...oops...

Today I found out that I apparently made a pretty big mess-up the other day in my CE2 class. Not confidently knowing whether or not I would pronounce the word correctly, I tried telling the students they could "baisser les mains," hoping to mean they could "lower their hands."

I accidentally ended up telling they could "baiser les mains," which apparently meant they could "F&*$" their hands. They all started laughing and I thought that I had just said "kiss" instead of "lower." Found out tonight that that is definitely NOT what "baiser" means (not for years anyway).

Anyway, I've been sick for the last week :( For the UMPTEENTH time since my coming to France. womp wommmmp You'd think I would've done some blogging or something in that time, but obviously I didn't. So, I have a little bit of time before going to celebrate a birthday and thought I'd at least post my amazing mistake and my equally amazing (but in a more positive light, to even things out) dinner.

Since being in France it has been on my "to do list" or sorts to make an amazing French grilled-cheese sandwich before leaving. Today I accomplished said task. I went to Carrefour, bought four different kinds of cheese (emmental, brebis, comté, and tomme montagne auvergne...never heard of that last one, but it was good!), got a tradinette (a sort of mini-baguette with pointy ends) at my boulangerie, and set to work. Here is the process and the final product. Nom nom nom!


Someday soon I'll actually update you all on Italy. It was AMAZING. I have SO many photos (I've uploaded a bunch, but not all yet to my photobucket account. Check it out!)

Going to Germany April 16th-23rd to visit my friends Salka and Kathy in Hannover and Bremen respectively. SO excited!

Hope you're all having a great week. It's raining here and everyone is sick, but this weekend should be great and sunny and reeeeally nice! (And I'm going to Versailles and Chartres ;))

Peace, love, and eskimo kisses!

Tid-bits

I haven't written in here in a couple of weeks...but I don't really have much to say. Here are some little tid-bits about what's been going on:

1.The other day a child asked me if I was the creator of Dora the Explorer (she teaches English in France instead of Spanish). As I'm probably the only English-speaker this kid knows, I guess it's a valid assumption in the mind of a 7 year-old. It made me laugh! I certainly would not mind having the bank account of the creator of Dora the Explorer, that's for sure.

2.Today was our program coordinator's last day as our coordinator. She's been replacing the woman who usually does it since we got here, but now the woman is back and so she's gone...which is really sad, cuz she has been FANTASTIC!. A few of us got together and got her some chocolates and two girls made a card that we signed. Three of us went to her house tonight to deliver the stuff and say goodbye and she made us tea and then we had drinks and some snacks and two hours later (!) she drove us home. I'm really going to miss her, but she's really cool and one of those people I could just call up and invite somewhere sometime, so I'll probably do that. Also, she may call me someday soon to babysit her son for her (who is SUUUUPER chatty and will be a very intense French exercise for me, haha).

3.I've been reading a French novel called La Premiere Nuit. I've scheduled myself to read at least 10 pages a day, in order to actually finish it at some point...and also because my friend, to whom the book belongs, told another friend of ours that she could borrow it after me...and finally because I want to read something else in French while I'm here! ;) Anyway, the book is goodish. It's a lot like a Dan Brown book (but French), and not really something I'm super into reading right now, but I'm trucking along anway. I'm on track and almost half-way through. I'm sure I'll get lots of reading done over break (airports, train stations, trains...stuff like that).

4.I'm giving a mini-report tomorrow on the north-western regions of France (Brittany, Normandy, and Pays-de-la-Loire...which, apparently, doesn't have an English translation) in my French class. It was neat to learn a bit more about other regions of France...I barely know anything even about the region I'm living in! It did make me wonder, however, how I ever made it through college. Life has been so easy-going here these past 5 months that I sometimes forget what work is. lol

5.Yoga is still going well and I'm still doing it daily (for the most part). Healthy eating still going pretty well. The news watching...not so much. I haven't been turning it on in the morning anymore like I used to...not really sure why. I should do that again, cuz if I don't listen to the news in the morning, I won't do it at any other time during the day. :(

6.Tomorrow is my last day of classes (today, technically, as it's currently 12:19 here) before break. My friend Noelia is coming to Paris from Madrid this weekend to visit Stevy and me! WOO HOO!!! And it's exactly a week from today that I'll be heading off to Italy. Good stuff, good stuff.

7.I've decided to buy a bike/borrow a bike....FIND A BIKE...at some point in order to take a bike trip along the Loire at the end of my stay, which I think will probably be until the middle of May now. I don't want to leave right away. I'm going to Germany for about a week at the end of April and then I'd like to do this bike trip and, if I have time, head to the south of France with Sylvette and Alain. We'll see what happens. Also, it's just SO gorgeous here these days and I'd LOVE to be able to go on bike rides. (Where I will keep this bike, I'm not yet sure...as there is absolutely NO place anywhere in my apt/apt building to keep a bicycle. Meh, I'll figure it out.)



Those were a lot of long tid-bits. Hmm. I'd better try to sleep, as I am getting up in 7 hours.

Hugs and Kisses!

French Journal

So, my friend Tara (another assistant here) and I have decided that in order to write a bit more in French durin our time here, we will start writing French journal entries to one another every week. In talking about said journals today, we gained a new member to our mini journal club (if you want to call it that), Tom, another assistant.

The entries must be:
-written in French.
-under 500 words, but over 350.
-related to that week's topic (for example, this week's topic is...yoga!).
-emailed to the other journal participants by no later than Wednesday at midnight (so, technically, Thursday).

It's 9:41 and I have yet to start mine...or to lesson plan for tomorrow. So, of course, I decided to watch a yoga documentary and post a blog instead.

I really am excited about this though. Especially this week's topic! :)

Language

I've been reading Frankenstein lately. Yes, in English...but it's the last of the English books I brought with me and once I'm done (which I almost am) I'm finishing Le Petit Prince and then moving on to La Premiere Nuit. So I will be reading in French soon!

Anywho, as I was saying, I've been reading Frankenstein, and it turns out Frankenstein's monster learned French in less than a year simply by observing a poor family of three and reading a few books. Absolutely impossible, BUT pretty cool all the same. In the story there is a lovely section of the monster's monologue to Frankenstein, during which he's telling the Dr. about his life up to that point and talks about how he felt about his discovery of language. I'd like to share it with you guys, because I think it's really beautiful and really captures at least how I, personally, feel about the beauty of language.

"By degrees I made a discovery of still greater moment. I found that these people possessed a method of communicating their experience and feelings to one another by articulate sounds. I perceived that the words they spoke sometimes produced pleasure or pain, smiles or sadness, in the minds and the countenances of the hearers. This was indeed a godlike science, and I ardently desired to become acquainted with it[...]. Their pronunciation was quick; and the words they uttered, not having any apparent connection with visible objects[...]. By great application, however, and after having remained during the space of several revolutions of the moon in my hovel, I discovered the names that were give to some of the most familiar objects of discourse[...]. I cannot describe the delight I felt when I learned the ideas appropriated to each of these sounds, and was able to pronounce them."

Good Stuff :)

Two silly anecdotes from the day...

1. In arriving at one of my schools today a teacher said "Bonjour, Meg!" and I immediately responded with "Hola." Oops. Had a good laugh over that one. (I've been doing that a lot lately...speaking Spanish instead of French by accident...the other day our apt. maintenance guy was in the hall and asked me "Ca va?" and I replied with, "Oui, como esta?" Hmm)

2. This report was on the BBC this morning. How French.

Have a day! :)

Take the good with the bad

As per the title's promise, this entry brings both good news and bad news. I'll begin with the bad, as it happened before the good.

My neighbor's apartment was broken into Friday morning and her new $1200 Mac Book as well as her most valued jewlery were stolen. There was no forced entry, so the intruder obviously had a key to her apartment, as the door was locked when she left for work in the morning. We don't know how this person got ahold of a copy of the key, being that the only supposed people with the key are she and the landlord, who also confessed that he does not change the locks on the doors whenever someone moves out. Yes, it'd be work to change the locks everytime someone left, but I do feel it the necessary duty of the landlord to make sure his studios are secure before renting them out to young foreign girls. Luckily she has renter's insurance here in France which will hopefully cover some, if not all, of the loss. I certainly hope no one has a copy of the key to my apartment. (Her lock is now changed, btw, so this will not happen again *knock on wood*...although they'd have to have some nerve to come back and try it again.)

And the good news...I got a tutoring job! Sylvette works with a man whose son is 10 years old and has two penpals in the U.S. The family will be going to Washington D.C. in October to meet one of them and they want their son to be ready to understand and speak American English. Sylvette told them about me and they contacted me earlier this week. So, today I went to meet the family and it turns out they want to pay me double what I asked just to chit chat and play games in English with this kid once a week! Thanks, Sylvette! :-D

The World of French Pastries

France is filled to the brim with amazing pastry delights such as: le croissant, pain au chocolat, croissant aux amandes, pain au chocolat aux amandes, le torsade au chocolat, les suisses, etc... My amazing friend and neighbor, Pat, recently posted a video that he found, which I would like to share with you. This video will probably make you wish you lived here and, indeed, it makes me want to take a trip to the patissier around the corner! I never knew just how much work went into these things...but I also didn't know that the same dough was used for just about all of the bakery goods. Awesome! Anywho, enjoy your little trip to France with: Crossants...how to.

New Year's Resolutions

A few quick sidenotes before I actually begin talking about my resolutions of 2011:
1.'Tis the season of the "SOLDES" (Sales) and all of us assistants are broke. (Minus those who have been lucky enough to receive their CAF assistance already. Mine is yet to come and, though I've been hopeful that I will soon see those 1,000 euros soon, my program coordinator does not have the same confidence in the French government, and she's French...which depresses me a bit). These sales do nothing for that learn-how-to-save-money thing I've been trying to do. Crap.

2.For those of you who have been worrying about my homesickness, I think I can safely say that it's gone. I'm getting into a groove I wish I had been able to get into months ago, but better late than too late! It is so beautiful here! I was walking back from a friend's house the other night quite late when all was quiet and dark and the general ambiance was absolutely magical. The beauty around me on a daily basis is a lot to take in and sometimes I get overwhelmed by the fact that so much history and, well, europe is around me. I think that is what will be the hardest when I'm back in the U.S. U.S. architecture is so modern and, though beautiful in its own way, not so awe-inspiring. (I will also miss having a bakery on every corner, but I'll think about all of these things in April, not now. For now I'm just trying to appreciate what I have here on a daily basis and soak it in while it's around me.)

ATTENTION READER: You may feel some nausea due to the incessant optimism and cheerfulness exuded in the following entry. Please enter with an open and positive mind and understand that we all deserve to be the best that we can be!

Now, to the New Year! Usually I make New Year's Resolutions that I don't actually intend to keep and I've decided that this is the year to end that (particularly since it's the last year of the world ;) no, seriously, I'm kinda scared bout 2012, but I digress). I've made 4 resolutions this year, and they are as follow:
1.Read/Watch the news everyday.
2.Do yoga. (Starting with a Mon, Wed, Friday, Sunday routine.)
3."Jump into the French pool"
4.Maintain a healthy diet.

1.News. For years now I've felt far behind when it comes to knowing what's going on in the world, and it's 100% my fault. I never used to watch or read the news, but always wished I would just finally get into the habit. It seemed like so many of my friends were able to fit it into their schedule somehow; listening to the news on the radio on the way to work, watching the news while eating breakfast or dinner, reading a newspaper over lunch or a coffee break. I am literate, have access to any kind of news I wish to read/watch, and have absolutely no excuse not to know what's going on in the world and it was getting ridiculous. Therefore, I've "bookmarked" BBC live on my computer, set the BBC world news page as my homepage, and equipped my cellphone with a New York Times application, which I update on a daily basis. It's been a couple of weeks now that I've been watching BBC everyday (I turn it on as soon as I wake up in the morning and listen to the reports as I do my morning routine and eat my breakfast) and then sometimes I read the New York Times to get some back-home news on the tram to/from work. There's a LOT of news in the world, but I feel so much better knowing that I at least know the basics of the main reports, and it hasn't been difficult at all to follow this resolution, as I made a point to fit it into my daily routine. Happily, it's becoming a morning habit!

2.Yoga. Keeping myself physically healthy is not something I can say I've done a good job of since my freshman year of college, when I worked out 6 days a week. After a summer of not working out after that first year, I never got back into it and fell back into the same lazy guilt I've kept myself stuck in ever since. True, when i was living in La Crosse I used to walk/bike all around town, but that was out of necessity, and I didn't push myself to go much farther than where I needed to be. I had tried yoga a few times, but always gave up...I've never been much good about going to exercise classes and don't much like doing physical activity in public when I'm completely out of shape :-P I'd always shy back and say "I can't do it," embarrassed about how heavy my breathing may be or what my butt looked like in my workout pants. Well, my body has had enough of this lazy crap! I've got a makeshift yoga mat that a friend of mine picked up for me in a town near by, I've downloaded "yoga for weight loss for beginners" from yogadownload.com, as well as a yoga breathing exercise from yoga-vidya.org, and I've been following my routine since Monday. Yes, that means it's only been two days of yoga so far, but just try and tell my abs that that hasn't done anything...ouch! (but in the best possible way!) I've also been doing some Chakra meditation on the side, which has been really good for balancing my energy and making me feel a lot calmer with my CM1 and CM2 classes, lol.

3."Jump into the French pool." On the train on the way back to Orleans from Paris after Christmas break my friend Tara and I ended up sitting next to a Frenchman (a bodyguard who was Tina Turner's bodyguard for a few years!) who chatted us up during the hour-long ride home. We talked about lots of things (well, mostly he talked...he was chatty, but really nice, and we had a good time talking with him!), but what ressonated most with Tara and myself was an analogy he made about being in another country/culture with a different language. He said it's like a swimming pool and you have to jump in the pool when it's full of water and not wait to jump in until after they've already drained out the water. What he meant, if it isn't obvious, was that we need to throw ourselves into the incredible opporunity we have here to learn the French language and about the French culture, and not to hesitate, because in a few months our opportunity will be gone. My resolution I guess is to take any opportunity I can get to speak French and to put myself into it whole-heartedly. I've been reading a lot lately, but not in French, so today I went to the library and checked out a copy of "Le Petit Prince," which I'm going to start when I finish this entry.

4.Food. This is the easiest for me of all of the resolutions. I began this resolution almost a year ago when I picked up a copy of Alicia Silverstone's "The Kind Diet" at Barnes and Noble and gave vegetarianism a second try. Since reading her book I've become more aware of what I put into my body and why it is or isn't good for me. I'm since become really interested in what it means and what it feels like to have a "balanced diet." Since living in France I've definitely gained weight and had changed my diet a bit and been buying foods that left me feeling fatigued and depressed. No. Good. That's over now and I'm trying my best to eat what my body asks for and what I know my body needs instead of what my boredom tells me it wants.

Basically, I LOVE these resolutions and I'm 100% dedicated to making sure they get the attention that they need because I've felt great for these first couple of weeks and each day has felt like the "first day of the rest of my life" instead of just another day. I hope your resolutions (if you made any) have been going well!

Lots of love <3 Meg

A long-awaited update

Hi folks! Meg here. That's right, it's me...for real...it's been awhile, I know, and I apologize.
In this post I'd like to give you the rundown on my English Christmas and my New Year's resolutions. So, grab a cup of java, sit tight and let me re-cap you on my past month!

Christmas break began quite quietly, as mine started on the 18th, but my train to England didn't leave until the 23rd. Those first days, however, quickly became crowded with fear that my very British Christmas would have to be canceled, as snow began to cover the tracks of the Eurorail, keeping half of the normal trains from running, slowing speeds, and leaving thousands of travelers waiting hours upon hours in line to cross the channel. Eurostar ticket-holders were advised not to travel unless absolutely necessary, leaving room for those who really needed the seat. I began to think my Christmas would be spent alone in my studio, streaming Christmas carols from my computer and re-reading my three Christmas cards over and over (awwwww). I googled Eurostar over and over during those first few days of break hoping for some kind of good news, but feeling more and more dejected when I came across an interview with some travelers waiting in line to take the eurostar from London to Paris. The interviewer spoke first with a man and then with a woman. The man told the interviewer that he had been waiting in line for hours to take the train across "the pond" on a business trip and expected to be back in London by the end of the day. The man said he knew that Eurostar was doing all that they could to fix the situation and that there was no reason to get upset about the wait. He was confident that everything would work out and had a smile on his face throughout. The woman had a similar point-of-view, saying it was a long wait, but there was no reason to get upset about it, as everything that could be done was being done. THAT was it. If a man taking a business trip lasting one day could be so optimistic about the situation, then I would be too! I was going to get to England no matter how many hours I had to wait in line.

Two days later Eurorail send an email to all ticket holders saying that their trains had gone back to normal boarding procedures and would only be delayed in arrival by 30-60 minutes. YATAAA! (Heroes? Anyone?) Anyway, I went to Paris with another American assistant who would be staying at our friend's house in England with me (we were also to meet another American assistant, who had arrived in London earlier that morning), we got through the check-in in less than 30 minutes and on the train in less than an hour! Easy Peasy, and we were on our way!

Our friend, Felix (whose family we would be staying with in England), met us as we arrived, along with the other American assitant, and we took a train to Godalming, a small town about an hour outside of London by train. I couldn't believe I was in England! I'd always thought of it as semi-non-existant, for some reason. I guess when you hear so many stories about a place like England over the years it just becomes a bit unreal. Felix's dad picked us up from the trainstation and we had our first ride on the wrong side of the road! It was a bit of a shock everytime a car drove toward us, before realizing it was, indeed, on the other side of the road.

Felix's family is amazing. His stepmom, Karen, is such a lively personality and she and Felix's dad, Sean, made us feel at home right away. It was really nice to be spending Christmas in a family's home (and one with carpets! yay! I don't think the French are big on them...from what I have seen thus-far). Felix's younger brother was there for the holiday as well and spent much more time with us than I would have had I been him at his age! Throughout the weekend we ate traditional English meals (on our last morning we had an English breakfast, which was amazing! I've never been much of a fan of sausage, but for English sausage...oh man...it melts in your mouth! Roast tomatoes, scrambled eggs, toast and jam, earl grey with milk...now THAT is the perfect way to end a vacation!). Below is a picture of my plate on Christmas. We had honey roasted parsnips, mashed parsnips (both...wow!!! Just...wow.), yorkshire pudding, turkey, jam (their substitute for cranberry sauce), pigs in a blanket (which are different from the American way. In England a pig in a blanket is a small sausage wrapped in bacon), brussel sprouts (which went SO well with the rest of the meal! yum), carrots, stuffing patties, broccoli, and champagne. I don't even know what to say after that.


We pulled apart the traditional Christmas crackers, which, for those who aren't familiar with the tradition are small capsules (see above my plate of food) that you grab the ends of (crossing your arms as in the photo below), and pull apart to find a crown, small very random toy (I got a mini deck of cards...probably the most normal toy of anyone...someone got a clip-on mustache and the night before, at the pub (another Christmas tradition in England is to go to a pub on Christmas eve), I got a comb for a barbie doll), and a very dumb joke (they're always, always dumb, or they're not a Christmas cracker joke). The Christmas cracker thing wasn't new to me, as my mom has always had them for us on Christmas, but for my two American friends it was a new experience and, actually, I'd never opened them the arm-crossing way!

On Christmas morning they even had presents for us to open! We hadn't expected anything at all, and their inviting us into their home had been gift enough for Tara, Phil, and myself, but I have to admit, it was really nice to have some wrapping paper to unwrap that morning! I got a "Little Miss Sunshine" coffee mug (not the one you're thinking of, see the link! And here's the back of the mug.), which was AWESOME! I also got a chocolate orange, YUM! And a tiny book of funny anecdotes, from "Father Christmas." ;)

Throughout our few days in Felix's home we played games (I found a new game that I'm ABSOLUTELY in love with called Pit...I hear we have it in the U.S. and will be buying it when I get back and forcing people to play it with me. Get ready!) We also watched the Queen's speech, which was really lame. She talked about sports and their importance to the well-being of the U.K., then she watched some choir boys sing. lol Yea...good stuff. We went to a couple of pubs in Godalming (which I wish we had more of in the U.S...I decided pubs are awesome.), went to a few shops (including a candy shop...and just check this place out! I can't even tell you how many things I saw in England that made me think of Harry Potter...this being one of them!).

Speaking of Harry Potter, Felix's dad also showed us a school in Godalming that made it into the top 5 choices for Hogwarts in the movies...pretty cool! Also, for those of you who have seen The Holiday, with Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Cameron Diaz, and Jack Black, the scene where Cameron is in England and goes into a grocery store and drinks a bottle of wine as she's shopping...that was shot at a grocery store in Godalming.

What else did we do? We made mince pies (which I always thought was a meat pie...turns out it's a fruit pie with raisins and stuff...sad times, but a cool cultural experience!). And then, on our last day in England, we took a day trip to London, before taking the eurostar back to Paris. London was great as well, but I prefered the quaint small-town life that we had in Godalming. In London we saw Trafalgar Square, The National Portrait Gallery (sounds kinda lame, but it's not at all! It's Felix's favorite museum in the city and with reason. Each portrait has information about it's subject next to it and the portraits are done in different mediums by many different artists and their subjects are contermporary through ancient and fascinating). We also went to the National Gallery and spent a short while being deep and artsy before wandering a bit more. We saw Westminster Abbey, Parlament, Big Ben, the London Eye, and the street where Hermione disapparated Ron and Harry to after the wedding in the more recent HP movie! hahaha No, but seriously, pretty cool.

We finished the day with a late pub lunch, where I finally got my English pub meal of meat pie, potatoes, peas, carrots and cider. How many times can I say "YUM" in this entry before it gets annoying? YUM!

Then we were back in St. Pancras Station (not without stopping at King's Cross Station to try and find platform 9 and 3/4, of course! No luck...I don't think it's actually between 9 and 10...oddly enough), and on our way back to France.

What a very merry Christmas, indeed!

Next: My New Year's Resolutions (but for now I have to go to work)

"Oh My Log!"

Highlights of the past week or so, in no particular order:

-I moved my bed and desk (to the only other place they fit...not a whole lot of interior decorating options in here, lol) and now it feels much more spacious in my room!

-Something seemed to click with me yesterday when I was at my troublesome school. It just felt better...though the kids were the same.

-The teachers in my schools all of a sudden started talking to me more this week! I dunno if they finally realized I'm gonna be around all year and they may as well speak to me, lol, or if it's cuz of the Holidays, but I like it!

-One of the teachers I work with invited me to her house on Thursday for coffee!! I was SO excited cuz I've heard of other assistants whose teachers invite them to do things, but it hadn't happened to me.

-I lit my two candles last night, turned on my mini string of christmas lights and read a French tabloid last night in the warmth of my little studio. It was great.

-A little 6 year old today instead of saying "goodbye" when I left shouted "I LOVE YOU!" hahaha I was laughing so hard as I walked out of that school.

-Harry Potter is officially coming to Orleans in English tomorrow! Guess I'll get to see it earlier than I thought :)

-Went to an amature improve night at the community center the other night and before the show we had to write a sentence going along the theme "end of the year" and then put it in a hat. During the show they had random audience members pick out the pieces of paper and read them. I got chosen to choose a paper and out of the probably 100 pieces of paper in there chose my own! CRAZY!

-Last week after one of my French classes my friends and I walked past a bar that we like and saw that there was music inside, so we decided to check it out. It was an American Folk Music night! With a guy from Indiana and a guy from France being the two artists. REALLY cool! It reminded me of the Root Note (which everyone here says I talk about too much...haha EUROPEAN PUBLICITY!)

I'm sure there is more, but those are the ones that come directly to mind. I have some pics on my phone from the Marche de Noel that I'll post on my photobucket account soon. Post coming soon: A Day In the Life Of Meg, France Edition.

It's beginning to feel a lot like Noel!

Hey guys! I feel like I've been miss negativity lately...sorry 'bout that. France has been rough for me the past month and a half, as you can tell, but I'm trying really hard to get past the homesickness and just enjoy what I have here. French class is going well and our teacher is a lively personality, indeed! My students are all really antsy and chatty lately because of the holidays, but I can feel the classroom/teaching thing getting easier for me...though I still have lots of problems with my CM1s and CM2s, but my "advisor" or sorts is coming on Monday to observe my CM1 and my CE2 classes in that school and help me figure out what I can do to achieve a more stable classroom with these kids.

One of my CE2 kids made me something the other day and gave it to me at the beginning of class. I was so tickled! It's supposed to be the American flag (which I taught them about during the first week of class), but he thought that 50 stars would be too difficult a feat for him, so he just drew one big one (this is what he told me), hehe. The back is supposed to say "Pour Meg....Mathieu," but it ended up saying "Pour Meogge" with the last "e" crossed out. It's great! :) I'm going to hang it on my wall.
As I mentioned in my second to last post, Christmas markets are big in France, and the Christmas market in our city center finally began (after about a week and a half of setting up) on Wednesday! It's great! (Expensive as all get out, but really fun!) They even have an ice skating "rink"...it's not really a rink, but more of a path, seeing as the entire market is located in a small plaza. It's 5 euros to reserve a spot on the rink (you have to call ahead to reserve a spot, as they only let a certain amount of people in at a time), so I'm thinking I'll be leaving the Christmas market ice skating to the families. Anyway, it just wouldn't feel like real ice skating without the risk of falling through the ice into a freezing pond of water and dead fish. Now THAT'S Christmas.

My friends and I tried to see Harry Potter in English the other day, but apparently the internet lies sometimes, and the local theatres didn't have it in English. I talked to the people I'm going to England with for break and we've decided to see the English version there. I'm so excited to finally be able to see it! I've heard good things...

Happy Holidays, everyone!

Never will I be a teacher.

This is how I feel in my CM1 and CM2 classes. I REALLY wish I could quit that school. It's not in the inner city or even near that, but it feels like this. I don't understand how some people CHOOSE to teach in these kinds of classes.

So, the Thanksgiving feasts are over and everyone's looking towards Christmas now! We American Assistants got together last Friday night, invited some "foreigners," and we each made a dish to pass to share as much of the Thanksgiving tradition as we could. We ate picnic style at Tom's apartment, and he supplied paper and markers so that we could all make handprint turkeys (see above for mine [left] and my friend Lana's [right]). It was lots of fun! We even had pumpkin pie (pumpkins are NOT easy to come by around here...and it was made from a real pumpkin too)!! We even took a few minutes before eating to go around and say what we were thankful for, so that was really nice.

Then yesterday I went to the Marché de Noël (Christmas Market) in the Parc des Expositions, which was super cool. They had food, cotton candy, Santa!, Moving displays of woodland creatures doing random stuff in houses...kinda weird...see photobucket for pics, crafts for sale, and these really creepy singing space people...creepy...REALLY weird. It was tons of fun, and I even got to get a Santon, which I'd heard about for years in French classes. I've wanted one ever since my French class in high school! :-D


It snowed ALL day yesterday, and it was coming down pretty hard too, which resulted in a couple inches of snow and a full stop to all public transportation, which means no work for us assistants today! Snow day! :-D Patrick was right. When I first moved here and asked him about snow, he said, "If it snows two inches, everything shuts down." I'm liking this :)

Also, this snow is SO beautiful! It's the first time I've really noticed the beauty in a while, since in WI it's beautiful for about 2 seconds, until you realize you'll have to shovel it, drive in it, and trudge in it. Speaking of trudging, I DEFINITELY need to buy a pair of winter boots! I was slippin' and slidin' all over the place last night on my way home. Luckily I DO have a sturdy umbrella now.

I also bought my tickets last night for the eurorail to London for Christmas. Turkish delight, here I come! :-D Well, I'm being observed tomorrow morning by our program coordinator, so I'd better go over my lessons again, and do my French homework. A few paragraphs on what I think about France so far. I'll try not to let my homesickness do the talking.

À bientôt!

Meg

P.S. There are tons of new pictures in my photobucket album, if you're interested!

Working on Turkey Day...WeIrD!

Hey everyone!

I'm sorry I haven't been blogging more often like I said I would. I'll try to get better about that.

The Thursday after my last blog we had the day off due to a national holiday, so I took a trip with a couple of friends of mine to Tours, where my friend Stevy lives. My friends spent the day with Stevy and me before heading back to Orleans, but I stayed at Stevy's for the next couple of days. Tours is a great city! From what I saw of it, it seems a bit busier than Orleans, and definitely with more to do! It was really nice to get to ride around in a car, too. Actually, as Stevy and I were driving around I felt like I was back in Madison, which was really nice, since I've been really, really homesick lately. I dunno what it is exactly, but I've never felt this homesick in my life! I've actually never really had problems with homesickness, that I can remember. Naturally there have been times where I've missed my family and friends when I'm away, but never in a way that aches like this and makes me wish time were going faster. I really, really hope this feeling goes away soon, because I still have 6 months here...and I'd rather enjoy my time in France and appreciate how lucky I am to have this opportunity.

The Friday that I spent with Stevy was particularly cool, as we got to see Amel Bent in concert...for free! Stevy is a gospel singer, you see, and the bass player that plays with them also plays with Amel, so he got us free tickets and backstage passes...I'd never had a backstage pass before in my life, so that was really neat! lol Unfortunately Amel was in the shower when we were back there, so we didn't get to meet her. We did, though, get to talk to Stevy's bassist (super cool guy!) and the backup singers and the other musicians. It was really neat!

Then this past weekend I got to go to Madrid to visit my friends Noelia and Pilar, which was great! I flew out of Paris on Thursday night and stayed at Noelia's apartment. On Friday I did a bit of exploring on my own while Noelia and Pilar were at work, and then the three of us met up and went to lunch, and then they showed me a bunch of the city. Harry Potter opened in Spain that night, so Pilar went to that and Noelia and I hung out just the two of us. I can't wait to see Harry Potter, but it's not playing in English in Orleans, so some friends and I are going to wait to see it in Paris, assuming we can find a place in Paris that's playing the English version. I almost went to see it tonight in French, but after watching the trailer I just thought it'd be too odd seeing it dubbed before seeing the original version. I'm not a big fan of dubbed films. Subtitles are a much better option, as it gives those who understand the original language the option of listening to the dialogue in it's original tongue and those who don't the chance to read the dialogue, but I digress...hardcore. ;)

Saturday we got to go to yet ANOTHER free concert, and this time of one of my favorite Latina artists, Julieta Venegas! I couldn't believe it when Noelia's roommate told us that she would be playing for FREE in one of the city plazas! What a great birthday present! It also happened to be the first concert she had given after giving birth, which is pretty cool. The reason she was in Madrid was because there was a Mexican Revolution Anniversary celebration going on in the plaza, in fact we had walked through it the night before and heard a mariachi group playing! At the sides of the stage were food stands serving traditional Mexican foods, too. After the concert we waited in line 45 minutes at least to get some food...it was worth it, though. Unfortunately I got a fever about 2 hours after the concert and was unable to enjoy doing anything else the rest of the weekend...which meant I spent my birthday (Sunday) doing little to nothing (we went to a market in the morning and then to lunch, but I just felt like crap and ended up sleeping the rest of the day pretty much). Sick or not, it was nice to spend my birthday weekend with good friends and in such a beautiful city! I'd love to go back to Madrid!


By Monday afternoon I was back in Orleans and planning lessons. That night I went to a gathering of Foreigners in Orleans (namely university students and language assistants), but didn't end up meeting anyone new, as it was a pretty cliquey night. Then on Tuesday I finally started taking a French class! (In fact, I have a bit of homework to do tonight before going to bed...once I'm done preparing my classes for tomorrow that is...though all I have to do in that regard is color/cut/paste some flashcards and draw a handprint turkey, lol) It was a great class. I learned a lot in just the 2 hours that we were there, and it was nice to be in an academic sort of environment again, even if it is just a community class. Plus it only costs 15 euros for a class that meets two hours a session, two sessions a week until June! Good deal!

So, tomorrow is Thanksgiving...and another reason for homesickness. I'm teaching my kids a little bit about the holiday...but not going into any "Pilgrims and Indians...nice, friendly dinner" crap. Just keeping it simple and traditional. Then at night I have the French class, where we'll actually be having a "Thanksgiving" party-type deal (just bringing in treats and dressing up as either a celebrity or a stereotype from our countries). Friday the other American assistants and myself will be doing a Thanksgiving dinner as close to American as we can get it. Since only a few assistants have ovens handy, we'll be spread out around the city trying to cook for it, but everyone is bringing a dish, and mine is greenbean casserole...if I can find the ingredients. I'm pretty excited for that, but I miss my family (though my family's all spread out at the moment, it's not just me who isn't home).

Anywho, a very Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! I hope you are all well and that you enjoy your national holiday tomorrow...while I'm at work ;)