Les premiers jours

Hey all!

It's been a long time! I think this is the first week I have real time to write... although it's been almost 2 weeks since I arrived, I was trying to adapt to the life, language, people, and everything else here in Perpignan.

It's very strange how the beginnings are always so difficult. When I first arrived I was in Paris and I met my friend Regs there, so we walked all around Paris, almost froze to death, but we had lots of fun there. Then she came to Perpignan with me, which was absolutely great, for she helped me settle down and mainly - and most importantly - to communicate!! When I got here I didn't understand a thing people told me, so it was very good that Regs was here to help me out! (Thanks for that, Regs!!).

Well, so I arrived in Perpignan two Sundays ago, everything in the town was closed! But we enjoyed anyway, cause Perpignan is really very cute. It has this historic center that's so nice, full of small shops including a chocolate shop that's just like the one in that film Chocolate, with a French woman preparing delicous kinds of chocolate that you simply fall in love with in the first bite. So we walked around in the first day and then on Monday, after having bought all the things I needed to survive (cereal, wine and French cheese, a new shower, and a knife!) we moved to my new apartment and visited all the touristic points of the city. On Tuesday we went to Canet-Plage, a small town with an amazing beach just 30 minutes away. It was great going there, although it was very cold and the town was totally empty (apart from a few old people and their dogs).

Anyway, when Regs left I found myself alone (aaahhhhh!) in a new place where I didn't know anyone. I thought at first that meeting people here would be easy cause although it's France here, it's also Catalunya, it's close to Spain and everyone is warmer in the south. However, it's funny but people in the university are not that friendly. Most of them are immigrants so I think they tend to be together in their own groups, avoiding other people (like me!)

But then on the weekend, as I was alone and there was no internet (the library closes on the weekend) I decided to go to Barcelona!! My favorite city in the world is only 3 hours away, so I booked a hostel (very good, by the way), I bought the train ticket and there I was in Barcelona! Having been there before in this almost magic experience when I was 17, I thought that maybe I could have fantasised some parts of the wonderful memories I had of Barcelona, but no! It is even better than I remembered it! Sorry to say, but Barcelona totally beats London and Paris; it's officially my number one city in the world! Too bad I was alone and the people I love were not there with, which would have been even greater... but hoepefully we'll go there together one day.

So I came back on Monday night and I met other two girls that came to Perpignan in the same Mundus program as I did: Maria Paola, from Italy, and Tu, from Vietnam. Both of them are very nice and now we're doing everything together: from classes to shopping. Tonight another girl arrives and next week a boy. So I guess we'll be 5 hre this semester, plus Svetlana and Inessa, from the second year, who are going to Portugal in March, and Florence, the only French I've met so far! And by the way, she made wonderful thin French crèpes the day I met her!!

So this is it. Tonight there's a rendez-vous at a professor's house so that we can meet everyone in the group (students and professors) and decide which classes we'll attend. Hopefully it'll be great and I'll be able to decide what to do from now on... I guess the traveling part has to be over, haha!

So, check my new pics at public.fotki.com/IzabelaV/ and have lots of fun with it!

****Iza

PS: it feels realy nice to have my own apartment (even if it's only 22m²!)