The Strikes
Suz brightening up the moment, like always! 
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| Cooking with Suz... it's the small things in life :) |
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| Fall in Perigueux |
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
A "used to" wanna be French Person
( I wrote this blog as a joke. I am still having a really good time, and I have met some wonderful people. It's a good thing to just laugh things off.)
Ok, let's get straight to it. I love France. I have loved France from the young age of twelve when I was invited to stay in the Pyrenees Mountains for a month. As a twelve year old, and then as a 21 year old, life in France was like a box of chocolates- really good and expensive chocolate.
Life as an English Language Assistant in the rainy city of Perigueux goes as follows...
1) Me: "Im sorry to bother you, Sir, but we haven't had hot water in our apartment for three weeks now."
Frenchman: "Well it's because you live on the 6th floor."
2) Went to the doctor because of severe head pain, along with intermittent hearing loss. Was given a prescription for a CT scan.
Told the school nurse that I was going to have to wait for 4 weeks because they have no sooner appointments due to the medical system here. Was advised to just go to the ER and they will take care of me.
Three hours passed, while lying in a thin hospital night gown, with no blanket, with an old man starring at me in pain, and a woman screaming and moaning in pain, the doctor then finally arrives.
French doctor: "You don't need a scan, you just have a headache."
Me: "But I've been here for three hours and they said I was going to have one."
French: "You can just go home, bye."
3) Attempted to move into my friend's house temporarily until I find another place to live.
French: "You need to leave the property at once! This is horrible, outrageous. Why do you think you can just come here? Did you know that France is terrorist threat "red" right now? Are you terrorists?
Me: "I am American, here to teach English, I am just staying here for two nights until my room is ready."
French: "Did you know that France is at "red" for terrorist warnings.
4) French lady: "Holly, are you really going to go out in the rain when it's pouring that hard?"
Me: "Yes, I don't really have a choice. I need to go to my friends house and buy groceries."
French: "Well, we have a saying here, 'this is the kind of weather we don't even put our dogs in'."
5) French: "This is Holly, she is from San Francisco."
Frenchman #2: "Hello, Holly. (did the french kiss thing on both cheeks). You come from San Francisco?"
Me: "Yes"
Frenchman #2: "San Francisco is ugly."
Me: "Wait, what????"
Frenchman # 2: "Well they eat lobster on the side of the street at 4 pm, 4pm!"
Me: "Ok, first of all, what's the big deal about eating lobster at 4? And how does it make San Francisco ugly?"
Frenchman #2: "4pm is too early to eat dinner."
Me: **JUST WALKED AWAY**
6) Eating a kiwi in the cafeteria with my lunch.
French: "Why are you peeling your kiwi?"
Me: "Because I want to. Why, how do you eat it?"
French: "Well, Holly, here in France we use a spoon to eat kiwis, we don't peel them."
Anyways, I guess one thing I have to learn is... WHEN IN FRANCE...
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Hugs
To my dear loved ones,
So it has been a while since my last post because my computer has gone to computer heaven.
Things have been going well here overall aside from a few bumps in the road. After spending a fair amount of time and money decorating my not-so beautiful room, I found out that I will have to start paying a hefty sum for rent. I would be fine paying for it if it had a kitchen or at least an extra sink to wash my dishes. Finding hair on my plates and forks from washing my dishes in the bathroom sink is getting quite old. Not only that, but the hot water available for the shower is quite unpredictable and they turn off the heating on all holidays.
I bought an iphone with the hope of being able to contact you all with the skype app, but they forgot to mention while I was dishing out quite a lot of money that the 3G network in France is too slow for skype.
Regardless of these little nuances, that are primarily only annoying and inconvenient, my head is still high and I am enjoying the French life and the company of the people around me. Well, needless to say, my family will be happy to know that I am no longer considering staying in France longer than I have to. Don't get me wrong there are some things that I love here, but I definitely prefer home.
My french is starting to pick up and it is so nice not having to ask people to repeat themselves 5 times, maybe now only twice haha. It takes so much diligence and dedication and hopefully with my stubbornness I will conquer my second language.
For the past two weeks we had a vacation for All Saints. My friend Suzanne and I got all excited to go to Bordeaux to check out the shops, yet when we arrived at the train station bright and early we found out there were no trains or buses going due to the strikes. Well, we then decided to hop on the next train to wherever it would go. In one hour's time we were in Limoges, which is a city known for their gorgeous porcelain and dinnerware. It was a great change of scenery and it started our vacation on a good note.
Then, I was off to a small town called, Boulazac, which is 10 minutes from Perigueux. I stayed with one of my student's families. They were so sweet and welcoming. I was thrilled to be able to use a kitchen to make some desserts and meals; well, it was a nice change from my toaster oven :).
Later that week the family went off to Paris and my two friends, Suzanne, Katharina and I stayed to watch their dog. We had free range in the house and it was wonderful. We made dinners, sat by the fire and enjoyed the comforts of being in a home.
After discussing my living situation the family has kindly offered for me to rent a room from them. Their home is a little far by foot to my school, so I am going to try and find a family closer. I am here in France for two reasons, the main reason is to learn french and the second is to see if I like teaching. Thus far, I am learning french at a normal speed, and teaching is ok (well, it's good when the students show up. Oh yes, this morning I had only one class, but I found out, after waiting for them for 10 minutes, that they randomly decided to skip class and go to a morning movie at the cinema). I think living with a family will be amazing for my french and it will give me the opportunity to pick up on french household tips. For example, one thing I learned last week is that they like to put fresh vanilla sticks into their sugar jars to add extra flavor for their desserts. I also learned how to iron and fold well haha; the mom thought it was hilarious that I was insistent on learning her mad ironing skills.
Anyway, I will try to keep you updated more often.
I hope everyone had a great Halloween, I sure missed it. The Europeans just don't get the hang of it! :)
GO GIANTS! Speak to you all soon. Oh yes, I AM able to chat on skype through the instant message thing on my phone, so if any of you want to you can add me, holly.milligan.
Also, my new number is 0033635413629
Hugs (the french people are afraid of them haha, they think kissing on the face is less personal),
Holly
So it has been a while since my last post because my computer has gone to computer heaven.
Things have been going well here overall aside from a few bumps in the road. After spending a fair amount of time and money decorating my not-so beautiful room, I found out that I will have to start paying a hefty sum for rent. I would be fine paying for it if it had a kitchen or at least an extra sink to wash my dishes. Finding hair on my plates and forks from washing my dishes in the bathroom sink is getting quite old. Not only that, but the hot water available for the shower is quite unpredictable and they turn off the heating on all holidays.
I bought an iphone with the hope of being able to contact you all with the skype app, but they forgot to mention while I was dishing out quite a lot of money that the 3G network in France is too slow for skype.
Regardless of these little nuances, that are primarily only annoying and inconvenient, my head is still high and I am enjoying the French life and the company of the people around me. Well, needless to say, my family will be happy to know that I am no longer considering staying in France longer than I have to. Don't get me wrong there are some things that I love here, but I definitely prefer home.
My french is starting to pick up and it is so nice not having to ask people to repeat themselves 5 times, maybe now only twice haha. It takes so much diligence and dedication and hopefully with my stubbornness I will conquer my second language.
For the past two weeks we had a vacation for All Saints. My friend Suzanne and I got all excited to go to Bordeaux to check out the shops, yet when we arrived at the train station bright and early we found out there were no trains or buses going due to the strikes. Well, we then decided to hop on the next train to wherever it would go. In one hour's time we were in Limoges, which is a city known for their gorgeous porcelain and dinnerware. It was a great change of scenery and it started our vacation on a good note.
Then, I was off to a small town called, Boulazac, which is 10 minutes from Perigueux. I stayed with one of my student's families. They were so sweet and welcoming. I was thrilled to be able to use a kitchen to make some desserts and meals; well, it was a nice change from my toaster oven :).
Later that week the family went off to Paris and my two friends, Suzanne, Katharina and I stayed to watch their dog. We had free range in the house and it was wonderful. We made dinners, sat by the fire and enjoyed the comforts of being in a home.
After discussing my living situation the family has kindly offered for me to rent a room from them. Their home is a little far by foot to my school, so I am going to try and find a family closer. I am here in France for two reasons, the main reason is to learn french and the second is to see if I like teaching. Thus far, I am learning french at a normal speed, and teaching is ok (well, it's good when the students show up. Oh yes, this morning I had only one class, but I found out, after waiting for them for 10 minutes, that they randomly decided to skip class and go to a morning movie at the cinema). I think living with a family will be amazing for my french and it will give me the opportunity to pick up on french household tips. For example, one thing I learned last week is that they like to put fresh vanilla sticks into their sugar jars to add extra flavor for their desserts. I also learned how to iron and fold well haha; the mom thought it was hilarious that I was insistent on learning her mad ironing skills.
Anyway, I will try to keep you updated more often.
I hope everyone had a great Halloween, I sure missed it. The Europeans just don't get the hang of it! :)
GO GIANTS! Speak to you all soon. Oh yes, I AM able to chat on skype through the instant message thing on my phone, so if any of you want to you can add me, holly.milligan.
Also, my new number is 0033635413629
Hugs (the french people are afraid of them haha, they think kissing on the face is less personal),
Holly
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