j'adore mes amis / j'hais le sncf

So, it got sort of depressing in the days leading up to Thanksgiving last week, knowing I wouldn't be able to go home and stupid facebook telling me about everyone who was on their way home to spend the holiday with their families. I'm so grateful that Isaias and his roommates decided to host an amazing Thanksgiving fiesta!

I was planning on driving to Biarritz on Friday with Kat and Kyle (we all planned to celebrate Thanksgiving on Saturday because sadly France does not give people the day off work on Thursday and Friday) but on Wednesday evening, K&K decided that they were going to opt out due to lack of funds. So, I decided to book my train ticket for earlier and managed to find a €40 round-trip ticket from Toulouse to Bayonne and spend Thursday-Sunday with Isaias -- woohoo, right?

You would think -- except the stupid SNCF is always disappointing me (side-note: the SNCF, or Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer is the French National Railway service). It turned out that the train that was meant to go directly from Toulouse to Bayonne had to stop in Pau, a city in-between, because there was a problem with the line or something stupid. So from Pau, I had to get a 2 1/2 hour bus to Bayonne, which really wouldn't have been a big deal if they had bothered to alert their passengers to the fact that they would be arriving nearly three hours later than they anticipated. Instead, they just assumed that everyone was aware of the problem... Ugh, the french.

It wasn't too bad on the way there, it was the way back yesterday that was absolutely miserable. I figured that four days later, the SNCF would have the rail problem sorted out so I decided to take a later train than the one I had originally booked because given that we were celebrating Thanksgiving the night before, I knew I wouldn't want to try to make a 9:30 am train. Instead, I decided to go for the 12:15, so I got the bus from Biarritz and made it to the train station in Bayonne to discover that no, they hadn't resolved the problem. I had to take another bus to Pau and then would have to wait to take the train to Toulouse... but it didn't leave until 5:34. That meant waiting for three hours in Pau. I had no choice but to grit my teeth and bear it, so I had to try not to get too angry about it. I arrived in Pau around 2:30 and sat in the open-aired train station while it was 50 degrees and raining outside for three hours and was nice and frozen by the time they alerted us that the train was to be an hour late. Of course, now I'm beyond peeved -- the only thing I've had to eat were two clementines and a cup of chamomile tea and really really had to pee but the bathrooms were outside and looked less than inviting. All I could do was sit and wait until the train arrived so I got on and decided to wait on the train rather than in the cold station. It was then delayed another 45 minutes after the original hour delay and all the while I was fidgeting in my seat with a book that no longer interested me and a dead ipod. Finally, we left at 7:15 and I spent the whole train ride staring at my phone in a super-human attempt to speed up time which only made things worse. What seemed like several hours later, we arrived in Toulouse at 9:45 to which point I was practically running home. In all, it took me nearly 10 hours to get 300 km. Needless to say, I curse the stupid stupid stupid SNCF. Stupid stupid.

 10 hours. 300 km. Ridicule!

BUT! Despite my miserable journey home, I had such an amazing time! Biarritz is unbelievably gorgeous, it's like southern California but French style. There were tons of little surf shops everywhere that sold things like vans and quiksilver, things which french people normally do not wear. AND, there were Churros. Plus, Isaias can friggin' see the OCEAN from his bedroom. Connard!

Biarritz

Thanksgiving dinner was so much fun, we had fourteen people there, most of whom were from the assistantship program but not necessarily teaching english, making it very interational indeed. We had American (obvs), English, Mexican, Spanish, French, German people there and after a few drinks, we were all singing our national anthems which was hilarious. I'm so so SO glad I decided to spend the holiday there, it would be have been so depressing on my own! And the best part was that all the boys spent the day cooking while us girls sat back, drank and watched them. Ha, it was fabulous.

Anyways, I'm sure pictures will follow at some point (Sorry BH, I still don't have a camera and I'm still waiting on Jean & Alex for photos from Liverpool!) which I intend to steal from Isaias. Hope you all had a good Thanksgiving and I'm excited to see some of you over Christmas! Two weeks! YAY!!!!!!!

muchos besos!