November 2002 archive
(112 entries)
November 30, 2002
The US hasn't cornered the market on tackiness
Strangely enough, the vichyssois seem to have the same Christmas-decoration philosophy as Americans. Despite the fact that they don't know when Thanksgiving is, they started with the Christmas decorations the day after Thanksgiving, just the way we do. Spooky. Perhaps it's a coincidence or their tradition is to wait eight days after the Beaujolais Nouveau. Who knows?
De toutes les façons, Vichy is now full of light structures in the shapes of Père Noël and other tasteful things. The Place de la Poste, just down the street, has been desecrated decorated with some lovely, natural-looking silver-white potted Christmas trees with blue accents that I am forced to lucky enough to walk past several times a day.
srah | 4:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
November 29, 2002
"Message d'evacuation numéro un, message d'evacuation numéro un..."
Fire drill again!
We lost the Internet last time we had one. I had hoped that it would come back after this one. My hopes were even encouraged by seeing Señor Tails in the CDI when we came inside. Perhaps he was reconfiguring things! Perhaps everything was finally fixed!
Nope.
"Do you know when we'll have Internet again?" I asked him, my eyes full of innocent wonder and nonchalance, as though it wasn't really important and I was just wondering. This is the way you have to approach these Technology Gurus, or whatever his job title is. You mustn't be demanding or accusatory or ask things like "How in God's name does it take three weeks to get a school back online in the twentieth century in a relatively technologically advanced country?" You mustn't look directly at the Guru, but instead cast your eyes downward in a submissive way as you approach, hunched over and ready to bow down on the ground whenever he is ready to pay attention to you. You may be required to offer some kind of gift or sacrifice.
"Internet? Still don't know," he replied. So I shot him.
srah | 9:54 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, internet, technology |
'Put that bloody cigarette ou--'
I have found something to keep me entertained for a while: 500+ small-print pages of The Complete Stories of Saki. Daddy had read them and suggested them but I never got around to it. I am quite enjoying them because in order to being a long, time-consuming book, the stories are sort of like a twisted P.G. Wodehouse. They're full of upper-class twits and overbearing elderly aunts, but also full of people being eaten by sacred ferrets and suchlike and whatnot. Ridiculous and twisted is just the way humour ought to be.
'And be surrounded by Americans trying to talk French? No, thank you. I love Americans, but not when they try to talk French. What a blessing it is that they never try to talk English...'
- Saki, "Adrian: A Chapter in Acclimatization"
November 28, 2002
Gobble-obble-obble!
Our Thanksgiving à la française was surprisingly un-français this year. If it weren't for the dominant language at the table being French, one could have forgotten which side of the Atlantic we were on. We managed to scrounge up enough native American foods to enjoy ourselves and to show our friends from Germany, Colombia and England that la bouffe américaine did not consist completely of deplorable sludge like Macdo.
Cranberries were an especially difficult part of the meal to locate. The French are not particularly familiar with the fruit. When I told a class of Hôtellerie students about Thanksgiving, someone asked me how you say cranberry in French, so I wrote airelle on the board. Then another hand rose and a student asked me, "How do you say airelle in French?"
We ended up buying cranberry preserves and doctoring them with spices. I found them quite tasty. There was also turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, a tomato-corn bread pudding in place of stuffing, squash with curry and raisins, and pumpkin and apple pie for dessert.
Between all of that food and the three bottles of wine, one of cider, and digestif of homemade-by-Stefan's-uncle schnapps that we polished off, we were all quite traditionally sleepy and loath to move after the meal.
srah | 7:02 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
Just in case you wondered...
One year ago today, I didn't want to eat vagina cookies, discovered Anna, and was elected president of the International Student Union.
Monsoon season in Vichy
I got the afternoon off due to Veronique's absence, so I've popped into the cybercafé. Almost wrote "pooped into the cybercafé", which would be almost as funny as when one of my students said that the most popular Thanksgiving dessert was pooping pie.
I'm feeling better than I was this morning and am having some unpriced milky tea which will probably turn out to be almost as expensive as this overpriced Internet access. Soon I will be off to Renata's to celebrate Thanksgiving à la française with all of the Vichy assistants, if I can convince myself to go back out in the rain.
Today's uploaded posts begin here, for some reason.
srah | 9:52 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, cybercafe |
Oooh, interactive
Following in the example of Krista, who is hosting a series of guest bloggers at the moment, I feel a great need for audience participation. Thus I invite you to blah blah your suggestions for subjects for me to blog about or, if you'd rather, give me imaginative challenging post-titles and I will try to write a post around that. Be creative.
Anyone? Bueller?
I've been teaching a lesson on Thanksgiving to my students for the past three weeks. You would think that eventually someone who had to read the phrase "This year, Thanksgiving is celebrated on November 28th" (perhaps the students I taught today, for example) would wish me a happy turkey day.
Nope. Here I have the two equally depressing conclusions that either no one cares or no one has understood a word of what's been going on for the last three weeks.
Shite, there go the waterworks again. I can't see the screen. Well, happy Thanksgiving to you folks, anyway.
Ca manque quelque chose
This school is spotless and beautiful - full of flowing water and glass and natural light. What it is lacking, however, is places to hide.
I had a bit of a breakdown today. I usually want to cry around 10am on Thursdays, but I suck it up and continue with the day, which usually gets better from there. Usually.
Handily, no one told me that Veronique is absent today until I got to the classroom door. There, one of my students told me. When my students tell me that the teacher is "missing", I don't know whether to believe them or not. Apparently they had been told that I would conduct class all by myself. So I gave it a try.
What finally caused my breakdown was not that the students were particularly difficult. I've seen worse. It wasn't just when one of my students started picking on my French-spelling skills as though he could do better in English. It wasn't just that the roleplays that had worked so well with the level below them were too difficult. It wasn't just the fact that I finally gave up and let them out early because I could see we were getting nowhere.
It was the frustration that I hadn't been prepared for the situation and that no one had told me. So I went to see the vice-principal and asked her to notify me in the future if Veronique was going to be absent, voice cracking all the while. I managed to get up the stairs to the teachers' area and into the teachers' restroom before the waterworks started.
Srah? Deal with a frustrating situation by bursting into tears? Quelle surprise!
I managed to calm myself down a bit, and realized I shouldn't be taking up the staff bathroom, so I took some deep breaths and left, but immediately went to one of the student bathrooms instead, to splash water on my face. I calmed down considerably, but on the way back to the teachers' area I ran into Danièle, who asked me what was wrong. Of course, in explaining it, I got all upset again, but she was happy to give me some time out to collect myself before teaching her class.
So then I had another hourful of monsters who weren't making any effort, but I think I managed to turn my frustration into the air of disgusted superiority typical of French teachers, rather than being the weak little American assistant who bursts out in tears when you don't know what a turkey is.
srah | 6:26 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
November 26, 2002
Still waiting...
I am at the library, which is free but doesn't allow cut-and-pasting, so no blogging today.
TWO WEEKS. Ahem.
In case you haven't noticed, THERE'S NO INTERNET HERE
So I am spending my "Planning Period" (a time when the teachers can come and consult me... cleverly scheduled during a time when all of the English teachers are in class) surfing the Encarta encyclopedia instead. Here are the fascinating things I've found:
I already knew about Iggy Pop, but apparently 1976 Nobel Prize (Physics) winner Samuel Chao Chung Ting was also born in Ann Arbor.
There is a place in Provence (Vaucluse, to be specific) called Le plateau d'Albion, where the French had underground missile silos, but apparently don't anymore. I'm a little disappointed.
The 1990 population of Vichy was 27,714 but the population of the agglomération (including Vichy, Cusset, Bellerive-sur-Allier, etc) was 61,566.
Valéry Larbaud was a writer born in Vichy in 1881. He was also well-known for translating James Joyce, William Faulkner, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Walt Whitman into French. He became aphasian in 1935.
The things you learn when THERE'S NO INTERNET!
srah | 3:36 AM | TrackBack | Tags: ann arbor, assistantship, valéry larbaud, vichy |
I Know What You Did Several Summers Ago
The teachers have access to two photocopiers and one risograph. Whatever a risograph is. It seems like a photocopier to me, except that you can only copy sheets of paper and not books and things. We are only supposed to use the risograph when we need 30+ copies.
One of the photocopiers is en panne at the moment, so we're down to one. With all the humidity in the air, it is impossible to get more than 5 copies at a time from this one, because the paper sticks together and jams. So into the photocopier I go, while everyone else seems to just abandon their plans and leave the copier flashing SERRAGE. Once again, I seem to be regarded as a techno-whiz.
I keep wanting to tell people I know all about photocopier paper jams because I spent several summers as a photocopieuse, but I hesitate because I suspect that would mean that I was an actual Xerox machine. So I just smile and pick crumpled sheets out of the innards.
srah | 3:19 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
Potato-man!
I am shocked and confused when I spend mental energy battling against cultural stereotypes and they turn out to be true. Thus I raconte you the story of Siobhan.
I am so excited to actually know someone named Siobhan. Valéry Larbaud's 7-hour-a-week Irish assistant is lucky enough to have this name that not even Anglophones can pronounce. The French have no idea what to do with it. Add to this that she has an Mc last name, and she is a complete enigma to anyone who is unfortunate enough to have to try to spell her name.
It was her first working day yesterday so I showed her around and took her to the cafeteria for the first time. We took our trays, our silverware, our baguette-style roll, and started down the line. We get our choice of fruit, our choice of dairy product, then we get to the main course, which yesterday was turkey and green beans.
I took my plate of turkey and green beans and Siobhan asked me "But isn't there a potato with this?" I stared at her for a moment, confused. It's interesting to have another native English speaker in the school, but sometimes we don't speak the same language. No, there's no potato. There's turkey and green beans. Did she see a potato somewhere? "I don't think so..." I replied. "You don't usually have some kind of potato or chips or something? It's always meat and veg?" I explained that we sometimes have steak haché frites or have a potato product in place of the vegetable, which she found completely foreign. Apparently she is used to having a potato product with every meal.
I am shocked. I had assumed that the Irish couldn't be as dependent on potatoes as they are reputed to be. I think I had assumed that after the Potato Famine they had learned to diversify their meals and that was how they survived.
But apparently not.
Huh.
srah | 3:10 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, cultural differences, ireland, potatoes |
November 25, 2002
Into the lions' den
Veronique had grading to finish so she sent me off to the entire class of THOTs alone. All alone. I don't think I would have stood for it with any other class, but they were lovely and told me how to keep their classmates in order (!) and although their roleplaying erupted into the usual hilarity, I was very proud of them for being imaginative and creative and not always liking what the waiter brought them.
srah | 10:16 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, teaching |
It bothers my sister when I go
Bork! When I talked to Becky on the phone last night, it was reported to me that the lovely and talented John Hannah was featured in the Surprisingly Sexy section of People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive issue, apparently just across the page from the lummy Alan Rickman.
Ha! What is so surprising, exactly? I am only disappointed they didn't figure more prominently. Bork!
srah | 4:42 AM | TrackBack | Tags: alan rickman, john hannah |
The Joys of Teaching
Yes, I write all over the board. But if you were paying attention when I wrote the words, you would know which one was the answer to which question.
And since I've already asked this question a million times in the past week, what the hell are you thankful for?
srah | 4:29 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, teaching |
Up in smoke
Señor Tails says that something exploded and that's why we don't have Internet. This was after I said "What happened - did something explode?" He seemed to think this was a good explanation and said that whatever it was that exploded is out being fixed and he doesn't know when it will be back. How can you not know? Do they not even give you an estimated time when they can have it fixed?
Renata, Jennifer and I decided yesterday that many of the computer-related slowness in France comes from people being allowed to smoke in public workplaces. Unless you have some powerful lip muscles, you are doing everything one-handed, including typing. This explains why I am seen as some kind of expert around here, with my 11 words a minute or whatever it is.
And even if you can hold the cigarette between your lips, you may also be dropping hot ash and sparks into important computer parts and melting them as you go along.
I can only assume that they've already fixed the exploded part but managed to set it on fire as soon as they'd finished. Ah, la France.
srah | 2:54 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, internet connection, smoking |
Some lummy yucky bork near Bumblefuck-sur-blé
Last night I went to Renata's for the Sunday Night Movie but ended up eating Fresh Homemade Spaetzle made by a Real Live German with a Real Live Dead Inanimate Spaetzle Press. I spent the rest of the evening playing Euchre very badly, gorging myself on Halloween candy and chattering away in invented tongues with My Fellow Americans. So no Movie of the Week Review for you. I know you're disappointed.
srah | 2:42 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
November 23, 2002
"How do you know he is a Gustav?" "'E looks like one!"
I have a serious problem with people who are not named Gustav.
When I was in Grenoble, there was a Swede in my class named Gustav, who was very pale and blue-eyed with white-blond hair.
When I met this year's French assistant at Albion, I kept wanting to call him Gustav as well, because in addition to his fair hair and blue eyes, his name is Gauthier. Gustav, Gauthier. Close enough.
Now I have a student with a Scandinavian last name and pale hair and blue eyes, but who insists on being called Guillaume rather than Gustav.
What is with this barrage of G-named blond people? I suspect that they're all Gustavs in disguise, calling themselves by other similar names just to confuse me.
srah | 7:23 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, gustav, study abroad |
That will bring us back to 'do'
The day we went to the Puy de Dôme, I imagined the mountain as having a flat green top where I could spin around like Fraulein Maria (always Fraulein Maria and never just Maria, thanks to Robin) in The Sound of Music.
Unfortunately when we got there, there didn't seem to be a flat green top and if there was, we couldn't see it for the fog. I must have been remembering the picture of another puy. So if anyone has suggestions of good locations for Fraulein-Maria-twirling, let me know, because I know one or two English assistants who would be interested.
The only reason I thought of this right now is because of my breakfast, which is tea with jam and bread.
srah | 3:29 AM | TrackBack | Tags: the sound of music, travel |
November 21, 2002
Igor
I am scrounging up pairs of eyes for the S2OLs to practice their eye exams on, because I am the nicest assistant ever and because I desperately want them to like me. How sad.
I feel like a bodysnatcher or something. Hee hee. I swear, all of these eyes are connected to living, breathing human beings and will not be used for any torturous purposes, but only to read far-off eye charts.
srah | 6:47 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
You know it's Thursday when...
... you have to hold two classes hostage after the bell in order to get everyone to participate in the "What I'm Thankful For" discussion.
I think everyone hates me. At the moment, I couldn't care less.
srah | 6:45 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
November 20, 2002
Calling people with eyes!
If you are in the Vichy area on a Thursday afternoon, the S2OLs would like you to be a cobaye, bay-bay, for their vision examinations. They are sick of practicing on each other.
I have now invited everyone I know to come and have their eyes checked out, so I am going to start branching out to people I don't know. "Holding the door for you was really no problem, ma'am. But you know how you can repay me? Go and have a delicious meal at Valéry Larbaud, followed by an enjoyable eye exam."
srah | 10:00 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, teaching |
November 19, 2002
Cha-cha-cha!
I think I'm losing my mind. I have a burning desire to watch televised ballroom dancing.
On vous attend, Señor Tails
In the week that the Internet's been dead, I've written 13 pages of nonsense in Word. What a burden it will be to read it all when I get it up. What a ridiculous amount of time it is taking to get it back up. Is there anything I can do to speed up the process? Did the server explode and we're building a new one by hand? From Legos and chewing gum?
If I had a disk, I would take my blog-posts to the cybercafé. Unfortunately, I am not clever like that.
srah | 6:10 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, internet connection |
Extremely confusing explanation of class levels
| Terminale BEP The last year of the BEP, a two-year specialized technical degree which allows students to enter the workforce without continuing their studies until the BAC. Last year, they were in Seconde BEP (and before Seconde, they were in middle school). Next year, they can go to work or continue with the Première Adaptation BAC Pro. |
| Première Adaptation BAC Pro A class of "adaptation" students who have the BEP and who then decided to continue their studies in order to get the Professional BAC. This is separate from the more general students who have come directly from middle school and have not done the BEP (Première BAC Pro), because they are usually older and less motivated. Last year, they were in Terminale BEP. Next year, they will be in Terminale BAC Pro. |
| Terminale BAC Pro The second and last year for the Professional BAC. Last year they were either in the Première Adaptation BAC Pro (if they had to be "adapted" from the BEP) or in the Première BAC Pro (if they did more traditional general studies). Next year they can enter the workforce, go to the university, or go for a BTS degree. |
| Première année BTS Students working for the BTS technical degree, equivalent to some trade schools. Some have come from the BAC Pro, some from the general BAC Last year, they were in Terminale BAC Pro or the general Terminale BAC in a general school, or they were working. Next year, they will be in the Deuxième année BTS. |
| Deuxième année BTS Second and last year of the BTS degree. Last year, they were in Première année BTS. Next year, they can go into the workforce with a technical degree. There may also be opportunities to specialize their craft with further studies. |
srah | 5:59 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, france, teaching, technical school |
srah's schedule
| MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY | FRIDAY | |
| 09-10 | TV2 Terminale BEP Ventes | Planning Period | TH2 Terminale BEP Hôtellerie | ||
| 10-11 | 1ASMS groupe 1 Première Adaptation Sciences Medico-Sociales | S1HOT 1ère année BTS Hôtellerie | |||
| 11-12 | S1OL 1ère année BTS Optique | 1ASMS groupe 2 Première Adaptation Sciences Medico-Sociales | TH1 Terminale BEP Hôtellerie | ||
| 12-13 | |||||
| 13-14 | |||||
| 14-15 | S2OL 2ième année BTS Optique | 1AHOT groupe 1 Première Adaptation Hôtellerie | |||
| 15-16 | THOT Terminale BAC Hôtellerie | 1AHOT groupe 2 Première Adaptation Hôtellerie |
Well, that was a terrific waste of an hour and a half. How sad that I have nothing better to do.
srah | 5:49 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, teaching |
Oops
I accidentally came to school today. I forgot the 1ASMS have a test, so I have no classes today. This wouldn't be so bad if a) the Internet worked, so I had something to do while I was here or b) I hadn't walked to school in the freezing freezing Michiganesque cold. They are doing work on my bus stop, so I had to walk to the next one and missed the bus in the process. And to think I considered wearing a skirt today. Brrrrrrrrrrrr.
srah | 4:16 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, weather |
Ahem
I would just like to point out that ça fait une semaine aujourd'hui qu'on est sans Internet. Ahem. Some of us need the Internet to do our job and are quickly running out of materials. Ahem. This is not exactly a third world country here; it seems to me we should be able to get back online faster than this.
srah | 2:52 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, internet connection, teaching |
November 18, 2002
The Pilgrims? Aren't they like monks?
Today I did a lesson on Thanksgiving. It was not all I wanted it to be because the stinking Internet still isn't back, but it was okay. I used it on two classes. One was bored out of their minds and the other, one of my favorites if I'm allowed to say that, spent most of the time erupting into hysterical laughter that had nothing whatsoever to do with Thanksgiving. But at least they weren't dead.
Anyway, I've been sidetracked. The point I wanted to make is that I told my students the story of Thanksgiving, then I told them how we celebrate it today. After describing a modern Thanksgiving, all I could think was that Thanksgiving is the quintessential American holiday. First we stuff ourselves with food until we're sleepy and sated, then we plonk ourselves down on the couch to watch American football. Egad.
srah | 2:25 PM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, holidays, teaching, thanksgiving |
Soupe aux crevettes, cocktail aux crevettes, crevettes Creole?
After the glorious thing that was Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves dubbed into French, this week's Sunday night movie was Forrest Gump. It's been a while since the last time I saw the movie. Haley Joel Osment is so young. It's funny to see thirty years of Americana dubbed into French.
Et c'est tout ce que j'ai à dire à ce sujet.
srah | 11:42 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, movies |
Hell's well!
For crap's sake. While awaiting The Return of the Internet, here I am typing my blog entries in Microsoft Word. My Mariah Carey entry is over a page and a half long in 10 point font.
I really ought to be shot for wasting the Internet like that.
srah | 10:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack | Tags: |
November 17, 2002
I like free stuff
Especially free food.
Even when the food is a "Remember, it isn't our fault, so don't try to get your money back, but here is a box of airplane-style comestibles" non-apology consolation prize. I find it amusing, however, when my roll has stuck to it a little white silica packet like the ones that come in boxes of new tennis shoes. A little roll, wearing a sign that says, "Do not eat."
Mariah Carey is stalking me
Yes, the billionaire has-been had nothing better to do than follow me around all weekend. She was one of the guests this week of the Star Academy, a sort of American Idol-Big Brother hybrid where young French people are locked up together in a château for intensive pop star training and eliminated one by one by the audience and each other until someone wins. The Star Académiciens are visited from time to time by various pop stars who sing with them or offer them pearls of wisdom like "Always follow your dreams."
This week the académiciens and the public at large were lucky enough to have Mariah Carey And Her Enormous Breasts thrust upon them. And I was lucky enough to be spending the weekend with 25-year-old men who are really big fans of Star Academy.
Mariah pulled up in her limousine and tottered into the château in her sweatpants and high heels. She said some completely useless stuff to them through the help of an interpreter, all the while with an air of "Yes, I'm Mariah Carey. Isn't it such an honor to be in the same room as me?" about her and all the while falling out of her shirt. The students, on the other hand, had more of an air of "I'm really glad the interpreter finally told us who this was, because Mariah has managed to put on a good 50 pounds, most of which has gone to her face and made her completely unrecognizable."
After her brief introduction, Mariah held interviews with three lucky students, the first of whom was Georges-Alain.
Ah, Georges-Alain. How does one describe Georges-Alain? He has somehow managed to become the cheri of the voting public, despite being indisputably ugly, having no talent for singing or dancing, and having about as much charisma and stage presence as Al Gore. I think it is perhaps for all of these things that they keep him there - because he's so very untalented that it's entertaining. I myself love Georges-Alain for his lack of talent - it always makes me laugh.
On top of all these charms, Georges-Alain is painfully shy and speaks about zero English. So it was completely impossible for any conversation to go on between him and the vapid superstar. She dismissed him and had much better luck with Aurélie and Nolwenn, who get by much better in English. Then Mariah tottered back to her limo, all the while saying stupid things and making me wish I didn't speak or understand English.
This was all during the week, in the daily grind of being a superstar-in-training. On Saturday, however, it was The Big Day. Saturday is when everyone performs and they announce who's been voted off. It's when the starlets get to sing with their idols. And with Mariah.
Mariah returned on Saturday and got to engage in very confusing banter with the Franco-Greek host of the show. I think it was more confusing for me as an Anglophone because Nikos was trying to carry on the conversation and translate for the audience and improve on the inane things that came out of Mariah's enormous face. He would say something to her in French, she would look blank, he would translate into English, she would respond, and he would say in French whatever he wished she'd said in English. As a result, it took a million years and nothing really got said. Then sometimes she couldn't understand what he was saying in English either, so she tried to get Aurélie to translate for her. It was all live and it was a chaotic mess of languages where normally she should have had a bug in her ear with a running translation.
Then Mariah started singing and looking over the students with an air of "I believe the children are our future. Maybe someday one of them will be as big a star as I am. But just in France." I don't listen to a lot of Mariah Carey, but her voice sounded odd, like there were two distinct personalities fighting for possession of her brain. One, the one who sang the high and loud parts, was the Mariah Carey I knew. The other, the one who sang lower and softer, had the strange vocal sounds of a deaf person, in the way that they tend to enunciate less clearly and seem to speak from a different place in their mouth and throat than the hearing community does. It was extremely odd and made me wonder exactly what had happened when Mariah had her breakdown.
When she was done singing, Mariah didn't seem to know exactly what to do, so she did what any normal person would do in that situation: she kidnapped Georges-Alain. She grabbed him by the hand and walked off stage with him. Nikos, of course, had no idea what was going on, so he translated whatever she had muttered, "She says she wants him to help her compose some new songs." Riiiiight. Does Mariah Carey compose her own songs? Somehow I doubt it.
I believe we went to a commercial at that point, in the style of any live television program which has just erupted into chaos. When we came back, Georges-Alain was back on stage with the other académiciens and Nikos was grilling him about Mariah. Georges-Alain, of course, had no more idea than Nikos did about what happened. Some scary trampy American former star with mental issues had dragged him off the stage and chattered at him in a foreign language.
With Mariah gone (perhaps being questioned by the police), the show was able to continue as normal. Or as normal as it can be, given the circumstances. Of the three candidates for eviction, evil bombshell Nolwenn was saved by the public and the académiciens, given the remaining two, chose to keep weird Jérémy - elegantly clad in a plastic headband and some kind of potato sack or butcher's apron wrapped around his waist to look like a skirt - over Anne-Laure, the ever-perky hard-working lesbian.
I hope you realize that there is no hint of sarcasm when I say that I am so disappointed I don't have a TV in my apartment.
srah | 8:46 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, mariah carey, music, my favorite posts, star academy |
A disturbingly insensitive and graphic post
If you want to end it all and piss everyone off while you're at it, an excellent way of going about it would be to throw yourself under a train at the place where the Angers-Nantes and Angers-Cholet lines meet. That way people who arrive at the Angers train station at 10:30 for an 11:00 train will not be able to take this train, because it had to stop after it squished you. In addition to that, they won't be able to take any other train, because no trains can get to Angers. "Indeterminable delay" will flash up on the departure board for all of the destinations.
Then perhaps, if you're lucky, at 12:30 some American girl will be standing in line to ask if she's going to be charged extra for her connecting train (if there will be one) when they suddenly announce that the 11:00 for Lyon has arrived and everyone needs to get aboard immediately. This is where you get a bit more revenge, because it is discovered that your squished carcass has caused some damage to the engine. Everyone off! This train isn't leaving after all!
Back goes the American to the line, wondering if she's going to have to take the 13:45 Angers-Lyon-St-Germain des Fossées-Vichy trip that costs twice as much as the original ticket. The SNCF won't reimburse it, of course, because it was not their fault that you threw yourself in front of the train. Then there's another announcement. The American's ears perk up. They're going to change the engine, so everyone back on board!
Everyone will be annoyed that they had to get off and back on, but at least they're leaving now!
... or in a half hour. Maybe. Or whenever they get the new engine on.
Bravo. Perhaps this was a last cry for attention; it certainly attracted the attention of hundreds of people trying to get to or leave Angers, Cholet and Nantes.
November 16, 2002
Srahs are punny
My favorite thing is when someone makes a play on words in French and I get it. I love songs with plays on words because I am happy to understand them. Sometimes I am entertained even when it wasn't done on purpose. For example, the French use the same word, avocat for lawyer and avocado. So when the lawyers went on strike two years ago, I was quite amused to imagine little green fruit in the street with signs and banners.
At dinner tonight, they were talking about a friend who had been in the hospital. Mme Astagneau asked if he was better now and Lucie said he must be, because she saw him the other day, eating a réligieuse.
I started giggling and it eventually built up to hysterical laughter and I thought I was going to cry. Although I knew very well that a réligieuse is also a kind of cake, I couldn't help imagining that the friend had been feeling well enough to eat a nun.
The Astagneaux looked at me like I was crazy.
It's not my party but I'll spell like I want to
In France, if you're talking about a family it's not The Duponts, but Les Dupont. The plurality shows in the article, rather than in the name itself. I still have a great desire to call Antoine's family Les Astagneaux because I like things with Xs and Zs in them.
So there.
Wouldn't you like to be beside the seaside?
Antoine, his sister Lucie, and I went on a day-trip today to Les Sables d'Olonne, a seaside town two hours from Le May. It was especially nice because it was a nice day in the off-season. We had lovely weather, but we didn't have the masses of tourists and sunbathers that Les Sables gets in the summer.
We saw Le Puits de l'Enfer first, or Hell's Well. I'm going to start exclaiming that, because it sounds just as ridiculous as "hell's bells". It's an area with steep rocks and crevasses where the waves crash violently and fall with big splashes of foam. This is the way I like the ocean! Passion and excitement and danger, not the in-and-out of your average sandy beach.
Les Sables reminded me of Penzance, although I've never seen Penzance. It reminded me of my mental image of Penzance, anyway. But then I'm always thinking about Penzance, aren't I? It also made me think of La Serena in Chile, which I have seen.
We had a drink in a café where Antoine got pooped on by a seagull, then a delicious lunch in a seafood restaurant by the port. Then we went to another beach. You have to go through the forest to get to this one, so there weren't many people there either. During WWII, the Germans thought the Allies were going to debark there so they set up camp and waited for them. Their bunkers are still there and because they did a lot of shooting practice, every time there's a storm (as there was last Wednesday, apparently) it stirs up the sand and people look around for old bullets. Lucie found two, including one right next to my foot that I hadn't seen. My excuse was that I didn't know what I was looking for.
On the way home we drove past the restaurant where Antoine and Fanny announced their engagement to his family (the wedding is December 14th) and the castle of Gilles de Rais, also known as Bluebeard.
srah | 12:00 PM | TrackBack | Tags: antoine, assistantship, sables d'olonne, travel |
You've come to the right place!
If I am going to show up in this search request at all, I'm rather disappointed that I'm only #43.
srah | 4:07 AM | TrackBack | Tags: search results |
November 15, 2002
Hi, not dead here
... but the Internet is, at the lycée Valéry Larbaud anyway. There was a blackout and when the power came back, the Internet didn't. I'm blogging away on paper and in Notepad while waiting for it to come back, but they say it might be a week. Then I will pre-date my blog posts and this one will be lost in the middle somewhere and you will all be confused and hate me forever.
Meanwhile, this weekend I am in Le May sur Evre (between Angers and Nantes), visiting Antoine, our former French assistant from Albion, who has kindly allowed me Internet access to let the world know where I am. He has also allowed me to eat a lot of chocolate and pastries, as the family lives right over the patisserie/chocolaterie that they own.
I am here in a chocolate wonderland and you are not. Nyah nyah.
See you when the Internet comes back to life!
November 14, 2002
One of the guys
I went out tonight to dinner and a bar with Antoine and his copains. It's funny to be the only American and the only girl in a group of French men. I spent a lot of time watching and listening and only spoke when I was spoken to. It's hard to participate in a really animated conversation between friends because by the time I've formulated my thought it's moved on to something else.
As if I don't freak out enough
I was stressing out as the train got closer and closer to Angers. Every time I'd called Antoine's cell phone, it had gone directly to the voice mail, which suggested to me that it was not on. I had left him a voice mail to tell him what day/time I was arriving and I had visions of arriving at the station and trying to find a patisserie in Le May sur Evre in a taxi. I had left his landline number at home so that wasn't an option unless I could find a phone book when I arrived. So I spent the four hours in the train in turmoil, brewing over my various sources of stress, of which this was the primary one at the moment.
Luckily, Antoine had found it odd that I hadn't called and had called his friend David who had his cell phone while Antoine was in Mexico. David couldn't check the messages because the battery was dead, so Antoine had to call his cell phone provider and find out how to listen to the messages through his landline. He discovered at 8:30 that I was arriving at 9:15 - just in time to make the 45-minute drive from Le May to Angers!
So I was very very happy to see Antoine sur le quai when I arrived and he was very happy to have made it on time.
And now I am happy because Antoine lives in a chocolate wonderland.
Manic-depressive year
In case you hadn't noticed yet, I complain a lot. I'm sure I had many complaints in Grenoble, too, but I didn't have anywhere to write them down so I remember it as a mostly positive experience.
And despite my complaints I am happy here, when I'm not losing my mind.
srah | 1:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
Everything is lonely for you, you whiner
What is the likelihood of running into someone else from Ann Arbor, Albion, Grenoble or Vichy/Cusset in a train from St-Germain des Fossées to Nantes? Not very good. So why am I still staring at everyone I see, looking for a familiar face?
Train travel is lonely.
srah | 12:54 PM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, travel |
His name means "tails" in Spanish
I tracked down the system administrator and asked if he knew when the Internet would work again. He didn't know. "Do you think it will be ready by Monday?" I asked. "No - it will be at least a week," he replied. I exited his office depressed and dejected. "Don't listen to him," said a prof standing outside the door, "he's a big liar."
Now I'm confused. Yes? No? What the hell is going on? Stop playing with foreigners like that!
srah | 7:56 AM | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship, internet |
Encore jeudi
Three classes in a row. The first one won't behave and this frustrates me and makes me want to cry and depresses me for the rest of the morning, so that I am in a bad mood for the other classes. Although I may not show it - because I'm frustrated when I arrive - I love you, S1HOTs, because you are the pick-me-up that gets me through the morning. If it weren't for you, I would be hiding in a staircase somewhere, crying and babbling in franglais and losing my mind. Thank you for participating.
srah | 6:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack | Tags: assistantship |
You can run but you can't hide from the Internet Addict
When the power came back on Tuesday, the Internet didn't. And still hasn't. And so I am typing these blog-entries into Notepad. How long can it possibly take to get the Internet back