What is Culture Shock?

I keep hearing about it.... couldn't tell you.

Everyone kept warning me that upon my arrival everyone in France will most likely be really rude to me and I will be really overwhelmed by the differences in social norms. As far as I'm concerned the only thing I've been overwhelmed with is the beauty of the people, the children, the architecture, and even the dogs - not to mention the limitless number of things to do at any given point of the day. Okay, maybe it gets a little sketchy late at night... but so do all other places in the world. 

Today was my first day meeting the students in my ISA group who will be studying at the American Business School with me. I was pleasantly surprised at the variety of states that people are from. Another pleasant (yet not surprising) factor was everybody's incredible attitude. Naturally there was a variety of people from shy to extremely outgoing, but everyone was positive and friendly nonetheless. I expected that considering all of these people had to possess some similar qualities having made such a life changing decision as living in a foreign country for 4 months. Another big similarity is that we all chose Paris. I can't speak for everyone else in the group, but these past 3 days have only further confirmed that I couldn't have picked a better place to spend these few months of my life.

PS. My birthday is coming up this Thursday. On this day we are taking a day trip to Versailles, followed by a wine & cheese tasting. To say I'm pretty excited would be the understatement of the year.