Finally Here

Hello everyone! I am finally in Switzerland and at my host family's home. But I should start at the beginning...

On Wednesday my flight left Minneapolis at 6AM, I had a layover in Chicago, and then I arrived in NYC for my orientation around noon. Everything went very smoothly. It wasn't really scary flying alone because I had flown so many times that everything felt natural. The AFS people met the arriving students at the airport and together we traveled to the Doubletree hotel by JFK airport for orientation.

Orientation lasted from 3 on Wednesday until around noon the next day. It was pretty boring and just made everyone want to get to their country sooner. However, it was great meeting with 160 exchange students from across the country who are going to Switzerland, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Latvia, Czech Republic, Russia, Ghana..and some other places, I think. In all there are 15 girls and one boy from America going to Switzerland, and 4 girls including me in the French part.

We hung out together at the hotel until 5 Thursday night when we left for the airport. The SwissAir flight left around 9 and landed in Zürich a bit after 11 in the morning Swiss time. On the way I was lucky to catch some Z's while listening to my iPod.. consequently I had several strange dreams of the other exchange friends I had met singing Mason Jennings songs. I think I got around 4 or 5 hours of sleep which is pretty good. I also bought Fig Newtons for the flight but never ate them so now I guess I will share them with my host family, haha

Anyway, after the flight landed in Zürich (and we had all expressed to each other our nervousness, excitement to meet our host families, and sense of surrealism many times over) we grabbed our checked luggage. Across the glass from the baggage claim were a bunch of waving, smiling Swiss families. We exited but I saw no one who looked familiar. I was about to ask an AFS volunteer about it when suddenly my host dad came up to me and said "Are you Ruth?" and obviously I said yes.

Pierre-Antoine and I drove to Fribourg, a 2 hour drive through beautiful countryside. We talked a lot on the way but mostly in English because my French is basically nonexistent when it comes down to actually holding a conversation. A lot of times he would say things in French and then repeat them like a lot really slowly but I was still confused so he would say them in English. He told me that he probably has to go to army training next week for 2 weeks because every Swiss male has to do that every year. However sometimes employers can excuse their employees, so that might happen (he's hoping for that.)

Before we talked in the car I had no idea what I would be doing in the next few weeks. However I learned that starting this Monday I will be going to French language school in Fribourg for at least a few weeks with the other AFSers in my canton. Apparently there are 11 or 12 besides me, including an Italian girl within walking distance of my house. I will be the only American in my group because all the others were placed in Genève. However this is okay with me because I am so excited to meet so many kids from other countries. After language school I will be going to regular school at some point, but I am quite glad that I will be able to pick up some more French before meeting a lot of Swiss kids (so I can actually talk to them..!)

On the way home we stopped at this cool shopping area where we bought a lamp for my room, an alarm clock, and a pizza which we cooked at home. Since I arrived at my house I have eaten, unpacked everything into my room, and showered. I will meet my host mom Jess later this evening when she comes from work and right now Pierre-Antoine is at work to check about the army thing.

My house is pretty cool, it has a entryway and then all of doors of the rooms basically branch off of that. My host family has special shoes for inside the house, and they gave me a pair of slippers to wear around, because itàs pretty cold in here. There is a fairly fast computer here which is convenient but the keyboard is so hard to type on. Everything is in different places.. Y and Z switched for example so I have to keep going back to fix mistakes. And some keys can make 5 different letters or symbols if you know how to use it right. Driving here was great, we exited off of the freeway and then drove through one little village after another on windy roads. The hills are beautiful and bigger than I expected (which is good) and apparently there are mountains behind them which can be seen when it's not so overcast. Also, not sure yet if there are sheep in the family but I would not be surprised. There are cows and sheep and crops everywhere around here. I will definitely take a picture of the view (and animals)later, when I am not so tired, and put it up here.

For now...



^^My entire wardrobe



^^Mon lit



^^Salle de sèjour



^^La cuisine

Sorry if it takes me a long time to email you, I think the first week will be pretty crazy though. If I have free time I will try to get on the computer some more.