This morning I played the clown for my colleague, acting the parts of the older members of last night's trip to the exposition. Even if I say it myself, I'm a hoot, though I imagine that no small part of that is down to my accent. Foolishness over with, I went to greet my supervisor and find out what I'd missed yesterday evening.
Yesterday evening I missed a meeting for those volunteering with the huge careers day/forum event happening at the university. This will be its 7th iteration, and no drill sergeant in Her Majesty's Armed Forces has been so fiercely punctual of timekeeping as the event's organiser. She has given me the role of bad cop, with the responsibility of going around the rooms and essentially cutting people off when it's time for lunch. People who refuse to leave will be locked in their rooms and will have no lunch and, having already spoken about lunches here in France, you can understand why that would be seen as a Bad Thing.
The rest of my day passed uneventfully; the last few stragglers are signing up for tests, I have a brief translation to complete for "whenever" (Oh, how I love vague deadlines, how I adore them, how pleasing it is to be suddenly told 'I need that translation now') and, of course, hanging in the horizon like a star is my interview for -
I want to tell you all who the interview is with. I really do, because it's exciting and if I get it then I think it will realistically change the whole direction of my career and life. And this blog has readers who, despite the inanity of my life, keep coming back, and I should dearly like to reward those good and patient people with something exciting.
I assure you this sudden dip into seriousness will be temporary, but for the moment do bear with me.
Taken from
http://www.docnews.fr/data/classes/actualite/actu_7844_vignette.jpg
So: I have an interview with Agence ELAN, a French PR firm which opened an office in London in 2011. They've directed PR for companies like Moët Chandon, L'Oréal, and Eurostar. They are the essence of where I want to be; fast moving, European - my immediate supervisor will speak three languages fluently and has three degrees - and working with a broad range of clients. This would only be an internship, of course, but even the first inch of a toe in the door is sufficient for me.
Okay. So that's happening on Thursday and I'm fizzing with excitement, but I'll try to bottle it for the moment. I shall likely pop a little on Friday, but I will do my best to keep it off your lovely clothes.
I rounded the day off with a French film, which was incredibly good fun. L'Arnacoeur is formulaic and even features a frame-by-frame reproduction of the dance sequence from Dirty Dancing -
You know which one. Don't make me -
I hope you're satisfied.
But it still had some great, laugh out loud moments, and I'd recommend it to most anyone, although it does see this poor guy get stood up by the girl he adores.
Aw.
Unfortunately this isn't the first time this has happened. See also: Love Actually
Awww.
That's a hell of a thing to be typecast as, isn't it. The guy who gets his heart broken.
What a blog. And it's only Tuesday. Here's to the rest of the week.
So: I didn't write anything yesterday. I got an awful lot of flack for not writing anything yesterday. I'm gratified that I have such eager readers, and I enjoy writing more than anything, but please realise that I'm only human and sometimes I need a night off.
Last night was that night off, but let's start in the morning. The morning started badly; my colleague was somewhere between an hour and an hour and a half late and, since I have no key to the upstairs office, I instead went downstairs and continued to record the DVDs we have. Four hours of that later and I was just about ready to end it all, my very will to live reduced by the illogical way the pile of DVDs appeared to get no smaller. I seemed to be stuck in a parallel universe.
Lunchtime came and went, and that was just about the highlight of my day - a Portuguese student of startling vivacity and a regular in my little mediatheque came in at the same time as me and so we ate together. She speaks Portuguese, of course, as well as excellent English and is attacking her ignorance in French with vigour. She was curious about where I'd come from and what I did, and I likewise was curious about her - I see students so rarely and they all have such interesting stories. Nearly everyone does.
After lunch I lent her La Fille sur le Pont, a black and white French comedy/romance/drama that I really enjoyed. The copy we have is not subtitled so it may be a struggle, but I think she'll profit from it. If you've not seen then I'd highly recommend it. The trailer is just about the most wonderfully...French piece of film I think I've ever seen, and although the quality is abysmal, I hope you'll get a sense of it from the clip below.
If not, imdb has a great quality copy (that I can't stick in my blog) over here, although the voiceover adds a dimension of reality to the whole thing which is somehow disappointing.
The afternoon was given over to more of the same and I left feeling utterly drained and itching for a drink. The drink was to come, but first I had my two new students, who are 12 and 15 and shall be known as C and B. Teaching anything from basics is very difficult, but language more so - I learnt English through assimilation, and so I have a sense of what "feels" right. Going back to the start and trying to explain the tenses is difficult, and I almost wish we'd been taught the rules in school. In any case, it was a success, as it relied on me being able to explain in French, so I taught pretty much 50-50 French and English. All was understood and some small amount of progress has been made, and that makes me feel warm and fuzzy, like a blow-dried panda bear.
B, on the other hand, has a good level of English, so I've set him a writing task to see if his written measures up to his spoken. We talked a lot about past tense, and that seems solid, though as with many French students he wants to say have where we use be, in examples like j'ai quinze ans - I am fifteen (years old).
A minor blip, though, in an otherwise strong ability. I'm really excited about these kids; new challenges and new things to be taught.
And after? I headed into town for a games night. This was my night off; spent in the company of international people, with tapas on one side, pastis on the other and the whole gamut of humanity before me. People were playing go, from China, abalone from France, chess - which has taken a roundabout route from India, where it was called chaturanga in Sanskrit - and poker, which may have come from Germany or France but took off in the States.
It was a really fantastic evening, and I'm already looking for ward to the next one.
Today has been my normal weekend student, A, with whom I'm exploring problems requiring linear functions to solve. Nothing too complex, but again I'm having difficulties in slowing him down. He answers the question before reading it, and it's causing no small amount of headaches. Does anyone have any advice on how to encourage students to slow down and consider their work more carefully? Comment below and I'll be eternally grateful.
For the rest of the afternoon I'm scaling Mount Dishes, another physics-defying construction which can never quite be utterly conquered. I've thrown together a stew too, which bubbles merrily behind me. I've crunchy, still-warm French bread to go with it, though I confess I'm starving myself for dinner and it's looking more and more likely I'll need to go back to the shops before long. The smell is intense.
Finally, and most importantly, my baby sister is 18 today. If 200 people say happy birthday to her, then something amazing will happen. She's on twitter. Go forth and wish her happiness.
I got an internal memo today in the internal post. Some of my readers, including the four Russians (Zdravstvujtye, by the way, and welcome) probably get internal mail all the time. Their desks are veritable mountains of internal memos and notes. But my desk isn't. I've never had an internal memo because I've never worked anywhere big enough for there to be a need for internal post. If something needed to be widely circulated, all twenty of us would be told on-shift. Easy.
But I got an internal memo, and the subject thereof was the many holidays that are coming up. My favourite has to be Ascension, the day commemorating Jeshua-Bar-Joseph's return to Heaven. If you believe that to be true, then you may well spend the day in church, but since the French believe in committing to holidays, I am looking at a five-day weekend in May. I'm seriously excited by this prospect and so I would be indebted to you if you could recommend places in Europe to spend my days. I may even try to find somewhere with a church, because although I am not a believer, the love and care that has been put into - and continues to be lavished upon - cathedrals and their like is worth seeing.
It occurred to me suddenly that I had left a riddle without an answer over the weekend, and I can only apologise. The riddle was Black pool, and it turns out that Blackpool, England is etymologically twinned with the town of Dubhlinn or in English: Dublin, in the Republic of Ireland.
Today's question (these seem to be turning into QI questions) is as follows: Santa has 9 reindeer. But why has nobody ever seen Donner?
In brief, today I finished stamping envelopes and typing up handwritten evaluation notes. I am always surprised when anyone hopes to get useful data from named evaluations, especially when the writers are less powerful than those who will receive them. There is always a worry that the writer will be pulled over hot coals or invited for an interview without coffee, which might be worse.
My English-teaching colleague is back today, and my French-teaching colleague on Wednesday, so with any luck I might be teaching and learning again before long. A brilliant reason to teach came from my Monday student today who, incredibly sweetly, has bought me a French film as a Christmas present. It's called Bienvenue Chez les Ch'tis and is, by all accounts, the funniest French film in the history of the world. I absolutely cannot wait to watch it, but I have to get an early night, as I have a morning meeting tomorrow.
Again, I know there will be rolling of eyes as veterans of the morning meeting read this but again, I say, this is new to me. I have worked in bars for most of my career; the earliest meeting we ever had was 3pm. The prospect of coffee and croissants while discussing a project in French with a co-worker is really very exciting, and no amount of eyeball-rolling will make me think otherwise.
So: a morning meeting, an early start (which means an early finish), an opportunity to put on a recipe for pork and sweet potato stew that I got from my Aunt and a fantastic French film to watch as it cooks.
