Good-bye to Mom and Amber:(

Surprise! We were awakened at 5:30 by the telephone ringing. It was my dad; he had some bad news. Nothing tragic, but mom and Amber’s flight to Amsterdam had been cancelled! So we all rushed to get ready, while taking turns talking to Lauren on the phone while my dad continued to research things on the computer. Even though we were all a little panicked, it was a lot of fun to talk with Lauren. She had so many stories to tell, she’s never been that talkative before. But, it was good my dad called because we were out of there a whole hour earlier to try and figure out what needed to happen to get my mom and Amber home. We took the bus to the airport. I chose to get out at the wrong terminal. So after asking the at the info desk, we had to take the shuttle to the other terminal. We then had to figure out the plane situation. Fortunately, mom and Amber had been moved to another flight going to Amsterdam. It was awful though that the airline never called to notify us, especially since the new flight left quite a bit earlier than the original one. Not cool. Also not cool was that because this new flight was with a different airline, mom and Amber were going to have to re-check their baggage in Amsterdam. So now they were worried about maybe missing their flight there. In any event, their plane was now going to leave from the other terminal (the first one we had gone to) so we had to take the shuttle back over there for them to check in. It was quite the hassle. And then, once we finally found the correct place for them to be, we had to wait for them to check in because the airline didn’t have the transferred passenger list yet. While mom and Amber were waiting for that, I went to a pay phone and called my dad to update him on the situation. As usual, he had already gotten it figured out. But he was glad to hear that they were for sure getting to Amsterdam for their connecting flight.

Finally, finally, they were able to check their luggage in and get their boarding passes. It was now just a little after 8am. I walked with them, just until the entrance to the security check where we had to say our good-byes. Man it was hard to watch them go, knowing I had to stay for a while longer. But, I reminded myself that the time I had left was shorter than the time I had already gone through. That made it a little easier.

I left them to get through security and made my way over to where the bus would take me back to Cannes. I bought a ticket, but the bus wasn’t scheduled to leave until 9am, so I was going to have to be rather late for my morning class, but there was nothing to do about it then. I sat for awhile, just waiting for the bus. In the end, I had to wait 50 min in total. But it wasn’t so bad. About 5 minutes before the bus arrived, a man, whom I think may have been homeless; I’m not sure; came and sat down next to me on the bench. He then asked where I was going and why I was in France, etc. It was awkward for me because, my French is so bad that I barely knew how to respond to his questions and I couldn’t think of what to ask him. My bus arrived shortly though and so I was finally off to go back to Cannes.

So after a 40 min bus ride and a hike back to the college, I finally at just about 10am. That meant I had 15ish minutes to get my stuff back to my room and unpack a little before it was break time and I could discretely rejoin my class. I, therefore, went only to the 2nd half of my French class that morning. It was nice when I came down after my break because apparently people had been wondering what had happened to me. It’s nice to think that people care enough to worry… I was the first back after break and there told my teacher why I was missing during the 1st half. It was a sad day in class though because it was our last day with Katya. She had been a really great teacher and I am going to miss having class with her!

After class I was pleasantly surprised with 2 pieces of mail; 1 about registration for next semester, and the other a letter from my friend John. It was a good day! Lunch came next and then the only thing I could manage after lunch was a nap. I was sooo tired. It felt so nice to just sleep for a little bit and catch just a bit up before I had to go to class again in the afternoon.

Fortunately, all there was in the afternoon was French Civilization. We finished our discussion of gender equality and moved on to religion. It was interesting, but everyone was so tired that no one really got into it. After class, I went to the cyberdrome for a little to do several things. First, to catch up a bit on all the e-mail I had missed over break. Second, to do a little checking on classes for next fall. And third, to see if I could chat at all with anyone back home. I was mildly successful. It’s crazy to think about classes next fall. And I had a heck of a time trying to figure out what I should register for. I probably shouldn’t complain because most people would like the freedom I have to take basically whatever class I want, but sometimes, there just aren’t enough classes that sound truly interesting. I’ll get it figured out though, no worries.

After the cyberdrome, I came back to the room and spent a little more time working on my schedule. Then I did some reading. Started into the Sudoku book my sister so kindly brought for me and eventually went to bed. And with that Spring Break is offcially over and the second half of the term is officially begun. The time is going quickly.