Sweet Home Chicago

My journey back to America for the holidays was an eventful one. Taking some detours along the way, I stretched it into a four-day affair.

I started on Sunday by leaving Montpellier on the 10:06 train headed to Strasbourg. After the 6-hour journey, I explored the famous Christmas market. Meandering about, I happened upon multiple city nooks that sported vibrant markets. Map in hand, I found the Christmas tree, the magnificent cathedral, as well as glittering rows of mini market houses containing all kinds of goodies. Pain d’épice (multiple varieties of bread with various spices) was in no short supply, and vin chaud (a mulled wine of sorts) wafted into the air from many a bubbling pot. When I arrived in the city, it was clear that it had recently rained, and at 8:00 on the dot (when the markets closed), the rain started again. I was fortunate to have missed the inclement weather during my promenade through the city.

The next morning, I woke up early to take a train to Rouen… my former home! My host mother from two years ago met me at the station when I arrived, and we walked around the town to do some Christmas shopping. I visited the Cathedral and the Joan of Arc church, marking the place where she was burned at the stake. I learned that the church was built to accommodate some stained glass windows that were shielded and preserved from times of war in the region. After some shopping, we had tea and later raclette for dinner. Yummmmm. (Raclette is a bit like fondue, but it is cooked differently.)

Closing in on my take off point, we headed into Paris the next morning. I explored the Champs-Elysées, where I stumbled upon a free photography exhibit put on by Louis Vuitton. I browsed yet another Christmas market, and had a lovely evening with my high-school exchange host family.

I got to the airport in Paris on Wednesday morning, more than ready to be home. After being harshly interrogated by airline personnel, I finally boarded the plane and began my journey home to the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Is this what french fashion is coming to?

Champs Elysées decorations!

Standing in the middle of the road, looking down the champs élysées....those two motorcyclists sped past me while I was taking the photo.

arc de triomphe

Let's go to Lyon for the festival of Lights

Last weekend I went to Lyon for the famous Fête des lumières. It was super crowded, but there were so many cool light exhibits to see! It was much colder than the sunny Montpellierian day I left, but we discovered an amazing Christmas market, so I suppose the weather was appropriate for that. I am not ashamed to admit that the first thing I did upon arriving in Lyon was get a Chai tea latte from Starbucks to warm me up. My first trip to Starbucks in France. It's not like I'm a hardcore fan or anything, but I really do like Chai tea lattes. I also tried a marron chaud for the first time!

It was nice that we arrived in Lyon in the daytime, because we got to explore the city a bit before the light exhibits at night.

See below for some pics!

I bought this delicious cinnamon flavored cookie at the Lyon Christmas market! It was SOO good.

There were an unusual amount of "American" restaurants that we came across.

In this beautiful church, we saw the region's orchestra play a mini concert. It was amazing.

View from across the river.

And a Joyeux Anniversaire it was...

It is always a tad triste when I can't be with my family on my birthday, but this year I was able to celebrate it in an interesting way.

On the big day, I woke up and rushed to Place de l'Europe to get a ride to Nimes. Why you ask? Well, because Nimes was the site of my first frisbee tournament in France! That's right folks, on my birthday I played indoor ultimate all day long. We didn't win many games, but I scored the game-winning point in the first game, so that kind of made up for it.

After the tournament, I hurried home to host a birthday gathering for all of my friends! It was quite international, as there were people from about 9 countries in attendance (France (obvi), America, Spain, UK - England and Scotland, Germany, Morocco, Poland, Italy, Argentina?). I invited my American assistant friends, my french friends, my frisbee teammates, the other language assistants at my school, and my roommates of course. French was the dominant language, but there were also smatterings of English and Spanish. I had a wonderful time, and even got to play a little beer-pong. It is important to share American culture inside and outside of the classroom.

People stayed long into the night, and I didn't go to bed until 4am. It was still my birthday in America when I went to bed! I like going out, but it was nice that I was able to see so many people, without having to take a step out the door.

Kerstin (German Assistant at my school), Cornelia (Kerstin's roommate), Ana (Spanish Assistant at my school), Me and Chris (English Assistant)

My roommates baked me a cake and had me blow out candles!

My friends Jenny and Amanda brought macaroons to stick candles in (a 2 and a 3 !)

Amanda!!

A bunch of Frisbee teammates

I actually only know the guy on the right (he's on my frisbee team), the others are his friends

More frisbee love and an American Assistant (Meredith)

Beautiful flowers from my family!

Frisbee tournament! The tournament was for co-ed teams, but most of the teams we played had only guys....

Beautiful flowers from Linsey and Yiannis!!

The teachers at my school gave me a birthday gift! Yummy chocolates, lotion and French soap :)

I am Thankful for the Little Things

So here it is, a long-overdue Thanksgiving post.

It is no surprise that Thanksgiving is not celebrated in France. Most French people don't know what it is, and if they do know what it is, they don't really understand why it's celebrated. 

My students were no exception.

But, fear not! I set the record straight and spread the word of this sublime American holiday ON the very day it was celebrated.

I had a full day of work on Thanksgiving (Thursdays are usually my busiest days), so naturally I made sure all of my classes left school with an in-depth knowledge of the importance of this holiday. Ok, maybe not in-depth, but at least they learned the basics.

Since I normally take half the class at a time and switch half-way through the lesson, I had the honor of teaching 10 lessons in a row about Thanksgiving. Since it is by far my favorite holiday ever, I had no problem with that.

Anyway, I started off each lesson by asking the students if they knew what Thanksgiving was/what they knew about Thanksgiving. For the most part I got blank stares, but occasionally students would throw out words like "Indians," "big party," or "chicken." 

After hearing their thoughts on the matter, I moved on to a read-aloud story that explained the basics of the First Thanksgiving. We then discussed what a typical Thanksgiving meal consisted of (pictures and all), and I stressed the difference between Turkey and Chicken. Turkey is for Thanksgiving. Chicken is not. Mashed potatoes and Pumpkin pie were new vocabulary, the latter being a completely foreign dessert.

After discussing the origin of Thanksgiving, why it's celebrated today, and delving into a traditional meal (I wish I could have cooked a meal for the school, but sometimes you just have to draw the line), I brought up the concept of being "thankful" for things you have in life. This was a little hard for them to grasp, as there really isn't a good French translation for "I am thankful for...", nor do they spend much time considering what they are thankful for.

I developed what I thought was a very simple speaking activity, where I had each student say what they were thankful for, but it didn't go completely as planned. Most students gave appropriate responses, such as parents, friends, good health, but others were not as enthusiastic. Some students just stared at me and said that there is nothing they are thankful for (hearing that made me a little sad), and one even said, "I am thankful for the little Chinese boy who made my sneakers." Not exactly the point, but oh well. I think by the end most students got the idea and were prompted to consider an aspect of life that they normally do not recognize.

At the end of the lesson, I explained why I like Thanksgiving so much. I like it because it really is about being thankful, and recognizing the important things in life. Family. Friends. Having enough food to eat, etc. Also, it is the one holiday that has avoided becoming too commercialized. Yes, football has become a bigger and bigger part of the day, but in general it is a day to spend with family, friends, and a table full of delicious food.

Last time I was in France for Thanksgiving, I made a traditional meal with some American friends, and we shared the holiday with some French and German friends. It was a small but meaningful gathering.

This year was a little different. 

First of all, I had not one, but TWO! Thanksgiving dinners. Lucky me.

The first one took place the evening before Thanksgiving, on Wednesday, in Nimes. Nimes is a town about 30 minutes away from Montpellier by train. I have several friends that are also English assistants who live in Nimes, which is how I got invited to this shindig. Everyone was in charge of bringing a certain dish; I was tasked with creating a fruit salad and making cranberry sauce. My fruit salad was superiorly decorated, if I do say so myself, and since cranberries are literally non-existent, except in the dried form, I found a substitute of lingonberries at IKEA. Who'd a thunk!?

After cooking all day, we gathered at an American assistant's apartment. It was truly magnificent. We had about 30 people there. Probably half were Americans, and we had people from the UK, Germany, Spain, as well as a few other countries I'm sure. 

The meal included everything you could ever want, plus more. My favorite dish, sweet potatoes, was in no short supply. We also had macaroni, something that I was not aware people ate at Thanksgiving, however it ended up being present at both of my Thanksgiving celebrations, so maybe it's a thing? I still don't really know.

At the end of the meal, everyone went around and said what they were thankful for. Most people said it in English, but some chose to express themselves in their native language. It was beautiful. A lot of the foreigners said they were thankful to get to experience their first "Thanksgiving" surrounded by such wonderful people.

All in all it was a truly glorious night. The only hiccup was that I missed the last train back to Montpellier, so I had to stay at a friend's apartment and couldn't return home before work the next day. Henceforth, I had my full day teaching about Thanksgiving on approximately 1-hour of sleep, wearing yesterday's clothes. Oops.

Thanksgiving Round 2 : This Thanksgiving occurred the Sunday following Thanksgiving. It took place in Montpellier, and also involved a gathering of Americans who had prepared a dish to share. I did not cook for this one, since I came straight from an all-day ultimate frisbee tournament, where I unfortunately injured my thumb. (Yes, I am a proud member of the Montpellier Ultimate Frisbee Team : Lez Héraultimates...but more on that later.) Nevertheless, it was also a wonderful experience, with great people and delicious food. 

At both of the celebrations, I met new people and got to know former acquaintances a little bit better.

I am extremely pleased with how my Thanksgivings went, although I would have loved to spend the day with my family at home.

Thanks to Skype, I did talk to them on the actual day, and my parents paraded their plates in front of the screen so I could get in on the action. This was one of those times when I wished Skype could transmit smells. Oh well, in less than a week's time I will get to smell the genuine scent of my mom's cooking with my very own nose!

Happy (belated) Thanksgiving to all, and I am so thankful that technology allows us to stay in touch.

I am also thankful for this magnificent opportunity to be in France, improve my French, and share American culture/teach English.

Below are some photos from the Thanksgiving fun...

I'm way back in the corner (top right). Also, I'm not sure why everyone has demon eyes. 

Jumping Fences

Recently I have started giving English conversation lessons to a French woman who teaches management in Toulouse. She is particularly interested in how theaters are managed. Her research centers around talking to people and gathering qualitative data, which is not valued very highly here, so she often meets resistance. She presents her work at conferences, and has to present in English sometimes. Her husband is a math teacher at my school, and he gave her my info, and she contacted me for lessons. It was quite perfect how it all worked out. So now, we meet about twice a week to speak together in English. Sometimes we discuss her work, and sometimes she asks me to talk about life in America. She has two adorable children, and I go to her house to give lessons, so I always get to see them :)

I had a lesson tonight, and as usual it was a learning experience for us both. Talking with her gives me a French perspective unlike any I've had before, and she always has funny and interesting things to say.

For example, tonight she told me about how she would jump the fence in high school in order to avoid a 30 min long walk around the school to get to the other side. This led us to a discussion about crazy things teenagers do and she said, "I want to keep my daughter from becoming too wise. If she's too wise, she'll do a couple really stupid things. But if she's kind of wise, she'll do more stupid things, but they won't be as "highly stupid." (as she put it) Her logic makes sense in my mind, but the way she says things is always unique, since English is not her first language. 

Tea, crêpes, and the music of broadway!

This past Sunday (yesterday) I was invited by a teacher at my school to her house for an afternoon get-together. She invited the three language assistants (me, the Spanish assistant and the German assistant). All of us assistants have become friends, so we made the journey to her house together. It was a wonderful afternoon, and there were some other teachers from nearby schools that I was able to meet as well. Everyone was very interested in my Ultimate Frisbee endeavors. The afternoon was full of good conversation, tea, and crêpes! I tried a crêpe with melon jam (can't say I've ever had that before), and it was delicious.

Directly following, I attended a “Cabaret Broadway” show at a local theater. It was interesting because the songs were in French and English. The actors did not seem completely comfortable speaking English though, so it was quite an experience. I heard excerpts from Chicago (in French), Grease (in English),  Rent (in English), and a hippie musical (I’m skeptical as to whether or not this is a real musical because I had never heard any of the songs and they were a little strange).

After the show, I went home for some hot chocolate and marshmallows (courtesy of my mom J ).

All in all, 'twas a marvelously brilliant day.