Arrived in Lausanne!

Truth be told, I arrived in Lausanne on Monday morning, but I've been crazily busy since then, so let's just pretend i'm writing on Monday. Coming to JFK airport on Sunday evening put an end to a lovely, but busy summer in Connecticut: I was working full-time at a great internship with Alexion Pharmaceuticals in Cheshire from late May to the middle of August and enjoying living with my family and Herve and seeing friends from high school as well as visiting Boston to see MIT people a few times. My flight over wasn't the greatest. When we had been seated in the plane for a few minutes, the captain told us in an exasperated voice, that it seemed we would have a 3 hour delay because only one flight lane was open at JFK due to weather conditions. After about 5 minutes (just enough time for everyone to text whoever was meeting them in Geneva), the captain returned to tell us that he was as confused as us, but it seemed that JFK had played a big joke on us and we would be able to leave in about 20 minutes. Overall, we left about an hour late, but we arrived in Geneva at the exact minute that we were scheduled to arrive. Flying with Swiss should have been a fun time since they had great food, delicious free cocktails, and a comfortable plane all around- I didn't feel really well and got a little sick, though, which ruined the experience. By the time I was in Geneva, though, and saw Herve waiting for me, I felt tired, but better. I passed Herve most of my luggage and he gave me a really pretty rose in return (a fair trade I think); then, we were on our way to our apartment near Lausanne. Most of Monday was spent unpacking, getting various IDs and passes that I would need, and resting. Monday evening, though, Herve managed to drag me out to hang out at one of his friends' houses in the center of Lausanne, despite the fact that I hadn't slept in about 36 hours. I ended up not regretting it at all, and had a great time. I was a little lazy with my French, but most of Herve's friends spoke English really well, so I could fall back on English whenever I didn't feel like thinking. I'll go ahead and introduce all of Herve's friends now considering I've seen them pretty much everyday since I arrived. We were at Mathilde's house, together with her boyfriend Nicholas Mermoud (who just goes by Mermoud), Antoine and his girlfriend, Fabienne, Prune, Helena, Julia, Elodie, and then Herve and me. I had met Mermoud, Mathilde, and Antoine last summer, and those are probably Herve's closest friends. Mathilde is a quiet, but really interesting, sweet and beautiful girl with long brown hair and dark eyes; her mom is an artist and she herself loves art and is studying art history at unil (University of Lausanne). Her boyfriend, Mermoud is the quietest of all-he has an intellectual, brooding air about him and he never talks much when there's a lot of people. I've hung out with him for a few days now though, and he is really awesome. Antoine, though, is the fun, loud, joker of the group and it seems like wherever he is, there's a good time to be had. His Swiss-German girlfriend, Fabienne is the only one who might match him with how funny, warm, and outgoing she is. The two of them were both so welcoming to me from the first moment I met them that they immediately put me at ease. Prune was also a really sweet girl and I'm sure I would have become good friends with her, except that she is leaving to spend a semester in Scotland (or "Ecose" in French). Elodie, Helena, and Julia I only spoke to briefly but they also seemed like great girls. The night overall was quite different from what I'm used to: the parents were home, and we were all sitting in the living room drinking white or red wine and nibbling on some chips with guacamole. What was really weird for me though, was when one girl took out her cigarette case and then almost everyone but Herve and me began to smoke in the middle of the living room. I knew people smoked a lot in Europe, but I was still taken aback when they started to do it in the living room. The overall atmosphere was relaxed and fun though, and I was sad to go.