Dear friends,
I’ve had a wonderful week since my last post, so it might be a long one – brace yourselves! I finally got my checkbook from my bank on Tuesday, a whole 18 days after I ordered it (they told me it would be “une dixaine de jours,” or 10 days). I should have known it would have taken forever, but ce n’est pas grave now that I have it and can officially pay rent!
Two of the assistants had their boyfriends in town last weekend and for the beginning of the week, so we had a dinner party on Tuesday night so we could all meet them. It was really fun, but kind of challenging linguistically. For the most part, all the assistants speak English (and French, obviously) except for one, the Spanish assistant from Costa Rica. Sarah’s boyfriend is Austrian and speaks German and English, and Tish’s boyfriend is English and speaks English and a little French. We ultimately decided to speak in English for the night, but there were lots of little side translations into French and German going on!
My classes have been going really well, and I think the kids are really excited now that we’ve started working on Christmas vocabulary! We’ve also been practicing a simplified version of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” in a lot of my classes, as that school puts on a Christmas Market. The kids have been working on making Christmas crafts to sell there (they’ll also have hot chocolate, coffee, and vin chaud being sold on school grounds, which I’m pretty sure would NEVER fly in the US!) and they’ll be singing Christmas carols. I plan on going and bringing some of the other assistants with me, and I’m quite excited – I think it’ll be really cute!
On Friday afternoon I went with my fellow assistants Sarah, Mari, Lizzi, and Tish to Nevers’ cutest (and possibly only) salon du thé, En Apar’thé. It’s about the girliest place I’ve ever seen in my life, but it was a wonderful way to spend a cold December afternoon – it was all decorated for Christmas with a beautiful tree, and we all ordered the same tea, the Esprit de Noël. They also have lots of delicious little desserts that are served on beautiful china – we definitely plan on going back!
This weekend I went to Lyon with 5 other assistants for the Fête des Lumières, which is held there every year. It’s a big festival in which there are really cool light shows and light installations all around the city, and I really enjoyed it, even if it was SUPER crowded! We arrived in Lyon around noon and spent a few hours exploring the city – we saw the Place Bellecour, which is one of the biggest public squares in Europe, and climbed up the (VERY steep) Fourvière hill to visit the Basilique de Notre Dame de Fourvière, a beautiful basilica dedicated to the Virgin Mary. In fact, the entire Fête des Lumières is in honor of the Virgin Mary, as she saved Lyon twice from terrible fates – once in the 1500s from the plague, and once in the 1800s from German invaders during the Franco-Prussian War.
On Saturday night we went into the very crowded centre ville to see some of the installations of the Fête des Lumières. The Fête’s theme this year was “Playing with Weather and Time,” so most of the shows/installations dealt with that in some way. One of my favorite installations were at the Hôtel de Ville, where lights shining on the façade produced the effect of the building being subjected to all 4 seasons in rapid succession – it froze, then cracked and fell apart, then there spring raindrops and flowers, then summer heat and fire… It’s kind of hard to explain it, but it was amazing to see! The other installation I really liked was the one at the Cathédrale Saint Jean, where the title was “La Construction de la Cathédrale.” The lights projected onto the façade first showed an architect’s hand sketching the plans, and then we watched it “being built.” All in all, it was just a wonderful festival, and I’m so glad I got to see it!
(You can read a little bit more about it and see some awesome pictures here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/8401011.stm)
Lyon is a beautiful and lively city with a lot going on – it used to produce a lot of silk, so it has some neat covered passageways called traboules that were used to transport the silk between buildings without exposing it to the elements. These same traboules also came in handy for the Résistance during WWII, as they could be used to smuggle people between buildings. On Sunday afternoon we visited the Centre d’Histoire de la Résistance et de la Déportation, an interesting museum dedicated to, oddly enough, the French Resistance during the German occupation of France during WWII and the deportation of Jews from France.
We were all also very glad to see that there was quite a sizeable Christmas Market, so we did a bit of wandering through there and I managed to buy some spices to make vin chaud, I think I’ll use them as a Christmas present!
I’m looking forward to this week and weekend, as I’m going back to the Maison de la Culture (where I saw Cendrillon) on Thursday night to see a show called “Tango Metropolis;” hopefully it’ll be good! Nevers’ Marché de Noël (which sadly only lasts 3 days) is this weekend, so I’m planning on going on both Friday and Sunday afternoons. Even if it’s not very big, it’ll be good to get me in the Christmas spirit! A group of us is going to Orléans for a day trip on Saturday, I’ll let you know how it goes!
I hope all is well with you, à bientôt!
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