Je suis heureux

I am done with my first semester of SciencesPo.

I took my second and last final today.  Yeah, I thought it was weird having a final on a Saturday too, but to be honest since I've been back I have kind of forgotten what day of the week it is.

The exam wasn't too bad.  It was in my Social History of the US in the 20th Century course.  I really liked that course.  It was the one where the professor sounded like the offspring of Yoda and Kermit the frog.  The fact that I was one of like four Americans in the class also made me feel a little important.  Every once in a while the professor would ask for our own experiences living in the US.  He asked me to describe what it was like growing up in a suburb, because most of the french students didn't.

The exam question was simply "The Civil Rights Movement (1945 - 1970)."  No prompt, no directions.  So basically we just had to write as much as we could about that subject.  We could choose between that and "American Middle class in the 20th Century."  I wrote about four pages on the civil rights movement, mainly based on what I learned in elementary school.  But not to worry, I have two things working in my favor.  The first is that I am being compared to French students.  They can write English pretty well when they get to take their papers home and work on them there, but I have a feeling on an in class timed essay the upper hand goes to the native English speaker.  The second thing is that my paper is being graded by a non native English speaker.  So I feel pretty confident that I at least didn't fail.

So when I got out of that exam I was finished with my first semester here.  I was so happy, I decided I wanted to walk home.  The weather since being back has been pretty nice.  It has been in the low fifties. So I decided to profit from this rare lapse in cold. I walked all the way home.  It took me about two hours.  It was pretty cool to see parts of Paris I had only gone under (via metro).

Now I am sitting in my apartment about to cook dinner.  I have tomorrow and Monday in Paris and then Tuesday off to Spain.  After Spain, my dad gets here and we are going to go to Munich, Salzburg, Vienna and Austria.  The day after that trip I fly out to the US where I am going to see m jaw doc.  The afternoon of my apointment I fly out to LA where I will be able to see my friends I didn't get to over break.  Then I go up to Seattle for a night to see where Dad's new office is.  Then it is back to Houston and then back to Paris to start classes.

I've got a pretty jam packed January, but I think I'm okay with that!