Last night I had a lesson from 6-8 which my boss interrupted halfway through to ask if I would be cool with teaching the lesson right afterward from 8-10 because the other teacher wasn't feeling well. I said sure (goodness knows I could use the hours!) and even though I didn't know any of the students, I was just going to use pretty much the same lesson plan because they were around the same level.
It ended up that only two older doods showed up, despite it being an eight person class. And guys, when you get a group of nervous people together to speak a foreign language, they tend to freeze up. It put me in a weird position because the topic wasn't really all that great and it was mostly a discussion based lesson. These two older doods weren't very talkative, I had never met them before and I was sorta unprepared for the situation.
About and hour and twenty minutes in, I decided to throw the lesson plan aside and just have a casual discussion with them, asking them questions about themselves and their interests, correcting their grammar when necessary, and they ended up asking me about where I was from. When I told them Arizona, they lit up -- because they each had not only been to Arizona, but to Tucson. And there's nothing quite like a french person, who is so in love with their own country and culture, language, people, food, history... Telling you how amazing your home is, how beautiful it is and how friendly the people are and lovely and blah blah. I was practically bursting with pride hearing such high praise of my hometown from FRENCH people, who most of the time respond with "ah, air-ee-zohn-ah? wehr ees eet?" or "you must be vehry cohld 'ere een Frrrrance."
Anyways, we talked for nearly fifty minutes about their travels around the southwest and the west coast, from San Francisco to Death Valley and Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon and these two older guys were kind of exactly as I imagine older french men to be: somewhat outdoorsy, very family oriented, successful in their careers but not too concerned with money and even if they were wealthy, they're more interested in simply enjoying life, quite calm and relaxed, and once I got them interested in a topic, they were of course total chatterboxes. I showed them on the giant map other good places to visit on the east coast and told them that if I had my way, I'd visit the pacific northwest without a doubt.
Basically, it was one of those I-can't-believe-I'm-getting-paid-for-this moments (albeit getting paid very little) but still -- plus I get a bonus for picking up a last minute shift. Awesome possum.
xoxo
Friday, January 29, 2010
Friday, January 22, 2010
a dog sandwich. français style.
Recently, I wrote about my foodie ways -- specifically about running home with a warm fresh baguette. I love eating. I really love to eat. My only problem is... I can't cook. I'm awful. And living alone has been a painful realization of that fact.
I have a somewhat, er... "limited" kitchen. In my apartment hunt, I decided that the apartment had to be furnished because I wasn't going to buy all new furniture just to give it away less than a year later. So, le busca apartment is indeed furnished, but very sparsely -- in the kitchen, it had a mini-fridge and two hobs. That was it. On my similarly limited budget, I bought plates, mugs, cups, silverware, a few utensils, a kettle, a pot and a toaster oven that Kyle and I named the trinosaurus after a very amusing retrieval story, which I'll refrain from telling because it's really not that funny except to me. And maybe Kyle too.
So, I've been trying to figure out how to cook. But not how to cook well, just how to cook, y'know, to stay alive and stuff. Mostly my meals consist of some combination of frozen vegetables, potatoes, pasta pasta pasta, cheese, eggs, chorizo, and an obligatory baguette and somehow I put all the elements together and try to make something, er, edible.
I discovered the other day at the Carrefour that you can buy 10 saucisses de Strasbourg for a mere .89¢ -- saucisses de Strasbourg, my friends, are basically hot dogs. And I had a wonderful realization! A little backstory: back in San Diego, my wonderful roommate starting buying veggie soy Smart Dogs from Trader Joe's and she used to nuke them for a few seconds, wrap them in a piece of whole wheat toast and douse them in ketchup (and spicy brown mustard) and I, not having any creative cooking talent, fell in love with the appeal of eating something hot and delicious and quick. Thus, the dog sandwich came about and we loved it. We would come home from our restaurant jobs on Saturday evenings, veg out on the futon (chaise lounge style) with our aprons still on, feet sore from running around all day, watching some crap like The Real Housewives of blah blah blah with a dog sandwich in hand. So. Very. Nice.
Anyways, seeing these saucisses de gloriousness, I came home and created a french version of it -- that is, a dog sandwich in a delicious french baguette. I added some scrambled eggs, sprinkled with some cheese and ketchup and felt a little sad, a little happy, mostly nostalgic. Damn.
I won't make dog sandwiches a new staple, don't worry. Before I left, my mother gave me an old cookbook called Cooking in a Bedsitter which is ancient but amazing and made specifically for use in very small kitchens, like mine. So I don't plan on suffering from malnutrition anytime soon.
Thanks, Sum. I miss your dog sandwiches.
la petite cuisine
So, I've been trying to figure out how to cook. But not how to cook well, just how to cook, y'know, to stay alive and stuff. Mostly my meals consist of some combination of frozen vegetables, potatoes, pasta pasta pasta, cheese, eggs, chorizo, and an obligatory baguette and somehow I put all the elements together and try to make something, er, edible.
I discovered the other day at the Carrefour that you can buy 10 saucisses de Strasbourg for a mere .89¢ -- saucisses de Strasbourg, my friends, are basically hot dogs. And I had a wonderful realization! A little backstory: back in San Diego, my wonderful roommate starting buying veggie soy Smart Dogs from Trader Joe's and she used to nuke them for a few seconds, wrap them in a piece of whole wheat toast and douse them in ketchup (and spicy brown mustard) and I, not having any creative cooking talent, fell in love with the appeal of eating something hot and delicious and quick. Thus, the dog sandwich came about and we loved it. We would come home from our restaurant jobs on Saturday evenings, veg out on the futon (chaise lounge style) with our aprons still on, feet sore from running around all day, watching some crap like The Real Housewives of blah blah blah with a dog sandwich in hand. So. Very. Nice.
Anyways, seeing these saucisses de gloriousness, I came home and created a french version of it -- that is, a dog sandwich in a delicious french baguette. I added some scrambled eggs, sprinkled with some cheese and ketchup and felt a little sad, a little happy, mostly nostalgic. Damn.
I won't make dog sandwiches a new staple, don't worry. Before I left, my mother gave me an old cookbook called Cooking in a Bedsitter which is ancient but amazing and made specifically for use in very small kitchens, like mine. So I don't plan on suffering from malnutrition anytime soon.
Thanks, Sum. I miss your dog sandwiches.
Friday, January 15, 2010
trois jours sans mes affaires
So, I'm back in France and I'm starting my first [real] blog post of 2010! I wrote this long entry a week ago about whether or not I should make resolutions and being in France and blah blah--I even added some funny cat pictures! But in the end I realized the whole thing could pretty much be summed up in one concise thought: I don't want to do resolutions anymore. There, I saved you about eight minutes.
In other news, I arrived on Sunday evening after another nightmare traveling experience. I'm not sure why I seem to be prone to awful travel dilemmas--canceled trains, canceled/delayed flights, sitting next to obese people and/or screaming babies, lost luggage... It's really no wonder I have such terrible travel anxiety now. The night before I travel, I lie in bed, eyes fixed on the ceiling, stomach churning with anxiety. Such experiences make me want to forget this whole adventure and come home and lie in the comfort of my own deliciously warm, pillow-filled bed and never move. Ever. Again.
This time, amongst the delayed, rerouted, and canceled flights, I arrived in Toulouse with no suitcase to follow which was a pickle as I didn't leave much here in the way of warm clothing. So I had to go three days wearing the same jeans and sweatshirt I left in, no computer charger, no good clothes and no make up, but at least I had my books and my ipod to keep me company. I got to teach classes and walk around looking like a complete schmuck for three days which I guess I wouldn't normally mind doing so much back home, but here the caliber for looking good is slightly different. I'll never really get their whole looking-good-all-the-time mentality, but it's crazy to me how so many people can look so good and coordinated in their outfits all the time. Particularly the women--I have older women in my adult classes that dress so freakin good and look stunning for their age. Definitely no Sears mom jeans here, people.
I'm not gonna even mention how cold it is here because I know there are colder places in the world and I don't wanna bitch too much. But remember when I said it rarely snows here? This is what I had to come home to...
Anyways, I guess that's all for now, I'll add some more exciting pictures of Toulouse and France a bit later on, when the sidewalks aren't covered in ice and going outside isn't suicidal.
bisous!
bye bye Tucson!
In other news, I arrived on Sunday evening after another nightmare traveling experience. I'm not sure why I seem to be prone to awful travel dilemmas--canceled trains, canceled/delayed flights, sitting next to obese people and/or screaming babies, lost luggage... It's really no wonder I have such terrible travel anxiety now. The night before I travel, I lie in bed, eyes fixed on the ceiling, stomach churning with anxiety. Such experiences make me want to forget this whole adventure and come home and lie in the comfort of my own deliciously warm, pillow-filled bed and never move. Ever. Again.
This time, amongst the delayed, rerouted, and canceled flights, I arrived in Toulouse with no suitcase to follow which was a pickle as I didn't leave much here in the way of warm clothing. So I had to go three days wearing the same jeans and sweatshirt I left in, no computer charger, no good clothes and no make up, but at least I had my books and my ipod to keep me company. I got to teach classes and walk around looking like a complete schmuck for three days which I guess I wouldn't normally mind doing so much back home, but here the caliber for looking good is slightly different. I'll never really get their whole looking-good-all-the-time mentality, but it's crazy to me how so many people can look so good and coordinated in their outfits all the time. Particularly the women--I have older women in my adult classes that dress so freakin good and look stunning for their age. Definitely no Sears mom jeans here, people.
I'm not gonna even mention how cold it is here because I know there are colder places in the world and I don't wanna bitch too much. But remember when I said it rarely snows here? This is what I had to come home to...
brr
Aye yay. What's up with this weather? Why did I leave the beautiful sunshine for this? OHHH well.
Ok, in news unrelated to France, while I was at home, I got to ride around in my friend Tyler's dad's 1959 Corvette, a car that I've been drooling over since I was eleven when Tyler showed it to me (he lives across the street). Needless to say, it.... Was... LEGEND--wait for it!!!...
....DARY!
WOOHOO!
We just ran some errands for Tyler's mom and it took less than an hour, but it was still pretty uh-may-zing driving around Tucson in the middle of the day on a Friday. I can't believe how many double-takes and thumbs-up we got. I could definitely get used to riding in a car like that. Driving it, on the other hand, no way jose. I did not want to be in any way responsible for it. Plus, it only has three gears. Ancient!
bisous!
Monday, January 4, 2010
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