Mid-vacation update

Well, as I keep learning, this is France, and nothing ever goes exactly as planned. As a nice little side effect of missing my OFII appointment in Lyon, I wound up not being able to go to London; without the titre de séjour I would have received at the appointment, I am able to leave France, but doing so would invalidate my visa. This required some creative last-minute planning, as I'd already bought non-exchangeable, non-returnable train tickets to London for Brooke, Josh, and myself, and Brooke had already made hotel reservations. Since it would be a giant waste for all of us to stay in Paris just because I had to stay in France, Josh and Brooke went ahead to London and I made hostel reservations for the three days I would otherwise have been with them. But all's well that ends well, and even if I wish I'd had more time to research a hostel in a less sketchy region of Paris, it's been nice to explore the city on my own.

Before I launch into that, however, I'll go back to the beginning!

Sunday: One of the profs at the lycée very generously offered to drive me to Lyon to avoid dealing with the possibility of my Feurs - Lyon (and then from there to Paris, but the regional trains have been the more strike-prone ones) train being canceled the next morning, so I made a hostel reservation in Lyon for Sunday night. However, upon trying to check in to said hostel, I realized I didn't have my passport with me. They were willing to let me check in anyway, but the prospect of a week in Paris without my passport and also without my train discount card that I keep tucked in it did not seem wise, so I left my bag at the train station in Lyon and made the depressing journey back to Feurs. I found the silly passport in my coat pocket, where I'd left it in preparation for my earlier failed journey to Lyon. Not the best start to the trip, but on the bright side, it could only get better from there!

Monday: Thankfully I needn't have worried about getting to Lyon on Sunday, since both my Feurs - Lyon and Lyon - Paris trains were running on schedule Monday morning. I got to Charles de Gaulle airport in plenty of time to meet Brooke and Josh after their overnight flight, and we made our way to check in at our hotel, which turned out to be about two blocks from the Moulin Rouge and thus right in the heart of the red light district. Though that may seem sketchy, it's actually one of the safer areas of Paris to be in, since because of its sordid reputation many policemen patrol there at night.

After dropping off our luggage, we hastily tracked down some lunch from a street vendor and set forth to explore the Montmartre area with no set plan in mind. At the foot of the steps up to Sacré-Coeur, Brooke and Josh got scammed by some guys who grabbed our arms and started weaving thread bracelets on our fingers and then demanded money for them; I was speaking French with the guy who accosted me and accidentally-on-purpose misunderstood him when he asked for 5 euros for something that wasn't worth more than 50 cents, so he made me give it back. While I was trying to get free, though, I didn't realize that Brooke and Josh had not been so lucky (or their bracelet-maker was not so willing to take no for an answer), so that made for a less than auspicious start to their trip. Note for the future: take a nice picture from the bottom of Montmartre, then find a less touristy way to go up.

To avoid dealing with tourist traps on the way back down, we decided to take a more circuitous route back to the hotel before getting cleaned up to meet Caroline for dinner. We followed one of the paths laid out in my Lonely Planet guidebook, which took us past the Lapin Agile. Unfortunately, Schmendiman was nowhere in sight! That tricky bastard.

We met Caroline outside the métro at Odéon, where she was just coming from classes at the Sorbonne. I had wanted to introduce Brooke and Josh to classic French dining, so after wandering around a bit we settled on Le Menhir, a créperie/fondue restaurant near the touristy Blvd Saint-Michel. It was delicious... or at least, Brooke and Josh tell me it was, since I had the onset of a cold and couldn't taste anything :P (On a side note, French cold meds are miraculous, and I thankfully have since regained both senses of smell and taste!).

After dinner we were tempted to go home and crash, but the prospect of seeing the very nearby Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris lit up at night was irresistible, and we strolled over to marvel at its splendor. Even though I've only been in France a month, I feel like I've done a more than healthy share of cathedral/basilica marveling, but Notre-Dame de Paris really is the cream of the crop. Especially at night without all the throngs of tourists, you really can sense its magnificence.

However, being up since 5:00am for me and the overnight flight for Brooke and Josh finally caught up with us, and we crawled home to get some rest, since the train to London was early the next morning.

Tuesday: Bright and early at 7:00 in the morning, I escorted Brooke and Josh to the Gare du Nord (where they make you use three separate metro tickets to get from the metro line to the train station! Yeesh), then crawled back to the hotel for a few more hours of sleep. I should have been a good little tourist and taken advantage of being up before the crowds, but it sure was nice to rest. Good for the cold, too! When I finally got my lazy ass in gear, I dropped off my bag at the hostel before meeting up with Maddie and Nick, a couple fellow assistants in France from UGA, and Rachel, Nick's friend who's an assistant with him in Cherbourg. We headed to the Latin Quarter and found a delicious falafel stand, then walked a good ways over to their hostel to meet up with some more Cherbourg assistants and spent some time chatting in a nearby café. They later headed out to a concert (Suckers and Yeasayer, who apparently I should look up) and I went to Caroline's for dinner (pan-seared fish and pasta, yum).

Wednesday I day-tripped to Rouen, and today I went to several museums (Musée Marmottan-Monet, Musée Nationale du Moyen Age) and spent a good hour or so inside Notre-Dame de Paris, but my paid internet at the hostel is up so I have to stop for the night! Tomorrow morning I go to meet Brooke and Josh at the Gare du Nord, and I'm really looking forward to seeing them and hearing all about London.

Lyon, Part Deux (or not)

There's a train station pun in the title, though probably no one will get it :) Today is one of those days where I really have to count on the little things for amusement, because everything else has been determined to go wrong. I wasn't able to go to Lyon today for my immigration medical appointment because the train I was going to take wound up not existing, and each attempt to call OFII (office français de l'immigration et integration) to tell them I'm not coming keeps getting cut off before I can talk to an actual person. I sent them an email explaining the situation, so hopefully they'll be understanding and let me reschedule. The other option is that they cancel my visa, which would be quite unpleasant.

It may be for the best that I couldn't go to Lyon today; from what I hear, the striking has intensified a bit this week into more active displays of dissatisfaction with the government. Some of the profs were saying that Bellecour, where I was last weekend, was completely blocked off today to reign in protesters, who are displaying their anger by setting trash cans on fire (also on strike are the trash collectors, so there's plenty of material available to burn for those so inclined).

Between learning we can't have our own internet and the strike undermining everyday life, I think my blogs have had a little bit of a negative air, but I'm still really happy to be here. Just have to get around these obstacles and make the best of it. Now picking up where I left off earlier in the week: Lyon in less riotous times!

I had a lot of free time to explore on Saturday since Fanny was at a German teachers' conference all afternoon. To the left is a picture of a very strange sight, a centuries-old church next to the modern monstrosity that is a Monoprix department/grocery store. The perspective in my picture is a little off, since the two are actually about the same size even though the Monoprix looks bigger. I guess the building itself is actually pretty cool for a department store, but next to the church it's just strange. You do see a lot of this in France though, beautiful old buildings eclipsed by newer, sleeker designs.

Also of architectural interest, though in a different way, is this awesome-looking offbeat bookstore I came across. I love that there are so many independent bookstores in France rather than just the big chains like Barnes & Noble and Borders in the US, though there are also the big book/media stores here too; FNAC and Virgin Megastore are the two most well-known, and they're also the places you go to for concert/event tickets.

After a day of wandering and window shopping, I met back up with Fanny to cook dinner at our hosts' apartment. We'd gone to the marché that morning to buy veggies and fish, so dinner that night was a dish that Fanny cooks often but that is so delicious I could happily eat it every day: sliced onions, olive oil, fish (a light, white variety), tomatoes, and blue cheese all baked together, served over rice. Next time we cook it -- probably in a couple weeks, after break -- I'll have to take a picture, since it looks almost as good as it tastes. A few other German assistants came over after their meeting and joined us for dinner, which became more of a late-night social event than just a dinner. Thankfully everyone was speaking French for the most part so I was able to understand!

With transportation still being a tricky issue, Fanny and I wanted to head back to Feurs fairly early on Sunday, but we first hiked up to Notre-Dame de Fourvière, the church that looms over the city. It was a bit too hazy and rainy to take a good picture of the view from the top of the hill, so I'll have to try and do that another day when the weather is more accommodating. Fortunately weather doesn't matter so much on the inside of a church/basilica, and this one is especially gorgeous. The earlier incarnation of the basilica was destroyed in the Franco-Prussian War, so this one is fairly young for a church (built from 1872-84). I don't know that my picture captured it very well, but the sheer magnitude of this building with its colorful, gilded interior is absolutely breathtaking.

Ok, only a couple minutes of internet left, so I'd better wrap this up. This may be my last blog for a while, as the internet will be shut off this weekend and then I'm off to Paris and London next week with Brooke and Josh. Bonne vacances!

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Starting with the Good, infused with a delicate swirl of the Bad (or really just the Frustrating): I'm on break! It almost feels silly to have a vacation after only three weeks of work, but at the same time I feel so very ready for it. This teaching experience has been a little overwhelming so far, as I come prepared with absolutely zero background in teaching methods. Having almost complete autonomy in what I teach is more of a curse than a blessing at this point, since I feel like I could really benefit from some rules or guidelines.

So far the only rule is to try and make the students talk. Sometimes this is worse than pulling teeth, like this morning... With Halloween being next week (during the vacation), I prepared some lessons on American traditions for celebrating Halloween. One of the activities was to have the students read aloud the legend of how Jack O' Lanterns became a symbol for the holiday, and then I asked some basic comprehension questions. There is not much more disheartening than asking a simple question ("Who is the main character?" -- Answer: ...Jack) and being greeted with blank, apathetic stares. But I survived the class and am glad they're not always that painful. Usually there's at least one or two students per class I can count on to make a slight effort or at least guilt into answering by staring them down.

More on the Good, the arrival of the break means that Brooke and Josh will be here soon! I've got a couple days before they arrive and a couple days after they leave to work on some (hopefully more effective) lesson plans, but the rest of my break will be fully dedicated to touristing it up in Paris and London.

The Bad: I've been a lazy blogger and didn't finish my Lyon post; instead of continuing my entry yesterday like I thought I would, I instead went to St-Etienne with Claire and dropped more money at Ikea and at the bookstore than is really prudent. But who can pass up a block of chef's knives for 3 euros (using a kitchen knife to cut bread and veggies like we were before = not fun)? Or three frying pans for 9 euros (pancakes are now an option!)? Or an intro guide on French wine for... ok, that one wasn't as reasonably priced. But I digress. Claire talked me into staying overnight instead of being responsible and catching a train back to Feurs that evening, so as a result I got to experience bar trivia (le quizz), French style. Rather than one question at a time, there are three rounds where you're given 10 questions at a time and have to answer them all at once. I also had the chance to meet a bunch of her friends, who are all really cool, and the night was topped off by winning trivia (though in no part thanks to me!). Upon further reflection, the Bad really isn't bad at all, aside from slight irresponsibility :)

The Ugly: the internet, which is getting quite ugly indeed. It's been two weeks since SFR told us that our phone line was supposedly functional, and we finally had a technician come out today to check it out. After several tries and completely deconstructing all the related wires in the wall, he seemed to think it was some sort of electrical problem, which then becomes the school's problem, not France Telecom's. Unfortunately the school doesn't have an electrician -- and we're really not even sure that's the problem -- so it looks like internet/phone/TV are not going to be an option here after all... even though we've been paying for it for two weeks and SFR told us it was functional. I'm currently using a loaner 3G USB stick that they gave us while they were still working on the problem, but I'm guessing we'll have to give that back imminently. Bleh.

Also as a side note, no pictures today since 3G signal in Feurs is only one bar. If it's not strong enough for g-chat, I feel like trying to upload a picture would bring the whole system crashing down. So my Lyon update will have to wait a little longer! Speaking of Lyon, I have to trek over there tomorrow afternoon for my immigration/medical appointment, so I'm hoping trains are running smoothly enough that I won't have any problems. Tomorrow is a day replete with appointments, as I also have a doctor's appointment in Feurs to get a physical done that will allow me to practice and race with the running club. Here's hoping the strike impedes none of these important errands!

Lyon

I feel like I'm long overdue for a post, but with my lessons having started in earnest this week (well, at least as earnest as the strike permits), I haven't had the free time I got used to having in the past few weeks... especially since we STILL don't have functioning internet at home, so being restricted to when the school's internet is on limits me even more!

Fanny graciously invited me to go visit friends with her in Lyon last weekend, and I'm really glad I went along. I was worried at first that I'd be an extraneous non-German-speaking third or fourth or whateverith wheel, but as it turns out Fanny's friend Kathrin lives with her French boyfriend, so we spoke mostly in French. They live in Vieux Lyon, a really beautiful area with narrow, cobblestone streets that almost makes you feel like it's 1610 instead of 2010.

This picture shows part of the climb up to their apartment, which is about halfway up the quasi-mountain that the Basilique Notre Dame de Fourvière sits atop. I didn't run this weekend, but a few trips to and from their apartment was enough that I don't feel bad about it!

Just getting to Lyon was almost an adventure in its own right, though, as the strike is still in full swing. Trains are only functioning at about 1/3 normal capacity in the south, and the St-Etienne/Roanne line that passes through Feurs is almost completely defunct. In lieu of trains, there are some buses running from train station to train station, but catching them is more or less a matter of luck. There're supposedly on schedule, but as far as I can see those are more of loose guidelines. However, our schedule was flexible, so waiting around on a bus that came 35 minutes late (or 25 minutes early? Who knows) was no worry.

I've got to head to chaperone a field trip to see Macbeth (in French, of course...we'll see how that goes!) in Saint-Etienne, and by the time I get back there will be no more internet for the evening. I'll leave you with a few photos (ok, or just one, internet is being wonky) and then finish this update tomorrow.

Cathédrale St-Jean, overshadowed by the Basilique Notre Dame de Fourvière. The Eiffel Tower-looking structure is a television/radio tower that's up next to Fourvière, not attached to the cathedral!

October 13 Update

Another day off means no excuse not to post a blog, though if I were smart I'd be working on next week's lessons rather than blogging. But there will be enough time for that later, especially since I don't even know what some of the teachers expect me to contribute to their lessons yet. As I mentioned before, this week has been abnormally lax for me between the strike and schedule mishaps, but next week I go into full gear (just in time for Fall Break the next week after that!). I've felt almost guilty on this second week of observation, as Fanny just had one week of observing classes and has started doing her own lessons already while I'm still basically just lazing about.

Lazing about and running a lot, that is. Last night I tried out the local running club, and if they're willing to waive or at least minimize their annual fee for me, then I'll definitely be joining. I think there's a men's and a women's division to the club, but it was only the women's club that met up yesterday. I don't know how many members there are, but last night five other women in addition to myself showed up. They were all super fit ladies in their early 40s decked out in fancy running gear (side note to self: I might want to get more running pants, since I have yet to see anyone here running in shorts... almost felt naked yesterday wearing mine), so I wasn't sure how I'd measure up and was feeling somewhat silly for claiming to want to train for the Marathon de Paris.

As it turns out, I could keep up and may even be among the fastest in the group! This is a feeling I'm definitely not used to... speed has never been my strength so much as endurance. It's really nice to have a group to run with, and if I get a physical done in time I can run with them in an 11k race next month (11k is an abnormal race length, but 11k on 11/11... oh so clever). I haven't had the chance to train for and do a race since last year's Thanksgiving Half-Marathon and haven't really trained for a race since high school cross country, so I'm looking forward to this.

There are also some new developments in the realm of transportation. One of the teachers at school, Françoise, offered to let Fanny and me use two bikes of hers that she didn't need in winter, so we decided to go pick them up today since schools are all closed on Wednesday afternoons. However, since the trains are still striking, this made for an interesting way to get down to her town. No trains (or at least very limited ones) were running, but we could still buy a train ticket and then use it to take a bus from one train station to the next. I don't know how this serves to help the strikers advance their agenda, but I'm glad we were at least able to get down to Montrond-les-Bains! The idea was to ride the bikes back up to Feurs, but we were sad to discover that one of the bikes has leaky tires that deflate as soon as you put weight on them. Instead, Françoise was nice enough to drive Fanny and me back up to Feurs with the one functional bike, so at least now one of us can run errands more quickly now.

And now for a random image from around Feurs:

The writing in the corner labels it as "FestiFeurs 2010," so I gather that every year at this festival (which I think is in summer, so I missed it) they paint a new mural around town. Perhaps a bit strange, but this guy seems like congenial enough company while you're waiting for the bus...

La grève, l'internet, et le ciné

I've touched on it before, but today's entry will be dedicated to that most beloved of French pastimes: going on strike. As opposed to last week's student strike, this one was at the national level with all public services doing their part to make sure that nothing was running as it should! I hear there was a huge demonstration in Saint-Etienne that many of the students were going to (and a few teachers as well), but since the trains weren't running normally I decided not to chance it. I also was supposed to have three classes today, but as it turns out none of them happened (one because of a scheduling error, and the other two because the prof didn't show up; though it doesn't really matter because there were no students to teach). So of my supposed 12 hours a week of class, it looks like I only have to do two this week. Nice.

All organizations tied to the government had the choice to strike or not, and seemed to do so with varying degrees of success: the post office and trains have limited services, and maybe half the teachers and a quarter of the students came to school today. This strike was much less obvious than the student strike last week; no one was barred entry to the school so much as people just didn't bother to show up. I'm sure some people instead went to Saint-Etienne, but I also heard at least one prof say yesterday that it was as good an excuse as any to take a day off and relax.

Also going on strike (though not intentionally) is the internet. Fanny and I have been facing an ongoing battle with the SFR office in town and their silly misdirections. As soon as we were able, we went and set up an account to get internet, TV, and telephone as part of their "neufbox" deal. But as opposed to a modem being shipped to your house like in the US, they told us we had to go pick it up at a delivery point 4 miles out of town that turned out to be a home furnishings store. Fanny got a text message saying the line was activated and the modem was ready to be picked up, and a very awesome teacher offered to go out of his way to drive me over there and back on Friday afternoon. However, the delivery point had no record of our account, despite the paper I had to the contrary. With everything being closed on weekends and Mondays, Fanny and I waited until today to go hassle the SFR boutique about where it had run off to. They told us that the package had been delivered to the school, except it being Saturday no one was there to answer for it. So now we should be able to pick it up from the post office... if only they weren't on strike!

Despite the strike, we decided to try anyway. The lady at the post office was extremely helpful and told us to keep it secret that she was breaking the strike to go next door to the parcel office to look for our box, but she found it! So it was with a rather high degree of euphoria that Fanny and I came home from the market, laden down not only with fresh fruit and veggies but almost certain knowledge of unlimited, unblocked internet from here on out.

Alas, it was not to be. When it didn't work after several tries, I went over to the school and roped Claire into seeing if she could help us, since she would probably have a better shot getting through to SFR's customer service than us. Whereas the US often outsources customer service to India these days, France outsources it to North Africa, and a combination of French technical terms and an unfamiliar accent would probably have been a little overwhelming for Fanny or me. As it turns out, our line is cut and they're going to try to fix it remotely (is it possible to fix a severed line from afar? Stay tuned to find out...), and then if all else fails they say they'll send a technician over in a few days. So maybe late this week or hopefully early next week at the latest I'll be able to use Facebook again, just as I'm getting used to life without it!

Moving on to a more non-strike related topic, Fanny and I tried out Feurs' Ciné last night, which was showing Le Bruit des Glaçons (The Clink of Ice), in which an alcoholic writer is paid a visit by a physical manifestation of his cancer. It was a rather strange film, but at least it was not at all predictable as many comedies tend to be! The cinema itself is really nice and almost certainly a converted theatre. Ciné Feurs shows two different films per week and at has least one showing per day. When we showed up at the theatre to buy our tickets last night, one old man rather adorably told us to hurry and pick seats, because il y a déjà pas mal de gens! (there are already a bunch of people). A quick glance inside showed us that yes indeed, a whole 10 or 12 patrons had taken seats in this 100-seat theatre.

We decided to test out the balcony and sat in what are quite possibly the most comfortable movie theater seats I've ever sat in. Whatever else one might say about Feurs, you cannot deny that it's got a nice cinema! I also enjoyed that instead of ads before the movie, we saw this lovely banner draped in front of the screen that advertises local businesses.

I also recently learned that there's a running club in the area that meets Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5:30 in the high school parking lot (very convenient) and then goes on a long run in the countryside on the weekends, so I'm going to try it out tonight... or in 15 minutes, actually. You have to pay to be part of the club, but first I need to find out if I'm even fast enough to run with these people before I decide if the fee is worth paying.

Bonne journée et à la prochaine!

St-Etienne - Premier Rencontre

Just when I begin to fear I'm running out of interesting things to report, a new host of topics crop up! Yesterday was the English Language Assistants' orientation for the Loire département of the Lyon académie in St-Etienne, a city I'd only passed through before. To the left is one of the oldest buildings in the city (my picture doesn't really do it justice...bad lighting!) that has been transformed into a drug store (la Droguerie).

But before I launch into the tale of the longer-than-intended day (and night) in St-Etienne, I must first report on one of the favorite national pastimes in France... la grève: going on strike. There's a huge ongoing debate in France right now about raising the retirement age by two years in order to help save the French government some money, and of course those who reside in the land of the 35-hour work week are loathe to extend their careers. There was a big organized teacher's strike on September 23rd that I just barely missed, but I was quite surprised upon walking out my front door yesterday morning to find all of the students milling about outside the school gates after 8:00am, when classes were supposed to already be in session. Since it was the day of my orientation in St-Etienne, I didn't have any classes scheduled but still needed to go inside to check my mail and see if the translation of my birth certificate had arrived yet.

You learn something new every day in France... apparently students can go on strike too! Apparently they do it a few times a year, and this one was supposedly in support of maintaining the retirement age (suuuure, 16-year-olds care about retirement...). In any case, they'd all taped big X's across their clothes and linked arms to bar the entrances to the school to any fellow student who would be so dastardly as to break the strike, but professors were still free to go in and out. I really wish I had had time to take a picture, but as it was I had to hurry to check the mail and was afraid I'd have to run by the post office and be in risk of missing my train to St-Etienne. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that the students mistook me for one of them, and it took several explanations for me to make the girls I was trying to break through realize that I was in fact a teacher. Oh, how quickly they went from snotty to mortified! I've got to hand it to the students here, they are very respectful and deferential to professors... when they recognize them, that is.

Okay, back to the main topic for today: St-Etienne. I did wind up having to run (literally) by the post office in Feurs before sprinting to the other end of town to make my train, but I made it in time. The 50-minute train ride was followed by a 40-minute walk to the high school that was hosting the orientation, which sits at the very top of one of St-Etienne's infamous seven hills. Between the morning dash and the cross-city hike, I was feeling glad I hadn't bothered to wake up early to go run.

The morning section of the orientation was filled with administrative information, and during those few hours I realized that despite its somewhat less than prime location, I'm actually very lucky to be in Feurs. I was the only assistant in the whole region who had already taken care of everything: securing housing, opening a bank account, beginning classes, and enrolling in social security; and it's all because the people at my school are so organized and helpful. There are some assistants who still haven't found a place to live, and so far no one who is teaching at the elementary school level even knows what schools they've been placed in yet. Actually, I don't feel so bad for the primary school people; despite the inconvenience of not knowing where they'll be working, they're basically on paid vacation and will only start observations right before the fall vacation. A month of being paid to meet people, stay out late, and explore St-Etienne? Yeah, I wouldn't complain.

After lunch in the school cafeteria (definitely a notch or twelve above American school lunches), the focus switched more to the educational side and discussions of potential lesson topics, which was very helpful for me but probably would be quite dull for whoever's reading this, so I'm going to gloss over it :)

One of the English teachers at my school, Claire, lives in St-Etienne, so she met me and a few others from the orientation at a café/bar called Midi-Minuit in the Place Jean Juarès, a very cool plaza where half of the numerous cafés' seating areas are across the street with little awnings to point out which seats belong to which cafés. As the group slowly dwindled down with evening approaching, those of us who remained decided to strike out in search of food. After a quick pedestrian tour of cool places to hang out in St-Etienne by night, we picked a fondue restaurant called Chez les Fondues and all four of us (in addition to me and Claire, there were two other assistants, Tyler and Katherine, who were feeling culinarily adventurous) ordered the raclette fondue to share, which is not quite your typical "dip the bread in the pot of molten cheese" kind of fondue.

The pictures above show a before and after of our raclette, which is heated from above and melts down. Ohh, so yummy. It's best over potatoes (in the wooden tub behind the cheese lamp) and bread, but is also served with a jar of pickles (which made it into the picture of me to the left), salad, and a charcuterie plate that rivals Farm 255. We also got a small pitcher of very smooth local red wine for only about 10 €... I really can't get over how reasonably priced wine is here. But who am I to question it!

It was getting close to 9:00 when we left the restaurant, and Katherine and I knew we had to be sure to catch our trains out of St-Etienne on time, mine being the earlier one at 9:55. Yet an hour is a long time for two young women to wait at an empty train station at night, so we decided to grab a quick drink before catching the tram to Chateaucreux. Seemingly 10 minutes later, I look down at my watch to see that it is in fact 9:35 and I've got 20 minutes to get across town to make the last train back to Feurs, and my second cross-city sprint of the day commenced. Well actually just a dash to the tram stop, a very frustrating five minute wait for the next tram to arrive, and then a dead sprint (loaded down with all my paperwork from that morning) from the train station's stop into the train station. We got there at 9:57, and the train was long gone. Missed the damn thing by two minutes... They say here that trains never arrive on time, but always leave early. So far, this is true.

At least Katherine managed to make her train, but consequentially I now found myself alone at the desolate train station. Thankfully Claire had anticipated that I was probably going to miss my train and offered to let me crash on her couch for the night, and then I'd catch a train the following morning in order to make it back for my morning class in Feurs. On the bright side, by missing my train, I no longer had a 9:55 curfew! Claire picked me up at the train station and dropped me off back in town to meet up with some of the other assistants who were out that night (mostly the primary school assistants who don't have classes yet and thus have been able to stay out late whenever they want... jealous much? Yep) while she met up with some of her friends for a while. I found the other assistants at an Irish pub, Saint Patrick, that I'm going to let slide as being authentic because they served Strongbow on tap. There were five of us still out at that point, Tyler from Tennessee, Andrenne from Virginia, and Amanda and Mirren from Canada as well as me. Since all of the Americans present were from the south, much of the evening was spent trying to teach the Canadians how to do a Southern accent (this mostly consisted of inserting "real" -- aka, "rull" -- in front of adjectives, as in "Hey y'all, I'm rull hungry").

However, knowing I had to catch an 8:00am train was quite a deterrent to having too much fun (not to mention the drink prices), so after a while Claire caught up with me and we headed back to her house, an awesome modernized old house divided into apartments, one of which she and her boyfriend own. Both the bedroom and the living room are lofted on opposite sides above the office and kitchen, so it turns what otherwise might be a one or two room place into something much bigger. It was really lovely of her to put me up at the last minute for the night; everyone here has been incredibly nice and generous, almost to the point of putting the reputation of American Southern hospitality to shame (no snarky little "bless your heart" comments here... but also no sweet tea!).

Fanny had her orientation in Lyon today, so she's staying there with friends for the weekend, which leaves me in Feurs on my own. But just because I'm here doesn't mean I have to stay! A train ticket to St-Etienne is only 3.70 €, and I think further exploring the city would be a great way to pass Saturday afternoon. It's now Saturday morning as I'm wrapping this up -- I got cut off before I could finish the blog last night at 7:00pm -- so it's time to get out and about before I squander the whole morning away putzing around the internet before it shuts off again. To those in Athens, I hope the Epic Proportions opening was a resounding success and that the show has a great run!

Weekends in Feurs

...aka, how best to retain sanity when stores are all closed and the school's internet is turned off. I thought for a moment that we'd been misinformed when the internet was working on Saturday morning (or at least what little part of Saturday morning I was awake for; I still seem to be compensating for my sleepless first week), but it turns out that's just because some schools in France are open on Saturday mornings. After lunch it was gone, and my sleeping in also meant I missed the Saturday morning farmer's market. It's actually kind of nice being out of touch with the world, since it gave me a chance to get out and explore when I might otherwise have been squandering my time trying to keep up with the abysmal UGA game.

We had absolutely gorgeous weather this weekend (sunny, windy, 73 degrees... just perfect), so that was even more reason to get out of the house and go explore. I went for a run along the Loire after finding the path that runs alongside it, though as of yet my sad attempts at marathon training have been more of the relaxing variety with frequent pauses to take pictures. I don't think this Loire trail is the 15km one I'd heard about, though, since it dead-ends after about 20 minutes rather than looping back around, so hopefully there is another one to discover.

After my run, Fanny and I had lunch and then went for a walk. Meals here have been very healthy so far. We basically just throw some veggies together (boiled carrots or potatoes, sliced tomatoes, etc., all from the farmer's market), accompany it with bread and butter and/or cheese, then have fruit and yogurt (ok, and nutella or honey...) for dessert. Fanny eats fish but is not very fond of other kinds of meat, so I may buy some tilapia or tuna at tomorrow's market and try to find an interesting way to cook it. I sense that I'm very quickly going to get spoiled off the farmer's markets and am glad that weekly markets have started infiltrating US towns, even though I didn't have the good sense to take advantage of the ones in Athens before I left.

Our leisurely stroll turned into more of a cross-country hike in flip-flops, as the plan to venture east from the school then cut back around to the north and then west towards home was thwarted by no roads or paths going north until we'd reached Salvizinet, a little town 4km away from Feurs. Rather than turning back, we thought to continue with the plan to circle back to Feurs via Civens, which was another 4km from Salvizinet and from there another 4km back to Feurs. After having already run an hour that morning, the prospect of another 12km was not entirely enticing... but hey, I'm training for a marathon, right? Suck it up, Myers. There were plenty of curious cows to keep us company (check out the guy on the left with the wonky horn). We did find a shortcut that let us cut out Civens, so it wound up being probably a 9km or 10km walk.

I had my first official classes today, though they were much like the one I "helped out" with last week. In each class, the professor told the students to ask me questions about myself and the United States, and each time I was met with awkward silence until I finally just decided to start talking and asking them some questions, though even then it was hard to elicit a response. They do seem to be very nice kids, though, just very shy and not sure of their English and probably having some difficulty with my American accent. Most of the professors -- if they've managed to throw off their French accents when speaking English -- have British accents, so it's understandable that I might be hard to comprehend at first. The first two classes I had were beginning English classes and they were very much deer in the headlights whenever I said more than one sentence at a time, but the latter two classes were more advanced and willing to talk, though it still took lots of prompting. This week and next week I'm just observing the classes and meeting the students, but after that I'll start teaching my own lessons, which is still a bit of an intimidating prospect at this point.

My 7:00 cut-off approaches, so I'll close with a better picture of the lycée and my apartment. Off to the left of the school is a track, and behind it is some motocross tracks; to the right of the frame, across the street, is a public gymnasium. Being attached to the school, our front door is a popular hangout for smoking (or, even better, making out) teenagers on breaks between classes, and we keep startling them by opening the door and coming out... mwahahaha.