196...

That's it!

As of this morning -- after 15 lovely minutes of sleep; going out on a Sunday might have been a bad call --I am no longer employed by the French government.

Hello, unemployment!

Which means, I'm finally a tourist in Europe!!!! I'm not an employee and after Wednesday, I'll no longer be a resident.

Freedom.

I wonder if I'll get to 200 posts before I leave France

Here are some things that I'm really looking forward to in the upcoming weeks, be it in France, Spain, Germany or the United States:

-My mom's visit! It seems that being so far away has really made me miss a lot of things. And while I thought I was pretty independent in college and down at Santa Barbara, I've grown quite homesick. And I think I've seen my family more often over the past seven months here in Europe than I would have during a normal academic year at UCSB.

-Saying goodbye to the beaches of the South of France in the gorgeous SPRING weather! Finally.

-My birthday weekend. Who doesn't like cake? Need I say more?!

-Germany! Being able to visit a country I haven't yet seen. I have NO idea what to expect because I'll be hanging around with a crowd of locals :) Supposedly beerfests will be kicking off soon as well as crazy German football fans. Oh yeah and sausage/canned veggies, that'll be fun.

-Barcelona with my parents! More seeing my family, always fun. But also, seeing another country I've yet to see! And I believe that the weather in Spain will be the hottest I've experienced during this entire trip. With that also comes Spanish beaches, beautiful architecture, TAPAS/SANGRIA, and oh yeah, going out until 8 a.m. If only I can convince my parents to join me...

-Jeopardy! I love that show. Who cares if they're going to be reruns shortly.

-Grey's Anatomy! When the writers' strikes hit, I was still able to catch up on old episodes I'd missed online. But now that that's (supposedly) resolved, new episodes will begin airing in the month of April. When I come back home!

-BASEBALL! My favorite sport. My favorite season. The reason for living -- well, one of the many reasons. And since the A's have gone into such an overhaul mode this season, I imagine their marketing department will be doing all it can to entice fan attendance, i.e. even cheaper tickets, anyone?!

-Road-tripping! With my sister still in Santa Barbara and friends spread out from San Luis Obispo down to San Diego on the coast, I might take a long Wednesday to Monday trip down the 101 and take in all California has to offer! Who cares that I've already seen/done it all, it's been a freakin' year since I graduated and nearly 10 months since my last visit!

-Healthy Food! As much as I've LOVED -- understatement -- the food over here, it's been doing a number on my body. It'll be nice to get back to whole grains, low fat, low carbs, and really small portions. I'm trying to convince myself to stop buying fixed price menus. Even though they're way cheaper, it's still an ungodly amount of food!

-Gym memberships! My gym experience here was ridiculous. Can't wait to finally join a 24-Hour Fitness or something like that with real, modern equipment ;)

And one last thing:

-Customer Service! Sorry France, you just never really got on board with this one. But you know what that also means? NO MORE TRANSPORTATION STRIKES! Those really threw a wrench in many of my travel plans over here.

It's kind of hard to be a spoiled American and adjust to the French lifestyle, isn't it? But I'm really glad I tried it for almost a year!

One more thing

I PURCHASED MY RETURN TICKET TO THE UNITED STATES!!!

I'll be landing in San Francisco by 7 p.m. on Friday, April 18th.

That is all :)

You gotta fight, for your right....

...to party?

Anyways, I feel like fighting's a pretty good theme to wrap up this week.

You already know that I had to fight for my friends' visit -- who just left, BIG BUMMER -- and I also had to fight for me and my personal space here in France.

However, as much as both made me very unnerved, uncomfortable, angry and stressed in the beginning, I honestly believe all is for the best now. Two more days of work and then I move back home.

But on a different level of "fighting," I literally saw three outrageous fights in the last 45 hours. Not even two full days.

Yesterday morning when I was running around like a chicken with its head cut off (to close up everything here) I heard obscene amounts of honking coming from the auto-route exit when I was walking on the street to the CAF building. Turns out some old man was driving like an A-hole or something -- come on this is France, don't expect much from the drivers -- when the guy behind him gets out of his car and starts slamming on the window. Even though it was entirely in French, he was telling the other guy off in a very, very foul way. Then it died down and he drove off. All that for cutting someone off.

Situation two happened this morning when we were on the way to Nice on the Promenade des Anglais. Half the road was blocked off and these guys on motorcycles boxed in a good three cars. Man #1 in the middle car gets out and forces his way through the motorcyclists. He then proceeds to open the door of the car belonging to Man #2 who was with his wife. Man #1 lunges for Man #2, intent on dragging him out of his car so he can kick the French out of him. Man #3 on motorcycle pries Man #1 off Man #2, while Man #4 in the car to the rear starts running towards the scene. Then our light turns green and we drive off.

And the third brawl occurred while we were sitting in the TGV, waiting for our train to take off. A big huge group started forming near our platform, because apparently some teenage girl jumped on this really old, senile looking woman. No idea what caused this rise in tension, but she was swearing, throwing fists and lunging after the old woman. Security came running to the scene and pulled her off, forcing her arms behind her back. Then the girl continued swearing at the security officer and spat in his direction. I don't know if it got on him. This causes the other security guard in the little cart to come running to his friend's aide, and then proceeds to viciously KICK the girl in question. That completely shocked Kat, Libby and me. I wish I could tell you how it ended, but again, our train pulled out of the Gare on its way East.

French people are really leaving a good taste in my mouth for my last week here.

Oh and don't forget: Clocks forward tonight for those of you who live here.

Odds and Ends

I've officially been given clearance from the Inspection office in Nice and both my schools to leave after next week. And I'm only probably going to work on Monday and Tuesday.

Then my time working for the French government is up.

It's funny because now that I'm about to leave and have friends visitng, I've been doing all the fun things I should have been doing this entire time here. And I'm really enjoying myself! Maybe it's because I know that I have a finite number of days remaining in this country.

Either way, I've done a lot of administrative crap like filing for an address change (22 € ridiculous!), finishing my CAF document, etc. Basically I'll be keeping my bank account open so that way the CAF can be putting in half of the rent payments that I've made since October all the way through June. Then supposedly I can close the account online, but I'll need to figure that out for sure.

As for today, all afternoon classes were cancelled so the teachers could sit and argue on the new government's plan of action for proposed programs during the 2008-2009 academic year. Supposedly the ministry of education has already signed off on these plans, but all schools are banding together to oppose them.

And as usual, I sat on the side while everyone argued.

But supposedly the new plan includes over ten hours a week of French grammar lessons and the regularly allocated time to foreign languages. That leaves less than five hours of the week to dedicate to geography, math, art, sports, science and maybe one or two other subjects. And don't forget about the two 15-minute recreational breaks they get before and after lunch.

So where does the rest of the time in the day go?

France will be reinstating daily "moral" lessons for the first time since all the teachers were children.

All good things must come to an end

Long story very, very short.

Now that my friends are here, my roommate troubles have exploded beyond all possible belief. I can't really get into too much detail about it right now because I'm not at home and have limited Internet time, but I believe I will be terminating my contract to teach here after Trimester 2.

Brief run-down: I have friends over for the rest of the week. My mom comes early next week. Then it's my spring break/end of the second trimester.

When spring break's over, I will be staying at my dad's house, hopefully with a flight to get back to California before the end of April in order to start my career search back up.

Either way, I have to be out of my house by the first week in April. And that's a personal choice, seeing as how I can no longer tolerate what's been going on and building up over the past two weeks.

I feel better about it already.

Global Warming Killed My Boyfriend

I'll have to update this with picture proof when I get back to Antibes. But I've finally succumbed to a French love-affair.

It all started *cue flashback music* in Switzerland of all places. This chilly Easter morning, I experienced my first real falling flakes of snow in quite a number of years. It sparked something in me that hasn't yet been awaken. Kind of like a child-like state. So in this "weakened" mentality, I was able to let it in.

In Neuchâtel, Switzerland I saw this little guy. My first glimpse of a snowman left by some other love-struck wanderer and suddenly, I was inspired beyond my years.


Since I'd already been heart-warmed by this child-like state, a few hours later and back in Annecy, France chez mon papa, I was quickly reminded of my brief infatuation from earlier in the day. Just like that, a wave of emotions I've never felt rushed over me.


A new idea struck my little American brain and love walked back into my life. This is the beginning:


Just when I thought I'd never have a French romance, I was willing and patient to let things develop. I was trying to catch something before that wasn't yet ready to materialize.


It took a lot of hard work and energy -- even the eventual delay of my favorite nightly ritual: tartes from the local bakery.


In order to make things work with a French man, you must be patient. You have to be willing to see what you want to see and accept the rest for what it is.


French men never smile in photos.


But in the end it'll never work out. Our differences are greater than the miles that span the Atlantic Ocean and separate California from France. Eventually I'll have to go back home. His temper got the best of me the few short hours we spent together. Because of his French heritage, he is cold and slow to let people in.

I made a joke about him being thus and he took it too much to heart. So then I pointed out the obvious stereotype: "If you're so upset about it, why don't your run crying to your mother." However, I didn't know he actually does live with his mom.

I let myself sleep on it and in the morning decided that I needed to apologize and we could work out whatever kinks exist between us.

...But in the morning, he was gone.

* * * * * *

I told you snow makes me feel like a kid. Though, I had to put up with a lot to get here, like a 13-hour delayed flight. I arrived at the Nice Cote d'Azur airport on Friday at 6:30 p.m., a little early for my flight. When the kiosk finally opened, my gate was never listed and "Flight Delayed" kept flashing by all the Easy Jet flights.

Well, three hours passed and the two flights of the night that were later than my 9 p.m. flight had already come and gone. Our plane sat patiently at the designated gate, waiting for people to fill it up. By 11:30 p.m., we were finally given the green light to board. Alas, after 30 minutes in the hangar, everyone was told to leave and go back beyond security to the airport's main lobby. Everything in the airport was closed and half the lights were off. Instead of flying out that night, every single passenger was given free transportation to the Park Inn hotel right by the airport along with a (HUGE, un-France-sized) breakfast the next morning and transportation back to the airport.

Long story short, I made my way to the Basel airport for a snow-filled weekend in Germanic Switzerland with my parents. Here's my very first glimpse of snow, before even getting off the plane:


Though I don't yet know how this story will end. It's supposed to snow heavily for the next three days in Geneva, so only time will tell if my flight will be able to leave ground this afternoon...

La folie de mars

(March Madness)

I know this isn't the best of quality, but as of Round 1 last night, I'm 13-for-16 with my March Madness picks. Not back for someone who's living abroad and hasn't seen a college basketball game in over a year and some odd months, right?

If you can see it, the green picks are my teams that have moved on. The red is the teams I've misjudged. And being a West Coast girl, the Pac-10 teams have really let me down *cough*USCandArizona*cough*

Don't ask any reasoning whatsoever behind my picks. Since I haven't been following NCAA athletics religiously, I kind of went with historic picks, plus added in a bit of upsets. Because we all know that the top seeds don't always perform to their "potential" in the Big Dance.

And just like my short attention span to fantasy baseball, I guarantee I'll stop tracking my teams real soon. Like, for example, when I go to Switzerland tonight for the weekend. Or when my friend comes to visit on Monday for a week. Or when my mom comes for a long weekend. Or when my birthday weekend comes and then I go to Germany and Spain on spring break!

(Note: My birthday coincides with the weekend of the final playoff round. All the aforementioned events will be happening consecutively. AKA, my interest dwindles tonight, once I'm hardly going to be around a computer for two- to three-straight weeks.)

**Edit Note: Speaking of fantasy baseball, I decided to go ahead and join a Yahoo! league anyways, what the hell! Wanna guess my team's name?!

Cleat-Chasers. Try to find me.

Just a spoon full of (fake) sugar

I am still sick. Day seven now.

After two bouts -- in six months, not too bad -- of violent stomach aches and vomiting, I finally summoned up the courage to go to the pharmacie yesterday and try to explain what was going on in hopes of receiving some magic pills.

I'm not so sure I correctly explained my situation. Though I was able to tell her what I did not have. It's not heartburn before/during/after meals and it's not nausea. Well after thinking it over for five minutes, the pharmacienne gave me a 3 Euro packet of some kinds of pills. She told me to take them whenever I feel sick, no more than three times a day. They are to be placed and dissolved in the mouth, no water necessary.

I then turned to my friend Sarah and said, "Oh, these must be like Tums," which would indeed be some sort of an ease to the pains I've been having as of late.

However, upon closer inspection after already purchasing the pills, I noticed they're made with ASPARTAME!

Earlier in this cold/flu thing, I'd been sucking down throat losenges like they're candy -- not too far from the truth, but I did have a real bad sore throat. Then I'd notice my stomach would begin to hurt after taking them because, shock of all shocks, they're made with fake sugar.

Apparently I can't handle more than one small dose of fake sugar, AKA Aspartame, a day.

Hopefully this goes down better than the last ones I tried....

Oh yeah:

(Happy Spring!)

And speaking of Spring, I'm kind of bummed I missed out on MLB Spring Training in Arizona this year. I've gone three times and have missed out on two because I've been here in France. And I never in my life got to make it out to Dodgertown, what with the Dodgers leaving Vero Beach as their spring training site, opting to join the rest of the West Coast in Arizona next year.

Either way, I AM going to as many games as possible this summer when I return to the United States to make up for the 2.5 months of baseball I'll be missing abroad!! Though, I'm not sure how excited I'll be to watch some ball if Barry Bonds gets picked up by someone else. The A-hole needs to retire already.

Opening Day is only five days away!

Oh, celestial sphere

Hello, going back to my days in Astronomy 1 freshman year of college! Anyways, just when I thought I had many of the subtle nuances of French culture down, nature has to go and throw me off my learning curve -- again.

You see, normally I pretty much got that people say bonsoir either when it's a.) dark or b.) the working day's over. And for the past few months, the two have usually been one in the same.

But now, with the approach of the vernal equinox in only two days (good riddance, winter!), our days here in the northern hemisphere are getting much longer. In fact, almost equal to the amount of time that is night. Which means, when I get off work (on the two days I work past/until 4 p.m.) it's still very bright and sunny outside. So wanting to take advantage of this weather that's slowly getting more and more dry and less and less chilly, I'm walking around much more. When I enter my humble abode after a full day of work and at least a solid hour at the gym, I can almost make dinner in full sunlight at 6:30 p.m. -- almost.

That's all going to change in a little under two weeks anyhow, when France finally hits on daylight savings times and jumps ahead one hour. Then it'll be sunny until 7:30 and beyond!

The only complaint/qualm I have with all of this is as follows: When's the appropriate time to say bonsoir now?! When I said hello to the people at the gym at 4 p.m. in broad daylight, they corrected my "bonjour" with a "bonsoir" in return.

Is it just me, or is there something wrong with saying "good evening" when there are still nearly three good hours left of sunshine?!

Well, at least I don't have to worry about the cultural importance of saying "good night" at 8 a.m. like they do in parts of Spain. Oh wait, I'll be there in about three weeks...

Happy Festival, Patrick

First thing's first: Here is my Facebook album of 40+ pictures from this weekend in Provence. You don't have to be a member to see the pictures!

Secondly, Happy St. Patrick's Day, English-speaking world! I celebrated by playing Bingo with my kids and giving out shamrock goodies that I bought at Target when I was home.

The entire school -- well teachers that is -- celebrated in another way, however. One teacher's name, appropriately enough is Patrice and today was his birthday. It's also his "namesake" day. The Catholic calendar gives a Saint's name to every day of the year and of course today is the day of Saint Patrick. Thus, in France you not only celebrate your birthday, but also the day of the Saint with whom you share names. I think Saint Monique is August 27th, or something like that. Sucks for you if you're named after the Saint dedicated to the day of your birth. Anyways for Patrice's birthday we all partook in chocolate mousse and pear cakes during the 15-minute recess.

Oh and I leave you with one more thing. It turns out that after every jour férié (school holidays) the elementary schools have to make up the day off on the following Wednesday, which are usually like mid-week weekends for us. However, knowing this, I am not sure if I have to come make up my language sessions. If you know, please do not tell me. I'm going to continue not knowing until the day of. I figure if they wanted me to come, my teachers/directors would tell me, right?!

I'm not going to be responsible enough to ask on my own accord. Instead, I'm going to take the day off like I originally planned and hopefully not receive any mid-day calls asking, "Where are you today?!"

Ha. Oh well, I'm only here for 85 more days anyways :)

Deux gormands

Though literally meaning "two gluttons," I'm a little letdown that the English translation for this title does not have an equally beautiful thought for this word. Glutton brings to mind a guiltless pig mindlessly stuffing his face with Lay's potato chips in front of the T.V. Whereas gourmand(e) conjures images of one who appreciates plump juicy berries ripe in their summer prime, the crunchiness of crisp green zucchini, the velvety feel of a rich chunk of chocolate rolling off the tip of your tongue or the fruity, yet peppery aroma of a finely-aged wine accompanied by the perfect blend of creamy cheeses.

In short, a gourmand is one who appreciates the food he experiences on a daily basis. And unlike its English counterpart, to be gourmand is not a sin.

Though after my weekend, maybe it should be! I've been following a successful low-carb/low-sugar diet and am (was before this weekend) almost two kilos lighter to show for it! But that always changes whenever I'm with my dad.

I need to back up just a little here. On Friday I was supposed to leave the Antibes station at 6 p.m. in order to get to Orange near 10. However, upon my arrival I noticed that EVERY SINGLE TRAIN was going to be two-and-a-half to three hours late. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that my train -- the only one going to Orange for the night -- was canceled! And if I were to leave Saturday morning, it would be useless because it'd take nearly half the day to get there.

No, I know what you're thinking. There was not a strike -- for once. Instead there was a fire on some of the rails near Les Arcs. I'll get to that in a second. Anyways, after waiting in line for 20 minutes to see what I could do about my ticket, I found out there was a delayed train going to Paris that made its last stop in Aix-en-Provence, which is only an hour away from Orange. Long story short, I hopped on that train which left literally five minutes after I left the ticket counter and what should have been a two hour train took nearly four hours. There were "unforeseen stops" because we had to wait the fire out. Though in Les Arcs, we kind of drove right over some of the flames, hot flames. And I made it to Orange around the same time I should have been there originally. Thank God for a dad with a car!

Saturday morning started out well, just like the rest of the trip from there on out! We began the morning with a Best Western buffet filled to the brim with delicious yogurt, bread and cheeses that have been adding extra kilos on to my formerly average body! Grrr... After we walked around the city and explored some of the Roman ruins and artsy little boutiques. Now I can proudly say that I own my first Longchamp bag (see below) -- Longchamp is to France what Coach is to California.


Speaking of shopping, the boutiques in Orange are all so artfully set up! My favorite part was just walking into the shops and enjoying the extravagance of all the displays. For my dad; however, I think his highlight was photographing the 100 fountains of Orange.

We next took our trip south to Châteauneuf-du-Pape and sat in a caveau or two for some dégustation du vin (wine tasting!). I'm afraid I haven't yet developed an appreciation for this varietal, as the dry, harsh climate lends to a higher alcohol percentage and a heavy, peppery taste that lingers on the tongue. Though I did enjoy the chocolate factory located on one of the vineyards who proudly displayed a 12 kilo chocolate Easter egg on sale for 180 Euros!!!

After that, we found ourselves with a few more hours to kill until dinner and made our way to Avignon. I officially take back what I said about Lyon being my favorite city in France!

Vieux Avignon has won me over with its antiquated Roman structures and "modern-hippie" quarter tucked right in the heart of an upscale shopping district. It was kind of like a really high-end L.A.-type area meets Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue. I loved it! If you haven't yet been, you must. Better yet, it felt really young because the walled part of the city is right along the border of a university campus. Perhaps in another life I'll study abroad in Avignon.

Today -- Palm Sunday to be exact -- we drove around in search of more relics of the Roman Empire. As we left Orange's city limits, we came across the "Arc de Triomphe" that was built in 20 B.C. Though after a few hours of nothing as impressive, we agreed to return to Châteauneuf-du-Pape for our final lunch at La Mère Germaine. The menu was all fixed price, so I ended up ordering the following:

-Velouté de châtaignes (chestnut cream soup)
-No idea what, but some kind of fish farci (stuffed with risotto and tomatoes)
-Brochette d'ananas au coulis de fruits rouges et perles du Japon (Roasted pineapple skewers with berry sauce and tapioca)

And don't forget a chilled glass of Châteauneuf-du-Pape blanc! Heaven. Even so, I was a little too full to board my train 15 minutes after. Luckily, because of the damage Friday's fires did to the tracks everything heading south was delayed 15 minutes. Peu importe, I still made it back to Marseille on time and ready for my connection back to Antibes.

And now I'm back. Oh yeah, I also consumed two packets of antibiotics, three travel-sized Kleenex and a handful of antisceptic lemon throat losenges. Plus a shot of Nyquil! What an end to a great weekend :)

I leave you with some photos:

Orange

Châteauneuf-du-Pape

Avignon

Qui a faim?

This is kind of fitting, seeing how I just taught my younger students all kinds of emotions including "I am hungry/thirsty." (Sidenote, I hope I am not getting sick just before the weekend hits, as coughing, a runny nose and sore throat have led to this conclusion...)

But last night I had no idea what to make for dinner, I just knew I had to use up some veggies left in the fridge before I headed out for the weekend, along with the half pack of tofu I've had open for about three days now.

After browsing through an old (AMERICAN!!) magazine my mom left here over Christmas break, I came across the Eat Better America website. Oh my goodness, if you click on the "recipes" section there are over a billion things to choose from, organized by labels such as drinks, desserts, snacks, lunch, breakfast, dinner.

I kind of wasted the better part of my night two days ago drooling over every single recipe listed there. So much that I didn't really have enough time to cook that night, so I whipped up something quick (hello, large salad).

Last night I decided to go to the search bar and typed in "tofu" because I really don't know how to cook tofu since I've only ever thrown it in with lentils and chestnuts or something. Desperate for new ideas here, people.

Anyways, the second or third tofu recipe on the site was just too perfect! It's called a Niçoise Tofu Skillet Supper!


I improvised a little bit, cutting the portion almost in fourths. And while I didn't have any green beans, I did have some asparagus chillin' in the freezer (ha, get it?) and I threw in some of my roommate's cherry tomatoes (shh, don't tell!) and duh, Herbes de Provence took the place of the Italian seasoning and garlic salt called for in the recipe. Dang it was good. And like I said, too perfect for someone who's actually living in the greater Nice area!

Best website, EVER.

A weekend in Provence

After what I suppose was a pretty low-key strike at the SNCF stations yesterday, I finally have my train ticket for this weekend!

So it looks as if I'm all booked up until Spring Break in April :) Should you need to spend time with me, please take a number and wait until late April. Thank you.

No but seriously, Dad and I are making our way to Orange this weekend and perhaps even Châteauneuf du Pape for -- you guessed it -- a wee bit of wine tasting. I'm really hoping we can find at least one Irish pub somewhere that will serve me a green beer this weekend! I just want one, is that too much to ask for?!

Next weekend is the long Easter break -- woo, three days instead of two -- and I'll be meeting up with the fam in Basel/Zurich/Lusanne, Switzerland.

Just a few days after that, my mom's coming down to Nice to hang out with me on my mid-week days off, while we head down to La Ciotat for my BIRTHDAY WEEKEND from April 4-6.

And then I'm off to Germany and Spain!

Life really can't get any better than this right now. Oh wait, yes it could. I still have to teach, don't I...?

More reasons why I like French people

This I don't get.

I'm on the bus like usual, in my gym clothes -- why am I the only person in this country who ever wears gym clothes?! -- when the following happened.

There were no more seats available, so I had to sit in the side-facing seats in the back. Instead of getting all car sick by watching the side-scenery, I turned my body towards the front of the bus and looked straight ahead. I noticed some woman in front of me, and I'll admit I'm frequently guilty of this, but I couldn't help but admire how well-dressed and fashionable she looked. It's not like I was rudely staring or anything like that, but you get the idea. At one point she turned back and looked right at me, like she knew I had been looking at the back of her head or something. However, when she snapped her head around, I was no longer looking at her. But because I was in the back, I was perpetually looking forward, beyond her and at the road. She kept turning back, why I'm not sure.

Then as she's getting off, she straightens out her clothes, stands up from her seat and looks back, right at me. I tried not to look at her, but kept staring straight ahead, minding my own business. Well this is kind of hard to ignore: she keeps looking at me and puts up the middle finger really aggressively with a crazed look on her face. And she held it there for a good minute.

I looked behind me to see if there was anyone outside she might have been gesturing to, but located no such person. And then the two Moroccan guys sitting in the seat adjacent to me, craned their necks to look over at me, in my direction, and started laughing silently.

Not sure why, but right then and there I felt extremely embarrassed, confused and offended. What the heck did I do to warrant this?! Well it took me the better part of the day to forget about it.

When the heck did I get so sensitive?!

And another note about French people: They have no shame whatsoever.

My roommate is having her boyfriend staying over for the week because he just started a new job in Antibes. Since he lives in Nice and doesn't have a car, it'd be kind of difficult for him to get to work on time. Her and I are actually getting along a little better again with him here because he's way more friendly and keeps her personable and accountable for all her messes. I kind of like living in a house of three for now. It's never felt too small for us.

Except for yesterday morning, when he walked in the kitchen in search of breakfast, still half asleep.

It would have been a normal morning scene, if he wasn't wearing his speedo-esque p.j.s showing off more than I'd ever like to see of what might possibly be the hairiest legs on Earth.

The Day's Second Post

Sorry, I just came across something really exciting I'd like to share with the world.

I'M OFFICIALLY A PUBLISHED AUTHOR! (And no, the hundreds of sports journalism articles I've had published online and in newspapers don't count.) In an actual BOOK.

I knew the book was coming out soon and I couldn't for the life of me remember the title. And God bless Google's little virtual heart, a quick search for my name followed by the word "baseball" brought up a whole mess of hits. Mostly were my articles, but I did find a few other interesting things.

Like, this mail bag from the Cleveland Indians' beat writer about three years ago ("From bats to hats to music"). But I'm mainly interested in this little book right here:

Baseball/Literature/Culture
Essays, 2006–2007
Edited by Ronald E. Kates and Warren Tormey

Description
The Conference on Baseball in Literature and American Culture has consistently produced a strong body of scholarship since its inception in 1995. Essays presented at the 2006 and 2007 conferences are published in this work.

Topics covered include early baseball journalism; sportswriting as mythology; the Henry Wiggen baseball novels; fictionalized baseball broadcasts; racism, religious fundamentalism, patriotism and Marxism; Philip Roth’s The Great American Novel; Zane Grey; masculinity in Richard Greenberg’s Take Me Out; Willie Mays; Northern Exposure; Salvadore Dalí and surrealism; baseball’s economic trendsetters; Pete Rose; baseball literature in the classroom; and Jim Bunning’s perfect game, among others.

And if you turn your attention to the table of contents, guess what you'll find?!

Need a hint? One chapter and eight glorious pages written by yours truly! And yep, if you're curious I actually was one of only two girls who attended/presented at the conference. I'm officially excited. Now if only my copy would come in the mail...

PLUS DE PLUIE!

Welcome to my lovely département, The Alpes-Maritimes, in the greater Provence-Alpes Côte d'Azur region!

Well, as of today, I once again feel like I live right on the Mediterranean Sea! Why all the exclamation points, Monique? Oh that's because after months and months of yucky rain, ominous clouds, fog and evil Mistral winds, it finally is getting to be weather you'd typically expect from this little beach region. Never-you-mind that we're on about the same plane/latitude as the Eastern Canadian border, ok?

Regional météo forecasts indicate that over the course of the next few days, we'll be seeing weather anywhere from 15 to 17 degrees Celsius. Hello mid-60s and possibly even 70s on Thursday! That's what a girl from California likes to see.

I'm also pretty stoked on life right now because one of my afternoon classes was canceled today, so I basically had to work from 8:30 to 10:00. And after I eat lunch/give myself an hour, I'll be making my merry way back to the gym. Speaking of the gym, I've already lost about two kilos since I've been back from my "vacation" in the United Sates -- which, by the way, I flew home exactly one month ago today!! Since then, I've been making a point to do cardio exercises for about 35-50 minutes a day. I've stopped eating past 9 p.m. and for the most part, I've cut out lots of added sugars (and alcohol)!

And the best part is that IT'S EASY! I mean, I get a few cravings every now and then -- I'm allowed to cheat once or twice a week, I think that's the key to longevity -- but I'm quite impressed how easily I can say "no" to dessert or even the 28,482 pastry shops I pass each day. Ok that's a little exaggerated, but yeah point made right? (Oh yeah, and I've had a little help from this diet. Too bad they don't include the recipes online, but I ran across it in a fitness magazine when I was home in February and decided to give it a try! It really does work!)

***EDIT: I searched and searched online and I actually found the equivalent diet for men in the Men's Health Magazine. Their website has included a few of the recipes for the male version, some of which cross over for the ladies too. Hey, I'm all about it, new recipes and we all know how much I do love me some smoothies!

MENTEUR!!!

I'm in a bit of a little bind here. Ok, maybe two little binds.

One of them concerns my Spring Break. THIS LYING PIECE OF S--- WEBSITE notified me that the vacation would be from April 5 to April 20. Bear in mind it is the official ministry of education's website. However, I guess this is sort of my problem for not checking in with each of my individual schools.

Apparently schools who are only in session four days a week (that'd be both of mine, since I get Wednesdays off) don't actually start their vacations until April 9. Well that's all good and fine, but I've already booked my flight for Germany leaving on April 7. So I'm going to have to ditch two days of school. Only the second time I've done so. However, I'm being smart here and am thinking up a worksheet to give the teachers to occupy the students' 30-45 minutes that would normally be spent with me.

The other bind is more of a deliberately self-imposed one. Temptation is luring me towards missing more school. You see, I think part of the reason we have two extra days of school to attend in April is due to the fact that we get so many random days off in May! Normally, I don't have to work Wednesdays. For some reason, we get May 8th off, which is a Thursday. At first I thought about doing something fun, but I'd have to work Friday, May 9th anyhow. But I'm tempted to play some hookie because we ALSO get off Monday, May 12th.

In theory, if I ditch just one day of school -- May 9th -- I'd be free from Tuesday afternoon until the following Monday night. Ummmm, vacation anyone?

It might be important to mention that I'm already breaking my contract 2.5 weeks early so I can make my sister's graduation ceremony at UCSB on June 14th....

What are they going to do, fire me?!

Why a French woman is never wrong...

There is no justification. She is always right. No arguing, that's that.

So I believe that living here is really continuing to be more of a character-building experience than I had ever bargained for. The roommate situation still continues to deteriorate since we had a little spat on Thursday -- and by little I mean she yelled at me for 15 minutes, I took it and wasn't allowed a word in otherwise because she closed the door on me when she was done talking.

Today was a bit more of that long, drawn out problem. But at least I got in three words of self-defense. So what I'm learning from this is not tolerance or anything heart-warming and important like that. Nope, I'm learning that I'm never again going to live with someone I don't know prior to moving. Even if I have to live in some dumpy little place all by myself, I think it will be that much better.

The funny thing is that I keep thinking, "I wish I lived with someone normal." And I apologize for every French woman that reads this, but you guys are a little stubborn when you hold to an opinion ;-) I won't continue to generalize, but just say that I think we're going to butt heads more often in the future. So living at my house is again becoming a hostile environment.

But luckily I have family nearby and friends are coming soon, so I'll find lots of ways to distract myself or find excuses to be out of the house. And once this dang rain stops, I fully intend on going to the beach as much as possible!

Let's hope things get a little better. If not, then let's hope that my time continues to keep flying and not drag on! But one thing to look forward to: VACATION SOON!

And now time for some light reading

Originally, I checked out John Steinbeck's East of Eden from the Médiathèque because it's a 720+ page monster. This was early February when I assumed I'd get most of it finished on the plane back to the States.

How wrong I was. Instead, I watched three movies both ways, played a little Sudoku, ate happily and slept quite a bit. Then I figured, well I'll have nothing really to do at home, but my entire break was action-packed (haha, not exactly that exciting, but I found enough things to keep myself busy)!

Well, either way, I finished it and went back to the médiathèque to check out some more books this afternoon. I get most of my reading done on the bikes at the gym, so you can understand why I'm drawn to the small English section of our library.

However, I keep having constantly recurring thoughts spring into my head: "Wouldn't it be such a shame to have spent all this time in France, and not have read any of the really good-recommended-classic French novels?" So I always wander around the extensive, confusing and overwhelming adult section jam-packed with thousands of French (and translated into French) titles.

Well, later in the day, I kept this thought going and purchased a French magazine in the Presse store downtown. Along with a Snickers bar. So I figured it's a good day of indulgence, candy and Parisian fashion mags.

And do you know what books I ended up checking out?

Two English books, ha! All those good thoughts gone to waste. One Ray Bradbury because I really like him and one short book which I think is some trashy British page turner. I'm excited to begin!

Love is in the air...

I guess it's fair to warn you all now. I may not be coming back to the United States at the end of the academic year.

After yesterday, it seems I have my pick of at least seven suitors and I'm pretty sure they all would agree to marry me so I could stay in the country legally.

Let's see how this day started, shall we?

When I went to my first CE2 class, the little boy who does the best in my class and walks with me to school some mornings came up to me at the end of the period and asked me with rather sad looking eyes, "Monica [they all think I make my name sound French because I'm an American living in France, so untrue!], your birthday hasn't passed yet, has it?"

Not really sure why he wanted to know such information, I responded with a smile, "Nope! You guys are lucky because France gives two weeks of vacation for my birthday; it's the start of the April vacation."

Then he looked really pleased, hid a little smirk and ran off to recess.

The nice thing about teaching is that I also get the recess. But I get both recess periods, so I essentially have 30 minute breaks throughout the day. Enter what I'll call Scenario No. 2.

While I was sitting in the teachers' room with the door open, I noticed the "sick bench" was full of giggling boys. I looked back to see what was so funny, but didn't recognize a single one of them. Going back to making my copies, I heard from around the corner, "'Ello Monique!" when it turned out one of my students was certainly in the doorway.

I looked back, waved and they all erupted in giggles a second time. Shaking my head and smiling to myself, I kept at my work. But during the next 10 minutes, they kept making excuses to come into the room or provoke me to enter the hallway where they were seated. Finally, it all culminated in my one student nudging his little friend, asking, "Sooo, Monique. What do you think about him?" pointing to the boy right next to him. Then I couldn't help but join in the infectious laughing, noticing that at least three of the boys were blushing and waiting for a response.

However, I didn't give them the satisfaction of hearing a response. I figure whatever I was going to say would have probably been illegal, because I can't refrain from making a good joke. But I kept it to myself.

And now for the third and final "romantic" part of my day.

When I went to my second CM1 class after lunch, the teacher greeted me hastily as soon as I walked in the room. "Don't start getting ready for class yet, we had a poetry unit this morning and two people would like to read poems they wrote about you."

Now I was the one blushing. Did all the students conspire today to flirt with their English teacher who's twice their age?!

Well, the poems were hysterical. They actually started to make me kind of nervous, ha. Either way, this is about the gist of what they said:

Monique. Elle est dynamique: Elle est tres énergique, mais jamais diabolique. J'aime comment elle est sympathique. Des fois, elle est vraiment acrobatique. Jamais alcoolique. Elle est super magnifique! Monique: elle est très très unique!

It's basically just a whole bunch of nice words that rhyme with my name. There was actually much more, but I can't really remember it all. Either way, it was pretty funny slash cute.

There you have it. The French really must be great seducers if they all do things like this from such a young age.

But what do I love?


Smoothies. And a few days ago I was trying to pass time and stay warm waiting for a friend in a bookstore. Wandering past the cookbook section, a smoothie recipe book caught my eye. And while I've seen my share of smoothie recipes -- I'm an addict, what can I say? -- nothing compares to the French ingredient lists! They're so creative and bizarre, so I'm going to try making one tomorrow.

It's kind of my twist on a recipe I saw in the bookstore, but the ingredients I have on-hand that will be going in are as follows:

-Vanilla soy milk
-Green tea
-Grapefruit (meat and juice)
-Pineapple yogurt
-Honey

Here's to hoping it's as good as it sounds!

I'm not M.I.A.

...I'm just tired, that's all.

I'm really trying to be enthusiastic about this teaching thing, but I just can't. I mean, I'm coming up with new, fun lessons for my classes every day but in the back of my head I keep mentally ticking off my teaching days as they slide along. No, in fact, I actually have a paper sheet that I made up at the beginning of the academic year with all the number of sessions I'd have in each class to get a general idea for how many classes I'd have to prepare and how much time I'm allowed to spend on each unit.

Well it's now evolved into a "how many days do I have left in class" plan. And I swear to God, if I never hear "If You're Happy and You Know It," again...

But apparently I'm not as bad as some of my teachers. I'm not sure why, but when I showed up to one of my CE2 classes today, the maîtresse frickin' snapped! When I asked her if it was o.k. to erase the board and begin the day's English lesson, she started screaming at the class, "It doesn't matter anyways because we never advance. We're always falling behind on every lesson because someone wants to go to the bathroom, you forget something, there's too much talking..."

And then I saw the red darts come shooting out of her eyes. This sparked a five-minute rant that took up some of my teaching time as she continued chastising the children, blaming their insolence. (If I can get my two cents' in here, I haven't noticed their behavior to be bad enough to warrant this mess, but what do I know, I'm just the American girl who doesn't understand French, right?)

Either way, when my lesson was over I was about to head out the door. I finished five minutes early because the coloring page I set aside for the class to do was thwarted by this angry teacher. She told them they weren't allowed to have a fun activity today because they didn't merit such a thing. Instead she asked me to do something else to take up the last five minutes, like study vocab. This was requested of me so she could run to the bathroom for longer than five minutes. I had to stay in with the class during their recess break and babysit, while she did whatever the heck it was she had to do.

Oh, and might I add that she was doing absolutely nothing during the rest of the 40 minutes of my lesson. Couldn't she have gone then?!

But, I want to end this little puzzled rant on a good note. Because, as much as you might believe to the contrary, I am not an angry person who hates living in France. I'm rather enjoying it -- it's just the teaching part I'm not so sure about.

So in hopes of having some good news, I am finally done with all the French administrative, bureaucratic garbage for the rest of my stay -- I hope! Both yesterday and Tuesday I went to the CAF office which had been closed during the entire month of February, with all my filled out forms and carte de sejour. I don't know what the next step is, but at least I handed in all my documents so a folder could be created for me, meaning that in about a month, I'm going to start being reimbursed for about half of the money I've been spending on rent!! And if all goes well, it can't be better timing, as I'm going to need a bit of spending money for my trip to Germany and Spain over Spring Break :)

Easter means another day off!

Although nearly half of the teachers here have told me they don't exist, France, like the U.S., does have the rare three-day weekend.

The traditional thinking behind not having these precious days of nothingness is that most of the school two-week holidays fall on every major government holiday, like Christmas, New Years, La Toussaint, etc. However, spring break is not until April and winter break fell on two weeks in February.

So what happens to Easter?!

Well, a three-day weekend, that's what! I get the Monday after Easter off -- why not Good Friday is beyond me, maybe because they think we'll be too full to work/go to school on Monday from all the serious eating that probably goes on during Easter Sunday.

So since I'll have an extra day off, I'm going to meet my Dad -- and Mom who will soon be flying in again! -- on the tail end of his work trip to Basel, Switzerland, which is right on the corner of the French-German border.



Then what to do from there?

Visit the Black Forest in the German state of Baden-Württemberg?



Or explore Northern Switzerland and take in Zürich/Berne?



Oh and did I mention that two weeks after this long weekend is SPRING BREAK?! I love France :)

Var-ious outings

Like how I set that one up?

This weekend -- as promised -- I met up with my dad in the Var. The only thing I can liken this to, for you non-French residents/visitors, is the regional separations are sort of like states in the U.S. But not as "autonomous." Anyways, I left the Alpes-Maritimes district to see what the next section of coast one hour to the west looked like -- in the spring.

My dad got a bit of spring fever and wanted to ditch Annecy for the weekend because supposedly a big storm was coming through, though it's supposed to snow tomorrow so I don't think he's really escaping much. And as for me, the weather here is basically the same as it is over on the western coast (minus the evil Mistral winds they get near Marseille) so I just wanted an excuse to go hang out!

Luckily, our friends over in Forcalqueiret decided to move their weekly gathering up one week because next weekend marks the municipal elections. And it turns out that Jean-Claude is running yet again for the mayor of Forcalqueiret. Now you can't really prepare and serve a six-course meal for 20-ish people on the day of the elections, can you? He's supposed to be out kissing babies or some garbage like this -- which he essentially was all Sunday morning once the meal was ready to go.

But the biggest surprise of the weekend was our trip to La Ciotat. After three different trips out to Forcalqueiret and the Var, my dad and I collectively decided we were getting a bit tired of Toulon. Obviously, we wanted to stay on the beach especially with the lovely 19 degree (Celsius) weather we had last weekend. So we made our way towards Marseille -- uncharted territory for both of us -- and went on a mission to find something neat slash go wine tasting!

And this is what we found:

Nothing says you're serious like a bowl of Moules-Frites and a glass of rosé in the South of France!

...and then my camera battery died. [[Always carry around an extra battery pack/charger.]] So I can't show you the massive drop-off cliff that lays just outside of the camera's scope and into the ocean, excuse me, (Mediterranean) sea. But trust me, it was gorgeous! So much that we're probably going to be heading back there towards the end of the month.

Happy March!

Though it hasn't been seven full months, March marks my seventh month here in France during the 2007-08 journey.

As usual after an event-filled weekend, I want to do nothing right now. Not even grade my tests. Not even write a blog entry.

So I won't. (Apart from these few sentences.) Instead, I kept the creative process alive, writing more of this weird, futuristic story I've been scheeming up recently. Currently, it's at 17-18 pages of typed up paragraphs and notes to spark future thoughts.

Maybe once that's stopped taking up all my brain activity, I'll write up a little something about my weekend in the Var. Or, I could always show you pictures. Pictures take no creative thinking after they've already been taken...

:)

(Oh, and it's good to know that despite furious rebuilding efforts, the A's are still the better baseball team in the Bay Area. I know it's super early in the season, but 23-5 against the Giants' No.1 ace and former Athletic, Barry Zito?! Maybe ditching higher-paid players really is the way to go...)