D'accord, je suis ici!

Bonjour mes amis!

Well.. in the hustle and bustle and stress of moving here I almost forgot that I should maybe throw in an update or two! So, after a flight from MKE to MSP to CDG (which I obviously didn't sleep on) I jumped on some random bus that was supposed to take me a train station (thankfully it did) and from there I hopped on the short train ride from Paris to Angers. However, while the planes, trains, and automobiles were manageable, my luggage was not. I thought the hard part about my luggage was packing for a year in two 50 pound bags but LOL PLOT TWIST I was wrong. All you need to do is imagine the short American ginger with a duffle, a large rolling suitcase, a rolling carry on, and a purse, sweating and carrying/rolling it/dragging it to the train and then on the train and then off the train and to the cab. Thankfully a nice French man helped me take my luggage from the train in Angers to a cab. But anyways, about 24 hours later I was done!!!!!!!!!

After the luggage chaos, I was excited to finally relax and get to know my new city and walk around. I thought my worries and stress was over. I went out of my Airbnb, took a walk, got my cell phone, got some groceries and called it a day. I was feeling pretty good about myself and the more I walked around the city the more I fell in love with it.

The day after I arrived I went and got my gym membership and walked over to the bank expecting to get my bank account. However, me walking in and asking resulted in me standing and waiting for multiple people to talk to me about the account and then tell me I have to make an appointment and then the next available appointment wasn't for a week and a half (?) so not really sure what's happening with my bank account but I guess we'll see next week, I just kind of let that one be for now. Because little did I know the real stress was about to come...
ALRIGHT TIME TO FIND A ROOF TO LIVE UNDER. The entire summer our employer kept telling me to wait to get an apartment until I come here so I can see it and talk to the landlord in person, etc, which all did make sense. However, now I am here and I am homeless. Luckily I have an airbnb for a bit, but every single time I get the courage to call a landlord or agency it is either way outside the city or it is already rented. About 20 out of 25 apartment listings I have responded/called say they are all occupied, yet they don't take it off the website...cool thanks.

My second day, I had my first apartment visit. It looked promising, the price was right, it was in perfect location, etc. Event the door and the entrance were cute! It seemed too good to be true...and well yeah it was too good to be true. I follow this old french man up to the apartment which is  floor consisting of four tiny rooms that share one disgusting kitchen, one un-usable shower, and one toilet room that would be rejected by even the grossest gas station. Oh and the best part...the rooms didn't have beds, they expected me to sleep on a futon for a year. So as you guessed, I turned that offer down and it was back to square one.

At this point I had barely explored my city and was sitting inside all day calling landlords and rental agencies and sending emails just to get the same response: "je suis désolé, l'appartement n'est pas disponible"...the apartment is not available. Some ads will also say that the apartments are available in January or February, so I have the option to live in a box for 3 months and then move into those if I want...I dont know just a thought. But I did visit a studio today that is needless to say tiny and very subpar but it has a roof, good location, and its available. So chances are i'm settling for that one! Yay!

ALRIGHT apartment rant over, sorry for all of those who just wasted their time reading that thinking I was going to be gushing about my city, but i'll get to that part now!

So, Angers (looks like anger but pronounced on-jay in your best french accent). Before being placed here I had never heard of it before. I looked up as much as I could on it and there wasn't a lot of available resources but what I did find was always positive, so I figured it would be fine. And luckily, I wasn't placed in a small 8,000 person town. Rather, Angers averages at about 150,000 people, which is a size that I love. Angers is one of France's oldest cities and is covered with amazing architecture, castles, cathedrals, and more; it even has a beautiful park that goes along the river and leads you to a lake. However, while the size, the buildings, the attractions, the food and everything else is a plus, there is one small downside...language.

Because Angers is not a touristy town, not that many residents have a need to know english. Therefore, not a lot do. This has made a few things more complicated obviously and by the time I get home I automatically want to FaceTime someone because I am longing to hear english from someone's mouth haha. But, one of the reasons I wanted to come back to France was to improve my language skills, so this small speed bump will definitely be an advantage soon when I am settled and using my french more frequently.

Well, I think that's all I have about the last 72 hours...good cheese, good wine, good nutella, beautiful buildings, good coffee, a lot going on... it's just a great city. AND another huge plus is that a lot of streets in the city center (especially those with cafes, bars, restaurants, etc) are pedestrian only so its a lot of walking and very pedestrian based which is amazing too. D'accord, au revoir!

Bisous,
Libby