Pâques-ing up.

Today I am friendless, fridgeless and soon to be internetless. 

Not a few minutes ago, Isy and her belongings were picked up by her parents, the last of my friends here has gone. 

And I'm still to pack most of my shit, fortunately my parents sent 2 delivery boys to come collect my heaviest case- wayhayyyy! One less stress. I'm now very aware however that I've got a tonne to do before I leave France. For good! Actually quite excited about returning to my homeland, as much as I love France, I now know I wouldn't live here for any extended period of time- the French are just too damned weird. Ex. the headmaster of Isy's lycée who I was left with when the car pulled away, he spent 10mins telling me about why he needed to close the shutters in Isy's flat, it took about 3 of those minutes for me to realise he was actually talking to me and not to himself....

Anyhow, I'm well ahead of myself. I didn't even blog about Easter here, which was fantastic as my friend Kat came to visit me- hell of a lot of effort to get here, got a good friend there!  

I love Pâques here, the French have so many amazing chocolate-y creations, it's not just simple eggs here- hell no. i could have chosen rabbits, hens in chocolate nests, or A FISH! There was even a large heron. 

I went with the fish.

The tradition of fish comes from the poisson d'avril- 'April Fools!', it's a tradition here to stick a paper fish to someone's back as a fool. 

Anyway, after eating plenty chocolate, Kat and I wandered around Issoudun and visited the tourist sites which, living here, I hadn't actually done before. It was a lovely day and really quite nice to see our white tower- the whole reason why we name this place Isengard.

Isn't she beautiful? Apparently built in the days of Richard Lionheart.

On Kat's last day, I asked to switch my hours at work and accompanied Kat to Paris- she was getting a rather late plane, so we did all the fun stuff, visited Notre Dam (which is getting new bells soon and celebrating being 850 years old), went to the Louvre and saw the Mona Lisa, saw Monet's Les Nymphéas (the waterlillies) and I finally got to go to my Mecca.

Such an amazing place! We also visited a Canadian bookshop nearby which was a bit of a squeeze (think Voltaire and Rousseau style). I bought far too many books, as said- thank god for luggage boys!

It was a brilliant couple of days with Kat, can't wait to be reunited with her and all my friends in Glasgow this year. 

Last weekend, we said goodbye to all the Bourges crew- it was a great night out and nice lunch at the Chinese afterwards for us. Can't believe that there's some of them I probably won't see again, such an odd thought. Had so many good times in Bourges with a hella lot of people- there were about 20 of us, so while I  didn't get the opportunity to be good friends with all, it was still nice knowing that there was so many people not that far away who would be there for you if needed...

And finally last week at school, I'll miss teaching, I've really enjoyed it this year. I'm gunna miss quite a few of my students, I had one class attempt Auld Lang Syne for me so that was nice, and on my very last hour of work I was told by one of the teachers that I had been a huge help this year with the students and that some of them had reported back about how they felt far more confident about their BACs and speaking English in general after they'd worked with me. It's a nice feeling to know that you've helped someone and given them a boost where they needed it. :)

Also I got given a leaving present by the teachers at the college that I worked with this year.

So bloody delighted! I LOVE BOOKS!!!

Oh well, gunna have to check to see if the films I'm downloading for this weekend are loaded then march to the Orange shop and return my Livebox to them. I don't wanna. :(

Jungle Speed, Cock-blocked and Goodbyes.

Yet again time has gone at break-neck speed. I've just handed in my dissertation application form for next year of university and I'm looking at only two more weeks of teaching. I only came to France yesterday, right?

Anyway, first week back after the holidays went rather quickly. I'd been working with my 3eme on Shakespeare in the computer room, while the teacher remained clueless and thoroughly pleased with their 'enthusiasm' I couldn't help but notice that some boys in the corner were doing the Harlem Shake- clearly spending their time on Youtube. I needn't describe how ridiculous they looked. It's actually quite the step-down from Gangnam Style.
After a long week of keeping teens off sites they shouldn't be on, and being questioned at the lycée about whether a Gantry crane can be called a 'lifting' crane (I could have lived all my life thinking that there was only one type of crane quite happily), I found myself in Bourges for another weekend with the assistants. It was brilliant, Caitlin introduced us all to a rather popular game in France- Jungle Speed:

Here's the rules.

and here's some people taking it to the extreme- 

fw a little past all the annoying drivelly talk and introductions. 

After a few drinks, it can get quite brutal I imagine. At one point Caitlin went to scratch Loren's eyes out for getting the baton first, Sam was bruising for a fight apparently but lost rather abruptly, and the baton got thrown around a bit- hitting a confused Matt, as Sam and Caitlin rushed towards him, leaping and crawling under the table in their bid to get it first. Quite an amusing evening all and all, and definitely a game that will test your temper and reflexes. At one point I almost bit Sam tbh, I did win the baton though!


Second weekend, Kathryn invited us to an apartment in Tours. One of the neighbours there was called 'Dieu'- God, can you imagine having the last name God! Only the French would have such a superiority complex that 'Dieu' would be an accepted surname. Anyhow, while searching for the apartment, Sam and I found ourselves on the upper floor and after pressing a button which I thought was the light switch, I realised I'd been ringing someone's doorbell. Of course I did the childish thing, I made us run back into the lift before anyone came. Playing 'knock-knock' at 22 is perfectly acceptable right?
Once in Kathryn's apart, we set ourselves down to some drinking games, unfortunately we waved goodbye to Isy's Macbook which took some alcohol in the wrong hole and completely frazzled. Farewell good friend, we had some good times watching Buffy together. As Isy mourned her inevitable loss, we cranked up the drinking a bit with Ring of Fire, Kathryn dressed head-to-toe in leopard pint and was extremely infuriated when Sam asked "Why are you dressed like a whore?" during the Awkward Question game, them being tied together as drinking partners did nothing to help their constant brawling throughout the night, Loren got rather merry and kept babbling to herself about Wales: "Can we ALL just take a minute to miss Wales... I really miss Wales" while Isy soldiered on and Maddy kept quiet and respectable. Me: I got a little merry, until we went out to the club where I sobered up again entirely. There weren't many people to begin with, the drinks were a rip-off (8 euros), there were far too many men to women ratio, and most of them were weird. There were even two elderly men trying their luck, in my head they were called Fagan and Grandpa Joe.GJ managed to pull a young French girl, they were disgustingly chewing eachother's faces off later in the evening- it was hideous.  Anyhow, I whinged. People gave me bits of their drinks- to them, thank you! Eventually it got to the point where I was going to the bar to shot straight whisky, if I had to stay there then I may as well spend a fortune and be blootered I thought. Typically as I bought my last 2 drinks, the others wanted to leave- I downed one, then realised Sam and Kathryn were staying so might as well have some fun. Which I did! Mostly. Cue Captain Cockblock (previously named Sam), just as I was about to dance with a cute Frenchie I'd met earlier, he decided to 'save me': "I'm her boyfriend." Cute boy dashed off, I drunkenly raged at Sam for quite some time. Still not sure I forgive him. Anyway I had a decent enough night despite that, I was absolutely pissed as a fart and even managed to slam my back off the bath tub as I attempted to put on my PJ bottoms later that evening, I am my mother's daughter after all.
The next morning I had a DREADFUL hangover.
Several hours stuck waiting in train stations that day did nothing to improve my mood.



And last Friday we went back to Bourges for a farewell party for all the German language assistants, they leave early as their scholar year starts in April- joy to be them, huh? No holidays for them!
We all had a meal together, I felt sorry for the poor French waiter and waitress serving about 20 of us, they could have not looked more relieved to see the back of us once we'd finished our meal. My main had been rubbish, but my lord I asked for banana crépes and received a mountain of delight and looks of envy from everyone else- still one of the best decisions I've ever made in my life.
We all had a few drinks together, unfortunately with such a big group you never get around to talking to everyone however. I caught up with a few but barely spoke to some which was a shame actually.

So I've stolen a pic of the German assistants from Julia:

Julia, Sam and Lisa.

Goodbye, and good luck, I wish you well in all you do!

The first of many goodbyes has already been and gone, it's so damned weird. Things are coming to a finish here. I am excited to get back to my beloved Scotland, but wouldn't mind if time slowed a little more please! 

Oh well, still got Shakespeare on the brain so...

Exit pursued by a Frenchman.

Février

So the French do not like to work that much, therefore we have holidays fairly damned regularly here and instead of returning home again Loren and I decided to join Sam on his tour of the South of France then meet-up with Isy and Kathryn in Geneva.

Day 1: Travelled several hours to get to Marseille- unfortunately you can't just cut across France to get to the South, if you live central then you have to do this stupid thing of travelling all the way to Paris just to travel back down again... Logical? No, but the French never have been. Sam had set-up an account on Couchsurfer- a site where people offer free accom and hope to meet others who will return the favour, that or they're simply lonely and looking for company. We lucked out big time and met Jacques in Marseille, I made a very good first impression by getting exceedingly drunk and puking all over his flat and the dude didn't give a fig- so chilled, so awesome, again, I'm sorry. *Hangs head in shame*.

Day 2: Jacques' flat stank of puke thanks to me, I had also broken 2 mugs the night before whilst doing my re-enactment of the girl in The Exorcist. FOR SHAME! After meeting his family, who lived upstairs and were hopefully unaware of my shenanigans, we quickly left the apartment (all windows open) and escaped into fresh air and beautiful sunny Marseille, it was t-shirt weather!!! Marseille has a bit of a bad press, much like Glasgow I suppose, but quite frankly the city was lively, fun and really quite pretty. We visited the cathedrals, saw a fantastic sweeping view of the entire city and the islands nearby where the Castle of If (Count of Monte Christo) is situated, and went round back alleys with interesting street art and artist galleries on display. It was lovely seeing the sea too after spending months MILES away from it. Sea-breeze and sun were just the medicine I needed. Needless to say, after my mess the night before we decided not to have another hard night, instead I quickly replaced one of Jacques' mugs... Forgot I need to find another at some point. ><

Day 3: Travelled to Nice where the skies were grey and the city was all in carnival mode, streets all covered in confetti, floats hanging lack-lustre around the city-centre waiting to be re-animated at night, people selling Venetian-style masks and music pumped out every hour of the day.We dumped our bags at our hostel, which was packed with fellow English-speaking tourists, then headed out to the beach to see the sea again. After a few hours on the disappointingly pebbly shore (I had honestly expected sand after all the hype about Nice), we went up Chateau Hill which is a nice walk up a gazillion steps for a view of the city. There is an interesting looking castley thing up there which I forget the name of, but unfortunately it was shut when we went, the waterfall around it was very nice to look at though. When we came back down, we explored the old town, had a nice meal in one of the many Italian places there then we met-up with Loren's friends from home for a drink. It was a rather chilled night, in both meanings of the word- I was freezing and not so impressed having been walking around in sunshine the day before.

Day 4: Decided to go through to Monaco for the day- and thank god! I LOVE MONACO!! Rich, polite people with expensive cars and yachts, oranges growing on trees in February, and SUNSHINE! The place is beautiful, extremely hilly so a lot of work for the calf muscles but pretty from absolutely every angle. I now know where I want to retire anyway.. If I could only afford to. After spending so long in France it was shocking to be in a place where people were polite and cars actually stopped at pedestrian crossings. We saw yet another castle, and the casino and decided that although absolutely gorgeous there was nothing more to see and we may as well nip through to Italy for lunch. Oh yeah, it costs less than 10 euros to get to Monaco and Italy from Nice. and takes 20 and 40mins respectively, that is cheaper and takes far less time than it takes to get from Issoudun (a nowhere place) to get to yet another nowhere place in central France. Less than impressed. Anyhow, we landed in Ventimiglia, not particularly pretty, nor warm, but the pizza was nice and it was worth it just to say we'd dipped our toes on Italian soil for a wee while. It was also great to be somewhere where we didn't understand the language at all. Kinda a nice brain switch-off.
Returned to Nice that night and because Loren was still feeling lousy with cold, we went to see Hitchcock which was absolutely bloody brilliant, kudos to the director, it was smartly done with brilliant actors (Anthony Hopkins is a babe!) and was funny as hell.

Day 5: Visited Nice's beach once again, then turned around and went to see the Russian cathedral which was rather impressive and tasteful in its beautiful golds and turquoises. Then we carried on to the tourist office where Sam got shat on by a pigeon, made our way back to the old town, where Sam then got ran over by a skateboarder and was cursing the city, and we stopped at the ice-cream place where you can get almost any flavour- including beer, I had coke flavour which was rather refreshing. We then tried to be somewhat cultural and go to the Natural History Museum, apparently the Chagall Musée is worth a visit but being a Tuesday it was closed (stupid France!) and I have to wonder if the museum we went to was also, we could not get to it at all due to one of the many annoying construction sites around it. instead we sunbathed in the park around the back until it was time for our train to Aix-en-Provence. There we met couchsurfer Coraline who was very nice but unfortunately after putting up with Sam's snoring for several nights I was too tired to be very sociable... That night, he was louder than EVER! ><



Day 6: Aix is a rather nice, relaxed place, and I quite liked the Provence accent, but there just wasn't much to do... We went to the Granier museum which was somewhat interesting, but it's a hell of a lot of fuss to get in- bags handed in, security all around in every room, it was not a place to feel relaxed and quite frankly I was disappointed to find only one Van Gogh and then a fuckload of Renaissance paintings... I cannot emphasise how much I do not care for most art that came before the Impressionists. A bunch of saggy faced, drippy blue-eyed, fat unattractive women and men with curly hair ne m'intéressent pas! Granted towards the Enlightenment they start to slim down again, but it doesn't stop them looking either vacant (women) or scowly (men) and damned ugly (both). After a gullet full of rubbish, we then went to see Cezanne's workshop, which was somewhat a let-down, it takes a lot of effort to get there and less than 5mins to look around, after a quick sweep of the room, we were then swept out the door again. We then made for a nice burger place (I actually got a veggie option- hallelujah!) and a place which sells 1 euro wine, both on Coraline's good recommendation and both brilliant, and the wine necessary after we'd checked into our 'hotel' for the night which was a moldy old room. There was white gunk in the shower and our neighbours were actually called the Lepers...

Day 7: Headed to Avignon where we met couchsurfer Annie, who from now on shall forever be known as Awkward Annie. Very nice American assistant, same boat as us, bar she lives with many other people in a flatshare situation and they all spoke French all the time which was great... If we'd actually understood them all the time given that one was Spanish and spoke French with an incredibly thick Spanish accent. We did very little during the day, Sam explored the Palais des Papes while Loren and I sat outside in the sun, I'd decided 10 euros was rather steep for a castle that is pretty damned empty...
When we returned to Annie's we were faced by a large gathering of people, who didn't really know Annie either, and generally it was just an awkward evening as only one girl tried to engage me in conversation then for the rest of the night proceeded to speak in Portugese with the other girl next to her, and the others just cliqued together in general. I had a cold, I was tired, I was generally miserable and just wanted to cry and go to bed but couldn't as all those people were there though completely ignoring my existence.

Day 8: Went a walk outside the city walls and made friends with many pigeons. Then visited another gallery, which was actually quite nice, it boasted Degas, Van Gogh and Monet though in all actuality only had about one of each, still it was nice having put up with enough Renaissance bullshit. Returned to Annie's with the full intent of going out to watch a film and avoid people, but dinner got later and later as Annie faffed about getting ready for Barcelona, so instead we watched Westside Story and played French Cluedo and Uno with a few wines... All and all it was a pleasant enough night despite our plans going awry.

Avignon's daft half-bridge.

Day 9: Headed to Montpellier where we met couchsurfer Stefan who was more awkward than Annie, I think months of being a bit of a recluse had left him somewhat lacking in social skills. We went out again to tour the city, but being buffeted with a shitload of wind, Loren and I just wanted to go to the cinema instead. We were met with a rather grumpy German who wanted to tour about, but we were ill and not remotely content about the thought of wandering around outside with the wind whistling in our ears. Quite frankly Avignon and all its bloody wind had given me enough earache and I wasn't up for any more. We went to see Lincoln, which was a rather nice film to pass the time with, and my-my what a surprise to see Joseph Gordon-Levitt's little moonface come on the screen. Having spent the last couple of days living on pasta and pizza, we needed vegetables badly so were quite happy to be let loose in Stefan's kitchen where we cooked a veggie curry for all of us- absolutely delightful. We then spent the evening playing cardgames, badly in some cases, then went out for a pint at a nearby beer bar- shitloads of beer! And the oddest crowd I'd ever seen, mostly men, mostly the kinda punk/goth look, but a few in trackies and generally all passing bottles about as tasters. It was nice enough for one drink, but being too ill I was glad we went home early. It was day 1 of the Sudocream 'tache, my nose being so dry after constant blowing.

Day 10: Pretty much saw all the sites in a matter of hours so Sam needn't have complained the day before. Made the mistake of going to the Fabre Musée where after yet more Renaissance paintings I came close to blowing my brains out. I may well puke if I see another oilpainting of Jesus any time soon, the only amusing thing was Saint Agatha with her tits served on a plate, literally- she is the patron Saint of breastcancer I now know. After hundreds of shitty oilpaintings it was a relief to come across Soulages paintings, not particularly impressive on their own but after the clusterfuck of colours and symbolism I'd just witnessed it helped me reach zen again. On our way back we found an artshow taking place in a church- it was blooming fantastic after everything we'd seen that day. My kind of art- so exciting and refreshing, damn right creepy and brilliant. Loren and I then got on the train to Geneva- we were deeelighted!
Until we got to our hostel where someone was hacking up globs of snot in the shower. We went showerless that night.

My favourite piece.

Day 11: We left our hostel pretty damned quick the next morning and decided to go see the old part of town, we felt pretty smug using our free tram cards we received from the hostel- only good reason to stay there really. Well we got off the tram, and looked at the map- none of the street names matched, we were absolutely clueless. We marched off in one direction, then another, then another and decided to stick out our mistake (or more like Loren did as she thought we'd 'come so far' and I wasn't willing to argue) until a delightfully kind man came up to us and told us we were actually walking in completely the opposite direction and sent us back the way. After half a year of living with French rudeness I almost shed a tear for the compassion he showed us... Ok, might be a bit hyperbolic, but seriously! He may as well have walked up to us and declared us the new princesses of Geneva and bent to kiss our toes. Eventually we got to the old town and we must have gone around the back way because we felt there wasn't much to see. I was hungry as hell and my empty belly does not make for good company, in fact I go quite sour quickly. After searching high and low, we found a place called l'Enfer (hell), I have to say Hell was quite nice, fairly expensive for some good toasties but it was a place to get warm again. After wandering down the street some more, we called it a day, made our way back to the hostel then off to the trainstation to meet Isy. Unfortunately the Jewish welcome committee we got her decided to board their train a bit early (honestly, there were curls and chanting galore coming from them). Well, Isy had managed to sort out with one of her friends that we could stay with her family there, and her family were amazing! Think the nicest bunch of people ever, and times that by the fact that they were rich- swimming pool, hot tub, wine cellar... The only problem was their dog kinda wanted to kill Isy. 'Snoopy' should really have been named Cujo, one moment he was your best friend, the next he tried to bite Isy's face off.... So by the end of our stay we were avoiding him. Anyway, that day we went a walk out in the snow, by a wee river that ran down the back of the houses (all typically Swiss and wooden), it was beautiful but short, and we were pleased to see that the neighbours had a Rottweiller and a White Shepherd who seemed rather like Snoopy in nature, I was even more pleased to find that they were kept in by an electric fence. After that, we met our other friend Kathryn who was joining us for our trip- just came a little later. She'd been skiing during the holidays, "the first day I cried infront of my students then looked at holidays to Egypt"- still one of my favourite quotes. We got treated to wine that night in a nice bar by the father, who told us more about his hundreds of pounds worth of wine- they must have had thousands of pounds stocked in that cellar of theirs... I will NEVER be that rich. :( If they weren't so damned nice I would be resentful, but they were pretty much the best people ever.


Day 12: We made for the old town again, deciding to stop by the park for a game of outdoor chess. Well I never got to bloody play, by about 3 moves in I'd acquired a 'helper', by which I mean an annoying unwashed little man that didn't speak a word of English and would bark at me whenever I tried to move a piece he didn't want to, instead hitting the pieces he would (and did) move with his cane. After losing almost every piece in his determination to check the King with very little game plan from what I could see, even trying to cheat and move the other team's pieces when it wasn't their turn, 'we' lost to Isy and Loren... I can honestly say it was the worst game of chess I've ever had the misfortune to NOT play. I can imagine the only thing worse than a backseat driver was this annoying little Yoda. I was quite thankful when we finally left and  I could breath again. We then made our way to the United Nations, losing Kathryn on the way there as we made a run between trams. As we waited for her to catch the next tram, we ate at the bus stop- while common enough in Britain, the rest of Europe frown and think you must be homeless if you're not able to go home to eat. There was a protest going on just under The Chair, I still don't know what for , but I somewhat imagine this to be an almost daily occurrence. Well the search for the visitor centre part is a bit confusing, it's miles away from the front and you walk quite some distance whilst feeling that you must have walked past it, we encountered a family and a pair of Germans who joined us- we obviously must have looked like we knew where we were going. Indeed we got there, to find that a bloody school of Italians had made their way there before us and created quite a large queue. Apparently they'd seen us earlier playing chess in the park and taken quite a few photos- me in a delightful strop with an annoying elderly man shall be in some Italian kids' FB albums, how fricking marvellous! After queuing for an hour we discovered that there was actually another line, just nobody told us as they thought we were part of the schooltrip... GAH! Well we'd missed the last tour and would have to wait another hour, we went for a quick hot chocolate in the nearby fancy restaurant where they served us warm milk then gave us the sachet to pour in ourselves, I have to say I thought they were taking the mick as we had to make our own chocolate. Anyway, we eventually commenced our tour of the UN which I would recommend to anyone, it may be somewhat geeky but it was very interesting. At the time they had two displays- one displaying the affects of landmines, and the other full of newspapers showing the 'ups and downs' of history, like there was one dating back to the time the Titanic sank, and another showed the Moon Landing. We also had a moment where we played with the microphones in one of the rooms, much to the dismay of our tourguide who quickly swept us out again 'before we broke' anything. Unfortunately we did not get to see the amazing artwork in the Human Right's Room, if you have no clue what I'm talking about: http://www.foxnews.com/photoessay/0,4644,5715,00.html/#/photoessay/image/1118081403_M_111808_ceiling7-jpg

Would have been amazing to see!
Anyway, after all this. We met up with Isy's friend Alex who's currently staying in Geneva on a work placement. She took us to an amazing wee Indian/Persian restaurant, it was great being somewhere that had so much choice for veggies- I've always loved Indian food, if I had to live on one diet I'd choose it, healthy and tasty! After our meal, we got treated to some shisha (hookahs). Alex and her friend, who joined us, were great for a laugh and it was generally just a lovely evening. We eventually had to make our way back to the family home again, topping our night off with some Psycho (after Hitchcock, Loren and I had had quite the yearning to see it).

Day 13: The mother of the family kindly offered to take us out to the mountains, she took us to Megeve which is a big touristy skiing place, but absolutely gorgeous. Sun was shining down on us, snow was glistening, we were surrounded by beautiful blue mountains. Needless to say Megeve isn't a place for those with little money, it has interior design shops, expensive bakers and chocolatiers, and if you ever wish to buy your own moonboots or antelope skin coat then you are in luck! Even their local Christmas tree is decorated with Swarovski crystals. Pretty sure I saw pet dogs that are so expensive that I've never laid eyes on one in real life before. Well Marianne (the mother) bought us all mountain passes so we could use the skii lifts to get to the top of the mountain where she treated us to a fantastic meal which cost her about 300 euros... The generosity of these people knew no bounds! After a fantastic afternoon of sun and snow, where I spent FAR too much on chocolate (worth it though, I have creme brulée stuffed chocolate eggs, that is the stuff of Willy Wonka right there), we made our return home. We treated the family to a meal cooked by ourselves- pumpkin risotto didn't really seem to be quite a big enough thank you really, but they sang its praises as lovely people do. We were also treated to their live-in guest, Stefan (Greek-Austrian) making salad for us, the Austrians use pumpkin oil for dressings- this is a revelation to me, I could drink the bottle, I need some in my life! Pumpkin everything for everyone! After a few wines, Kathryn finally treated us to some Bulgarian yodelling which was actually rather impressive and interesting. Then Isy sang some Adele, generally a rather musical night, plenty drinks, a few games of pool and more fun. Ending the night tucked up in bed with Cool Runnings. A brilliant end to our trip. The only thing better would have been for the family to have announced that they wished to adopt all of us and we could live in such luxury forever (one can dream).

And then we went home, concluding my holidays and one of the longest blogs I've written, if you're still reading well done. And if you flicked all the way to bottom here without really bothering, you cheat!

How do you milk a lion?

Well I was definitely in a need of a weekend away to improve my mood last week.
My Monday last week consisted of a teacher telling me she'd be back 'in a moment' and buggering off for 30 mins. Result: me with no preparation and a class full of hyped up teens who thought their teacher was gone for good. I could literally do nought with them, so they were drawing on the board, hanging out the window shouting and generally just being pains in the arses. I have to say I was rather passive, if they had nothing better to do why shouldn't they behave like brats? I am NOT a substitute teacher. The cleaners are probably paid more than me. I'm an assistant teacher, if the teacher is not there then I cannot assist. I'm happy working with a class alone if I have to, but only if I have work prepared for them. Also this is not to say that all of them behaved badly, the majority that I have worked with before sat quietly and cooperated well. Unfortunately this was a new mixed group however, so those I hadn't encountered before were the ones who took advantage at my complete and utter confusion. Eventually the teacher returned and asked why I hadn't done anything with them? Quite frankly I could have screamed at her. "Oh but everything looked fine from outside" apparently, I'm sure me sending two kids out to find her earlier hadn't been a big enough message.  Anyway, needless to say she blamed the students (and more than likely myself) for the situation.
All in all. I was in quite a bad mood that day.
For the rest of the week, I still felt somewhat down even though absolutely all my other classes went perfectly fine (all as beautifully planned- planning IS everything! Lesson learnt, I shall never go into class again without extra worksheets in case I'm ever dropped in the shit again), and all my students were nice as ever.


Anyway, weeks of saying we were going to Lyon came to fruition for 3 of us. There was a large group of us wanting to go to begin with but in the end it was only Sam, Lucy and I who followed through. And I'm so glad we did! It was sooo nice exploring a new city and Lyon is really pretty. We could have only hoped for better weather, on the train as we got further and further South we started to see snow EVERYWHERE! Sorry for thinking that the South would be somewhat warmer, I was completely and utterly wrong...

View from the train.

At one point it was apparently a very cool -8, it took a bit of time for us to brave going out that night. But I'm getting ahead of myself. We only got to Lyon in the later part of the evening (it was a 4 hour train ride for us) and we didn't know where to go for cheap food/drink so we spent a lot of time kinda just wandering about. Next day we were more prepared. We knew we wanted to try out a place we saw the night before- Best Bagels, and we were not disappointed! It was a nice American style place, it sold things like marshmallow fluff and Hershey bars, and their bagel combos were bloody delicious! I was extremely impressed to find several options for me to eat, I settled on the veggie orgy and an oreo and Jack Daniels milkshake. Yes, Jack Daniels in milkshake- bloody marvellous!  

It seemed a great little place for fellow Anglophones. The two, very English, kids near us were especially cute as they kept laughing loudly at the 'magic chicken' on the menu.

After tearing ourselves away from this place (it took a lot, it was so bloody nice there) we went exploring.

This is of course the Cathédrale Saint Jean-Baptiste, very beautiful, very Catholic. While there were many beautiful statues and pictures, I have to say my favourite was this one:

Jesus looks like he's got some swag going.

Even the gorgeous, fascinating astronomical clock didn't quite beat it for me. 

Then for some reason, we decided to climb some bigass hill to go see some Roman amphitheatres and the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Fourviére. It was pretty much a vertical climb to get there but it was very cool to see both. And the view of the city, from the very top was worth it.

Just waiting for the music concert to begin.

*inside the Basilica...* Sam: "So trashy!" Me: "I love it!"

Didn't really get any good shots of the outside cos the place is so damned big! It's more interesting on the inside anyway... 

Lyon from above.

After we eventually climbed back down, we came across the Bartholdi fountain, by far one of my favourite sights. 

I love how wild the horses look, and she's beautiful. 

We refreshed ourselves then set out again for the Parc de la Tête d'Or, it's rated no.1 attraction in Lyon on quite a few sites from what I saw, and it certainly deserves it. It's free to walk around and see the majority of the animals, and they're quite friendly. We had one deer come right up to us, think he was hoping for Sam's apple to be honest. Lucy got close enough stroke the wee deer anyway.

I was quite excited myself to see a red panda, love those little chaps, they're like stuffed animals they're so damned cute! They're extremely hard to get a picture of however, especially with my shitty camera. I was extremely jealous of another tourist who had a camera lens the length of the Nile pointing at the animal cages.

I did make friends with these guys though, they got the best part of my blueberry muffin.

After much walking we eventually went back to our room at Hotelo, decent enough little place, if a little quirky (back by 1 am and hand your keys back every time you go out! Felt like a kid.) This was the night of the -8 degrees... Having walked all day, we were perfectly entitled to take the Metro I think. We went to a nice little bouchon (traditional Lyonnaise restaurant), where I actually got a veggie meal! There are so many bouchons, always next to eachother, but hunting out a menu suitable for me was somewhat difficult and I have to say a big thanks to Lucy and Sam for being so considerate as to find one that suited me while it was snowing down on us. After that we went to a wee Irish bar, I was slightly saddened we didn't go to the James Joyce one simply due to its sign outside:

Standing while drinking= gun to the head...

Yet again, we saw a rather old person with a scooter at the bar. And I mean scooter- as in the ones you rode when you were under 10, little push ones. Apparently very popular in Lyon...And on the way home on the Metro, there was a woman shouting at her son "ALEJANDRO! ALEJANDRO!"... Well, Gaga had to get it somewhere. Lyon definitely has a sense of humour, not sure if it knows it, but it's blooming cracking for a laugh. Even as we got the train back home, there was one last giggle as I noticed some graffiti by the tracks:

Crepe... Just imagine having a streetname like Pancake. 

Anyway, this week has started well. All my classes have been good, finally finished some work on posters with some classes and they turned out awesome- wish I'd remembered to get a picture but I may do later. I had one student at the lycée beg to come work with me, and generally being lovely and chatty. I even got told that they feel they learn far more English with me, so that's brillaint to know. And just everyone's in a good mood- holidays are coming after all!

As for the title of this blog, if you still can't answer, just look at this photo:

Check out the udders!!!

Vegetarian in France.

I was going to write something in the wake of the horse burger, but I got rather absorbed in day to day life, so instead I'm trailing a million miles behind. Quite frankly, I never saw the fuss- I am living in a country where it is perfectly acceptable to have a horse served on the same plate as a cow anyway.

I can't say I've really fathomed the French and their relationship to animals yet, here horses are both pets and food, riding is extremely popular out in the countryside where I am, but all the kids who do so say they'd quite happily eat horse meat. Yet, if you mention eating a dog they shrivel their noses up... Dogs and cats seem to be given privilege over other animals here, while us Brits claim to be a land of animal lovers, we've banished them out of restaurants, schools and shops as we consider them a health and hygiene issue. How surprised was I to come to Issoudun and see the owner of a German Shepherd strut into the bar with his gigantic dog. Even in fancy restaurants you may find yourself with a cat purring in your lap happily as you enjoy your meal- the French don't see the problem, the Brits can't believe how you'd let an animal at the table while you're eating.

See, confusing?

I can see why us Brits draw a line at horse meat if they associate them as pets, yet why complain about it when you're happy enough to eat rabbit? Quite a few of us have had one of the floppy-eared cuties as a 'starter-pet', if your parents hated you then I'm sorry, perhaps you got a goldfish instead. There is of course the argument that horses are intelligent animals, therefore shouldn't be put through as much suffering as the other creatures on the food chain- yet pigs are just as smart but because they're 'frigging delicious' people choose to ignore this. It just reminds me of the quote from Animal Farm "ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL, BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS."

All in all everybody seems to have their own rules about what animals should be on the menu or not, it is confusing as hell and makes me happy to be vegetarian as I have the simple answer of "none for me thank you".

I can and have given many reasons for being vegetarian, but the simplest is that I simply like animals. My first 'animal rights act' (shall we call it?) took place when I was 4. My dad had just caught an octopus that he was going to take to the local Chinese to have cooked, he left me a total of 5seconds before he heard a splash and came running to see me waving goodbye as my new friend scurried back into the sea, turning many beautiful colours in its rush for freedom. Since then I have brought home orphan hedgehogs, swallows, birds with broken wings, and I don't think I can quite forget the earful I got when mother came home to find two frogs swimming in our bath. To me, animals are just simply a hell of a lot prettier and more interesting alive than dead. However, I don't believe in telling people in what they should and shouldn't eat, it's a personal choice- just don't get shitty with me for being veggie and don't go preaching about your love of meat, it's sickening. Deal?

There are two things however that I dislike about France. We'll start with the less annoying one-

Fur is fashion... Apparently. I don't wear leather myself, but I can see the use if quite frankly you're going to eat the animal, you may as well put the rest of the carcass to good use. However, seeing someone wearing fur or a stole pretty much makes me wanna go all Ace Ventura on their ass.

If you feel it's absolutely necessary to eat meat to survive still, yes you're prehistoric but meat has been sustenance for many years so minds can't be changed too quickly. However, using dead animals to decorate yourself will NEVER be a necessity.

The second thing that disgusts me- foie gras. While the standards of farming in France is actually pretty damned good in most respects, those horses you perhaps worried about had quite a good life before they were served up, geese are treated like shit. Quite frankly, they probably get treated worse than rats here. In fact the rats get well fed on these poor, diseased geese.

Here's Mr Roger Moore to tell you about it.

If you don't have the time to watch it, I'll sum it up for you- these birds are kept in cages so small they can't move and then a steal pipe is rammed down their throat, causing broken beaks and wounds to the neck and stomach, if they survive this first part they are then force-fed food until the majority get cancer. These birds are so ill and weak that when rats come to feed off their open wounds, the birds can't even defend themselves against it. Yes, this video centres on the farms in the US, but the standards are no better here in France. It's fucking disgusting and this is no way of life for any living creature.What's more, it's completely unnecessary. Geese put more fat on during Winter- so killing them then would mean you get the same product (fat liver), just no disease and no cruelty. But the French are unwilling to call fatty liver that has been made 'sans gavage' (without force-feeding) 'foie gras', as it's a break from tradition. Well, it was once a tradition to keep slaves and pass them on through the family but that joy eventually came to an end. Them saying but "Ohh, but it's so tasty" kinda sounds a bit like ex-slaveowners complaining that they now have to clean their houses themselves or actually bloody pay people for it.

If you have the time, here's a presentation about good, humanely produced foie gras:

The fact it's so completely unnecessary fills me with rage, quite frankly I've done well to have held my tongue about the subject on numerous occasions. I doubt I'll move any people here. I'm just bloody glad we don't produce this crap in Britain.
If you wish, there is a petition to stop force-feeding in Europe:
http://www.stopgavage.com/en



Oh well, I'll get off my soapbox now I guess.
I'm still searching this country for veggie food, so far I have been pleased to find tofu ravioli in the local supermarket- BIG step here in the French countryside. However, the day I go to a restaurant here and I have an alternative to a goat's cheese salad is the day I can celebrate.

Home.

As much as I like France, it's just not home- I bloody well love Scotland! Being home for the festivities certainly clarified that, surrounded by people that have the same 'funny' accent I have, lots of good food- I stowed some veggie haggis and cheddar in my suitcase for the return to Isengard, and good TV- sounds sad, but damn I've missed the British sense of humour!
I feel I spent my holidays well, I saw A LOT of people in the short spell I was home, and I caught up with a few that I hadn't spoken to in  years! It was blooming great catching up with my old school-friend Kari, I mean we used to hang out when we were this size:

After a rather less than white Christmas, I'm certainly nostalgic about these days- SNOW, and lots of it is magical stuff. 

As well as catching up old friends, I made some new ones- yes, more cats! This blog has featured them somewhat heavily... And this year is the year of the kitten it would seem, so nought's gunna change there!

First my neighbours got two cuties who visited us first thing Christmas morning much to Kit's annoyance. I have never seen my cat look more green-eyed as she watched the two frolic across our lawn.

Unfortunately they've taken a big interest in our pond, and getting into our house. Double trouble.

Then Helga, after much begging, has finally got herself a new kitty too. Meet Mogo, who fits into the Garrioch family no end (he even has a viking name):

Here he is, a little stuck. While most cats would struggle to get free, this wee chap just sits resigned waiting for someone to help him.

I had a fine Christmas, and a great New Year- no tears, no drama for once. And as for New Year's resolutions? Not really made any. I would like to be fitter though, as my parents new treadmill made me realise when I set it to an 'advanced work-out'. The bastard beeps every time it's about to change settings, after 10mins of running 'up-hill' I almost wept with relief to hear it beep, until I noticed that it said 'increase incline'- steeper hill, same speed, oh the cursing that came out of me...

So yeah, maybe we'll go with that one.

I also came back to France armed with Oor Wullie, Brave and a Giddy Limit calendar. Thinking about teaching my kids about the Orcadian tradition of the Ba too. For those not familiar with the Ba:

Ba game is a version of medieval football played in Scotland, perhaps most notably in Orkney and the Scottish Borders, around Christmas and New Year.

Ba is basically mob football, or village football. Two parts of a town have to get a ball to their respective side. For instance the two sides are called the uppies or the downies depending on which part of town they were born, or otherwise owe allegiance to. The ball must be manhandled, and is very often a moving scrum. The game moves through the town, and can go up alleyways, into yards and up streets. Shops and houses board up their windows to prevent damage. Unlike traditional mob football, generally people are not hurt.- Wiki.

And here's pictures for more of an idea (stolen from the BBC Radio Orkney FB page)::

This is the Doonies about to win (they have to jump in the basin).

And this is the Uppie win, touching the wall.

This year, three went in the basin. :) Also, for more of an idea of how there are basically no rules- people have been known to jump in their cars with the ba (the ball) in a big attempt to get it to their side, perfectly acceptable if not moral. 

Well I wasn't gunna spend ages writing an explanation when someone already has- and probably better... Luckily this year it didn't head for our house, last year my dad was just about pitchforking ba players to keep them out of his beloved garden. 

Think my kids should have fun hearing about it anyway,

A French Thanksgiving, Winter in Paris and the return to my beloved country.

Well, it's been a long time since I last posted. I mean, Thanksgiving was only a matter of weeks ago- really? It feels like months now! Well, the last weekend in November we found ourselves in Bourges celebrating Thanksgiving with the American assistants there. It was a lovely Autumn day and I think everyone's mood matched. We'd all agreed to each bring something for the table- I made nut roast, which I was pleased to see some people try! It always pleases me when people aren't complete and utter meatheads and are willing to TRY veggie food rather than just screw up their nose and whinge about the lack of dead animal before them. Anyway, the table was amazing! Bar the turkey, I could pretty much eat anything- so many vegetables, breads and puddings lay before me. I was especially taken with the pumpkin soup we had for starter and the pumpkin pie for dessert- I freaking love pumpkin!! I was also extremely pleased to find a big bowl of mulled wine on the table- if there's anything to love about Winter, it's the hot drinks!
Like the big greedy bugger I am, I went straight to the food without mentioning that we'd been given plenty demonstration by the Americans what Thanksgiving was about:

Pilgrims and Indians obviously!

After absolutely stuffing our faces, we of course went around the room and said what we were thankful for, I'd say everyone pretty much had the same things to say- family, the opportunity we have at the moment to explore other cultures and the fact we have each other. Bar me, who after my week of hell said I was thankful that my knee was healing and that I'd lost nothing that couldn't be replaced. It's not remotely that I'm not thankful for all the first things, but I'm thankful for them every day- it's amazing how lucky I am to have so many awesome people around me all the time, I'm never alone and it's blooming great! There's absolutely no way I would have survived without the other assistants- especially on my Tours trip, that's for certain. Hence why I'm thankful I lost things that could be replaced- cards and mobiles are, the people in your life aren't. As for my knee- it's the typical 'time heals all wounds' thing, it's just easier to see when it's physical. I'm quite frankly still marvelling at the human body's ability to heal so quickly, one minute my knee is a disgusting mess,  next there's only slight bruising- magic!

Anyway, much food was had, many pictures taken and I had great fun. Thanksgiving is a great holiday and I was pleased the Americans shared it with us, quite frankly they're troopers managing to get through such a big family holiday being miles away from home, so I hope it cheered them a bit.

The week following this, my parents arrived so I went off to meet them in Paris. I was more than prepared to hear a lot of complaining, but I was mostly expecting it from mother- due to the sever lack of veggie food. Hence it was funny when it was dad that was the least impressed- no English speaking channels on the TV, despite being a meat eater he wasn't particularly taken with the food and he and mother pretty much needed a pee-stop everywhere, which is apparently hard to find in Paris where every train toilet was out of order. The parents had booked in at an hotel some miles out of the centre, so we had fun hopping on the train and then trying to figure out where we were exactly when we got off in the centre. Dad and I were prepared to carry on down the road when mother called out "Is that building supposed to look like the Arc de Triomphe?" Needless to say it wasn't 'a building', first landmark spotted and now we could identify where the hell we were. We stopped for a quick, expensive lunch in a café where we had the pleasure of meeting Rosetta the teacup-sized Yorkshire terrier who was sitting at the table next to us and acting up as only a baby can, yapping and nipping at her owner- she was absolutely adorable. We lost our Yorkie a couple of years ago, and since have pined for every single one that has walked by us since, the little buggers just have so much character! And in Paris, there were Yorkies EVERYWHERE! The temptation to smuggle one into a bag was constant.

After finally tearing ourselves away from Rosetta, we got on a tour bus so as to see as much in one day as possible. 

My parents.

Mother and I and bloody great big soldier!

Really wanted to see Esmerelda...

Instead, saw Santa.

It was great fun, but as the light started to dim, the chill started to set in as did stress as I wanted to get the train back at 6.40 and it was 5.30. Seems like a lot of time, but Paris is HUGE and trying to make your way across it can be hellish. Needless to say, I missed my train. This wouldn't have been dreadful, if the next one wasn't at 6.30am. I had work that day, so yes, I was up at 4.30am, running across Paris like a mad woman to get on that train. How great I felt for putting all that effort in when I discovered that some of my classes had been cancelled that day anyway (just nobody thought to tell me) and i was so blooming tired that I just left my one remaining class to make posters while I flopped at a desk trying my best not to shut my eyes and drift off. Knackered!

Eventually my parents arrived in Isengard. Trying to get them a taxi from the train station to mine proved to be absolutely hopeless however. Ask a Frenchie in Issoudun if there are any good taxis, and they simply laugh at you. And no wonder, every single number I phone: "n'est pas possible". As I walked to meet my parents, many empty taxis went past me but all with red lights, one even stopped outside the bakery, got out and came back with a baguette- absolute pisstaker! 

After much grumbling, we got back to my flat having walked it with all their luggage. The grumbling didn't stop there, my TV didn't work, my water was too hard, calcium build-ups everywhere.. I was prepared for a week of hell, but within a matter of days, I'd had things fixed, cleaned and cooked for me- blooming marvellous! My dad had fixed everything up in a matter of minutes where the French janitor had faffed for about an hour then shook his head and mumbled about coming back later, to never return again. 

As my working week finished (where I'd had to correct some boys and explain why Theo Walcott is not a famous football 'streaker' but a 'striker' and explain why I was giggling), mother and I decided we wanted to go to Disneyland. Absolutely childish it may seem but the pair of us were excited as hell. And so we should have been!

Our hotel was decorated for Christmas!

The park was full of festive displays and parades such as a Goofy Santa.

The moment of absolute joy for me came when we were outside having lunch and hot chocolate when fake snow started fall down and the song 'It feels like Christmas' from the Muppet Christmas Carol played by a brass band came loudly across the speakers in the park. I pretty much squealed and bounced like a typical childish girly girl. I was definitely in the festive spirit! I absolutely loved my time in Disneyland, it was great watching the little kids getting hyper and dressing up. The only thing we could possibly complain about was our dinner, decidedly 'gourmet' meals are not for us. We've had disappointment after disappointment where gourmet food is concerned, and this was no exception. Mother and I didn't expect much for us veggies, but even dad was disgusted. While we were served the driest, blandest pasta mixed with very little cooked vegetables, no sauce, dad was served a plate of barely cooked zander fish- it stank to high heaven and was still slightly grey in the middle, along with a vegetable we didn't then recognise, the French's beloved endives. Well, endives taste like earwax quite frankly, hence why I don't believe them to be that popular in Britain, thank god! After picking away through our meal, we were relieved to be served a cheese course... Or so we thought, before us sat what I believe to be some of the unpasteurised cheese that the French also bewilderingly love, the reason why us Brits tend to avoid it I can only guess is because it stinks like horse piss and tastes like it perhaps was milked from a horse, or a pig... all the farm bar the cow quite frankly. Well, we returned to our hotel room, slightly green, washing our hands repeatedly and trying to get the lingering stench out of our nostrils before heading back to the park to see the festive lights in all their glory, and to find something nicer to munch on. 

Despite our hideous meal, everything else was fantastic. I was even delighted to meet Jack Skellington, what a dude! He totally checked me out.

See! Sally who?

I did NOT want to leave, I loved it there and quite frankly, the thought of going back to work when you feel so festive is a complete comedown. At least for the most part I just got to play Christmas themed games with the kids such as a competition to see who can make the most words out of 'Christmas tree', it got surprisingly competitive! And I played Christmas themed Pictionary with the younger ones, which just about became a bloodbath as they got even more competitive and high as hell on sweets. I was disappointed to find out that some of the kids didn't know what an elf was, even in French... They shall never know the joy of Buddy the Elf. 

Anyway, my last week in Issoudun was ace, we watched Xmas films, went to the Xmas market and drank even MORE mulled wine while I got sucked into buying crepes for everyone as my students were running a stall there, and on the last night we got together and had a Secret Santa, made our own paper hats and an Xmas roast. It was fab. :)

Everything was great. But I had to travel back up to Scotland- yayyy Scotland! BOOOOO travel! The 4.30am start wasn't the hard thing, nor was negotiating Paris, the hell began at Charles de Gaulle airport. I was sent here, there and everywhere by clueless workers, met many more exasperated travellers in wrong queues, LONG queues, flights had been cancelled to some areas and it was basically just chaos. As the time of my flight got closer and closer, I came closer and closer to tears and wanted to just throw myself down in a childish strop on the airport floor and scream that nobody knew how to do their jobs. Eventually, a tired, hungry, haughty me found myself in the right place and with the right people- they were cheery and managed to have me smiling again in a matter of seconds. 

One trouble done. On to the next one.

Eventually got to Birmingham where my flight was delayed by an hour so I was stressed that I wouldn't make my connecting flight at Aberdeen. But we made it in time.

From Aberdeen- simple. Got home. No luggage at Kirkwall Airport. FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-

I'd barely eaten, I was tired as hell as I'd been up since 3.30am British time and I was just not amused. My luggage still hasn't arrived. But thank buggery I'm home now. Reunited with British food, all English speakers and my kitty! Absolutely delighted. And the best thing was seeing my little cousins yesterday, all chuffed to get their Minnie ears from Disneyland. :)
Now if only I can get out of the annoying habit of waking up at 9am... ><