Finalement...l'escalade!!

Even though the weather was nasty in Lille this weekend, I still managed to do a lot of really fun things!

On Friday night I went to the Fanfarlow concert with Sadie and Angela at Le Grand Mix in Tourcoing. I didn't know anything about the band--apart from the fact that they are British--but they were really good! Before I wasn't sure if I wanted to do anything at all that night, but I was really glad I went. They had kind of a weird opener though. They were called Morningstar Pop Choir, also British, but strange. It was mostly one guy who was trying REALLY hard, plus some back up people and a choir. When the choir left, I actually enjoyed them a little, but the choir was just god awful. I won't lie.

Saturday was supposed to be a day for haning around Lille and exploring, but it was cold and rainy, so Mandi, Emily, and I went to a random museum in Roubaix instead. It was called La Piscine because the building was an old pool house in the early 1900s, but had been since converted into an art museum. Very cool! The collections were great and the pool was stunning. There were two big art-deco stained glass windows on either end of the hall and incredible marble statues lining the sides of the pool. Most of the old showers are also still intact and some of them house some of the art collections. Just a really neat place for an art museum. After the museum, we stopped at a coffee shop and then hopped on the subway back home. I really wasn't feeling well by the time I got back due to a massive headache and motion sickness, so I just chilled the rest of the night. We had a pleasant surprise at dinner though when one of the Polish girls offered us homemade pierogies. Yum!

Sunday was a low-key morning, followed by a fantastic afternoon! Meghan teaches english at the Franco-American Club here on Wednesday nights (similar to the Alliance Française in MKE), and they held a "Country Danse" this weekend that we went to. It was so fun! It was nice to go somewhere where the people openly accept Americans and their culture...what a relief! The people there were incredibly kind and really fun. The whole evening consisted of assorted country-esque music ranging from Shania Twain to celtic tunes and a lot of Frenchies doing some hardcore line dancing. They even played the Electric Slide and we got to show off a few of our moves. It was really funny how surprised some of them were that we didn't know the line dances or the songs. I seriously felt like I could have been in the South! Hilarious. After the Country Danse, we all went out for chinese for dinner, which was actually pretty delicious. Definitely a good choice.

Today I had class at 2 and then I FINALLY (drumroll..........) got to go climbing! I honestly woke up antsy this morning because I was so excited to go. It was a fairly successful venture. I gathered two partners and headed to the gym in Wambrechies. We got a little lost due to my fault map reading skills...but that was resolved relatively quickly. We finally made it to the gym and I went up to the counter and asked for three day passes, to which the woman said, "well, the gym is closed right now...we don't open until 6 on Mondays." FOILED! She was very kind though, and let us hang out there until the gym technically opened. We ventured out for food to kill some time, but there wasn't much open, so we stopped in a boulangerie and headed back. 6 o'clock finally arrived and we were able to climb. It wasn't my most productive day ever, but I taught them how to belay and tie a figure 8, so at least we got that all figured out for the future. I did maybe four routes, but nothing harder than a 5c (5.8). I was a little nervous about falling on a fresh belayer. Good news is we're going back on Friday! Can't wait!