Des bonnes nouvelles!

Unfortunately I don't have a lot of time to write at the moment, so I'll just try to impart the details...

To my astonishment, I was elected President of IES! It was an eight-way race and usually these things are silly popularity contests, so I had no expectations whatsoever of winning, but somehow... Wow, I was in shock when they announced it. Not that it's a huge deal, but I am now the official representative of these 60 students, so it is kind of exciting. My responsibilities aren't that heavy, but I provide a link between administration and students and preside over meetings and things. Plus people tease me and call me Madame La Présidente. Ha ha.

It also opened up an opportunity for me to have a paying job (yay!). I will be heading a conversation group for a program called France-Etats Unis, well, more specifically, I will be hosting English discussions for native French speakers. That should be interesting! It's just an hour a week, and it starts next week. So I'd better come up with some things to talk about, huh? But I get paid 10€ an hour, which is great! Mme Roucher offered it to me first because she said as president I should be a good representative of IES. Well, cool! I will certainly try my best!

Yesterday was the début of my two other cours sportifs. Well, I thought cross country was starting, anyway, but then it turned out that unlike all the other courses, it starts next week. How does everyone else know these things and I don't? Must be some special telepathy for French people that I don't have... Anyhoo, I went ahead and ran 3 miles at the track, since I was there. Then because I didn't have anything else to do I went to musculation again and worked out for an hour. (Still didn't talk to anyone. Wimp!) Then I was really tired and decided maybe I didn't really want to play Ultimate Frisbee that much even though I signed up for it, but my friend Mark talked me into going anyway. So I ran around playing Ultimate for an hour and a half! Yikes! Let's just say I slept like a baby last night, I was exhausted!!! And today I am pretty sore. But I'm going to be in good shape if I keep this up! (It's a good counter-balance to my pastry- and cheese-laden, à la française diet...)

Today I wandered around the university looking for two other courses to take. Ironically, I can't take that politics course that I was so upset about missing, because another class changed times. So I guess it's good I haven't wasted my time by going after all! Still, I'm having a really hard time finding a replacement. I'm going to take a philosophy class on property with readings of Locke and Hobbes that should be interesting, I hope, but it's a pain because it requires me to leave another class early. But it's seriously all I could find, and trust me, it hasn't been easy looking. The only way to get the class schedule is to go to the school, find the department office, and look at a posted schedule, and then read the course descriptions which are posted on the other wall. So I've done this for Politics, Law, and Philosophy now, with the result of just that one class I can go to, and it isn't even very convenient. Rrgh. I did find a Sociology of Politics class that sounds interesting, but the schedule for that won't be posted until next week because it doesn't start for two weeks yet! Isn't this system insane??? Actually, French students don't have to go through this mess as their courses are all predetermined... So it's just the poor Americans who are already having a hard enough time that have to jump through all the hoops.

Oh well, I'm not letting it get me down. I'm actually in a very good mood today because I'm going to Paris tomorrow. So I will let you all know how that trip turns out!