J'ai vingt-six ans

Just a quick post to say thank you to everyone for all of the cards (see them behind me), emails and posts of Happy Birthday wishes. It was so nice to receive all of them. 

** The title for this post is French for "I am 26 years old" directly translated it means "I have twenty- six years" **

I had a great day and the weather managed to hold out for most of the day. Friends from my classes remembered it was my birthday from the day we had learned numbers, dates and holidays. They all wished me a Happy Birthday and one even had a gift for me. A japanese girl named Yuka who I befriended on our first day of classes gave me a gift of Japanese stationary and cute stickers for writing letters home. I was completely surprised to receive anything but it was fun to be able to open a gift on my birthday. 

Last night Linn cooked dinner for us and then we went out with a friend of mine and her boyfriend. Rachel was in my French class for the first week then was transfered to another group but we've managed to keep in touch. She is from Minnesota and is so much fun. Her boyfriend Bruno is from the greater Montpellier area, they met when he was studying in St. Paul. The four of us wound up at a British pub "The Shakespeare" for beers and it turned out to be trivia night. We stuck around for two rounds and then they had to leave as they had class early the next morning. 

Linn and I decided to go to a little wine bar we found last week "Esprit Vin." We had a great time there trying some different wines from the Languedoc region and eating delicious olives. I some how "befriended" George, an intoxicated 70-something at the bar and he and I proceeded to have a conversation in French. I looked over at Linn a couple times who looked as though he felt sorry for me but gave me the "you wanted to practice your French" eye. The man asked where we were from and after I told him he launched into his life story which started when he was 19 on a boat to New York. He told us several times than he made his way to San Francisco and loved it there. I understood some of what George said, asked him a few questions, I asked the bartender to translate a little and then I asked him to distract George :)

After our long walk back to the dorms Linn surprised me with a birthday dessert. He had purchased a chocolate mousse dessert topped with raspberry coulis and meringue from this great patisserie around the corner. I was so happy and it was the perfect end to a great day. I tried to set the timer on the camera to take a photo of both of us but couldn't figure it out so I'm toasting my tired self :)