Another week in Lyon

We returned from Oktoberfest in time for my favourite day of the week in Lyon--Monday! Before heading out to Cosmo, I met up with Virginia for some dinner. We got these chicken tacos that were soo good! In France, their idea of a taco is a lot different than in the US. Tacos here are usually like a wrap and I get mine with chicken, some veggies, and curry sauce, and they always put fries on them too which I think is pretty cool. I actually really love the tacos here and think I will miss them when I go back to the US. After eating our tacos, we headed into Cosmo with a huge group of IBP students for another awesome Monday full of dancing on tables, €1 beer, and being with friends! While I was there, I met a cool guy from New York named Joel (but he pronounced it like Joe-elle). He said that he is going to be a famous movie star someday, so I got my picture with him in case! So if he makes it big, I can say I met him way back when! I stayed until the last group of us were leaving and when we were walking home, I started to feel sad that a month and a half has already gone by. But Natalia, who did a semester abroad before, comforted me by saying that even after the semester ends you will still stay friends with everyone and then you will have friends all over the world that you can visit!

at Cosmo on Monday with Sandra, Virginia, Ben, and Kristina

dancing on the table with Natalia

dancing on the table with Natalia and Antonio

with "Joe-elle", the future movie star

On Tuesday, I went with Anna and Virginia to a cute little French cafe for lunch. It was only about a 10 minute walk from the university and it had a ton of good food that was really affordable. There was pasta and paninis and sandwiches. I had already had lunch so I got a tarte au chocolat that was très délicieuse! Later on that night, a group of us went to my friend Julie's apartment for a girls' night in. We each brought a bottle of wine and some sort of snack. We hung out for hours talking about girly stuff, drinking wine, and eating French cheeses! It was awesome and we are definitely going to do it again soon! After that I met up with some more friends and went to a French guy's apartment to hang out. We played some drinking games and met some French people, so that was cool!

wine night at Julie's!

wine night at Julie's!

On Wednesday night, I went with Virginia and Kirsten to my friend Josh's apartment. Everybody has been going to see Taken 2 and saying how good it is. I still haven't seen the first Taken, so we went there to watch it. But by the time we were going to start the movie, we realised we wouldn't have time to watch it if we were going to catch the last metro home. So instead, we joined some of the other guys in his building to play poker! I still haven't improved much since I learned on the train home from Annecy but it was still fun!

The next night was pretty crazy! After booking bus tickets to Barcelona for Fall Break and getting dinner with Virginia at a new restaurant (I got a chicken burger and then we split a brownie for dessert), a huge group met up at the steps before going to a party! The parties here always have themes and the theme for this party was "F*#^ me I'm Erasmus" haha. Apparently in Europe, a lot of people have shirts that say "F*#^ me I'm famous!" We could never get away with that in the US! None of us really knew how to dress for this theme though. It ended up being so crazy and we danced and hung out there for hours. The time flew by and before I knew it, it was 5AM and everyone was leaving to get on the metro to go home. This staying at parties until 5AM is becoming such a regular thing here that it will seem so weird getting back to Elon where the parties are always over by 2 or 3 at the latest!

After that awesome night, everyone was feeling so rough the next day. Almost half of my French class was absent, and I'm amazed that I actually managed to drag myself to the school! After class, I dragged some of my friends to Brioche Doree for sandwiches because all I could think about all morning was how much I was craving tuna! After class, everyone kind of recovered from the party some more, and that night I went to the stairs with some people. It was freezing and we were all so tired so we decided not to go out after hanging at the steps for a while.

The next day, I met up with Virginia and Ben to get some of our Fall Break booked. We are planning to go to Barcelona with a big group, then some of them are going back to Lyon and we are going on to Madrid, Rome, Milan, and hopefully Florence! I am soo excited!! After that, we went to a place for lunch called Mezzo di Pasta. I had seen it so many times on my walks to Bellecour and had always wanted to try it! You could pick whatever kind of pasta and sauce you wanted and it came with a drink and dessert. I got pasta with a really good salmon sauce and tiramisu for dessert. It was really good! Then Virginia went to meet up with her friend who was visiting and me and Ben decided to explore a little. We ended up stumbling upon this really cool wine tasting near Hotel de Ville. You just had to pay €1 for a glass and then you could go to all of the tents and taste the different red wines from the Beaujolais region. There were about 20 tents and we went to all of them twice! Needless to say, we were a little buzzed! There were some other IBP people there too and some girls from my dorm. After the wine tasting, we all went to a nearby restaurant for some tacos. I know I mentioned earlier how delicious the tacos here are! Later that night, I went with a couple of the other IBPs to this guy Peter's apartment to hang out before going to the steps. We played "Never have I ever" and some other fun games. When we got to the steps, there were a lot of people there and it was really fun for a while! Then a creepy older French guy kept trying to talk to some of the girls and wouldn't leave us alone, so one of the guys in our group told the guy to leave. Then the French guy grabbed our friend and tried to fight him! It was kind of scary but everyone was ok. After that, me, Virginia, and her friend decided to get out of there and get some late-night McDonald's before going home for the night.

On Sunday, I just relaxed which I really needed since I've been sick since Oktoberfest and haven't really gotten the rest I need to get better. And I did some more planning for all of my upcoming trips! A weekend in Paris and then Fall Break! I love studying abroad.