Play first, Work later

That's exactly how I'm going to treat this post, and my current lunch break.

Like I did last night. I came into today's classes without much preparation because all night I was up excitedly researching my trip to the Loire Valley in two weeks, as well as mine and Aimée's vacation to Genève, Switzerland and Paris during the Christmas break. Since I winged this morning's classes with hardly any prep, I imagine doing so this afternoon shouldn't prove to be any more difficult.

So without any further ado: Play time!

From November 1st until the 5th, Oana and I will be making the eight-hour train ride north to the city of Tours, in the Loire Valley:

And I'm really excited because the hotel we chose is going to be about 25€ a night per person, although it's a two-star, but we agreed we'd rather save our money to spend on châteaux and wine-tasting tours! If nothing else, the room has two beds, a lock, cable T.V., a hair dryer and its own private bathroom and shower!! The private bathroom AND shower is quite a rare find here in France.

The hotel itself is situated in Centre Ville, near the old part of town and is within walking distance of the Loire River, the Office de Tourisme, and the train station. All very big perks! In doing research, I've discovered that Place Plumereau (or Place Plume as it's more commonly known) has all kinds of night life every weekend. Again, we are only blocks away. Supposedly there's some place called L'Académie de la Bière which has over 200 beers on tap and is teeming with college students. Sounds like something that shouldn't be missed!

But I think that's enough excitement for now.

As for my schedule pédagogique, things are still fairly complicated at the administrative level, because it seems like the director and teachers are on different wavelengths here at La Tournière. I'm supposed to be giving the students fun activities and worksheets, but in order to do so, I need access to a printer/photocopier. However, each teacher must provide his or her own paper to put in the machines. The director tells me the teachers will provide me with paper here, while the teachers tell me they have no money to do so and it's the director's responsibility.

So until then, I'm just having the students do a lot of drawing, which is nice for me because it keeps them calm and busy. At least I never finish too early this way! Despite that, Day 3 has been my best yet.

As for France as a nation, the entire country is under a transportation strike today, meaning every single train line is out of order. Because of that, people in Antibes need some form of transportation, so all the regional buses have lifted their otherwise normal Thursday strikes. I will never understand these people. What's the point of even striking when you're eventually going to cater to your clients anyways? Why even strike in the first place if it's not producing any visible results? Just change jobs already :-) Ok, maybe it's not that simple, but still...

Thanks to the strikes, I guess a lot of kids couldn't go home for lunch, so the school provided a picque-nique for everyone who stayed today. That meant me! I was the only maîtresse to stay, so I got a cute little bag lunch, something akin to most American sack lunches -- kind of. It included taboulé (a Moroccan-type rice and veggie salad), apple sauce, chips, chocolate-granola bars and like always, bread and cheese! Mmm. Because I'm the only teacher eating here today, I got three sack lunches, so I can save two for snacks for another day -- or more likely, hour.

I still have another hour to go until my next class, so I guess I should start researching more activities for future lessons.