Monday 25th February

Met the girlies at the fountain at 8.30am. It was very strange waking up in the dark, but walking in the streets so early in the morning was wonderful and so peaceful, with the smell of freshly cooked croissants in the air. Arrived at the art school at 8.50am. It didn’t actually open until 9 but the reception was open so we went to tell them we had arrived. The receptionist, Christine, is a lovely, bubbly english woman (english - hooray!) who showed us around the art school, gave us a cup of tea, made properly I might add, and told us to pop in at anytime for a chat. Unfortunately, Patricia Duflo, who is the erasmus organiser in Rouen, isn’t in on a Monday and somehow everyone failed to tell us this, so after arranging to come back later, we had another look around the art school. Its very different from Norwich, not in looks, but in facilities. There are only 150 students in the whole school spread over five years and all the years apart from the 1st share the studios. These are set around a central courtyard and are mostly long and thin, with creaky floorboards, beamed ceilings and peeling walls. There is no sign of any lockers anywhere and hardly any materials lying around. The library is very small - about the size of the photocopying room at Norwich, with only three computers but packed full of books. We introduced ourselves to the librarian. She seems nice but said she would only speak english at that moment - from then on it will all be in french!
After this, we all went back to our own flats to collect our laptops and re-met outside Flunch for a spot of lunch and and internet session. I think we stayed there for about two hours, and and one point it felt like being on a ship because the best signal was in a room with no windows. Its a strange place, Flunch. Bright yellow walls, music videos playing on a big screen, photos on the walls of people eating which have definitely not been taken in Flunch, but the food is so good and the free wireless internet makes it perfect. On the way home I went to an art shop and bought a little wooden mirror, some beautiful bright papers, some felt shapes in bright pinks and greens, and an amazing silver sparkle paper - I have never seen anything like it before. It glows like a glitter ball. I also went the The Phone House and bought a cheap french phone for only 25 euros, which will mean I can contact the girls and Morgane cheaper. Back in my room I decided to decorate. I covered the mirror in some blue paper with pink flowers and hung it by the window - its amazing how something so small can make a difference. Then I put the felt shapes on the wall in a spiral and cut out lots of stars from the glitzy paper to brighten up the dark staircase. Beautiful! And I did all of that while watching ‘The Holiday’ in French, I want to try and get as much of the language into my brain as possible!