First Days in Paris

Hi everyone,
I'm sure that you are all wondering where your bloggers have gone with no blogs popping up every few min. Well it turns out that we can't get an internet connection at our homestay yet and we haven't found an internet cafe until now, and it is the most limited internet cafe in the world. We will try to find a better location close to home.
But here is what has happened to us so far. When we got on the plane to leave for Paris Kali and I were amazed at how nice the Air France seats were, there was bottled water at our seat, fancy lights by our head and the best part was the seats had a sign that said we would be able to lay the seat all the way down! The stuardess had already asked for our coats and we were settleing in for our long flight. Moments later a man came up to us and asked if we were in his seat, well we were..... so we had to move all the way in the back from our first class seats to our lowly economy seats. Cute!
Once we got to Paris, we were greeted by a tall, dark and handsom man, he was our taxi driver. One thing about Paris is the men dress in suits all the time, and very very nice ones at that. So our driver didn't speak any English, of course, and we still made it to the homestay. What we are coming to find out is no one really speaks English, no one, SUPRISE!
The first day was filled with excitement mixed with a little fear. We found our selves asking what were we thinking a lot during the day, or at least I was. Next week met the host family, first the woman. She is very nice, also doesn't speak much english but she cooks well since she has grown up at the Cordon Bleu that her grandmother founded! Our room is small but very nice with a big window that looks out on the yards of the apartment complex. There is a small stone path with a lush carpet of grass on either side and patches of roses bushes as tall as me scattered in grass. The view is perfect, we open our window every morning to catch the breeze. We are living with one other student. I don't remember her name but she is from Japan and also speaks very little English so at dinner we all struggle to speak to one another. We met the man of the house later that night. He is very nice and of course another nationality, he is Italian. We try to speak to him in Spanish since he knows almost NO English. The house is a hodge podge of hillarity!
Now our first real day was at la Tour Eiffel! We woke up late since the metro lines during the weekday are supposed to be busy during "rush hour", the first task was to secure metro passes for ourselves. LOL. fun. At the counter we struggled through and recieved 10 tickets. When we were getting ready to board we forgot to find out which train takes us where, as in which way on the line does a certain train go, north/south whatever. The trains are by number and after that there is a name of a location that is the last stop for that particular train. So all you have to do is know which way you want to go and find the ending stop name on that numbered train. I'm sure you all think this sounds very easy but since I have never been on a subway I thought it was really hard. Finally we get to the Tour Eiffel. We waited for hours to get up and hours to get down, but was a view, Paris pulls your heart strings, and my stomach ones too; after waiting so long I thought I was going to die at the top of the tower! We placed our feet on the ground and went in search of food right away. First stop lunch! We found a little cafe on an off street that was full of only Parisians and plopped our bags down. I orderd a quiche and Kali had a fabulous sandwich made of ham and cheese but you guys should look it up on wikipedia its called croque-monsieur, it looked good. To drink we of course orderd wine. After filling up we headed out to find the Metro to get home since by now we have been to two places in 4 hours and were ready to nap. We got a little lost but stumbled on an ice cream stand to make us feel better and ease our frustrations. Pistachio and vanilla for both of us. We found a spot in grass to hang out and figure out where we were while we ate and enjoyed our views of the Eiffel Tower.
That night we went out to a cafe, had drinks and spoke to our French waiters in broken English. They were very helpful by pointing out how to get to the bar we going to go to until we got lost again looking for it. The day was all in all a success. I feel like every time we get lost, which is often, it lets us see something new that we hadn't planned on. We have accomplished a lot and it is only sat! Well we have to go soon this cafe is as expensive as it is crappy.
We love and miss all of you and think of you all often
Kelly I miss you the most, and I am trying hard to find a way to get a scheduled talking session! I love you sooo much and take care of your teeth.
If anyone wants to ask specific question to each of us just email us and if you want to let us know what you think in general or just let us know you like our blog just comment!
Au Revoir
Savannah and Kali