Tu connais 'arry Pottair?

So...

I sorta hit jackpot with my homestay.

This afternoon, I went to my university's classroom building in the 15th, right across from the Champ de Mars (building henceforth known as PIP). After struggling with the door and then finally realizing the entrance was next door after another student showed up and waltzed in, I got my housing assignment and went back to the hotel.

The apartment where I'm living is in the 10th arrondissement, which i was pretty apprehensive about. When I got here, I was astounded:

There's a huge set of double doors (sooo French) leading off a small side street. After entering a code and pushing the door, you step over the jamb and find yourself in a teeny glass room. You turn a key and the glass door buzzes open, and then you are suddenly inside the courtyard. The building is about 6 stories high and has windows opened onto the leafy little garden from every height.

You enter another code, and the door to the stairs and escalator lets you in. It's ridiculously old-fashioned and quaint, and I love it all.

The apartment is huge by French standards, and my room is bigger here than in Chicago. There's room for a double bed and everything like that, even though I'll have to get some boxes for real storage. I don't fancy having all my things lined up on shelves or crammed into one seriously miniscule standing closet.

The kitchen is great, the living room superb, and the ceilings are soaring. I also have a small powder room completely to myself, even though I need to use the one shower upstairs to get really clean. Yes-- upstairs!

Madame lives in the room up there, and she works from her office. Basically, she is a PR rep/freelance event planner, and she's doing Harry Potter. The French book release is at the end of October, and she's already invited me to the press party. I sort of got embarassing and started gushing at one point about how much I love the series and everything about it, but she took it all in stride.

There's also an older gentleman friend staying here for the weekend, and he's extremely nice. I ended up spending more time with him because Madame's daughter is in town and she wanted to stop in all the stores on the way to getting a drink. I just sauntered around the Canal St Martin for an hour or so with Madame, her daughter on rollerblades, and Monsieur chatting amiably.

We invited my parents to dinner, and it was a crazy mishmash of French and English, with everyone trying to speak both at basically the same time. I had a really excellent meal (pâté, scallops, and fruit salad in vanilla oil) and watched everyone be crazy.

I really hope everything works out here, because at this point it all looks almost too perfect. I could mention how the shower doesn't have any water pressure, or that I only have one pillow, but let's not spoil it.