Ce qui me meut: Say "la vie"

Even though the music video is terrible I really like the song. After a combination of OneRepublic, this article, and a Friday night at home, I’ve realized that I’ve regressed a little and let myself slip into some sort of “comfort zone;” something that I set out to avoid when I started this adventure. I went to a graduation ceremony and party at the lycée by myself tonight, and it really was weird being the only English speaking person in a gymnasium full of people. I did get the chance to talk to some of my students and teachers, but being there was still a little overwhelming. While at that point I was looking over the metaphorical edge, in terms of taking full advantage of my surroundings, point number 2 of the article has really made me reflect on my experiences so far. In the beginning, I started off strong and surprised myself at how I was breaking out of the shell that I’ve managed to build over the years. But now I realize I’ve done what every person in a new and unfamiliar situation does – I found a group and I’m sticking with it. Yet after the commencement ceremony tonight, I’ve realized that some things need to change. The weather is supposed to be nice this weekend, so Sunday I’m going back up to the coast to visit Dieppe – one of the cities on the “Bucket List” I made before I came back. Time to do work.

On Tuesday I had a couple new groups of kids for the first (and unfortunately last) time. I learned that I’ve got a nickname circulating: “BG” because “tu es un beau gosse.” Hey, I’ll take ‘em where I can get ‘em. The kids were all really enthusiastic, which after seeing how things can be sometimes with their real teacher, is a nice change of pace. Wednesday afternoon I had a class by myself because the teacher never showed up. After waiting for her in the hallway for about 5 minutes, I opened the classroom to let the students in and found that she had left her bag, laptop, projector, etc., on the desk, so I figured she was just running late. I sent a couple of students to go look for her, but they were unable to find her. Honestly, I was impressed at how long they paid attention and participated so late in the afternoon. After the first exercise though they did crash and burn, and with 10 minutes left in class I had to pull teeth and cut my losses. Thursday afternoon at the collège was fun as usual; I did a physical description crossword and several rounds of “Guess Who” with the 6èmes and watched different versions of “A Christmas Carol” with the 4èmes (tough, I know). Marianne, the 6èmes teacher asked if my timetable was going to change any time soon because she wants to put me with a different class. She was smiling while she said this but she commented that, “they come back to me and are like, ‘I hate you!’ They think I’m terrible.” I know that’s not the case because when I sat in on her classes even I enjoyed them, but I guess they prefer me because I'm something different and have given them candy.

While I didn’t end up booking my trip for the first part of winter break, I’m glad I held off this long because originally I had planned to go to Tunisia and Morocco - dodged a bullet there (literally) because now there are massive riots in Tunisia with people dying and things getting burnt.

But back to the ceremony earlier this evening. So the theme was “Gastronomy through the Ages.” They did a really nice job of decorating the gym with different booths from Neolithic and Egyptian times to the 1800s and even the future. Each booth featured a couple of different cocktails as well as a variety of fancy finger foods. Faculty, friends and family were all invited; one of my teachers said they were expecting around 500 people, which is a pretty big deal considering the event was in honor of at most 30 some students. Here are some photos of a couple of the booths: