I finally made it to Toulouse today and it was jawesome. I was supposed to go there to meet up with a bunch of other teaching assistants, so I bought my ticket so that I would be there from noon to 5, only to check my email today and see that the meet-up was supposed to happen at 6:30. Great. Well anyway, I found the number of a girl I had been e-mailing with, Sam, who is placed in Tarbes but staying in Toulouse for the next few days. I called her as soon as I got off the train and she came and met me where I was and proceeded to spend the next 4 hours hanging out with me and showing me around the city, which was super nice since I just called her out of the blue, not know whether she may have had plans for the day or whatever. It turns out that she studied abroad in Toulouse 2 years ago, so she knows the city really well and was happy to show me all the cool things we could see in an afternoon, and tomorrow she's coming here to get oriented at her school and then I'm going to show her around Tarbes, which should take all of about 40 minutes ;)
I was going to put up photos but at the rate they were loading it would have taken about 40 minutes per photo... maybe I'll add them next time.
Anyway, Toulouse is really big (compared to Tarbes), beautiful, and vibrant, full of pretty shops and people and things. Unlike other french cities like Paris and Bordeaux, which are basically all white, everything in Toulouse is made out of brick, giving it the nickname la ville rose or the pink city. It was originally part of the Roman empire, so the architecture of the churches is roman and it's full of tiny narrow curvy streets and tons of places or squares. There are a lot of immigrants there, especially north and west african which are the most prevalent in France in general, and I definitely heard people speaking wolof and saw others that were probably Senegalese although they didn't open their mouths so I couldn't tell for sure. I thought it would be kind of stupid to only be there for 5 hours but it turned out to be perfect because I didn't see the other assistants, and I figured Sam probably had other things she wanted to do before she moves to Tarbes. And since it's so easy to get there I can go as often as I want, to discover the rest of the city. In fact, I'm going next week for the regional teaching assistants' orientation, so I will be there all day and meet all the other assistants but will probably not have much time to explore. However, one of the Spanish teachers in my school just started teaching this year, so she's only 1 year older than me and went to university in Toulouse and goes back there virtually every weekend, and she invited me to go with her anytime I want to meet her friends and go out in the city.
Tomorrow I go back to Jacque, the tiny village where Anne and Jean Paul live, to hang out with them and start learning how to make quilts from Anne.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
High school, round 2
I met some of my students for the first time yesterday in the cafeteria at dinner. Did I mention that I'm slightly afraid of high school students? especially girl ones? especially french ones?? Anyway, I was so nervous and flustered about the idea of going to the caf by myself with a bunch of french high school students that I got there after they stopped serving dinner and ended up eating one of the leftover plates that they save for students who do after-school sports. There were 3 boys there (almost as scary as girls) and I managed to eek out my end of the conversation in mediocre french, resulting in them thinking that I had come there to learn french, not perfect mine after 8 years of study. The situation was slightly helped by the fact that they knew I was their English assistant, so I was slightly impressive. In fact, the students actually call me "vous" instead of "tu" which is weird, and the teachers tell me to call them "tu" instead of vous, which is weirder. In order to avoid being rude, I have basically always called everyone "vous", especially especially teachers. Also, I'm allowed to hang around in the teacher's lounge. Being at high school is weeeeird.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Bon weekend à la campagne
I just got back to Tarbes after spending the weekend at home with a different english teacher, Gisele. I met her at school on friday, and after having lunch at school we went back to her village, Maubourguet. Friday afternoon we walked around the town, which has a Roman church, and then went to one of their friends' house to pick figs from his fig tree, which Gisele made into fig jam the next day. I brought a jar of it back to school with me.
Saturday I got up early to go to the market with Gisele in a neighboring town/village called Vic en Bigorre. We bought fruit and pork and then came home to finish making lunch. I am going to describe every meal I had this weekend in detail for my mother. If you aren't interested, feel free to skim over the foodie parts. Saturday's lunch began with melon, and then we had the main course which was pork roasted in the oven with tomatoes, onions and potatoes. After the pork roast we had cheese, a bunch of different kinds that I can't remember. Dessert was strawberries from the market with whipped cream, followed by coffee. After lunch, Gisele, her daughter Céline and I took off to go visit Lourdes. Most Catholics probably know that Lourdes is where Saint Bernadette had visions of the Virgin Mary in a grotto, and now the water there is supposed to have healing powers. In any case, it was packed with tourists, especially pushy old Italian ladies, although I'm told it was nowhere near as bad as it would have been during the summer. Normally, we should have been able to see the mountains but seeing as it was cloudy that day they had completely vanished from sight. After seeing Lourdes, we drove back to Maubourguet and had dinner--stuffed tomatoes.
Saturday night, Céline invited me to go out with her and some of her girl friends, which was really nice. She's only here for a week; she normally lives in Barcelona, so I didn't really think she would make an attempt to get to know me, but it was really fun going out with her and her friends. We drove into Tarbes and went to a bar near my school, where Céline informed me that I will probably run into all my students whenever I go out, so it was good to have an anonymous outing before I start teaching. After that bar closed we went to a nightclub on the other side of town, and stayed out dancing till 4am. I'm not really big on staying out until morning, but I figured it will be a while before I have the opportunity to hang out with french girls my age. My french is coming along well, I'm getting to the point where I understand pretty much everything everyone says, but when they're talking to each other they talk so fast it's hard to jump into the conversation so I pretty much just listen unless the person is talking directly to me.
Sunday, Céline and I slept until noon; I barely had time for a coffee before we sat down for lunch. We had grilled duck, which was rare and juicy and delicious, accompanied by french fries and green beans with garlic. Then cheese and then dessert, which was a tarte tatin. I always thought tarte tatin would be something really exotic but I found out that it's nothing more than an apple-upside down cake. After lunch we went to Pau, which was about an hour from Maubourguet and probably 45 minutes from Tarbes. We went there to visit the chateau, and then walked around the town a bit. It is absolutely gorgeous. It's a bit bigger than Tarbes, and there is a university there, so it would have been a really fun place to live. In any case, it's not far so I'm sure I'll go back often. The terrace of the chateau has a panoramic view of the Pyrenees, which is spectacular. There were banners of Swedish flags hanging all over town, and when I asked it turned out the the princess of Sweden is coming there next week, and that someone from the Swedish royal family called Bernadotte moved from Pau to Sweden, so the current royal family of Sweden is still named Bernadotte.
I got up early this morning to go back to Tarbes with Gisele, and finally got settled into my room at school. I had left all of my suitcases there on friday so I wouldn't have to dig through them all weekend, and after basically wearing 3 outfits for the last week, leaving everything packed away for fear of not being able to get it back into my suitcases, it was glorious to take all my crap out of my suitcases and throw my clothes all over my room. My room looked really small when I saw it on Friday because it was full of extra furniture, but once they got everything out of there it's actually quite nice. I have 2 desks, a large window facing the courtyard, an armoire, a small closet-thingy, and one very small bed.
Today I've been walking around running errands and seeing the town. I went to Monoprix to get bath stuff, and let me tell you, I have never been so overwhelmed by bath and beauty products. The french are apparently obsessed with skin care because there were about 3 aisles of creams, facials, etc. And that's only in the supermarket--there are tons of stores devoted entirely to skin care.
The mountains are absolutely beautiful today. Apparently when it snows in the mountains, it's cold here because the cold air comes down from the mountains. It snowed up there this weekend, so it was pretty cold, but now it's nice and sunny and you can see the mountains from far away, clear and covered in snow. Another weird thing about the Pyrenees is that here it's totally flat all the way to the mountains, and then they rise really quickly, which means that when you're driving out in the country and there's nothing around to block your view, you can see the whole mountain range from one end to the other. For an idea of what they looked like today, there is a good photo on the Tarbes tourism website.
Saturday I got up early to go to the market with Gisele in a neighboring town/village called Vic en Bigorre. We bought fruit and pork and then came home to finish making lunch. I am going to describe every meal I had this weekend in detail for my mother. If you aren't interested, feel free to skim over the foodie parts. Saturday's lunch began with melon, and then we had the main course which was pork roasted in the oven with tomatoes, onions and potatoes. After the pork roast we had cheese, a bunch of different kinds that I can't remember. Dessert was strawberries from the market with whipped cream, followed by coffee. After lunch, Gisele, her daughter Céline and I took off to go visit Lourdes. Most Catholics probably know that Lourdes is where Saint Bernadette had visions of the Virgin Mary in a grotto, and now the water there is supposed to have healing powers. In any case, it was packed with tourists, especially pushy old Italian ladies, although I'm told it was nowhere near as bad as it would have been during the summer. Normally, we should have been able to see the mountains but seeing as it was cloudy that day they had completely vanished from sight. After seeing Lourdes, we drove back to Maubourguet and had dinner--stuffed tomatoes.
Saturday night, Céline invited me to go out with her and some of her girl friends, which was really nice. She's only here for a week; she normally lives in Barcelona, so I didn't really think she would make an attempt to get to know me, but it was really fun going out with her and her friends. We drove into Tarbes and went to a bar near my school, where Céline informed me that I will probably run into all my students whenever I go out, so it was good to have an anonymous outing before I start teaching. After that bar closed we went to a nightclub on the other side of town, and stayed out dancing till 4am. I'm not really big on staying out until morning, but I figured it will be a while before I have the opportunity to hang out with french girls my age. My french is coming along well, I'm getting to the point where I understand pretty much everything everyone says, but when they're talking to each other they talk so fast it's hard to jump into the conversation so I pretty much just listen unless the person is talking directly to me.
Sunday, Céline and I slept until noon; I barely had time for a coffee before we sat down for lunch. We had grilled duck, which was rare and juicy and delicious, accompanied by french fries and green beans with garlic. Then cheese and then dessert, which was a tarte tatin. I always thought tarte tatin would be something really exotic but I found out that it's nothing more than an apple-upside down cake. After lunch we went to Pau, which was about an hour from Maubourguet and probably 45 minutes from Tarbes. We went there to visit the chateau, and then walked around the town a bit. It is absolutely gorgeous. It's a bit bigger than Tarbes, and there is a university there, so it would have been a really fun place to live. In any case, it's not far so I'm sure I'll go back often. The terrace of the chateau has a panoramic view of the Pyrenees, which is spectacular. There were banners of Swedish flags hanging all over town, and when I asked it turned out the the princess of Sweden is coming there next week, and that someone from the Swedish royal family called Bernadotte moved from Pau to Sweden, so the current royal family of Sweden is still named Bernadotte.
I got up early this morning to go back to Tarbes with Gisele, and finally got settled into my room at school. I had left all of my suitcases there on friday so I wouldn't have to dig through them all weekend, and after basically wearing 3 outfits for the last week, leaving everything packed away for fear of not being able to get it back into my suitcases, it was glorious to take all my crap out of my suitcases and throw my clothes all over my room. My room looked really small when I saw it on Friday because it was full of extra furniture, but once they got everything out of there it's actually quite nice. I have 2 desks, a large window facing the courtyard, an armoire, a small closet-thingy, and one very small bed.
Today I've been walking around running errands and seeing the town. I went to Monoprix to get bath stuff, and let me tell you, I have never been so overwhelmed by bath and beauty products. The french are apparently obsessed with skin care because there were about 3 aisles of creams, facials, etc. And that's only in the supermarket--there are tons of stores devoted entirely to skin care.
The mountains are absolutely beautiful today. Apparently when it snows in the mountains, it's cold here because the cold air comes down from the mountains. It snowed up there this weekend, so it was pretty cold, but now it's nice and sunny and you can see the mountains from far away, clear and covered in snow. Another weird thing about the Pyrenees is that here it's totally flat all the way to the mountains, and then they rise really quickly, which means that when you're driving out in the country and there's nothing around to block your view, you can see the whole mountain range from one end to the other. For an idea of what they looked like today, there is a good photo on the Tarbes tourism website.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
My time with Anne and Jean Paul has been very relaxing, especially the last 2 days. Yesterday I didn't even leave the house except for a walk. I hung around the house and garden with Anne's parents in the morning while Anne was at school.
After lunch, Jean Paul and I had a cookie baking competition, and although the cookies were basically the same I helped reinfore american stereotypes by making mine twice the size.
Of course we had to taste both of them, and after all the cookies Anne and I went out for a walk around the village and surrounding farms. It was just the most beautiful evening, with the sun setting over the corn fields and the yellow houses dotting the hills... of course I didn't bring my camera that time...
Today they've just got something in the mail saying the village council decided to name the roads and give the houses numbers, which is a BIG DEAL. It is rather a small village, with the town hall across from Anne & Jean Paul's house, which looks like this:
Today we got up early(ish) to go into town for the market. Anne and Jean Paul know many of the vendors since they all live around here. Anne bought leeks that she's putting in the ground as I write (I did help for a while). Outside of the food shed there are people selling ducks, chickens, rabbits, and a bunch of junky housewares (or rubbishy, as Anne and her mum call it). We came back and had lunch, and now it's more sitting around. We'll be going over to Jean Paul's mom's in a little while to pick the peaches while she's out of town, and apparently poaching them this evening. Tarbes is going to seem like a glittering metropolis after these few days en village...
After lunch, Jean Paul and I had a cookie baking competition, and although the cookies were basically the same I helped reinfore american stereotypes by making mine twice the size.
Of course we had to taste both of them, and after all the cookies Anne and I went out for a walk around the village and surrounding farms. It was just the most beautiful evening, with the sun setting over the corn fields and the yellow houses dotting the hills... of course I didn't bring my camera that time...
Today they've just got something in the mail saying the village council decided to name the roads and give the houses numbers, which is a BIG DEAL. It is rather a small village, with the town hall across from Anne & Jean Paul's house, which looks like this:
...even the cat thinks so!
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Tarbes Day 2: good news all around!
I am staying with the English English teacher Anne (not a typo), and her english parents are staying with us as well. So I get the best of both worlds, being able to speak english but also french, as her husband is french. They don't actually live in Tarbes, but in a really really small village about a half hour away, so I'm going into town with Anne when she starts work and coming back in the afternoon with them. We're up in the hills opposite the Pyrenees.
These are several cool things I have done or found out:
Bisous!
These are several cool things I have done or found out:
- I can in fact live at my school, which will not only save me a ton of money, but it's right in the center of town (not that you can't walk the town in 40 mins)
- The tallest mountain in the Pyrenees is called the Pic du Midi, and is about an hour from Tarbes.
- The school often takes the students on ski trips on Wednesday afternoons, and I could go with them as a chaperone. This means I will have to learn how to ski. Oh, my life is so hard.
- I'm re-reading the Millenium trilogy (girl with the dragon tattoo, etc) in French.
- Everything is waaaay cheaper here than in Paris. I got my whole lunch yesterday for less than a cup of coffee costs in Paris. There is also a store called "c'est 2 euros" as in, it's 2 euros, as in the tarbes version of a dollar store. LOL
- Everyone is REALLY nice here. I have never found Parisians to be particularly unpleasant, but people are even nicer in the south.
- There are a disproportionate number of parks/gardens for how small this town is. The big one, le Jardin Massey, has palm trees and flowers (still summer!) AND peacocks.
- There is a thing going on till the end of september called "la foire au vins", which is basically a big wine sale so they can get last year's stuff out to make room for this year's stuff.
- Tarbes is hosting an annual international military music festival in October. Not that I'm into military music (is anyone?) but it's just a curiosity...
Bisous!
Monday, September 20, 2010
An Ode to Sunday
Yesterday was the most glorious Sunday à la française. I never realized what an awesome day Sunday was, but almost all of the shops were closed, and everywhere we went there were people just sitting around in cafés, strolling with crêpes and ice cream in hand, and enjoying life. After four years of devoting my entire Sunday to homework I was already looking forward to being able to kick back and enjoy the day, but I guess I didn't realize that all of France had the same idea. The Rue Mouffetard, where we were staying, was actually closed to cars from 10am-6pm so that people could walk around, and in the square near our hostel there were free massages. I found out that the people working in the gelateries were no mere ice cream scoopers, but gelato artists, and got a two-flavor gelato flower on a cone.
After strolling around our neighborhood for a while we went to the Jardin de Luxembourg. The park was absolutely packed and no one was even doing anything! They were just sitting around on benches, chairs, and fountains, and talking to friends/making out. I started taking random candid close-ups of French people enjoying life.
This gave Ginger the idea for our new photo-project, the album of French couples making out. It's almost too easy. It's like, when I see one I think I'll never get my camera out in time, but they just. keep. going.
Blogger's HTML does not support photo rotation, so I guess you'll just have to turn your head and/or computer sideways... sorry. Obviously, these will all eventually be published in our bestselling book.
I'm hooked on a feeling
First of all, this is what I feel like right now:
so I suggest you press play before you keep reading.
I have so much blogging to catch up on, I'm starting with today and working my way backwards. Bear with me as I upload Paris pictures and unload my journal onto my blog. But first, today:
I just had the best 6 hours of my life!!! After this morning's frustrations with my train (more on that later--I don't want to spoil the mood) I basically enjoyed the best train ride ever. I had a perfect 4 days in Paris with Sara and Ginger, but today, the further I got from Paris the better it got. I knew I loved southwest France, but seriously. I started internally reprimanding myself for how corny and emotional I felt. And then, just when it couldn't possibly get better (think vineyards, sunflowers, palm trees) the trees opened onto a huge valley and on the other side, mountains. Mountains! Like, purple mountain's majesty, blue, craggy, misty in the distance, mountains. And we were going towards them on a super-high-speed train. I felt like laughing out loud because of how ridiculous it was, but managed to limit myself to grinning into my hand with my forehead pressed to the window. Under my cool exterior, I was giddy like a schoolgirl with her first crush. My euphoria has finally started wearing off a little, but every time I looked down the street on my first walk through town, I would suppress a giggle at seeing the mountains looming past the edge of town. I actually saw someone hang-gliding ten minutes ago. Seriously? That is just disgusting. AND, I went from a cold fall day in Paris to basically summer. The only way it could possibly have been better is if it had been gray and rainy in Paris. In conclusion, sorry Paris lovers, but the southwest is where it's at.
Now that you all know that I'm hooked on a feeling, high on believing that France is in love with me, I can start working on the real blog posts. Just thought everyone would want to know I've arrived safely ;)
so I suggest you press play before you keep reading.
I have so much blogging to catch up on, I'm starting with today and working my way backwards. Bear with me as I upload Paris pictures and unload my journal onto my blog. But first, today:
I just had the best 6 hours of my life!!! After this morning's frustrations with my train (more on that later--I don't want to spoil the mood) I basically enjoyed the best train ride ever. I had a perfect 4 days in Paris with Sara and Ginger, but today, the further I got from Paris the better it got. I knew I loved southwest France, but seriously. I started internally reprimanding myself for how corny and emotional I felt. And then, just when it couldn't possibly get better (think vineyards, sunflowers, palm trees) the trees opened onto a huge valley and on the other side, mountains. Mountains! Like, purple mountain's majesty, blue, craggy, misty in the distance, mountains. And we were going towards them on a super-high-speed train. I felt like laughing out loud because of how ridiculous it was, but managed to limit myself to grinning into my hand with my forehead pressed to the window. Under my cool exterior, I was giddy like a schoolgirl with her first crush. My euphoria has finally started wearing off a little, but every time I looked down the street on my first walk through town, I would suppress a giggle at seeing the mountains looming past the edge of town. I actually saw someone hang-gliding ten minutes ago. Seriously? That is just disgusting. AND, I went from a cold fall day in Paris to basically summer. The only way it could possibly have been better is if it had been gray and rainy in Paris. In conclusion, sorry Paris lovers, but the southwest is where it's at.
Now that you all know that I'm hooked on a feeling, high on believing that France is in love with me, I can start working on the real blog posts. Just thought everyone would want to know I've arrived safely ;)
Friday, September 17, 2010
ahhhhhh!!!!!
I'm in Paris!!! more words and pictures to follow when internet/computer battery are not about to run out!!!
Gros bisous!
Gros bisous!
Monday, September 6, 2010
Bonne nouvelle
I just got an e-mail from an English teacher at my school informing me that they have a room for each of the teaching assistants, so it looks like I'll be living at the high school for free or very cheap. Plus we get our meals at the school with a meal card. More money to save for travelling?? Yes please!
The other good news is that I will be on a plane with Sara in 8 days, Paris-bound!
The other good news is that I will be on a plane with Sara in 8 days, Paris-bound!
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