I've survived 11 days!

This blog post marks everything being sorted here in Aurillac as I finally have an internet connection in my flat! This is not the only accomplishment I have made - on the first day here (Thurs 26th Sep) I managed to open a bank account, get home insurance, sort my French sim card and sort my gas and electricity which felt like big achievements. I have been very lucky too with my landlady, who picked me up from the station when I arrived and took me to a big supermarket to get what I needed on the first day. Of course I got straight on with making the flat my own, so with all my stuff in it definitely feels more like home!

 I've enjoyed having big windows that open out onto my balcony, especially over the first couple of days when it was really hot here (Aurillac didn't exceed expectations for long on the weather front...)

 One of the best parts of being here has been the other assistants in Aurillac - we all get on so, so well and after a week and a half it feels like we've known each other for ages already. 3 of 4 of the other Aurillac assistants live at the Lycee down the hill from my flat which is great because they're only 5 minutes away. I did get the opportunity to move in with them but it made more sense to stay put as I was already settled here and had set up everything I needed here (take a minute to appreciate having to do that in a foreign language). I don't think I'd cope too well having to move out and settle somewhere else, plus the others are so close by it's hardly inconvenient. I haven't started teaching yet as we (primary school assistants) have been told we don't have to start working until after the French school holidays which end at the beginning of November! We will be meeting the teachers we'll be working with in Aurillac and planning lessons over the next two weeks so hopefully we'll have more of a routine going soon. We also found out that although we'll be based in Aurillac, we'll be teaching some long-distance lessons via Skype!

 We had our training day at Clermont-Ferrand on Wednesday (2nd Oct) which was really good because now we have an idea of how and what we'll be teaching. I decided to stay in Clermont the night before as it's 2 and a half hours from Aurillac by train (or 100 miles by road) and I didn't fancy being on a train before 6am and then having to concentrate for the rest of the day. It turned out quite well as the hotel was 2 mins from the CRDP where we had training and I got to talk to my parents and Dom over Skype using the hotel wifi. I also had quite a goof view of the Clermont-Ferrand cathedral from my window...

Although it's not the biggest of places, Aurillac is beautiful (that's the view walking down to see the other assistants) and it's amazing how you can be in the centre of town and see green hills all around. Apart from gigantic hills to walk up every day to get my apartment I really love it here and now everything is sorted out I really feel at home (yay).