Computer Problems, or, La télé française

So...my computer stopped working. It was bound to happen sooner or later, since the poor thing is nearing five year old--gotta love planned obsolescence, right? *sarcasm*

 Without my little old HP Pavilion, I lost all motivation. Sad but true. And since it was during the winter holidays (February 21), I had ABSOLUTELY NO WAY of getting internet. Thus, poor little bloggy-blog suffered. At least I have my writing saved on a USB. Thank goodness for that!

To fill the void, I stared watching a lot of French TV. I have since discovered that the French have shamelessly imported all of the trashy and disgusting American reality TV programs I would never deign to watch at home. Plus, they've created their own: notably, Les Ch'tis à Las Vegas, which is basically the French Jersey Shore. A group of young people go on (often drunken) adventures in Las Vegas and experience various forms of culture shock--mostly not being able to understand English while being in the United States. I had a hard time watching a full episode, since the "stars" remind me a little too much of my students (especially the poor English skills).

"Ch'ti," for those unfamiliar, is the term for the inhabitants of the region Nord-Pas-de-Calais, near the Franco-Belgian border. The Ch'ti accent is very thick, as many Ch'ti traditionally spoke Picard, a romance language closely related to French, also spoken by the Belgian Walloon population.

Mostly I just watched the news and movies on TV, but I happened upon a show I really liked one night on France 2: Nicolas Le Floch, which is a period police drama based on novels by Jean-François Parot. The story revolves around the marquis and police commissioner Nicolas Le Floch, who works for Louis XV during the Ancien Regime (roughly 1761-1789) and swashbuckles his way into the hearts and minds of the people of Paris, including several lovely ladies. It's so fabulous--an excellent stand-in for Downton Abbey.

Nicolas Le Floch, as portrayed by Jérôme Robart

On the computer front: obviously, it is working again. I had to order a new battery and a new power adapter, which is all I can afford right now--no new computer (I wish!)--and were sent from Hong Kong in a relatively timely manner. Gotta love Amazon.com!

*Crossing fingers my computer problems are resolved*

A Trip to Aix-en-Provence

At the beginning of the month, Epiphany to be exact, I made it up to Aix-en-Provence to look around and do a little shopping. I ended up buying an incredibly delicious chèvre cendrée (goat's cheese with an ash rind--it sounds gross, but it is not! Just don't eat the ash) and Turkish apricots that were to die for at the farmer's market; drooling over a pair (...make that several pairs...) of Ubu earrings at a boutique; and hightailing it to the Musée Granet to see some of the lovely works of native son Cézanne--as well as other Impressionist, etc., artists.

Paul Cezanne lived here once

Santons: little figures for your Nativity scene made in Aix!

For my first trip to Aix, I'd say this was a success! I wish I had enough money to buy myself a pair of Ubu earrings, but the trip itself will have to suffice for my little birthday present to me. I thought about buying some santons, the little Nativity figurines that are made in Aix and a staple of Provence at Christmastime, but I realized, if you buy one, you have to buy a set--and those don't come cheap, either! They're something you buy as a collection: one each year to add to as the years progress: finding the perfect one is half the fun! But for me, I didn't think it was worth it, knowing I probably won't be able to collect year after year...I'm not going to be in France forever! Then there's the question of which figure to collect first: Baby Jesus, because he's most important? Or one of the Three Magi? Maybe Melchior because he has the coolest name...and there's where I left off, because I cannot make a decision, if ever so inconsequential, to save myself.

Here are some more pictures of santons:

And here are more pictures of Aix:

Hotel de Ville

A protest?!? In FRANCE?!?

One thing I learned at the museum, which was small but good, is that Cézanne and Emile Zola met when they were kids at school, and continued a lifelong friendship, even after they each became famous! Definitely cool. I also learned the French for "still life": nature morte. It just seems so much more philosophical and expressive! 

Here is a famous Cézanne nature morte:

Should Old Acquaintance Be Forgot?

Happy New Year!

It's that time of year again--the end of it! 

Though all of the hullabaloo over the end of the world about a week ago was all for naught, we can turn the pages of our calendars, or put up new ones, to celebrate the turning of Earth on its axis yet again. For those of us using the Gregorian calendar (i.e. most of us in the Western world) it will shortly become 2013! 

Wow...it seems like yesterday it was 2012! And it was. Sometimes I wake up thinking it's still 2008. Is there such a disease as understanding the movement of time but not internalizing it? If there is, I might have it. I don't know where my time goes. I don't know if it hides from me until it runs out and gives up, or if I don't give it enough incentive to stick around...maybe I just waste it, and Time has decided to bank on better options.

I am a terrible procrastinator, something those nearest and dearest to me have known for a long time. I never send birthday cards on time. My applications, essays, work assignments, etc., sit undone until the eleventh hour. I arrive "fashionably late" to basically every event I'm invited to. I think they will prove some day soon that procrastination is genetic, since my dad and sister are worse than I am, and despite hundreds upon thousands of times they could change, they just don't--and neither do I. It's become so bad that anyone who knows us well enough always gives us invitations for 30 minutes ahead of schedule, assuming we'll be 30 minutes late, i.e. on time.

Here in the South of France, it's not a big deal to be late. In the scheme of things, the French are often called schizo-chronic, a crazy and unpredictable time schedule somewhere between poly-chronic time managers and mono-chronic time managers. In Paris, things are more fast-paced and the schedules seem to run more toward the Germanic/Britannic time schedule (mono-chronic) but in the south, like Marseilles, or here in La Ciotat, things are much more laid back and Mediterranean (poly-chronic). Just about everything can wait until tomorrow. Feathers aren't ruffled by much. 

It's nice in a way...like all the stress I cause by being late in a mono-chronic culture really isn't worth it. I can rip up my schedule and have another cup of coffee before I hit the road, because everyone else--socially and professionally--is going to be "fashionably late" like me! It's a good feeling.

Bonne Année à tous!

Thanksgiving in France

This is coming a little late, but I've been busy!

I got a new job...a post on that will come...and my students have (finally) actually been showing up! Which means I have to actually do lesson plans--it's not all fun and games in the South of France! Also, I've had to clean my studio and go to the laundromat and...and...

MAKE THANKSGIVING DINNER!

Yes, I decided to celebrate it this year with my gals--fellow teaching assistants and Europeans all--who had never eaten Thanksgiving dinner before. I made all the fixin's to be as authentic as possible: turkey (just cutlets), stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, squash, sweet potatoes and black beans, and pumpkin pie! The only thing I couldn't get was cranberry sauce. So, I bought red currant preserves and warmed them up...good enough for me, though I'm sure purists are gnashing their teeth. 

The best compliment I got was the admission that American food can be tasty and is not just McDonald's! Vindication! It's probably not going to get much better than that by way of compliments here in France...

I've noticed myself become slowly more patriotic the longer I live abroad. I would like to examine why, but that probably also deserves its own blog post. It might be homesickness, or re-forging an identity after forging an anti-identity as an "ex-pat" wannabe. I haven't lived abroad that long, but I feel as if I'm more accepting of my "American" moniker than I was when I was a student, for example. It might be in part that the American image abroad is improving, or that I'm becoming more mature and thus more accepting of my roots, culture, etc. I don't particularly identify with what is "typically American" but in a way, I don't have a choice when I'm seen as "the American."

And boy, do they know I'm American! It's not like in Austria, where I think some of the teachers (granted, ones I didn't work with) either mixed me up with the TA from the last year or made up a history for me in their heads. One day in early December I was in the teachers' room and the snow started coming down hard. One of the math teachers was sitting next to me. He leaned over and asked, "Does it snow like this in Scotland?"

To which I said, "I wouldn't know. Never been."

I hope, in embracing my nationality in small ways like this, I'm not turning into an Ugly American. That, after all, would be counter productive to being a "cultural ambassador" or whatever the heck I am.

La Toussaint: or, a Rant about Public Education

This week is the Catholic/Christian holiday All Saint's day--or, as they say in France, La Toussaint.

While I was in Austria, because the Austrians, like the French, are nominally Catholic, I got All Saint's day (Allerheiligen in German) off there, too. But, instead of, say, a four day weekend, like in Austria, I get a whole two weeks off.

I'm getting pretty used to the French way of doing things: from my ridiculous number of days off to my peripheral teaching duties--virtually no lesson planning--since I've been asked to help the student improve their speaking skills and all I have to do is show up with a topic and a vocabulary list.

The government-mandated French work week is 35 hours; the average amount of time off a year is five weeks (also government mandated) and as a teacher, I get all of the school holidays off - that's four two-week vacations a school year, not to mention summer vacation.

Before you scoff, or express your jealousy, or anything like that, I wish to mention a few things about the average French high school schedule. School starts at 8AM and can go all the way to 6PM some days, though the students are not obligated to stay in the building when they don't have class. They have 10-12 subjects each year, and are required to take a grueling school leaving exam, the baccalaureat or bac for short. If they don't pass it the first time, they repeat their final year until the do.

Most kids who don't repeat a year graduate at 18, like in the United States. But, if they do repeat a year (once, twice, or even more times), they stay until they pass the bac: I have a student who's 21. No joke. The system is relatively speaking the same throughout Europe. Students in Austria who don't pass their Matura the first time around have to stay until they do; likewise in Germany with their Abitur.

It makes me wonder: in the United States, we push kids through so virtually everyone graduates at 18, whether they've learned what they need to in high school or not. As the old saying goes, "D for Diploma--that's good enough for me!" There are no school leaving exams, at least not in Wisconsin, and though certain educational programs are implemented at the national level (the infamous "No Child Left Behind," or the equally dubious "Rise to the Top"), most decisions on public education are left up to the states to decide. And that doesn't always work.

Not to get political, but I must contribute the travesty of my home state's gubernatorial recall election in June 2012. One of the first things Governor Scott Walker put into place when he was elected--the thing, indeed, that caused riots in Madison and a call to arms to recall him in the first place--was to cut public workers' rights, including teachers', by limiting their bargaining rights.

Now, you might not see directly how this would affect education in Wisconsin. Think about it this way: if teachers are demoralized because they're getting paid less than what they're worth--or have no control over their pensions, etc.--they will not be as effective in the classroom. Fewer young people will want to go into the teaching profession, since there is little prestige and virtually no pay for lots and lots of hard work. So you see?   Policy can affect a lot of different things, and what your child learns is definitely one of them.

Though the American school system isn't perfect, it does compare favorably to the French system, which has a lot less interactive learning and a lot more lecture-based. Teaching in France has a more...um, didactic?...quality along the lines of "I talk, you listen."  In Austria, it depends, but the preferred teaching method there is of a "call and response" nature: the teacher has the answer book, and checks the students' knowledge against what it says in the book. Of course, discussion comes into play more often in Austria as well. Having an opinion is valued in both cultures, but in France, the tendency is to keep it to yourself until you're out of the classroom.

One last note: teachers in France do not get paid as well as teachers in Austria, but they certainly get more days off.