Off To School

I've been here for going on four months, and haven't written a post about work yet. Oh where to start?

I work at Jean Jacques Rousseau ecole primaire (elementary school) in a suburb northwest of Paris called Saint Ouen l'Amoune. I work Monday, Tuesday and Thursday for 12 hours a week, but it takes me an hour and a half to get from my apartment to work. Also, the French take a two hour lunch from 11:30 to 1:30. So, I'm there for about six hours a day.

To get to work, I have a five minute walk to the metro stop, Bastille, take line one to Gare de Lyon, transfer to line 14 to go to Gare Saint Lazare. From there I catch a 45 minute train at 9:27 towards Pontoise, and finally have a ten minute walk to school to arrive at 10:20 a.m. So, I leave my apartment at 8:45 a.m. and get home at 6 p.m. to teach roughly three hours a day plus an hour of prep.

The school it self is rather small and only has seven classes for ages 7-11, and a pre-school for the little munchkins. The students, ages 5-11, are always excited to see me and eager to learn. The teachers on the other hand are not a basket of rainbows and sunshine.

Learning how to teach a class of 25 or explain a lesson plan in English and French or prepping lesson plans has not been the challenge-- working with the teachers has been the hardest part of this job. They're cold, non-communicative and absent. They're not the friendliest sort to work with, they have no problem forgetting to inform me of changes, canceled classes or that I exist in general, and they pretend to not understand my French when I'm telling them something they don't want to hear.

They're also extremely rude to the children. Some of their lest harsh teaching skills would have most teachers from America fired and with a lawsuit on their hands. They scream and yell at the children when they're noisy; they grab them by their shirts when one is talking out of line or misbehaving; call them unintelligent; and make them stand in the back corner of the classroom, facing the wall, as a punishment...just to name a few.

All and all they terrify me and trying to speak with them is near impossible with my nervous, stumbling French. So, I sit in the library, blissfully alone, reading books and doing lesson plans during my three and half hour breaks.

Paris is...Paris

Over the holiday break, I had tons of people asking me how it was to live in Paris, and not too many were thrilled when I told them it was hard.

Paris has this blown up image that it is some magical place that when you come here there will be nothing but butterflies and unicorns dancing you down the street. But it's not like that.

Paris is like any other big city-- there are too many people, dirty streets, crowded public transportation and sketch balls.

It doesn't make the daily three hour commute to work any more special, the blistering cold wind any easier to tolirate, four room mates in a two bedroom apartment a picnic in July or the creep who stole your phone or touched himself while looking at you on the metro your best friend.

Paris is...well...just Paris.

And don't get me wrong, it does have many positives to it: the history, culture, food, language and much more. But that doesn't mean everyday I've spent here has been a royal ball with glass slipper and all. It has been a huge learning experience into what I want out of life and where I want to be. It has been a challenge, not a vacation.

Catch Up

So, I'm a little behind on my blogs lately...After my last it has
been a whirlwind of activities--here's the low down:

My boyfriend, Nick, came to visit me for two weeks in the end of
November, beginning of December. He surprised me with a very romantic proposal on the kissing bridge, which has the tradition on Valentines day of couples going, kissing and locking a padlock with their names on it to the bridge. I had told him about the bridge (but not about the tradition) and asked him to bring a padlock. It was a surprise what it was for. So, that morning I wrote our initials on it with the date we started dating and the current date. I left the other side blank for him. When we got to the bridge, I offered him the lock to write something on it and went to kiss him. While we were kissing he wrote "will you marry me?" and hooked the ring onto the bridge with the padlock. I went to look at it, looked at him and said "Are you kidding me?!" He was down on one knee, and an American couple was yelling,"OMG!" I said, "Of course."

We also went to Oslo, Norway (his country of origin) for a weekend; where we learned that yes, it is the most expensive city in the world, but also very clean and beautiful. He also helped me and my room mates host a Thanksgiving dinner here-- where for many Frenchies, it was their first.

Two weeks after he left, I returned home for the holidays after almost three months of being away. During those two weeks we managed to squeeze in a plethora of activities.

It decided to snow in Paris two days before I was supposed to leave. So, when it was time for my plane to sore off into the great blue skies towards Amsterdam...we were delayed on the tarmac for two hours because the weather had caused some mechanical thing to freeze.
By the time we landed in Amsterdam, my connecting flight to Portland was taking off...without me on board. I thus began the fight for a flight home with a few thousand other stranded people. I was lucky, I only had to wait in line for a few hours to talk with a flight agent. They first rescheduled me for a flight for the next day that wouldn't get me home till after five p.m. west coast time and three hours after our engagement party would have started. The news of that caused me to lose my cool, and I started to cry. After explaining the situation, she told me I had the option to go on stand-by for a flight to Vancouver B.C. and then a flight to Seattle. She offered to hold my flight for the next day too, so I had nothing to lose.

I held a three hour vigil at the gate while on stand-by along with 25 other people. Somehow, I was the first one to get a ticket on the flight. So after about six hours of what would have been into my original flight home, I boarded a plane-- thinking the worst was over.

When we landed in Vancouver B.C., I got to go through American costumes because I was taking an immediate flight to Seattle. Well I was delayed there because I didn't have the next boarding pass and couldn't get through security. Once they managed to get that for me, I was delayed at customs because one of my bags was missing and they wouldn't let me through without it. After sitting for a half-an-hour (I had an hour layover, and had already been delayed at security for 20mins) they managed to get me a missing bag report and let me through. Even though I ran thirty gates, I still missed the last flight to Seattle.

Next step? No, not a hotel. Mission get on U.S. soil.

Nick was already on his way to the SeaTac airport, and I didn't want to wait another night. In Canada if you are over 21 you can rent a car, and that's exactly what I did. It was a little tricky cause I would be crossing the boarder and then needed to be 25. So, I had to pay an underage fee for that, and going across the boarder was interesting too. The agent was a little curious as to why: first, I was driving from Canada and second didn't have any luggage after being in Paris for three months.

By the time I met Nick in Blaine, Washington at the International Motel-- I had been traveling for 26 hours, had been in four different countries and crossed four different customs. Also, ended up going to four different airports: Paris, Amsterdam, Seattle and Portland (had to stop at SEA and PDX to look for my luggage).

Even though my luggage was lost for five days and getting home was a challenge, I had a wonderful holiday vacation. We celebrated our engagement, had four Christmases with all our families, learned how to snowboard and had New Year's with friends.

Coming back to Paris was definitely a challenge for me. It's hard to leave family and loved ones so soon.