Merci, au revoir!

And the semester abroad is over, I'm back in Novi typing this 61st and final blog post. I could tell you the details about the trip back but at the end of the day, I made it! Briefly, there was a 2 hour delay due to the snow at CDG and I had to wait nearly 3 hours just to check my luggage in, imagine this airport the Sunday before Christmas....pretty packed! But it was a normal flight and now I'm back to business and some winter break fun with family and friends...It will be a great break!

I leave you with my final thoughts on the experience, or at least what is on my mind now. Before the trip and really when you tell someone you're studying in France, stereotypes come to mind. Right out of the gate in Paris, it was good to get educated on these. Certainly it can be argued whether some of the typical stereotypes have any truth to them, but I have my ideas after 4 months. Did I see people with berets? Sure, but not everyday, it wasn't crazy, the scarf was way more common. Do people walk around with baguettes? Yes, you buy it and take it back to the house. If you were in France, I'm pretty sure you'd start to love baguettes as much as the French. Now that I'm on the topic, how about French food? It's true that I lunch I ate kebab sandwiches and that is obviously not French, but I had a good share of French meals. They really love food, it can be important in a conversation. Here's my example: after dinner one night Jacqueline's sister called, the first thing that Jacqueline told her after hello and how are you was "The sauce I made tonight was really good!" Try fitting that into our daily conversation! The love for food continues with a passion for pastries and chocolate. As you've seen in some of my pictures, they make little desserts that can look like tiny pieces of art, it is incredible. The only way to find out is to go and see these for yourself. The chocolate places were also great to me here. Each shop has certain traits which make it unique and put places like Godiva and other stores around here to shame.
Another big part of French life is politeness. If study the language you know that there is a formal and informal "you", and this is very important in conversation. But more than that, this carries over to stores and restaurants. This really hit me when I was shopping at a few stores back home here and being helped, the service is totally different! Obviously it helps shopping in your native language, but I could be way more informal when shopping here and talking to the workers.
The national identity is important too. I'm proud to be an American, and the French are proud to be French. I was treated very well over there, and sure at times there were rough moments or times when some people might not've been as nice to me...but overall I met some very nice people who I hope to see in the future.
Speaking of the future, this goes to everyone if you didn't know this, but Paris isn't the only city in France! In fact, I'm not really dying to go back to Paris now, but I will be back in the future to see relatives in Marseille, my favorite city in France. There is more to France than the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Paris shopping..Exploring the rest of the country was incredible, and that has left me with a countless number of memories thoughts as I look forward to a new year with a fresh view on life.

It has been great, I thank all of you for reading, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year!