Up Up And Away

On July 18th, 2007 at 11:40am I departed from Will Rogers Airport with the final destination being Paris, France. Nerves and excitment all running through me at the same time. I was so excited, so ready, so..........excited...My expected arrival time in Paris was July 19th 11:00am(local time). That means July 19th 4:00am(Central Time).....

There was so much that went one between July 18th to July 19th, that it would almost be like writing novel.

My plan from Chicago to London, England was delayed about 1 hour because of all things the pilot was stuck in traffic...Now, am I saying too much to say that that is no excuse at all. I mean, Chicago is a very populated city..Anybody who works there or whose ever even seen a picture of the city knows that one must leave home ealry to get to work on time. His tardiness forshadowed the rest of events that would soon come to pass. So, when the pilot finally arrived he brought clouds and lighting with him. That further delayed the flight another 2 hours. Finally, after several hours of delay the plan takes off for London...We arrive on the outskirts of London and I have just about 40 minutes to get off the plane, go through customs, and catch my next plan. However, against all expectations, the pilot decides that we ought to see where the Prime Minister of Enlgand spends his summer vacations. In Checkers England. You won't believe it. We flew past Heathrow Airport and turned around to go see the Prime Minister's vacation home. This takes 20minutes in itself. Come to find out the real reason we didn't land is because the airport wasn't ready for us yet. Even though we were already delayed a smooth three hours.

Finally we land and I have just about 20minutes to catch my next plane to Paris. Which was impossible(which I didn't know at the time) because last call for check in was 20 minutes ago.

I get to the airport go through customs, which takes about an hour and then I stand in line for another 2 hours to change my plane ticket.

About 3 hours later I arrive in Paris, France feeling so relieved that it's almost over.

NOPE..I thought wrong. I head to baggage claim and I am stumped to find that my baggage is not appearing for some reason. I have two bags but I see neither one of them. I speak with the man at Baggage Claim kiosque. He tells me that my luggage is lost. So I say, Are you serious Sir? Are you serious?!!! He tells me that my luggage may be in Chicago, still in Oklahoma or(of all places) Italy; where it will be destroyed. I give him all my information and he give me some and I just leave to catch the train.

I am running through the train station under the airport only to arrive to find I missed my non-echangeable, non-reimbursable train to Bordeaux, France(that's where I'm staying). I buy another ticket and make a few phone calls home and to my host family. I get on the 4 hour train ride to Bordeaux and 2 hours later I find out that someone committed suicide but jumping in front of a moving train which will delay the train about 5 hours. You can imagine how I must feel now. Just dumbfounded. Asking why me, why me; praying; taking deep breaths, sighing, thinking......The story does get better.....I make it saftely to Bordeaux where my friends are waiting for me and I recieve my luggage about 3 weeks later.

I know this is a long post, but writing this has been some therapy for me...I can now leave it alone.. Bordeaux is a beautiful city indeed!

-German

German Carter: Big Dreams

So, I have finally started this blog. It comes with a little hesitation because of my lack of web designing skills. But, I thought about it and concluded that that is not a very good excuse.

So Welcome, Bienvenidos, Bienvenue..This blog is essentially for my stay in France, however, I'll throw in some other stuff just to give you the rawness of my life..Hahaha...

To begin, I will share with you a little about the type of person I am. As a kid I wanted to be an atronaut. I thought it would be amazing to be on the moon looking down on the Earth when all of a sudden I get a call from NASA congratulating me on my arrival.

I always dreamed...day dreams, night dreams, dream dreams...Just always thinking on the miscellaneous..Just a mini story to share.

As I got older I decided that I wanted to be a doctor. Largely because I liked the image of seeing myself with a long white coat on preparing for surgery. After that phase, I decided that I wanted to be a businessman, largely due to the fact that Stephen and I had started a small candy shop from the appartment. I really enjoyed making profits and going to the store to stock up on inventory. Up to date I have worked about three different jobs and I can honestly say that that job was the one I learned most from; and it also gave me the idea that I would like to make my own money someday. We had complete control over everything. The products, the money paid out, the presentation and most importantly the hours. : ) From then on I knew that I would like to do that someday but at a grand level.

Around the ninth grade I became very interested in language. So I pursued this interest by taking the Spanish language and in my junior year I decided to study the French language.

I am now a graduate from high school as of May 19th 2007 and now wish to combine my two biggest interest. Making my own money and language. I enjoy knowing about different cultures of people and history and all that type of shit. Learning another language forces you to expand your mind. You have to really change way your brain processes information. Which makes you better understand the differences of other people. It also makes you not so judgmental. A large part of who people are is because of their surroundings. In conclusion, learning language makes you accept that the world is different and people are the same everywhere..But, they are the same in a different way.

That being said, my goal in life is to not only be who society tells me that I am. But who I make myself. I want to be able to say I think this way because I want to. Because I have researche on why some do it different. I like knowing why I do things in life. So I ask myself questions like:

Why do I think it even though I was never taught why to think it?

How do/can I re-think it?

What can I do to form myself to how I want to be and not how society tells me to be?

I guess these are some questions that one would have to answer in a philosophy class....

To sum it all up...This is why I am in France:

I am in France because I want to become an International Businessman!

Je suis en France parceque je veux devenir homme d'affaires internationales!

Estoy en francia por que quiero llegar a ser gran empresario!

-German