This One Time In... Dover/Calais/Paris/Brest

Okay so yet again it has been like FOREVER since I have written anything here... just been extremely busy with school and what-not. Just spent an amazing week in Freddy house-sitting/working for my momma and it reminded me how much I LOVE and miss Fredericton... boo Saint John!

So because I have realized that at the moment my life is not nearly interesting enough to justify having a blog, I have decided to go back to a time when it was. Meaning my travels last summer... I have lots of great stories and have never actually written them down so instead of writing them in a journal (BLAH) I've decided to share them with you guys! :) Starting with Dover... mostly because nothing overly exciting happened in London.. well I mean London is awesome but just not really anything story worthy.

So. AHEM to begin. Those of you who do not know where Dover is, it is South East (maybe) of London, on the coast... I think maybe the bus took us 2 hours? possibly...and to England standards, that's a long time! So Dover is most famously known for "The White Cliffs of Dover" featured in many stories and poems, etc. and probably MOST famously, King Lear by Shakespeare... messed up play but pretty amazing.
Another thing in Dover is the HUGE ferry port to get to France. Calais to be exact. It worked out to be cheaper to take this ferry over then to take the Chunnel directly to Paris so this is what we were doing getting on a bus in London in the early morning (umm.. like 8..haha).

We (my travel companion and I) arrive in Dover after what felt like the longest bus ride ever to police officers everywhere and police tape and ambulances (oh great.) we end up enter a part of the building that wasn't roped off yet but told to leave immediately...oops... and went to stand outside with the rest of the spectators. Apparently there is "airborne toxins" in the building (whatever that means) and they began asking if anyone was experiencing nausea, blurry vision, lightheaded-ness, stuffy nose, etc and taking anyone who said yes straight to the ambulance. (YIKES!)

So...what a way to start a 6 week backpacking trip right? haha All ferries were postponed and we stay outside the building for hours waiting for the all clear. Slept on the pavement for a bit, almost got hit by a car, my backpack got hit by a car (I JUST managed to get away) and finally we are aboard! (thanks to a beautiful worker with his beautiful accent...yummm...he actually had nothing to do with it but he was nice to talk to)

So these ferries are actually huge boats with casinos, restaurants, gift shops, etc etc... and were quite comfortable. Before we knew it, we were arriving in Calais with no idea where to go and very little English being spoken. God I love sitting outside a bus station watching as 4 buses that come every half hour go by while wondering "where is my bus?" only to find out all the buses are the same and go to the place you are. HAHA yeah stupid Jenn... BUT to our luck, two British boys with backpacks (everytime we saw a backpacker we would follow them...we called it follow the tourist...) so I'm eavesdropping on these guys' conversation and they seem nice and are pretty hilarious and I hear them mention they are going to the same train station as we are to also catch a train to Paris! HORRAY! The game of follow the tourist begins! We arrive at the train station and get our tickets to Paris and are standing around wondering where to go and so are the boys so I, being the smooth, cunning person that I am, walk up and ask them what time it is. He replies and we are instant travel companions! Their names were Mike and Josh.. two of the best guys you could ever meet... absolutely hilarious and on their way to Barcelona for a music festival.

Time on the train flies with our new friends to talk to and we share lots of laughs. Finally we arrive in Paris but WAY behind the schedule we had orginally planned (thanks to the Calais ferry station and their unclear buses) So, we have missed the last train to Brittany (west coast of France and home to a friend) and they have missed the Train to Barcelona. GREAT, lets get a hostel together then...better than splitting up right? We wander around until we find the hostel that I had booked for a few days later but sadly, no vacancies. The AWESOME guy behind the counter is so kind as to call around until he can find us a place nearby that has a room for 4 people! :) we get one and away we go!

We go out for a lovely dinner... apparently the service in Paris SUCKS though and if you want to get served you have to tackle the waiter hold him down while you tell him your order, no kidding. then, good luck getting your food and your bill! We almost dined and dashed getting sick of waiting for him.

By this time we are a couple bottles of wine in so we go to the store across the road and buy some more alcohol to drink on our way back to the hotel. we get lost (maybe a product of the wine and vodka) and end up in Paris' red light district... YIKES. the boys get asked by a sketchy looking man if he can "have us" they reply "uhhh..no?" haha bless...

We had a wonderful night drinking and play cards and listening to music and talking but sadly, morning came and we went our separate ways. Poor guys could not get a train to Barce and ended up having to take a 4-day bus. Me and my companion caught a train to Brest to see our friend Pauline. However, we were supposed to arrive the day before and had no way of getting a hold of Pauline to let her know we were on our way. EEKK

We arrive in Brest, evening, train station is closed and there is a gypsy (homeless man) with some sad looking dogs wandering around. OH GREAT. we find a girl and ask her how to use the payphones, you need a special card so she calls Pauline with her cell phone but ALAS Pauline does not answer! This girl leaves a voicemail (she was extremely weirded out by us) and leaves. We wait. and we wait. we wait some more. Steph calls her mom using her credit card ($150 later...) and Im watching our stuff while sketchy gypsy is pacing in front of me. watching me. getting closer each time he goes by me. Finally I tell Steph to get off the phone, we grab our stuff and decide to wait outside, away from the gypsy, and in view of the restaurant across the street.

After a few hours Pauline comes to the rescue! We head to her Grad party with her friends who feed us DISGUSTING French vodka and rum and are very eager to practice their english with us... unfortunately for us they were VERY drunk and it was hard to understand anything they were saying! They were all very nice though, but we were exhausted and eventually went to sleep...in Paulines' tiny European car because there were no beds for us in the house! haha WHAT A NIGHT! luckily we were so tired we slept like babies.

This is long enough and that is the end of those adventures anyways... I promise the other ones won't be so long! :) I must say though that Brittany, a province on the west coast of France is ABSOLUTELY beautiful and if any of you every get the opportunity to go, I highly recommend you take it!

Well, until next time, later all!

Soft Shock

BBBLLLLAAAAAHHHHH so it's been a while.. honestly, nothing too interesting has really been happening.

I started school again for my spring courses..surprisingly, I'm loving it! I wish all school was like this! they fit like 3 classes into one so your constantly doing something and I'm actually learning. The professors are awesome too because: A) they speak english and, B) They only teach university (my stats prof is a high school teacher) part-time so they aren't jaded and hating life yet. THEY ACTUALLY CARE IF YOU LEARN. Plus you can really tell that they love what they are teaching.

Aside from stats I'm taking an elective called America in The 1960s. yeah, its a real course. I would recommend it to anyone! But only with Powell, my prof. He is effing awesome. :) We are focusing on the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War but also looking into all the other craziness that happened in the 60s..most of it is connected anyways. We have been assigned 3 books to read, Coming of Age in Mississippi, Born on the 4th of July, and The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage. These are not, as you probably guessed, textbooks and are actually interesting. I just finished Coming of Age and LOVED it. Its so powerful. Its an autobiography about a girl growing up poor and Black in rural Mississippi before Civil Rights were established. She ends up getting heavily involved in the Movement and the KKK has her pretty high up on their blacklist, meaning they really want to kill her. GREAT book and I recommend it to any of you if you are at all interested in this stuff.

Ummm so not much else is happening in my life... Im incredibly sick.. stupid flu season... I havent been able to do anything for 3 days and feel like shit run over..repeatedly. haha On the bright side, I am leaving for Fredericton tonight where I will be spending a whole week while my parents are away visiting my brother in Toronto! I'm pretty excited for the whole free groceries and car and house allllll to myself...unfortunately though, I still need to attend my classes in SJ on Tuesday and Thursday so there is a bit of running back and forth. Oh well!

Well my brain is about to go back to sleep so time to pop in some Disney movies and surround myself with kleenex for another 4 hours. Fuck, I hate being sick :( Peace Out A-Town.

Thrill Is To Make It Up

Yeah, that was me tonight, listening to Santogold extremely loud on my iPod and dancing on the sidewalks of uptown Saint John while walking my dog at 9:00pm. Yupp, I'd say today was a success.


ps, If you don't know Santogold, you NEED to educate yourself. <3

Pink Star

So guys, I have finally found the perfect shade of lipstick..it only took about a month and 4 tubes that I will very rarely, if ever, use. BUT there is is, Pink Star by Rimmel London.. LOVE IT.

Went tanning today with my old roommate, Natalie, who I haven't seen in what feels like FOREVER...mmm tanning. Very successful, yet short, outing to put me in a great mood! Going to hanging out with a certain boy tonight..probably just watch a movie and relax..overall, today has been/will be a very good day! :)

I love rainy days where you just hang out all day, don't really do much..watch a lot of movies and relax. UGH but I hate when you are stressing out about asking someone something kind of important and you don't really know how to ask it. You finally get the courage to say something but its kind of more like dancing around the question, not just coming right out and asking, and you don't even get an answer! haha I have done this twice today with the same person about the same subject and just get a kinda laugh and no response. I'm guessing this means no, but at the same time I really wanted to hear a yes so I keep thinking if I just come out and ask then I'll get what I want, but no... if I had a magic 8 ball in front of me, I know it would come up "unlikely". DAMN. Oh well, that's that.

Time to get ready for the night ahead :) What did the 5 fingers say to the face?

Its a gas gas gas

What a weekend! Saturday night I finally got to go out with the girls again and had a blast! I changed Candyland around a bit and made it into a drinking game which actually turned out to work really well... we were all feeling it about halfway through and just didn't finish, success! haha
Unfortunately however, I ended up having a few too many jello shots and fell down.. a few times. The first time was still at the apartment.. I slid on something and did the splits and just sat there for a bit...a little embarrassing right? Well A LOT embarrassing was when I fell directly on my ass at the bar in the middle of the dance floor. yeah. I was THAT girl. haha BUT all in all I had a really wonderful time and it was so nice seeing everyone again!

I was deathly ill this morning though. Haven't been that hungover in a while. We all went out to the coffee mill for breaky (yumm yumm) I didn't eat.. just laid my head on the table..then we went back to Stephs and watched a show that Will Ferrell produces. I had never heard of it before "eastbound and down" if you ever get the opportunity, WATCH THIS. It is hilarious! Had a pretty relaxing day, went grocery shopping with momma, then watched Pirate Radio and had a nap. If you haven't seen Pirate Radio, it just came out on DVD and its AWESOME. I really enjoyed it. A lot of really great old music from the 60's like the rolling stones and the beatles and whatnot.

So my friend, Ahmed from the community center, turned creepy on me. Guess he wasn't just a nice guy...boo. We were talking one morning and he asked what I was doing that day and I told him I was working. He rambled on a bit about the work he does (I didn't understand any of it) then says that he has to make the money because he smokes like 2 packs and day and drinks every night. hmm.. okay? he then proceeds to ask if I drink, I say occasionally, he says "lets get a drink sometime, you and me, yes?" I say "ummmm....mmmmaaayyybbbeee...." and walk away. UGH great! I panicked and didn't know what to say so now he probably thinks he has a chance.. I hope he doesn't get angry when I turn him down. JUST what I need.. an angry, violent, foreigner with really bad teeth coming after me. haha Just remember what I said before, if you dont hear from me for a couple days, Ahmed, Duke street community center. hahah

I've got a pretty slow week ahead of me. Classes don't start until next week and I only have 3 shifts so I'm probably just going to take 'er easy. Really looking forward to it actually. I'm going to do some "just for fun" reading and probably go tanning..yumm.. Well off I go, Enjoy yourselves.

Technologically Challenged and Accident Prone

Okay so I've decided that I am both (like in the title) technologically challenged and extremely accident prone. For some reason this page is stuck on HTML format (at least I know what that means!) and I cannot for the life of me figure out why, or how to even fix it... UUGGGHHH sometimes technology sucks.

Now for the accident prone... well this isn't really new news to anyone I'm sure haha Today, at work, the milkshake machine decided it didnt like my fingers (touch screen) and wouldn't turn off. Therefore...strawberry milkshake avalanche. IT WENT EVERYWHERE!! and right in the middle of out high school kids lunch rush...so of course all the little assholes were laughing at me...have I mentioned how much I hate my job?? Luckily my manager, a little pakistany woman is super awesome and just made a huge joke out of it and gave me a prize for "best mess" hehe I love her.. coincidentally I also just found out that I am living in her old apartment..so I get her mail sometimes...its pretty funny...or at least I think so. :) There was many many more accidents throughout the day, but that was the biggest and I wont bore you with the rest. Just sayin...Im clumsy... :)

So my last couple of days have gone quite well. I wrote an exam last night and aside from missing a 14 pointer, I think I did quite well. My roommate and I went for a lovely tan at this new place on Rothesay Avenue that has these amazing new beds and its actually the best 9 minutes you can spend...you get out feeling so refreshed and warm and just lovely. I'm definitely going to get a monthly package at this place.. very cheap and very awesome! We also went and bought some lillies from the superstore.. I can smell them all the way from the other side of the room and I love it! They are so beautiful :)


I write my last exam tomorrow and Im not at all ready for it. So nervous..but also so excited to be done! Except I am now taking 2 classes from may to june. BLAHHH Stats (barf.) and "America In The 1960s" I figured hey, what the hell. I need more electives and you can't go wrong with the 60s! I hope... I'll keep you posted.

OH I almost forgot. DATE NIGHT. It was so awesome! Steve Carrell and Tina Fey are the dream team! annnddd for all you gossip girl fans: Leighton Meister (Blair) had a small, but good part in it as well. A very clever movie..of course, a little predictable but still full of laughs and well worth a watch or two!


So today I was a little down and thinking how much it sucks that I dont really have any friends in this city... I have Natalie, my old roommate, but we never see eachother anymore, my cousins..but they don't count, their my cousins! and thats about it.. well Mitch of course, but I dont think he really counts either. haha BUT I got a very lovely message today from my good friend Steph! She will be moving to SJ for the summer to work! I'm so excited!! :) She is also hosting a little after exams party this Saturday and I am pumped to see these girls again! It has been way too long! :)

Well, ABDC champions is on...yet again..I keep watching it because I LOVE the JabbaWockeez..WHen they danced to Apologise by one republic... I got chills..haha youtube it!! but from watching this about 4 times now, I've decided I really like that song by DJ Khaled in the beginning of the show "All I do is win" So, I shall leave you know with this little message: All I do is win win win, no matter what, got money on my mind and I can never get enough, and every time I step up in the building everybody hands go up, and they stay there :)


Heres a clip of the JabbaWockeez Dancing to Micheal Jackson- PYT VERY VERY GOOD!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzuGRyN90uA

(part of being technologically challenged means I don't know how to just put the video)

Rain, Rain, Go Away...

What a weekend! Full of nothingness. Friday I went for a quick shopping juant with the cousin! spent the last of my money but bought a really cute dress from Boathouse! love it! :) Then Saturday, I worked all day and it was sooo busy. There was some kids thing on at Harbour Station. I sold so many happy meals I wanted to barf. haha

So Saturday night I was exhausted but some friends decided to come up and go out drinking. I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to try out the new dress! Plus I hadn't seen these people in a while and was excited to see them again! Unfortunately, plans got mixed up and I got left out of the mix which sucked. I hate that feeling when your really excited for something and you have it all figured out in your head but because of some dumb misunderstanding and lack of communication, everything goes to shit! But oh well. I had an early night and worked today.

Tonight, I am going to see Date Night with Tina Fey and Steve Carrell! This is sure to be a hilarious movie...I'm excited to see James Franco in something again [drool]. I will give you guys the full review, without any spoilers!

Also, I have already started the whole "exams are over so I'm going to read something for fun" phase of my summer, even thought exams aren't over for my until Thursday..bbllaahh... I'm reading "Eat Pray Love" because I have only heard good things about this book. So far, I really like it! and the woman reminds me a little of myself...minus the whole searching for divinity and God part.. no thanks. Its a short book though so if you have any suggestions on what to read next, let me know! :)

So I have most of this week off, for exams, but OF COURSE its supposed to rain. I cant wait for summer to get here when it will be nice 90-wait I live in SJ now-75% of the time! haha

Well the dog is crying for some lovin so that's it for now! I hope your all ready for the week to come!