So much for updating regularly. I can't even use the excuse that I haven't had the chance, because frankly, I have. I guess it's lack of a desire to write. Anyway.

I've been here in Jonzac for about one week, and it's been just under 2 weeks since I left the US. I can't say I'm homesick, exactly, because it's not the US I miss. I just miss having people around. My apartment here is quite isolated, and it's in a very small town of 3,000 inhabitants, most (if not all) of whom are retired or families. Thus, no one my age, so no one really to hang around with. It's lonely, I have to say, and I've been spending probably too much time on the internet, chatting with people from back home. Every day I promise myself I'll go out and explore the town, and to a certain extent I do, but the town is small and quiet. Beautiful, quaint, old, French, but quiet and often deserted. I guess I like it here, and I probably will grow to like it more, once I get more into the rhythm of working and cooking better meals. I think once Eric comes it will be nice too, to have someone to have a drink with at one of the local bars, to have someone to talk to at night and eat with.

The teachers at the lycee and college have been welcoming to a certain extent as well. It is the first year here in Jonzac for one of the teachers, and she has invited me to do things with her and her boyfriend on several occasions. Yesterday, for example, we went on a bike ride to the Gironde estuary, which was beautiful. Another teacher took me swimming at one of Jonzac's giant pools. Basically, it was a giant pool maze, with a current and everything. Very weird but very cool. So I can't complain that they haven't been friendly or welcoming, on the contrary they have been. It's just difficult to return every night to an empty apartment, in a town where you know no one.

I wonder if anyone else doing this program is already as melancholy and regretful as I am. I can only hope it will get better here. I guess I don't do very well on my own, which is strange because I'm not particularly social or extroverted. I guess I just need to have people I'm close to around me in order to feel happy and comfortable.