Today, the date is written the same in the US as in France. Here we write the date as day/month/year rather than month/day/year. I made sure to write the date a million and one times on my Philosophy papers. Since it's Wednesday, I had one class, Philosophy, for two hours and it starts at 9:00 am. One of my friends was absent today and when I asked where she was, another one of my friends explained to me that she was participating in a "Journée d'appel du citoyen." When a person turns 17 years old in France, they attend an obligatory meeting where they learn about being a french citizen. It's also known as a "Journée défense et citoyenneté." They learn about their rights and responsibilities as citizens and about the French military. You can check on the website to learn more about it- however, I'll warn you it's in French:
http://vosdroits.service-public.fr/F871.xhtml. Since the France has a socialist government, the government is a lot more integrated and involved in citizen's lives. For example, you can tell even in school. Every other week I have another class, ECJS (A civics/ethics class), which starts at 8:00 am.
Anyway, today I had only two hours of school. It was great! During the afternoon I went shopping for Noël with Elise. I didn't buy anything, but it was still nice to walk around Châtellerault. This evening I watched the "The Daily News with Jon Stewart" and the "Colbert Report" to catch up on some American news. They're definitely not the most dependable sources for current news, but they were entertaining. I feel a little more in the loop on current American politics. Tomorrow will be my last day of school before the weekend because I will be going to Paris (again!) with my school. Can't wait until then :)
A toute à l'heure,
Becca
