I See London, I See France

Hello, everyone!

This update is coming to you from Rochester, from my own personal room (teacher's perks!) in a perfectly-typical English home. I was lucky enough to be invited on my lycée's six-day trip to London, and I have already had so much fun, and seen so many iconic places and buildings, that I would be happy going home tomorrow.  But guess what! I don't have to!! I get to see more! Yippee!!

I have no pictures, and I'm so tired that I'm not sure I could form cohesive thoughts to update you on everything we've done, but I wanted to let you all know I'm alive and well!  More than anything, I'm loving the time to get to know my colleagues and my students.  I have been so blessed to be surrounded by so many incredible people, and I love every awkward, somewhere-in-between-French-and-English moment that I've had so far, and I can't wait to creating semi-uncomfortable moments.

It's funny how life's hardest and most wonderful moments often arrive together, isn't it? Just a thought.

So much love to all.  I wish I could take all of you on my adventures with me. You are all in my heart.

Angie 

Angie's Awesome Americans Make Christmas Trees

A new week, a new club meeting! This week we made Christmas trees out of strips of paper.  Thank you, Pinterest!

Important Vocabulary

Believe me, these were fun to cut!

Making the trees!

Here's how one turned out! 

Our only boy!

The whole activity was a huge success! The kids all really enjoyed it, and they made great Christmas trees to take home to mom and dad.

However, my favorite moment of the whole meeting was right after we talked through the parts of the tree, and I told them I wanted to show them a picture of my Christmas tree.  So I shut the blinds, turned off the lights, and then turned on the projector, which slowly and ever-so-dramatically pulled up this picture of my Christmas tree from home.  It was so stunning that some of the students gasped. I couldn't have planned the moment better if I'd tried!

I hope you're all enjoying the most wonderful time of the year!

Lovesies,

Angie

Humor Me...

Yes, early morning flights can just be a pain in the butt sometimes, but look at this view!

Life is pretty good.

Lovesies,

Angie

Thanksgiving in Dublin

I love being in France, but it was wonderful to take a quick trip over to Dublin for Thanksgiving! I was able to celebrate my favorite holiday with a wonderful group of family and friends, and eat lots of delicious food!

Look at that gorgeous table!

Happy birthday to my favorite little sister!

I am so thankful for my family!

And for these goobers.

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and that all of your radios are now on the Christmas station!

Lovesies,
Angie

Angie's Awesome Americans Celebrate Thanksgiving!

Bummed that you missed out on the fun of my first English Club meeting?  It's ok, friends, you can relive it here!

Pin the Football in the Goal

Every club member received a personalized football!

Angie's Awesome Americans!

and a selfie for good measure...

We started the club by singing "10 Little Indians", and I'll get that to you as soon as I can. It is way too precious!

Until next time,

Angie

A Quick Trip to the Coast

One of the benefits of where I live is my super-close proximity to the western coast of France.  On a train, I can get there in about 30 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on how classy of an establishment I want to visit.  So my roommate, Natalie, and I chose to take a drive to Le Croisic and Guerande.

Le Croisic

Hey, look! It's me!

Poor little guy!

 We stopped for a fabulous lunch at this petite creperie because it was just too cute!  We were about 10 feet from the woman making everyone's lunch. She probably thought we were hilarious/really creepy because we stared at her for pretty much the entire time we were there.  I tried to look away, but she was just such a master of galettes and crepes!

So much Christmas!

Creeping on my new favorite chef

And then we walked around and did silly things... 

I couldn't have asked for a better roommate!

After we had our fill of crepes and the Bay of Biscay, we made our way to Guerande: the fortified city, and home of delicious salt!

Fortification.

Really we just spent our time in Guerande looking through cute little shops, and buying souvenirs. And then we found the wall of pigs:

It took so much self control to not buy all of them!

Great day, great food, great cities!

Lovesies,
Angie

Angie's Awesome Americans

That's right, kids.  The rumors are true.  There's a new club in town: Angie's Awesome Americans.  Keep reading to find out more!

Wish me luck; our first club meeting is Tuesday!

Angie

My Thanksgiving Quiz

It's a big week in Savenay: Thanksgiving Week!! Ok, sure, this means little to anyone but me at this point, but my students are going to learn to love it soon! Especially having great quizzes like this one to take:

I'm really just hoping someone answers "dolphin" for #3.  It's the little things that get you through the day.

Happy Turkey Week!

Angie

UPDATE: Someone answered dolphin.

What's for Dinner: Goat Cheese and Lardon Salad

One of my favorite parts of being in France is the food.  I love when others make it, when I make it, or when I walk past it on the street.  So, I'd like to share some of my favorite meals with you, especially when they're cheap ones!

For tonight's dinner, I made a salad (€1 for the whole head of lettuce) topped with a sliced tomato (€0,20), lardons (€0,75 for a whole pack. I probably used a fourth of it for this meal.), and baguette slices (€0,27 for the whole baguette!) on which I put a slice of goat cheese (€1,20 for the log) and threw under the broiler for a few minutes. (Just the cheese logs went under the broiler!). Throw a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar on top et voilà! A wonderful and cheap (about €1 total) meal!!!

Got to love the economic life!

Until next time,

Angie

This French House Is Too Cute For Its Own Good

A Little Look at My New Reality

So is life really that different in France?  In so many ways, no.  People are people, teenagers are teenagers, and teaching strategies work everywhere.  However, there are some key differences that I'd like to bring up.  Some of them are because I'm living in France, some are because I'm living in a school, and some are just because I'm finally living on my own.  

Here's the first picture I'd like to offer to you to explain some of these similarities and differences:

Sure, it might not look like much, but it says a great deal about my life at the moment.  For instance....

- Look at that little electric stovetop deal we've got going on there.  There is, in fact, a real stovetop hidden between the electric one and the oven, but it's gas and has been turned off because we live in the school building.

- Those oven nobs.  Hieroglyphics would be more helpful.

- Check out that lid, or shall we say 'top hat' because it's just so classy.

- If you direct your gaze to the right of the oven, you'll notice the bread tower.  Here you can find out baguettes, brioche (sweet bread that, when combined with the power of Nutella, is arguably the best thing on this earth), and a new addition: donuts. (Note: we only have donuts because they were Natalie's comeback for my brioche purchase.)

- And to finish, my personal favorite: the "turned off??" sign.  This is only up because I, twice in the same day, left our little electric burners on, and nearly burned down our apartment.  What's life without moments to keep you humble, right?

Until the next installment,

Angie

Shout Out to My Roommate!

Just two little assistants in one big lycee!

Although I've thrown love at many a person on this blog, one person in particular has been overlooked for far too long: Natalie, my roommate.

I've now gone potluck on roommates twice in my life: freshman year of college, and freshman year of real life.  So far, both have been out-of-the-ballpark wins.  Eileen, my first collegiate roommate, remains a great friend, even after learning of my ranch obsession, and strange music-major sleeping hours.  And now I have Natalie, my German space sharer, who I knew would be perfect from the moment she saw me wearing my TMNT boxers as pajamas and said "those are great!"  I feel so incredibly lucky to be sharing this year with someone who cares if I'm home or not, who listens to every time that I screw up, and that is struggling through this language right along with me.  So cheers, wait, crap, prost to you, my new buddy. I can't wait to see what the future has in store for us.

Love from France,
Angie

A Quick Trip to the Coast

My wonderful friends Allison and Melina came to Savenay for the weekend to celebrate Allison's birthday, try our hand at the Nantes nightlife, and go to the beach in St. Nazaire!

See! It has sand; it's a beach!

I'm collecting cute Germans!

Note: Allison really was a cheerleader.  Learning from the best.

MirandaSings meets the French beach. Haters back off.

 Love to all!  I hope you're getting excited for my favorite holiday: Thanksgiving!

Angie.

Rail Passes: How the Magic Happened

If you've been catching up on all my posts, salivating over the great pictures of Paris, daydreaming about boat tours in Strasbourg, and wondering "How can I do that?", then this is the post for you.

Here's the step-by-step process of how I made a rail pass save me loads of euros.

1. Compare Rail Europe passes to Eurail passes.

In the past, I used a Eurail pass to travel to 4 different countries with 12 days of travel.  And what a great deal that was!  However, as I was country browsing, I realized that Eurail did not have a one-country pass for France.  Wah wah. So, Rail Europe won for this trip!

2. Decide how many days you want to travel.

In talking with my sister, we knew that we definitely wanted to see at least 3 cities.  So, we knew that we needed at least 4 days of travel on our passes.  However, we really liked the flexibility of adding one more day to our trip, so we compared some options:

3. Choose your pass.

In the end, we decided on a 5-day travel pass for France in 1st class.  There were two reasons for traveling "en premiere": 1. Because we can, and it was only a $35 difference per person. 2. It would give us many more booking options, as I knew we'd be making reservations within a month of our first travel date, and there are a certain, limited amount of bookings open on the TGV (fast train) for those traveling with a rail pass.

4. Choose your cities.

If you look through other blog posts that I've written, you'll see that we stopped in Mont-Saint-Michel, Paris, Strasbourg, and Lourdes.  And we had a few great one- or two-hour layovers in other cities like Bordeaux, Montpellier, and Rennes.

5. Book your trains.

I did all of this at an SNCF (French nation-wide railway company) ticket booth, but you can do it online as well.  (Note: I just discovered this booking online through the RailEurope site, so I can't help too much with it, but I'll definitely be trying it out in the future!) 

Depending on how long you take to make these bookings and what kind of trains you're looking at, this step can test how rapidly you can adjust travel plans, how kindly you can speak with French ticket clerks, and how willing you are to spend all day traveling to see a city.  But hang in there, the results are worth it!

6. Breathe. You've accomplished an incredible amount.

7. If you're staying overnight in a city, look at booking a place to stay!  I've been really happy with airbnb, but more on that in another post!

8. Enjoy your work! I know that I did!

Congratulations, it's time to travel.

--Angie

In the Steps of Bernadette: Lourdes

As a Catholic, I grew up watching movies about Lourdes, Bernadette, and the holy water that springs up out of the ground there.  I was lucky enough to have visited this city one time before with a good friend as I was studying abroad, and I was not about to say no when my sister asked if we could go back.

At the holy water spickets

The town of Lourdes cracks me up because it is so plainly obvious that this was just a little country town buried in the mountains until it became a pilgrimage site.  You walk off the train, and immediately see nothing but hotels, restaurants, and places to by holy water containers, rosaries, and other souvenirs.  However, once you arrive at the grotto, you understand why this city has been able to be built up around this holy site.  There is something so beautiful about all of these people from different countries coming to pray to Mary. Pretty stinking cool.

Know that you were all in my thoughts and prayers while Juliana and I were there.  We were lucky enough to be there on All Saints' Day, so we found a mass, and a candlelight rosary that evening.  We also lit a few candles for you all and left them alongside the prayers of everyone else who had visited Lourdes.

Much love to all,
Angie

The Land of Our People: Strasbourg

Having recently found out that my father's side of my family came directly from Strasbourg, my sister and I knew that we had to make a stop there on our tour of France.

Look at me! I'm an Alsacien specialty!

We really had a great time just roaming the city.  We took a boat tour, walked through the cathedral, and ate lots of Alsacien foods!

Beautiful.

I loved all the signs in French and German.

This city made me giggle because it absolutely felt like a place I could belong.  Being of German descent, I've always wished that I could speak just a little German to be able to connect with people that still live where my family once did.  However, being in Strasbourg solved that problem.  I was able to roam the streets that my great-great-great (I think that's enough?) grandparents did, while also conversing with the people I ran into.  Great stop, and I can't wait to go back!

-Angie

Where else than Paris?

As I take you through my three days in Paris with my sister, I thought it'd be easier to navigate in pictures.  Very few things we did were out of the ordinary on paper, but the fact that I was able to do them in great company made them each new and entertaining again.  So, here goes...

Trying to remake the classic ESQ picture that originated when I went to Paris with my 5 fellow music majors.

Inverted pyramid inside the Louvre. Classic.

She's so purty.

Just so much love.  So, so much love.

NERD ALERT: Found Stravinsky's fountain!

Life goal: Accomplished. Baguette sword duel in front of the Eiffel Tower.

In case you couldn't quite see the details.

Hey, look! The Arc de Triomphe!

Hello, Versailles! You'r'e looking quite elaborate today!

OMG Selfie in the HOM!

When the fountains dance, so must I.

Marie-Antoinette's house was almost as beautiful as we are.

Snack time! Macaroons and fancy hot chocolate, anyone?

Giving our art opinions.

We made it to the top of the Eiffel Tower!!

Quick stop at the Moulin Rouge.  Note: no dancing here.

All in all, this was a great 3-days stop on our journey.  I don't think there's any big site in Paris that we didn't see, or any pain that my feet didn't feel, but it was all very worth it! And there will be a blog in the very near future on how to make it all worth it without spending too much of your hard-earned cash flow.  All of the important things!

Lovesies to all,

Angie