Home at last...

Didnt think I could feel so relieved coming home to La Chatre, but I did! It was a long GREAT 2 weeks that started in London! I headed out here, spent a night in the city at Caitlins and then met up with Lucy to fly out from Poitiers. Found a place with the worst hot chocolate ever there. I finally met up with Luke and his friends around 9pm on the 11th at a restaurant after a long tiring travel day. I hate travel days, though it is part of the adventure. It was a pretty relaxing stay in London got to see some sights, though I had already been to London I had never seen the changing of the guards so I got to do that. I met up with Lucy one day and did a little walking around town. It was nice to be in an english speaking country and great to see Luke again.
From London I headed to Turin Italy to meet up with Ashlie and Hayley for a little Olympic Game fun. Fun is for sure! Fun is definitely what happened there! I got there the night of the 15th and met up with the girls, Vincenzo our couchsurfing host and his friend. We dropped my bags off at his work so we could go for a little tour of the city as well as sit down and have a drink. It was a nice relaxed evening. Vincenzo had bought us each a 1-day transport ticket which was really sweet of him. His apartement was nice as was the fresh sqeezed orange juice the next morning. We all headed to our next couchsurfers house that morning to drop of our stuff and Ashlie and I went out for a little city tour. There were so many people out and about there it was great. We stopped at a couple bars on the way to the bus stop to have a couple drinks before the game. We made our way home, put tatoos on painted our faces and headed to the game. Canada VS Germany! We finally made it to the game! We were in the 7th row behind the net and the funny thing was that 2 seats over were the canadians Ashlie and I had met on the tram earlier that day. It was unbelievable how many people were there, how many Canadians were there supporting! It was definitely a great experience, one of those that stories will never be enough to explain how amazing it really was. Here is my advice to people: "Never take the extra tube of face paint with you if you plan on having a drink or two....you'll end up all red...including your clothes". After the game we ended up in the beer tent, which we didnt know existed until we got there. So many Canadians so much red and white! Ron MeLean was at the game as well as Kelly (cant remember his last name) and I got them to sign my Canada Flag! Random moment of the night: running into someone you know....that's right, Brandon from Laurier. Ashlie and I had climbed up on the blocks to dance to the music and soon as I got up there and looked out in the crowd, I saw a familiar face! From the beer tent we went to a bar. It was a lot of fun, met a lot of fun crazy people throughout the night. It was so much fun until about 4am or so when I realized my wallet was gone. That was not fun, and thanks to a wonderful Canadian and a great American I got help cancelling my cards. It was quite the adventure with a cold ending seeing as we didnt wear our coats to the game (silly us).
Well, because of the wallet I made us miss our 8 am train and were not able to leave tilll the next morning at 8am. Hayley and I ended up getting our money back which was the best news of the trip by far. We took it really easy our day stuck in Turin and then headed to Annecy to do some skiing in the alps.
We got to Annecy with a few hours to spare before Guillaume was going to meet us. We hit up the laundry mat and got some food. Guillaume was super friendly and welcoming at his place about 45minutes from the city and about 20 from the ski hill where he works. We ended up spending 5 nights at his place and spent 4 amazing days skiing in the Alps. I had waiting to do that, and so glad I did. It was like heaven skiing there. The scenery was just amazing! We had some good wipe outs skiing, the all time best was when I bailed looked up to see where Hayley was and saw her bail, ski came off as well as the boot. The inside sock part was still on her foot though. It was quite funny to see ski and boot 10metres away from her sticking out of the snow. I had to ski down to get help because neither of us could get her boot back together. I have never seen so many one piece ski suits in my life. EVERYONE had them! Ok, not everybody but a good number of people. The all time best were the yellow ones and each time we saw one of those we yelled out "BANANA" because that is what they looked like. It was quite an amazing adventure. We were at the hills by 845 every day and skiied till around 5 then had some "vin chaud". Great experience and stayed with a great host!
From there I eventually made it to Paris after some frusterating money issues. I met up with Sabine and Florien for a couple days. Nice to see her after 3 years! Did a little tour of some things in Paris and saw a little play at a small theatre. I then went to Brunos to stay with him for a night and go to the Couch Surfing meeting. Oh was that fun! Met some more great people that is for sure! Had a nice debate about Canada and Quebec with a Quebecer. Cant wait till the meeting in March. Lets leave it at this: It was one definitely AMAZING holiday!!!!! Nothing can change that!

On my way out....

Well, it's that time again! It's time for the holidays! I am headed to the city in an hour pretty much all packed up and then tomorrow to Poitiers to catch a plane to LONDON! I'll be staying there for 4 days with a friend before heading to TURIN, ITALY for the Olympics! Going to see a hockey game with a couple other Canadian assistants! Its going to be a blast! From there I will be headed back to the french side and go skiing in the Alps, which will no doubt be amazing! I am soooo excited for this holiday. Dont have much time to report in, though I should leave a word about last night.
Last night there was a party/dance for the 'internes' aka the students who board during the week. I wasnt planning on going, but when I was on the pay phone kids would walk by me to go to the toilets and telling me I should go in. I got off the phone and was about to go in, but they happened to be playin slow song so I waited a few, cause I feared Jonathon. I made it in and hung out with the 'surveillants' aka res people. Some of the girls kept harrassing me to dance, after refusing multiple times, I finally gave in and busted a move on the dance floor. I was really itching to do it, but seeing as they are my students and the res ppl were around I didnt think it was a good idea. The res ppl got a kick out of it and even took pictures! haha! Anyway, it was a fun evening for the most part. Glad I want to see what it was like. Very similar to our 'highschool dances' though only for the kids that stay at the school.
Well, I better get going here, clock is counting down. Need to do last minute packing and whatnot! May or may not post while away, more likely on the NOT side, but oh well, take care everyone and bonnes vacances!

Pics of Pancake day

Pancakes&Maple syrup....some kids in my class

One week till holidays...well needed

Ok, so I havent posted in awhile, over a week actually. I have been keeping busy and trying not to be just hanging around the school too much this week due to some of the happenings of Monday. So Monday night is movie night with the boarding kids. I go every week usually because it gets me out of the school and my room and I get to see a movie for only 1.50€ which is really cheap (about 2.15CAD). This past week was a big one because it was being shown in VO(original version). So we saw, Mrs Henderson Presents. I was not going to write about this on here because you never really know who is going to stumble upon this and I am not sure how I would feel if some certain people managed to find their way on here. Anyway, friday just made me a little more angry so I decided I am going to post it anyway. So off we went to the movies...Jonathon starts talking to me on the walk there....Ugh! I tried to not talk to him, but he is persistant. Finally movie! On the walk home I managed to not walk with the guy, Yeah me! So I talked with Jéremy on the walk home briefly and he told me that Jonathon seems to really like me, even tries calling me, which he sure as hell does NOT have my right number which I am VERY happy about. Back at the school again, before the guys went upstairs to their rooms they all said goodbye to the girls and he waited to do the kisses. F**K (I have used that word a lot this week...sorry). There were 2 girls that saw this, two girls that I know fairly well and the "responsable" - woman in charge. So the girls laughed at me a little and made comments on the dude hitting on me. Then they went their way and I was going to the internet room so I went in the same direction as the responsable. She decided to say something to me about the kid. She said that he is a problematic student and that I should be careful. She also told me that he is a minor and so his parents could have some concerns. She told me that if I dont tell him now that he may get some ideas in his head which we all know I DONT WANT! She also said to me after saying that tell him you are just friends, or if not that we have to keep it outside of the school. I told her that I have NO intentions whatsoever on being with this kid, though I dont think I said it convincingly enough because I get this feeling she thinks I want to be with this kid....NO I dont! From the moment he started talking to me the first week at the movies something about him really bothered me. I have felt a little shitty about all this so I headed out of town for a couple days to visit friends. Tuesday night I went to Chateauroux (aka Chateautrou) to Caitlins, then headed to Rosys for some Desperate Housewives. Her boyfriend is sending the episodes to her which is wonderful, so she invited us over. Yes, we watched episodes 1 & 2 and are waiting on the suite. Wednesday we headed to the zoo which was quite fun. This is for all you north americans, but you should have seen the best animal they had....**note sarcasm**....they had raccoons. Haha!! I thought that was quite funny. I came back Thursday and one of the students, Sarah, of the 2 girls that saw the situation with Jonathon, saw me and made a comment. Ugh...I was annoyed and told her to shut up. Ok, so friday...I was on my way to class when I saw the kid...I tried to walk past but it didnt work that way and the kisses were done. Sarah started laughing at me. Then I told her to be quiet and then she said she was going to tell him he cant do the kisses with me. That she did and from what she said he did not take it that well. Anyway, then in class instead of doing her work, the other girl that was there Monday night, Julie starts drawing on the board. Then she decides to write "Jonathon" on the board. I was so unimpressed. Of course the other kids start being curious and I think she knew I was not happy. So later that day(end of the school day) I met up with Sophal. I had to grab something from my room to give to one of the teachers so I took her up and showed her my room and we had a snack. After, we went back downstairs, and it was parent teacher day, and the students go with the parents to see the teachers. Of course, in my hall way there has to be Jonathon, he said hello and Sophal and I continued walking with me cursing. This kid just frusterates me. Friday night I didnt get upto too much, just relaxed. Saturday night I went to Issoudun for dinner and to see Brokeback Mountain with some friends/teachers. It was a fun girls night! Other than that, not much has been going on here. One week till the holidays, 5 days = 3 days of class = 7 hours. After the holidays I will be changing some of my classes, or atleast that is the plan, and it will be finalized tomorrow. If all goes well, for 4 weeks in the month of March I will not have Friday classes. 2 of them are hopefully being changed till Monday afternoons and the other one, the students have there "BEP blanc" which is a practice for thier final exams at the end of the year and then they have "stage" (co-op i guess) for 3 weeks. Sweeet....long weekends for Erin. And, if some of my Thursday classes get cancelled....I would only work 2 days a week. I lead a difficult life!!!