Last Week of Lessons.

So, it's over. Today I had my last-ever class. The seven months have gone incredibly quickly, and I don't really want to stop teaching!

A lot of pupils had made me 'goodbye' cards and posters. Some of them were cute and well-written, some of them were a bit last-minute, and simply a scrawled poster. I have a few favourites, though, such as this one, which was done by a particularly inventive pupil. Apparently it shows the Conquistadors invading South America and the Aztec people fighting them off. An obvious choice for an English assistant.


That's maize they're growing in the fenced-area. This is going on my wall when i return to England.

This one, however, is the best of all. It's a joint effort from a class of 10-year olds. It's not artistic, but the message they wrote on it is the best thing i've ever read:



You can zoom in to see the message, which reads:

"For Gavin I go missed you
A feeling which is down at the bottom of l'heart at the bottom of the eyes a good qu it is necessary to have a good qu it is nessecary to give a mistery which give l'friendship. It adore Gavine passes a good voyage."

It does make me wonder if they've learned a single thing this year. Never mind.

With my two favourite classes, it was not a proper goodbye, as i'll be meeting up with them in a couple of weeks in London. They're all going to be there on a school trip, and i'm going to accompany them for a day around various tourist attractions. Apparently they're looking forward to seeing me in my 'native habitat'..!

Spitfire Stop-motion.

A while ago on the BBC, there was a series called James May's Toy Stories, which basically made giant versions of childhood toys. One of the episodes involved building a huge Airfix model. I'd pretty much forgotten that Airfix existed, but felt briefly inspired to build a Spitfire, before quickly forgetting once again.

Then, Frida sent a parcel to France containing an Spitfire Airfix kit for 'a boring day in the shed'. Today, being Sunday, was that day, and so I made my Spitfire. Not content with simply making it, I decided to make a short (very) stop-motion film of the model, complete with authentic Spitfire engine noises.



Like I said, Sunday + France = Suddenly taking up weird hobbies. Probably need to get out more.

Nantes Carnival.

Last Sunday, there was a carnival in Nantes. A french friend reliably informs me that it's the beginning of a festival-week where Nantais people celebrate the end of the winter, and the beginning of the spring. All I know is that it involved an unhealthy amount of confetti, squirting-string and bizarre floats.

There were all kinds of strange things coming down the road, such as a troupe of Sarkozys, Noddy and friends, and some robots with whisk-hand. People were spraying the ones they didn't like with the squirty-string stuff, so the Sarkozys were covered pretty quickly.


Noddy, PC Plod and Big Ears. Interestingly, in French Noddy is called 'Oui-Oui' (yes-yes), and Big Ears is 'Potiron' (pumpkin).


Some of the eleven Sarkozys (Sarkozi?)


Whisky men.


A deep-sea diver with a spider as a hand acting as a puppeteer to the mayor of Nantes. Obviously.


There was a lot of confetti on the floor by the end of the parade.

Now for a blog-first - there should be a video just under here. Apparently Noddy and crew enjoy listening to Muse when they are in procession. How odd.

Salmon Shenanigans.

My trip to Geneva was cancelled, due to an certain Icelandic volcano. This means i've got a whole week to fill. Today, I passed the time by making an overly-extravagant lunch.



I don't know what they're actually called, but never mind. I made a dill sauce out of oil, vinegar, cream, lemon juice, salt and sugar and left it for a bit to make it all dill-y. While I was waiting, I prepared some cucumber, salad, and smoked salmon on a plate, then poured the dill sauce on top.

I'm thinking of trying to make sushi next, but i'm scared I might poison myself. I might wait until i'm back in the UK, where i'm certain of my fish-vocab.

Joyeuses Pâques!

It's Easter Sunday, and i'm sitting in a shed in France. It doesn't sound very attractive, but you'd be surprised. It's sunny outside, and there were children running around earlier looking for eggs in the garden. This morning, in true Greene-family fashion, I was about to paint a boiled egg, when it occured to me that acrylic paints aren't edible. So, I just ate the egg instead. Never mind.

The best thing about being away from England for easter is that I completely avoid all the 'hilarious' puns which appear at this time of year. This is the poster which was displayed in the One Stop staff room last year:


It actually hurts to read it. And the last part, with 'egg-tra' doesn't even work!

Luckily, the French language is not geared up to such painful punnery - 'oeufcellent' doesn't really work as well, does it? Much as I miss Creme Eggs, i'd quite happily do without them every year if it meant no puns.
And i'm not even yolking.

(Sorry.)

Bicloo.

Nantes is roughly 300 miles south of Horsham. That's 300 miles closer to the equator. Thanks to this geographical position, Nantes is a lot warmer than England at this time of year. In the past week, it's been up to 20°c most days.

It made sense to make the most of the warm weather, so myself and another assistant hired Bicloos for the day. The 'Bicloo' system is a bike-sharing scheme, with a network of 'bike-stops' across the city which are available to hire. It only costs 1€ for the day, and you can go pretty much anywhere you want within the city. Best of all, it's actually exercise, and healthy!


Becky on her Bicloo. Taking this photo almost made me fall in the river.

We cycled around the Ile de Nantes, which is the big island in the River Loire home to th former shipbuilding yard. It's nice and flat, with virtually no traffic, so it's a perfect place to ride around!


The Ile de Nantes.

It took about two hours to go around the island. This convinced us that we were definitely entitled to eat vast quantities of unhealthy food, so we went to the nearest Subway and each had a huge sandwich.

I'll leave you with a few statistics:

• You burn about 800 calories during two hours of cycling.
• A 12" Subway sandwich contains about 700 calories.
• Sitting quietly for two hours burns about 150 calories.

It would've been healthier to watch TV. Oops.

St. Patrick's Day.

It's been over a week since I last updated this. Poor effort, I know, but i've simply been too busy! Luckily, the French have realised this, and hastily arranged a strike for today to let me catch up.

I'll start with St. Patrick's day. No, i'm not Irish, and I don't think I have a drop of Irish blood in me, but when there's an English-speaking celebration in France, I have to join in!

Now I don't know about Ireland, but in England, St. Patrick's day is a fairly understated day, where the pubs try to take advantage of people by putting green dye in their beer and charging them double. In nantes, St. Patrick is a major evening out. There's three 'Irish' pubs in Nantes, and we were going to wander around them and see which one had the best atmosphere. That was, until we saw this:


You'd never even know it's France.

John McByrne's was overflowing, with hundreds of people int he streets, and all the pubs in the area had brought out portable bars into the road. Irish music was being blasted out of the speakers, and everyone was having a generally good time.


Not a particularly good photo, but there were a troupe of bagipipers who marched throught the crowd at one point.

We stayed until about midninght, as I had a full day of teaching the next day. In the four hours that we were there, I met only one Irish person, and i'm pretty sure that he was putting the accent on himself. The only words he seemed to say were 'Guinness', 'Paddy' and 'potatoes'. Suspect.

Impending France

I got a new camera yesterday. It was a birthday present from Frida. Well, about three-quarters of it was, anyway. 'Twas about time I got a new camera - my former one worked perfectly well until the zoom lens decided to fall out one day, giving me a close-up of the floor that I didn't particularly want.

It is now two days before I leave for Nantes - two days in which I need to pack, buy shoes, get some leaflets about Horsham, work out budgets, and have a 21st birthday. Eek!

Nice as this photo of Nantes is, I hope the weather's not always like this...




Photo from Manuel MC's Flickr

Nantes

I got a letter through the door yesterday, telling me where i'll be going in France next year. It's a place called Saint-Herblain, and it seems to be a suburb of Nantes. It looks reasonable enough. Except for that block of flats. Oh, and the ominous warning that there'll be CCTV watching me all the time...

Still, i'm sure it'll be a very nice place. Now to find a apartment...