an update from saturday morning

i moved into my host family's home last night. they live on the fifth floor of this great old building on the avenue de versailles, which is in the 16th district of paris. they're great people; the mother, sandrine, is in school for web marketing, but still finds time to prepare AMAZING meals for her three children and their friends. there are two twins, clara and valentin, who are 13, and an older sister ines, who is 16. last night sandrine's boyfriend arnold was over for dinner as well; the two of them prepared chili con carne (yum!) and an amazing apple crumble that i positively devoured. during dinner all the siblings and their friends were talking so quickly that it was really difficult for me to follow along; sandrine and arnold made an effort to speak slowly, which i appreciated. arnold even offered to give me cooking lessons! after dinner i hung out with ines and her friend whose name escapes me. they were much better about speaking slowly and repeating themselves... i feel like an infant sometimes, it's frustrating. they like all the same music and movies as i do, which is pretty cool. i conked out pretty early though; i was exhausted.

my room is actually on the seventh floor, which can only be accessed by a stairway inside their apartment. this is an old apartment building so the 6th and 7th floors are what used to be the maids' quarters. there are several rooms up here; mine is a single room with a bed, desk, armoire/etc, as well as my own sink and shower. there is a communal toilet on the floor as well. it's almost like a dorm, except i don't know any of the others that live here, and i'm much more a part of the family downstairs.

the bed isn't too comfortable but i hope to find a mattress pad today. the shower turned cold halfway through so i didn't get to condition, but i think there's a knob somewhere that will allot more hot water to my room. the walls are overwhelmingly white, but i plan on finding some posters or pictures or something.