And the insanity continues...

I'm going back! To Rouen! To my same school! To my same free apartment! Ouaaaaaaiiiiiiiiis !

Will the second year of teaching mostly ungrateful French 15-year-olds English grammar and vocabulary be as entertaining as the last? Will I get Internet in less than 3 months this time? Will I overstuff myself on cheese and baguettes and pains aux raisins? (Okay, I already know the answer to that one.) Will I become completely unable to speak English? Will I actually come back permanently to the US and get a real job afterwards? Stay tuned to find out!

Things I Love About France, or PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME LEAVE I WON'T GO I WON'T GO I WON'T GO

I've got two days of nearly complete unexpected free time, because my regular teachers on Mondays and Tuesdays are in the US with a group of students ("We can't smoke in the US? What do you mean? And they don't do bisous? What kind of godforsaken place are they taking us to?") and my favorite teacher, the one I was going to do a lot of make-up classes with, is sick. So today I decided to get a sandwich and sit out by the Seine for a bit to enjoy the springtime weather. And now, while the so-American-it-hurts oatmeal-raisin cookies I'm making for a Hispano-Franco-Germano-American dinner party tonight cool, I'll type up some of the things that have made me happy lately.

• Old men playing pétanque in the gardens of the Hôtel de Ville every sunny afternoon; you can tell they've been coming to the same place at the same time with the same friends and the same beer for decades, and will continue until either their last breath or until they can't properly throw the pétanque ball, whichever comes first.
• Young men playing pétanque in the gardens of the Hôtel de Ville every sunny afternoon who will grow up to become the old men; let the circle be unbroken.
• The trip-trap, trip-trap of high heels clicking on the street, setting up a unique French-city rhythm (extra points if the street is cobblestone and the women remain unfazed).
• French couples cuddling in parks, by the Seine, on benches, because they're young and French and in love and really, does it offend anyone all that much?
• Chèvre paninis eaten by the Seine on a sunny day, washed down not with a Coke, but with a Coca (I swear, it tastes different if you call it a Coca).
• Inventing French words that make enough sense to make French people laugh, like "Let me combobulate myself" in English. Most recently, I was following a teacher "louchement" - sketchily, creepily - and we laughed for a good five minutes. Louchement should totally be a word.
• The fact that one of my French friends has a scar on his forehead from a pétanque ball that bounced wrong when he was 8. Seriously. How much more French can you get?
• Trees! Blossoming! Everywhere! Forsythia, magnolia, and a bunch of others I can't identify so I just call them purty.
• Awesome European friends, some of whom are close enough that I now have couches to crash on in France, Germany, England, Spain, and Italy, among others.

Fête Internationale !

So, I just got back from an international party at the Italian, Spanish, German, Chinese, and Columbian girls' apartment (où je me suis un tout petit peu bourrée la gueule, mais bon c'est une histoire pour un autre jour, ou pour jamais) where there were two Italians, two Spaniards, two Germans, two Chinese girls, one Belgian, one English guy, five Mexicans, and me. And as I was walking home, I realized that I can't remember the last time I spoke to a truly monolingual person. Sure, there are people here whose second language isn't very good, but even those are few and far between. And people who speak three languages nearly fluently are actually quite common. It's just such a change from the US, where speaking even a few words of another language is so rare.

And I sense that this could go on, but really my half-drunk musings are only interesting to me, so I'm cutting myself off. Only three more weeks of teaching, and only 7 more weeks in France! They'll have to drag me away kicking and screaming - I don't want to leave. Especially now that I've started to make French friends.

Vampires!

They attacked me! Oh no!





And by "vampires" I of course mean the lovely people at the Etablissement français du sang (French Blood Organization), and by "attacked" I mean that I went there voluntarily to give blood. I would like to say that it's because I'm selfless and a good person and all that, but I think really I was just curious about what kinds of snacks they would serve afterwards (I was not disappointed).

I had called up before vacation to find out if I could still donate, being a foreigner and all, and the woman barely listened to me before asking if I wanted to come in and donate that day. I couldn't then, but I set up an appointment for today. So on Monday night I made myself a hamburger - I even found Worcestershire sauce! - and last night I had lentils, in an attempt to get my hematocrit up to normal-people levels (although in France it only has to be 12 for women, and I think in the US it has to be 12.6). Then I looked up the questionnaire online to make sure I knew what they'd be asking me (you'd think that the word for malaria would be "malarie", but no, it's "paludisme"), drank my weight in water, and set off for the collection center.

They of course had no record of me in their system, so everyone thought I was a first-time donor, but luckily I had my American Red Cross donor card, so I showed them that and they were reassured that I wasn't going to faint on them or anything. The doctor who did the mini-physical loves English, so he was really excited to see me and conducted most of the exam in really good English, aside from a few medical terms he didn't know. He also asked if he could have my e-mail so he could practice his English with me, so I gave it to him and we'll see if he follows up. My hematocrit was 12.4, so that was good, and everything else was fine. On to the ickiest part!

All the women working in the blood-drawing area were wearing white coats with skirts, tights, and boots. Welcome to France. The procedure was mostly the same, except that to my great delight they used alcohol instead of iodine to clean my arm, so I don't have a gigantic sticky brown stain to deal with. Also, they didn't bother to cover the needle with a gauze pad - apparently the French have a stronger constitution than we weak Americans and can stand to look at a needle poking into their arm. I even watched as it went in, so I felt quite brave. I was also given water to drink while donating, which I swear helps it go faster, and we had chairs instead of those stupid bed-like things the Red Cross is now using in the US that make me get a wicked head rush when I'm finished. So the donation went without a hitch, they filled all their little sample tubes, and I got to go through the door marked "Restauration".

There was a whole little kitchen, with a stove and microwave and everything, and the nice woman working there asked what I would like to drink - they had hot drinks, fruit juice, iced tea, mineral water, and even Coke (although I don't know about the wisdom of serving a diuretic to people who've just lost a pint of fluid). So I got pineapple juice, and then she asked if I wanted some apple tart with it. Which of course I did. So she brings all this out on a little tray, with real dishes, and then I notice the little basket of Petits Ecoliers and madeleines and apricot-filled cookies sitting on the table right next to the basket of individually-wrapped portions of Président cheese and butter. The apple tart was delicious, as were the two other kinds of cookies I tried. France definitely wins in the snack department.

Then it was back to the bus and back home to eat more lentils and drink my weight in water again. This is the best I've ever felt after a donation, and I don't know if it was just because I really paid attention to drinking water, or because I could sit up during it (seriously, Red Cross, get a clue), or because of the apple tart, but I'm seriously considering going back in two months, right before I leave, because why not? Maybe they'll have something chocolate next time...

Whirlwind Tour

Okay, so I'm back from Lyon safe and sound (and probably about eight pounds fatter - we ate a truly inconceivable amount of food). And I would post about it now, except that I'm leaving for AMSTERDAM in about 6 hours. Woo! There will be posts about Lyonnais food and museums and Roman ruins (never let three girls loose on sparsely-fenced ruins with cameras) later, but now I'm going to go unpack and repack and try to remember my towel this time.

More Stories!

So, faced with a choice between leaving my nice cozy apartment to do useful things (buy contact solution, return books to library, get photos off camera and on CD) and staying here to blog, the evil with less motion involved wins. Although I'm promising myself I'll leave after this, because the books are due today and French libraries still believe in fines. With that, two stories:

In my "Body Stretch" class (light strength training, lots of crunches) there was more melodic hilarity: "I Like To Move It Move It" came on, of Madagascar fame. Then when I had just recovered from the visions of lemurs dancing around, "Barbie Girl" started playing. I was instantly transported to the TA gym, dancing self-consciously away in a ring of 8th-grade girls. Seriously, I couldn't make this stuff up. Anyway, after class I asked the instructor where she gets the music, and she offered to make CDs for me if I bring her blank ones, which is really nice of her. It also means that anybody near me will be subjected to dance remixes of terrible, terrible pop songs, so be glad most of you are at least a continent away.

On Thursday, I decided to play "Two Truths and a Lie" in one of my classes to practice the present perfect (I have been..., I have never done...). Everyone thinks of two things that are true about themselves and one thing that is a lie, and everyone else has to guess which is the lie. It's a fun game, and it worked really well - the kids liked being told they could lie. Mine were the following:

1. I have swum naked in public in broad daylight.
2. I have never smoked a cigarette.
3. I have never visited the Gros Horloge (the second-most-famous landmark in Rouen, right after the cathedral)

Most of the kids thought that the first one was a lie, two thought the second was, and three thought the third was. Do you know which one it is? Post guesses in the comments (but don't give it away by saying why you know) and we'll see how you stack up against the tiny Europeans! (I expect most of you to get it right - it's only hard for people who don't know me.)

Adorable Children, Oatmeal Cookies, Peanut Butter, and Aerobics

As I predicted, the advent of Internet in my apartment heralded the advent of Lisa-never-posts-on-her-blog-anymore-itis as well. I do apologize, and I will try to get better (as the novelty of Internet wears off more and more - really, one can only check Lifehacker once a day).

So, a few vignettes, in no particular order. (I like vignette postings because I don't have to actually organize my thoughts or think of transition sentences or anything. If only you could write papers this way.)

A few weeks ago, a fellow assistant named Ben told me that one of his teachers has a daughter in my school who doesn't get to see the English assistant, and that she would really like to. So I found out her name and class and asked her English teacher if I could come in at least once. The teacher was really excited for me to come, so last week I did the question-and-answer session yet again, for a class of 15-year-olds. They were adorable - really enthusiastic, and even the ones who weren't very good asked lots of questions. After class, the girl who had requested my coming in came up and said, in English, "Ben said you were really nice and it was true!" Unfortunately by the time the idiotic grin had disappeared from my face and I could once again formulate a coherent sentence, she had left the room, but hopefully next time I see her I'll be able to thank her properly. That made my week.

Last Friday, I decided to have a "Soirée Princess Bride" at my house, so I invited a bunch of assistant friends (it ended up being mostly Americans, with Ben, who's English, as our token European) over to watch The Princess Bride and eat oatmeal cookies and drink milk. All I did Friday was bake cookies, clean the house, tidy my room, and rearrange the living room furniture, and now I totally understand the Pre-Party Panic that grips my mother before parties. What if there's not enough food? What if there's not enough to drink? What if the cookies don't turn out? What if nobody has fun? What if they think the movie's stupid? I will never make fun of her again. I understand. Fortunately, everything came out beautifully, even the oatmeal cookies with their European substitutions (real brown sugar and vanilla extract are impossible to find in this country), and my friend Christine brought fresh cow's milk that she buys directly from the farmer and we all had milk and cookies. And muscat, which is a really sweet, really alcoholic wine that I've become addicted to, and after serving it at a few gatherings at my house I'm now known for it. You're supposed to have it as an apéritif, but we tend to drink it whenever the fancy takes us.

My craving for peanut butter, which has been steadily growing in intensity ever since Christmas break, got to the point of no return today and I decided to go on a hunt. A lot of stores sell Skippy, but it'll be a cold day in hell before I think of that as peanut butter. So I went to a new store, near the market where I go every Sunday. It's huge - a real supermarket - so I was very hopeful. First I found the Skippy, right next to the Nutella and all the jams, but I decided to look further. In my methodical, aisle-by-aisle search (I'm not very good at finding things in American grocery stores, let alone French ones) I found chips, lentils, red beans, chickpeas, cereal... Lugging my basket (French stores don't believe in shopping carts) I rounded another corner and found Nirvana: the international foods aisle. It started out with Great Britain, with a helpful Union Jack above the shelves: McVitie's, liquorice allsorts, lemon curd, marmalade, and tea. Then Great Britain sort of merged with the US, and there were Oreos, various salsa/queso substances, and... DR PEPPER. Now, I rarely drink soda, but there in the aisle of the Intermarché it was a sight for sore eyes. I love Dr Pepper. So I picked myself up a can (99 centimes) and scanned the shelves again for peanut butter. There it was... in the British section? It was a brand I didn't know, but it had sugar rather than corn syrup like Skippy, so I figured I'd try something new. I continued down the aisle to the "Asia" section, where China, Japan, India, and various other generically-Eastern cuisines sat side-by-side, and sometimes mixed-up, since clearly they're mostly the same - no distinct cultures or languages or anything (French people have a good deal more unconscious racism than Americans do). I did find some curry powder that looked nice, though. Then it was time to lug everything back home and make myself a peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich to eat with my Dr Pepper. Nothing has ever tasted so good.

Finally, a brief gym incident: during classes the instructor plays a constant high-speed mix of techno remixes of pop songs, a lot of which are in English and very familiar to me. Sometimes this helps, like when I can't do another crunch and "Shut Up and Drive" comes on, and sometimes it totally throws me off, like when I'm trying to remember the step routine and "I Kissed a Girl" comes on and I am compelled to sing along and then I fall off the step. Not so much with the multi-tasking. Today, during cardio dance (basically we just prance around, but I do break a sweat and it's fun) we were going over a particularly difficult skippy bit and an extremely-sped-up version of "Truly Madly Deeply", by Savage Garden, came on. Savage Garden was one of my very first CDs, so in addition to a burst of nostalgia for 7th grade, I had to mouth the words, and therefore messed up. Then I got back on track and managed to mostly ignore the song for a while. Then a new song came on, and it sounded incredibly familiar but I couldn't place it, so while I was trying to figure it out I just flailed about anyhow, occasionally on the beat, to the great amusement of all the French girls in the class, I'm sure. Finally some of the words came through: "I Touch Myself", by the Divinyls. Oh yes. At that point I pretty much went all out with the mouthing along, because why not?

And there you have it: snippets of my wonderful life. I'm on vacation next week, and the week after (woo!) so I'm going to Lyon for a few days, then Amsterdam for 6 days. If anyone has recommendations for either city, let me know!