Bonjour a tous!
Although I must admit, at 2:15 am on a Saturday morning, I am starting to get a little sleepy, I'd like to try to post one more blog entry before I go to sleep tonight, so that everyone will be fully caught up with what I've been up to this week. This will probably be a shorter entry, since I have already told you so much, and there's only so much I can talk about. And especially since this post is only about what I did on one day, which was today. Well, one day, and what I did last night after class.
Last night, Thursday, after class, I came home and took a brief nap, got up and made myself some dinner with what little food I had left around here, and then went to the internet cafe down the street for almost 3 hours. I tried to write the first 2 posts I made tonight together as one post, and after an hour or so of typing it out, tried to post it, only to have it fail. That was super frustrating. Anyways, I left the internet cafe a little before 11, when they closed, and came back to my apartment, to read or do something boring. But I decided that I would rather walk down my street and look for a decent bar than stay in and read. I get super stir-crazy when I'm stuck in this little apartment with no way to communicate with the outside world. So I walked all the way to the end of my street, probably a mile and a half or more, to where the Bastille monument is, which is like a smaller version of the area where the Eiffel Tower is, in terms of craziness. I even thought there was a carnival down there with games and stuff, but I think it was just a creperie. But there were even more people than are usually around my part of the street, so it was interesting to watch everything going on.
I started walking back and stopped in for a few pints at this Irish bar I found called Corcorans, which was fun. They DJ was mashing together American and British popular music from the past, and I was enjoying this bit of familiarity. I picked up a little journal with information about all of the English, Scottish, Australian, and Irish bars around Paris, and I may want to check some of them out, if only to find a Newcastle and watch some sports. Although, the beer I had at Corcoran's, called a Kilkenny's, I believe, was pretty similar to a Newcastle, so that made me happy. Also, the bartender told me that these types of bars are hugely popular in France, and among the French as well as the people who are of the nationality that the bar celebrates. I found this to be interesting. Anyways, I left at about 1 and walked home. I didn't want to get drunk, I just wanted to have a few pints and see what was going on around my neighborhood as far as good bars go. There were other once, but they seemed too be a little more "upscale" than what I was looking for, though who can really tell, since so many French people seem to try to dress as nicely as they can as often as they can. Anyways, moving on.
Today we only had class from 10am until 1pm, which will remain my schedule for the entirety of the class. This is a very nice way to end the week, and I know I will appreciate it more and more as the weeks start getting longer and more intense. In class, we had a quiz, which is only for our benefit, not for a grade, on what we have been going over so far this week as far as teaching methodology is concerned. For some reason, this morning I was totally out of it (I think the last of the jet lag was finally leaving my system), and the wording to all the questions confused me, but I shared a lot of my answers with the class, and my teacher said I was on the right track with everything. I must admit that I haven't been keeping up with the reading, but I will have lots of time this weekend to go over everything I have yet to read, which I plan on doing, now that I am caught up with all of my internet obligations. ;)
Also, to update the job situation and staying in France, the coordinator over here just wrote me another e-mail with resume and cover letter advice and forms, and she wants me to fill them out and send them to her, so she can help me with them. She also gave me a bunch of websites about the legalities of working in Paris and everything, which is very comforting. It's good to know that she is going to do everything she can do to help me realize my dream, and it's also a good feeling to know that I can begin working on finding a job now, instead of waiting until the class was over, and then spending up to another whole month looking for a job while staying in an apartment that is costing my dad a fortune. I am much more confident about this whole process now that Julie has proven to be so willing to help me, and such a good resource. It fills me with indescribable joy that my long ago abandoned dream is finally coming true, and that I seem to be turning into the person that I was always meant to be, and doing all of that self-actualizing psychobabble stuff. :)
So after the quiz, we talked about how the lessons that Helen, Brian, Sarah and I presented yesterday went, how we ourselves perceived them, any critiques our classmates had, etc. Then we watched videos on a bunch of different methods for teaching English to non-English speakers. I was a bit late to class today, as I took a different metro stop that Sarah said was closer and got a bit lost, but that's not why I was late, since I was allowing myself an hour to do internet stuff before class today, and planned on arriving an hour before class started, since it looked like my best chance to post blog updates would be at school. Luckily, that has proven to not be the case. Thankfully, Sonja was forgiving about that, but still...damned "crack book" is never a good reason to be late to class. She did get a little mad at Brian, Sarah, and I, however, when we took an extended coffee break in the garden, just talking about everything. But Sonja didn't remain mad at us the rest of the day, which was good. She doesn't seem to stay mad at people for very long, which is something I appreciate, but I still don't like upsetting her, which is something I have already done a few times. :\ Oh well. I think things will improve now that I don't feel so out of it any more.
So, after class, Sarah, Helen and I went to that Italian place I already told you all about where I got the delicious eggplant wrap with cheese and ham and marinara, and took it back to the garden outside of our school so we could eat and I could check my internet stuff some more, just in case I couldn't do that when I got home, and then Sarah left to go hang out with Michael, her boyfriend, and Helen went back home to nap. I totally sympathize, though...I could have had a nap myself, but Brian and I decided to do something much more fun, starting with an extra-special treat for me.
He took me somewhere that was on his way to school every day, albeit seemingly several miles from our school, which he said he knew I would enjoy immensely, since I seem to keep talking about how much of a nerd I am and have already been seen sporting Harry Potter t-shirts on two separate occasions in the week since I've been here. Enough suspense. He took me to a SUPER awesome Comic book shop, which I didn't even know existed in France. It was a little like Star Clipper in the loop, with a lot more than just comics: figurines of just about everything imaginable, plushes (they had angry birds), and all sorts of random stuff that was devoted to all things nerdy, like pac-man mugs and replica wands from almost all the characters in Harry Potter. I unfortunately couldn't find Ron Weasely's, but the rest of his family's were there, including Percy's. Let's just say I was in complete heaven, and it showed. Brian said I had the exact reaction he wanted me to have, and I simultaneously thanked him for showing me this place, and cursed him because I will probably spend a decent amount of time and money in this store...though of course, I will keep it within reason. If you are interested in looking it up on line, it is called "Album Comics."
I only bought one thing while there today, but I think it is a very practical purchase. I bought the first book of Scott Pilgrim in French, and even though I already own the whole set (or, two be fair, half of it) in English, I rationalized my purchase thusly: I am absolutely obsessed with Scott Pilgrim, and therefore, know the books almost line for line. Since I have it almost memorized, I figured it would help me improve my French, because I could just look at anything I didn't know and just remember what they say in the English version. But I cannot over-emphasize how excited I was that they had Scott Pilgrim in French. That totally blew my mind. I even asked the guy at the counter if Scott Pilgrim was well known in France ("Est-ce que les livres de Scott Pilgrim sont biens connues en France?") and he said that yes, they were. I am still happy about this fact.
Anyways, moving on. After that, Brian and I stopped in at a very pretty local church (though I don't remember what it was called), ignoring the beggars at the entrances and continuing inside briefly to look at the stained glass and take some pictures.
After that, we went to the Louvre for about an hour and a half. It was pretty cool, but I sort of found out how very specific my interest in art is by wandering around the Louvre for so long. For example, even though I said what I wanted to see the most were the paintings, I guess what I really meant was that I wanted to see newer, non-religious paintings, and paintings that I was familiar with. I did see La Jocund (The Mona Lisa), but I had already seen her once before, so it wasn't as big a deal as it could have been. I also did see a few that I recognized, but not very many. The huge, wall sized paintings were pretty cool, though. What I found myself to be really interested in, though I had no idea of this at first, was all of the Egyptian stuff we somehow stumbled upon. Sarcophaguses, artifacts, tablets with Hieroglyphics on them, etc. I was also very interested in all of the Medieval castle-looking structures that we found in the basement. I was even more interested, in retrospect, in all of the statues that we looked at first, even though I said at the time that I found them boring and just wanted to see some pretty pictures. ;) All in all, it was worth the 10 Euro admission price, and I will surely be back, hopefully to check out some of the paintings that I consider myself to be more interested in, and especially since we probably only saw 1/100th of what is in there.
I wanted to stop and talk about the weather briefly, in case anyone is interested. It is very variable, and strikes me kind of like St. Louis weather, with maybe a bit less humidity. Today, for example, was very hot, and people were sitting around the fountains outside the entrance to the Louvre with their legs in the water, to cool off. But this looked like common practice, since no one was stopping them. Today was another day that made me realize that I won't really have to do much extra exercise while here to stay in shape. Walking around for 5 hours with a 50+ pound backpack (I took my laptop to class to access the internet) will surely help me stay trim, and if I want to buff up, I will just do some push-ups and sit-ups. There is a gym just down the street, so apparently this is not strictly an American phenomenon (Tom, whoever else wanted to know about that), but I will be so busy with school the next few weeks that I don't think I'm going to worry about it until I have a job and am settled in and everything. After leaving the Louvre, Brian and I walked to the metro, where I stopped twice along the way. Once was so I could buy a cute print of the Eiffel Tower for only 2 Euro (It was between that or one of my favorite Art Nouveau prints, which I will probably purchase the next time I am out that way), and again for some ice cream, since I thought it would help my still-uneasy stomach. The good news was that it did help, and between the ice cream, the good dinner, and finally re-hydrating myself, I am happy to report that the sour stomach is totally gone.
After getting home, I napped a bit, went to the Monoprix for some groceries that will probably last me the whole week (I also finally bought a big bag to carry my groceries in...they charge you extra for plastic bags here), came home and made maybe the most delicious dinner I have ever made myself, and then spent the rest of the night updating this here blog and managing my Face book accounts and e-mail accounts. I think I did really well at the Monoprix though, and though I spent like 35 Euro, I will probably have food for the whole week, and therefore won't need to spend much more on eat-out food or more groceries until next weekend. I even brought a little notebook, wrote all the prices down, and tried to find the cheapest brand for everything I wanted. I felt like a grown-up in training. Haha!
Anyways, I should probably wrap this up so I can go to bed...tomorrow's plans include getting up in the early afternoon (probably), finally registering at the American Embassy, doing some laundry, typing out my resume and letter of interest for the on-site coordinator here, and then going to Batofar in the evening, to listen to some Funk, Soul, House, and Drum and Bass, apparently. Of course I will let you all know how it is, and I will probably take tons of pictures. I should say before I go that Batofar is more than a club, it's also a restaurant and a non-electronic concert venue. They even show movies there sometimes. It sounds really awesome, and I know that admission tomorrow night is free. Grosses bises a tous!
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