Paris je t'aime!

I've been in Paris with Kirsten since Friday. We have seen so much in such a short amount of time. I have learned a lot about this city. It's been cold, busy, educational, entertaining, wine filled and at times overwhelming. We are still alive and have met a lot of really great people through couch surfing and will be meeting more tomorrow at an improve show in downtown Paris. We have so many pictures but there's only one that I have time to post right now. It's late and I'm going to sleep right away.

This picture is on the first day of Kirsten and I doing touristy things in Paris. We got some "cougars" to take our picture. They said "Sure, under one condition, you must kiss in the photo, or I'm not taking it." So, voila!

PS - I didn't judge the ladies and call them cougars because of the way they dressed and all the make-up they had on. It was the fact that one of them had been to Paris before and we asked if she knew all of the good places to go, then the other one responded, "actually, she knows where all of the good men are ;) ;)"

Hope you like the photo,

Bon nuit

Stephen

Laon then Paris

Bonjour!

I just got to a town called Laon. I have to see a doctor tomorrow to complete the paperwork for my work visa. We got here late in the evening and it was very quiet at the train station. We had met a couch surfer online and she told us to take what we thought was a train. It turned out to be a train that was more like a roller coaster! Best ride ever. It took us all the way up to the top of a mountain where the couch surfer lives. I will have more pictures for you soon. I have a lot of catching up to do with my blog, and it doesn't help that my vacation starts tomorrow and I'll have even more to talk about after my time here and my time in Paris!

Check it out. It's called the POMA.

À toute à l'heurre!

Stephen

Getting settled in Château-Thierry

Bonjour!

It's been 2 and a half weeks since I landed in France. I almost have all of the paper work done and I'm starting to teach some classes here. It's been really busy figuring out everything about life and teaching in France. Living life here seems fairly normal on the surface, but there's so many difference that you wouldn't notice at first. And those are the things that throw me off the most. Like looking for loose leaf paper and only being able to find graph paper. Trying to find three ring binders and only being given the option of 2 or 4 rings. Finding milk in the grocery store that is not refrigerated. These little things add up.

All the staff here are really nice, but I've noticed it takes time for the people here to warm up to someone new. I'm doing my best to introduce myself to everyone, but I need to spend more time in the teachers lounge and give them opportunities to get comfortable and approach me at their own speed. I've heard that this is common in the French culture, but it is even more pronounced living in a small community. I feel like everyone here knows each other and I think it's hard not to with only 14,000 people in your town. I go out shopping and for dinner and usually see someone from the school, be it a student or a teacher. If you think about it, there's 700 students at the school plus about 50 staff which means that just over 5% of the population is here every day. So, it's really not surprising.

The job itself also has quite the learning curve. I don't have a lot of experience in front of classes and it takes some time getting used to the French school system. The teaching style of the teachers is a lot more strict than what I've seen in Canada as they have a very strict curriculum to follow throughout the year. It makes it hard for the students to open up and learn at a pace that works for them. I've found they really like designating someone as the translator and he or she answers the questions for everyone. It's going to take some work, but I think I'll get them all speaking :)

Aside from getting accustomed to all the different aspects of life in France, I'm enjoying my time here. Thankfully I have a lot of support from family and friends through emails, the two other assistants that I live with are also going through the same struggles. The best part is that Kirsten is here with me through the first month, so I have someone close to relate to while the town gets comfortable with having the new guy around.

And now for show and tell.

Here is a picture of my bedroom. There is a desk a bed a sink and a wardrobe. It is in the high school and it is very much like a student dorm. There are four separate rooms and we share a bathroom, shower and kitchen.

Here is the front door of the school as seen from my balcony.

On one of my first days, the fog rolled in and I thought it was so cool! After a couple days of fog, I realized this is normal weather for my region. It's not cool anymore, I miss the sun!

On my second day here, there was a street market. Many locals had tables set up selling their old junk. I happened to find a lot of children's books to help me learn French. I also found the one thing on my shopping list that I was hoping for. A guitar! I paid 15Euros for a 3/4 sized classical guitar. It wasn't very good, but I put brand new strings on it and it sounds great now!

Here I am with all my purchases in hand.

Here is Vicente with the game of Scrabble that we all bought together. We play it only in French. It makes the game really difficult.

 Here is Nicky with a bunch of books that she bought at the street market. Her French is a little more advanced and she bought some Dan Brown novels and such. I'm quite content with my Goosebumps in French and my French comic books.

Here we are on the only bridge in town.

 And here is the town square. Up on the hill behind the fancy looking building are the remains of the castle. There are quite a few restaurants here and a tiny movie theatre as well. But because the town is so small, a lot of places close early.

I have two more weeks of classes and then I get holidays for two weeks over Halloween. I guess they really like trick-or-treating in France. I'll make sure to get some pictures of Kirsten and I in Paris during our time off. Until then, there's not a lot more to show you from the town, but I'll keep you posted as I experience new things around France.

À plus tard

Later

A day in Paris

Hey everyone!

So as you all know, I made it to Paris, but I was unable to load my pictures. Here are only a handful of the pictures I took while in Paris. First off, thanks again to Yacin for welcoming Sean and I into the country. I don't know what we would have done without him. Here he is in the car waiting for us to grab some tourist photos. He showed us most of Paris in under a day. I was so tired and jet lagged that every time we hopped back in the car I would fall asleep. Thanks again Yacin, we had a great time!

The traffic in France was a crazy experience for me. I'm glad we had a local driving us around, because although there are traffic laws in France, people generally ignore them. Those lines on the road don't seem to mean anything especially for people on motorcycles and scooters. It was hard to capture the ridiculousness of the traffic, but here is what I got. Yacin's "chill" expression while a scooter zoomed around him going into oncoming traffic, then squeezing in between another car and the median. Apparently this is normal and after a couple days here, I see it all the time.

The roundabout that goes around the arc de triomphe is another example of crazy traffic. This roundabount is about 10 lanes wide and doesn't have any lane markings. But as I learned from earlier in the day, no one would use them anyway.

Arc de triomphe

Next is the Notre Dame de Paris. We didn't get a chance to get out of the car and say hi to the hunchback. Maybe I can stop in the next time I'm in Paris.

Next we went to the Luxembourg gardens. I got a nice picture with the sun shining on the building and a storm cloud behind. It started raining on us a few minutes after I took this picture.

Here is the bridge with all the locks on it. Couples get their names engraved on the lock and them lock it to the railing on the bridge. You can see a lot from here, but they go all the way across the bridge. I have holidays at the end of October and will be visiting this bridge with Kirsten to put a lock on the bridge with our names on it. :)

Next the classic pictures in front of the Eiffel Tour.

 

Here I am trying to push over the 3,300 year old Egyptian obelisk called the Luxor Obelisk. Because I am so jet lagged, I cannot make it move an inch!

And the last picture that we got during our day of sight seeing in Paris is of the Louvre at night. Yacin took this beautiful picture while we were driving through the courtyard at night.