BONNE NOUVELLE!!!

Censier is OPEN! This means that we have class this week, and they're going to push our exams back a week or two so we have extra time to study. Woo (I guess)! Though my one European studies class seems to have gone kaput, the professor didn't even show up today and she already gave us some other work to do for the grade instead. At least I've got my other two classes!

I'm still planning on switching schools next semester, I might go to see Paris 12 (in Creteil) tomorrow if I have time. But at least I'll get grades for this semester, yay!

one more week!

Since I've only got one more week till I get to go home (YAY!) I figured I should probably give one more quick update about what's been going on here. Well, my school is closed now, not just blocked, and I'm not sure what that means, but I'm pretty sure there are no exams this year...or something. Tomorrow my independent study is due, so I'm going in to talk to MICEFA about everything. I'm looking at going to the university in Creteil next semester and taking history classes. They have some pretty interesting ones, so as long as I can get that to work out with my work schedule, I'll be good to go.

Germany was amazing, it would take forever to list all the details here, but I really had a wonderful time. Aachen is a really fun city, and Monschau was really easy to get to. The Christmas markets are really just sort of big parties with lots of food and lots of warm wine. Unfortunately it rained all weekend long, which was sort of a disappointment because being outside and wet for many hours isn't great fun. Luckily there were no other major mishaps, and it was definitely a relaxing weekend, though I was pretty tired when I got back to Paris at 10 at night on Monday...

The week went normally, I got to see Faima on Saturday, which was nice but we went shopping at La Defense and it was just insane...there were so many people, and her friend was there with her baby, so it was really slow going and I was exhausted by the end of the day. Luckily I got some cool presents...then Cory came over last night a little bit. On Thursday we hung out, and we thought there was a concert at Notre Dame, but it was really just the telling of the Christmas story...some other MICEFA kids were there but they were all drunk (surprise surprise) so we left to get hot chocolate. We went to this place right next to the Finnish institute and I saw my Finnish professor through the window! So weird. On Friday we took Cecile to lunch as a little going away party, and we went to this excellent cous cous place that had the best mint tea EVER.

Today I was supposed to go to have dinner at one of my teacher's houses (one of the English teachers from Creteil) but her dad is there and apparently he's quite old and tired today, so she cancelled...so I'm probably going to go ice skating with Cory instead! Yay! Otherwise nothing too exciting has happened, I'm ready to get this school stuff worked out and to go home!!!!

So I'm a fascist now...

I thought I should probably write another post about this week before going on my crazy adventure in Germany this weekend. Tuesday was a little ridiculous, we were supposed to start making up the time we missed for one of my European studies classes, but then of course the students voted to reblock during the AG on Tuesday afternoon (I was in Creteil, of course, and couldn't go) so nothing. I went to Finnish movies instead, which was great and I saw a great film called 'No Man is an Island' which is about the director's father who lives alone on an island, and it was really well made and absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately that's the last Finnish movie of the season, so now I have to wait till spring to go again.
Wednesday was equally as ridiculous. When I was at Censier on Tuesday, I saw two girls from my class and they told me to come back for class on Wednesday to see if we could de-block the school. So I went with Kristen from MICEFA and Tytti, and there were probably 40 or so people there as well as our professor. We all got in a group, some girls thought we could probably force our way in because we had so many people and there weren't that many blockers, but the professor said no so that no one would get hurt. We all walked up to the school and said we wanted to go in, which was when all the blockers started calling us fascists. The professor went in, I'm assuming it was to see if it was possible to get a room, but when he came back out they started calling us fascists again and said he was a 'con' (which is a not nice way to call someone stupid) and began to argue with the professor in the most disrespectful way I've ever seen! All of the students were yelling at him, and some crazy professor too, it was ridiculous. But the prof's reaction was great...when they said we were fascists, he was just like, 'Fascists were groups that developed in the 20s and 30s after World War I in Europe, not students that want to go to school.' Either way, several people came around and tried to explain to us stupid folks who can't understand the blockage cause geez, if we just understood then we wouldn't be trying to go to class, but they annoy me so much because they just talk to us like we don't know what's going on, when just about all of us have gone to AG's and have read up and definitely do know what's going on. So that was unsuccessful. and we didn't have class.
Thursday I went to work and it was nice, I had some new kids and they weren't bad, they were really, really excited to talk to me. Thursday afternoon I went to a Conseil de classe, which is something they do every trimester to tell the kids how they're doing. It was really interesting, especially since it's a class that I have and that I like, it was neat to see how they do in other classes and what they do to the bad kids.
On Thursday night I went to a Finnish independence day party! It was at Roosa's, she's Tytti's friend and she's in the European studies master program. It was so fun, we watched the ball on some internet station (there's always a big ball at the presidential palace and all the important people in Finland go and talk about how much they love Finland) and we ate some Finnish food and Tytti and Roosa sang songs in Finnish. They were the only two Finns, there were 2 French guys, three German guys, and a Ukrainian girl, so it was pretty interesting. I even spoke a little Finnish with Tytti and Roosa, which was so fun! and I figured it was good practice for my exam today.
I had my Finnish exam, it went well, I made one mistake for sure but the rest was good. Now I've just been getting ready to leave this weekend! I'll definitely post again next week when I get the chance!

Train toilets, mummies, and a carte de sejour!

It's really been a long time since i posted last, and a ton has happened since then, too! Most importantly, it's December and there's less that three weeks till I go home!!!!! Technically (well, according to the student mobilization website, I don't know if that's 'technical' or not) my school is still blocked, but on Thursday there was a secret ballot vote that the president called for - most people (students, professors, workers...) boycotted it because the General Assemblies rejected a secret ballot vote three times, so only about 3,000 people voted (out of a lot more, I can't remember how many), but of course they voted to de-block! But I haven't been back since Thursday night, when they were having a little protest in front of the school against the vote, and there was no class. Thursday afternoon there was an enormous student protest at Bastille, I saw it on my way over to Censier after work. Hopefully I'll find out something more today and maybe will have class on Wednesday...
There doesn't seem to have been any more protests in the suburbs, but evidently they're trying to tighten security around the schools in Creteil...I guess we'll see where that goes! Hopefully things stay calm.
On Friday I went to Anne's for dinner, which was nice. We were going to go out afterward but then we were both tired and feeling lazy so we just hung out and talked for a while. It's going to suck not seeing her for two weeks! It's so weird still, though, because the first time we met, I was with her for about 2 months straight, and then I didn't see her again for 5 years, and now I see her almost every week! It's awesome, but still kind of weird to have a sort of 'normal' friendship ; I've always considered her one of my best friends but we've never had this kind of a seeing-each-other-all-the-time friendship! Hopefully we'll get to go to Orleans soon, too!
Saturday I went to Amiens with Sasha, it was a really fun day! We left at 8 in the morning and didn't get back until 7 p.m., so it was a bit long, but I had fun. The train had Hogwarts Express-style compartments, which was awesome, and I used the train toilet for the first time - there's no flush, it's just a hole...you can watch the ground rushing by if you like...it's only a little cold...also it's not like on an airplane where there's not usually too much motion...I almost fell several times! Anyway we got into Amiens at 9, and we went to the tourist office and got a map and figured out what to do. We went to the cathedral first, it's the tallest Gothic cathedral in France, or something, and it's from the 13th century. The outside is beautiful, but I have to say that overall the cathedral at Chartres was much more stunning. There weren't as many windows or little chapels inside, and outside the architecture was not very exciting, compared to Chartres. The labyrinth inside was really cool, though, and actually the floor overall was really interesting. After that we decided to go to the Musee de Picardie (Picardie is the region that Amiens is in) , which was by far one of the best museums I've ever seen. There was a whole archeology section, and I got to see a MUMMY!!!! It was AMAZING. There were sections about ancient Egypt, Greece, the Gauls, the Romans (Amiens used to be a Gallo-Roman town) - apparently the Romans were into glasswork! So they had all kinds of cool glass, as well as stuff from the old baths and another dead guy, this time the skeleton of a warrior and all the stuff he was buried with. Then there were a painting galleries and a lot of sculptures, which were so awesome because you could walk up literally right next to them, I almost touched a few because I wanted to know what the marble felt like...but I was really good! Anyway it was just one of those great museums where there's enough of a variety that it's really interesting, but there's not too much stuff that it's overwhelming.
After the museum, we walked around the Christmas market for a while (apparently this is becoming popular in France in all the major cities) , and I had a hot-off-the-grill Liegeois waffle for lunch (the best kind of waffle there is...mmm...). It was a cute market, there was a lot of kind of random stuff but it was nice. In the morning there weren't too many people, but by the afternoon and before we left it was so packed, I couldn't really handle it...anyway we moved on to the Quartier St Leu, which is pegged in the city's brochures as 'The Venice of the North,' it's a little neighborhood that's built around whole bunch of canals. The houses are mostly older, some are half-timbered style, and it's really, really cute. We walked around there for quite a while, and then we went to the Parc St Pierre, which is a really big park on the edge of the town. Normally in the summer they have this thing called 'Les Hortillonnages,' floating gardens, and you can take boats all through the rivers and canals and see the gardens. Of course now it was just muddy and cold, but we saw the boats and walked around the lake a little. It was very nice, even if it did almost start to rain and begin to get really, really cold. I got so tired, too, I'm not sure if Sasha still had energy, but we were just killing time in stores before going to the train station, and I couldn't do that for very long. So we ended up sitting in the train station for an hour, which was fine and a little warm, but we got on the train as soon as possible and I think I even fell asleep on the way back. So overall it was a nice day, I'm really glad we went!
On Sunday I went to the Musee du Quai Branly with Mme Bluteau from Victor Hugo. It's the museum that Chirac dedicated a few years ago, it's sort of a 'civilisations of the world' type of museum. It's really huge, though, and strangely set up so that there are a million different artifacts that are all really interesting, but there's almost no information about them. Also, it's really hard to read the descriptions of each thing because all the text will be on one tiny plaque on one side for an entire case of artifacts. While the stuff they had was awesome, I really didn't learn anything at all, which was disappointing. Luckily, because it was the first Sunday of the month, it was free, so I didn't waste any money. Afterward it was absolutely pouring rain and really windy, we got lunch in a cafe near there and then headed back to Gare de Lyon. Then I did a little homework and had macaroni and cheese for dinner, which was perfect!
Today I went to the Prefecture and I got my carte de sejour! I can legally live here until April, yay! No hassle, almost no waiting, it was a very atypical visit to the Prefecture. I'm kind of glad that's all over and done with now, I have to say... Now I'm all set to go to Germany this weekend! I'm getting SOOOO excited! I can't believe that after this weekend I'll have been to Germany as many times as I've been to France! I need to practice my German...
I have my Finnish exam Friday! Why am I so excited...?

Moushin & Larami, je pense à vous...

Sorry for the lack of, well, anything in the past week or so. Everything here feels like it's out of whack, with Thanksgiving & not being home for it for the first time in my life, not having class until who knows when, and planning a trip to Germany that's been way more of a hassle than I had bargained for. While the transport strike is technically over (meaning they're still in negotiations, no one's really satisfied, but the train unions thought they'd try to get the French back on their side by giving them some mobility for a bit), the blockage at my university is continuing with no real end in sight. I've been working again, trying a little to get into a new rhythm but it's not that easy when I'm never really sure what will be happening each day.

Paris sort of feels like a powder keg right now. The threat of the transport strike starting anew, the potential of fac-blocking students attempting to take over the whole city, or restless suburban youth who have once again decided that lots of fires and riots is the only way to get revenge for the deaths of more young people at the hands of police are all contributing to this tension I feel mounting. This time, in Villiers-le-Bel (a suburb to the north of Paris), two more young boys (15 & 16) were riding too fast and without helmets on a motorbike (which, in the first article I read, was allegedly stolen, but that accusation seems to have disappeared...) and crashed into a police car. It seems easily enough to be just another tragic death, but this is a Paris suburb - only hours after the accident, riots broke out, and by today 80 policemen had been injured and a large number of buildings - including a library, I want to add - had been burnt down and busted up. It's the same story as two years ago, two young boys with non-French names die, their neighbors take to the streets, set cars and buildings on fire and attack police with whatever they can find - including guns. It's the same questions, only different words : did the police chase Bouna and Zyed into the power station where they met their deaths simply because the police are inherently against all non-White French people (or at least because these policemen had bad intentions)? Or did those kids have something to hide, be it the fact that they didn't have their papers or something worse? This time, it's, did the police hit the kids head on and then leave them at the scene to die? Or did they actually steal the bike, and, in their haste to get away, hit the side of the police car while going way too fast? None of these questions will ever have answers, but it's obvious who is on which side. Now, it's just a matter of how far it'll go this time. It's the same spark, will it set off another wave of riots till all of France is consumed? Will Sarkozy answer again by calling these kids thugs and criminals, while he's the one taking away all their future jobs to buy airplanes in China? I'm not saying that huge riots are the right way to answer things ; it doesn't take long until people start dying and rioters burn up an old lady because she's on a bus and they couldn't wait for her to get off to set it on fire. I'm just saying that Sarkozy's response to the riots in 2005 was less than sufficient and certainly less than respectful, which I imagine doesn't make suburban kids want to kill police any less. Anyway, I hope I'm jumping the gun this time and that someone will act in a positive way before I start seeing the burnt-up shells of cars in Creteil.

Sorry to leave such a downer, but I've been thinking about it a lot.

On the other hand, I apparently have friends : Vegetable Man and Nighttime/Sunday Market Man. Vegetable Man's from the market, obviously he sells me vegetables, but he is really nice and always remembers me and talks to me about Bush and Sarkozy being friends. Nighttime/Sunday Market Man works at the market that's across the street that is open at all the times that every other market is inconveniently closed, and the other day I saw him in the street and he recognized me, and then this evening he told me I am the only American who speaks French well. Anyway the point wasn't to talk about weird people in my neighborhood, just the fact that people in my neighborhood know me as that American girl who speaks French well...it's pretty cool. It makes this place feel a little more welcoming when I've got people I can strike up a conversation with regularly.

Oh, and I wanted to tell a tale called French Bureaucracy at its Finest. It has to do with banks and transfering money to another country. I'm not at all sure how that works in the US, so my first transfer ever being done in another country/language was probably not the best foot to start off from anyway. I was so proud of myself, I knew I had to do the transfer today so I went and found the bank in Creteil so that I could go there this afternoon, I did all the research online and it was great. I go into the bank, tell the girl I want to make a transfer to Germany, and she says, Oh no, no, you have to go to your Agency, which is the place where I opened the account. Which is in Paris near MICEFA, suuuuper convenient. Not. But I had to do it today, so I had to go to Paris during my lunch break before 2 p.m. So I go to the place where I opened the account, go in, the lady's so nice, she helps me fill out the form and isn't even annoyed that I've got no idea what those blanks mean...only when I'm done she says, oh, Mme Jousserand opened your account. Well, she doesn't work at this agency anymore, she moved down the street. Your account moved with her. It's probably better if you go there and send this transfer from there. It's right down the street. So I went, did the transfer, no big deal, got my checkbook and everything. It was so nice of them to let me know that my entire account had moved!!! Luckily it wasn't far, it could have been a lot worse and even right after the transfer was done I was laughing about it. And I got to eat Greek for lunch, I found another (cheaper!) Greek place right next door so it was worth it. And I even made it back to Creteil on time...

Well, I should go to bed, as I have...ONE CLASS tomorrow, yeah grammaire du texte! Gute Nacht!

Le Mans!! et toujours la grève!!

This past weekend I went to Le Mans, a city in the Centre region of France, to visit my friend (pen pal) Frederick and his wife Anais. Actually, this blog entry has to start hilariously on Friday morning when I decided it was a good effort to try to get to Creteil (I have to say that sometimes my power of reason is not at full force at 6 in the morning), I talked to a bunch of people in the station who told me I could get a train in 25 minutes but they couldn't guarantee anything for the afternoon. For some unknown reason I thought it would be a good idea to take that train, I made it all the way to Creteil, and I talked to another guy in the metro who told me there were three trains in circulation that could stop at any time. I went ahead and walked to the school (again, unknown reasoning here) where my morning class was all assembled but Aude (the teacher) wasn't there. They really wanted to have class anyway, they suggested we do it in the hallway, but I told them I couldn't really do that and they had to tell me what do because I don't actually know the procedure for when the teacher's not there. Thank goodness those kids are awesome and took themselves to la Vie Scolaire where I talked to the guys who felt so bad about me having come and just sent me back to Paris. So at 9:30, I caught the LAST metro of the morning back to Paris. Needless to say we were packed. Like sardines. In a crushed tin box.
I made it back to Paris, took a little nap, and then woke up and called ILPGA to see if they were blocked or not - and they weren't! (I found out last night from Anne that part of the reason they started putting different parts of universities in other places than the main building is so the can't block them all...) I went to class there, and my usual professor couldn't come, but we had a different woman who I liked a lot. There were only 5 of us, and I was the only non-French person, and we did some review, but it was still fun. Apparently there's a minor in Finnish you can do where you take at least one other course that's practically entirely grammar...some of the girls were talking about it. Oh well, this suffices for me, at least it's the one class I actually have!!
So after Finnish, I went straight to the train station (lots of love for line 4), where I found out that NO TER's were running (that was the train I was supposed to take) so I got to take a TGV instead and didn't have to pay anything for it! I had to wait in the train station for a lot longer because I didn't want to get to Le Mans and have to wait in the train station there for someone to get off work, but I will never get to the train station that early again - it was FREEZING and there was no place in any cafes...I had to keeping going into the same bookstores over and over to get warm. But I finally got a train, and it only took an hour to get to Le Mans (the TER would have taken 2,5!). I met Fred in the train station, and we walked to their apartment from there. It's a really cute and typical French apartment, the kind with a separate toilet and bathroom and everything. Anais made dinner, she's a great cook and I ate really well all weekend. We all went to bed fairly early on Friday night, but we got up Saturday morning to go to the 'bio co-op,' it's an all-organic co-op a little ways outside of town. On the drive there, I got to see that Le Mans is actually surrounded by a Gallo-roman wall and has a really nice little old town. The river Sarthe runs by the town, too. The co-op was really awesome, there were so many fruits and veggies, stuff I'd never seen before like the 'potimarron,' it's in the squash family and is orange like the tramway. It was really fun to look around at all the amazing food in there, and all entirely organic, even the cheese!
We had lunch, and then we decided to walk around Le Mans, they were inaugurating the new tramway that weekend, so there were tons of people and music and lots and lots of orange. The tramway's orange, like you can see in the picture, and apparently the mayor asked everyone to wear orange for the occasion (none of us had any orange...). We walked around the tram lines, then to the main square (Place de la Republique) and up to the cathedral, which sits on top of a big hill and is surrounded by the old town. The old town's really cool, it's all old half-timbered buildings and lots of tiny cobblestone roads. The cathedral was really nice too, not as impressive as in Chartres or anything but still really beautiful. We walked around for a while, and then we went back to the other part of town and went to some interesting shops there. They were having some projections on the buildings at Place de la Republique, so we went there for a little while, but they were kind of strange and it was getting cold, so we ended up going back to the apartment and eating a cabbage lasagne that was excellent. I stayed up with Fred for a while and looked at all their wedding pictures (they took a big trip around France afterward, to Bretagne and Bordeaux and then to the south too).
On Sunday I went to the main market with Fred, we took the tram one way but it was SO crowded because it was free all weekend, so we walked back. We just got some cheese and looked at the book stand (of course), but then we went back for lunch (I got to try the potimarron, it was yummy) and then afterward we went to l'Arche de la Nature, it's a big nature place like 20 minutes from Le Mans. It's a big wood with farms and stuff, but unfortunately it was raining and freezing, so we didn't get a chance to walk around. They were having a fair for apples and chatignons (like chestnuts but not...) so I got to smell apples and watch goats, which was excellent. I got some apple juice that I've yet to open, but I'm sure it'll be excellent! Unfortunately I had to go like right after we got back, so we had some hot chocolate and I changed my socks, and then it was time! Luckily I got to take another TGV back to Paris, but getting back was another adventure. There were no buses, so I had to take the line 4 and 1 metros, but when I was in there listening to the announcements about other lines, several of them had no trains running at all. It was really disappointing to come back to that after having such a nice weekend not worrying about what trains are running and which ones aren't. Sigh. Also, my school's still blocked, they voted to block it until Thursday afternoon, when they'll vote again. I couldn't get to Creteil at all today, so...stuck in Paris again, at least this time I'm going to attempt to go to the movies! (as long as the electricity's not on strike...which it very well might be)
We're having a large Thanksgiving gathering on Friday night, I'm really, really looking forward to it! Hopefully everyone will be able to get here!!

L'Assemblée Générale

So I thought I'd follow up a little bit, because today I spent 4 hours in the 'Assemblee Generale' of my fac (university, but who wants to write it out every time?) to figure out what exactly people are against and what exactly they're trying to do to get Sarkozy to break. Of course in heated debates, I can't understand all the French, but this is what I found out.

The Assemblee Generale is pretty neat, it really does consist of an enormous group of people being fairly democratic about every single thing. At the beginning, they explain what they'll be talking about and why for the rest of the meeting. Then they had a debate about the law, each person got to speak for 3 minutes (called interventions) where technically no one's supposed to interrupt but people do anyway. Then they had some 'perspectives,' some ideas they had about other things to move to next (like another Assemblee Generale and the Assemblee Nationale and stuff like that), and they had proposals, again a bunch of people speaking for 3 minutes each. At the end, we voted for 14 proposals as well as whether or not to recognize the strike and whether or not to block the school.

Basically the law is how I explained last time, and most people are in agreement the things need to be changed in facs because of the huge numbers of students going to them and the fact that government funds are changing around. The problem is that there will be some pre-inscription requirements, I think, and less public funding, so there will be a lot less students each year (ok, I admit I am not entirely clear on this point, but I'm working on it). However, about the companies financing schools, basically they're trying to create facs with special niches that will only send students with special degrees to those firms - problematic because those degrees have no value outside of some big organisation that's financing the school. Most people support the 'abrogation' of this law, which means that people are recognizing there needs to be a change but are refusing this law (la loi Pecresse) entirely, they think it should be thrown out and something new started. Some people think, though, that some parts of the law should be kept and other parts negociated, because if everyone agrees there needs to be a change, then why start over entirely?

Either way, I have resolved that I'm against this proposed law. My problem is still with the reaction of the blockage of facs. I still can't understand how this is an affective way to show Sarkozy that they disagree with his law. "OK Sarko, we don't like your laws, so we're not going to go to school - nor are we going to let people who want to go to school go - until you let up." If they're talking about equal education and autonomy for students, then they are being completely paradoxical. They are only hurting themselves and other students by shutting down schools. There are much better ways to mobilize as students and show solidarity for one another. They are also discussing blocking train stations; this is the goal for tomorrow - but the railway unions have already expressed their disapproval of this idea. If students want to show support for the rest of the unions trying to mobilize against Sarkozy, that's not really the way to do it.

I'm almost sure they're going to vote for another blockage Monday, so that it holds over at least until Tuesday when the other major strike should be happening. The potential to be really affective is there, I think, I just hope they let me go back to class eventually...

Your opinions, please.

Today, I began to lose my certainty with the school strikes. I’m supposed to have three classes today, and one of them’s offered by my exchange program. It’s usually at the Sorbonne (the old, famous building), so I took a bike there this morning because it’s too far to walk. When I got there, there were fairly large crowds at each entrance, which were all still shut at around 9:15 or so. By the time 9:30-9:45 rolled around, the students had literally blocked the doors, so people couldn’t really get through without a fight. Annoyingly, I had to get over to the exchange program’s office for my class because at the last minute they changed the location.

After that class, I went ahead over to Censier, which is where I have my other two classes, and it was physically blocked, as in there were tables piled up in front of every door (except to the library). I asked the kids what was up and if I could go in, and it turned out that every normal undergrad class was cancelled; the only classes to be held were special international student ones (like French as a second language ones, not like where I take a class that’s mostly international students but still considered a French class) and masters programs. Tomorrow at noon they’ll be voting whether or not to continue the blockage. So I went over to the library where I found my friend Raoul (he’s French), who asked me whether I was for or against the blockage, and I automatically said yes. I didn’t really have an answer as to why, so he proceeded to explain to me why he’s against it, which is where my confusion started to come in.

What the students are striking against is this law Sarkozy wants to push through that makes universities have the choice to be autonomous. Currently, they are entirely state-funded, and only ‘poor’ students get financial aid (there’s no merit-based financial aid), though schools cost nothing in France compared to what we pay in the US. The autonomy law would allow schools to choose to be financed (partially) by outside organizations, which would then open up more jobs to students who had graduated from the university they finance. According to Raoul, students who couldn’t afford to get to a university would still be funded by the state. Students would also still have the choice to go to whichever university they want.

The problem most students see with this law, like one of the kids holding up the blockade told me, is that they think it is a step toward privatization, like in the American system. However, autonomy does not mean independence; at the end, the government is still going to have a hand in direction of the French university system. I sort of feel like this system can never be completely privatized – in the US, schools were private from the beginning, and it’s kind of a whole, whole different system of who directs what (as in states directing public universities and the national government not really having much of a hand in anything). The problem seems to come in with the difference between autonomy and independence – and there is definitely a huge one (think about Finland, it was autonomous, it had a form of self-government, for years under both Sweden and Russia but wasn’t actually independent until 1917 – and in a case like that, we’d never mistake autonomy for independence).
Raoul and I were discussing how paradoxical this total blockage of the school is. If students want school to be free and free for everyone, how does it make sense to not allow people to do go school if they want to? They are imposing their opinions on everyone else, and now it’s some students who are taking away other students’ independence. The blockage was decided by a popular vote (and will be decided to continue or not tomorrow – potentially until Tuesday, when teachers and public workers are striking). For the French students, it’s no big deal, the school can’t fail over half the students for striking and missing a month of classes. But for the exchange students, we risk being required to stay over the summer to make up classes or not getting credits transferred because we haven’t had enough hours of classes. How is that fair to others who also deserve an equal education? When Raoul asked another kid from our class if he was for or against the blockage, this is what he said: “I’m not really for or against it, I voted for it...” so Raoul asked him why, and he basically said that it was because everyone else was voting for it. He said, “If everyone votes to go to class, I’ll go to class, and if everyone votes for a blockage, I’ll go to protests.” Really well thought out. It made me lose a lot of the confidence I had previously in the well-founded decisions of the French students.

I’m interested to see what others think. I know many of you are really not into the higher education thing, or government funded anything, but please consider what the reality is for France at the moment, that the government funds all transport and all universities, and let me know what you think. I feel like on principle I should be supportive of the strike, but I also feel like there’s something much bigger here than one principle. I’m just really questioning whether or not this is the most effective way to show that people are really against this new plan.

So, please let me know what you think about this, I'm really having a hard time with it.

La grève demain : ce n'est que le début!!!

My new best friend, Radio France, has been keeping me updated about the new strike that's set for this week. Tonight (Tuesday), it's the SNCF (train network), and tomorrow the RATP starts (Paris transport system). As it's again an open strike, there's no set end date, and it'll only be over when someone gets something done. Best case scenario : the strike lasts until Friday (SNCF & RATP included). More possible scenario : nothing is back to normal until Sunday. Worst case scenario for the poor traveller and best case scenario for the unions : the transport strike lasts until next Tuesday, when 'functionnaires' (public sector workers, including teachers) and students are having a general strike, and then everyone joins together in an Anti-Sarko bloc that completely immobilizes the country. As of right now, that sounds fairly feasible even though it may seem ridiculous to those of you who have not yet fully experienced the incredible power of the French left. Tomorrow I'm expecting to use no public transport ; I might try out the Velib (the bike rental system) but it may not be possible because the bikes are in too high demand during the strike. I can potentially walk to Sorbonne for my MICEFA class, but I will put money on the professor not getting there because I believe she takes the RER - line A is 'quasiment nul' and line B will have no traffic. According to the nice lady in the Creteil metro this morning, there will be no trains on line 8. As for Paris 3 classes, apparently the students & functionnaires are jumping the gun ; they're set to be on strike for tomorrow too. Looks like I might have a free day coming, so hopefully I'll get caught up in some excellent giant protest somewhere. Anne told me she'd take me to one...

In other news, Saturday was excellent, it was strange to see Anne's parents after 5 years but they are great and just like I remembered. Except for that Luc's French got easier to understand (not a bad thing...). They invited me to Orleans sometime, so hopefully I'll be able to find a weekend to go with Anne, though I guess it might not be until after Christmas. It was definitely too short this time, so I hope I can go sooner rather than later! After they went to lunch, I went to meet Faima, which was excellent. I have a much better time understanding her in person than on the phone. We hung around the Champs-Elysees for a while, and then we went to Parc Monceau, and then we went to La Defense for a little bit. It was awesome, I invited her to the Thanksgiving dinner so hopefully she'll be able to come and then we can hang out on Saturday for a little bit, too. I went to Elly's after that, we had dinner and *gasp* watched some TV. I figured I was allowed since it's been 2 months since I've watched any. The rest of the weekend was fairly boring, I tried to get some work done...Verena came over last night to help me organize/read some stuff for my trip to Germany in December, so that was nice to see her (since I probably won't see any of my friends this week...).

I didn't go to Creteil this morning, since I was supposed to be with Amel (who works at both schools) and she told me if I didn't hear from her then I shouldn't come since she didn't have anything for me to do. But according to one of the students, she told them that I didn't want to come...whatever, I guess I don't really want to deal with those kids who throw chalky erasers at my stuff. This afternoon was normal, I've got some homework to grade and a 'prise de parole continue' (oral report sort of thing) for the 3e Europeans in a few weeks (next week is supposed to be another orientation, but we'll see because of all the striking) and then the next week they're going to Caen. I think that'll be a good way to handle things because the kids who actually want to work and make the effort will get a good grade anyway, I know they'll do the thing and I know they can stand up and speak for two minutes. I'd prefer to even take them one by one, but we'll see if that works.

So...Bonne Greve demain!!!!!!!!

Les Reliques de la Mort!

I got to get HARRY POTTER today!!!! I finally got paid on Thursday, I got a check and everything (even though the whole ordeal with the bank account was so that I would have direct deposit...) so now I can be all fancy and French-like when I buy things with a bank card. It's kinda cool...

I feel like I have nothing to tell, hence the lack of blogging over the past week or so. It's been weird, I'm kind of getting to the stage where the things I brought from home are running out, I've had to get all sorts of things like toothpaste, floss (that was an adventure...I got some from Monoprix but it was horrible, no wax or anything. I had to go to a pharmacy to get waxed floss, and it cost 4 euro!), band-aids (also ridiculously expensive, I guess the French don't get hurt...I'll have a really nice scar to show everyone when I'm home, by the way...)...I'm dreading the time when the choice of what shampoo to get arises. I guess this all might sound kind of lame, but for me, every time something runs out, it's a new adventure of where to go, what to get, and the fact that there's no Crest toothpaste in France. Today I had a nice time walking around my neighborhood, trying to find some things like a pencil sharpener, and I ended up finding a cool organic/fair trade store where the lady gave me some kind of disgusting tasting drink (Guarana cocktail...) that apparently helps you focus and is good for diplomacy, and I ended up getting some coffee (of course) and some nice spices (cinnamon sticks and cloves...I'm going to make mulled wine and it's going to be amazing...). I also went into a random bookstore that had a lot of neat books on religion but the guy told me (in a not very nice sort of way) to be careful of my backpack, and then he watched me the entire time to make sure I didn't break anything. I glared at him on the way out. I tried to make French bread pizza for dinner, but without an oven it didn't really work. I can use my microwave to make gratins, or something (there was metal in there and nothing blew up!) but it just made the bread chewey and got cheese everywhere. I tried to make the other half in the pan on the stove and I just burnt the bottom of the bread. Sigh. Luckily I have Harry tonight.

This weekend was fun, Amy came up again from Vierzon, on Saturday we went to the Indian neighborhood (which is really only one street long) and had really fantastic food, and then we went to a grocery store where I got some henna! Anne met up with us, we walked aaaallllll over the place for a while and ended up going back to Anne's for dinner, and then we went out for drinks afterward. We were talking about Americans with accents in French, and Anne was saying that neither of us have distinctly American accents, but that we sound like some kind of foreigner, or maybe a French person with a malformed mouth. Which I guess is a compliment... :-) It was pretty hilarious. On Sunday Amy and I just hung out, I did my henna and we made a huge dinner, and we watched Umrao Jaan (Bollywood movie, of course). She left on Monday, and I went to the library to do a bunch of good research. I even bought a copy card so that I can make copies when I go...I feel so cool.

I forgot about last Wednesday, I went out (ooo!) with a bunch of kids from my European studies classes. It was mostly French kids, and two Finnish girls (one named Tytti, who I'm going to be doing a little project with on Kalevala for the next class!) and a Polish girl. It was really fun, some random dude on the street gave one of the guys 50 euro so he bought us all drinks. It was cool to hang out with French kids (finally) and I talked with one guy, Raoul, for a really long time about the classes and our professor who never talks about slavery, only the end of it, and who also talks a lot about the end of colonialism...he was glad to know there was someone else who notices and has a problem with how this professor talks about some stuff. Oh, and Raoul grew up in Creteil, he knows where my colleges are, how weird is that? I guess it's actually not that weird, he'slived here his whole life...Anyway there is/was some potential for us going out again tomorrow but I haven't heard from anyone so I'm not entirely sure what's happening, but I will be hanging out with Tytti and working on this project.

Tomorrow I have class again, but only in the morning...I have Grammaire du Texte, and then lunch with Cecile and Cory. I have to work again Thursday and Friday (sigh...) but then I get to see Anne's parents and Faima on Saturday! Then next weekend I'm going to Le Mans to visit my penpal, evidently there are going to be strikes again so we'll see if that even happens. As much as I like strikes, I REALLY want to go to Le Mans, so I kind of hope it doesn't happen! Sorry, SCNF workers!

Sorry about the brightness of the picture, I just wanted to show off my hair and my Harry!!

Objectif proof that my French is improving...

is that I just talked to Faima on the phone, and I probably understood 70 or maybe even 75% of what she said, instead of 30%!! I'm so excited, I'll actually not embarass myself when I see her, I'll probably even be able to understand most of it! Yay! (I'm going to see her on the 10th of November.)

Yesterday it was raining, which didn't really motivate me to get to the library, but I did it anyway and was there for a really long time. It's really nice, because there's enough people there that when you get too tired, you can take a break and people watch without leaving your seat. I read a lot about intellectuels during the Dreyfus affair, which is surprisingly interesting! I think I might go back Thursday (yes, I am that nerd who is using her vacations to get ahead in her studies...) and try some more history of rock books, since evidently I don't have class because it's a holiday. But we'll see, I might take a holiday too...

Today was SO SUCCESSFUL, I went to the Prefecture and came out with a Recipissee! Which means 'This is proof that I turned in my documents and am now waiting another month before I will have the real carte de sejour.' I was supposed to have the appointment at 10, but I went at 9 because I wasn't sure if I was going to have to wait in line...it took me till 10:30 anyway!!! I'm not actually joking about the month thing, it's really not going to be ready until after December 3rd...as long as all the documents are okay, which they may not be since my name is actually spelled with one L on the attestation d'hebergement. I didn't say anything, I hope they won't notice...we'll see! I've heard that it takes three times to do anything administrative in France, and if things go well...then yes, it'll have taken me three times to get the thing. Actually, I wondered, the first time I went in there, why all the other people knew what was going on and didn't have to ask for help...now I can understand that it's because they've all been there probably twice before!

I met this other TA girl there who said I'm going to need to translate my birth certificate for the health insurance people, I'll have to look into that further because the translation thing doesn't sound like much fun...

Afterward, I met Anne and we went to Maisons-Lafitte to visit Jean-Francois, it was really nice! He made us lunch and stuff and took us around the town a little. It was nice, it's a nice suburb and fairly bourgeois, according to him. His house was really, really nice, his family lived in China for a while so they have all kinds of amazing Chinese furniture and pottery and everything. He's such a funny guy, he went through a goth period in high school and kept everything from it, he was showing us today...it was very romantic goth, so lots of lace and really wacky jewelry. He's so serious about it too, but he's making fun of himself. I don't know quite how to describe it, but it was really entertaining. Now he's studying 'naturopathy,' natural healing stuff, and he does a lot of yoga and is studying plants and energies and stuff like that. Anne asked if he went straight from being goth to being a yog-ist, evidently there was a transition in there somewhere. Either way I really enjoy hanging out with him.

I came back with Anne, I took the 14 line metro, it's electric and runs with no driver, it was strange. There was an abnormally large number of businessmen there. I am trying to get some homework done, but of course blogs are more interesting than homework so I'm doing this instead...but now I should really go read, so a toute a l'heure!

P.S. The top picture is Escalier F, Prefecture de Paris, where you go for your titres de sejour. The other picture's from Maisons Lafitte.

Another week in Paris...and Chartres!

Centre Pompidou!

Chartres!


Monday I did successfully make it to the library, it was actually great. I read some books for History of Rock, and I'm actually going to go back tomorrow to read some more. I really enjoyed being there, I think tomorrow I'm going to look for some books for my Europe classes, too. Tuesday was another normal day at Victor Hugo, it was week B so I got some 6e and they all want me to bring them American names. I think I like the 6e classes best...though I really, really like some 4e at Louis Issaurat...the littlest ones are just so nice, they still don't hate school that much and they think I'm a lot older than them, so they are not mean.
Tuesday night I went to the Institut Finlandais again for another documentary, this one was about the Finnish military service requirement - apparently the civil service option (which is one year) is longer than any other country's requirement in Europe. Also, Finland is the only European country that puts people in jail for being conscientous observers. The film followed three guys who were all 18-20 who each chose a different option, it was really interesting. It was definitely the highlight of my Tuesday!
The rest of the week was fairly normal, I was supposed to go to another orientation on Friday but it was after Finnish, and I didn't even make it to the train station until 4, and the thing was supposed to end at 5, so I just didn't go because it would have taken me a half hour to get out there, and I just didn't think it would have been worth it. And it was fine, because then I got to hang out with Anne - we went to a bar place in the Marais and I had my first citron presse (it's really just fresh lemon juice) and we stayed there for hours and talked about all kinds of stuff (what a French lesson!). Since Greg's mom lives in Chartres, she told me some places to go. I didn't get in until 2, but we had so much fun! I think I forgot to mention that we're giving each other mutual French/English lessons, which I think will be really helpful for me - she's helping me with paper writing and stuff, like the actual words you're supposed to use and formats and stuff. I'm helping her talk about sustainable development, because that's the kind of program she wants to do, and apparently they all require English! It's funny to be in France and speak English with Anne...but it's fun to do, and then we get to see each other at least once a week anyway.
So Saturday I went to Chartres with Elly and Cory! We got the train from Montparnasse (which is kind of an insane station...) at 9:30 in the morning and got into Chartres at 10:30. It's really a small town, but it's famous for its cathedral...which is really incredible. It's huge (not as huge as Strasbourg or Cologne) and incredibly beautiful. Apparently its real beginnings were in the 4th century, but there's nothing left from that period. The earliest remains are from the 6th century, but of course we weren't allowed to see those. It was burned a few times...once by the Vikings...anyway most of the church is from the 12th century, it has 176 stained glass windows from the 12th and 13th centuries, and it's also the place where the color Chartres blue comes from, it's all over the windows. Anyway it's beautiful, the outside architecture is amazing as well, we spent so long there! Then we walked around the top of the town for a while, got some crepe lunches, and then walked down to the river (the Eure) where there are beautiful little houses next to the river. It's very picturesque and very typically French. We went to another church, where they happened to be having a fungus exposition (I'm not lying, though it may seem completely unbelievable)...we just wanted to see the church, but then there were hundreds of mushroom and other types of fungus specimen, and the craziest part was the number of people there who seemed a. interested and b. like they knew what was going on. It was one of the strangest things that's ever happened in my life! There was also a really pretty medieval garden outside complete with every herb ever and an absinthe plant (just in case you were wondering how they make absinthe...). We were really tired by the end of the day but we had a great time!! I'm so glad we went!
Like I said, tomorrow is the library again, and then Tuesday's the big Prefecture day! Hopefully this time I'll come out with a recipisse instead of nothing!!!!!

Le Mont St Michel, and being the first person to ever exit the Prefecture de Police with a smile.

Saturday I went to le Mont St Michel with MICEFA folks, it was about a 4 hour bus ride from Paris into the north of France. The bus ride was okay, it was beautiful to drive through the countryside, but of course a couple of girls would not shut up and I didn't get to sleep at all (I was up at 5 so that I would make it to MICEFA on time in case I couldn't get a bus, which I did). For those who don't know, le Mt-St-Mich is an 8th century abbey that is built on an island in the Atlantic (I guess it's in the Atlantic...), and there's a little town there around the abbey and everything. As soon as we got there, me, Cory, Cecile, and Elly decided to ditch everyone else from MICEFA, and we decided to go straight to the abbey, which turned out to be a good idea because we beat a huge group of people. It's really just amazing, I'm not sure I can describe the place in words because it's so much about the feeling you get walking around a place that's so old and so beautiful. It's just sort of incredible to think of what it must have been like in the 10th century when there were pilgrims and monks and who knows who else there. The view from the top of the island is amazing, too. We were so lucky to have amazing weather, too. After we toured the abbey, we walked around on the beach for a while, and it was wild because it's sand there, but it's really just mud because it's saturated all the time. We were there during low tide, but when the tide comes in, it comes right up to the bottom of the island. Unfortunately we couldn't stay to watch the tide come in, which was a bummer, but it was also quite fun to play around on the rocks and in the sand. It was great to get a vacation from Paris for a day, and Elly and Cory and I decided that we may go to Chartres this Saturday because it's so nice to have a break...
The way back wasn't bad, though those girls were annoying again...we didn't get back too late, but traffic getting back into Paris was awful because it was the rugby final and there were just tons of people. Elly came back with me to eat, we took the bus, and then I slept so well on Saturday night. Sunday I was supposed to go out with the same girls for lunch, but I woke up and Anne texted me and asked if I wanted to watch a rhythmic gymnastics competition, so I ended up doing that instead. It was totally awesome, I've never seen RSG in real life, so it was awesome. I'm going to go to some of Anne's competitions in November and December...I'm really excited about it! Afterward we went to Bois de Vincennes with Gregoire and sat by the lake for a while, it was really nice but it got a little chilly. I went home and failed at doing my homework...sigh.
Today has been really productive so far! I went to the Prefecture to do the carte de sejour, and I think I discovered the secret to making French bureaucracy workers not be mean to you...well, the first lady I talked to was not very nice, but then I went in and talked to this secretary guy, and I was very nice to him, and I shocked him by having all my documents...he asked me for them one by one, and he seemed so sure that he was going to stump me, but I had everything and more! Actually the problem came when he needed the attestation d'hebergement, which is the document that says that I have housing, and he couldn't accept what I had, and he even said 'C'est dommage,' as if he were disappointed by the fact that he could not help me, since I already had everything. He gave me an appointment for next Tuesday (I completely forgot that vacation starts then!) and then called Adrien at ACCENT and he's going to try to hurry the guy who's doing the attestation up so that I can have it by then. Anyway he turned out to be nice, I just kept smiling the whole time and being nice and having my documents, I guess that's how to not piss people off! I almost got lost trying to find the exit...it was a little silly.
I decided then to go to the Centre Pompidou to go to the library, but of course I forgot that it's not open before noon, so I thought I'd do my grocery shopping and write this blog. I'm working on uploading the pictures from MSM but of course I have almost 200 so it's taking a little while. I guess I should try to make it to the library this afternoon and I can take as much time as I want, so I guess I'll end the blog for now.

La visite medicale et toujours la greve!

So I wanted to explain the strike a bit better, I got a 'Appel a la Greve' in my mailbox this morning at Louis Issaurat (among other things I got in the mailbox...urgh) and it explains all the details about why everyone's striking. Basically, Sarkozy's trying to impose a law that seems mostly to affect people who work for a salary. He's trying to make them work for longer (usually they work 37.5 years, he's trying to extend it to 40), and he's also reducing their pensions depending on when they retire - it's worse if you retire at 60 than at 65, but even those who retire at 65 will have their pensions reduced, according to this new law. He's also trying to reduce military pensions. Evidently he's also trying to reduce the number of people on salary by 22,000 by 2008, which includes 11,200 people in education - and making up for it by having teachers work in more than one school, etc. The strike is also against the privatisation of Social Security, which is what Sarko's all about (and for students, it's against the privatisation of universities - he's trying to make at least some schools private). There's also an addition on this sheet that I got from the school that it's against his immigration policies and the deportation of individuals who don't have their papers. So it seems like a broad range of complaints against Sarkozy, but it has really been a large-scale strike, and people don't really seem to want to back down.

Yesterday, I waited for a metro to Creteil for 45 minutes before I gave up. Line 8 (which is the one I take to Creteil) seems to be having a lot of problems - I think it's the ones that extend furthest into the banlieue which are the most affected. Anyway, I didn't want to get stuck out there and miss my class. So I stayed home and got some work done, and then I walked to Censier for class - it turns out that the walk is nice and probably about as long as the bus ride! As for today, I really had to make it to Creteil, and the metro was really, really packed. It's usually busy, but this time it was unbelievable. I waited about 25 minutes this morning before a train came, and then I got to Louis Issaurat and found out that my medical visit for my carte de sejour was...this afternoon! In Montrouge! (They received the fax on Tuesday, and I just got it this morning!) I wouldn't have been so stressed out about it except for the strike! I went to one class, the 6e, who chose their American names, they were so excited about it, and then I left! I waited about 20 minutes for the metro this time, and it was really kind of scary because it was so full, I thought I wasn't going to be able to get out! Luckily I did, I got home, grabbed my passport and every document about anything ever, and then had to head to Montrouge.

If you're looking at a map of Paris, Montrouge is basically south central suburb, right outside of the city (literally, you cross the peripherique and you're in Montrouge), but I didn't want to take the 13 line, which is closer to there, because I didn't want to have to change trains, so I walked to St Michel to take the 4 line to Porte d'Orleans, which is still in Paris but on the way to Montrouge, and man, it was a loooooong walk. It was much longer than I thought it would be. Luckily I got a train right away, and I made it to Montrouge without getting lost, though I walked about 2 miles before I found the ANAEM (the place for the medical visits). And of course, the visit took about 30 minutes, I got special treatment for being a TA...it was kind of weird to have a medical visit in French. I had to read alphabet eye charts, and I was so scared she was going to think I couldn't see because I mixed up letter sounds! And I had to get a chest x-ray (they let me keep it!!!!) and then I had to do my blood pressure - respirez, soufflez (breathe in, breathe out), and I had to talk about vaccinations...she asked me if I had had my vaccinations, I didn't know which ones she was talking about but I'm assuming I had them all before I came to school. Either way, I got some stuff stamped, got authorized to work, and was out around 2. I took a bus back to the metro, and I got back to Paris fine, I stopped by ILPGA to see about the Finnish class (Verena had texted me earlier to say that it was cancelled, but then she wasn't sure), and I talked to some dudes from my class and they said that it was cancelled and also told me where to find the bus. They were nice, I was excited. Anyway then I came back, went to ACCENT to copy EVERYTHING so that I can go to the prefecture on Monday (though I don't have a real attestation d'hebergement so they might not accept me yet) and then I got some Photomaton pictures done (they are so bad, of course), and now I'm ready to go to the prefecture...hopefully things go fine!!!

Sasha came over for dinner - Elly, Hannah, and Cecile were also supposed to come but they couldn't get transportation and didn't want to get stuck, so they didn't, which is fine cause I'll see them tomorrow anyway. I had a really nice time with Sasha, she updated me on everything, and things seem to be going well for her. I went to the Marche at Aligre earlier today and got some veggies, so I made a nice salad with some good dressing...I even broke down and bought some buffalo mozarella from this Italian dude who's at the market, so I put it on my salad, basalmic vinaigrette dressing with garlic, it was really awesome. Now I have a massive amount of really good lettuce in my fridge, I hope I can eat it all before it goes bad!

So anyway, that's my life from the past two days, I am looking forward to a little vacation tomorrow to Mont Saint Michel. I'l definitely be posting about that, probably Sunday, so keep your eyes out, and until then...la greve continue!!!

BONNE GREVE!

Starting at 8 tonight is what hopefully promises to be a huge strike by the SNCF (train system), RATP (Paris transport system), and pretty much everyone else (some of the teacher from Victor Hugo are striking). It's set to be really big, but we'll see, some people think it'll be much smaller than has been forewarned. However, I will be experiencing it full force, since I'm set to go to Creteil tomorrow morning, and the banlieue are going to be the hardest to get into/out of. I just tried to connect to the RATP's website, where they're posting new information as soon as they have it, and there are already too many people on it! Luckily our professor let us out early tonight so we'd all make the last trains/busses home...and we didn't have our class in the middle of the day, so in fact my busiest day was probably my easiest for the week.

Saturday I went to see the rugby game on giant screens at the Champ de Mars (the big field in front of the Eiffel Tower, it sparkled during the game) with Elly and Hannah (and some random other people from Cordon Bleu, where Hannah goes - the cooking school). It was really fun, some random French dude sat with us and explained the game to me, which was nice. I couldn't see that well, but France was winning until about the last minute, when England scored a large number of points and won...thus ended the hope of a home team victory. On my walk home, I ran into Molly and Daryn and Carla (from AU, they're in Rome and Brussels and were visiting for the weekend...I didn't even know they were in Europe!) and they broke a bottle of wine on the sidewalk...

Sunday I mostly relaxed and did some work, my friend Verena from my Finnish class came over, it was very nice. We had tea, of course. Monday was another work day...I was going to go to the library for my history of rock class but then I discovered (thanks to Anne) that libraries are closed Mondays, and plus I got really confused as to where/what/who I was supposed to be looking for. So I went to dinner at Anne's instead, it was really fun. They made a cauliflower gratin that was delicious. Anne & Greg think I should go to the Pompidou Center's library because it's fairly easy to access the books and you don't have to get a card. I just don't know when it'll be possible if it's closed on the days I'm off, I guess we'll see.

Tuesday was an adventure at Victor Hugo again. I had some good kids in the morning, then I had to threaten some kids with 'I will not talk in class' because they were laughing at fart noises (but they were 12 or something, when it's still kind of okay to laugh at fart noises, and then someone actually farted, too...). Unfortunately I'm having a lot of trouble with the 3e European group, I guess because it's the last class of the day, they just never want to work and I choose to stay the extra hour so I can benefit them...I usually get one good (ish) group and one bad group, and the bad group made me so mad because I asked them to write their names on papers so I could read and learn them, and they just wrote nasty things in French (thank goodness they were things I knew or that could have been bad) and I just thought it was ridiculous that I was trying to do something nice to get to know them and they couldn't even respect that. I think I made one kid feel bad, I hope so. I guess I'm dealing with a different level of maturity than I'm used to, huh? At least I got to see a Finnish movie afterward, I went to the Finnish institute with Verena to watch this cool documentary about some kids who didn't do anything with their lives, I thought it was really well done. We're going again next week, and I'm really looking forward to it! It's a nice way to relax after being at Victor Hugo all day!

Today should have been really busy...but I had grammaire du texte this morning (I pleased Mme Le Coadic with one of the texts that I wrote!) and then my first European studies class was cancelled because the professor wasn't there, and the second one was short because of the strike. It turned out to be a good class, too.

So tomorrow should be interesting, I'm totally unsure of what I'll be doing because it all will depend on whether or not the metro runs and how often. Hopefully I'll be able to post tomorrow with some pictures of the strike, and I'll try to get a more complete idea of why they're striking (I know partially, I just want to see how big it is and who actually gets involved). So, until tomorrow...BONNE GREVE!!!!

Minä en ole ulkona!

More pictures of Creteil: the Palais de Justice and the area where Louis Issaurat is

Yay, not a whole week in between posts this time! I'm quite proud of myself, really. I would have posted sooner, but I had to fend off a nasty cold earlier this week. I seem to have beaten it, let's hope I don't speak too soon! I'm pretty sure the entire city of Paris has been sick either this week or last week, so no wonder.

Tuesday I went to Victor Hugo, I swear that school is going to wear me out. They really think they're better than Louis Issaurat but those kids are so bad! I tried to talk about Thornton Wilder for a 3e, because they're learning about Shakespeare, but they didn't understand and would not listen at all, I was so frustrated. Later I had to yell at kids, like really kind of yell, in French, because they wouldn't listen and they don't think I'm serious or that I can do anything. In every class there are some kids who really stand out or at least who make the effort, but the other ones really hinder everyone else. I guess it's like that everywhere, but it's very frustrating, especially when you're not quite a teacher and they don't think they owe you the same respect...not that they really respect the teachers either...the day was okay there, I was with 3 6e classes, and I like them, they're still young and not adolescent jerks yet.Oh, and Mme Tejerina got piiiiiissed off because Mme Bluteau took me for both her 6e classes, even though the week before I was with Mme Tejerina's class (they have a weird Semaine A/Semaine B thing where the schedules change) and in front of her class in French she expressed her severe dislike for Mme Bluteau, it was...well, it seemed very inappropriate to me to say that in front of a class. But hey, I'm just the assistant, who am I to comment on in-school politics.

Wednesday was great, except for the sick thing, I had three classes and they all went well. I finally understand the grammar stuff Mme Le Coadic was explaining to us (thank goodness, I can't handle not understand grammar, no matter what language it is), and then I had falafel for lunch in the Sorbonne neighborhood. It was cheap and they gave me tea while I waited! Then I had my Euro classes, and they were both good, I talked in the identities one! We had to research Flemish authors, and she was randomly calling on people (though almost no one did it) and she called on me, and I had answers, she was pleased. It was kind of exciting. :-) The other Euro class was also fun, the professor's kind of wacky but I like him. He makes fun of the US a lot, I mean like the Bush administration, normal stuff you make fun of about the US.

Thursday I went to Louis Issaurat in the morning, I had four classes, and they were generally good. One was a 3e with Mme Ruze, they were great and almost everyone talked. Then I had Mme Kerkouri's class (she's the one who also works at Victor Hugo) and they were kind of bad. I don't think they're as bad as the kids at Victor Hugo but she thinks they are worse...weird, I thought generally they weren't too bad, or at least not worse. Anyway then I had Mme Michel's two 4e classes, and they were fine. One was better than the other, but they were generally okay kids. I'm going to just take groups of kids, like the better halves of classes for the higher forms, and work with them. There are some kids in Mme Michel's classes that can express themselves decently in English, one girl was telling me how she has played the violin for ten years and was asking me about playing clarinet, it was really impressive. I'm looking forward to working with smaller groups of kids there and really getting to know them better. Thursday night was histoire du rock, it's such a funny class for me. There was a French Canadian girl sitting behind me talking to a French girl, and her accent was SO funny, I was really excited. I still didn't introduce myself to the professor, I think it might be too late now...

Today has been great so far, I think I'll like Fridays a lot even if they start at 6 a.m. I was so excited to wake up and feel well that I didn't even mind this morning! (Though I did go to bed around 10 last night...) I had Mme Schaller's 6e in the morning, I took half the class for 30 minutes and the other half for the other 30. I really like them, they're a bit rowdy, but they want to learn and generally pay attention. They are excited to choose American names, one kid already wants to be Kobe Bryant and I'm sure the others are going to choose names like that too. Actually, they are learning nationalities, it's really interesting because they have lots of questions about it because they were all born in French, so their nationality is French, but their parents aren't French, so they have a different origin. So I got to teach them 'my nationality is French, but my origin is whatever,' which isn't really a good way to say that but it was the simplest thing I could think of. I've got kids whose origins are Moroccan, Algerian, Congolese, Guadeloupean, Martiniquean (are those the proper adjectives, does anyone know?), Portuguese, Sri Lankan...I think that was all. But for me it was so cool to see how they expressed that and that it was important to know exactly how to say it in English (considering that they're from 10 and a half to 13 - and yes, I did have to teach them 10 and a half). Anyway the other class I had today was really good again, we talked about the United States and this one guy knew all the cities and where everything was and I was impressed, because most of the kids didn't even know there were 50 states, or what a state was. It's apparently really confusing to have states and cities that aren't the same thing.

This afternoon I tried to eat grape leaves from the Greek place for lunch but they were frozen, it was so disappointing, I had to wait until after Finnish. Finnish was awesome (how can an hour and a half of Finnish not be awesome?) and we learned all about introducing ourselves and how to say 'I am not outside' (hense the subject line). I think I'm going to hang out with Verena (the nice German girl in my Finnish class) on Sunday, that should be fun. I think that even if I don't learn that much grammatically in this class I'm definitely going to be able to speak better...or at all. I will really have the chance to (finally) remember these things and maybe be comfortable speaking a little in real life. We'll see, I still love having the class.

Tomorrow France plays England in the rugby semi-final, I'm probably going to watch it on a big screen at the Hotel de Ville with Elly. I hope France wins, just so the city will go totally crazy again! As for tonight, I haven't decided if I should have one more night in to make sure I'm well or if I should try to do something more interesting, we'll see. Bon, a tout a l'heure - nakemiin!

Class, Nuits Blanches, Salon Zen...La Vie Parisienne!

Huge apologies for taking such a long time to post a blog about the week! It's just kind of been one things after another, but in a good way, I think. So here is what's about to be the longest post in the history of Blogger, I hope it doesn't become horrendously boring!!!

I guess I'll start with Wednesday, which was my first day of real classes. In the morning I had Grammaire du Texte, my only MICEFA class, with Michele Le Coadic (who I had in September, too) and honestly I think it'll be the hardest class. I mean, I don't even know what to call half the things we talked about, we're picking apart Rousseau and Dumas grammatically. Cecile and I tried to do the homework last night and failed at a good chunk of it...the Grammar Queen seems to have found a grammar that is a true challenge...anyway hopefully the class will progress and I'll start to understand more what exactly is going on. After the class I had to go pick up my student card from MICEFA (FINALLY!!!) Then I ran to Censier, where I have my European studies classes. The first one is 'La construction culturelle des identites nationales en Europe' and my professor is Svetla Moussakova, I think maybe she's originally Bulgarian. It should be an interesting class, she talked for a while about what it means to be in the 'European studies' program and then the bibliography, but I think overall it'll be a neat class. Actually there was an adventure beforehand because we didn't have a room, but eventually we sort of took one over. It's a huge class, and there are only about 10 French people - it's mostly other Europeans and one other MICEFA girl whose name I think is Kristen (who is also in Grammaire du Texte). The I had to kill 2 hours, I should have gone home...but I stayed on the campus and read, and I also called ILPGA to see about registering for the Finnish class, and the mean guy tried to tell me the class was really full and he wasn't sure if I could be in it, that I would have to go see the secretary first before going to class (even though class was at 8:30 in the morning on Thursday). So I was still freaking out about that class at that point, but I had to go to 'The EU and its nations, 1815-1914' which is taught by Professor Delauney, who tries to speak slowly but gets really excited about Clausewitz and Hegel and then...well let's just say note-taking is a real adventure in the class! But I think those Euro classes will both be really interesting!

Thursday morning I decided to go to the Finnish class anyway, even though I hadn't seen the secretary and the guy told me not to come, I really didn't want to miss the first class. We were all waiting outside for it to start, and then we went in and...they changed the time! Now it's on Friday afternoons at 2! At first I didn't know at all what to do, because of course I really, really wanted to take the course, but I'm supposed to be working on Friday afternoons. I decided to go ahead and register, and I called Mme Michel from Louis Issaurat - luckily she picked up the phone - and she told me to go ahead and register, that we'd fix the schedule so I can come in on Thursday mornings too. So I gave the secretary my student card, told her I only wanted to take the Finnish class, and she put me in there in 2 seconds, no problem. Thanks, mean dude. Oh well, at least I'm registered! Anyway then I had to go to my training for work, unfortunately I got there almost on time. Gosh, it was pretty much the most useless thing I've done in a long time. It was done by two English teachers, the guy was nice enough but I didn't really like the lady. They just kind of lectured to us about how we should teach, so I didn't find it very useful, and no one could really pay attention...they sort of tried to have us work in groups but couldn't agree on what we should do, so they just didn't. They also asked us what 'authentic' stuff we brought...one girl said she brought stuff she had gotten from a teaching store, and they said that wasn't authentic...and I said I brought children's books and they told me French students don't read aloud, that is completely useless, did you read aloud when you were in school? And I said, why, yes, we read aloud through high school. Thankfully some other kids came to my rescue and said they had seen kids doing it in their schools here, and the lady got mad because 'they're not supposed to be doing that' - thanks, lady, becaues you run the world. And what they consider 'authentic' is worksheets with maps of the UK 'Patrick is from Northern Ireland, color in the shamrock and paste it on his shirt.' (not kidding). I'm supposed to go to another one but it's on a Friday at the same time as my Finnish class, so I really can't go to it...I might even lie and say I have a test...

Thursday night I had my History of Rock class, I think it's really going to be cool. I'm pretty sure I might be the only American in it, which is cool, the professor is Olivier Julien and he's a little dude who apparently knows a lot about music. We are going to focus on music in the 50s and on, and more how 'musique populaire' (which isn't popular music, it's more like 'grassroots' music) influenced mainstream culture and the mainstream music industry. We're only going to talk about the US and the UK, and last class we talked mostly about jazz and R&B and 'country-western' music from the 50s in the US, I think this week is going to be some more about mainstream stuff because 1954 is when Elvis Presley signed to Sun Records, and we're talking about record labels and everything too. The only problem for the class is that I can't understand the English words he says...like when he was talking about 1954 I totally didn't have a clue he was talking about Elvis, I had to read it on someone else's paper!!!!

Friday I went over to Creteil again to go to Louis Issaurat, and it really went well. I only had two classes, but I was so impressed by both of them. One was a 6eme with Aude Schaller (she's really young!) and they were so well behaved, and while they didn't know much, they were excited to have me there. They were also REALLY well behaved, they actually listened when she said to be quiet...anyway then I had 2 hours free, but I met with Mme Michel and we went all over and met important people and made my schedule for Thursday mornings and everything. Then I went to class with Mme Philippeau, who for some reason I thought might be kind of a push-over, but man, that was the best class I've seen yet. They were SO well-behaved, and the way they interacted was really awesome. They had English 'names' like we used to do in French class, and when someone said something wrong the other students corrected it, but they ALL participated, except for one kid. I was really amazed, they really knew what was going on and what was being asked of them, instead of usually when you feel like half the class is fine but the other half has no clue what's going on. I am really looking forward to working with them, and also to Thursday when I get to meet the other classes at Louis Issaurat.

I was so exhausted by Friday, but I had made plans to hang out with Elly and Cecile, so they came over with Hannah (Elly's roommate) and we made 'Mexican' food... we used red beans and some kind of Dutch cheese, but it turned out great! We had beans, corn, green pepper, I made rice, we had some guacamole and really the WORST salsa I've ever had in my life, but it was really nice. Then we watched the end of Stick It, which I had started with Elly, and we drank a bunch of wine (now I have like 4 bottles on my counter because I haven't recycled them yet, let's just hope no one from ACCENT comes by!). I'm glad they came, we had a nice time, even if I was really tired.

On Saturday Sasha asked me to come to Defense, but since I was kind of just there and I really wasn't feeling great by Friday night I decided to sleep in instead, since Anne had already invited me to dinner. So I slept late Saturday and spent the afternoon on the phone, really, and then I went to Anne's at 8. I took them some flowers because I keep going over there for dinner empty-handed, I got some chamomiles and some purple stuff, it was really pretty. Jean-Francois and his really cool friend Ariane came, we had pasta and really nice pear cake, it was great. Then we went to the Tuileries to meet Greg's friend Sophie, who's an art student somewhere in Paris. I discovered that Ariane is a HUGE Radiohead fan, so we basically talked about how amazing Radiohead is all night, Apparently she went to Oxford and saw his house, she said she'd give me the address. :-) It was really cool to walk around there, I mean there were a ton of people but some artist had set up all these clay pots (like for potted plants) and they all had fire in them (good thing Mom and Allie weren't there!) and they were in huge balls or arcs all around the edges of the gardens. It was so beautiful reflecting in all the ponds throughout the walk from Concorde to Louvre. Then unfortunately Jean Francois and Ariane had to go because they had to take the RER, but we were walking to the Marais and came upon some exhibition where an artist had taken photos of bodybuilders and put old people's faces on them, as a commentary on people wanting to stay young...it was really awesome, also because it was projected onto a church. In fact most of the churches were part of art exhibits, later in the Marais there was another one...so we watched that for a while, and then we went for a drink in the Marais. It was cool because the whole way there we just kept coming across different things, people playing drums, art stuff, whatever. We tried to take the Noctilien back to Bastille from there, but it never came, so we ended up walking (me, Anne, and Greg) which wasn't really bad, but it was 3 a.m. before I got back. Needless to say I slept till 10 before I went to Mme Bluteau's on Sunday!

So Sunday I went to Champigny-sur-Marne for lunch with Mme Bluteau (from Victor Hugo), she lives there with her 2 sons, Etienne (12, I think) and Adrien (15). It's really, nice, she think it's too far from Paris, but it's right next to the Marne (hence...sur-Marne) and there are a lot of really cute houses, really typically French. It was a great meal, we had an aperitif (yes, for lunch!) and she made ratatouille (apparently the first choice when it comes to cooking for vegetarians! I'm actually enjoying it, though, even with eggplant. It's all so mixed together...) and we had quetche tart for dessert. I think it took 3 hours for all that, then we walked around the Marne for an hour, which was really pretty, and then we had tea. Either way, she didn't take me back to the RER till 6 p.m.! It was really nice to get to know her outside of school, she's really a nice and interesting person. We spoke mostly French but also some English when we were talking about some English language things. It was good for me to talk with Adrien a little, and to hear him talk (Etienne's really shy, he didn't say much), because he speaks a really 'young' French, it was cool. They were both really excited about France beating New Zealand on Saturday night (everyone pretty much just drove through the city honking for joy...), and it's cool because Mme Bluteau's into it too. She also let me borrow some French novels, and when I go home for Christmas, I'm going to get a few for her in English. It was really nice of her to have me over, I'm glad I got to know her better.

Then Cecile came and we failed at much of our homework...but it was fun anyway, we did well on some of it. Then today I ended up going with Anne and Jean Francois to this 'Salon Zen' thing, it was like a huge conference for 'zen,' so there was information about yoga, health, natural stuff, organic food, that kind of thing. We were there for a long time, but it was so interesting. I got a plant that grows without water or dirt, it's magic and it kind of looks like a wacky mohawk. I also got some essential oils because, well, they smell amazing. I got lavendar and rosemary, they do sort of the opposite thing. Rosemary's supposed to help you focus when you study, and of course lavendar is there to relax you. But I already used a little of the rosemary today when I got back and kind of had a lot to do for tomorrow, and I think it might have helped. We also ate lunch there, I had a sandwich thing with spinach, lentils, and feta, it was on a flat bread with sesame seeds, all organic and really yummy. We also met this lady how made butters, like almond butter, but also quinoa butter, which was so amazingly interesting. I wasn't sure if I'd eat a whole jar of it, though. Also, we sat down for a long time with the essential oils lady, so I got to learn a lot about a looot of different scents. And it was really neat practice for my French, talking to a bunch of zen hippy ladies, really. Actually it was funny because it was really very hippy, but of course not like a hippy crowd in the US, it was a very well-dressed, Parisian hippy crowd. Anyway while it took up most of my day when I should have been studying, it was a really awesome time and of course it's so fun to hang out with Anne and Jean Francois. So now I'm going to go read for a few hours. Next time I won't wait a whole week to write a post!

Bienvenue a Creteil!

Sorry, the only picture I have of Creteil that is horizontal is of the church!

Today was my first day of work!!!! I went to Victor Hugo at 8 this morning; I even took the bus to the school because I was scared of being late. Luckily when they say class starts at 8h20 they really mean 8h20; I was actually early. I got to talk to Mme Tejerina, the one English teacher they didn't have me working with, and I planned on going to one of her classes in the afternoon; apparently there's some in-school politics with her and Mme Bluteau, the woman who makes my schedule. And apparently Mme Tejerina wants me to come on Monday afternoons to work with one of her classes, it was Mme Bluteau who told me this and she didn't sound too happy about it. More on that later....
The first class I went to was a 3e (so the last grade in college) with Amel Kerkouri, the young, really nice professor. She told everyone that I only spoke English, so I had to pretend I didn't understand them, which was really difficult. I introduced myself and let them ask me questions. They're doing a unit on Shakespeare, so I think for next week I'm going to bring in some information about an American playwright (at first I was like, Oh, Tennessee Williams, but even 16-year-olds shouldn't be reading that in a classroom...) and I think it'll probably be Thornton Wilder, because can you honestly go wrong with 'Our Town,' ever? Anyway I liked that class pretty well, and I met some of them at the end of the day, too...
The second class was with Mme Bluteau, it was a 4e and they were so incredibly enthousiastic that they spent the entire hour asking me questions, and eventually they discovered my real age, that I have 10 piercings and some tattoos, and that I have a boyfriend. Persistent little buggers...but they were asking me in English, and with proper grammar, how could I lie? no, really, they were cool, and a couple of them found out I speak 'some' French, so I talked to them in French too. I really feel like the ones who are interested in getting to know me are going to get an American culture lesson even speaking French...I'll be able to speak better because I don't have to use a child's vocabulary and speak so slowly, and I know that they understand. I mean, I do want them to speak in English, but if they want to know things about be and ask me in French, I'm not going to not tell them just because they can't ask in English. When we get to the point that I can explain to them how to ask things in English, I'll do that, but for the first day, I'd rather they didn't think I was a monglotic idiot.
Anyway the third class I went to was definitely my least favorite of the day, it was the 3e C with Mme Bluteau. They were rude to her and to me and just were not interested in listening or doing work or anything, and later Mme Bluteau confided in me that she isn't very fond of them either. :-)
Then I meant to go to Amel's class at 11:30, but I couldn't find her, so they sent me to the teacher's union meeting...they're thinking about striking on the 18th of October, I'm not sure why because I don't know any of the laws or regulations they were talking about and I also don't know the abbreviations...so it was kind of hard to follow, but still cool. I kind of hope they strike while I'm here - not so I don't have to work, but so I can go block up a petrol station for something that I'm sure I'll eventually understand.
Mme Bluteau invited me to her house on Sunday for lunch, it's only one RER stop past Creteil and by then I'll have 3 zones on the carte orange, so I'm definitely going to go. I'm really excited, I think it'll be good to get to know some of the teachers outside of school, since I'm kind of autonomous from them. I mean, I work with them, but I can kind of follow my own path according to where the kids are most interested. So it should be cool to get to know her a bit better, she seems really nice, and I know she has one 12-year-old son, I hope I get to meet him.
Then I had lunch and talked to someone who I think is the physics teacher, some nice guy who apparently lives on my street. Afterwards, I had class with Mme Kanoute, a 5e (so I kind of just introduced myself and then let her have class, they are still learning 'Are you from Ireland? Yes, I am Irish' and stuff like that). She seems to have most control over her students...she's the only one who can make them be quiet and listen, thank goodness one of them can.
At 3 I went with Mme Tejerina, I guess it's a 3e because I saw some of them with the European section at the end of the day. Some of them were really pretty good, and some of them didn't seem to know anything or really care either. For her I think I am going to do a little presentation about DC history, because she really likes DC and some of the kids have studied it a bit. I'm not sure how I feel about her, she seems to be a big Sarko fan and doesn't like immigrant parents who don't speak French...I totally led her on for a bit and she told me she supports building a wall on the US-Mexican border and that she was scared of the Black people at Union Station last time she was in the US...I'm sort of thinking I know why Mme Bluteau isn't her biggest fan. Anyway I'm not sure it was totally appropriate to write that publicly but it's really interesting for me because honestly I think it will reflect on how she treats her students...
Anyway the end of the day, I took a break at 4 because I had too many hours, so I went and hung out with the awesome secretary whose name I can't seem to remember, who filled out my forms like an awesome person so I can get paid. She's totally great and helpful, yesterday at the orientation for TA's they told us to become good friends with the secretaries, she seems to like me well enough, so I think I'm in luck.
Finally at 5 I went to Mme Kanoute again because she's got the European section, and I think they're the ones who will benefit most from talking to me because their English is most 'advanced' anyway (it's kind of relative) but they were really not enthusiastic...they had read a text about William Wallace and had to read sentences they wrote about it. So by the end, I was with one small group, and I just kind of let them ask me stuff (half in English, half in French) because it was all about what I did and liked in the US, it's cultural enough for the first day. Some of them had been in Amel's class in the morning and they were really shocked when they found out I spoke French, it was kind of great. They were good kids, just a little trouble focusing at 5:30 in the evening, that is a long freakin day!
Overall I think it went well, they seemed to be interested enough in having me there and hopefully the things I have ideas about are interesting enough for them. I think a US history lesson will be good, especially DC history and WV history (because most of them don't really realize WV is not just the western part of Virginia....like most good Americans), and some random other things too, like some rock music and maybe some of those kids' books. Hopefully this Thornton Wilder thing will be interesting and not completely useless. :-)
tomorrow starts classes, and apparently my student card will be ready, but honestly I don't think there will be time for me to get it and go register at ILPGA. Hopefully I'll have really great things to post about tomorrow!!!!