Author: emily_hawhee

THE GROUP:  It is July 9th: the last day before departing for Paris! A day that came so soon, yet seemed so far away. It was bittersweet, because although we knew it was the end of our journey in Tours with our exchange students, it was so close to the beginning of another journey in Paris! People spent it different ways: whether it be getting rest, packing, or visiting Paris (Estella and Kelsey!) However, we eventually came together: At 3 until 9, the Americans and French students met at the park island called Simon Island for a picnic party. People ate chips, cheese burger chips, peanut puffs, chocolate crêpes, brownies, apricots, peanut m&ms, mcflurries, and more! Everyone enjoyed the nice 70 degree Fahrenheit 24.5 degree Celsius weather and hanging out as a group one last time. People took some last pictures, and at 9 everyone headed back to their host homes for the last night. 

For my experience with the last full day, I slept in for the first time on this trip: Until 11!! I chilled for a few hours to get some rest before Paris, and I started to get my things together for my departure the next day. My host family and I had a big last lunch- goat cheese on toast (soo good!) garden (from their garden!) salad (filled with roses and more!), fresh green beans, and duck leg (which was pretty good but very fat filled). We finished lunch with a traditional French tradition during Easter which is eating a clafouti, which is basically an abricot almond tart. In the tradition, they put a porcelain figure inside the clafouti and whoever gets it is the king! She let me keep a few of her figures which I hope to use at home to carry on the tradition! After eating a ton I got soo full- lunch lasted 2 hours! At 4 I joined the group picnic party. I ate 4 chocolate crêpe triangles, lots of chips, some peanut mnms, tried the cheeseburger chips which tasted too much like cheeseburger, and had fun being with the group. Sadie and I played on the playground and performed some beautiful xylophone music! I left at 7:30pm (19:30) to go back to the house, where I did a little more packing and had one last meal with the host family. At my request, we had the delicious French meal: a tartiflette! It was soo good- cheesy yummy potatoes!! I had it with fresh clover flower salad 🙂 I finished up the meal with some mousse au chocolat! Eventually it was time to sleep, and I headed downstairs to finish packing and set my alarm for 7 before going to bed. It was a great, relaxing, tasty-food filled last day! I’ll miss you, Tours!

This was a lazy Saturday. Not much really happened. I played board games with my exchange student. We played Connect 4, aka “Puissance Quatre.” First to five won and it ended with him winning 5 games to my 4. Next, we played poker, where I shut him out and won all his chips. Afterwards, we were called up for lunch. We started with some carrot medallions cooked in a sauce with other vegetables like onions. Then, the rarest steak I had ever seen came out. It looked uncooked except for its sides which had a pink-brown color. Despite its looks, it tasted pretty good. I stuffed myself on the steak and carrots, ate a little salad and waitex for dessert. We got cherries and espresso, which I enjoyed. A very good meal.

 After lunch, we went to downtown Tours to “faire du shopping.” In town, there was a demonstration with the Yellow Vests. Very exciting. For the evening, the boys gathered and watched a soccer match. We started with some knockout and then HORSE. Afterwards, the Americans found an American Football, so we played Jackpot. Finally, the game started. Pizza in hand, the boys all sat around the TV and enjoyed Turkey v/s France.

After an exciting two weeks without a day of sleeping in, my host family nicely allowed me to have the last day here to relax and sleep as late as I wanted. I took advantage of their request and ended up waking at 10:30. At around 11 I emerged from my room to eat some breakfast. Only the sister was at the table, so I decided to start a conversation by asking what she got up to last night, as I heard her come back at 2 in the morning. She only had time to laugh before the mom came into the room. The mom told me something about how “today, we have the journey of couscous”. I was confused, but it sounded exciting, so I said “oui!” In exclamation. She then sadly stated that it was my last day here, and asked what I was doing in Paris for the next four days. We talked like this for around 45 minutes and then I went back into my room. I worked on my portfolio a little, and then got up to brush my teeth and get ready. A little later I was called for lunch and the grandma was home. Turns out, she was making couscous. The lunch lasted around 2 hours and we all chatted for the whole time, until the grandma brought out her special Moroccan tea and pastries. During dessert we laughed about the dogs sleeping position and then talked about what we should do for the rest of the day. We ended up going for a 1-2 hour bike ride around town. We went across train tracks, wheat fields, horse stables, and tiny towns. We even accidentally stumbled upon a little castle. Me and Anais couldn’t resists, so we ended up running through the wheat field, just praying there weren’t any nasty bugs around us. At the end of the bike ride, we were able to look out at the river Loire from up high. When we finally got home, i had to start packing my suitcase because my exchange student told me that I wouldn’t be home until late tonight. I didn’t know where we were going, but I was around halfway done when she knocked and told me we had to go. I still didn’t know where we going. When we finally got there, it turned out to be a picnic in the park with everyone, a surprise leaving party. I was very excited to see everyone before we all went to Paris and I ended up staying there for three hours. It was fun, me and my friends went down to the riverside, talked to some new friends who weren’t in the exchange, and went on a fun walk. After I got back to the house, I got sad because I had to finish packing my bags. After I was done I took a shower and got in bed.

Saturdays are for the boys. Today was my last Saturday in Tours and the morning was used to recover from the very busy and eventful week we just had. The whole family slept in until 10:30 and then we had a lovely family breakfast consisting of nothing but bread. There were baguettes and croissants galore. After breakfast we all got ready for the day and then headed off to the Auchan supermarket to get some food and drinks for the party tonight. Once we gathered all the supplies the only prepping we had left was to move the tv into a larger room and rearrange some furniture. This ended up taking longer than expected and lasted all the way until lunch time.

 After a delicious lunch, Ethan and I headed off to Kart Indoors to meet up with some other exchange students and ride some go carts. The go carts here are much better and faster than in the US. They had a max speed of 25 mph and the track was massive. We raced for a couple hours and even though I was one of the worst, it was still super fun. After that we headed back to my host family’s house where a bunch of other exchange students came over to watch the French National team take on Turkey in soccer. We played basketball, soccer, and football pregame and then chowed down on some of the best pizza I’ve ever had while we watched the game. Sadly France lost by 2, but getting to hangout with everyone made up for it. It was such a good day with an equal balance of family time and friend time.

We only had one thing planned as a group today, which was to visit and tour one of the many homes in which the famous artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci inhabited during his life. We had a pleasant yet rainy bus ride that took us to the house, but unfortunately it was still raining when we arrived. Luckily, we were inside most of the time. The house was very cool and interesting, filled with lots of significant and recognizable paintings, sculptures, and documents from his life. Unfortunately, we were given a very long and difficult worksheet that we were required to fill out throughout the visit, which was very long and boring, and took almost the entire hour and a half long visit. Once the rain stopped, we were able to go outside and explore his very beautiful pond and garden, which was a very enjoyable experience. Once the time was up, we drove back to Tours and walked to the school, where we enjoyed a very nice picnic lunch provided by the school. After that, the group activity was over and we all parted and went our separate ways.

 After the morning group activity, I went out with some friends and their exchange students to see the new Godzilla movie. Since I was very tired from the tour of the home and the long and difficult worksheet we had to do, and since the movie was in french and I couldn’t understand any of it, and was therefore not interested in it, I laid down on 4 seats and slept the entire time. It was a nice nap. After that, my exchange student, Bart, had a clarinet lesson so I stayed at Hugo’s house, who’s Lincoln’s exchange student. We chilled there and ate snacks for about two hours, since we were all very tired. At about 6:00, we left to go to a pick up soccer game that the french boys had arranged for all the guys to take part in. It was fun but tiresome, so we only played for about an hour or so. My team was not very good, but I don’t care because it wasn’t competitive and it was just for fun. After the game, I went home with Hugo and Lincoln, since Bart had yet another music lesson, and hung out there for half an hour or so. When Bart came to pick me up and we went home, I was very sweaty from the game so I took a shower. Now I am here writing this blog post as fast as I can at 9:55 because it is due at 10. I am about to have dinner so hopefully it will be good. After that I will probably stay up late on my phone and then go to bed. It was a good day.

On this day, the group ventured into the former household of the now deceased famous artist, philosopher, and inventor known as Leonardo de Vinci. 



A look at the outside of the home.

 Once we entered the beautiful home, our beloved teacher Mr. G surprised us with an “unexpected but lovely 61 page workbook with questions on every page”(Becca Humphries, “hailing from Russia”). The students were resilient but unfortunately no one was able to complete the workbook in our given 2 hours. Even though it was freezing and raining when we arrived, classmate Sarah George, age 16, proclaimed that she had “an excellent, exciting, and educational experience that she would not trade for the world”. 

Sarah George excited to enter the home.

 However, Lachlan McCallum, age 16, claims that the experience was “cold and tiring and tedious.” He does not recommend this spot for any tourists.

Lachlan McCallum, bored.

 While Lachlan found the experience boring, I felt like it wasn’t too bad. We were sheltered from the storm going on outside, and when the storm subsided, we got a beautiful view of the garden. 

A pond with de Vinci’s bridge crossing it.

A different view of de Vinci’s backyard.

 With these different perspectives, the students of Cary Academy’s french class will reflect on their time here and store it in their memories, whether it be short-term or long-term.

As for myself, I almost died today. After the time at the museum, I went to a soccer park with the boys. Unfortunately, it started torrentially raining buckets upon us, and everything I had was soaked to the core. Even the stuff I had in the backpack that was inside my backpack was ruined. I then had to suffer more as I slipped in the mud because of a puddle which resulted in my appearance being one similar to a pig that had just rolled around in a swamp. Somehow I found myself at Brieuc’s (Lachlan’s exchange student) home with the boys and I got to change into a pair of dry shorts (his dad gave them to me). I then proceeded to take a one hour nap and woke up refreshed. Unfortunately, immediately after, I was forced back into the trenches where everything that had just dried off got soaked in cold water again. It is important to note that I am just wearing a windbreaker and not a shirt because I took off my shirt since it was wet. I just wanted to get back to Placide’s house, but no, we were going to an indoor soccer arena. 

Some of the boys hanging around.

 So when we eventually got to the indoor soccer arena, I was miserable. Fortunately, the soccer itself wasn’t bad. After the matches, I finally arrived back at Placide’s house. The first thing I did was take a hot shower followed by another short nap. I woke up at 8:40 pm, ate dinner, and plan on going back to sleep. I am currently burnt out and I have as much energy as this dog sleeping in front of me. 

Today me and my exchange student Lucie started off our morning early. We woke up, got dressed and Lucie’s’ mother had made me a surprise 16th birthday breakfast. It was a lovely way to start off my birthday on a good note. We then walked (in the cold) to the team station where we rode the tram to the bus stop. We met everyone there got in the bus and started out long drive to military house riding academy. We got a tour of the academy and got to learn some of the history.  We met some of the horses along the way. We finished out the tour with watching an equestrian show where we got to see a bunch of horses do lots of tricks and jumps. After the amazing horse show was over we jumped on the bus and took a ride to a cute little town. The town had amazing shops and houses all made with white brick. We were set loose to go eat lunch for 2 hours. Clay and I went to the center of town, sat down and ate our lunch. There was so many restaurants surrounding us and the aroma of all the amazing smells filled our noses. After we ate Clay and I went to a bakery to get some pastries to celebrate my birthday. We got our pastries and left the shop and saw an amazing ice cream stand so of course we also went and got ice cream. We sat back down, ate our ice cream and pastries then took a lap around town taking lots of photos. We saw a chocolate shop and went to (of course) get another snack. Clay ordered a brownie and I got a chocolate heart for Lucie as a thank you for the amazing birthday.  After lunch we all met on the bus and drive to the mushroom cave. We took a tour and learned about the different kinds of mushrooms and how each species and type of mushroom needs to be cared for. Our guide was very polite and very intriguing. We finished out our tour looking at a cage of snails and learning about how they take care of the snails. We then jumped back in the bus to return to tours. Over all a great experience 10/10 highly recommend.

Today everybody got off to an early start, waking up at 6:30 AM so we could make it to meet up at the Chateaux de Tours at 8:00 AM. Waking up this early was necessary because our first visit was a top-ranked horse riding academy that was an hour-long bus ride away. A French-speaking guide gave us a tour of the facility, and along the way we were able to see several of their horses. Each horse had a tag outside of its room, which detailed its race, age and parents. We were even given the opportunity to stay in the horses’ sauna for around a minute. The tour of the horse riding academy concluded with a horseback riding show. The most entertaining part of this was getting to listen to the English translation of the live commentary, because the woman who was doing the translating had an interesting voice, and was doing it live and unscripted. When the show ended, Lachlan dropped his phone, and when Max tried to get it he got stuck between the wall and the bleachers and needed the help of a worker to get out, which was hilarious.

 Next, we went to an underground mushroom farm. The roof of the cave was short in most places, which made moving around pretty difficult for me. We were explained the methodology behind growing mushrooms underground, and were shown some examples of mushrooms being grown. We also got to see a room dedicated to breeding and growing snails. After this, Mr. G gave Max a large shiitake mushroom, which he refused to let us get near for the entire bus ride because he “didn’t trust us not to throw it out the window”, which was probably fair. I sincerely hope that you and Adrian enjoyed your mushroom tonight, Max. Once we arrived in Tours, Evan came home with Hugo and I, and we hung out and ate some snacks for an hour before Evan was picked up by Barth. Afterwards, Hugo and I ate dinner (salmon, potatoes and peppers) and desert (melon and strawberries) and I went up to my room because I’m very tired and just a little sick. Overall, today was a really long and tiring day, but the extended lunch with the boys and the horse-riding show made it worth it.

I woke up later today because everyone had to be at school by 9 but the castle that we went to was really close to the house, so I only had to leave at 9:30 so I could sleep in a little. I started the morning with a cup of apple juice and a brioche and chocolate roll like I do every morning and then I waited for Elena and her exchange students mother to pick me up to take me to the castle. It was rainy and cold all day, but I had my rain jacket and my umbrella. Lots of students didn’t have these because they forgot. Once Elena and I (who lives nearby so also slept in) caught up to the group we walked to the castle very quickly in the rain. We arrived at the Chateau de Langeais and it was really pretty, you couldn’t really tell because it was rainy but I’ve seen it before so I knew it was pretty. It was not as big on the outside as other castles I’ve been to, but we toured the inside and it was very big. The tour was in English, so we could understand a little, but the tour guide’s accent was very thick so some parts were hard to understand. I thought it was cool and somewhat interesting, but touring castles and other museums and places is usually boring to me, but this wasn’t. During the tour we went to a reenactment room of a wedding and they had these really creepy wax figures that everyone thought were real. We got to walk around the top of the castle to find windows that had really pretty views of the little city once the tour was over. Once the tour finished we were all pretty hungry so we got a quick snack and I got a croissant that was very good. Then we took the bus back to tours to have the afternoon with our students.

 We were supposed to go canoeing as a group for our free time but since it was raining we could not. A group of us decided we were going to go shopping at the mall. It was Chloe, Becca, Elena, Dena and me and our exchange students. We had the waffles thing for lunch which was really good and for dessert I had a waffle with ice cream on top even though we were eating somewhat outside and it was cold. We did some shopping, we went to stores like Zara, H&M, and Sephora that we knew of, but we also went to some new stores and we really liked those as well. We ended up getting tired and just sitting around until 4:30 because we had a very long day. Everyone met up and left around 5, but we had to stay until her mother came and we ended up running into other students in the exchange (Olivia and Estella). When we got home, I decided to take a nap because I had a tiring day and then we just had a family dinner around 9:00 which was really late. I was a very fun day but I’m very tired from it.

Today was wet. It has rained basically all day. That means, even as we waited this morning for the bus to show up, we were slowly reaching the point of being soaked. That, of course, did not phase us, as the French students, of Cary Academy: Class of 2021, do not ever complain about how wet they are. We visited the castle of Langeais. We got to stay inside for that, luckily. The castle had hosted a wedding and a couple of distant relatives of the royalty of that time period, but that was kind of boring to hear. The tour was in English, the first English tour yet. The castle itself was really cool. There were all types of furniture (which I did not take pictures of) and really interesting tapestries (which I did take pictures of because the animals looked funny). There was one part of the exhibit that had a slideshow and a wax museum of the one wedding that happened in the case. The wax figures looked really realistic (but I didn’t get any good pictures because it was dark). We also walked around the ramparts, which is the upper walkway that wraps around the outside of the castle with lots of windows facing outwards. We got a lot of good pictures of the city. After the castle, we messed around in the gift shop for a bit, then got 20 minutes to walk around town. There were restaurants and bakeries, but I wasn’t hungry, so I took the opportunity to see a more typical French town, because at this point getting wet doesn’t really matter. After that we drove back to Tours. We were supposed to go canoeing, but it got canceled because of the rain. 

 I ate lunch, and then went to the movies with all the guys (i.e: all the male students on the trip). The movie was in French, but it didn’t really matter. The movie was Dark Phoenix, and even in French it still earns its grade of 18% on rotten tomatoes. Most of us, not including myself, tried to sleep through it, but were unable to because the walls light up with the movie. I thought this was really cool, but those trying to take a nap did not. After that we went bowling. It was fun, we messed around a little bit, but we didn’t get in trouble. A few people stayed and ate at a restaurant, but a little more than half of us went home, including me. I ate dinner pretty quickly, in order to get this in on time . All in all, a pretty fun day.