Jaime ma vie francaise

I think it’s about time I explain the title of my blog to the non-French speakers out there. Jaime ma vie francaise has two meanings in French. “Ma vie francaise” translates to “my French life.” So the first meaning of my title is simply “Jaime: My French life,” a pretty basic description. However, my first name, when written with an apostrophe “J’aime”, means “I love” in French. Using this meaning, my title is “I love my French life," which I find much more appropriate.

I absolutely love my French life. The past two weeks I have really settled into Lyon. I constantly meet new people from all over the world. Two different maps are always in my purse. I discover a new part of this huge city everyday. But even in a city of millions, I accidentally run into friends around town. In my neighborhood, the waitress at the café recognizes me. I can sometimes even give directions.

Erin and I at a café after running into each other in town

I would be lying if I pretended everything has gone perfectly. For the first time in my life, I am not a student. I’m starting my post-graduate life in another country, which adds another layer of difficulty to an already tough transition. Frustrations undoubtedly lead to bouts of homesickness. Looking back I know I experienced homesickness when studying abroad in Angers. But back then I was so incredibly busy with classes and homework, I did not have time to realize I was homesick. Here, I only started working this past week, leaving me a lot more time to be homesick. Not to worry though, the spells of homesickness end quickly when I go out for a nutella crepe with my wonderful roommates or a café crème with a friend.

I should have started teaching on October 1st. In typical slow-paced French fashion, I actually started teaching this past Monday, approximately two and a half weeks later. I’ll tell you about my first week of teaching later, but for now here are some highlights of my couple weeks of paid vacation.

Besides lots of errands with my roommates, many afternoons spent lounging in cafés or parks, and evening drinks (apéros in French) at English pubs or friend’s apartments, I have also spent time being a tourist. One Wednesday afternoon I planned with a group of other assistants to visit a museum. Our first attempt, the World War II Resistance museum, was closed…due to a strike. How French. After stopping at a café (of course) and watching a movie being filmed on the square in front of city hall, we tried again and went to the Musée des Beaux Arts (art museum). The museum is built inside an old church/monastery and features art and artifacts from ancient Egyptian up to the modern works of Picasso. Although a few rooms were closed, because of the museum workers strike (seriously, I kid not), I had a great afternoon.

Courtyard at the art museum

Two Saturdays ago the Hôtel de Ville (city hall) building was open for visitors. It is only open one day a year, so I certainly did not miss the chance to tour the beautiful building constructed in the mid-1600s with some assistant friends.

Me at the City Hall


The whole group at City Hall, with the Opera Building behind us

Inside we found an interesting mix of ballrooms decorated in the style of the Second Empire of France, a modernly decorated mayor’s office, and practical conference rooms.

A Second Empire Ballroom


The out of place decor in the Mayor's office

In one room of the building, entertainment groups and venues from around the city set up booths to promote their events. I took home a huge bag (about as heavy as a small child) full of information. Included in this was a coupon to attend a performance of a play written by Emile Zola (the namesake of the street I live on here and a famous French author) that same night. With an offer to get tickets for 8 Euro instead of 35, my friends and I decided pourquoi pas (Why not?). We ended up getting front row seats! I really enjoyed the play and was pleasantly surprised to discover that I understood almost everything they said. I guess my year in Angers really did pay off for my French!

The following Sunday after church a couple friends and I went to a “salon,” meaning an exhibition of traditional food and wine from the area. With free tickets my friend Erin’s teacher had given her, we were lucky enough to spend the afternoon tasting cheese, wine, frog legs, wine, meats, wine, sauces, wine, desserts, and…did I mention wine? All for free. Needless to say we had a great time and even took some delicious treats home.

Friday before I went to the city hall I actually did kind of work. The school district had an orientation meeting for all the English assistants in the city that I attended for much of the day. Although the district employees were generally unhelpful, I got some helpful ideas to use in the classroom in the afternoon session. Even better though, I met tons more English assistants in the area (there are about 60ish in total). After the meeting, I went off to a café with new friends I had met that day. Some of these new friends were a married couple, both English assistants, who very kindly ended up inviting me and another assistant over for a delicious home-cooked meal (much better than my sorry attempts at cooking). We spent the night dreaming about vacation plans for the rest of the year. I finished the long day with drinks at a Scottish pub, a popular ex-pat hangout in Lyon. The place was packed, both with locals and other assistants I had met that day, many of which were British. I had an enjoyable night, especially when the live band played an amazing Britney cover.

Now that I’ve caught up to this past weekend, I’ll stop here. But be prepared for a post tomorrow about the most random and surreal, yet awesome night of my time here so far. Oh, and I may talk about my job a bit…

L'auberge espagnole: Part Deux

L’auberge espagnole (The Spanish Hostel) is a film I watched my senior year of high school for a French class project. It’s about Xavier, a French college student who spends a year studying abroad in Spain with the Erasmus program. After a horrendously difficult apartment search (which many of my fellow teaching assistants are now suffering through, sorry!), Xavier ends up living in a flat with 6 other Erasmus students from all over Europe. The movie follows the roommates’ adventures living in a foreign country, learning a new language, and trying to understand each other and their cultures.

In high school, I remember thinking I would love to live in an international apartment like Xavier. Now, I actually am. In the apartment provided by my school, I am living with the school’s German and Arabic teaching assistants. The German assistant, Ramona, is from Austria and the Arabic assistant, Aya, comes from Palestine. The last time I posted, I only had one roommate, Ramona. Wednesday night, when Ramona and I returned from a day of being tourists and exploring Lyon, we opened the door to find “surprise!” (again), we had a new roommate, Aya, who had been alone in our apartment all day wondering if she actually had other roommates! Plus, we will eventually be getting one more roommate, although right now it’s all up in the air as to whether our fourth and final roommate will be from Spain, the UK, or another Palestinian. We just have to wait and see. I imagine we’ll probably come home again one night to find the fourth room occupied.

Most of my past week has been spent getting to know my new roommates. Although we unfortunately don’t have a common room or living room in our apartment, we’ve become completely comfortable hanging out in each others’ rooms. Just like in the film, we try to speak mostly French (emphasis on try), but we really end up speaking a mixture of French and English (which they both speak fluently, better than their French actually, putting me to shame as a speaker of only two languages) with frequent games of charades thrown in to help us understand each other. Sometimes we even use pictures. Regardless of the language barriers, we’ve been having a great time, or at least I have!

We come from three different, basically polar opposite backgrounds, but we all bond over shared experiences getting started here in Lyon. I really appreciate having two people who come with me to the bank or the grocery store. On their first days here, I got to play tour guide a bit since I had been living here for a few days already. But now we help each other find the nearest laundromat or understand our cell phone plans. We complain together about complicated French bureaucracy and laugh together when we enter and exit the metro three times before finding where we want to go.

The three of us have also come to Lyon with different friends, some from home and some we’ve just met through our programs, but we always take each other along to get togethers with friends around town. So our little international circle of friends in Lyon just keeps getting bigger! On Friday night last week, there was a massive get together of all the teaching assistants in Lyon, from every language. In all, I think there was about 50-60 people there! I had a great time meeting people from literally all over the world, (England, Russia, Germany, Canada, New Zealand and more!) , as we spent the night mingling on the terrace of a café located in the shadow of the beautiful Cathedral St. Jean.

Cathedral St. Jean

Besides other meet-ups with friends I met on Friday night, I’ve also been making French friends. A friend, Spencer, who I met in the US through Liz and Korey (my best friend from Pittsburgh and her husband) actually is dating a Lyon resident, Harmony. Harmony and I met up for a typical French afternoon at a café on Friday, spending hours chatting in the sunlight. Then Saturday she brought me along to an afternoon BBQ with her university friends. It was great fun seeing what a French BBQ is like. They call it a BBQ because they grill hotdogs on a mini charcoal grill, put them on ripped off pieces of baguette, and eat them with spicy mustard spread. I must say, they were better than most American hot dogs in my book. I also had another great day getting to know some native Lyonnais.

All together, my week was spent meeting new friends at cafés and restaurants, running errands around town, and not working. I did accomplish some important steps in getting settled here. I got a cell phone, filled out paperwork, did major grocery shopping, and reopened my French bank account (which I found out had 121 Euros in it I didn’t know about!). What I have not been doing is working. I am basically on a paid vacation right now. Even though I was supposed to have started on Thursday, the teacher in charge of my schedule at my school hasn’t made it yet. He told me not to worry about working or observing any classes until I get my schedule. When that will be? TBD. Until that happens, I love getting acquainted with international friends and the city of Lyon.

A view of Lyon from a top its highest hill

New link for Paris pictures

It has come to my attention that the website I used for my Paris pictures (for the non-Facebook users) required you to sign up to see the pictures, which was not my intention. I've changed the pictures over to a new site that you should not have to register for to see my pictures. If it doesn't work again, please let me know!

Paris Pictures: Try Two!