Le premiere jour d’école

Lundi: 2 fevrier
J’ai reveillé á 7h00, j’ai mangé petit dejeuner. C’était deux crêpes, un jus d’orange, et un chocolat chaud. C’était très delicieux. Ma mère française conduit mon frère français (Thomas) et moi á la station de train. Nous avons voyagé en train á l’école. D’accord, that’s enough français maintenant. The classes I had today were “Accompagnement” (8h30 - 9h30), “Mathematiques” (9h30 - 10h30), “Sciences Economiques” (10h30 - 11h30), “Francais” (11h30 - 13h00), dejeuner (13h00 - 14h00), “Sciences Physiques” and “Sciences Vie et Terre” (14h00 - 17h00). During most of the first class I was getting a tour of the school, which is a very big school. I guess there’s about 3-4000 students, but they’re of all ages. It was bizarre to see little kids in the hall walking around with all the high school aged kids, especially when they’re all dressed too. Oh yeah, everyone dresses like 5 notches higher on the fancy scale in France than people in the US, even the little kids. However, we’re not supposed to wear ties. I’m not entirely sure why not, but my host mom explained that it’s a major faux pas. Math wasn’t bad, because numbers are numbers, however they write a lot more for each problem, as in each problem not only do you have to find the answer you have to write up to a paragraph about how and why that’s the right answer. Sounds intense, right? Well, my homework was p60, # 113b, 115b. They were both solving inequalities. Someone still in math can verify this, a homework assignment of two inequalities (we didn’t even have to graph them) is so small in comparison to our average 10, 15, maybe 20 problem assignments. But I suppose the French stay in school for two and a half additional hours. I’m just going to settle on “It’s about the same” because my school starts a half hour later than school in US and lunch is a half hour longer here. Economiques was very hard, I really didn’t understand anything. They kept asking me questions: What I thought about Obama, what I thought about the recession, how Boeing was doing, things like that. In English, I feel that I am relatively equipped with handling such questions, and BSing whatever I don’t know. Not in French. Ne pas en français. Le classe de français was about théâtre classique, et je comprende (I know how to say the word for about, but I haven’t the slightest how to spell it) about half of it. I know many theatre terms, so that came in handy. Dejeuner: oh mon dieux, il y a beaucoup, beaucoup des gens á mon école. (Fun fact: when you say “mon école” quickly, it sounds like “monocle.” I have a little giggle every now and then). With 3000 students, the school is about twice as big as mon école dans les états unis. I had… oh what did I have…I had food. I can’t believe I forgot. I ate with Thomas but partway through lunch he had to go talk to a teacher about something (side note: the teachers are generally nice, helpful, friendly, and occasionally funny. They acknowledge students in the hall, and answer questions before and after class. I say this because I was told many times over that most teachers won’t give you the time of day, they march in, give a lecture, then leave. That’s really not the case at all, even the principal is helpful and friendly), so he left me with some of his friends (Éric, Noäh, and others) and I was supposed to wait there with them until he came back. Well, they hadn’t eaten yet so they were like, “Come on, you can chill with us while we eat” but not really because it was in French, so I did that. Then we went back and they tried to teach me how to play Magic: The Gathering. A generally short story even shorter: I didn’t learn, maybe from lack of trying. Physiques was not physics, but chemistry, and I understand chemistry, so I had fun, especially because we got to build molecules with the little model sets and I’m really good at that. I actually got to help Thomas, and that made me feel less like a stray puppy following him around all the time. However it didn’t help that I had a nosebleed in that class (Oh, je suis malade, j’ai une rhume, et quand j’ai une rhume mon nez saigne souvent - I have a cold, and when I have a cold my nose bleeds frequently. Yes, I’m using the Neosporin, mom) (another side note, I like telling gruesome bloody nose stories - the first night here I woke up in the middle of the night, and I could feel that my nose had just started bleeding. I tried to make sure to guide the runoff so that I didn’t stain these new pillows, but as a result I ended up having to desperately wipe away the blood that had pooled over my left eyelid. I had to act quickly, you see, because once it dries I can’t open that eye until I scrub and wash it. I managed to keep my bedding clean, as well as make it to the bathroom without anyone noticing my bloodied face. Did I successfully gross everyone out?) Wow, this is lasting really long. Where was I? Okay, Les sciences de vie et terre, or biology and geology. I almost fell asleep. As I believe I said before, the afternoon (about 3, ou 15h00) is when jetlag (I think) hits me like a, well, a jet. This particular class was about reproduction as far as I could tell. I recognized the word “blastula” and the other terms that I’ve forgotten at this point because I never liked bio. There didn’t appear to be any “terre” this time, which is strange to think about because the class was about 2 hours long. The way it works, the reason I put it in the same time slot as physiques, is because it’s supposed to go physiques, then vie et terre, then physiques again, then finalement vie et terre, at least that’s what it says on the schedule. Then the way home: Thomas et moi walked a block to the train station, rode a train for a while, got off, walked a block to check a bus - oh, did I say walk? I meant sprint because we were about to miss it - then rode that bus for a while, got off, then sprinted to catch the next bus, which we missed. So we walked home, it only took about 20 minutes though so it wasn’t that bad. And all that running made the snow negligible. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, my first night there it snowed. It was pretty much melted by afternoon though. Though generally sunny, the temperature has been flirting with 0°, bouncing on either side throughout the day. Mais, c’est la même á Bellingham. So, school: I got made fun of a little, but it was funny and I didn’t really care. Way home: I would get lost if I had to do it by myself. Home: watched Naruto and South Park en français et c’est très bizarre mais assez drôle aussi. Played a little Smash Bros Brawl, Thomas pwns as Kirby…puts me to shame…fait mes devoirs des Mathematiques, et j’ai mangé at like 21h30 or something. It was fish eggs in bread or something. I think it was fried. It was good. There was a bunch of other stuff too. Dinner always includes: appetizer, first course, bread, second course, desert. (Desert is usually pudding or yogurt or the like). Then I slept. Oh, how I slept. And the rest will be saved for Tuesday.
Á demain, mes amis!

Taylor en France