1) Toussaint. For those not in the know, Toussaint is a glorious two-week break that goes through the end of October through the beginning of November. The geniuses behind this break have expertly coordinated its scheduling so that it falls just as the exciting novelty of the new school year has worn off and the little kiddies have started going bonkers. [See my previous entry if you feel that this statement needs elaboration.] The timing of this break has been effectively absorbed into the French's circadian rhythm, so as of today, it's all anyone can talk about. It's like everyone woke up this morning with a one-track mind: TOUSSAINT! Even the copier broke down this morning and one of the teachers joked, "Ah, it's started its vacation early!" Then she asked me how to say Hors Service in English and when I walked past the copier later I saw her handwritten sign that read: OUT OFF ORDER. I didn't bother to correct it. I'm on vacation from teaching English.
2) I bought cheddar cheese yesterday. Cross off "They don't have cheddar cheese in France" from my list of "Reasons Why I Probably Want to Go Back to America."
3) My birthday. It's this Saturday and one of my classes remembered and sang me Happy Birthday four times-- twice in English, once in French and once in German. Then they all wanted to do la bise (the cheek-kissing) with me, so they stood on their tiptoes and I bent down, and my heart just about exploded from kissing all of these adorable little French children.
4) I'm eating organic Simpsons pasta while watching the Simpsons. The fact that they have organic Simpsons pasta here is another reason why France is a great country.
5) I have eight different types of cheese in my fridge. See #4: France is a great country.
6) Halloween. Because of this legendary American holiday, all of my lessons for the month of October have been easily planned thus garnering my first month of teaching the official label of: easy-schmeasy. However, expect the second month to be more difficult when I have to stretch Thanksgiving into four weeks of interesting lessons. Turkeys, pilgrims and atrocities committed to Native Americans aren't as interesting to French kids as skeletons, vampires, ghosts, zombies and pumpkins. I have no idea why.
7) Revisiting my childhood on a daily basis. When was the last time you sang "The Farmer in the Dell," "Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes," "The Wheels on the Bus," and "Five Little Pumpkins"? It's been a few years, hasn't it? I get to sing them everyday! Expect my patience for these songs to grow thin by mid-December and have me ripping my hair out by March.
8) I have awesome friends here who make me laugh a lot. Wherever you go, you should always find friends who make you laugh.
9) My French is getting better. Very slowly, but steadily. And I do believe, friends, that it was the slow and steady tortoise who won the race. So in my proverbial race, I will very, very slowly learn French and by April I'll be fluent while those who have learned French very quickly will... lose. Yep. (Please just allow me this fantasy.)
10) I had to explain to one of my teachers today that no one really knows the verses to "We Will Rock You," until you get to "duh duh duh duh MUD ON YOUR FACE, YOU BIG DISGRACE!" He asked me if I could listen to the song and write down the lyrics for him.
Thank you, Google, for coming up with this video when I searched, "We Will Rock You France"
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Monday, October 18, 2010
Un Gros Mot
In my CM1 class today (nine and ten year olds), a rather precocious girl told me she knew how to say a grand mot* in English. Thinking that this meant a "big word," I foolishly asked her what it was.
"Fuck!" She shouted, grinning devilishly. Before I could catch my jaw, it hit the floor with a deafening thud.
"Non non non non!" I cried. "Tu ne peux pas dire ça!" But in spite of myself, I found that I was laughing along with the rest of the class. Gone was my lesson plan about skeletons in kitchens, bats in bathrooms and witches in living rooms. I spent the rest of the class period trying to keep the other kids from repeating their impish classmate and fending off requests that I say the word. Or better yet, translate it for them. I'm fortunate that my students like me and think I'm funny because I could see see how this situation could've turned out badly, with me fighting for control of the classroom. But I just kept repeating French phrases like, "Oh la la, c'est pas vrai!" (Unbelievable!), "Tu m'énerves!" (You're getting on my nerves!), and "Ça suffit!" (That's enough!), while shaking my head and laughing. They love it when I speak any French at all, and soon we had at least switched to an American culture lesson, albeit in French.
"What are the names of the supermarkets in the U.S.?" (They couldn't believe we didn't have any of the big French stores there, like Auchan, Cora and E. Leclerc.)
"Do you like McDonalds?" (Gasps and feigned heart attacks abounded when I said I was a vegetarian.)
"How do you say vampire?" (Vampire.)
"How do you say Dracula?" (Dracula.)
"How do you say mummy?" (Mummy.)
At this point, the classroom had deteriorated into tiny French children bouncing off the walls, and just when I thought I was going to lose my mind, the bell for lunch rang.
"Ça sonne!" I shouted, and everyone cheered. Including me.
As the kids filed out into the hallway, my little imp came up to me and said in French, "At least you'll never forget me!" Truer words were never spoken.
*Thanks to Lucie who pointed out that she probably said gros mot, not grand mot, which makes a lot more sense.
"Fuck!" She shouted, grinning devilishly. Before I could catch my jaw, it hit the floor with a deafening thud.
"Non non non non!" I cried. "Tu ne peux pas dire ça!" But in spite of myself, I found that I was laughing along with the rest of the class. Gone was my lesson plan about skeletons in kitchens, bats in bathrooms and witches in living rooms. I spent the rest of the class period trying to keep the other kids from repeating their impish classmate and fending off requests that I say the word. Or better yet, translate it for them. I'm fortunate that my students like me and think I'm funny because I could see see how this situation could've turned out badly, with me fighting for control of the classroom. But I just kept repeating French phrases like, "Oh la la, c'est pas vrai!" (Unbelievable!), "Tu m'énerves!" (You're getting on my nerves!), and "Ça suffit!" (That's enough!), while shaking my head and laughing. They love it when I speak any French at all, and soon we had at least switched to an American culture lesson, albeit in French.
"What are the names of the supermarkets in the U.S.?" (They couldn't believe we didn't have any of the big French stores there, like Auchan, Cora and E. Leclerc.)
"Do you like McDonalds?" (Gasps and feigned heart attacks abounded when I said I was a vegetarian.)
"How do you say vampire?" (Vampire.)
"How do you say Dracula?" (Dracula.)
"How do you say mummy?" (Mummy.)
At this point, the classroom had deteriorated into tiny French children bouncing off the walls, and just when I thought I was going to lose my mind, the bell for lunch rang.
"Ça sonne!" I shouted, and everyone cheered. Including me.
As the kids filed out into the hallway, my little imp came up to me and said in French, "At least you'll never forget me!" Truer words were never spoken.
*Thanks to Lucie who pointed out that she probably said gros mot, not grand mot, which makes a lot more sense.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
There Goes the Baker With His Tray, Like Always, The Same Old Bread and Rolls to Sell. Every Morning Just the Same, Since the Morning That We Came to this Poor Provincial Town.
As yet another week draws to a close in France, I can say with certainty that life is beginning to take on a quotidian normalcy again. I haven't figured out if that's a good or a bad thing. On one hand, it's nice to have a solid schedule of classes plotted out in my free planner (thanks Banque Populaire!), I'm having a great time developing rapports with all of the different teachers, and I've figured out exactly how late I can leave my apartment every morning and still get to the bus stop in time. Well, almost. I missed the bus to school on Tuesday and had to power walk for 30 minutes straight uphill to get to school, and burst into the teachers' lounge panting heavily and covered in sweat. Oh... bonjour, everybody. In my defense, the bus came early, which I had not thought to factor into my apartment departure time. I guess there's still some room for spontaneity. I just don't like the kind that makes me have to go uphill.
However, the downside to my now-conventional life is, well, just that-- it's conventional. I no longer wander through the 15th century streets with my eyes wide open in awe, drinking in the sights and marveling at how lucky am I to be living in this fairytale world of France; rather, I wander through these same streets, my eyes glued to the ground so that I can dodge the dastardly dog residue that the French seem to have a sixth sense for avoiding. I take the bus up and down and up and down the hills, and when the bus turns onto the road that rises straight up into Ville Haute, I don't stare out my window anymore at the majesty of the little city unfolding beneath me-- the view that caused me to audibly gasp the first time I saw it. And I'm slowly coming to realize that the people living here were not placed here solely for my benefit. I am not Belle and this is not my big song and dance number in the village square.* As much as I wish that people popped their heads out of their windows to say Bonjour! to me, that's not the case. What I mean is that these people have probably been living in Bar le Duc their whole lives and one American is not going to shake things up that much. A good handful recognize me, a lot know my name, but few people really care that I'm here and even they don't lose sleep wondering whether I'm settling in okay and making friends. Blame it on the insular world of Kalamazoo College, but I find it a little hard to adjust to.
There are little things I do to combat the drone of daily life though. Like going for a run yesterday. Do you know how much I hate running? A lot. I really, really hate running. My whole body seizes up as soon as it feels my pace change from the steady walk it's come to love and appreciate. I try to trick my body by slowly building up from a walk to a power walk to a slow and steady jog and finally to a full-out run. But as soon as my feet begin to pound against the pavement in a quick rhythmic tattoo, my body is like, "Whooaa, sister, you want me to do what now?" Usually the subsequent side stitches have me doubled over in pain shortly thereafter, but yesterday I ran two miles (part of it straight uphill) and I only had to stop twice for fear of my lungs collapsing! Huzzah! I've decided that my completely unrealistic goal of running the Paris half-marathon in March is now only slightly less unrealistic.
I also try to contribute to the community culture by singing in a choir every Thursday night. I'm no stranger to community choirs, and have often found myself the youngest person there. In this choir I'm clearly the youngest by at least a decade and a foreigner which either gets me double brownie points or puts me at a double disadvantage, depending on how you look at it. The other choir members are comprised of your typical screechy sopranos, consistently-flat altos, tenors whose voices crack like a prepubescent's and a bass section that rumbles around searching desperately but fruitlessly for a note to cling on to like a lifesaver in shark-infested waters. I've also come to realize that the chatty, undisciplined kids in my classes grow up to be chatty, undisciplined adults in choirs. I've never seen a director have to fight so hard for the attention of a choir, who all seem to view this thing called "singing" as an annoying impediment to their social time. (Keep that in mind, Mom!)
There are other things that keep me going though: weekly drinks with the other assistants in town, my Nook (currently reading Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, which I highly recommend), 500 GB's of movies on my external hard drive, and that constant itch to write-- although I haven't been very disciplined about it. But before you think that I'm not enjoying myself, let me step in and say that I'm loving it here and wouldn't want to be anywhere else right now. I love my classes, love the kids, love the teachers, etc. But it was the French who coined the term "ennui," which is the only appropriate word to describe how I'm feeling. I bet whoever came up with that word lived in Bar le Duc.
*I will say, however, that my life is exactly like the opening sequence of Beauty and the Beast, minus the song and dance. Especially all the parts about the strange, peculiar, odd girl who doesn't quite fit in. I get the feeling that old ladies whisper about me behind my back all the time.
However, the downside to my now-conventional life is, well, just that-- it's conventional. I no longer wander through the 15th century streets with my eyes wide open in awe, drinking in the sights and marveling at how lucky am I to be living in this fairytale world of France; rather, I wander through these same streets, my eyes glued to the ground so that I can dodge the dastardly dog residue that the French seem to have a sixth sense for avoiding. I take the bus up and down and up and down the hills, and when the bus turns onto the road that rises straight up into Ville Haute, I don't stare out my window anymore at the majesty of the little city unfolding beneath me-- the view that caused me to audibly gasp the first time I saw it. And I'm slowly coming to realize that the people living here were not placed here solely for my benefit. I am not Belle and this is not my big song and dance number in the village square.* As much as I wish that people popped their heads out of their windows to say Bonjour! to me, that's not the case. What I mean is that these people have probably been living in Bar le Duc their whole lives and one American is not going to shake things up that much. A good handful recognize me, a lot know my name, but few people really care that I'm here and even they don't lose sleep wondering whether I'm settling in okay and making friends. Blame it on the insular world of Kalamazoo College, but I find it a little hard to adjust to.
There are little things I do to combat the drone of daily life though. Like going for a run yesterday. Do you know how much I hate running? A lot. I really, really hate running. My whole body seizes up as soon as it feels my pace change from the steady walk it's come to love and appreciate. I try to trick my body by slowly building up from a walk to a power walk to a slow and steady jog and finally to a full-out run. But as soon as my feet begin to pound against the pavement in a quick rhythmic tattoo, my body is like, "Whooaa, sister, you want me to do what now?" Usually the subsequent side stitches have me doubled over in pain shortly thereafter, but yesterday I ran two miles (part of it straight uphill) and I only had to stop twice for fear of my lungs collapsing! Huzzah! I've decided that my completely unrealistic goal of running the Paris half-marathon in March is now only slightly less unrealistic.
I also try to contribute to the community culture by singing in a choir every Thursday night. I'm no stranger to community choirs, and have often found myself the youngest person there. In this choir I'm clearly the youngest by at least a decade and a foreigner which either gets me double brownie points or puts me at a double disadvantage, depending on how you look at it. The other choir members are comprised of your typical screechy sopranos, consistently-flat altos, tenors whose voices crack like a prepubescent's and a bass section that rumbles around searching desperately but fruitlessly for a note to cling on to like a lifesaver in shark-infested waters. I've also come to realize that the chatty, undisciplined kids in my classes grow up to be chatty, undisciplined adults in choirs. I've never seen a director have to fight so hard for the attention of a choir, who all seem to view this thing called "singing" as an annoying impediment to their social time. (Keep that in mind, Mom!)
There are other things that keep me going though: weekly drinks with the other assistants in town, my Nook (currently reading Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, which I highly recommend), 500 GB's of movies on my external hard drive, and that constant itch to write-- although I haven't been very disciplined about it. But before you think that I'm not enjoying myself, let me step in and say that I'm loving it here and wouldn't want to be anywhere else right now. I love my classes, love the kids, love the teachers, etc. But it was the French who coined the term "ennui," which is the only appropriate word to describe how I'm feeling. I bet whoever came up with that word lived in Bar le Duc.
*I will say, however, that my life is exactly like the opening sequence of Beauty and the Beast, minus the song and dance. Especially all the parts about the strange, peculiar, odd girl who doesn't quite fit in. I get the feeling that old ladies whisper about me behind my back all the time.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Voilà, l'internet!
You may have heard the rumors circulating on Facebook, but I am here to confirm that YES, I HAVE INTERNET! As soon as I got it all hooked up and working, I felt the muscles in my body relax on command, as if my brain had sent a surge of seratonin coursing through my body, or as if I was a junkie getting her first hit of smack in the morning. I would imagine. I celebrated with an immediate internet binge (that I'll admit I'm still in the midst of) that will probably last for three days straight, after which I'll feel very poorly about myself and the time I wasted online, and take a break for a day or two before I break down and binge again. I'll admit that it's an unhealthy situation. But I'm in control, I swear.
But I should be thankful for another reason-- surviving my first week of work! Granted, I use the term "work" here very loosely. I mostly sat in the backs of various classrooms, piping up to give a pronunciation here and there when the teacher asked and having this conversation over and over and over again:
Kid: "Hello!"
Me: "Hello!"
Kid: "What is your name?"
Me: "My name is Laura. What's your name?"
Kid: "My name is [insert impossible-to-understand French name here]"
Me: "Hi, [mumblemumble], how are you?"
Kid: "I am fine. How are you?"
Me: "I'm great, thanks!"
Kid runs out of phrases and backs away, and the next one comes up to start the conversation again. Repeat.
Variations on this theme include: "Where do you come from?" Answer: The United States. "England?" No, the United States. It's the United States. "You are English?" Um, no, American. Chicago? "Ohh, gangster!" Yes, I am a gangster.
I have also never said "hello" and "goodbye" so many times in my life! I at least need to teach the kids "hi" and "bye" to cut down on some syllables. I thank my lucky stars that there are other English-speaking assistants in Bar le Duc, because I think I might go crazy from having the same limited conversation otherwise. But the kids are cute and excited about learning English, I'll give them that. I'm glad I don't have to worry about motivating angsty teenagers, and they probably wouldn't laugh at my silly faces and dramatic readings of "Which Witch's Wand Works?" like the kids do. Next week, the Halloween lessons begin. Anyone have any favorite Halloween songs or rhymes that they'd like to share? When I was in France last time, I taught the boy I babysat, "Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat! If you don't, I don't care, I'll pull down your underwear!" He loved that, but somehow I don't think it would go over real well in a school.... Yeah, I probably shouldn't have taught it to him either.
But I should be thankful for another reason-- surviving my first week of work! Granted, I use the term "work" here very loosely. I mostly sat in the backs of various classrooms, piping up to give a pronunciation here and there when the teacher asked and having this conversation over and over and over again:
Kid: "Hello!"
Me: "Hello!"
Kid: "What is your name?"
Me: "My name is Laura. What's your name?"
Kid: "My name is [insert impossible-to-understand French name here]"
Me: "Hi, [mumblemumble], how are you?"
Kid: "I am fine. How are you?"
Me: "I'm great, thanks!"
Kid runs out of phrases and backs away, and the next one comes up to start the conversation again. Repeat.
Variations on this theme include: "Where do you come from?" Answer: The United States. "England?" No, the United States. It's the United States. "You are English?" Um, no, American. Chicago? "Ohh, gangster!" Yes, I am a gangster.
I have also never said "hello" and "goodbye" so many times in my life! I at least need to teach the kids "hi" and "bye" to cut down on some syllables. I thank my lucky stars that there are other English-speaking assistants in Bar le Duc, because I think I might go crazy from having the same limited conversation otherwise. But the kids are cute and excited about learning English, I'll give them that. I'm glad I don't have to worry about motivating angsty teenagers, and they probably wouldn't laugh at my silly faces and dramatic readings of "Which Witch's Wand Works?" like the kids do. Next week, the Halloween lessons begin. Anyone have any favorite Halloween songs or rhymes that they'd like to share? When I was in France last time, I taught the boy I babysat, "Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat! If you don't, I don't care, I'll pull down your underwear!" He loved that, but somehow I don't think it would go over real well in a school.... Yeah, I probably shouldn't have taught it to him either.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Cowpies and Paris
Bonjour à tous! Apologies for the lack of updates, but I hope my poem kept you satisfied. I’m still sans internet, although I received a text at 4am last night from the internet company saying that it should be activated this Saturday. Why they chose texts as their mode of communication, I’m not sure. Although it makes more sense than email, seeing as how I don’t have internet… In any case, because of the lack of internet chez moi, I’ve been at the mercy of the McDonalds wifi, which chose to take an elongated break over the past few days. Yesterday, I asked one of the employees if the internet was working again, and she said, “Oui, ça marche!” However, when I turned on my computer, I couldn’t get a signal and another guy said it wasn’t working for him either. Anonymous McDonalds employee, you are now on my blacklist.
When we reached the end of the walking path, however, Alinéa was still tantalizingly out of reach, and I used the word tantalizingly in its full sense. Alinéa was our fruit and water and we were poor Tantalus, but in this case, all we wanted was a cheap rug and some bedding. 
In any case, what a few weeks it’s been. Claire, my friend from Kalamazoo who studied abroad with me in Strasbourg, arrived last week and we’ve had many (mis)adventures already. Put the two of us together and something is bound to go awry. We are an idiot. Take, for example, our search for furnishings. It’s a long story that I will regale you with in detail some other time perhaps, but in a nutshell—we took the bus out to a suburb of Nancy, looking for the cheap furniture store Alinéa, which, according to the map, was supposed to be very close to the bus stop at which we arrived. However, after a few miles’ walk out into the middle of cow country, it was still nowhere to be found. We were getting ready to turn around and head back, when I spotted the store. “There it is!” I shouted.
Yes, it was across a valley. (Click on the picture for a full-sized view, complete with arrow.)
So down we trekked (fortunately there was a walking path), traipsing through fields and pastures, stopping to take pictures with a few of the locals.
Back we went to Nancy, the day only half over, and we decided that we’d go up to Metz, a big city north of Nancy. Because there lay the cheap furniture mecca—Ikea. You’d think that it would be even more difficult to go to a completely different city that we’d never been to before, rather than simply take a bus out into the suburbs, but the rest of the day came off without a hitch. We took the train from Nancy to Metz for only 5 euros each way, and once we arrived in Metz, we found the bus that dropped us off right in front of Ikea. Hallelujah! Although it bordered on agony to lug back all the stuff that we bought, it was still easier than hauling our luggage across Paris. It’s all about perspective.
This past weekend, Claire and I went to Paris for Nuit Blanche (literally, White Night) during which, from 7pm to 7am, chic bourgeoisie Parisians (or drunken teenagers, take your pick) wandered around to different art exhibits, concerts and films, ranging from the simple storefront installation to a full-on Big Band concert in the Pompidou center (my personal favorite). I won’t bore you with the twelve hours of wandering we did but I will say that at 5am, when we had nearly lost it with fatigue, we stopped by the Artisan Boulangers exhibit where Parisian bakers, who had been baking all night, handed out fresh patisseries for free. I ate a croissant there that literally melted in my mouth. That made the whole night worth it. That, and getting a grande coffee at Starbucks. Real coffee! Starbucks! It’s amazing the little things that make you feel at home.
In other news, I started observing classes this past week. While it’s been a little stressful trying to figure out my exact schedule as it seems that every teacher wants to teach English at the same time and few are willing to move their schedules around, I’m still really looking forward to my job! The kids are, almost without exception, adorable. As soon as they see me, whether it’s in class, in a hallway, or waiting for the bus after school, they say, “Hello!” with their thick French accents. And when I say hello back, they grin and blush and whisper excitedly to the other kids around them. I think they finally learned the phrase “Turn around” because that’s what I keep having to tell them as I sit in the back of their classrooms and they all turn in their seats to stare at me, open-mouthed. My favorite cute kid moment so far was yesterday, when a little girl whispered something to me as I stood close to her, observing class. I leaned down and asked her to repeat it. “Tu es belle.” (“You’re beautiful”). I just about lost it! I grinned and thanked her and told her she was sweet. I didn’t even want to correct her—the kids are supposed to use the formal vous with me, not tu!
In other news, I started observing classes this past week. While it’s been a little stressful trying to figure out my exact schedule as it seems that every teacher wants to teach English at the same time and few are willing to move their schedules around, I’m still really looking forward to my job! The kids are, almost without exception, adorable. As soon as they see me, whether it’s in class, in a hallway, or waiting for the bus after school, they say, “Hello!” with their thick French accents. And when I say hello back, they grin and blush and whisper excitedly to the other kids around them. I think they finally learned the phrase “Turn around” because that’s what I keep having to tell them as I sit in the back of their classrooms and they all turn in their seats to stare at me, open-mouthed. My favorite cute kid moment so far was yesterday, when a little girl whispered something to me as I stood close to her, observing class. I leaned down and asked her to repeat it. “Tu es belle.” (“You’re beautiful”). I just about lost it! I grinned and thanked her and told her she was sweet. I didn’t even want to correct her—the kids are supposed to use the formal vous with me, not tu!
My orientation is tomorrow, after which I’ll finally start “assisting.” Hopefully my job description will become a little clearer, because right now I’m not really sure what I’ll be expected to do. On verra! For now, I’m enjoying being the celebrity among the kids. I hope that doesn’t wear off anytime soon.
A la prochaine!
(Renard is Fox in French!)
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