December 25, 2003
When I woke up after 11:00 on Christmas Day, I knew there was no hope that my newly messy room (following a rather exhausted return home the night before) would be clean, and that my personal “family” Christmas would be done in time for my invitees. So I called/messaged everyone asking them to come after 3:00, instead of after 12:00 (I figured that that would give me lots of time) and went back to sleep. I think it was around 1:00 that I got up, and shortly thereafter got a phone call from my mom (ie. way past time to open the gifts that were waiting under my tree…including my birthday present from my mom). So I had my own little Christmas for an hour or so, before cleaning up and stuff. I had just finished preparing the jars of maple syrup that I wanted to give my guests when they arrived, when Jonathan (the American) arrived at 3:30pm. I congratulated myself for not having said 2:00 as I had planned. Once we had four people, we opted to play some cards. Since we had two French people (Nero and Jo), and two North Americans (Jonathan and I, for those having trouble following), games in common were becoming a problem, until Nico arrived, and proposed a couple of games that I would never have guessed were games I knew until we started playing. I can’t remember the name of what were were playing, but the other, which it resembled a lot is called Trou duc’ or (ahem) janitor; a game we played plenty of in the “caf’” at Q.E. Oh, those high school days. It was short-lived, as space is limited here (as I may have mentioned once or twice before) and when more people arrived, it just wasn’t an option anymore. It was really cool; cause more people came than I expected, and it was the first time that I actually hosted anything chez moi. We stayed until fairly late, then those of us that were left went to Cindy’s for a movie (the Green Mile…even fantastic in French). By the end, I was having major difficulty holding my head up, and my bed was calling my name. All in all, a really really great Christmas, although I missed (and still miss) my family, my friends, and the traditions that I left behind. I was so lucky to have such wonderful people around me, and, given the circumstances, I really couldn’t have asked for more, but I miss you all more than you know.
Chapter 43 – Christmas special (part 2…the short part)
Chapter 42 – Christmas special
December 24, 2003
After such talk about food in my last email, I’ve been shown up (grave!). Christmas at the Niess’ is a production and a half. I suppose my few-course meal on Air France should have been an indication, but I guess, buried in my mind, I just figured that Christmas dinner would be turkey here too. I was so very mistaken. My Christmas Eve (the more European time to celebrate) was spent with Jo’s family, who so graciously accepted me as one of their own. Food and presents are intertwined in what ended up being a 5-person, 8-hour meal. No, I’m not exaggerating. The pre-festivity involved an inventory of who had how many gifts under the tree, and for each gift, your name went into a bowl. When I arrived at 6:30, the food was almost all prepared and waiting, and we added the last of the gifts to the rather impressive collection already around the tree. At 7:00, things started (as the so often do) with an apéritif with which came olives (very common), cocktail sausages, cherry tomatoes and a sort of pâté in a pastry. Next came round one of present-opening. Since the number of presents under the tree divided by five left a remainder of one, Texan (pronounced à la française), the dog also got to pick a name. Someone then picked out the presents for those picked (each person had a least a couple of sort of gag gifts, which were the first ones they would get to open). Then, they open the presents one at a time. I thought it was really cool that way. We then did another round of presents, in which I scored a CD of music from various French pop stars (volume 1) that had been a giveaway from the bank that Angélique (the hostess) worked at.
The second course was…wait for it…wait for it…foie gras (no, there were no frog legs – which I still haven’t tried – or escargot – which I don’t want to try again). This was my second time having foie gras (and since then I’ve had it once more) and each time it has been totally different. I liked the most recent one best, but I digress. Foie gras is served with toast (cold by the time you eat it) and jelly (a generally flavourless gelatin), which Angélique had shaped into various Christmas shapes. It was pretty good. Next was presents (if my memory serves; a lot of food and a lot of presents make it hard to keep track of the order of things). In two rounds, I scored…volume 2 of the free CD collection!
Next up was seafood; smoked salmon and toast, oysters, and two sizes of giant shrimp (I’m telling you, these things were enormous). I decided to try oysters. Vincent (Angélique’s boyfriend) showed me how to remove them from the shell, and everyone had different advice; chew/don’t chew… I decided to just have a little piece. And to eat something, it seemed only natural to chew. Ew. Yeah, I won’t be eating those again. It was only later that they informed me that while sitting on the table they were still alive, and that removing them from the shell may or may not have killed them instantly. I was feeling a little off for much of the rest of the meal, but I still enjoyed the evening (when I wasn’t pre-occupied by the being whose head I cut off and ate). I had a little salmon, but I’m not big on shrimp, so I passed on that.
I feel like I’m missing a course, because there were 10 rounds of gifts, and it was usually two after each course…anyway, in rounds 5 and 6, Texan got his third and fourth gifts, but my name wasn’t pulled. They seemed almost concerned. It was cute!
The main course wasn’t filet mignon, but Vincent and Angélique are amazing cooks, because it certainly tasted like it! So, there we were, at 1:00a.m., eating bacon-wrapped steak, bacon-wrapped green beans (see Mom and Dad…if you’d done THAT with my vegetables, we might have gotten along better at meal time!), broccoli and more stuff that I’m forgetting. In rounds 7 and 8 my name was still not pulled, and everyone joked about Jo (who managed at least a gift or two in each round) fixing the bowl of names. I assured them that I’d be happy to be the only one opening presents at the end, while they all looked on jealously (fortunately, while not all French people share my sense of humour, they did).
The cheese course (which is present in even the most simple meals) was skipped, since everyone was completely stuffed. There was mostly just chatting and such for a while, until dessert could be considered; a chocolate sauce/mousse/crumble/je ne sais quoi cake that was incredibly rich (I could only handle one piece). In round 9, 4 of 5 names pulled were…me. They decided to make it three, so I wouldn’t get everything at once. I got a much-needed (if ridiculous looking) pair of fuzzy slippers (I’d had to leave mine at home, because they’re enormous, and would never have fit in my suitcase), a box of truffles and a shirt. We took another pause for those that were able to eat more cake (I don’t know how they did it). Round 10 brought me another shirt (yay for gifts; they’re the best way for me to get European style!) and one of those water-fountain thingies. I’ve always thought they were cool, but would likely never have bought one, so … cool.
So, there we were, at 3:00a.m., just finishing dinner, and cleaning up, and avoiding Texan, who was jealously trying to protect all of his gifts, and totally confused at how to do so. Amazing how a meal extended out that way can make you tired, but give you enough energy to keep going for hours after you would normally have simply passed out. Yep; 8 hours for 5 people to eat 5 – 6 course meal. It was really cool. All that being said, I miss turkey and stuffing sooooo much. Especially since Thanksgiving was a write off in the turkey department. It was well past time for bed, since I was hosting sort of an open-house Christmas thing on Christmas Day, starting at noon.
Chapter 41 – Stage 3 in becoming European
December 22, 2003
I have been lamenting how much better a French meal is, so I figure that after 1) getting to the country and 2) becoming a part of the system, it is well past time for stage 3) cooking like the French. A normal French meal (even when eaten in front of the TV) consists of an apéritif (some alcoholic beverage, like pastis and water – like sambucca, or malibu and juice, or a beer) with gateaux apéritif (Pringles for a no-prep apé, or some more elaborate thing if you have the time; mini toasts with butter/ham/pickles for example, or foie gras etc). Then people just hang out and chat for a while before the meal (standard; some kinda meat, some kinda starch). Then is bread and cheese. The first piece of bread seems to be the one used to get the last bit of whatever sauce is left on the plate, then the rest for the cheese (people generally have 3 or 4 kinds on hand). Finally, dessert; a yoghurt/pudding/creme brûlée (something small, perhaps elaborate, but nonetheless small). Then coffee (that is, espresso, but they call it coffee). So I was rather excited tonight to have roughly half of a proper French meal. Jonathan, the American, was over, and after several episodes of the Simpsons (what would I do without the internet?) we opted for dinner. We even (by coincidence) ate at the average French dinner time (8:00ish) although we didn’t take the standard couple of hours. We didn’t booze up, but I had veggies and dip (a Tzaziki dip that I found at the grocery store, and hoped it was good…it was ‘meh’), and pickles for the pre-meal snack. Dinner had no meat, but the ricotta and spinach tortellini could just as easily have been meat. I even made quasi garlic bread (something I’ve actually never seen here) with some cooking Boursin (actually a cream, not a butter, with garlic and “fine herbs”, but it worked quite well) and after was able to offer yoghurt or creme caramel for dessert. Not bad. I’m quite proud of myself. It was hardly more than I would have made, say, a year ago, and yet seemed so much more like a meal. Yay! (ps. I may have missed important details, but basically I’m just trying to show that a “normal” meal here is hardly the one-course phenomenon that seems to permeate the North American way of life).
Chapter 40 – Communication is a wonderful thing, especially when it works!
So, I thought I’d already sent this. You can rest easy in knowing that my cell phone is working again (yeah, all you that are crazy enough to pay 10 times to call my cell phone rather than my landline…and no, I’m not exaggerating).
December 18, 2003
Too bad it’s such a pain with French technology/policy. Today’s (ahem) comment is brought to you by the letters “FT” and “SFR” (France Telecom, and SFR; my cell phone provider) and the number 22 (the percent difference between calling Canada, and calling a French cell phone). First things first; it costs me 18 centimes a minute to call Canada…and 22 centimes a minute to call, say, the cell phone right next to me from my landline. Pure genius. That rate might change also if the cell phone next to me happened to have a different provider (there are 3 or 4 main ones in France). Just silly. I guess it’s okay since if I call from my cell phone it costs less (although I don’t know how much less) which brings me to my next problem…my cell phone isn’t working today. For no apparent reason. I know I have credit on it, and I know that the network isn’t down, but calls that I try to make on it won’t go through, and if anyone calls me, they just get my answering machine…which I can’t check, because you have to check it from the phone in question, and even that, and the info number for checking my credit doesn’t seem to be work…for me anyway. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
On a brighter note, I have finished my classes for the week, which means; YAY! IT’S VACATION TIME! Sadly, I still have lots of work to do over the vacation, but hey, at least I don’t have classes. On an even brighter note, I brought Office Space in for my Finance and Control Biz students…and they understood it! These are the students that struggle most with English, and I’m sure they had trouble with some of the faster conversations, but I put up the English subtitles as well to help, and it worked! They understood and liked the movie! I was very happy. A great way to end off before my first (much needed) actual vacation.
Speaking of vacation, and Christmas, which I am still completely unprepared for, I got my “tree” up. My little pre-decorated tree (now with a few extra, chocolate, decorations!) is up, with my stocking (thanks Cynthia!) and cards and such under it, and lights around it. Pictures are up now! (okay, so there’s only one picture of the tree, but some new ones since my last update in September). Well, they were up, but since that site doesn’t exist anymore, there’s not much sense in me leaving the address in 
Chapter 39 – Yahoo for renters’ rights
December 17, 2003
I’ve just found out that it doesn’t matter what your lease says, if you are renting an unfurnished apartment, you can leave anytime (with 3 months notice unless it says less in the lease). Apparently leases are required by law to be 3-years for unfurnished apartments, but that length of time applies only to landlords. Apparently it’s virtually impossible to evict someone (of course, that opens things up for abuse, but at least from a renter’s perspective it’s handy). In a furnished apartment, normal rules are one year, which renters are also obliged to follow, but unfurnished – nope! That’s a tremendous relief. Now, if I do stick it out another year, I can look for something better (although 3 months is still a lot of notice to have to work with), and otherwise, I can get rid of this place, well, whenever as the circumstances require. That also means that if I go back to Canada for more than a couple of weeks in the summer, as long as I can find a place to store my stuff, I don’t have to worry about paying rent! I may still be stuck paying internet, in an apartment I don’t own…I don’t know…haven’t checked that out…but MAN, what a relief to know that I can get out of my lease (I mean, my landlord did already say that, but I just thought he was being nice, and that he could change his mind if he felt like it, it’s just nice to know that I have some legal control of the situation). Well, now I’m just babbling.
Chapter 38 – Advice from your friendly neighbourhood postman and French cows say “meuh”
December 16, 2003
I got a thingy in the mail, with the 6 pieces of advice from my postman. I’m thinking that since at least one piece of mail (sent 7 weeks ago or so) hasn’t made it here…perhaps I should pass said advice on…First, and just to complicate matters, the French like to put the return address on the flap at the back of the envelope (we figure this was why one of the Americans got a letter back 2 months after sending it to the US). They also like to put “EXPEDITEUR” (sender) before the address. I figure if you put that, it’ll help. They also say to limit addresses to 6 lines, and use lots of capital letters, and don’t put any punctuation after the street number (contrary to what I was told before), oh yes, and to make the postal code very distinct. So, here we go again, the way they want to see it (I hope):
Address deleted
I know it’s not terribly different from what I originally sent you (and handily, with capital letters, you don’t have to worry about accents!) but there ya go. I still have faith that that missing mail will arrive, but hopefully this will prevent any future confusion (it’s a complicated job figuring out that the chances are the senders address is probably the one that corresponds to country on the stamp, and the intended receiver’s address is probably the other one). As for the other stuff…like not putting a comma after the street number…if enough people do it for them to need to say not to, why don’t they just disregard it when they see it? Anywho, in other news:
French cows say “meuh”
It’s just another one of those things you take for granted. Cows say “moo”. Well not in France, or in Germany. Stop me if I’ve talked about this before…oh wait…you can’t! I just never imagined that cows spoke different languages…or that different languages could interpret animal sounds so differently. I had this conversation quite a while ago, with a few French people, and a German (by the way, why don’t we have a one-word name for French people, like we do for Germans…boy is that question asking for trouble). We discussed several animals (roosters, pigs, dogs, cats) and all had different sounds in all three languages. Sadly (or perhaps it’s for the better) I can’t remember the rest of them. For some reason this conversation has been floating across my mind, so I thought I’d write about it.
Chapter 37 – The fastest bureaucracy in the west
Ain’t sarcasm grand?
December 10, 2003
(West of what exactly, I’m not sure). Today’s complaint is brought to you by the letter W (for Wanadoo, France Telecom’s internet service) and the number 90 (an approximation of the number of days it’s taken them to send me a piece of paper with a code on it that allows me to order my bonus gift online, which will take another month or so to be delivered). Granted it was stalled when they sent me a letter a month or two ago saying that I needed to send them a copy of my invoice (like that don’t have it on file that I bought the software) before they could send me the code. Even the sous-prefecture was faster than that, once I got my documents in (I got a letter at 3:30 Friday afternoon…just as they would be closing for the week…that said that my carte de sejour was ready for pickup). Tomorrow, being bureaucracy day, is when I will attempt to pick that up, and head to the CAF to give them the last of the documents they need to decide whether I’m eligible for rent assistance. I guess I can’t complain too much…assuming this all works out, it’s still a free (well, 1 euro) “baladeur MP3″ although my reason for wanting it is more the fact that my computer has no disk drive, and I have no way of getting files from my computer to the school computer (and printer) without putting it on the internet. It would be soooo much easier to move files this way…I was planning on buying one anyway…in which case I would have had it shortly after my first or second paycheque, but ah well.
My first USB key. Must have been about 30MB (I seem to recall being able to put about 6 songs). Now I’m walking around with one that’s slightly smaller, but holds 4GB. My how things have evolved.
Which reminds me of another particularity about France; everyone (and I mean everyone) is paid monthly. Semi-monthly and bi-weekly is totally beyond their realm of imagination…probably because banking fees are so ridiculous, it saves everyone a bundle to only deposit/pay one cheque a month, instead of more.
December 11, 2003 – Bureaucracy day!
I’ve been bracing myself since last Friday for this bureaucracy day; it promised to be action-packed with stuff to do at 4 different government institutions. I was home from class shortly after 10:00, but my telephone was dead, and I was expecting a call, so I couldn’t leave without it, so I stuck around until after 10:30, somewhat worried that the sous-prefecture closed for lunch at 11:00 rather than the 11:30 that I was pretty sure of. I got there just before 11:00, and the gate and door were still unlocked, so that was a good sign. There were two people in the waiting room (like at the doctor’s offices, “who’s next” works on the honour system).
That’s no longer the case: now you have to take a number, although unlike the other services in at the sous-préfecture, there is no electronic board: the people just yell the next number from the other room.
As it turns out, they were both already served (waiting for stuff to be processed) so I was already next. It took maybe 10 minutes, and 3 signatures, I there I was, holding my passport, complete with my residence permit! That’s right! I’m legally allowed to live in France until August 31, 2004!!!
The next stop was to bring all the precious residence permit, along with a couple of papers from the university, to the CAF to finalize my application for rent assistance. There was nobody in line at the pre-acceuil, and the lady told me to go right in; that nobody was waiting in acceuil either. I was impressed (but already daunted by the ridiculous crowd wanting to get into the CPAM (Sécurite sociale; health insurance) office, which was my next stop). Sure enough, after a brief wait to see which cubicle to go to, there I was, in front of an agent, and despite the walk into downtown (the sous-prefecture is en route, but not actually downtown) it wasn’t even 11:30. In fact, I had given her the papers, made sure everything was there, and got a set of things for a friend who will soon be applying, and got my number ticket for the SecU (the more common name for CPAM) office all before 11:30! That’s where my luck with time ran out. On the ticket it said that there were 18 people ahead of me, and that the estimated wait time was 16 minutes. It felt like longer, since there was no line up, or place to sit, just a group of people loitering around the pre-accueil desk. When I realized that things were moving pretty slow, and that I’d accidentally given the photocopy instead of the original of one of the key documents to the CAF people, I got another number for them, and was almost instantly served so that that was taken care of (something the pre-acceuil people can do). Oh yeah, and although I’d brought photocopies of my pay slips, instead of taking them, they photocopied them, so I now had an extra set of copies.
It did take about the predicted 16 minutes, at which point I didn’t know exactly what to tell the lady. I wanted to claim the stuff I paid back in October, but I knew I had to be set up in the system. The university (when I asked them how it worked) had filled out a form for me to bring, so I had that, along with the stuff from the pharmacist and doctor. She told me that I would also need ID (had my passport!), a pay slip (even an extra copy!) and a RIB (hehehe, not what you think…although it wouldn’t be shocking…actually a thing from the bank with your detailed bank account number; you need these for everything). Thanks to my developing the habit of bringing everything with me whenever I have to go to a government institution, I figured I was set. Then I got to wait inside the office. By now it was lunchtime, and people (including those at the front desk) had already started their rotating set of lunch breaks (hey, at least they’re open at lunch!). The wait was long on the inside; nearly an hour and a half, although there were always at least 2 people working, and there were only 3 or 4 people ahead of me. I’m not sure what everyone else had to do, but once it was finally my turn, I sort of understood the delay. First of all, I needed more than the woman at pre-accueil had said; the RIB could not be a photocopy (fortunately I still had originals too), I also needed my long-form birth certificate (I was even able to one up him on that; I offered that and one of the extra official translations of…he photocopied the translation, and gave me back the original, which was a nice relief…although I have a few extra “originals”, they are pretty valuable if I ever have to pay to replace them), and the form from the university. It took a fair bit of time for the guy to photocopy everything (in part because the photocopier was at the farthest possible point from his desk), although at least I gave him everything at once, so he didn’t have to make the trip 5 or 6 times as I watched him do with another client. Once again, rather than keeping the photocopy of my pay slip, he photocopied. Ah well. It took even longer get all the info into the computer. When he mentioned that I would get the money back after all the documents went to Paris, who would send me my Carte Vitale (I didn’t realize I would get one of those; the health cards here are way smarter than ours; old or new: they are microchiped (like bank/visa cards etc). There even a machine where you can update address info and stuff on it yourself, so you don’t have to go through this torture again, and so they don’t have to replace the cards each time there’s a change (that stuff isn’t actually printed on the card). I’m very excited; I thought only French people got them! Anyway, the last stop was the post office, but I sort of forgot about that for a while. I rewarded my success with the bureaucracy by heading to the creperie. As I left the creperie, a man working there chased me down to ask where I was from. I’m not sure how/when he heard my accent. I barely said 2 words to anyone, besides placing my order with my waitress (sorry Aimee, it was the evil one that gave you a burnt crepe). I told him Canada, and he asked (in only slightly accented English) where. When I told him Toronto, he said that his wife was American, and that her father was born in Toronto. I thought that was kind of cool.
I mosey’d around the Christmas market for a while, giving into some over-priced baked goods, some chocolate tree ornaments, and a “hot dog knack d’Alsace” (like a cross between Denninger’s veal weiners and knackwurst). Then I forced myself to the post before I inevitably forgot again. Unfortunately, I was told that a letter couldn’t be tracked outside of France (as I had originally been told…the whole reason I had to go to the post office, rather than just dropping my letter in a mailbox). I later decided to do that anyway, so dad; it’s on it’s way as of December 11th.
So there ya go; probably the most successful bureaucracy day I have had yet.
Chapter 36 – Apparently my room is “America”
December 9, 2003
An amusing expression, not used by all, but apparently when something’s a real mess, some French people call it “l’Amérique.” And yes, my room is definitely that. I’m hoping to take care of that first thing once my courses are prepped, and all assignments marked for the next week and two days. I’m actually looking forward to (hopefully) rearranging my room, and starting Christmas and the New Year with a new outlook. Unfortunately, there’s only so much I can do with the space that I have, although since I will soon be losing the washing machine (I will actually be able to close my bathroom door) and may soon thereafter lose the bed, the toaster oven (aka oven in my tiny world), and the TV. That’ll make for easy moving…just not so easy sleeping…
December 10, 2003
Well, I’m one step farther from the cleaning and decorating that I had hoped to get done, since I had to collect an assignment from one of my classes that I didn’t assign them, but I have to mark. How nice.
Chapter 35 – Adventures in the Vosges
December 7, 2003
It all started with an invite, a few weeks ago, to join my former classmates for a weekend at a cottage in the Vosges. Another one of those differences between France and North America. To the average North American, I think people pictures a lake when they picture a cottage. Here, people picture the mountains. It’s a cool difference, although deep down, I have to say that a lake is better. I miss the cottage…the fireplace…the lake iced over and covered in snow, for an amazing brightness in daylight, and a great lightness in the dark. There’s still no snow here…even in the mountains. Anyway, the story…
The email said to bring snow-type clothes, slippers, a sleeping bag and the like, and the cost was 16 euros. We were to meet at the bottom of campus at 4:00pm Saturday. I had no idea how many people were going, or really what to expect. I don’t have a sleeping bag though, so I brought my little Canada blanket that I bought on Canada Day this year, and another, bigger, blanket, and hoped for the best. By the time we left, there were 10 or so people, and a whole lot of luggage, in 4 cars. I was happy to be in the car driven by the person that knew where we were going, at least for the first leg. The next stop was Thann, where our caravan (minus one car which later caught up) pulled into the parking lot of a grocery store. There we met up with a bunch more people, and another few cars. We drove through a couple of small mountain towns, as we headed upwards. When we reached the driveway, more than a couple of drivers were concerned; the slope on the curved driveway was really steep. If there was even the tiniest bit of snow or ice, there would be no way a car would make it up or down (there was neither snow nor ice, just a creepy layer of fog that make everything a bizarre shade of grey, and reminded me of the Stephen King short story (I think called “the Fog”). As we unpacked the cars, I was amazed at the amount of stuff people had brought (I would soon understand).
It wasn’t long before the huge square tables (each easily seating about 12 or 15) were covered in bags and boxes, as people unpacked food and such, and found rooms to stay in (next to the main room was a hall with four room with two bunk beds each, and two rooms with one bunk bed each). That wasn’t enough to accommodate everyone though, and some stayed in one of the two basement rooms which I believe slept eight each. I ended up in what became the foreigners room (me, an American and a German…walk into a bar…). So anyway, things got unpacked, and the Disco theme of the night began to emerge. About half of everyone there had some kind of disco wear and/or makeup. The music started early (and quietly) as people snacked on “gateaux aperitifs” (the regular pre-meal snack…the French WAAAY overuse the word gateau (cake) since les gateaux aperitifs is generally something along the lines of a tube of Pringles. Of course along with the gateaux aperitifs goes the aperitifs (generally vodka, malibu…things of that nature) and the appropriate mixers. The music got louder, and the disco began…Jonathan (American) and I were a little confused…the dance was before dinner, but ah well. By the time people started setting up for dinner, it all came together; the piles of boxes were raclette sets. Mmmmmmm raclette. Altogether, the 25ish of us sat down at one enlarged table in front of 5 raclette sets. A couple of platters of cold cuts, lots of boiled potatoes (which you peel, and perhaps slice, at the table during the meal…I overheard a couple of people talking about how disgusting it was that in England they leave the skin on! Oh, how horrible!), a jar of pickles, and some salad. I’m not sure how much I told you about this last time I had raclette, but they often take a slice of meat, a piece of pickle, and a slice of potato together, with the cheese melted overtop. The cheese cools very quickly though, so you only melt enough for your next few bites each time (each person has their own dish-thing that goes in the melter-thing). Anyway, near the end of the (long) meal, we knocked out a fuse where two of the raclette sets were plugged in. With the help of yet another extension cord, we got them up on running, but we eventually knocked out that fuse too (fortunately right around the time that everyone was done). Everybody was really good about helping to clean up, and get things out of the way to get back to the dancing. I was just amazed at how everyone worked together without a second thought.
During dinner, a couple of friends of the guardian of the chalet came by, and installed themselves in a bedroom (they were apparently staying the night). Not long after dinner, the guardian (who had left well before dinner) returned with another friend, who had no problems with helping himself to the alcohol that we had brought. His creepiness was noticeable right from the start, but increased dramatically when he pulled out his cell phone (with built-in digital camera) and started taking pictures, mostly of girls, and mostly those dressed more revealingly. He later tried to cover that up by taking picture of everyone, but the creepiness in him was strong. Every time he came around to where me, Jonathan, and Susanne were sitting, I put my head down (covered in the hood on my favourite orange sweater) and waited for him to go away. Fortunately, I was tired enough to enjoy such breaks. At one point, Jonathan tried to explain to the guy, that it was weird that he was taking pictures. Creepy guy number 1 (as he became known) misunderstand, and thought he meant that the picture that he had just taken was weird, so he got Jonathan to pose so he could take another. I just about fell off my chair when Jonathan said “I’m playing with the creepy guy…how did this happen?” There’s nothing in the world like being able to comment on someone’s creepiness, right in front of them, without them understanding. The guardian then became creepy guy number 2 when he brought out his accordion. People were briefly amused/entertained, but when they started to indicate that they were ready to listen to the music, and play the games that they had brought, he just kept right on playing.
It wasn’t too much later, and partly in response to creepy guy number 1 having managed to get someone into conversation, that everyone decided it was time to go to bed (especially since we had to clean up and clear out before noon, and it was after 2:00am). I slept better than in days (the beds did have covers, so with mine in addition, I was good and toasty). In the morning, as we finished cleaning up, Mirko (one of my old classmates) asked if I’d heard the screaming in the night. I was more than a little concerned until he specified that creepy woman number 1 and creepy guy number 3 (who never left the bedroom from the time they arrived while we were eating dinner) were (ahem) moving furniture all night. And that they had (ahem) rearranged the furniture four times. He said he wasn’t sure which guy(s) it was, but he (or one of them) was named David. That much he was sure of. He even got to hear there post-(moving) conversation about how much money they’d spent on who-knows-what that day (what I do know, is that they were smoking some awfully funny smelling tobacco shortly after they arrived). We didn’t actually know which one was named David, and it was only upon discussion and reflection that we determined that it was the guy that showed up with her, but that we never saw again…but we could be wrong.
The moral of the story? The chalet was really cool, and great for groups, at a great price, but I have no plans to go back…
Chapter 34 – I live in a leaky ship
December 4, 2003
So the new draft coming from my door (or so I thought), as well a small one on one side of my window…whistles. Like air current isn’t enough, it has to taunt me, day and night…flames…flames…flames, on the side of my face…breathing, breathless, heaving breaths (bonus points to anyone that gets the reference). So don’t worry, I’m not actually going crazy (How can I go where I already am?), but it makes for another email I guess. I’m kinda like Eminem, I guess, if I didn’t have stuff to whine about, what would I say? I’m just kidding. Things are actually going quite well, aside from the minor annoyance of a piece of wall (it’s not actually my door) whistling at me. I guess that’s just because it’s French…they whistle at anything…hehehe. Ooooo, I’m mean today!
Seriously though, work (yes, I do do some of that now and then, with “now and then” being an expression meaning “every minute of the day”) is getting better all the time. While I still have rough weeks where I’m not at all prepared for my classes, and I’m still struggling to get many of my students to actually speak in class, it is improving all the time, and I’ve even managed to come up with stuff to do that requires little or no preparation on my part, and that the students actually enjoy doing. Of course, I can’t do that stuff all the time, and I can only use any given idea once (or maybe twice) in a year, although I can sometimes use them in almost all of my classes, which is cool. I also met with a high school kid and his mom last night, to tutor the kid in English. It ended up being an hour of small talk (he just wants to practice speaking, and I wasn’t sure what to talk about) but it was pretty cool. In fact, as it turns out, he used to play rugby at RCM (Rugby Club Mulhouse). The world shrinks on me with every passing day.
I’m really really looking forward to Christmas; a good part of the reason I’m a little less stressed right now; I’m mostly prepped for the next two weeks of classes, then a two week break before my stress skyrockets again, since I’m totally unprepared for anything after the holidays, and I won’t be able to get into the school to print or make photocopies during the holiday. Ah well. One crisis at a time. On the other hand, I’m totally unprepared for Christmas. I made it to the Mulhouse Christmas market for an hour or two last Sunday, but I didn’t actually buy anything (other than a hot apple sip). What I had been told about the markets is true; there’s a certain smell to them (the smell of hot spiced wine) that is just wonderful. Most of the booths sell food of various kinds, but the best the I found was the one selling cookies and stuff exactly like the ones my Oma (German Grandmother) makes at Christmas. Helps remind me why I like this region so much; while it’s not exactly part of my heritage, Alsace and I have some similar cultural influences. So yeah, all in all, things are going well. My next step (other than the pile of marking I have to do) is to decorate my place and Christmas it up a little. I can’t believe it’s December.
