Funeral and Christmas Vacations

Hello everyone

First and foremost, something really sad happened for my host family. Friday my host mom Béatrice's brother Marcel died; Andréanne and I found out when we came home for lunch. He had a sort of developmental disability, and couldn't talk but seemed to understand a bit when Béatrice spoke in German to him. He lived in a care home but once every month he would come here during an afternoon to have dinner with us- other weeks he would go to the house of Béatrice's siblings (I met him twice.) It is really sad for my host family, especially because it's the holiday season, the start of vacations, and it came totally unexpectedly (apparently the doctors think he had an epileptic attack while sleeping.) Anyway, now my host family is quite sad as one would expect and I am sad for them too. At this moment they are at the mass for him, and there is the funeral tomorrow. My host family and I agree that it is better if I don't go to either. If I thought that would give them emotional support, I would go, but I don't think it would. It would be putting myself in a sad atmosphere, and they know that, and so they too think it better if I don't go.

Okay so off that subject.. I will just describe a bit my week as usual. It was busy. Monday I had that geography test I wrote about before; I earned a 6 (which is 100% - it's a scale where 1 is zero and 6 is 100%) I guess all of that studying paid off. In Chemistry I got 4.9 which is also pretty good- my teacher wrote 'bien!' on the top so I'm happy. Thursday and Friday my classmates each presented in English a short review on a film or book. I corrected my host sister's text and helped her prepare a little bit, and she did really well. I myself prepared a small presentation about high school in the US but there wasn't enough time for me to present so I will probably do it after the vacations. In Math on Friday we had a test that was super hard, but at least everyone thinks they failed so I am not the only one. Thursday afternoon we went snowshoeing for gym, because there is an insane amount of snow. Andréanne and I brought her parent's raquettes from home. It was hard work but fun too; the whole class ended up throwing lots of snow at each other.

For the next vacations, which is of one week in February (after la semaine thematique), I am planning on going skiing with Nicolas and Andréanne for one week up in the mountains. Their family friends have a chalet there that they won't be using during that week so we are free to go. My host mom Béatrice has been asking everyone she knows if they have any old or unused ski boots in my size.. the skis wouldn't be a problem because I could use Nicolas's old ones. However if we hadn't found boots I would have had to rent them which is really expensive. Luckily one of their friends in our village said that they had some that might be my size.

Thursday night we went to their house and I tried on a few different pairs, and found some that fit (from what I know of my ski boots from last year they are a good fit.) And not only that, they happened to have a pair of skis and poles (quite good ones too, just a little beat up), both my size, that no one uses. I guess this is common here, because nearly everyone in every family has their own skis or snowboard, and they get replaced at least every 5 years. Anyway, we had amazing luck to find everything in my size, and the husband of this family who is on a ski team brought them to a sports shop to get adjusted for me. Obviously I will have to ski on them first to make sure everything works together.. we are probably going to go somewhere nearby sometime during the vacations. I am really thankful to this family to just let me use their equipment. From what I've seen, the Swiss are a prudent frugal bunch, but they also posses unrivaled generosity.

This weekend has been really relaxing, especially so because there is so much more free time in front of me. It's nice. Yesterday Andréanne and I made three types of Christmas cookies in the afternoon, and then in the evening we went to her friend Lauren's house. Angelique came too (these are the two friends we go to the gym with) and we watched two movies, one really bad not scary killer movie called Untracable and also Ratatouille. It was not quite the same in French, as the over-Frenchness of it all and the silly French accents are lost, but it was still good. We walked home around midnight and I went straight to bed.

Today I started wrapping my host family's Christmas presents, and I wrote a long entry in my journal for the first time in a while (less to get out now that I am with a normal family, and I can better express myself in French.) For lunch we ate cheese fondue, it was good as usual. In the afternoon we went to Bernard's brother José's house where Thomas, Emilie, and Vincent were too (those are Nicolas and Andréanne's cousins) and we played cards like the last time I saw them.

Ahh, right, so before I go I have to write about something that I forgot to write about before. In the spirit of going to a Madonna concert in Switzerland, I will be going in April to.......... WWE WRESTLING in Switzerland! I don't know if I've mentioned this before but my host sister and brother watch WWE wrestling once a week, and my host sister is an especially big fan. She loves this wrestler that comes from Chicago, it's really quite funny. Anyway, they have already been to a WWE thing a few years ago, and there is another in April in Geneva. Andréanne's aunt agreed to go with her, and she asked me if I wanted to buy a ticket too.. and I just figured, why not? Perhaps I am crazy, but it should be entertaining even if I do think it's a bit (really really) ridiculous.

Okay and now it's getting late so I should get going. Joyeux Noël to everyone!