DHSFrance

While going out to the Latin Quarter for dinner Saturday night students found out that our flight the next morning was cancelled by Air France due to ongoing strikes. We quickly scrambled and looked for solutions. Eventually we found out we'd have to go in two separate crews to get home. Many students wished we actually were unable to get home and said they preferred Sarreguemines and their new friends to Paris, the city of lights and hoped we could get back on the train to return with a longer delay. But life as we know it must go on and we knew the inevitable was coming. It was a very long day on Sunday but both groups kept their spirits up and were able to still get back to Atlanta. There were so many memories ... read more

We woke up early and left Sarreguemines from the train station. It was a very tearful goodbye and hard to believe that many of us only knew our French counterparts for about a week. One student described the experience as "like meeting your best friend and then finding out they are moving two days later." Everyone promised to keep in touch and indeed hours later students were snapping away on the high speed train to Paris. After locating our hotel and dropping our bags around 11, we took off for the Basilica of Sacre Coeur on foot while taking in the belles views of Paris. We took a bunch of photos and wondered around the neighborhood of Montmartre and tried some of the local cuisine. At la Place de Tertre some students checked out the local ... read more

Wednesday was a very very busy day for our group. Most students followed their host brother or sister to school for the first period class at 8AM while others didn't start until 9AM. After another lunch in the cafeteria at 12, several parents volunteered to drive the students in groups to one of our host families catering business where our group was warmly welcomed. Our cooking lesson for the day centered around cooking a classic regional dish - La Quiche Lorraine. Students watched demonstrations and followed the recipe and worked in teams over the course of about an hour. It was a great hands-on learning experience and a lot of sleepy students were able to wake up and get their hands "dirty" with the activity. The caterer offered this class, the ingredients, and a professional chef ... read more

After our trip to Strasbourg Saturday, Sunday and Monday were our 2nd and 3rd days apart from the group where everybody stayed with their own host families (including Mr. Kessel and Mrs. Ouanzin who are being hosted by their French counterpart Mr. Marc Seray). Since Easter Sunday is a big deal in this part of the world, often times families in France spend time together so the American students stayed with them and Monday was a day off from school as well. Besides celebrating the holiday and eating lots of chocolate bunnies and eggs, different families planned a variety of activities between Sunday and Monday, including swimming at the water park Calypso just across the border in Germany, bowling, eating lots of cheese (Elizabeth Cowen and many others), shopping around town, hanging with friends (both American ... read more

Getting to Sarreguemines France involved our group of 16 students and 2 teachers leaving from Hartsfield Jackson and flying direct to Paris overnight Wednesday. Thursday morning was a rough wake up (for those of us that slept during the approximately 8 hours of flying) in Paris. After a long wait to get through customs, a missing luggage that has since been recovered, and some waiting, we boarded the TGV (high speed train) for Lorraine. After about an hour and a half on train we switched to a private bus for another hour of commuting before we finally arrived in Sarregumines. A bit shell shocked, students stepped out to a warm welcome from their French host brothers and sisters at Henri Nominé high school. At the high school we were warmly received with snacks and greetings from ... read more