October 31

It's Halloweenie! And everything is closed in my town. The French don't really celebrate Halloween like we do. I'm sure there are parties in Paris tonight but it's just not the same.

Norman and I returned from our not-very-planned-in-advance vacation last night. It was a very cool and tiring trip. We first went to Clermont-Ferrand which is in the Puy-de-Dôme department. We trained it to Paris at 5:31 am and then to Clermont. Paris is our nearest big train station so we have to go there first to get anywhere else. On the train I sat with three cute children and their grandparents. I wanted to sleep but it was a challenge with all the card games and brotherly whining of "Arrête! Arrête! Arrête!" (sto-op!)

We checked out L'office de Tourisme (there seems to be one in every town, no matter the size) and ate cheesy mushroom crepes near a huge cathedral. We finally found a hotel after checking all the hostels- they were all full for the night. We dined at MacDo (Mickey D's) that night and planned our activities on paper. MacDonald's is very expensive here- almost 9 USD for a meal! The next day, we were hoping to climb a mountain (Puy-de-Dôme) but the little trains to get there stop running in the fall.  We had a fine time running around the city, being given very different directions and advice by bus drivers and train station workers.  We decided to take a train to another town.  We chose Mont-Dore based on the advice of the tourism guy. But, no train, just a bus.  The ride was only about 75 minutes but it was horrible.  It was very hilly and jolty and bouncy and I felt very very sick.  Buses should always have windows that open! Please!  We arrived safely and saw some huge, beautiful, snow-covered mountains in the distance.  While recovering from the icky ride, an aggressive bee followed me around (while I ran from it) and eventually stung me on the back.  But I love the pharmacies in France. You walk in the door, explain your problem, and the pharmacist goes into a back room and comes out with a medicine specifically for your ailment.  I bought some spray and cream made just for insect stings.  Easy! 


We had a hostel room booked for the night so we walked from the station toward the hostel- about 2.5 miles. No buses or trains in this town!  It was a hot and sunny walk.  With big backpacks and a bee sting, but whatever. We were in the mountains so I couldn't complain too much.  

We ended up not having anything to eat for dinner. There were no restaurants nearby and the pizza places didn't deliver (I called and asked, another accomplishment).  Earlier in the evening, we met a gal named Karen who was also staying at the hostel.  I found her in the dining room and we chatted for a minute.  She had some dinner fixings and we agreed to eat together later.  We had pasta with cheese, cucumbers from her parents' garden, sausage, and sangria.  I had to carry on an only-French conversation (as usual) which was tricky but fun. I hit the sack after dinner, full of sangria and excited that I could (mostly) communicate with real French people.

The next morning, Norman and I decided that we would take the little sky box guy up to the mountaintop (called Puy de Sancy).  We saw two mountain goats running about.  The gal running the box told us not to be scared, but I was (Aunt Mary, you would have hated it).  We got up there and walked up a bunch of wooden steps which were covered in snow and ice.  I was wearing some pink tennies, not great for scaling mountains.  We hung out up there for a long time, taking lots of pictures and making a cute little snowman (in French, petit homme de neige, literally little man of snow).  We saw our French friend Karen atop the hill. She invited us to join her on a long walk across the mountains and then down into the centre-ville.  I almost said no because I was scared at the prospect of falling off the mountain, but I figured that wasn't very likely and I might be sad if I backed down, so I said yes.  It was worth it.  It was surprisingly warm atop the cliffs and very sunny.  We hiked for hours and just when I thought I couldn't go any further, Karen explained that we were about 1/4 of the way done. OMD. She lent us each a walking stick and gave me a pair of snow boots from her backpack. Very nice. We hiked and hiked and stopped to eat sausage and cheese with bread, and kept hiking for hours. As we descended the mountain, we saw a very pretty waterfall and a cool Redwood-esque forest.  We finally stumbled into town and sat down at a cafe. I ordered a crepe with cinnamon ice cream, warm apples, and salted caramel sauce. And a coke. It was all very sweet and tasty. 

Some beautiful photos. 

 

Pretty, eh?

Tonight I'm eating a little herbed sausage and bread and doing laundry. Tomorrow is Toussaint (I didn't realize this until yesterday, but All Saints in French is Toussaint (Tous = all, Saint = saint). Goodnight! More soon! Happy hallo-weenie!

XO

Octo-brrrrr

Chauny is cold! However, the last few days have been filled with billowy clouds and blue blue skies and a few crunchy leaves and some sweet moss down by the canal. I miss Minneapolis October. The apples here are terrible! And expensive!

I had a nice solitary walk yesterday and took some pretty photos. It was Sunday so I didn't have much to do except check out the parts of Chauny I hadn't yet seen. I saw a few good spots to return to later (when I don't have people suspiciously watching me photograph buzzed mannequin heads). I went out with the intention of taking photos and then everything I saw became photograph-able. I saw patterns everywhere! And the light!  

  

A little taste of home

There's no reason not to get this done, right?

 

"Play-ya Gayme" where internet costs 4€ per hour

Train tracks and train station

DANGER OF DEATH!

Wood pile

Me & my shadow in the canal of Saint-Quentin

Impeccable shrub wall

Moss

Pretty pharmacy

My front door!

Tomorrow I'm catching a train at 5:31 am to Paris, then on to Clermont-Ferrand. Norman and I are going to hang out in the mountains for a few days. The area is called Central Massif. Don't worry- we're not going to sleep on a cliff or anything. 

My soul music for the day:

Norma & the Heartaches

Ed Crook

Evening

Evening hallway light

Protein. (and carbs)

New socks!

My ham and butter sandwich looks like a muppet! Wakka wakka

"I want to spend my heaven doing good on 
earth.  After my death I will send down a 
shower of roses." Pretty.

I had my first two real classes this week: just me and the students. Yesterday I had nine students, and only three today (two were absent). It's a little challenging to work with only three students... but we talked a lot. We talked about stereotypes (American toward French and French toward American). Every student I've talked to thinks Americans are fat and eat a lot of fast food. Yep! I talked about the difference between coffee sizes and drew some pictures on the board. We also played "two truths and a lie" to practice forming sentences and speaking. On student offered the phrase, "I have three turtles" but I thought she said "daughters." She drew a cute little turtle on the board to explain. She's only 15! 15 year-olds here look about 25. It's really weird.

A few of the kids yesterday kept saying, "I'm married to so-and-so on Facebook" as one of their sentences. The students all seemed to be friends and were very giggly and chatty. They asked for my family name so they could find me on Facebook. I did not tell them. But they were very nice and I think I'll have fun with them during the next few months.

Now it's officially vacation time! 12 days to celebrate All Saints Day (Toussaint). Chin chin!

Ouais!

Poor billboard girl with eye problem. Hehehe.

Feelin' good over here in France! The strike struck again today, but it worked out in the end (like it always does). I had a required medical appointment for my visa in Amiens this afternoon at 1pm, but because of the strike, the only possible train to get me there left Chauny at 7:25 a.m. It is silly because Amiens is only 90 minutes from Chauny! I would be missing two classes at the lycée so I carefully wrote notes (with all the proper accents... I laughed at myself because I wrote at least six error-filled rough drafts and then threw them in the garbage) explaining the situation to two of the English professors. My very kind and helpful roommate Ruth was going to drop them off at school for me in the morning (because my train was scheduled to leave before the school even opened!) (Thank you Ruth!)

Got up at 6:30 a.m., pitch black outside, and it was freeezing (not Minnesota freeezing but still cold). I took out some cash and walked to the station. A bunch of people were inside waiting for the trains. I went up to buy a ticket but the gal there told me that it wasn't possible to get to Amiens until after my appointment. There is even a little thingy on the train website that lets you look at the trains in "real time", which I did this morning, but I guess it wasn't updated. So I went home and told Ruth to go back to bed. Then I went to the lycée for the two classes I had been planning to miss! I know it's bad but I was relieved to not have to go... and then I went and didn't feel quite prepared, but it turned out okay. During the first class I was with the professor and did another Q & A with the students. They were very talkative during an 8 a.m. class! And very nice, too. They asked me to speak a little French, and I did, and they all gasped and smiled and said I spoke well! This happened the other day, too! I have a few sentences down really well so I bet if they heard me holding a less structured conversation with someone they wouldn't be as impressed. But I'm getting better and I think it's great that the high-schoolers are kind enough to give me a compliment like that!

After class I went to the PO to pick up some packages from Aunt Mary. MAIL! She is so generous and she sent many American staples like Mac & cheese, Reese's cups (just gave one to Ruth and she loved it, then ate another), lots of good TEA!, ramen noodles, Teddy Grahams, and more. And she sent SOCKS! and vitamins! and my beloved Mentholatum. I am spoiled! Merry XMAS!

I also had to call the medical office in Amiens because I missed the medical appointment. I thought I might get into trouble because this visit is REQUIRED and very important for becoming official in France, but the woman who answered was very, very nice and said we could reschedule after the holidays (there is a fall break here which is coming up called Touissant). She didn't seem at all surprised that I couldn't get a train. That was a relief because I don't want to be an illegal un-citizen! 

Then I took a nap, got up, and made some of my new macaroni. Norman made these cute little zucchini boats with a filling of carrots, shredded zucchini, smoked bacon, onions, and cheese.  I had a bite and it was delicious. Our lunches coordinated!

 

My roommates and I visited Noyon on our day off (Wednesday). Noyon is another small town which is about 20 minutes away by car. We visited another Spanish assistant who lives there. We found the church of Noyon which is named Notre Dame.

Happy!

Confession. Saturdays at 11 a.m.

There are so many churches here but I never get sick 
of them! This one was very peaceful and smelled like 
Hawaiian flowers inside.

Girls in boots in Noyon

I've been listening to my soul tunes which has put me in a good mood. Also, Norman and I are planning a trip to the south of France for the fall break! We have 12 days off starting this weekend, so we are hoping to take a train down and find some good hostels and walk around. We even bought fancy backpacks and super-absorbent towels!

Good good good! Je suis contente!

Minor setbacks.

We finally made it to Paris yesterday! We (me, roommate Ruth, other assistant Christina, and Norman for a while as well as a Spanish teacher from another school) spent about 9 hours walking around, shopping, and freezing our butts off. It sprinkled a little mais apres il faisait beau (the weather was nice). We hung out near Notre Dame (a few people took the tour), found H&Ms galore, a Zara, and a FNAC. We walked down the Rue de Rivoli (which I had remembered from my last trip to Paris) which was filled with many shops and people. We walked by the Louvre around 5:30 pm and the light was lovely. Then we wandered through the Jardin des Tuileries. It became very windy and birds were flying everywhere. We saw some cool modern art. 

I SUMMONED THE BLACK CLOUDS

In the train window

Ye Olde Notre Dame in the morning

We carefully planned our train travel around the strikes and we returned to the Gare du Nord to buy tickets for Chauny. Because of a huge line for the SNCF ticket-buying desk, we decided to buy tickets at the machine instead. One can enter the destination info, insert one's credit card, and a ticket prints out. We didn't know that this machine would be problematic later on. Because the last train left at 7:37 pm from Paris, we had to buy the ticket for that exact departure time (this early departure time was because of the strike... you can normally leave Paris around 10:30 pm). However, there was a 2-hour "layover" in Compiege, a town not far from Chauny. This layover business is really silly because Paris is only about 90 minutes from Chauny... but it was the only option. After buying the tickets, we asked an SNCF gal to confirm that we would make it to Chauny, and she said yes. I figured we would find somewhere to hang out in Compiegne for awhile. After arriving there, we found a bar, but they weren't serving coffee or hot chocolate or Coca-Cola (only beer?). We found a different bar next door and ordered three hot chocolates (by this time it was just me, Ruth, and Christina). We spent about 1.5 hours with a bunch of weird men watching a football match. Cool. 

A bit before our train was scheduled to leave for Chauny, we walked back to the station with all of our shopping bags. The TV listing the train times didn't seem quite right, so we approached a young man working at the station. He looked amused and told us that there were no more trains to Chauny that night. We said, "Whaaaat?! But we have the tickets!" He insisted that we check the schedule during strikes (WE DID) because apparently anything goes during a strike. The machine from which we bought the tickets did not reflect the correct train times. Apparently, the train we had taken from Paris to Compiege was actually a direct train to Chauny! WHAT! We got off early and waited around at a crappy bar for no reason! The train man brought us to his (warm) office and asked if there was anyone we could call to pick us up. Norman has a car, but none of us had his French phone number. I talked with someone who works at another school in Chauny but she didn't have his number either. 

The situation improved at that moment: the train man said he would call us a taxi (and that SNCF would pay for it!) We were so indignant and our French was so choppy (because it's difficult to express anger in a foreign language) that I think he felt sorry for us. The taxi arrived within minutes and as young the train man said farewell, he added, "You are lucky! Taxis don't run very often here." Thanks, bud. He really was nice, though. He asked about being assistants and where we were teaching.

The taxi driver was cool, not very talkative but not weird either. We listened to an interesting mix of French pop and American rock hits. When he started mouthing the lyrics to "I Want To Break Free", I knew he was okay. He first dropped Christina at her place in Noyon and then Ruth and I in Chauny. It wasn't very late, only 11:15 pm, but we were exhausted (and our town was completely dead; Saturday night in Chauny is like a Tuesday night in an American suburb, but even quieter).

Then today, I called SFR (the internet people) to request a technician. It is very hard to understand a mumbly Frenchman on the telephone. Norman helped a bit and after many minutes of being on hold, we hung up. I checked my phone balance and that 22 minute phone call (including about 15 minutes of holding) cost me 13€. Cool.                                                         

Today I'm just hanging out. Sundays in Chauny are very quiet. The boulangerie is open, as are a few bars and cafes. But that is all. I cooked up some vegetables (again with the brussels sprouts, zucchinis, and potatoes) and ate them with a little emmental (a type of cheese). It was tasty. I took photos of my food but most people think that's weird. Tonight I will do a little planning for the week. I will have my first students this week! Just me and them! In a room together! Speaking English. I hope they don't put my dry-erase markers on a ledge where I can't reach them.

Technologicalacking and (no)school

My roommates and I have been patiently waiting for two weeks for our phone/internet/TV package to be ready. Today was the day, and then we could not connect. We messed with the Neufbox for hours, waiting for the yellow light to turn green. I want to call people. The internet is important too, but I can connect to Wifi in my room. Only while the computer is propped in the windowsill, though. I'm sitting on my desk.

This is how we feel when our technology doesn't work.

I had class at 8:00 a.m. today. I was with the professor and I spent most of the hour in the back of the room talking with two teenage girls. They asked me some very choppy but sweet questions about myself. They thought my driver's license was cool. I will normally go into another room with a few students but I don't have my own room yet. I will have a room next week, though. So far, my largest group of students for next week is 10 (I hear that 12 is the maximum for assistants). So I have some planning to do. Two of my classes will be with students who are voluntarily coming to my class outside of their normal schedules! No attendance and no attitudes (I hope).

I was supposed to have a second class this morning but I didn't (for some reason). I am also scheduled to have two classes on Friday mornings but I was told that I am free tomorrow. I think I have worked about 4 hours this week. It's nice but I feel slightly bored and useless. Next week will be much busier.

I ate in the cantine last night with Norman. We had trouble getting in because everything was locked up. We found a man working in the lycee and he helped us into the lunchroom. Two kind lunchroom people explained everything about how a lunchroom works. We ate an odd breaded turkey dinner with green beans, bread, a cheesey roll, and an apple tarte. It was decent and worth the 3€ or so. Some of the high school students live at the school, so we ate in the same room with them. A nice gal said something in Germ-lish as she was leaving, and when we looked at her in confusion she rephrased her greeting: "Welcome to French!"

Get a life, grève

No Paris today. The strike, which I thought was limited to my town and school, is national. Merde. We walked to the station, bought our tickets, and waited for awhile. Eventually a train guy told us about the strike and that there wouldn't be a train until noon (we were at the station at 8:30am). Then we found out the the last return trip was around 8pm. That would only give us 5-6 hours in Paris. So, maybe next week!

Strike.

I guess retirement age and pension entitlements are important.  I have plenty of time to go to Paris and can afford to go often (its about 20€ roundtrip). And I found out that an old friend of my sister's (who is in the program too and with whom I flew from Minneapolis to Iceland and then France) has an apartment in Paris! So a Parisien weekend is possible.

Should I go back to sleep or have a cup of tea?

Ooh, maybe I can eat in the cantine today! Cantine reminds me of cans, and sardines. This school is very nice though so I don't think the cantine will feel like a can of sardines.

Croc' Affairs

Pup toys in Croc' Affairs

Pain chocolat

Me and my lingerie store

7:30 am in Amiens

Numero deux

I live in France now. It's so weird. The novelty has mostly worn off and now I just live here. C'EST BIZARRE.

Everything is peachy, though. I am visiting Paris tomorrow for the day with some pals. H&M, Zara, Sephora anyone? It's nice to live a train ride away. Two friends from my Paris 2006 program live in Paris now and are both married to French men, so I plan to visit them someday soon.

I received my emploi du temps today (weekly schedule). High school classes are 55 minutes each and I work 12 hours per week on average (it will vary a little each week). I think my schedule turned out very well:

Monday:
11:00-12:00
1:30 -- 3:30

Tuesday:
9:00 -- 12:00
12:00 -- 1:00 every other week
3:30 -- 5:30

Wednesday:
LIBRE! No class!

Thursday:
8:00 -- 10:00

Friday:
8:00 -- 9:00
10:00 -- 11:00

Everyone has lunchtime off every day (so I'm sure sure about that lunchtime Tuesday class). It's nice to walk home and be cooking lunch within minutes. There is also a cantine at the school which serves lunch and dinner for something like 2€ per meal. And I hear the food is not (at all) your typical American lunchroom food. I think my roommates and I will eat there later this week.

We visited an enormous grocery store last night called Auchan. It was very overwelming. I purchased a large bag of zucchinis and a sack of brussels sprouts, among other grocery items. I had never tried b-sprouts, but it turns out that I find them very, very tasty. Lunch today:



Choux de bruxelles, courgettes, et pommes de terre (potatoes) with bread (and butter). Where's the protein? (I burned the potatoes.)



There was also a strike today. This is normal. Only 4 students showed up for one of my classes because of the strike.



Cafe et coca in "Downtown" Chauny


I had to. This is 1/2 block from where I live. To the right is the post office.


Outside the Centre Pompidou



Art



Modern cube art


Collage for Jordan



Museum evening


Mostly all is well. I had good luck today at the bank-- I had to talk to someone there because my online account was blocked and I needed to deposit some money. I was scared to go in and try to explain all that in French, but it worked. The nice lady unblocked my account and helped me use the ATM. You stick your cash in and the machine counts it. No envelope needed! She asked if ATMS are different where I'm from because I must have seemed delighted by the technology. It was very easy and the French people I've met so far have all been very helpful. It's probably because my French is so bad. But one of the English teachers called me fluent and said my style and gestures were very French. !

Goodnight. I need sleep for Paris tomorrow!