Really good week
Last week was a really good week, I saw a play on Wednesday night, a comedian on Friday night and I went to a concert in Le Mans on Saturday night. I actually understood most of the play and got the jokes. This week is seeming a whole lot less productive so far. The big event on Sunday was watching Newlyweds and The Real World (Austin) on German MTV. It was so nice to be able to watch TV from back home and after a while I wasn't even that distracted by the German subtitles! It seems that France doesn't have its own MTV so they use Germany's MTV which seems kind of dumb because all the programming is either in English or German. I suppose it's good for watching videos - unlike our MTV, German MTV still plays them.
I also did laundry yesterday - I multitasked and read French Glamour while the clothes were washing. Everytime someone comes into the laundromat you're supposed to say "bonjour" to them. There were about 2-3 different guys that came in while I was there. They kept coming in and out and I'm pretty sure I "bonjour"ed one of them at least twice which made me look like a rude idiot who didn't remember saying bonjour to him a mere 2 minutes before. Vicky told me that she heard that it's rude to say bonjour to people more than once in a day. Oops. Then there was the guy who asked me for 20 cents and I just smiled and did the little laugh I do when people say something and I pretend I know what they said. It occurred to me that I couldn't just giggle this one off so I apologized and said I hadn't heard him. Then he asked again and I handed over the 20 cents. The most annoying part of the laundromat is the dryer. It just doesn't dry. You pay 50 cents for 7 minutes and after the 7 minutes are up your clothes are just as wet as when you started - they're hot, but not dry. I've realized that using the dryer is literally the definition of throwing your money away so I'm going to stop. Besides, now that they've turned on the heat in the foyer, the clothes dry surprisingly quickly. The only bad part is having to explain to everyone who comes to your door that you just did your laundry "hehe" and that's why there are socks, underwear, towels, etc all over your room. And it doesn't help that I never remember the French word for laundry. It always takes about half an hour to find hangers and places to hang my clothes around the room. I've taken to hanging them all on the curtain rod which must look really funny from outside. My English friends were waiting for me downstairs to go to dinner and when I opened the window the first thing they said was "nice drawers!"
I spent the day reading and trying to think of ways to teach the kids about Thanksgiving. I think we're going to do turkey hands this week. Tomorrow is the day I dread because in the school where I am the English teacher with my own classroom I have one period of decent kids, one of really talkative annoying ones, and a whole hour with the 7 year olds. They're really cute but it's so hard to teach them. Last week we did "How old are you?" "I'm 7." I didn't even bother to teach them the "years old" part because I knew it was futile. Besides, all they wanted to know was what "I love you baby" translates to in French. I kid you not. When they got too rowdy I just handed out something for them to color in. That usually shuts them up for a few minutes. After teaching in that school on Tuesday afternoons I'm usually really exhausted. Luckily there's never school on Wednesday!
I also did laundry yesterday - I multitasked and read French Glamour while the clothes were washing. Everytime someone comes into the laundromat you're supposed to say "bonjour" to them. There were about 2-3 different guys that came in while I was there. They kept coming in and out and I'm pretty sure I "bonjour"ed one of them at least twice which made me look like a rude idiot who didn't remember saying bonjour to him a mere 2 minutes before. Vicky told me that she heard that it's rude to say bonjour to people more than once in a day. Oops. Then there was the guy who asked me for 20 cents and I just smiled and did the little laugh I do when people say something and I pretend I know what they said. It occurred to me that I couldn't just giggle this one off so I apologized and said I hadn't heard him. Then he asked again and I handed over the 20 cents. The most annoying part of the laundromat is the dryer. It just doesn't dry. You pay 50 cents for 7 minutes and after the 7 minutes are up your clothes are just as wet as when you started - they're hot, but not dry. I've realized that using the dryer is literally the definition of throwing your money away so I'm going to stop. Besides, now that they've turned on the heat in the foyer, the clothes dry surprisingly quickly. The only bad part is having to explain to everyone who comes to your door that you just did your laundry "hehe" and that's why there are socks, underwear, towels, etc all over your room. And it doesn't help that I never remember the French word for laundry. It always takes about half an hour to find hangers and places to hang my clothes around the room. I've taken to hanging them all on the curtain rod which must look really funny from outside. My English friends were waiting for me downstairs to go to dinner and when I opened the window the first thing they said was "nice drawers!"
I spent the day reading and trying to think of ways to teach the kids about Thanksgiving. I think we're going to do turkey hands this week. Tomorrow is the day I dread because in the school where I am the English teacher with my own classroom I have one period of decent kids, one of really talkative annoying ones, and a whole hour with the 7 year olds. They're really cute but it's so hard to teach them. Last week we did "How old are you?" "I'm 7." I didn't even bother to teach them the "years old" part because I knew it was futile. Besides, all they wanted to know was what "I love you baby" translates to in French. I kid you not. When they got too rowdy I just handed out something for them to color in. That usually shuts them up for a few minutes. After teaching in that school on Tuesday afternoons I'm usually really exhausted. Luckily there's never school on Wednesday!
posted by Laura at 9:50 PM
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