazed when people in our Maths class were in listening to their iPods while working. I'm amazed that they have a two hour maths test. Last thing on a friday afternoon. Then again, they have to come in to school on a saturday morning as well, so it doesn't really mean much.

Today is Marine's little brother's seventh birthday (Jean-Edward, but I'm not sure how you spell it). He's the french Liam, I swear. His grandparents were over last night for birthday cake, but instead of cake, he wanted hamburgers. So we had birthday burger instead. He got some pokemon cards, and was running around the house going "Darkrai!", "Darkrai!", "Darkrai!". Then when I came down for breakfast this morning, he was sitting there, waiting for me to say 'happy birthday'. Except in french, obviously.

The teachers here are all pretty nice. We had economics this morning, and the teacher came up to me and started talking to me in english, and she was all like "Do you understand this?", and I'm like "Only a little, I don't study economics", and so she's all like "That's okay. It's boring.". Then later, she was like "what french meats do you like?", and I'm just like "......". Then she started talking about foie gras (which I have eaten, though strangely no criossants yet), and was asking if it has another name in english, and everyone in the class just started trying to say foie gras with an english accent and laughing.

In geography, the teacher brought in this projector and had up a map of the world. Though I didn't realise what is was at first, because it wasn't a normal map, everything was drawn as basic shapes. As in, North America was a triangle. And we were a square. How is this educational?

French TV is hilarious. I was channel surfing last night, and happened to see Starsky and Hutch (as in OLD Starsky and Hutch), The Simpsons (where Marge sounds like she swallowed a cat and then a cheese grater) the Pink Panther, and best of all, Knight Rider, knozn here as K 2000. If there is one thing that can make 70's style Hoff even better, it's being dubbed over in French. They also have this weird panel show on what I think is MTV, and the other day they had Samuel L. Jackson in a funny hat and glasses. He was talking about Shaft (Now that's gonna be a great movie) with Scarlett Johansen and lady-whose-name-I-can't-remember. Then they went to this segment basically called "box of questions". Hugh Jackman was in the box, but I don't know what the question was because they talk very fast and I was laughinf very hard. They were also covering what I think was the 'Twilight' premiere. They were showing all these screaming girls pressed up against the barricades around the red carpet, and then this one screaming guy. It's crazy.

Well, I think that's about it for now. It's been kinda half-snowing on and off all day, it's so cold. Someone send me some hot chocolate and some tim tams.

Trees with lights!

2008-12-12T08:51:00.004+11:00

Last night me and Juliette and her dad went driving around Paris to see the lights. GOD, the Galeries Lafayette must need their own power station, I swear. And they have try hard Myer windows. Clearly Myer is better than Prestigious French Shopping Centre.

SPE ANGLAIS (Specialist English) IS THE BEST SUBJECT EVER.
Ahem. It's like Lit 1+2 but with accents. The class is almost all in English, and the vocabulary is amazing - they keep using words like 'retrospective' and 'dramatic irony' and 'mortified.' If the teacher doesn't think they have used sophisticated vocabulary she stops them and makes them think of better word. This lead to much smothered laughter from me when the teacher suggested that instead of "Jim has not capitalised on his talents," they say "Jim did not make the most of his endowments." She wrote this on the board too, meaning I had to keep staring at my page until she rubbed it off because I couldn't look at it without laughing. It doesn't help that they're reading Tennessee Willian's The Glass Menagerie. Picture a guy with a really strong accent saying things like "Hey there Mr. Lightbulb!" and "Why, I'm as comfortable as a cow!" Oh man. I'm laughing all over again at that one. They took 10 mintues at the start discussing how the word 'gay decievers' was actually TW secretly saying that he was gay 'cos he never told anyone. I didn't have the heart to tell them that it was just slang.
I had two hours of French in which I could not concentrate at all (Why do they need to know the ENTIRE history of theatre? WHY?) I did concentrate for the part where they were reading from this play called 'The Rhinoceros' or something. This consisted of one character saying something, and another saying, at random intervals, "Oh, a rhinoceros!" Best play ever. Also mentioned was En Attendait Godot. I had to stuff my hand in my mouth when that came up. French makes everything amusing.
I also had two hours of class with a Seconde class (year 10 equivalent) who are absolutely feral and made the biggest fuss about me ever. The teacher seemed to spend the entire class pointing out that the author of the book had used lots of words like "today" and "yesterday" and that there were two verbs in the first sentence which gave it some sort of rythmn. I sure hope that isn't their Lit equivalent because I'm pretty sure all that might be a coincidence.
After school I caught the metro with the other Aussie at the school, Kathryn (Catherine? Not sure) who is super nice. We decided to go shopping on the Champs Elysées, just 'cos, but we couldn't find it until about 10 mins before we had to leave. Everyone I tell this to is incredulous, partially because the Champs Elysées is super expensive but mainly because it's A HUGE ROAD right next to the Metro station (yes I said metro station) and how could you lose it? We only found it when it started to get dark and I saw the lights in the trees. This caused us to run towards the roundabout, shouting "Trees with lights! Trees with lights!" We're going to try going shopping properly tomorrow.
And me and Juliette's twin Mathilde went to see Hunger this evening. I thought Steve McQueen was dead?
--Emma

I love english. So much.

2008-12-12T02:54:00.002+11:00

What, so I don't write for, like, one day and I must be sick of this? Thanks for your faith in me. I just havn't been on a computer since then.

English class is the best thing ever. They had two lessons of it today (though not as a double, which is kinda weird) and I spent the whole time trying not to crack up for fear of insulting everyone. First they were listening to this tape, which had some guy from Texas (though he had no texan accent) and some lady from Geneva (with this terrible french accent) having a conversation on a plane to Heathrow, both saying the dumbest things ever. It didn't help that the tape kept jumping. One of the girls in the class, Victoire, turned around and was all like "how do you spell hiccups?" and I'mm all like 'kay, weird question but whatever'. Then I look up and see that the teacher has written 'hickups' on the board.
In the second lesson, they were doing all these activities with phoenetic spelling, which I can't understand. But he kept getting me to say words so they could hear the pronounciation. He was asking about saying 'thank-you' in Australia, and he's trying to say 'ooroo', and everyone's staring at me, and I'm like 'yeah, no one says that. No one.'. I swear, one of the funniest things in the world is listening to a class of french people trying to say 'boots' and 'puffing'. But then again, they think it's hilarious to ask me to say 'baby'. Between the teacher's american accent, the english of the people on the tape and my australian, I don't see how they're going to learn anything.

In France, you get wednesday afternoon off, so yesterday we went to the shopping center. There are Christmas lights everywhere in France. There are lights on every tree everywhere. I wouldn't be surprised if I saw a dog covered in lights around here. There were also these giant displays everywhere- right in the middle of the shopping center, there was this giant castle with animatronic bears all over it. They really like their christmas over here.

By the way, if anyone sees Telstra walking down the street, can you give them a good kick up the bum for me? We've called them twice to put international roaming on my phone, and it's still not working. Photos still coming, I don't know if the school library people would like me showing up with my camera and all the cords.

--Caitlin

Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun!

2008-12-10T23:57:00.003+11:00

So there is sun today, but it's still minus a billion degrees. And also I can't SEE the sun because the buildings are too high, so it doesn't count. So no sun. France has no sun.

At the start of the day they had some sort of class thing where they got their averages for their notes for the term... or something. It is pretty much the worst thing ever, I think. This guy sits up the front of the class and calls out names one by one and reads their reports in front of everyone. And the person who is getting the marks has to stand up while they're being read out and everyone looks at them. I suppose it's good for the people who get good marks to get some recognition or something, but oohhh, the people that didn't.
Sample: Teacher Dude (keep in mind that this guy has one seriously cold voice): "Jean-Paul Jacques" (I don't remember who this was so that is now his name.)
(JPJ stands up. TOTAL SILENCE for about 5 seconds)
TD (eyes narrowed) - "11.3. (more pause) Bof. (Rough translation: "Meh," but more dismissively formal. The teacher looked absolutely disdainful when he said it)
TD then goes on to bawl out the guy for having un "unacceptable" number of sicknesses. He told Juliette's friend Heloise that from now on she had to sit up the front because she wasn't good enough to sit up the back. I honestly expected him to take a cane out from behind his desk and start giving 10 lashes to anyone who got below 12. So yeah, I spent most of the class up the back with my eyebrows almost up to my hairline. Luckily Juliette came top of the class.

I can't get my head around that English (i.e. book study with Ms Bourne and the like) is called French. I don't care if they speak another language. They can just deal. They are studying a play called "Lorenzaccio" which I do not understand. There is a marquise in it and at the end someone called Alexandre dies. Despite spending two lessons on it no-one has read aloud from it, hardly anyone seems to have their copy with them, and the teacher has only mentioned one or two quotes. This confuses me. I think they have all read it at home but what is the point of that? How ca you study a text when they just get lectures on which of the characters are ambiguous and which are not?

Oh, and Juliette forgot to give me the key again. Luckily a nice lady let me in.

--Emma

Snoooooooooooooooooooow!

2008-12-10T03:37:00.004+11:00

Well that's pretty self-explanatory, isn't it?

First of all, they have tests for sport here. Like, volleyball tests. We had a volleyball test.

We had English today and it was bizarre. Before the class, one of Juliette's friends was doing her homework, and I tried to help, but I had NO IDEA. Sample question (N.B. There is no list of words supplied): Fill in the blanks. Charles Someone _____________ was the first Irish Prime Minister. __________ his goal was to liberate Ireland.

Huh??

And why would you want to learn about Irish politicians anyway?

The English teacher has the strangest accent I've ever heard. When we were standing up (you stand up when the teacher comes in, like they're Dr. Schnagl, or Jesus) she scanned everyone's faces, settled on me, and said with a really weird look on her face "Hell-oooooOOOOOO". She then spent about 5 minutes telling Juliette off ("I AM NOT PLEASED" over and over and over while me and her kept catching each other's eye and trying so hard not to laugh) for not telling the teacher that I was coming (she did, by the way) because now of course Madame had to start the unit on Australia and she didn't have the notes. Cue Emma-standing-up-the-front-answering-questions-for-the-entire-lesson time. I almost lost it when the teacher asked me to "say a few words on Midnight Oil." She was so cut when I told her that they weren't a band anymore. I demonstrated Peter Garret dancing and I think I gave them the wrong date for the apology. And now they have to write an essay about me.

Afterwards, Juliette was like "You can take the bus home while I have evaluations" and I'm all like "k thanks bye" and then halfway down the street I realise she forgot to give me both the key to the house AND the code to the elevator. Luckily after about 10 mins I found her bestie Lucille, who found me Juliette's twin Mathilde, who stayed me with until Juliette got out. THEN Juliette gave me the key and the code and I took the bus to the Rue Alleray stop like she told me to BUT Rue Alleray didn't start for another 100m which confused me for another 10 mins and THEN I couldn't open the elevator (how was I to know you have to take off your gloves?) but the bin man told me how. And THEN, best of all, after all that time of going "crap crap crap crap crap" I set the alarm off. Three times. And when you set the alarm off some guy calls you to make sure it wasn't a mistake, and he was asking me ALL these things I didn't understand, or didn't know, like the dad's mobile number and what the password was and I couldn't say anything because I was crying and laughing soooo hard at the same time and also YOU try saying in french that you set off the alarm by accident when you tried to get the key out of the door. Luckily the mum came home during the third time.

Oh, fun times.

--Emma
Contrary to popular belief, the all-caps words in this post do NOT make a secret message. They are just there for emphasis. ELEPHANT.

Hey Oh

2008-12-10T02:39:00.002+11:00

You know what's a great start to the day? Walking to school in the freezing dark and then doing maths for an hour, despote the sun not being up. The maths teacher doesn't try to talk to me, which is good, because I have no idea what's going on. All I can understand from history is that they're talking about the third world. Also, she keeps saying 'Fidel', but I'm not sure if that's what she's actually saying. Oh, and the Suez Canal. Spanish is the most randm thing ever, they were doing a listening exercise that went for like 15 MINUTES. I can pick out the occasional word, cause it's similar to French, but apart from that, my mind wanders, and I find myself thinking a lot about Zorro. Economics is about as exciting as maths, and I have equally no idea what's going on. All I could gather from philosophy is that time is circular and happiness doesn't exist.

Marine told me that after lunch, we have two hours of playing soccer, outside. But it's freezing cold, I reply. We will get sick. That's why you're supposed to bring tracksuit pants, leggings, and a jumper to play in, apparently. But then, we were walking home from lunch, it started to snow. Very exciting, and pretty, but cold. We cannot play soccer outside for two hours, I say, it is snowing. No, apparently you can be forced to, in this random country.
But then we are told that sport is cancelled after all. A cheer goes up from me, Marine, and all her friends (who are very nice, by the way. One of them is called Berenice and she has the exact same coat that I do). As an extra bonus, we all get to go home early. We walk past some dude who is wearing SHORTS while I've got on a long sleeved top, a jumper, my coat, my leggings, my pants, gloves, a beanie and two scarves. And I was still cold. Thankfully, Marine says it only snows about two times in winter. Let's hope the other one is Christmas.
(P.S. photos coming soon)
--Caitlin

"Aaah! Tahiti Bob!"

2008-12-09T06:12:00.005+11:00

Today was my first day at school and I had lots of fun and my mummy gave me a vegemite sandwhich for lunch and I made lots of friends.
OK, 5 year old journal writing aside, we're in the same classroom ALL DAY and it looks like something out of Sovereign Hill except you can see the Eiffel Tower out the window. Today I learnt why no-one in Australia uses blackboards anymore. We had french history (words caught included "Communism" "Bourgeoise" and "EXACTLY LIKE STALIN"), Spanish (the teacher lets me read in class), economics (the first half of which was spent discussing Microsoft, Nike and Converse) I made a graph using inverse functions and I don't even know what they are. I thought it was awesome but Juliette said it was crap. Just because it had Bill Gates in a box sliding down the left side doesn't mean it has no merit as a piece of mathematical working.I was disappointed that we didn't have English. Maybe tomorrow.
TV here is awesome. I fell off the couch laughing when an ad for "Easy Off Bang" came on. MTV is a funny channel. Do you know that they have a show that's just two people battling it out for a thousand dollars cash by being the best at insulting each other's mums? And also a show concentrating on people's butts called "Shake ton booty." The tagline is priceless - "Plus de booty, tous les jours". Also, Sideshow Bob is here called "Tahiti Bob"
I've been to like twenty people's houses already; Juliette has about a billion friends. My first night we went to her friend's house and met his friends.
Me and Juliette are bonding over my brother. She thinks he's the hottest thing since sliced bread.
--Emma

My first day at school :)

2008-12-09T01:49:00.003+11:00

Marine has two hours of Latin now, so she kindly suggested that, after two hours of philosophy, she take me to the library so I could go on the computer. I understnd how she felt when she was here. Except her english is better then my french.

We left for school under cover of darkness. The sun didn't come up until we actually started classes. It's about a 10-15 minute walk from Marine's house to her school, and man is it freezing out there. Here, you don't tend to change classroms much, we've pretty much been in the same classroom all day. We had History first, the teacher asked me what history I studied and seemed very shocked when I said it wasn't compulsory. I managed to understand a few words, 'Cuba', 'communism', 'third world'. Then we went to spanish, and pretty much the only things I know about spanish come from Vertigo. So I just sang that in my head for an hour. Then we had english, which was hilarious. The teacher likes to talk very loudly, bangs his hand on the desk when he wants quiet, and speaks english with a strong american accent. They were discussing their homework, which was a bunch of questions on this extract from Barack Obama's memoirs (except the teacher kept pronouncing it barrack). Then he kept asking me questions in english. Weird questions. Like the etymology of 'keen'. And about 'the last straw', and straw, and straw hats, and hay, and hay bales, and Jesus in the manger. And how to define 'obnoxious', and other really random words. Then the word 'fellow' came up, and he, in trying to explain it, kept saying 'fellowship', and 'smeagol' and 'precious'. Most fun I've had all day. Which was good, cause afterwards we had maths, which made no sense to me whatsoever. I think derivatives might have been in there somewhere, but I don't know.

All the kids go home for lunch, so we walked back home, had some lunch, and then walked back. No wonder everyone smokes here, it's so cold. We just had two hours of philosophy, from which I could gather maybe the odd word. I heard Descartes a few times, and 'freedom', 'nature', 'rights' and 'knowledge'. I think actually going to double latin may have finished me off. They just sit there for hours on end, just taking notes while the teachers talk. And then some kid opened the window, because he was next to the heater and too hot. I better be so damn fluent by the end of this trip.
--Caitlin

Where the Caitlin is at

2008-12-08T03:45:00.007+11:00

!!!!!!! Check me out, exclamation marks !!!!!!!

So, I bet you're all really excited to hear what I've been doing, right? Well, guess what; you're going to hear it anyway. No-one's forcing you to read this. And I've got a lot to say.

Right, well if you're still here, you're obviously very bored, so you can just deal. As Emma said, sitting down for 16 hours really hurts. Singapore airport was hilarious, with it's vodka masquerade parties, giant Disney statues, flora and koi pond. I was muchly dissapointed by the lack of wasian Jessica Alba in that Forbidden Kingdom movie, I swear she was in it. Not to mention that boring lady replacing other one in the chinese Mummy. She was so boring and english that I went to sleep. Yetis aren't fun unless they're snowboarding.

Seeing as we arrived in France at about 7:00 am and it looked like the middle of the night, I felt it only fair that I slept for most of the day. Which I did. Marine's house is awesome, though. All the houses in Versailles are at least three storeys tall. There's all these stairs, it's like being in a super bunk bed. It's really quiet, too. Possibly because it's not wedged between a train line and a main road. Marine also has three sisters and one brother, which is just freaking me out. But the boy is honestly the french Liam. It's scary. Except instead of Star Wars, it's Pokémon. (There's an é right here on the keyboard!)

Yesterday, after my day long nap, we went to the circus. Thankfully I had a shower first, I smelt so bad there was no polite way to tell me how bad I smelt. The circus wasn't as tripped out as Cirque du Soleil, but iyt was pretty weird. The ringmaster was a rabbit, and they had this dude who looked like he'd stepped straight out of Guitar Hero. Kiss-esque make up, black leather, and then he actuallt started playing the guitar, too, it looked just like on of the Wii Guitar Hero 3 ones. And then there were these singer ladies who looked like, for those who know, a cross between Dee Vasquez and Lamiroir. We didn't get home until midnight, what a way to get into a different time zone.

Today, we went to the grandparent's place to celebrate the dad's birthday and the little boy's birthday, though I don't know when either of them actually are. All the suburbs out here look like something out of a movie, it's so picturesque. And when you're driving through a park/ forest and it's all foggy, it looks like the start of a horror movie. It was my first massive french lunch, which was a bit intimidating, seeing as it was with all the grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles and godparents too. First there was this weird dessert-y type thing, which was apparently tomato juice and guacmole (no clue as to spelling). Then there was the foie gras, which I undertook to at least try. Then the meat course, then the cheese course (as the mum told me, a meal without meat is not a meal), then some cake, and then come chocolate. They were all like "would you like some wine?", "would you like some champagne?". I'm just trying my best not to offend anyone.

So now, here I am, I'm sorry that I rambled on for so long, it's just been a long two days. For those of you who have stuck with this post the whole way through, let me express my gratitude in photo form.

Someone's watching you...

The view from my room. A View to a Kill.....?

Emma is full of joy!

The weird statue at Singapore airport

Look! Look where we were! On an airship, no less!

Emma's feelin' that ol' Disney magic.

Sorry about the length.
--Caitlin

Et voila mon passport

2008-12-07T04:31:00.007+11:00

A little picture I drew while I was waiting for Juliette to get out of the shower. It's pretty crap - there's no scanner here so I can't plan things out and then go over them in Flash like I normally do. And don't worry, I suspect this whole I'MA DRAW A PICTURE thing will wear off soon as is the common way, and you can all breathe a sigh of relief. Just bear with me for now, I haven't slept in ages.

Us and Samuel L., we pretty tight.

Spent quite a while on the plane watching movies about Wasians, including The Mummy 3 - woo, immortal Brendan Fraser - and The Forbidden Kingdom, starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li and someone who was not Jessica Alba, and her amazing technicolour hair. And by technicolour I mean white and extendable.
Sitting on your butt for 16 straight hours is not fun. Needless to say, when we finally got to Charles de Gaulle, we were fuulll ooof jooooooooooooy. Photos of that later. I happen to have left my camera cord... somewhere.
So far I've gone out with Juliette's friend Marine to a café and then back to her house to watch Les Choristes and eat an amazing amount of lollies. We've been eating nutella and bread for about an hour now. Screw clothing and presents for everyone; when it's time to go home I'm robbing a boulangerie and filling my suitcase with baguettes. Oh and it's like 6 degrees. And I suck at French EXCLAMATION MARK
There is no exclamation mark on this keyboard.

Greetings from Asia!

2008-12-06T01:14:00.002+11:00

First half of flight is over, and now we're posting live from Singapore Airport. It's 10:16 at night here, and about 1:15 back with you guys. This place is weird, there are giant disney characters everywhere and a koi pond too.
So far Emma has managed to lose:-
Her ticket
Her jumper
Her jumper again
Her wallet
Her coat
All in the space of five minutes.
Some random non-english speaking guy had to cme up and return her jumper one of the times. Better than the Canberra trip.
No snake on plane sightings as of yet. No Samuel L Jackson either. Most dissapointing.
That's about it then. We have anotherm long plane trip left until we get to Paris. And we are going oorrrrrf.

There's a man. There's a man with a gun.

2008-12-03T11:53:00.008+11:00

Who doesn't want an edible gun anyway?

2 DAYS. WE'RE GOING TO FRANCE.
Deal with it. I am.

I went into school today to get my bass, only for the alarm to go off the second I got out of the car. Getting stuck in the PAC for about half an hour with Pippa and Argine and Year 5 Person is just great.
Argine: So why do they have lockdowns anyway?
Mrs Gilbert: In case going out to the evac point isn't such a great idea. For example, if there was someone with a gun in the school
Me: Terrorists
Mrs Gilbert: Or a chemical spill.
Pippa: What about a serial rapist? You know, 'cos we're a girl's school?
Year 5 Person: I know aaaalll about that stuff.
General hilarity.
Question: How do you tell a serial rapist by sight? Does Schnags watch over the school, going "Either that's a gun in his pocket, or he's just happy to see the girls. SOUND THE ALARM!"?

--Emma

Posted to your forehead

2008-11-30T17:59:00.000+11:00

The first post. Hoorays!

Yeah, we figured this would be the easiest way to keep in touch with everyone while we're away. And really, there'd be no point in setting up seperate blogs, why would you read two blogs by the same person?

So yeah. I love blog.