Snapshots

WiFi!

I found a free WiFi connection!!!!!!!!!!!!

I moved into the apartment for the assistants today and I'm living with a very nice southern Italian named Rosangela. In a little corner of my new room, we found a WiFi connection. It doesn't work all the time, but it seems to work well during the weekends and at night. Wireless internet is really a luxury. I really don't have the patience for using Windows 98 in the school and on top of that, using a French keyboard (QWERTY is a stranger here).

So if you've got Skype or Windows Live Messenger, give me your username so I can add you and we can do a web chat!

Fingers crossed, I'll try to add some pictures now....

I'm Deeply in Love

Have you ever felt so happy you want to drop to your knees; weep and kiss the dirty ground? This is how I felt on Saturday. I went to Annie and Regis' house to celebrate the birthdays of one of their daughters (Marie) and grandson (Ludo). Just the fact that they invited me to such an intimate family gathering touched my heart. After the feasting and the champage and the Chinese liqueur (Litchi I think i's called?) and the decadent gateaux(cakes), we took a field trip to the countryside. My goodness. I can't imagine anything in the world being more beautiful than the French countryside. We drove through the greenest mountains, herds of French cows, sunflower fields, little random houses with blue shutters and flower beds spilling from their windows...I wish I could upload pictures but these computers are too slow!

I am so happy here. I don't think I knew this before, but I had a void that needed to be filled--and now it is. I seriously got teary-eyed like 10 times because of the overwhelming joy I felt inside. I'm in love--with a country!!!Who would've thought such a thing was possible...

Climbing Possibilities

I mentioned to Regis that I would like to rock climb while I’m here, whether in a gym or in the Vercors (the mountains nearest to Romans, you can see them in the horizon) and he told me he knew of two professors here that are in a climbing club. We tracked one of these professors down with Regis explaining to every teacher we came across in the hall that I was the new assistante d’anglais américaine from les Etats-Unis (the US) that lives in the petit appartement in the batîment administratif (administrative building). He also must always also mention that I’m from Miami, where there’s beaches and sand, and that because of this, I hate skiing. Then he explains that I am an excellent hardcore climber (untrue, I’m just intermediate and I’m not even that brave) and that we’re looking for so-and-so professor. Each of these little stops to talk to the teachers and make introductions take about 5-10 minutes. So everyone basically knows my whole life story. I think I’ve met the entire faculty (over 50 profs) in a matter of two days.

The point is, we finally found this rock climber teacher and he proposed that I join their rock climbing club. They get together every Monday and Wednesday night to climb in the rock gym of a middle school that’s about 5 minutes walking distance from the school where I’m living. Because it’s in a middle school, I thought it would just be a wall with one or two courses but I went to check it out with Regis and it’s BIG! It’s about half the size of GRG in Gainesville, pretty legit. And on Fridays, they take trips to the mountains to do REAL outdoor climbing!!! I’m SO excited to start climbing with them on Monday, which I haven’t done since the end of August. It’s just like 80 euros for a membership to the club for the whole year and it includes all the rendez-vous. Today, Regis introduced me to the president of the club and he seems excited to have me on board. He says they often get together on the weekends too and go out, so I’ll have new friends. I hope there are a lot of hot French guys climbing without their shirts on, haha. Woo!

Bonjour France! We Meet Again

Wow. The stereotype that the French are snooty and rude couldn’t be any more untrue. Here in the south of France, I’ve found the most hospitable people I’ve ever met. Annie and Regis (the main English teacher at the Lycée du Dauphiné and her husband) will literally drop everything they’re doing in order to help me out with whatever I need.

Regis picked me up from the train station and carried my VERY heavy suitcase all the way to the car. Our first stop before going home was a boulangerie (bakery) which you could smell from several hundred feet away. (Or shall I say meters? Stupid metric system I need to get used to.) We walked in and I almost passed out. It smelled sooooooooooo gooooood and I was starving. He asked me what kind I liked and I asked for pain au chocolat avec des aumandes (chocolate croissant topped with almonds). Everything there is so delicately made. Definitely going back there again sometime this week.

On the way home, Regis gave me a little tour of the city, which isn’t as small as I thought. There are about 35,000 inhabitants (yes, UF has almost double the amount of students) but since everything is so close together in Europe, it looks bigger and busier. The town is cute, it has its charm. You can see the Vercors mountains on one side and on the other side, smaller mountains whose name I’ve forgotten.

As I was the first foreign assistant to arrive, I’ve really received star treatment. I’ve eaten at Annie and Regis’ every day, and she cooks yummy yummy food. I slept at her house the first day and met her super cute I-wanna-eat-you-up grand children, Anya (3) and Ludo (6), as well as one of her daughters, who also teaches at the school. Annie took me to this store which would be the equivalent of Walmart to buy things for my place, and Regis has taken me everywhere else-to get a cell phone, to the tourism office to get maps, to visit the other schools I’ll be teaching at and meet the teachers, etc. I love them. It’s like they have no life but to be at my service, which I don’t ask them to do-they just do it because they like to help. And I’m VERY thankful. I feel like I’ve been so blessed to have everything fall perfectly into place.

I was supposed to live in this apartment in the dorms that’s reserved for three assistants but because it was not yet ready when I arrived, they gave the studio apartment on the second floor of the administration building that was reserved for the Italian assistant. Score! My own apartment. J It’s got two closets, a toilet room, a bathroom (which also had that fountain thing to wash your privates that I haven’t seen in years, what’s it called?), and then a big room with a bed, desk and chair, three big windows, little table with another two chairs, refrigerator (a luxury in France, trust me), and a little plug-in burner to cook. And the Mexican assistant that lived here before me left a mountain bike (very handy), a bottle of wine (even more handy), an inflatable bed (wanna visit?), and other miscellaneous things. When I decorate the flat a bit more, I’ll post some pics.

Also, Annie invited me to go to one of her English classes, which had about 10 students. When I told them I was from Miami, they all looked at me wide-eyed as in "then what the heck are you doing HERE?!?" They seemed nice, I hope I get assigned to that class. And they’re my age, too, so I can relate to them and vice versa. I’ll explain later why kids my age are in a high school. But briefly, this school is also a technical school for several subjects so after they finish high school, they can continue studies in whatever field they want to work in but they don’t get a diploma, just the knowledge.

Internet usage is limited for me, but I’m working on possibly getting WiFi installed at my place. It’s not looking too good though so I have to use the school computers, which have a firewall that doesn’t allow me to use msn messenger or its equivalents. L

I made it in one piece!

Ladies and gents, I made it. This town is pretty cute. The train ride through the mountains was beautiful and I had no problems. More later!

Tonight, Tomorrow

Tonight, I spent $156 in Walmart on nothing.
Tonight, I shared my last Dominican meal with my family. It was sancocho.
Tonight, I spoke to many loved ones and said my goodbyes.
Tonight, (or rather Today...don't wanna mess up the flow) I sweat like a pig outside. And I'll probably miss that.
Tonight, I packed my bags. (OK, so my mom did most of the work....)
Tonight, I will sleep in my full-sized uber-comfortable bed one last time.
Tonight, I reside in Florida.

Tomorrow, I'll spend a total of 16.5 hours traveling.
Tomorrow, I will set foot in four different countries (USA, UK, Switzerland and France).
Tomorrow, I will probably be cranky and jet-lagged.
Tomorrow, I'll be shivering in 50-degree weather.
Tomorrow, I'll sleep on a plane. Sitting upright.
Tomorrow, I will take a train ride through the Alps and French valleys. That'll be nice.
Tomorrow, I will reside in France.