Val is here

Inside Nemours Castle

I found Val! She is ok. Not having a phone and not having wi fi means trusting even when it seems silly to. Last time I checked in with Val was the day of her departure, a day before she would arrive here. I gave her some instructions of how to get from Paris to Nemours and I told her that I would meet her at the train station in Nemours at 4 or 5. I would check twice, giving her either 2 or 3 hours to arrive here from Paris. Turns out the train comes every 20 minutes during rush hour, so I visited the train station every twenty minutes for 4.5 hours waiting for her. I didn't know what had happened to her. On the last train that I was going to visit before walking the 20 minutes to wi fi, I saw her, waiting on the bench. It was unbelievable...and then her story....also unbelievable. She took the metro in rush hour with 2 suitcases, one with a broken wheel. Then just decided it wasn't worth it and got off, and took a taxi to the train station. Then the ladies at the train station put her on the wrong train by not telling her she had to switch trains half way. Val finally figured out that she was on the wrong train and got off...then took a taxi to Nemours, kinda like taking a taxi from Okotoks to Calgary. But alas she arrived. God took care of her!

Teaching in the 18th century

Recess time on the cement pad

Yesterday was a shock to the system. Courtney and I taught for our first full day. We have to teach Aesop's Fables , 10 stories in 8 teaching days. The teachers have asked us to teach the story moral, which is incredibly difficult with the language barrier, not to mention the school culture. School in France is night and day from school in Canada. We were asked to prepare a worksheet for body parts in English, that's how the children are expected to learn. The children come into class, sit in their little desks in rows and learn curriculum through memorization and work sheets. The children are shushed when they are working on their worksheets. There is no Reggio here, there is no inquiry here. There are blackboards and text books. Its hard to approach the children with the lense of inquiry and then be expected to teach in a typical French way. Its even harder to sit and watch how the children are treated when they misbehave. Some of the teachers publicly yell at the students and ask the other students to wait, and other teachers physically remove the child from their classroom and tell them not to come back until their work is finished. I feel as though childhood is not respected in the same way here as it is in Canada. The image of the French child is unequal to adults. Its hard to experience.

Thrown to the wolves

2 frenchmen on the metro...one with pink glasses and the other with purple and green...how chic

Today we got thrown to the wolves. We walked into our first class assuming we would be observing again, like last Tuesday, but NO! The staff assumed we had prepared a lesson, with no warning, with no materials and no curriculum. It has been an extremely difficult day, first off all, letting each teacher know, that no, in fact we are not prepared, and then trying to communicate all of this in French or simplified English. Two teachers understood that we had nothing planned and asked us to teach anyway. Out of the pot and into the fire. Currently I'm eating handfuls of M&M's to quell the anxiety!

Parisian for the weekend

A little embrace for a little shrub outside les Invalides

les Invalides

Cannons within the walls

Napoleons tomb

les Invalides from the south

Parisian children are lucky beyond belief

Eiffel Tower in the distance

Sacre Coeur

Kissing Oscar Wilde's tomb

Wall full of ash plaques in Pere Lachaise

Catacombs

Dead

View of Paris from first floor of Eiffel Tower

The Eiffel Tower

The end of a crazy weekend in Paris. The girls and I jetted out of Nemours on Friday and walked from corner to corner of Paris. We saw and did so much. Too much almost! At first we went to Napoleon's tomb in Les Invalides. Its a giant war museum with everything from the Ottoman Empire to WW2. Then of course we walked to the Eiffel Tower. It doesn't matter how many times you see it, it's just as magnificent as the time before. But the weather is playing games with us, because it was too cold to go up and the time before the tower was closed due to frost. We made our way back to the hostel and fell asleep nearly the second we walked in the door. The next day we went to Sacre Couer, the most awe inspiring place, God was there, just chilling in the pews, no question about it! Afterwards we made our way to the famous cemetery where Jim Morrison is laid to rest, as well as Oscar Wilde. It was no easy task finding those graves among 100 000 others! Just in case spending a few hours beside graves wasn't enough we went to the Catacombs. We waited in line even though Catacomb staff walked along the line telling us we wouldn't get in because the last entry time was quickly approaching. Lucky for us, we were the last people along with 2 behind us! We walked past bones from 6 million people...how do you think about? Oh! This skull was from someones mom and this skull was from someone else;s best friend. It was eerie, but at least the bones are honoured....by most. When we walked out, a security guard was confiscating stolen bones! Why would someone take someones bones? Modern day grave robbers. Shame on you. Once that was done we sprinted back to the Eiffel Tower to get sunset photos of it. I had a minor panic attack in between floor one and floor two. So I was unable to summit the tower, but the girls were dolls and took my camera with them. Then back home and insta-sleep. This morning we got up and made our way to Notre Dame for mass. It was weird sitting in the pews, listening to the priest thinking that for some people the most famous church is someones home church. Some lucky Catholics call that grandiose, magnificent structure home on Sunday's...crazy! I'm tired of touring and it's time to go back *home* to Nemours.