Well its not Madagascar but it sure is an adventure!

Hello again everyone!

So if you dont already know, im spending the month of january in martinique a department of France this is an island in the Caribbean!  Its for french credit and im here with a PLU prof and 5 other students. Id change the title of my blog but thats too much work so just pretend its called my Martinique adventures.

We arrived late Saturday night and got picked up right away by our host families. My host mom immediately grabbed my hand and then interrupted our prof and said ok can we go? Then things kind of continued like that...she is a very authoratative person and she is very very controlling. On Sunday i sat around the house and people came over because it was ephiphany, dont know if i spelt that right. its a big deal here and everyone eats this pastry cake with a little plastic king in it and if you get the king then you are the king of the day. my mom got the king but shes already the queen of the house. she is an older woman and all her kids are grown and gone its just her and her brother who only sits in front of the tv with the bug zapper. well by tuesday she had gotten REAL controlling and said i couldnt go out with my friends and wouldnt let me take the bus and tried to make me take a sweatshirt to the beach so i told my proffessor and she wanted me to change houses. so i moved out which was super awkward. she said im like her daughter and she had cried all day but i was sick so we used that as an excvuse. today i alm moving in with my friend hailey and her family and they seem very nice so that will be better.

So ya i was sick, surprise! I went to the doctor which was one little room with a nice outdoor waiting patio and she gave me medicine and i rested at my proffesors apartment. i staid with her on tuesday and wednesday night and she took care of me. Im feeling pretty much better now so hopefully thqt lasts.

So its really interesting here. Theres certain things that remind me of Madagascar but overall its very different. everyone speaks french which is nice, i havent heard very much creole. the houses are all fairly nice and are crammed on hills. roads are tiny and people drive like maniacs but we take the bus a lot. the ocean is goregous! i can see it right now as im typing at the university. ive only been to one beach that was pretty rocky but were going to find a beach this afternoon. the food is good, minus that its probably what made me sick. they eat a lot of warm food like soup which is weird cuz its so hot here. ill update food once ive eaten more. OH but yesterday i had the best mango gelato!

Yesterday we had a funpacked day. we started at a museum that explained the sugar cane production, thats basically why martinique became a french colony and they were part of the slave trade until 1948 :[ Its pretty sad but its good to be informed about it. then we switched it up and went zip lining! oh man that was so fun! it was more like a 2 hour obstacle course because you had to cross crazy tightropes going upwards in order to zip down and we were up pretty high in the trees. im kinda weak from beign sick and it took all the strength i had but it was worth it. If i can ill post some pictures soon. then after that we went to another museum type thing on slavery. this man basically took a machete and cut down some forest and built replica slave houses and stuff. its been rated one of frances best attractions and its been on national geographic i guess. it was interesting, they looked like the huts in Mada. The guide was the man who built it and he talked SO fast that we couldnt really keep up so Madame, thats what i call our prof, and our bus driver helped trqnslate for us. then afterwards we went to the town of Trois islets, a little coastal town, and walked around and got ice cream. it was a very nice day.

Hope everything is going well there in the states! theres another blog through PLU that we are all posting on...i dont know the link but ill try to get it for next time, maybe its on PLU's website?

So ya this is a pretty frazzled entry so hopefully ill be more settled for the next one. Overall life is good here, its very relaxed and chill. Time seems to be going quickly and im only here for the month so im trying to do as much as possible.  The other Lute gals and generally all the people here are very nice so were sure to have fun!

Talk to you all again soon! :)
A la prochaine fois! (until next time!)