Le jour où j'ai trouvé le choeur et une amie canadienne

Gale: It's not always about what you want. Dawson, you grow up, and life isn't what you thought it was going to be like when you were a kid.
Dawson: I agree. And you're right, being a director is a child's dream, and that's how I know that it's real. Because it's what I wanted to do before I knew how to be scared or cynical.






Curiosity killed the Kayla, and I've been slowly watching Dawson's creek for the past year or so, and now late night insomnia has me down to the last few episodes (and yes, 12:30 pm is late night for me, anything after 9 pm is late night for me). The writing isn't always stellar, but I think there's something that rings true for me in the above lines. 


Also I should be asleep but instead I'm blogging. Oops. 




Yesterday I went to chorus rehearsal! Being there made me feel refreshed immediately; I felt a wave of familiarity and subsequent cultural relief even though the conductor obviously was giving directions in French. I was able to understand the majority of the directions, and I felt happy to be able to apply French listening in a practical way, instead of just listening to a professor lecture about Swiss history and Rousseau. The conductor seems funny and nice; he does however mimic shooting people when they don't cut off in time, but I think it's really awkwardly hilarious and that we'll get along just fine.


It's amazing how much singing immediately changes my life perspective and even has the ability to make a foreign place seem temporarily like a home; there's something to be said about that and I'm not sure exactly what it means about me--whether I am supposed to just be a part of a choir wherever I am, or a director of a choir--but hopefully I'm in the process of figuring that out. 


At the end of the rehearsal Rachel and I went up to the director--whose name is Sebastien, of course---and asked if we needed to audition. He replied "Oui. Maintenant? Cinq minutes." He just had me sing through scales though which was easy peasy. I had the most trouble spelling my name out for him (I'm not used to having to say letters!) and explaining that I had an Italian last name but that I am from America. 


Sebastien placed me in the Soprano section! This is scary and new and different. I have been an Alto II pretty much my entire life just because I think it is cooler and better line reading practice even though I have a range that allows me to sing higher. So we'll see how this contributes to shaping my identity...or destroying my identity...haha. The conductor also said that Rachel and I could sit together in the middle so that we can sing next to each other even though we are different parts which was funny and nice of him. 


After auditioning, this nice Canadian girl named Emily showed us the way out, and she, Rachel, and I went to a salsa bar which was really cool and had awesome music. We stayed for about an hour, and had a nice chat with our new Candian friend (so souped to have a Canadian friend!) who is an au pair in Geneva. She decided to come here after high school because she spent a year nearby when she was young and always knew she wanted to return. I find it really admirable that she just took such a plunge in her life because she really knew what she wanted and where she wanted to be. She gave us some insights about the city, which was great.


Today we went to a watch museum, and it was fun for the first 15 minutes, and then it became, as Rachel put it: "A walk through Purgatory with a really enthusiastic tour guide." There were toooo many watches I couldn't handle it I had a watch overdose and was so glad to be out of there at the end of the two hours. 


I had class this afternoon as usual, whined to myself about how much work we have. Now I should go to sleep!