beaucoup plus compliqué que nécessaire

I know I haven't been doing any blog posts lately, but things have *slightly* evened out to the point where I don't need to write about me getting up, showering, eating, and going to school everyday. Nothing out of the ordinary has happened lately... except for a few days ago when I was walking downtown with two girls from Slovakia who live in my residence. We walked past a bar and there was a full blown band (the type with horns and drums and stuff) and a bunch of people dressed in very weird costumes. I tried to ask one guy what was going on, and I really couldn't understand him. It would have been a lot easier to if it hadn't been so loud around there. What's funny is that that was the ONE day where earlier I thought to myself "I don't need to take my cameras in my purse today... I won't see anything worth bringing them along" and this ONE time that I don't, I run into this. That's my life. But I was able to take some pictures and some crappy video with my french phone (my iphone doesn't take video). I'll eventually upload it and add it to this post.

Besides that I've just been trying to get my class schedule figured out. How it works here is that every student already has a "path" of study, and all their classes are pre-set for them. For us, we get to pick and choose whatever we want to take. That's just fine and dandy but the problem is deciding WHAT to take, and all the other logistical factors, like if it's the right level, what kind of credit will I get back home for it, etc. This process has NOT been fun or easy. I was about ready to lose it monday. All week any class I've attended has just been a test run. That's what they suggested we do. It's just so different than home. At home it's so nice and easy and organized. You go online, see all the classes with their times, locations, descriptions, etc. and register. Here I've been kinda deciding what to take by word of mouth. As far as I know, the classes are not posted online. You need to go to a specific bulletin in the school to find the schedule, and finding the stupid thing has been half the battle. And then there's knowing what you're looking at/for once you get there. Since there's so many different year levels, and types of study (I'd try to explain, but it's seems so complicated, and I really don't even understand it). I've had so many questions this week, and it's been tough because I'd really like to go see Sylvie (my director lady for the Centre Oregon) but she's always so busy and I don't want to bother her with my stupid questions everyday. I know that's what she's there for, but still... I feel like a nuisance. I still feel like I have so many unanswered questions. And here's another little challenge: they like to change class times and room numbers. This wasn't so awesome for me when I was 30 minutes late for my german class. What happened was that last week, when Sylvie suggested the class, she told me it was either in 1 of 2 rooms, but she couldn't exactly remember which one. So today I tried both, and I got there early for this reason. I went to one of the rooms, and there was a class going on inside. I waited until 4 (when my class was supposed to start) and no one left the room, so I figured that whatever class was going on in there was going from like 3 to 5 or something. So I went downstairs to the other room. Locked. So I got Sylvie and we went on this big chase asking all these people where the room ought to be. Turns out it was in the first room I was at the whole time, which made me look like an idiot. And then I get there half an hour late. Because they changed the time.

So this is one of the seemingly numerous examples of pretty much everything here being much more complicated than necessary. I could go into the whole situation of me moving into my dorm, and the money situation with my french bank account, but I can just make a few long stories short and say that these situations both were also much more complicated than necessary.

Ever since I got here, I feel like someone who's skiing, being dragged by a boat, and just can't get up on the water. I hope I can get on my feet soon though. I think I will enjoy life a lot more. I didn't expect this to be easy, but i also didn't expect to nearly have to lose my sanity over it either.