It's been a fairly busy week again :) And yes, I'm coming home again on Friday and I am very muchly excited - I really need to go home again! Plus, I get to see Paul (obviously! :p) and I'm going to visit Manchester to see my friends there.
Ok, so this last week or so. Got paid on Tuesday - so that was good. Friday we (Dana and I) decided to go swimming. It was chucking it down but we needed to go buy swimsuits out at the back end of nowhere. So we got wet. And then went swimming - still wet! Swimming was very good if quite tiring since my level of fitness is appalling. I think I got a good 13-15 lengths in though, so not too bad...:s
Saturday we went to another back end of nowhere on the other side of Chartres. A place called Barjouville because Dana needed something and I needed a cheap dishrack (obviously). It was basically kind of a like an outlet 'mall' crossed with Nursling Industrial Estate or West Quay Retail park - lots of big shops; houseware, clothes, kitchen/bathroom construction, and, randomly a Buffalo Grill. We wandered around a bit because for some unknown reason (oh, no, wait, we're in France...-_-) the shop we wanted was closed for lunch. France has not heard of shift working, apparently. Or staggered lunch breaks. Decided it would be 'fun' to walk across muddy grass, jump over a ditch and run through motorway traffic to spot the Cathedral across some meadows. I ruined my shoes :(. And muddied my trousers. Dana ruined her knee. So, yes, Fun.
Headed for shoe shop to replace said ruined shoes. Got a nice pair :)
Sunday was the first Sunday of the month and sunny, thus we (again, me and Dana :)) climbed the Cathedral Tower. It was steep, narrow and dizzisome. And it hurt my knee. But great views.
And onto School. I haven't spoken about school for a while, and since that's technically what I'm here to do, I probably should.
I. LOVE. IT.
Yep :) The kids can be noisy and uncooperative, but the nice ones make up for it and I still have a deep longing to be teaching my own class. I've done a few lessons on my own now, and I do find it quite hard. But I think this is due to two reasons: 1. It's usually decided on the spur of the moment that I'll be doing the lesson so I don't have time to plan it through properly - and you know me - I like every detail planned :) and two, the big one: 2. I'm teaching in a language I'm not completely fluent in - do you have any idea how hard it is to explain stuff to kids who don't quite understand that you can't speak their language and can't accommodate for you, plus, coupled with lack of organisation (so I haven't had time to plan what I need to say), it's very difficult. However, it's still fun, and I love helping them out, and by the 3rd explanation of a task, they usually have understood me and my French has improved enormously at each repetition! I pretty much only take the CE2s on my own (8-9) as they are less intimidating (yes, 11 year olds are intimidating!) and that's the age range I want to teach anyway.
I think that's about tout so much love and I'll see a lot of you very soon :)
Nielle xxx
