Au revoir, mes chéris, et à bientôt !
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Les Vacances Commencent
Today I'm leaving for a 10 day trip to Rome, Milan, and Prague. I am crazy excited. Also crazy impressed that I managed to fit 10 days into the same sized backpack I used to carry for an average day in middle school. Not sure how I'll be looking by day 10, but you can bet there will be plenty of pictures so we can all have a good laugh once I get back to Bordeaux.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
A Pictorial Update
It's been a while since I've updated, and actually I've been up to quite a bit in the last week or so. In recent news, I'm officially on "Winter Break" and my friend Lucy is in town for a visit. Rather than explaining everything, here are a bunch of photos to liven things up:
Last week a few of the girls came to Blaye to meet me for lunch. Here we are at the citadel, before we started climbing all over potentially unsafe stone walls/archways.
Yesterday (Saturday) we went to the Dune du Plya in Arcachon. Probably one of the best days ever - here's the dune, which is the tallest in Europe.
Pretty steep...
View from the top = totally worth the struggle
So pretty!
Luce and I at the top of the dune
The whole group - isn't this place SO COOL?
Emily had the good sense to stick to the recommended path on her way down the dune. Kristina and I slid down on our asses/rolled in spirals/sprinted (you wouldn't even believe the amount of sand I found in my pants later) and ended up going towards the forest instead of the exit. Oops.
Today (Sunday) after a lovely brunch at my favorite cafe in Bordeaux, we climbed to the top of the Tour Pey-Berland, which is right in the center of town and has a pretty sweet view from the top. Another beautiful day.
It's starting to look like Spring here, and combined with the fact that I have the next two weeks off (and during those two weeks I'll be going to Rome, Milan, and Prague) my mood has been somewhere in the realm of "absolute bliss." Can't complain.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
My Students Never Cease to Amaze
School is back in full swing after Monday’s snow day, which is to say that after tomorrow I will have worked just three days this week. Last week I worked only one. I don’t know how I’ve not yet been hospitalized for exhaustion, what with this laborious schedule I’m forced to keep. Thankfully, going “back” to work isn’t so bad when you actually like what you do. Today I met a group of students for the first time, and as I always do I made them introduce themselves before we started the day’s lesson. Usually I ask them to tell me their name, their age, and something about themselves or something they like to do. Here are my top three favorite moments of the day:
- When a student said “I am seventy years old,” instead of "I am seventeen years old," and only one other girl understood the mistake.
- When a student began his introduction by shouting “Hello, girl!” at me, and concluded it by saying, “I like…drink.”
- When a student said, “I am Damian, I have 16 years, and…I love you.”
It’s probably a good thing that my first inclination is to laugh at these moments, because it means I laugh a lot at work, which is incredibly lucky, and also because it means I can avoid some very awkward moments – a win-win.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Il neige!
This morning it snowed in Bordeaux, which is fairly rare for Southern France. A friend and I went out to frolic, and here's what we saw:
No tram service today
Hotel de Ville
The French love snowmen
At Jardin Public
No, really. They love snowmen.
That's me...inside an igloo.
Palm trees. WITH SNOW.
It was a pretty exciting day to be in Bordeaux.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Commuter Hell Hath Frozen Over
This morning at approximately 7am, the weather in Bordeaux was somewhere below freezing. Considering that the temperature here for most of this "winter" has been hovering between 40 and 55 degrees, below freezing is a big jump down the thermometer. This is Southern France, after all. All bundled up, I headed for the tram before the sun was even up. Usually I take the tram for about 20-25 minutes to the bus stop, and then the bus for another hour and 15 minutes. About three stops into my tram ride, though, an announcement came on asking all passengers to exit the tram. Uh....what?
Let's take this moment to throw in a little side note on public transportation announcements. Even in English they are garbled and white noise-y and hard to understand. In French, it is mostly impossible. For instance, earlier this week a tram I was riding announced that there was a fire and we would have to wait a few minutes while the firemen came. I was unclear on where exactly the fire was, but since no one else was running screaming from the tram I figured I wasn't in any immediate danger. I took a seat and waited until we started moving. It wasn't until I saw a car on the road next to us absolutely demolished and surrounded by firefighters that I really understood what the announcement had said - we were keeping out of the way for a few minutes while the firemen got things under control. What I'm saying is, announcements are hit or miss comprehension-wise. Okay, end side note.
Apparently I wasn't the only passenger confused. There were no transportation workers to ask what do to. Everyone was stuck at this stop, and there were no more trams coming. Service between here and another stop on my route was cancelled. People started walking. As I said, my tram commute is around 20 minutes, and although I guess it's possible to walk, it would take ages - where I usually get on the tram is the direct center of Bordeaux; by the time I usually get off I am no longer even inside the city. Still, I start walking across the bridge with the others, because tram service picks back up in a few stops. As it turns out, just over the bridge is a bus I can take to the tram stop. Perfect. I get on the bus, and there are literally tears running down my face because I am so so cold. At this point I have 10 minutes to make my bus to Blaye. Doesn't seem super possible, but I continue on. At the tram stop, dozens of people are jumping up and down to keep warm while they wait. When the tram arrives, it's a scramble to get inside first. Two stops into my ride, it's clear my bus has already left. The next bus isn't for more than an hour, and I'd get to work late, anyway. I decide to go home, which takes more walking and tears. I have been up since 5:30am, but I have not made it to work. About two hours after leaving my building, I am back and still shaking from shivers. I cocoon myself in my covers and wonder if I'll ever be warm again. And I come to the conclusion that Hell is not the fiery eternity we think it is. Hell is 7am, somewhere below freezing, somewhere under 5 hours of sleep, trying to get to work while the Devil cancels tram service and laughs. Lying in bed, I consider how feasible it might be to never go outside again. I mean, at least definitely not until Spring.
Let's take this moment to throw in a little side note on public transportation announcements. Even in English they are garbled and white noise-y and hard to understand. In French, it is mostly impossible. For instance, earlier this week a tram I was riding announced that there was a fire and we would have to wait a few minutes while the firemen came. I was unclear on where exactly the fire was, but since no one else was running screaming from the tram I figured I wasn't in any immediate danger. I took a seat and waited until we started moving. It wasn't until I saw a car on the road next to us absolutely demolished and surrounded by firefighters that I really understood what the announcement had said - we were keeping out of the way for a few minutes while the firemen got things under control. What I'm saying is, announcements are hit or miss comprehension-wise. Okay, end side note.
Apparently I wasn't the only passenger confused. There were no transportation workers to ask what do to. Everyone was stuck at this stop, and there were no more trams coming. Service between here and another stop on my route was cancelled. People started walking. As I said, my tram commute is around 20 minutes, and although I guess it's possible to walk, it would take ages - where I usually get on the tram is the direct center of Bordeaux; by the time I usually get off I am no longer even inside the city. Still, I start walking across the bridge with the others, because tram service picks back up in a few stops. As it turns out, just over the bridge is a bus I can take to the tram stop. Perfect. I get on the bus, and there are literally tears running down my face because I am so so cold. At this point I have 10 minutes to make my bus to Blaye. Doesn't seem super possible, but I continue on. At the tram stop, dozens of people are jumping up and down to keep warm while they wait. When the tram arrives, it's a scramble to get inside first. Two stops into my ride, it's clear my bus has already left. The next bus isn't for more than an hour, and I'd get to work late, anyway. I decide to go home, which takes more walking and tears. I have been up since 5:30am, but I have not made it to work. About two hours after leaving my building, I am back and still shaking from shivers. I cocoon myself in my covers and wonder if I'll ever be warm again. And I come to the conclusion that Hell is not the fiery eternity we think it is. Hell is 7am, somewhere below freezing, somewhere under 5 hours of sleep, trying to get to work while the Devil cancels tram service and laughs. Lying in bed, I consider how feasible it might be to never go outside again. I mean, at least definitely not until Spring.
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