Updates...

So it's been a couple of days since I last wrote and well there isn't a ton to say. Thursday night we didn't do a whole lot in fact I was asleep by 9 o'clock… but it worked out nice because I got a really good night's rest. Friday, we didn't really have class during the day but we did still have to head to the school. We watched a presentation on the École de la deuxième chance or in English the second chance school. Which as most of you can probably already decipher it's a program for kids that dropped out of school and want to receive their diploma, kind of like GED programs in the states. That was an interesting presentation and it might be something that I'll get involved with while I am here. After that we had about a 4 hour break where we went downtown and bough our discount train cards so that we can get at least 25 and up to 50% off all of our train fairs.

Then came a short movie on the history of the roman cathedrals that are in the area, why they built them in the shapes they did and how they did so… it was kind of cool to see especially since there are two really beautiful cathedrals in Clermont that I'll post some pictures of soon.   It's tough to get on the computer and go online because Bernard doesn't have an internet connection at his apartment and well we really haven't had a ton of time at night to do much of anything.

Last night was a lot of fun though. One of our professors reserved a big table at this bar for 20 of us and we went there to watch the opening match of the Rugby World Cup, France played Argentina. France lost, 17-12 but it was a really good match. Bernard told me this morning that the referees were terrible and obviously said that France should have won. (Sounds like a lot of us after a game…) After the game at the bar we went to this Australian Pub where we met a fellow group of Americans who are here studying from Oklahoma. I think we are going to try and maybe hang out as a group tonight, I am not sure.

The group of people that came here to Clermont is really good and it's starting to seem like we are splitting up into somewhat smaller groups more easily, this is definitely a good thing because we could never go out in a group of 17 and expect to find a seat anywhere. Today I plan on going downtown to use the internet and also go to the mall a buy a couple of rugby jerseys, next weekend we are going to try and find tickets to watch the All Blacks play in Lyon, which would be just awesome!!!

I think that is about all for today. I will try and keep everyone updated and make sure you leave a line on my blog and say hi!!  

If you guys want to be more updated on my travels, I do have a blog that I'm keeping a more or less daily update on what's going on here in Clermont. The address is www.jonstripabroad.info

Love to all,

Jon