End of an Era.

So today I finished my first term's worth of lessons as an English Language Assistant.

My 3em in the morning were a bloody nightmare, like usual. We were talking about the enthralling topic of 'health' so I thought I would win them over with some risqué video clips. And, granted, they did find Supersize v. Superskinny and Man v. Food disgusting, each in their own unique way (i.e. gross amounts of person v. gross amount of food). However the shock / attention-grabbing factor of me showing them such clips was severely undermined by the teacher showing them an extract of Supersize Me before they had their half hour with me. So far my novelty value + doing something more interesting than the half hour with the teacher (usually consisting of grammar and being told off for chatting) had won me some brownie points. Not today. 3em, if ever the phrase 'drawing blood from a stone' is to be used aptly, it is in your classes.
Actually, I take it back for some of you. One particularly smart boy was able to explain the point of the first programme from just a short extract (no mean feat at all), and another piped up with the word 'anorexic' before I had started to pull my hair out. That's the depressing thing about teaching. There are actually quite a lot of good kids in that class, but they are over-shadowed by the bad behaviour of certain individuals...

However I like to keep these blog posts fairly upbeat and humorous, so I shall move on to how I ended my day:

Namely with my gorgeous, cute, enthusiastic bundles of joy in 4em. Like usual they won my Favourite Class of the Week Award. In the first lesson we were acting dialogues between fussy customers and waiters (they found it particularly amusing when one girl protested that I was not performing, and I proceeded to act both roles on my own in what I like to think was a rather Michael McIntyre-esque fashion...). In the second, we talked about Hallowe'en and they all watched my PowerPoint, enraptured at what I had cobbled together last night in twenty minutes. What I found particularly cute was that when one of the more fidgety/chatty boys started talking another boy got especially upset and told him (in English) to 'shut your face!!'. I probably should have told him off for using such language, but was too flattered by how much he clearly cared about what I was saying.

Note to self: research French translations for words before I include them in lesson plans. Far too many times have I asked for a translation, only to have the same word with a French accent thrown back at me (golf, sport, endurance, calories, vampires, costume, even Hallowe'en which I should probably have seen coming...)

So that's the end of that then. Until 12th November.

To be honest, I am in desperate need of a holiday. I'm glad I only ended up doing three weeks of proper lessons to start off. Six weeks of lessons after the vacances de Toussaint is going to be a trial. The next two weeks of PAID holiday (hah! to anyone spending the Year Abroad at university) are going to be spent exploring this region of France further with my parents and younger brother for a few days, before returning to good old Britain and then heading off down to EXETER!!!!  A thoroughly exciting social calendar has been planned and will be enforced. Watch Out.

The end of another era comes in the form of accommodation. After meeting the charming Kyann and friendly Christel they have decided that I am not a freak, my average French is something they can survive with, and that they are happy for me to live with them. I am going to be living with in an actual house!  So that'll all be happening in the next few days. To cap it off, Carla is moving out to rent a flat in the town centre, Alicia has moved to Paris to work as a surveillant (a role in a school), and Carine won't be here for two months in the spring due to a work placement. So I'm sort of glad that I'll be moving out, as I can spend time with my new housemates and if all else goes to pot, watch horrific amounts of French TV, eating tarte tatin which I have made in my PROPER KITCHEN!! Such Fun.

Other eras coming to an end? Probably my regular pilgrimages to the boulangeries. I'm getting what I have semi-affectionately called 'pastry face'. It needs to stop. I am playing badminton three times a week here (keeno, right?!) and it's a half hour walk each way to school, but somehow I think it's not quite enough, given how my cheeks are now less like English roses, and more like French religieuses...


* (See left for a picture of a religieuse) These delicious edibles (essentially two profiteroles) are so called because they look like a nun AKA une religieuse.