Avignon is a great little city in the south of France. It is not too big and not too small. I am living with a host family (en français c’est une famille d’accueil) and they are very sweet and accommodating. Just a middle-aged couple, with a very large black cat, who cries even more than Chico, if you can believe that. His name is Amitah and his nickname is Bebo. Upon arriving in Avignon my host family met me at the train station and we went back to their apartment. They have an entire floor of a building and they live at the top because the people that live below them are elderly. I have my own room with a large bed but only one pillow, compared to my usual seven; I think I’ll survive. They then took me into the centre-ville of Avignon and we walked down the main road, which is called la Rue de la Republique, and is filled with tourist restaurants and banks, etc.

We went to the Palais du Roure, which is where the l’Institut is, and we went in because they are friends with the guardian of the building. It is a Palais from the 15ieme siècle (15th century). The guardian gave me my own private tour and afterwards we had an aperatif, which the French love, and consists of a drink, we had beer, and something small of nosh on, cacahuètes, (peanuts). After we came back to the apartment and talked until dinner, which we had around 9h. The French eat late like the Spainards.

My host mother is not a big cook, she says, but she made a tart that was pretty good and we had some paté en croute which is sort of similar to baked brie, although not served warm. Pretty delicious! And then I gave them a gift of a book of photographs from Vermont, which they absolutely loved, and R___ said that Fall was her favorite season in Vermont.

Today we met for the first time at the Palais du Roure as a group and the director gave us a brief introduction and then we had the day to ourselves and then short meetings in the afternoon to chose our classes. With my free time I had the opportunity to buy myself a French cellphone, which is called a téléphone portable. And it is less expensive than my iPhone in the US and very mignon (cute).

The only difficult part of my day was that apparently travellers cheques are old-fashioned and most banks no longer exchange them, the post office won’t take them anymore either, although apparently that is only temporary, and so I have to find a way to get euros. My host mother’s bank is possibly the choice, but by the time I arrived it had already closed, perhaps Monday.
Tomorrow we have a guided tour of Avignon and Sunday we are going to Arles and Camargue.
When classes start I’m not sure how much time I’ll have to write, but I’ll try and write at least once a week.

À bientôt