January 4th Friday

For breakfast, I ran to the corner boulangerie and got a demi-baguette. Adrienne and I shared it topped with strawberry jam. It was much fresher than the croissants from the previous day.

I started out the day frustrated and in a rush. I had wanted to get an early start on our official nonsense in order to beat lines. I set my alarm for 7:30am and fell asleep. I woke up to Adrienne stirring in her bed. She said, “Oh, Casey. I’m sorry. I slept in.” I groggily picked up my clock and shot up in bed. It was 8:15. I swore at myself as I realized that while I set the alarm, I forgot to turn it on. We tried to rush through getting ready but still ended up at the US Embassy at 10:00. We took a ticket and sat down in the waiting area. I tried to let my temper with myself cool down. They called numbers at what seemed like a random order. At least they politely warned us of this in the flyer handed out at the security station. Finally our number was called and we went up to the window. I explained that we needed birth certificates translated into French and were told that we could get those here. Can anyone guess what the response to that might be? You guessed it. They don’t have translation services at the Embassy. I tried not to get too disappointed because I knew just the embassy hurdle had seemed too easy. Thankfully, the woman gave us a list of names of people who were qualified to do official translations for French courts.

As we left the embassy they had trouble finding our personal items that they’d taken at the front door. I was getting more concerned with each passing moment since they had confiscated my new digital camera. After a few more minutes of searching, they finally found our bag and returned our items. We headed back toward the metro. I made myself stop for a moment to admire the obelisk and Ferris wheel before heading underground.

We decided to make a few quick calls to translators from the list to find out what information we could. The first receptionist told me in a polite yet slightly snooty manner that we’d have to come into the office. The price was €50… per document. I hung up the phone feeling slightly deflated and we called a few more. We left messages a few places and found another that did translations for €40 per document. There are still more names on the list so hopefully we can find something cheaper. Does it really take that long to translate those few words?

I also checked emails and had received one from Françoise in regards to the email I had sent about the apartment. She told me that she had some people very interested in it but would let me know if the close didn’t occur on Sunday.

I suddenly realized that we had also wanted to go to Sciences Po and see if we could get our student cards. I rushed us out the door because it was less than an hour until the noon closing time. We made it to the office at 11:50. I was hoping to at least find out what we needed to do to get the cards. The man and woman finished their conversation and turned to us. They tried looking us up in the system but couldn’t find us. Then they figured that our information must be up in the international student office. We climbed two flights of stairs to the international student office. Three women turned blinking eyes toward us that obviously wondered why we were there. We asked about getting our cards. They basically told us, no, you should be able to go to the card office downstairs and pick them up. The whole thing was rather confusing. We thanked the ladies and left. I decided that we should just wait until orientation on Tuesday. They would certainly tell us how to get our cards and we wouldn’t have to waste our time.

I took a deep breath as we stepped out on the street and verified that I’d seen the Bon Marché nearby on the map. It’s a kind of department store with a large grocery store attached. I knew that food shopping always made me happy so we made our way there. The items were average verging expensive so we just bought a few things to get us through a few days. We also got some sandwiches from the sandwich area for lunch. I picked out a ham, butter, and cheese baguette sandwich that was cheaper. I knew I loved these kinds of sandwiches but I wasn’t sure about the appearance. It kind of looked bland. The people in front of us spent €235 on their cart of groceries. I could feel my eyes go wide before looking at my pitiful basket of five items. Man, I need to find out where that guy works.

We went home and had lunch. I heated up some of my most favorite soup in the entire world. It’s called legumes de soleil. Someday I’ll figure out how to make it and be able to feed my addiction even more. We had little bowls of soup and our sandwiches. The sandwich turned out to be creamy and absolutely delicious. The good meal picked up my mood.

We decided for a little quiet time in the room. I uploaded some pictures on my computer while Adrienne took a nap. The next thing I knew, my cell phone pulled me out of sleep. I must have dozed off. It was Jacques. He was calling about the apartment that I had been emailing about. My cell phone doesn’t get very good service and he got frustrated with me very quickly. He couldn’t hear me so he thought I was distracted or couldn’t understand. He switched to English and asked if we still wanted to see the apartment. I asked about the people who were interested in it before. He said, “Well it is very complicated and we thought you could come look at it.” Confused and a little fuzzy from my unexpected nap, I scheduled a meeting time with him at 3pm the next day, Saturday.

Since we were awake, we did a few things around the apartment before deciding to make some dinner from the groceries we bought. We made some spaghetti and got a demi-baguette. We tried to find an open nearby grocery store for some other things to go with the meal but only the boulangerie was open. After dinner Adrienne read her book French or Foe? while I chatted and looked around online. I tried looking for more housing and school information. I also got a confusing email from Heidi (a girl in my program) on the listserv telling Sarah that she and Amanda had been talking to Françoise and Jacques for a while and were definitely taking the apartment that was emailed around. I didn’t know why Jacques had made the appointment with me if it was such a done deal. I emailed Heidi and told her that I had this meeting and to let me know if they were going to take it.
Eventually we got ready for bed. I read my book for a while before falling asleep.