So the Journey Begins!!

Hey Guys!

So right now I am sitting in my hotel room in New York getting ready to fly out tomorrow from JFK to Paris. After a fun-filled weekend hitting the city with my mom, I think it is time to get back to some "serious" studying and schoolwork. We have been hitting the town in our girls trip style with some broadway, food and museums, a great way to finish off the holidays and spend my last nights stateside for 4 months. We saw "Rock of Ages" on Saturday and "Promises, Promises" today with Kristin Chenoweth and Sean Hayes which happened to be the last show ever since it is closing. It was awesome with Sean Hayes intentionally trying to make other cast member laugh and random bouts of crying near the end as they were delivering their lines for the last time. We also went to the Met because no trip is ever complete without looking at ancient Egyptian, Greek, Roman and Mesopotamian artifacts and statues according to my mom. It was cool to both be students and show our oddly similar ID cards. :P Now onto thinking about the next exciting 4 months!!

I am keeping this blog for two reasons. First to keep my family and friends up to date on what I am doing since I obviously won't be able to email/text/call everyone all the time for an entire semester. Second to keep a record for myself since I have never been good at keeping diaries or journals. Either way, I will still be checking facebook and my email since I am seriously addicted to technology; it is a problem. With that said, I hope to update this blog every week but as I have seen with friends who have gone in the past, that does not always happen. :) I apologize in advance for any spelling errors or grammar mistakes but I will try to correct them.

So while I am studying for the semester in Strasbourg, France, my semester starts out with a 10-day, 2-credit seminar that travels from Paris to Amsterdam to the Hague to Cologne (Germany) to Strasbourg. I am so excited to go to 2 new places (the Hague and Cologne) but also to return to Paris and Amsterdam. Hopefully this trip will go better than my last visit to the Netherlands. :) While I have to do reading every night for classes which are mixed in with cultural visits, I am still very excited to explore!

Anyways, I should probably try to get some sleep before tomorrow so that I can be bubbly for all of the people I am going to meet at the airport for our group flight. Cross your fingers that my luggage is not over 50 lbs because knowing me, it probably will be due to shoes...

-Laura