Jeff Milner

This morning I was fretting a little because I really wanted to go to the “Parqours Aventure Le Relais” (I think that translate to something like Relay Adventure Park), but I didn’t buy a ticket in advance and I was worried that they would be sold out.

Well as the universe has decided to be on my side lately, I showed up at the University and got the very last spot! Ca va tres bien!

The Parquors Aventure is a series of suspended cables that stretch between the trees (we were told that each one was a separate “game”) and each game is a different level of difficulty. One of the most interesting ones was a kind of snowboard zip line where you jumped onto the board and then zoomed down the line. It’s difficult to explain properly without a photo and since we were doing a lot of climbing, I opted out of bringing my camera with me.

However, some of my friends brought their smaller (more manageable) cameras with them and so I have a few photos of the event (like this one):

Here I look a little wobbly, but it was because I was trying hard to use only my sense of balance and not to grab the “life line” above my head in order to get across. I ended up being able to get across this one without cheating but for most of the others, I would have fallen if it weren’t for grabbing the line (oh and of course the fact that I was strapped in).

At one point I was getting pretty confident about racing across the lines and one of the wood panels under my feet actually broke. Of course, I had the harness to hold me up, but I still got quite the adrenaline rush.

I’m having such a great time here but I’m heading out in only 7 more days! It’s time to really buckle down and get the most of it with regard to learning French!

There’s only a week and a day left in my short journey to Quebec. I knew the days were going to go quickly here, but seriously I can’t believe it’s so close to being over.

For the most part everything has been fantastic. The written exam didn’t go nearly as well as the oral, or phonetics but there will be more tests which will give me ample opportunity to improve. I think my major problem was that since I speak a little more fluently than the others in my class, I felt like I could get by with less studying (well I got by, but it was ugly).

Last night I tried to hook up with some friends, but somehow I forgot where I put the number and I was expecting them to call me anyway. I found out this morning that there WAS a message for me last night – but “we must not have heard the phone ring because we were talking to loudly at dinner”. Ok? That doesn’t seem just a little odd? Anyway it was no big deal, but I did check out the Salsa dancing place, Chez Morrice, just in case. Lot’s of dancing, little (or rather “no”) people that I knew.

Tonight I will be hooking up with the friends though. We are going for a picnic at the Plains of Abraham followed by a FREE jazz concert. Certainly Quebec is more fun than any place I have ever lived before. The festivals just keep coming one after the other!

Each day I’m notice myself becoming better and better at French. At school we are supposed to only speak French and while I’m no where near 100% fluent, I am becoming quite good at basic conversations.

Last night they held a “Casino Soirée” at the University. On my way over there a little old lady on the Street asked me for directions. I explained that I only spoke a little French but nonetheless she asked again, more slowly this time, if I could give her some directions. Amazingly enough, I not only knew the area well enough to explain it to her, I even did it completely in French. I must have gotten some good karma from it, because just moments later the bus arrived and I didn’t have to walk to the other bus stop as per my plan.

The Casino was such a blast! Even though we weren’t playing for money, I had a fantastic time. They had lots of Black Jack tables a roulette wheel and some other games of chance. I found it a little hard going at first, but then I discovered one of the dealers was giving out 20,000$ chips for only 10,000$ (She thought the blue ones were only worth $10,000). One sneaky exchange with her got me back into the game enough that I could feel comfortable that I wouldn’t end up losing all my chips early in the night, but she figured it out almost immediately after I made the change. One lucky guy had been cashing into blue chips all night before he or she knew of the error.

However, the real luck came when I discovered one of the tables where the dealer had NO CLUE WHATSOEVER how to play Black Jack. There was one time that she had 20 points and took another card. I guess she was hoping for an ace. It was pretty much the case that so long as never busted I won every hand. After awhile someone explained to her that as the dealer she only draws more cards until she has 16 or more—still it was fun while it lasted.

We ended the night with a little dancing and partying even though I should have been home a few hours earlier working on my homework. Learning French can be fun but doing activities in French is way more fun!

I can’t say enough how awesome the My Explore bursary program has been. If you are a Canadian student (within the last year) with even the remotest interest in learning French, I highly recommend the program.