So the weekend is over and Monday is here!  It is registration day at ISU and Dave is in the midst of that process.  He officially starts the program on Wednesday.  Right now I am in the student lounge spending some much needed time on the internet!

We had a great weekend - although some of our plans changed last minute.  There was a BBQ at ISU on Saturday, but the garage sale was pushed to today (Monday).  We spent the day at ISU meeting and getting to know people, and then a group of us went to Germany, just across the Rhine, to go clubbing.  So I spent my 27th birthday dancing in a very busy German club!  It was a fun experience, but thankfully I was not out all night, we managed to get home around 3am and I was in bed shortly after!  However, we did get up early the next day to go to church.  But right after we came home and went back to bed for a nap!  The trip to the German spas was cancelled on Sunday as there were not too many people who were interested in going.  So the graduating ISU student who was organizing the trip will be in Strasbourg for one more month and said he would organize another trip with the new class when everyone is in town!  So I will hopefully get to these thermal spas before September ends!
Sunday night we went and saw the Strasbourg light and water show - I think the name of the show translates to "Dreams on the Water".  It consists of fountains, fireworks, lights, lasers, etc. all cooridinated to music.  It was a lovely show and it was actually the last night it was being shown in the city! Afterwards a group of us went to an Irish pub - where they spoke English, so I could actually order for myself instead of getting Dave to do it for me!  It was nice to feel semi-independent again!

Today the garage sale took place at ISU simutaneously with registration - so Dave and I went shopping to get some things for the apartment!  Dave bought a chair for his desk at home (to replace the stool he has been sitting on), and we got an iron, a duvet, a blanket and I got a BIKE!  I am so excited about my awesome new bike - it is black and is just one year old and will be perfect!!!!  The woman I bought it from purchased it last year when she moved to Strasbourg with her boyfriend, another ISU student, but now she is moving back to Czech Republic and needed to sell it.  I am beyond pleased!  I will now be exploring Strasbourg and surrounding areas by bike!  Here is a picture of me and my new wheels!

I have some other exciting news - I got a job looking after 2 French little girls!  I saw an ad at an English bookstore here in Strasbourg for an English speaking babysitter - so I sent an email off to the family, explaining my situation here in Strasbourg and saying I was looking for part time work.  I went and met with the family on Friday and really hit it off with them and will start next week!  So I will be looking after the girls 2-3 times a week for a total of about 10-12 hours - but will be done by 7pm everyday - which is perfect b/c then Dave and I can see each other for dinner!  And I also explained to the family that I will be traveling a bit throughout the year, so may be gone for a few weeks here and there, and they were willing to accomodate my travel plans as long as I let them know when I will be gone in advance.
I am very excited to spend time with the girls and get to know them - and take them to the park, do crafts with them, help them with their English homework and just have fun with them!  I am missing my niece so much and it will be nice to be around other little girls and spend time with them.  So if any of you have some good ideas of things to do with 4-8 year old girls, email me and let me know!!!!

We have gotten a nice surprise a few times in our apartment over the last week - there is an opera singer who must live in a nearby apartment and we can often hear her practicing!  The first time I heard her I thought it was a CD playing, but then she stopped and started again and again and it was obvious that what I was listening to was live!  So now every few days we hear her and it is quite enjoyable (as she only practices in the afternoon so far, never in the morning!).

We got a different kind of surprise riding the tram the other day.... A few weeks ago Dave and I were on the tram and an older man, probably around 60, got on the tram with spectacularly tight short shorts on.  I tried to subtely point him out to Dave and we had a laugh about the different kinds of fashion that we are seeing in Europe.  Well a couple of days ago we were riding the tram again and we saw him - only this time he was wearing even shorter shorts, as in I saw his cheeks hanging out!  Wow is all I can say!!!!!  That is a memory I will have for a long time!  Unfortunately for you all, I did was not able to capture this sight on camera to share with you all - sorry!

Tonight we are off to a house party hosted by a group of ISU students who share a 3 bedroom apartment.  I told Dave I may not stay too late, but thankfull the apartment we are going to is about a 5 minute walk from ours so I will come home when I want to and he can stay as late as he likes!  It is very nice to live in a city where everything is so close and I feel so safe walking by myself at night.

Tomorrow is the graduation ceremony for the outgoing ISU students and the opening ceremony for the new ISU students.  So we will be getting dressed up and spending the day at ISU again.  In the evening there is another house party and on Wednesday there are some fun activities planned for the new students during the day that I will go to as well if I can sneak along!  We will see!

Hello ISU students!

This past week has been exciting as we have been meeting more and more ISU students and had our roommate, Martin, moved in with us!  Martin is an aerospace engineer from the Czech Republic and will be attending ISU with Dave starting next week.

The 2010 ISU graduating class returned to Strasbourg this week from all over the globe, where they were doing their 3 month internships.  Internships took place in the US, all over Europe, Nigeria, Japan and Australia.  So it looks like Dave will have no end of options of where he could go next summer!  The returning students were presenting on their internship experiences this week as well as organizing orientation activities for all the incoming students.  So this week Dave and I have been at the ISU campus listening to some presentations and participating in activities of interest!

On Tuesday night we went out for drinks with the ISU group and met a lot of the 2010 graduates - it was great to be able to talk to them to hear about their experiences at ISU and for Dave to get some advice.  I think talking to them has put him at ease in some ways and made him even more excited in other ways!  It has been a great resource to him to get all of their insights - and he is very glad he has been here this week to meet them.

The place we went to for drinks was called "La Lantern" and was a little bar in centreville.  Now most of Strasbourg has businesses in the main floor of the buildings with apartments on the floors above.  We were gathered at some tables outside the bar along the street and it was about 11pm.  Our group, along with some others who were outside, were not the quietest - so at one point one of the occupants of an apartment above dumped a bucket of water out their window over our heads!  I guess this is a common occurrence to indicate to the patrons of the bar that they are being too loud!  I think everyone got the hint - for about 5 minutes and then the noise level crept back up.  Needless to say, I am glad we are not living over a bar!

On Wednesday we went on a bike tour of Strasbourg with some of the graduating class members.  They were able to show us some of the landmarks in Strasbourg and introduce us the biking experience in this city!  We went to Petite France (the very picturesque area of the city), the Council of Europe buildings and the European Court of Human Rights, downtown and to Orangerie Park.

Strasbourg is an ideal place for the cyclist - it seems everyone here rides their bike all over the place.  You see everything from business men and women riding their bikes to and from work in their professional clothes, young women in flowing skirts riding around and seniors riding to and from the market, with their baskets loaded with baguettes and fresh produce!  There are bike paths all over the city and where there are none you ride on the street or on pedestrian walkways.  I have to say it was a little intense for me the first time I rode here following the group, we weaved in and out of traffic, pedestrians and other objects along the road!  At one point I ran into a pole!  Thankfully it was a small pole and I was not going very fast!

After getting used to weaving in and out of “obstacles” I found I was really enjoying biking around Strasbourg and am now thinking about purchasing a bike or renting one long term. For our tour we rented the bikes for the day – however you can also rent them for months at a time and even a year for a fairly reasonable price. So if I cannot find one to buy for a good price I will just rent one for a few months in the fall and the spring – as I do not intend on biking in the winter with snow on the ground!  Strasbourg is a great city for walking, but having a bike would be nice if I wanted to get somewhere quickly and did not want to buy a tram ticket....I could even bike down to ISU in the evenings to have dinner with Dave and back again.  It is great exercise and so easy to do here given the prevalence of cyclists. 

Our tour guides also pointed our where we need to go if we want to walk or bike over to Germany - again their advice was extremely useful as they told us everything is cheaper in Germany - groceries, clothes, toiletries, ice cream!  So again, I would love to bike over to do a lot of our shopping there.  With a bike it would probably not take me more than 20 minutes or so to get to the German shops. 

After our bike ride we decided to spend the evening roaming around centreville.  There is always something going on there for tourists and locals to see, so we went and got ice cream (tiramisu ice cream for me and after eight for Dave) and walked around.  We came across a bank playing in one of the squares - the band was made up 90% of older men.  They were so cute, and Dave humoured me and we stopped and watched them for awhile.  I really enjoyed the whole evening!

On Thursday we spent the day doing some shopping.  Ever since we moved into our apartment and got our own kitchen I have been really wanting to make a Thai green curry chicken dish that I had started to perfect at home in Winnipeg.  At all the grocery stores we went to here I found most of the ingredients I needed but I could not find the essential one: green curry paste!  So after a couple of weeks of looking around standard markets and grocery stores I went online and found a Thai market between our apartment and ISU!  So on Thursday Dave and I set out in search of this Thai market!  We took the tram to the nearest stop, then walked in the heat (+30 here yesterday) into the depths of an industrial area and found the market!  I was so happy - they had the green curry paste and all the other ingredients I needed at lower prices than the other stores I had seen them at!  So I loaded up on my Thai ingredients and left very happy.  I will probably cook my dish on Sunday (as the next few days we have dinner plans already)!

In the evening we were meeting up with the ISU group again to go to the "Living Room" - a local club in Strasbourg that apparently is the only place with a decent dance floor.  So when Dave and I got home from our days activities we did not have time to make dinner before we went to meet the group.  So we decided to take the opportunity to eat at the little Italian deli, Il Girasole, that is in the main floor of our building.  Yes, our apartment is above an Italian deli/small restaurant!  Everyday I get wafts of mozzarella, basil, olive oil and other heavenly scents hitting my nostrils and making me hungry!  It smells divine - so Dave and I decided to finally try it out!  We each got paninis - which were amazing!  Hot with wonderful smoked Italian ham and melted cheese with basil leaves!  This place is going to be a weakness for me all year.  And I made the most wonderful and dangerous discovery while in there - they make their own tiramisu!  So I have tiramisu available to me 14 hours a day!  If I come home a lot heavier than I left - it will be because of this tiramisu!  I did not try any last night, but tomorrow for my birthday I will be treating myself to some authentic, delicious looking tiramisu!

Once we ate and were extremely satisfied (!) we made our way to the hotel where the ISU grads were staying to meet up before going to the club. We had a wonderful time visiting with some grads we had not met yet and after a couple of hours headed out to the club. Now ISU hosted what is called the Summer Space Program (SSP) this summer – so people from all over the world were in Strasbourg for the summer doing an intensive summer school program at the campus. So the SSP students hosted this evening at the Living Room. It was reserved just for our group. When we got there the small little place was PACKED with people – the SSP students, the 2010 ISU grads and a few of us new ISU people. I have never been on a dance floor quite so crowded before!  Dave and I stayed for a couple of hours and (tried to) dance - but after awhile we were hot, sweaty and wanted to go home to bed!  We left the club and made it home just before it started pouring rain! It was definitely an experience!

Today (Friday) we are not doing anything terribly exciting.  The SSP reception is tonight at ISU which we may attend - it is free and it is catered!  I am going to head to IKEA to get some things for the apartment and Dave is going to relax for a few hours.
Tomorrow we have a BBQ and garage sale at ISU (the graduating students sell off their stuff to new ISU students) and in the evening the grads are hosting a "cultural night" where they present foods and info from the country where they did their internship.  So it should be a fun day!  And it is my birthday - so I am excited as always!

Sunday we are planning on going into Germany to swim in the mineral spas there - but so far Dave and I are the only ones signed up!  So we have to try and get a larger group together so we can all go hang out in Germany for the afternoon!

And then on Monday Dave goes to register and will start classes next week.  And then  I have to figure out what I am going to do here for the year!

It has been a busy, but good week!  We have met a few students that will be attending ISU with Dave this year, although it seems that the majority of the new students are not yet in Strasbourg and are arriving this weekend. So we have only met around 10 of Dave's new classmates and look forward to meeting more in the next few days.  We are both excited about what is to come, but also a little nervous for Dave to start school.  For him it will be a lot of work and long hours, for me it will be a lot of time alone until I have my own schedule and routine established here in Strasbourg....I am looking into some possibilities for me to fill my days with work and volunteer activities and will update the blog when I have details!

I miss everyone from home and am often homesick - but I am trying to take advantage of this year and all the exciting opportunities it is giving Dave and I.  It is quite an adventure for us to start out our marriage with - but I am learning so much, coming to appreciate Dave in new ways, and trusting God to show us what to do with this time and what to do next!

Love Heather & Dave

Exploring Strasbourg

The last couple of days Dave and I have been free to wander around Strasbourg and take in the city as tourists. With the apartment secured, the internet, phone and electricity set up and ISU business taken care of for the time being, we spent Saturday and Sunday exploring Strasbourg and taking some pictures!


Strasbourg is a beautiful city. Even the pictures I have taken could never capture its full beauty - you need to walk the cobbled streets, hear the Cathedral bells and smell the tantalizing scents from its many bakeries (or patisseries!) to get a true appreciation for Strasbourg. It is a city that I look forward to exploring and getting to know in the months ahead.



Strasbourg is right on the French border next to Germany. Throughout history it has been both a German and a French city, with the latest war resulting in Strasbourg being within French boundaries. As such, everything I have read about Strasbourg highlights the fact that this French city has a very distinct German influence - manifesting itself in the language, the architecture and the cuisine. It is a very interesting place where you get a taste of two very discrete cultures and get to experience the hybrid which has developed in this specific place due to its French and German influences.

One of my favourite things about Strasbourg so far is its many bridges and canals. Strasbourg is right on the Rhine and has many smaller rivers and estuaries flowing through it and around it. As you walk around the city you are never far from water. Centreville, or the city centre, is basically situated on an island – with a river winding its way around it. Thus, you cross multiple bridges and canals as you come and go. The bridges are decorated with profuse flowering baskets at this time of year and there are multiple benches to sit on and take in the lovely scenery. Along the rivers there are fisherman trying their luck, weeping willows grazing the surface of the water and pathways where the city’s many dog owners take their K9s for a walk – and sometimes a swim! You will also see multiple ducks and swans in the river as well as canal boats showing tourists the city at its best.

On Saturday Dave and I spent the day wondering around Centreville. Our first stop was the Notre Dame Cathedral – one of France’s foremost gothic style cathedrals. Of course this is not as large as Paris’ Notre Dame, but nonetheless it was extremely impressive. I am always amazed that these structures were built in a time where the technology was so basic – pulleys and levers and plain old human labour. Even with the technology we have today we no longer build such buildings, nor do we put the time and effort and the sweat into carving minute details into every surface as they did then. It is truly amazing. You can’t help but admire the craftsmanship and the dedication the workers and the planners had to their vision and to God. It took about 60 years for Strasbourg’s Notre Dame to be built. That is a lifetime!

After we visited the Cathedral we wandered the streets taking in all the activities that were going on. Every Saturday and Wednesday Centreville hosts a market – where vendors sell everything from antiques, to produce, to books. It is really interesting to see what people bring with them on these days and check out the prices! There were multiple flower vendors and I not so subtly dropped hints to Dave that he should maybe buy me market flowers from time to time!

As we wandered we also came across a group of Salsa dancers giving a demonstration, some clowns performing for children and painters offering to create portraits or caricatures for anyone willing to sit and pay! We sat in Place Gutenberg and Place Kleber and watched children on the carousel, people cooling their feet in the fountains and the many pigeons searching for food by the outdoor cafes!
It seems that there is never a shortage of things going on - however it is high tourist season right now, so we will see what it is like in January/February!  But right now it is very fun to be in such a bustling city with so much going on. 

Today (Sunday) Dave and I went to Trinity International Church for the second time and know that we have found a home church for our year in Europe.  Thankfully for me it is an English speaking church so I can actually understand what is being said!  But there are also many French people who go there who either know English or listen to a translator translate the service.  It is nice to be able to meet so many different people - everyone has been extremely kind to us and we have been invited to people's houses multiple times already.  After church we were invited to go to Orangerie Park with a group of people from the church for an informal picnic.  We said yes and told people we would meet them there - however when we got home we laid down for a "little" nap and woke up 1.5 hours later!  We rushed to the park and ran into one family who were just leaving - and they were the last to leave!  We apologized for being late and missing everyone and then proceeded to explore the park.  We were disappointed we were not able to visit with the people who had kindly invited us, but we enjoyed seeing the park as it was the first time we were there. 
Orangerie Park is right beside the Council of Europe Parliament Building and it is absolutely beautiful....I regret not bringing my camera, but I know I will go back to take pictures.  There are flower gardens, multiple fountains, gazebos, pavilions, ponds, etc.  There is even a little lake where you can rent row boats and go paddling on the water - again I hinted to Dave that that would be a romantic thing for us to do!  It was a lovely afternoon seeing the park and people watching.  It was a very hot day so the park was packed with young people and families enjoying the summer weather. And there were so many dogs - I loved watching them run around and frolick in the grass!

All in all it has been a wonderful weekend and we were glad to finally spend some days just enjoying the city together!  Tomorrow orientation week starts for ISU students - meaning there are fun activities planned, no work yet!  So we will be meeting more people from the school and doing more touristy things with the ISU group - such as a bike tour around Strasbourg, a trip to Germany to some hot springs, and a BBQ at one of the local lakes.  I am very excited to meet some more people and do some of these fun activities before Dave settles into the routine and business of school.  We will enjoy our last full week together before he becomes a Masters student!

I have found a few things that I will be involved with this coming year - taking French courses for sure - I am looking into a couple of different schools.  And I will hopefully be volunteering at an English/French pre-school.  The kids have pre-school in French two days a week and English the other two days they go - so I would be helping with the English but also being exposed to French!  So we will see how that goes!  But I am confident I will be able to find enough to do to keep me busy as I do not want to be laying about the house all day!  Dave will be so busy and I need to find things to keep me busy too!

Dave & Heather find a home! Now for a roommate.....

Wow – what a week it has been since I last wrote! It has only been 12 days since we arrived in Strasbourg but it seems like it has been much longer!


We found an apartment and moved in this past Wednesday. What a relief – but the drama is ongoing and the story of how we got here will take some explaining.

So the last time I updated the blog I wrote about how to secure an apartment in Strasbourg, particularly if you were going to go through an agency, one needed to have a co-signer/guarantor. We could not get our bank to be our co-signer and we did not know a French citizen who could be one for us either. So last week I was pretty much in despair about what we were going to do.

Well on Saturday I saw an ad for an apartment that was available immediately in Strasbourg as its owner had to move to England for work. I sent an email inquiring about this apartment and received a response a few hours later. The ad was posted by a woman named Monica who wrote that she was a civil engineer and the company she worked for in Strasbourg had won a bidding contract in the UK and she had to depart quickly for London and was now looking for someone to sublet her apartment. The pictures of the apartment looked lovely, and the price was right – so we emailed Monica back saying we were very interested!

Over the next couple of days we emailed back and forth trying to figure out how we could move the sublet along. She was in London and had the keys to the apt with her....so on Sunday she suggested we use an online company called moneybookers, where she would deliver the keys and sublet contract to moneybookers and we would wire the money to them. Once they received the funds they would hold the money and send us the keys and contract. Once we had the keys and contract we could look at the apartment and decide if we were going to take it within two days. If we decided to take it, moneybookers would forward our funds to Monica’s account and we would sign the contract and keep the keys. If we decided not to take the apartment, we would return the keys, etc to moneybookers to forward back to Monica and then moneybookers would return our funds.

So it sounded a little complicated but do-able. We went to set up our moneybookers account but then realized it would take 3 days for moneybookers to verify our credit card....so we emailed Monica with this information and she replied back with a solution. She laid out step by step instructions to transfer funds to moneybookers thru Western Union instead of through the moneybookers website. Once moneybookers received the funds (we would email them the Western Union receipt along with the Western Union id number which would allow moneybookers to access the funds), they would then fed ex us the keys.

Well – at this point if this is sounding like a scam to you, it was!!!! We looked into the information she had given us and the contact/agent at moneybookers who was dealing with our transaction. I called moneybookers in London and asked if they had an agent by the name given to us. The customer care person told us that moneybookers did not have agents, nor did they use Western Union – all funds had to come through the website after credit card verification and security checks were fulfilled. No Western Union!!!!

So we were very close to being scammed and ripped off of lots of money that we could not afford to lose...it was very scary and made me very angry. Here we were, vulnerable people, foreigners trying to find a home in a new country and feeling desperate and we were so close to being taken advantage of and stolen from. I can’t describe how upsetting this was – not just the whole scam situation, but oddly more than anything I was so upset about “losing” the apartment! We thought our search was over only to find out that our desperation put us in a dangerous situation.

The next day was a Monday and Dave and I decided to take the ½ hour tram ride south to ISU to talk to the Student Services staff – we were desperate for some advice about what to do next! Turns out that going to ISU really lifted both our spirits. It was just amazing to be at this place that we had only seen pictures of and Dave was so excited to just be in the building. We looked around at all the displays and pictures and wandered around the building exploring classrooms, the library and the student lounge. It just made every struggle we were going through worth it – we were in Strasbourg for Dave to go to ISU and to fulfil his dream, so finding an apartment and running into roadblocks was just part of the road we had to travel to get to that point. The Student Services staff had a few suggestions for us, and we left with more hope than we came with.

That afternoon we went to see an apartment – we had made an appointment with an agency to see this particular apartment days before but it had to be postponed until Monday. So we went to meet the agency lady, thinking there was not much point going to see an apartment offered thru an agency as we did not have a guarantor, but we decided to go see it anyway. Turns out the apartment was not furnished as we thought it was, but Dave talked to the agency lady and found out that they had a furnished one a few blocks away that we could see tomorrow. He repeated that we did not have a guarantor, but the lady said she had talked to someone about our situation and we did not need one if we paid a larger deposit!

So the next day we went to see our apartment! It was in a perfect location, still in centreville, close to the Cathedral and the Petite France district of the city, but just a block away from the tram station that would take Dave directly to ISU! It was rented to two ISU students the previous year, one student took the bedroom and one student took the living room as a second bedroom (it had doors that sealed it off, a futon that folded down into a bed, a closet and a desk). There was a large bathroom, good sized dining area and decent kitchen. It also had a washing and drying machine (they are 2 in 1 machines here!). We decided to take it! We were able to move in the next day.

We were very happy to finally have our own place – somewhere to unpack, put up our pictures and a kitchen to cook real food in again! Being in the apartment has made life in Strasbourg even better, it is just wonderful to have a place to call our own to come home to after a busy day.

However, the apartment costs a small fortune. It is a good size for a European apartment and its location is prime and the building is well looked after. And once we unpacked everything and spent a couple of days in the apartment we realized we did not need the living room and began to think about renting out the living room to another ISU student.

We would share the kitchen, dining room and bathroom. And then have our bedroom to ourselves. Our bedroom has two parts to it - what I call the “nook” has the bed in it and the bedside table, and the other part has the desk and wardrobe in it. The nook is set off from the other part and we are thinking we will put up a curtain to divide the two parts of the room a bit more. That way, I can sleep at night whenever I want to and Dave has his own area to stay up and study at the desk.

So we have sent out an email seeing if any of the ISU students who do not have accommodation yet would be interested and we will see what kind of a reply we get. We can afford the apartment by ourselves, but it just makes our budget a lot tighter. We would rather rent the room out and have extra money for traveling and doing fun stuff together rather than penny pinching!  So far we have two interested students who are moving to Strasbourg next week - hopefully one of them will work out.

In addition to finding an apartment, so far our days have been busy trying to get everything set up and ready for Dave to go to school.  We need to set up our electricity account, get internet and cell phones, do some shopping for a few extra household items we want for the apartment, etc.  We also want to do some fun stuff around Strasbourg in the next few days - a canal ride, a city tour, check out some restaurants and parks.  Orientation week begins on Monday and there is a lot of stuff going on for the incoming ISU students so we will also be participating in some of those activities (bbq, beach day, hot springs in Germany, etc)!

I will try to write more frequently now that things are settling down a bit - there is a lot to share of just day to day things that we experience and see here in Strasbourg and of course I need to get some pictures up to give a visual of our new city.  So stay tuned!

Love Heather & Dave

Trials, Disappointments & Love

The last few days have been a struggle for Dave and I.  We were successful on our first full day in Strasbourg in opening up a bank account.  We had been warned that this was no easy task in France if you did not have an address.  However, the flip side of this was that we could not get an apartment, and thus a permanent address until we opened up a bank account!  So at the bank we explained our situation - they first told us they could not help us until we had a permanent address....and then after a bit more explaining saying the school where Dave will attend had offerred to let us use their address until we found an apartment, the lady who was helping us looked into one of her folders and found a deal that the bank gives to ISU students.  So we were able to open an account - which because of the deal will be free for the year - so free debits and cheque book, etc and we were also given 60 euros as a bonus for opening an account!  This was a victory for Dave and I and we left the bank in high spirits!

The following days have proven to be more difficult.  As many of you will know through Facebook, we have been struggling to find an apartment.  At first the struggle was just getting in touch with anyone, either a private seller or an agency, as we only have a phone at our hotel to use.  The phone in our room does not work so we have been using one in the lobby - however in this scenerio we can only make outward calls, not receive any or ask people to leave us a message or voicemail.  We went to get cell phones one day but quickly found out that we need a permanent address first, makes sense, and they were not willing to use the school's address in the interim.  Thankfully our hotel has free wireless (we cannot access it from our room on the 6th floor - but we can in the lobby) so we have been contacting people mostly through that medium and calling when we can.

Yesterday we were finally able to set up some appointments to see apartments - but what we learned was disheartening.  We had been looking primarily at apartments available through agencies - which are like realtors for apartments in France.  People usually rent through these agencies and they are the easiest way to find what is available.  However, upon talking to staff at two different agencies we learned that the agency requires us to have a guarantor, or a co-signer, for any rental agreement.  The co-signer needs to be a French citizen living in France with good economic standing, or our bank in France.  We do not know anyone in France to start with, let alone anyone who would be willing to co-sign for us, so the only option that was left was our bank.

We went directly to our bank to talk to them about this situation, hoping that we would be able to wire enough money to our French account from our Canadian account so that they would be confident of our financial means and agree to be our guarantor.  We had read in our preparation for the move that banks would be guarantors if you had a full year's rent in your account that they could freeze - and we were in a position to do that once we had wired more money from Canada.  Unfortunately upon discussing this situation with our bank we were told that they would not agree to be guarantors under any circumstances, even if we had a full year's rent in our account.

Being very discouraged, we went directly to an apartment viewing we had booked the day before through an agency.  We hoped that we could get around the guarantor rule by agreeing to pay the rent for the year up front.  Again we were told this was not a possibility as it was illegal to ask for a full year's rent in advance in France and of course the agencies did not desire a legal issue on their hands.  Of course Dave and I understand the reasons behind these policies and rules, however it puts us in a difficult situation.

Thankfully we are staying at a hotel that is not terribly expensive, but of course any hotel adds up quickly, and we have been able to extend our stay another week, so we do have somewhere to live while we sort through what to do and where to live.  It is a strain on our finances, but it is shelter with a warm bed and a private bathroom and we are very thankful for that.

Coming into this year I knew God was going to stretch me and challenge me in new ways.  I had travelled overseas before and lived in Europe for 7 months away from my family and friends.  However, I had never come without being picked up by the airport and taken to my new home - this was the first time where I was in a situation where we were truly on our own in having to find a place to live and figure out the logistics of living in a foreign country.  Dave's school has offered its students information, but that has been the extent of their involvment, again for understandable reasons as they are a university not a charity.  So I knew finding an apartment was not going to be easy, however I did not expect to run into so many roadblocks.  We had tried to arrange permanent accommodation prior to leaving Canada, but each attempt was unsuccessful.  We had even asked other students who had secured a lease agreement for apartments with multiple bedrooms if they would be willing to rent one of the rooms to a married couple.  Each attempt resulted in nothing as no one was willing to take our rental inquiries seriously from Canada and other students were unwilling to share a small European three bedroom apartment with a married couple.  This was frustrating, however we decided those situations were not for the best for us, thus we would get our own 1 bedroom apartment once we arrived - it was all we could do at that point.

Now that we are here and finding things just as difficult it is extremely frustrating.  However, in the midst of it, I have been so thankful for my husband and for God for upholding us in this situation.

Firstly, Dave can speak French!  In Canada I had asked him to say something in French to me and he would shyly say something brief.  On our first night in Strasbourg in the taxi he carried on a full 15 minute conversation with our driver!  My mouth was literally hanging open - I had no idea exactly how well he understood and spoke French.  Over the last few days he has saved us in so many situations by being able to speak the language.  Now of course it has been difficult for him and he struggles through a lot of it, but people know what he is saying and he is able to engage with them!  If he did not know the language I do not know what we would do.

I have also found the last few days so much easier because I have Dave here with me.  He has truly been such a good husband to me in so many ways...and I feel so fortunate to have him as my partner in life.  Although it has been difficult, we have each other.  And there is nothing more important than that.  I could have stayed home in Canada and not run into so many unknowns in my life right now, but I would not be with him and by his side is where I have chosen to be forever, and that is the best decision I have ever made.  God is strengthening our marriage and teaching us to lean on one another - and while it is a hard lesson, it one that I do want to learn with Dave because I know our life together will be filled with difficulties and hard times.  I do know that this is not the worst we will encounter together, by far, but we need to learn to face life together, in every situation.

And what can I say about my faith in all of this?  This is a personal thing to share, but I need to get it down.  My faith is being challenged and stretched as I knew it would be.  And while it is hard for me to acknowledge it, I am thankful.  There is so much in my character and in my faith that I find lacking, and I want God to shape me and mold me into a person of greater faith, deeper sympathy, and unwavering trust in Him.  I know these things do not happen over night but are qualities that develop throughout life and are brought out through struggles.  I do not want to go through anything in life that is difficult or painful or frustrating - but I would never change, my faith would never grow and my understanding of God would be even more shallow than it is right now.  So in my personal context, where I know my life is blessed and I know I have it so good, I know I will go through things this year and beyond that will be hard and I am praying that God will mold me through it and strengthen my faith and prepare me for what is ahead.

Thank you to everyone who has written us to offer help or encourage us.  It has meant a lot to Dave and I to have so many offers of help and so many kind and encouraging words.  It makes us miss home all the more, but encourages us at the same time!

Love Heather

PS:  Dave will be writing on this blog as well - the poor guy is sick right now though, so I left him napping upstairs in our room and thought I would give our "followers" an update!

We arrived in Strasbourg!

Dave and I left Winnipeg early in the morning on Sunday, August 8th.  We said a tearful goodbye to our friends and family that had come to see us off at the airport and boarded the plane to Toronto.  We were in Toronto on Sunday and Monday for me to attend articling interviews.  On Monday evening we went to the Toronto airport expecting to check our luggage and get on the plane without any issues.

Unfortunately, once at the ticket counter where we got our boarding passes and tried to check our luggage, we found out that the particular airline we were flying with had very strict weight restrictions on each passenger's luggage.  Between the two of us we were double the weight permitted.  Instead of the standard 23 kilos permitted for two pieces of checked luggage per passenger, Transat Air only allows 23 kilos total per passenger!  This was not a good discovery as we each had about 45 kilos!

Thankfully, the lady helping us at the ticket counter was lovely and kind.  She suggested we upgrade our tickets to first class, as first class ticket holders are permitted 40 kilos each.  She then turned a blind eye to the extra 5 kilos we each had and the fact that our carry-ons were too large as well.  Thus, her advice and kindness saved us hundreds of dollars that we did not have to spare.  While waiting at the counter for everything to be sorted out she and I bonded over our similar stories....she left her country (Columbia) shortly after getting married to follow her husband to Canada and I told her Dave and I had just been married and we were moving to France for him to do his Masters.  I will never forget her or what she did for us!

Once we got on the plane we were even more thankful for her advice as our first class flight to Frankfurt was wonderful!  Neither of us had ever flown first class before (and probably never will again!), but it was lovely.  We settled into our large seats - we had a row of 3 between the 2 of us.  We were then offered champagne, which I accepted and Dave declined.  We were given free blankets and pillows to keep, and a care package with lip gloss, lotion, hand sanitizer, head phones, ear plugs, an eye mask and fluffy socks!  I was in heaven - all this "free" stuff made me very happy.  We were then served oeur d'oeuvres and dinner - canapes and roast chicken, roasted red pepper and caprese salad served with your choice of 4 different wines.  Then we were served "night caps" - I had a bailey's on ice and proceeded to have a wonderful 4 -5 hour sleep!  I was awoken to the captain announcing breakfast was about to be served - I choose the eggs benedict, Dave choose the fruit and yogurt platter.  We were then offered fresh rolls, and then fresh cinnamon buns!  I really could not believe the amount of food and alcohol we were offered - definitely an enjoyable flight, but I doubt we would pay that much extra for those extra perks in the future!

Once we landed in Frankfurt it was time to find the Lufthansa ticket counter and buy bus tickets on their shuttle to Strasbourg.  We had to wait for a few hours for the bus, and then drive about 2 hours to get to Strasbourg.  But we arrived when it was still light out and we were able to see the city as we drove into it!  We disembarked the bus, got our luggage, hopped in a taxi and arrived at our hotel.  It was good to know our journey had come to an end after days of traveling from one place to another.

We finished off our day walking along the canal for awhile and eating dinner at Subway!  It was one of the only places open near our hotel and inexpensive - so our French food experience had to wait a little bit longer as we partook of the familiar!