Thanksgiving

So while Thanksgiving was actually 3 days ago, I celebrated it Friday and this afternoon, so I feel like this blog entry is still relevant. Although I miss my family and friends, I haven't really been homesick since I arrived in France about two and a half months ago. Until Thursday afternoon, when I was repeating "On my Thanksgiving plate, there's turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing..." for the hundreth time (not an exaggeration, the activity I was using was a version of "Johnny's got a ball, an apple, and a pencil, ... in his pocket" and therefore involved lots of reptition). The kids' attention was waning and all of a sudden I had this incredible longing to be home, in our family room, watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade in my pajamas with my mom and dad and Trey and Holly. Although, let's be real, if I was in Cincinnati I would have run the Turkey Trot 10K downtown and probably wouldn't get back in time to watch the Macy's parade. But still, that was the image my brain conjured in its moment of homesick longing. And the vocabulary flashcards with appetizing pictures of turkey and cranberry sauce weren't helping either!

Luckily I did get in some delicious Thanksgiving food, courtesy of a few other assistants and the Coudel family. On Friday Candice, Laurie, and Kati hosted a Thanksgiving soirée at their apartment. I volunteered to bring an apple pie, since I made one for my host family in Dijon and therefore knew all of the ingredients were readily available and, in theory, I could successfully reproduce a dessert typical of America and of Thanksgiving. I toyed with the idea of baking the pie on Thursday, but because of scheduling issues I ended up doing it Friday between my riding lesson and the party. This ended up being a bad call. The pie itself took longer to make than I expected (peeling and slicing the apples usually takes a lot less time because there are more hands to help). The timing was going to be tight, but I thought it would still work. Just as I was laying the top layer of pastry crust over the pie, Steph walked in and frantically indicated that I should stop -- that pie pan (le moule, for those of you eager to learn more French voab) doesn't fit in their oven. Uh oh.

But it was too late, and even if I hadn't laid down the pastry, the pie pan was already full of the bottom layer, plus all of the apples and the sugar mixture. In Steph and Charly's defense, the pie pan was quite large and I should have checked that it fit in the oven before I started the recipe. In my defense, it seemed entirely logical that a pan in their cupboard is there because it is regularly used in those household appliances which are found in that same kitchen. But, that is not the case here. So, what to do? Start knocking on the neighbors' doors. I went down level by level, without any success until I reached the first floor (rez-de-chaussée, here). Mr. Maillot seemed amused by my plight and graciously volunteered to let me use his oven. So, I dropped off the pie, and went back upstairs. Unfortunately, his oven must have been a bit cooler than average, because the pie took 45 minutes to bake instead of the expected 30, plus the time spent waiting for the oven to preheat, and the time for the pie to cool enough to carry. Plus I stayed for a drink (glass of juice) because it seemed rude to take my pie and dash off. So, I was a bit late for the party. But they were just beginning to serve the meal as I arrived, so my tardiness didn't end up being a huge problem.


Candice & co. had prepared quite a spread! Turkey, carrots and onions, mashed potatoes and real gravy, roasted sweet potatoes, rice and raisins (which apparently her family does instead of stuffing), and a pumpkin pie. Kirstie and Nicola brought a yummy fall salad and all of the rest brought wine (and a bottle of Champagne). Despite it's early setbacks, my pie turned out great. We even had whipped cream to put on top! It was a really wonderful evening, a mixture of English and French, and we ended it by singing Christmas carols and taking quite a few silly group photos.

Then this afternoon I went to the Coudel's for a Thanksgiving meal with their family. I got a ride from their family friends: Annick and her daughters Michaëla and Gaël. Their story is in the inverse of the Coudels': she's French and he's American. Her husband was actually on his way back from celebrating Thanksgiving with his family in the U.S., and didn't make it back in time to join us. We had a really lovely afternoon and a delicious repas (meal), but unfortunately without turkey. Susan ordered one from a butcher well in advance, but when she went to pick it up yesterday he told her he wouldn't find one, and had two chickens instead! She was understandably annoyed -- a whole turkey is certainly unusual in France, but not impossible to find. If he had told her earlier, she could have just ordered one from another butcher. But we had tasty stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, green beans, spiced apples, and chestnuts to go with our chicken, so I really can't complain. And we had homemade pumpkin pie for dessert, made with the enormous pumpkins that grow in their garden. The Coudels are really wonderful and Annick and her daughters were equally friendly and warm. All in all, a very pleasant day.

As part of this Thanksgiving entry, I would like to mention a couple of the things I am particularly thankful for this year. My supportive family and wonderful friends from home and Wake are always at the top of the list, but I think this year I have some new reasons to be extra thankful.

This experience has been exactly what I had hoped for so far, and I would like to detail exactly how:

1) I have a really pleasant living environment -- Steph and Charly are very friendly and eager to help me with whatever I need. They are clean, respectful and generous. We have shared many meals (and the "Friday evening beer") together and they don't mind that I often wake up early and come back late. I feel really lucky that I found this accomodation that fits in my budget, is in a very central location and that I share with such agreeable people.

2) I like my job -- I'm not even sure 12 hours per weeks qualifies as a job, but since it's what I'm getting paid to do, we'll call it that. There are definitely challenging moments -- like when the kids do not listen, or I get to the end of a lesson and none of the kids remember the vocab they "learned" during that session, but it's really rewarding when I see they're enjoying the song/game/activity I picked and when they retain the information from one class to the next. And sometimes they're just too darn cute. And the other teachers at my schools have been very nice to me, especially those at École Champagne.

3) Les Friz'Bistonins -- Ultimate Frisbee has become the bad penny in my life... it keeps turning up no matter where I go. But luckily for me, it always seems to bring fun people along with it. In this case, about 12 or so people who make up the core of the team and with whom I have spent countless hours with since joined the team a few weeks after I arrived. Playing Ultimate can be really fun, like practice last Monday when the "regional" team really established a rhythm and had some great points together. But I also appreciate how much time we spend together off the field too. I feel really lucky to have found such a vibrant and welcoming group.

4) French bread -- Okay, this one is a bit silly. In fact, I might list it under both the positives and negatives of France. How is it negative? Do you have any idea how easy it is to eat an entire baguette in one day? The day I learned you can request a half-baguette was a very healthful one indeed... But seriously, there's something undeniably pleasant about living in a country where fresh bread is available every 500m or so. And I've had fun exploring all of the different varities. There are at least five boulangeries within a ten-minute walk of my apartment, so that makes for lots of options. I can't say I've found a favorite yet, but I'm eager to keep tasting.

5) I feel at home in Besançon -- Again, this one might seem too vague. Although Besançon can get a bad rep for being quite "provincial," I absolutely adore its "small-town" feel. I love how the centre-ville is surrounded by the Doubs, and is therefore densely packed with shops, apartment, and cute little squares. I love how the city is surrounded by seven huge hills, one of which is topped with the citadelle and many of which still have walls lining them. I love how verdant the city is, and how even in the fall (and now winter) there are still lots of plants and vines. I like how people are generally friendly and eager to help. They just put up Christmas lights all over the centre-ville, an extravagant quantity of lightbulbs I wouldn't normally associate with eco-sensitive France and the streets look really lovely. The Christmas market (marché de Noël) is set up in the Place de La Révolution, along with a giant illuminated ferris wheel. Besançon was my third choice city, behind Aix-en-Provence and Strasbourg, but I am quite content to have been assigned here. I think it's exactly where I am supposed to be.

6) I have a wonderful support network -- to you, faithful blog reader, who have made it this far in my entry, and to all of the others back in the States who continue to stay in touch despite the time difference, their own hectic schedules and mine, I really appreciate you. Thank you for being so great!

And now, bed time, a new week awaits bright and early tomorrow morning! Bisous!

Great weekend in Tongeren!

To say this weekend was a lot of fun would be a gross understatement. I had a wonderful time at the Discolorful tournament in Tongeren, Belgium with the Friz'Bisontins. Technically Franzi and I played with the Rainbow Warriors, a co-ed team composed mostly of players from Lille (a city north of Paris). Souki (top left in the picture below) used to live in Besançon and played with the Friz'Bistonins. Actually, he got his degree in geology at the university in Besançon and knows my apartment-mate Charly. Small world. Anyway, the weekend was a huge success. It is late and I am tired -- we had practice tonight even though we had a tournament this weekend -- so the rest of the details will have to wait. But in the meantime here are a few team pictures... I promise Kelsey is wearing his shorts behind the disc.

 

They gave us this Jenga game in our team tournament bag. We were more or less successful in recreating the visual though...

The party on Saturday night had a "slumber party" theme and, in lieu of wearing pajamas, I made my own Twister t-shirt (g-rated, I measured before I colored the circles :-) ). Unfortunately I didn't bring my camera to dinner/the party so this picture I got from Sophie is the only one I have. I'm not sure if this reflects the lack of females at the party (10 guys teams plus 10 co-ed, mostly-guys teams equals quite a gender-ratio imbalance), but I won the award for "best costume" for girls. The prize? A 75cl bottle of Grimbergen Selection (see picture below).

 

The Rainbow Warriors won the Spirit award in the co-ed division! The prize? 8 bottles of specialty Belgian beers. I'm sensing a trend here... And I'm holding my "Best Costume" prize.

The Friz'Bisontin team. 

From L to R, back: Fred, GuiGui, Luis, Romain, Gaël, Alex, front row: Colin, Tété, Gaëtan. 

Plus Franzi and me! I'm sorry Gaël had to mess this one up. And believe it or not Alex has his eyes closed in every single team picture I have. I think he might have done it on purpose.

No Good Very Bad Class

Well, I'm glad it's over. My first really awful class. At least this unpleasant experience was not the result of my lack of planning... The teacher had to step out of the room to have quick conference with the principal re: one of her students and chaos ensued. I guess I had been under-appreciating the teacher's ability to maintain order in the classroom because today I experienced the total behavioral regression that resulted from her exit.

At first I attempted to continue with the planned activities (learning the names of objects in the classroom, followed by a game of Simon Says in which the students show me the object I name). It was obvious after 5 or 6 questions that none of them had been listening when I explained the names of the objects, because none of them could produce the correct one. And one entire side of the room simply refused to shut up. So I took the advice of whoever told me I should threaten them in English, because while they won't understand the words they will understand my ire via the intonation, and not understanding might scare them even more. Then I told them to clear everything off of their desks, take out a piece of paper, and copy what I wrote on the board. I don't think "a pencil : un crayon" is part of the recommended pedagogical method, but it was something they could do in silence. The bell rang about 5 minutes into this copying, but I made them wait for their teacher to come back (she did a minute or two later).

When she left, the director told me I could come get them if I had any problems, but I wanted to work this one out myself. If anything, I think it was important that I follow through on my threat to make them do something really dull if they didn't shape up.

So, not my most positive teaching experience so far, but an important step. To me this lesson felt a little bit like the equivalent of falling off a horse: sometimes it happens, and while it's unpleasant you can make it less so by taking the right steps. And it taught me that when this happens (which, like falling off a horse, I'm sure it will occasionally), it's something I'll be able to handle.

A Kind Word for the French

So yesterday evening I had dinner again at Magalie's house. Magalie teaches CM2 at Ecole Champagne and she is one of the friendliest and warmest individuals I have met in Besançon. She invited me to dinner about a month ago and I had a wonderful time with her, her two kids, and her niece Charlotte. This time she invited me especially to introduce me to Florian, a friend of hers who used to work at Champagne and is now studying to get his teacher's license (he worked before as an aide). Last time he took the test he failed the English section, and Magalie asked if I would be willing to tutor him. I told her of course, and she suggested we could meet over dinner at her house.

As she promised the last time she made a very traditional Franche-Comptois meal: Morteau sausage, roasted potatoes with regular or garlic cancoillotte cheese, a salad with Dijon vinaigrette and an apple crumble for dessert. Florian brought a bottle of Bourgogne blanc (Chardonnay from Burgundy). We also had Comte, Morbier, and chevre cheese before dessert. Charlotte, Magalie's niece, told me that she found it amusing that her English texts always put the word "cheese" after the names of cheeses (like Feta or Comte or Swiss) -- "why do you need to add the word cheese?" she asked, "what else would it be?"

Magalie also gave me a little tub of cancoillotte cheese to take home. Cancoillotte is different from what we would think of as cheese, it has a texture more like yogurt and you serve it by dipping in a spoon,  winding the cheese around until you have a decent-sized dollop, and then pouring it onto a piece of bread. It's slightly sweet and very filling -- I have no idea how I'm could eat all the whole tub before it goes bad. I'm definitely going to share with Steff and Charly. Magalie also gave me an extra couette (duvet/comforter). The cold weather began on Friday and my mostly-decorative bed cover was not cutting it. I planned to go buy a cuette today, but Magalie offered me one of her spare ones, and this way I won't have to figure out what to do with it when I come home in May.

I got to Magalie's house around 8pm and Florian dropped me off at my apartment at midnight! I was quite tired by the end of the evening, but I had a wonderful time!

Then this morning I had to wake up for my 8am doctor's appointment. I'm not sick -- in order to get my visa confirmed I have to attend a medical examination. I did this in Dijon too; the premise is valid but I think the execution makes the whole thing a bit silly: if I had tuberculosis or something really contagious, I would have infected all of Besançon by now. But, I had to go. I was wowed by how effifcient the appointment was -- there were lots of assistants there and they moved us in and out in less than ten minutes per person.

Next I had to go to the Office of Immigration and Integration to get my visa officially confirmed (with the stamp from the doctor). Normally I would expect to wait a long time there too, but they took me within a minute of my arrival. I thought I had everything which was required, but it turns out I was missing one document with Charly's address on it (since I pay rent to him, none of the utilities or anything are in my name). I expected this to be a huge calamity, but the woman was really understanding and said I could bring it after work on Friday (since I'm finished at noon).

So, while France gets a bad rep for being very bureaucratic and slow, my experience today showed me that the opposite can also be the case. I don't doubt the overall validity of the reputation, but I think it's worth noting what a positive experience I had today. I hope this blog post finds you having a good day as well.

To come: indoor Ultimate tournament in Tongren, Belgium this weekend!!

PS One more thing, because I've been reading fairy tales to the two girls I tutor, I discovered last week via a friend how to say "and they lived happily ever after" in French: Ils vécurent heureux et eurent beaucoup d’enfants. Translated: They lived happily and had lots of children. For some reason I found this really hilarious. Hopefully you find it equally amusing.

A Short Stop in Germany... then on to Strasbourg!

*A quick disclaimer: some of you have been asking for more pictures of me on my blog. I made an effort to have Brooke take more pics of me this past weekend, but unfortunately we did not have a way to exchange photos, so the only ones I have of myself are the few I had her take with my camera. But I am going to make an effort in this regard!

This past Friday was Armistice Day (celebrating the end of WWI), and a national holiday in France. I spent the day in France, Switzerland and Germany, which seemed to cover pretty much every side. This was my first time ever visiting Germany and Freiburg is a cute little town. I was supposed to meet Brooke there at 1pm (leaving from Besançon at 9:40am), but both my train out of Besançon and my connection out of Mulhouse were delayed, which meant I missed my second connection in Basel (see map below for my route):

I went to the ticket counter, worried that this was going to be a crisis. The affable Swiss employee informed me that not only could I just take the next train, but I didn't even need to change my ticket. He was very helpful, but I had a tough time with his Swiss French. Now I better understand why the French always make comments about Swiss French not really being French, the pronunciation was so different that it almost sounded like another language. I guess it's sort of how lots of Americans feel about Canadians speaking English...

I had an hour to kill in Basel, so I figured I do a little exploring. I walked out of the train station only to find.... a Burger King and a Starbucks. Curse you, globalization!! I didn't walk very far, for fear of missing my next train, but I did snap a picture of the Basel train station from the outside:

I got to Freiburg around 2pm and Brooke was all ready to show me the city. After grabbing a snack (brattwurst weiss -- white bratwurst) we climbed up to the top of Freiburg Minster, the cathedral (in German Freiburger Münster). What a cool view!

The inside of the cathedral was pretty neat too, especially the stained glass. There were two roasaces (giant rose-shaped or circular stained glass windows on the front of the cathedral) instead of one, and they were off-center. I've never seen anything like this before. It must have been intentional, or a really huge goof. The cathedral's Wikipedia page offers me no clues, although I did discover Freiburg's French sister city has been Besançon since 1959.

I found the architecture of Freiburg to be really adorable. Of course, as my first excursion to a German city, it's possible that this is the norm for many of them, but I found it novel:

For dinner Brooke and I found a cute little restaurat called Erzherzog Albrecht that seemed to fit our price rage. It ended up being a total bargain: 14 euros for a plate of delicious rahmschnitzel (pork schnitzel) and spaetzel (a type of noodle typical of the Black Forest/Alsace region) and a pint of the local hefeweizen, tip incuded. Brooke's ravioli and local pils were equaly delicious and we left thoroughly satisfied. I thought it was sort of neat that the restaurant was run by a family whose last name is Maier, spelled the same way as my mom's maiden name. If I needed any more confirmation of my German heritage...

The train to Strasbourg took about an hour and a half, and when we arrived I called up Colin, the son of one of the teachers at École Champagne. On Thursday Véronique, said teacher, overheard me telling some of the kids that I was going to Strasbourg with a friend for the weekend. She asked where we would be staying and when I told her a hotel, she offered to call up her son and see if we could stay with him. He and his girlfriend Carole live in Petite France, the most quaint district of Strasbourg. They're both students in the university's architecture school and they were very welcoming. We got in around 9pm and went out with the two of them and Carol's cousin to a café/bar called Jeannette et les Cycleux (where I had planned for us to hae lunch the next day, actually). Carole suggested the 5 of us share a bottle of Pinot Gris, one of the 10 varities of wine grown in Alsace. It was my first time trying Pinot Gris and I thought it was delicious! I had to do quite a bit of translatig for Brooke, since Colin and Carol weren't comfortable speaking very much English, but we made it work.

The next morning Brooke and I set off for the cathedral, which we had seen the night before while walking to the bar. Notre-Dame de Strasbourg is magnificent! It was begun in the early 1200s and completed 200 years later. It's made of the rosy pink sandstone from the nearby Vosges mountains, and, as far as I know, is the only cathedral in France of its hue. It was designed in the gothique rayonnant (high or late Gothic style) ad is considered one of the finest examples of this style. It embodies the Gothic ideal of verticality -- your eyes are practically forced upward. Brooke and I ascended the 330 steps to the platform, which was almost too high up to see Strasbourg properly. I thought the best views were the ones we got looking out of the windows on the way up and down:

Above: the European Parliament building, seen from the distance.

Afterward we went inside -- to find the typical gorgeous stained-glass windows, a a unusually bright painted organ and a gigantic astronomical clock (which dates from 1838-1843).

Even though the Christmas markets haven't started yet, there were lots of tourists in Strasbourg for the weekend. Especialy around the cathedral we were constantly surrounded by a crush of people. We did a little exploring; then headed to Jeanette et les Cycleux for lunch. My guidebook recommended their planchette : 10 different meats, cheeses, and toppings served with fresh bread. I thought it might be a fun way for Brooke to sample lots of different things, so we split it:

My favorites were the goat cheese and the bleu Auvergne (local blue cheese). Brooke's were the Munster and Brie.

After luch we headed over to the Office of Tourism and picked up some audio guides to do a self-guided walking tour of the city. It took us around the cathedral, into the courtyard Palais Rohan (designed by the same man who did Versailles and inhabited by Mairie Antoinette and Napoleon, at different times), and along the quais (riverbanks) of the River L'Ill (pronounced LEE-luh), which winds its way through Strasbourg. We had to cut short the walking tour to make it in time for our dégustation (wine tasting).

Above: Brooke in the courtyard of the Palais Rohan. 

On the way we made a slight detour into a patisserie, and afterward were very pleased that we did. Brooke also shares my love of macaroons and we purchased the two best I have ever tasted. Brooke's caramel one was particularly sensational (but my chocolate one was superb). We may or may not have tried to go back for another round on Sunday, only to find out we were 30 minutes too late -- probably all the better our waistlines and budgets, but our tastebuds sure were sorry.

I found this wine tasting on the Office of Tourism website. It advertised an hour-and-a-half session tasting four different Alsacia wines: Reisling, Sylvaner, Pinot Noir and Guerwitztraminer for 10 euro. Both Brooke and I thought the session was a success. We did indeed try the 4 different wines and Mr. Arbogast, who conducted the tasting, explained a bit about the history of Alsacian wines and how they differ from other types of French wines. He also had some kuglehopf -- a very traditional Alsacian bread -- for us to try.

We already had a couple of options for diner, but I asked Mr. Arbogast for his recommendations. Unfortunately we weren't the only ones with these recommendatios, and we tried 4 different places before finding one with space before 10pm, Aux Armes de Strasbourg in Place Gutenburg. The food was pretty good, but our table was right by the door and the servers who walked by kept jostling my chair. Overall, the experience was not quite as stellar as I had hoped, but I think Brooke enjoyed her cerf (venison) and I was shocked by how much I enjoyed my choucroute garnie (sauerkraut served with local sausage and ham). Last time I was in Strasbourg I avoided the sauerkraut because it just didn't look appetizing to me. But before I left Steff insisted that I try it, so I gave it a chance. Now I would recommend it too!

While planing our trip last week I discovered there was a jazz festival going on while we were there, so we got tickets to see a three-person group from Switzerland called the Colin Vallon group and consisting of a piantist, a drummer, and a bassist. The concert started at 10:30pm and was held in a little local theater less than a 5 minute walk from our apartment (I forgot to mention, Colin and Carole went to Carole's parents' house for the weekend, so we had the apartment all to ourselves on Saturday and Sunday). As soon as we sat down I knew the concert was going to be tough -- all of that walking around and delicious food meant that I was really sleepy. It turned out, too, that the music was not quitewhat I expected; perhaps my personal definition  of jazz is too narrow, but this discordant music was not at all what I would have labeled jazz. It was as if the three musicians were playing entirely separately, without hearing the others. Very, very occasionally their three ryhthms would overlap and the creation would be auditorially pleasing. But most of the time my ear was straining to find any kind of similarity or concordace. That is, when I wasn't fighting the urge to fall asleep. When I looked over Brooke appeared to be in the same state. So, at 11:45pm we admitted defeat and headed home. Bed felt so good!!

Sunday was an abbreviated day -- we did a boat tour of the city at 10:30am, did some quick last-minute shopping for gifts, did some more exploring around the city and had lunch at a restaurant from my guidebook, Flam's. This place specialized in flammenkuche, another Alsacian specialty. It's similar to a thin-crust pizza, and the basic recipe involves gruyere cheese, onions, little pieces of ham on top of a base of creme fraiche. Brooke ordered the "Flam of the Moment" (with potatoes and I don't remember what else) and I ordered the fromager (cheese special). They brought each of ours out as half-and-half, so that we would both be able to eat them hot out of the oven. It was just as delicious as the guidebook promised!

Afterward I dropped Brooke off at the train station (her flight left from Basel, Switzerland, so she had to take the train there), I headed off to visit the Botanical Garden behind the university. Unfortunately it was closing just as I arrived. But I think most of the plants probably aren't worth seeing at this point in the year. I took a 6pm direct train and got back to Besançon by 9pm. It was a wonderful weekend! Now it's late and time for me to get some sleep!

A Quick Word on Wednesday

So yesterday morning was pretty uneventful: I had planned to do a track workout first thing, but when I woke up I realized I had forgotten to take my clothes out of the washer the night before. Since all of my workout things were still wet (and it was much too cold to run in shorts), I was sort of stuck. It's funny, not having a dryer isn't usually a problem, but there are some moments -- like this morning, when it would be really handy.

At 2:30pm I met up with Susan (sister of my high school physics teacher, the woman who invited me to lunch at her house and to the apple festival) and her mother in the c-v. Her mother has been visiting for the last two weeks and will be here for another week. We went to a cute little patisserie-cafe for tea and hot chocolate and a treat. Susan ordered tea, her mother and I both ordered chocolat viennois (hot chocolate with whipped cream). All three of us had the macaron (macaroon) of the day, chestnut. Chestnut does not happen to be my favorite flavor, but I absolutely love macaroons. Before coming to France this time I'm not positive I had tried them before, if I had, it wasn't memorable. But I think I was offered one early on and now I'm hooked. For those of you who aren't familiar, this is what macarons look like (not my pics, I nicked these from Google Images):

Usually they're sold in the size pictured above, slightly larger than the size of a dollar coin. The most common flavors are vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, coffee and pistachio, but I've seen some really wild ones (cassis, pineapple, elderberry). The blue/black one in the picture above is probably cassis.

 The ones we had yesterday were the size of a regular pastry (maybe tennis ball size, but a disc, rather than a ball), and filled with both chestnut cream and a chestnut mousse. There was a candied chestnut on top. I had a wonderful time chatting with Susan and her mother and all really enjoyed the macarons.

At 4pm I had to dash off to meet Janice (former assistant I met with when I first got here, she got married to a Besançon resident and has been living here for the past 7-8 years). I had promised to babysit her two little kids so she could run some errands and finish packing. Her whole family is leaving for a three-week excursion to the U.S. this morning (actually they left at 5am, they should be on their way). Let me tell you, babysitting is the best birth control! Her son just turned three and her daughter is one and wow they are both a handful. The experience demonstrated to me how many factors you have to take into account if you want to have a family (does your apartment building have an elevator -- if not, living on the 4th floor with two small children will be extremely difficult / does your husband have a 2-hour commute and therefore get back at 7:30pm every night when he would otherwise get back earlier). Also, I was flabbergasted by how slowly we had to move with the kids. It just takes forever! I'm so used to getting things accomplished as quickly as possible... It was definitely eye-opening. There are moments when they're so cute though. We read lots and lots of books -- it was an easy way to keep them entertained -- including "Blueberries for Sal," one of my childhood favorites. Janet wanted me to speak English with them as much as possible -- even though they're very young the little that they do speak is in both English and French -- so when we read their one or two books in French I sight-translated the words. It was tougher than I would have expected! Janice said that her son is starting to recognize letters, so she's going to have to stop sight-translating for fear of confusing him.

After babysitting I met up with Janice, Laurie, Kirstie, Nicola (all primary school assistants), Kati
(J and L's roommate), and Justine (their neighboor on the floor below) for dinner at a Moroccan restaurant called Chez Achour. Steph and Charly recommended this place to me and it was delicious! It was only a 10-minute walk from my house too.

Time to get ready for school! Bonne journée! (have a great day!)

Business as Usual

So enough with voyaging around Europe, I'm back to the Besancon routine. Classes started up again on Thursday and the kids were pretty rowdy. After nearly 2 weeks of vacation, they had some trouble getting back in the routine. We worked on the names of the days of the week and it took a little longer than I expected. As with the other lessons I have taught so far, the lesson in general got much better with each successive session. I always feel badly for whichever class falls first in the lesson set, so far it's been a different one for one reason or another, but after I've taught the lesson a few more times I look back and wish I could re-teach it to that first class. At the suggestion of one of the teachers (I think her class was the third or fourth to whom I taught this lesson), I started having the kids use their ardoises (miniature chalkboards/dry-erase boards). I used it to review the numbers -- I would say a number and they would have to write it down and then raise their board. They love racing to see who can get it first and it allows me to verify that they're really learning. Also, I usually quiz them by holding up a flashcard of whatever vocabulary word we're reviewing (in this case, it would be a numeral), so by having them write the numeral out, it was a different way of testing their retention.

After only a few weeks of teaching my respect for the teaching profession in general has increased exponentially. Because the information itself seems basic, it's easy to think that teaching would be just as simple. But it's not -- finding the most effective and compelling way to present a new concept is so much harder than I ever realized. And it requires a lot of flexibility -- sometimes a concept is much harder for the kids than I anticipated and I have to modify whatever I had planned to teach them. And then sometimes they get it right away and I have to come up with an activity on the spot because the first one goes so quickly. And sometimes the kids are just brats. In general they have been really good, but there are one or two malcontents in practically every class who occasionally make their voices heard despite my shushing. And one or two of the classes (I can think of one class of 3rd graders at Bourgogne and one class of 4th graders at Champagne) are less attentive and less cooperative than the rest. During those classes especially I wish I could tap into that resevoir of endless patience that my mother always seems to possess...

I didn't have any big plans for this weekend, but it ended up being quite busy. Most of the activity happened on Friday. I had my third riding lesson, which went even better than the first two. This time I rode a Connemara named Saphir (Sapphire). Even though he was a little small for me (Connemaras are ponys, but fairly large and sturdy, and so they can sometimes be more like small horses), he was very responsive and a lot of fun to ride. There was one other girl in my lesson, Elisa, who told me afterwards that this lesson was her first time back in the saddle after a fairly serious car accident over a year ago. She rode Nouba, the horse I rode during my last lesson. We had to ride inside because it rained pretty hard on Thursday and was too wet to go outside. We didn't get to jump, but worked on a lot of bending and exercises on the flat. Since I'm planning to visit Strasbourg with Brooke next weekend, I arranged with Marie, the director, to make up the lesson I will miss the next morning at 9am.

Ultimate practice went well. The 1st team (which plays in Division III, I believe) had the first round of their indoor championship tournament while I was away in Vienna and they won the whole thing! The final rounds of the tournament won't take place until February (I still don't understand the system), but they will have good seeding because of their victories last weekend. For the scrimmage on Friday night we played the 1st team versus the 2nd team (which plays at the regional level, not the national level, and is the co-ed team), which was a bit frustrating. It's always demoralizing to go in knowing you're playing against people of a much higher skill level, but we managed to score some good points nonetheless. The reasoning behind having the first and second teams play each other is so that the second team has a chance to work together, without depending on the first team players, who won't be there during our competitions. Hopefully we'll only improve!

Then, after Ultimate, I hurried home to shower and change for Candice, Laurie, and Kati's pendaison de la crémaillère (housewarming party). Candice and Laurie are the two assistants who found an apartment in the c-v and Kati, an Austrian ERASMUS student, is their roommate. ERASMUS is a really popular program in the EU which allows university students to study abroad for a year in another EU country. Most people I meet assume I am an ERASMUS student (for some reason most people don't seem to know it's only an EU thing). Because all of the EU countries use this same program, students have the security of knowing their credits will transfer when they return to their home university.

Anyway, they've been moved in since our second week here, but this party was an excuse to hang out and mingle (Kati's friends from the university -- she's in the faculte des beaux-arts or school of art -- plus the english teaching assistants). Because I didn't get back from practice until 11pm, I didn't arrive until nearly midnight, but was pleased to find quite a bustling party! I met a bunch of new people, including Kati's friends and some friends of other assistants. Even though it was a late night, I'm really glad I went!

Saturday morning I was up bright and early to get there for my 9am lesson. The barn was packed! There were 11 other people in my lesson in the smallish indoor, and then another lesson of 6-7 little kids on Shetland ponies in an outdoor arena. The most people I'd ever seen at the Ecuries at one time was probably 10, so the atmosphere was very different. I cannot say I enjoyed my lesson very much. I rode Saphir again, and he was fine, but there were just too many people in our lesson. The ring could probably comfortably hold 8 horses and ponys, but 12 was way too many. And besides the numbers, the range of abilities was also too wide; there were one or two adults who did not seem to have control of their horses. And Beatrice (Marie's daughter, the main coach/instructor) didn't do anything to curb her son, who was also riding in the lesson. He appeared to be about 7 or 8 and was a total brat. He kept shouting to his mother about one thing or another, didn't pay attention to the other horses around him, made loud noises and waved his crop around while we were waiting our turns to jump, etc. I was shocked by his behavior. We did jump -- a gymnastic which eventually included 3 verticals and an oxer, and that scared me even more than the flatwork. Saphir was fine, but watching some of the others, especially when we were supposed to do it with our hands behind our backs, made me really nervous.

Honestly, if Saturday's lesson had been my first experience at the Ecuries, I don't know if I would have gone back. Talking with a few of the adults in my lesson after it was over, they were surprised Marie would schedule so many people at once. They were also thoroughly annoyed by the instructor's son. Their reactions reassured me a little bit, because at least they didn't see the experience as the norm. But I'm definitely going to stick to my Friday afternoon slot. It's sort of a shame too, because there was a convivial atmosphere with the group at 9am. The adults from the lesson, about four or so plus another three who had come to watch, invited me to join them for coffee and a snack in the barn's common room afterward. They were really friendly and it was nice to chat with them. It was definitely the dynamic that I had hoped to find by joining this barn.

Then Saturday afternoon I went ice-skating with Colin, Romain, and Romain's girlfriend. We went to the patinoire (ice rink) Lafayette, the same one where I saw the hockey match. The ice rink participates in the carte avantages jeunes (youth pass), so I got in for free! We spent nearly 2 hours there and had a lot of fun! It was fairly crowded, and of course there were the teenage boys skating way too fast and darting in front and behind the other skaters. But there was a separate, smaller rink reserved for the kids, so at least I didn't have to worry about accidentally running over some poor toddler on skates! None of the four of us fell, so we considered it a success! I love ice-skating and was really glad that we got to go.

This morning I went to church as usual, and when I got back I baked a loaf of banana bread! I noticed on Saturday that Steph and Charly's 4 bananas were turning black, and suggested I could bake them a cake. So faux amis, or "false friends" like cake make French even more confusing than it already is. In French a cake is a loaf cake, usually savory but sometimes sweet, with the size/texture/consistency of banana or zucchini bread (maybe a little drier, especially if it's savory). You wouldn't say "pain de bananas" because pain is bread that you slice or use for a sandwich, like baguette or a loaf of whole wheat bread. I just took it out of the oven and it looks pretty good! I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies this past Wednesday when my package finally arrived, and Steph and Charly loved them! I was quite pleased with how well they turned out, and hope the banana bread is just as good.

Here are some pictures I took last Wednesday when I took a long bike-ride along the Doubs. The fall colors were even more beautiful on Tuesday when I went for a really long run following the same route, but unfortunately we had a big storm on Tuesday evening and that knocked down a lot of the leaves. You get the idea though!

Oh, one more thing. Yesterday after the #6 bus dropped me off at Place Flore I stopped in La Porte des Saveurs (the boulangerie/patisserie with the very friendly owner) to get a little treat. She only had 5-6 choices (not very many by the average patisserie's standards), and I asked which was her favorite. "Le figue" was her response, so that's what I bought. 

 

I'm starting to realize many traditional French pastries involve the same ingredients, just put together in different ways (as in an eclair and a Paris-Brest). This one is basically an eclair (pastry with creme de la patissier inside) but in a ball rather than a rounded rectangle, and covered in almond fondant. It was yummy, but a little dry for my taste. I don't think I would get it again, but now I now I can say I've tried one!