Spring Break 2 Part 1: France

That’s right, folks! I enjoyed not one but two spring breaks last year. This time, school was out for a week for the Feria de Abril, a six-day fair on the banks of the Guadalquivir River. I wish I could tell you more about the Feria since it is a HUGE deal in Sevilla, but I never actually went to it. Though that is culturally disappointing, I promise that I had a very good reason for missing out.

My reason traces all the way back to my senior year of high school. In 2007, I met two foreign exchange students who would become my dear friends over the course of the year. One of them, Emma, had come from France. We’ve kept in touch off and on over the past few years, and stunningly our spring break schedules lined up last year so that I could visit her in France while she was home from school in Montreal.

The first time we ever hung out was for Homecoming 2007.
Kim is left, Emma is center.

I was thrilled to be able to spend almost a week with Emma. We had not actually seen each other since high school graduation. First, I met up with her in Paris, and then we traveled to her hometown, Rodez, in the south of France to stay with her parents. I had met them when they had visited Emma in the U.S. during high school, so it was fun to be able to see them on their own soil. 

Reunited!

You can understand why the opportunity was just too good to pass up. What’s more, my cousin was studying in Paris at the time, so I was able to see her for a while when she wasn’t in class or working at a school there. She is only four weeks younger than me and was one of my closest relatives growing up. I had not only one but two very special people to see in Paris. Even as I sit here now, I can hardly believe it worked out that way. Those kinds of coincidences just don’t happen in my life.

Or didn’t, I should say, because it was real, and it was amazing. It was the best trip I had during my whole semester, which will manifest itself in the many parts into which I split the story.

A Plate Just Fell On My Head

Yes, the title is true. Today is Wednesday, April 11, 2012, and this morning a plate fell on my head. Actually, it was a beautifully glazed deep-dish 9" ceramic pie pan (a rather hefty plate). I opened the kitchen cabinet door to reach for a fork like I have hundreds of times, and the pie pan as well as a few other ceramic/glass dishes came crashing down. I actually have no clue which dish(es) hit me, but the pie pan broke. I think it is the dish responsible for the cut that now spans the bridge of my nose.


Luckily, that cut, a headache, and a goose egg on my hairline are the only outcomes of the incident. It could have been a lot worse. (Let this be a cautionary tale to you. Those dishes have been in the same place for almost two years. Why/how they shifted enough to fall today is beyond me, but you should rethink your cabinet organization if you store heavy objects on the topmost shelves). 

See, I'm just fine! The doctors glued up the cut and everything.

Anyhow, what in the world does this have to do with my Spain blog that I never finished and haven't touched for almost eleven months? 

Wow. Has it been that long already? So much has happened since then. I often think about finishing the blog, but then other things take priority. Job searching, school projects, friends and family, working out, scholarship applications...my list, at times, seems infinite. Today, though, I have decided to turn a crappy morning into an opportunity to start tying up the loose ends from that semester in Spain. 

It's not so much for sharing with you what happened to me a year ago--although of course I love that--as it is for recording the memories for my own sake before I forget them entirely. Plus, I never know when a bunch of ceramic dishes could fall on my head again, potentially leaving me with amnesia and no primary accounts to help me remember my life save this blog.