Taxi Trauma

Bonne année, as people are still saying!

Sorry I haven't written for a few weeks. I had a wonderful time spending the holidays in Kansas. In fact, I'm glad I got there at all. I got out of Charles de Gaulle airport about four hours before they cancelled all flights due to snow. Getting to the airport, though, was the real adventure.

My plan was to take a taxi to the high-speed train station, catch the 7:07 to CDG, and arrive with plenty of time to check in for my 9:30 flight. I reserved the taxi two days in advance to make sure I booked them before the snow fell. A teacher at school offered to drive me if they refused. "Would they actually refuse?" I asked. "Mmm. . . No. . ." he failed to reassure me.

6am Saturday morning found me and the Lithuanian assistant, who was sharing the cab, standing in the cold waiting for our taxi.

Waiting.

And waiting.

It was 6:15. I was calling the taxi service and getting the answering machine. The third time, I listened carefully to the message: "Hello, you have reached C--- Taxis. Due to the weather we cannot acquiesce to your demands. Thank you for understanding."

I was angry that day, my friends, like a man trying to return soup at a deli.

My friend knew that all the busses were cancelled except for one that went to a train stop in nowheresville. If we took that, maybe I could get to the airport in four hours or so. We started walking to the bus stop in the center of town. It was freezing. Only my ire kept me warm.

We passed two policeman hanging out in a bakery, chatting with the baker. My partner suggested we ask them for a ride.

Turns out they weren't policemen, but security guards. Nonetheless, they were very helpful. They got out a phone book and started calling different taxi services. No luck. Finally, one of the guards offered to drive us. It was very generous, and it's not like we had an option.

We arrived at the train station (with no problems) at 7:05. I had two minutes to get my ticket. Of course, as soon as I got to the counter, the man working there drew the shade and left. I tapped my foot, trying to look so visibly impatient that he would notice there were people with flights to make and get a move on. The intercom announces the arrival of my train. The man comes back. There's a young couple in front of me. They're asking about times, comparing prices, talking it over. . .

I can't take it anymore. I burst, "Are you going to be a long time? They're announcing my train!"

Thank goodness they were nice people. They insisted I go ahead of them. I slapped my online receipt in front of the man and ask for my ticket. He clicked his tongue reprovingly and said, "You should have gotten here earlier. . ."

But he gave me my ticket, I ran down the ramp, giant backpack just serving to make my run funnier, and-- I write this proudly-- made the 7:07 train!

Of course my flight turned out to be three hours late. But I got there on schedule, thanks to the generosity of a few Frenchmen-- and perhaps some divine intervention.

Christmas Comes in Chocolate

I finally got to go to Brussels!

I went there three years ago, though just for a day, most of it spent riding the bus around the city while lost on my way to the train station. The city struck me as gritty, gloomy, gray. I didn't have a real desire to go back. But, some of my students told me that Brussels around Christmas was a must-see, so I decided I'd give it a second chance.

Really, I wasn't going to see the city of Brussels, but rather the Christmas Market they have every year. For the month of December the city center becomes a village of shopping and food stalls flanked by winter-themed activities. A quick Google image search got me excited: Lights! Ferris wheel! Mini-luge!

I went up there on Saturday morning and spent the afternoon wandering the aforementioned village. It was cute. I bought a few things. I sampled the chocolate (and oh, what chocolate. . .). This wasn't the market of my Google dreams, however. For that, I had to wait.

The market came to life after sunset. The lights came on. The ferris wheel and ice skating rink went up. The food and drink stalls (many, many drink stalls) lit up and radiated heat and smells through the crowd. And crowd it was. Shoulder-to-shoulder. In fact, it was so packed that after a while we became one giant herd shuffling slowly in a U-turn through the village. If you wanted to look at something, you had to swim crosswise through the tide and jump out. After several U-turns, shopping bag weighing heavily on my shoulder, I'd had enough.

On Sunday, I felt like I'd pretty much exhausted the Christmas Market. (I visited the Rene Magritte museum instead-- more on that later.)

Nonetheless, apparently addicted to Christmas markets, I went to the city of Amiens on Tuesday to see what their market was like. It was basically a rip-off of the Brussels market on a smaller scale, but I had fun anyway. I'm posting pictures of this below, including a short video of an animatronic kids' ride. Maybe you'll get as much of a kick out of it as I did.

So the Amiens market was comparable, but not on par with the Belgian one. I'm really glad I decided to venture to Brussels a second time. Short as it may have been, it revised my memories of the city for the far better. And more chocolaty.

Green Tents for a Greener Life

Well, I was planning to blog about the Christmas market in Brussels this weekend. My travel plans, however, have been waylaid by snow. Even though it's only a couple of inches, the local bus system has been shut down since Thursday.

So I'm stuck in Péronne.

A pause in the snowfall allowed me to get out of the apartment earlier, which was good not only for me, but for the neighbors above me, whom I was ready to severely maim if they did not stop blaring bad techno and running power tools. (Really people, what are you building up there? An ark?) On my way home, I found something to write about.

Two green circus tents, like the kind you'd buy fireworks at in a parking lot, sat near the high school. They looked unoccupied. A sign explained, "Le Chapiteau Vert"(The Green Tent), and gave a website.

Le Chapiteau Vert, according to said website, hosts shows for children that illustrate the importance of recycling and reducing waste. The shows are called, "Welcome Inside My Trashcan." The website linked a couple of YouTube videos, which I'll post here. One features clips of a past show; if you want, you can skip to 3:30 and watch Poubelle-man battle the Trash Monster, put a kid in a trash can, and lead the 6-year-old audience in raising the roof. ("Poubelle" means "trashcan," FYI.) The other is a karaoke rap by MC Poubellos.

The Chapiteau Vert seems like a fun and effective way to teach kids the importance of green living. If I had kids, I'd make them go. . . or rather, I'd use them as an excuse to see the show for myself.

Quality Saturday in St. Quentin

I just posted pictures from my recent trip to St. Quentin, a small city (eight times the population of Péronne) an hour's bus ride from here. After receiving intelligence that there are ten teaching assistants there-- that's a lot!-- I decided it was time for a visit.

St. Q was just getting into the holiday spirit. Men were hard at work building a miniature Christmas village in the town center, complete with a gingerbread duplex and a statue of a pirate/Revolutionary/Ichabod Crane reading a book. I hope to visit again when it's finished. . . but can it compete with Péronne's festive disco ball? We'll see.

It was Saturday, so I had the good fortune to see St. Quentin's version of my favorite weekend activity: the market. Of course, it was more extensive and crowded than the market here. And the roast chicken stand didn't seem to be as popular. My favorite display, though, was definitely the cart of live rabbit and baby pig. No, these animals were not intended for dinner (although that was my first reaction). Instead, they served as visual aids for a woman selling cough drops to Save the Animals. I bought a box of cough drops and she let me pet them. So I petted a pig this weekend. Another life experience accumulated.

When I had exhausted the market, I visited St. Quentin Cathedral. The cathedral dates to the 12th century, although it's been bombed and re-built and re-bombed so many times that not much of the original remains. I've posted pictures of the visual highlights. I did not post a picture of the reliquary containing the "hand of Saint Quentin," which the church officials had mercifully relegated to a small side transept.

I met up with other assistants in the afternoon. There were eight of us in all. They proved to be fun, pleasant people. It helps that we all have something in common-- this boat called the teaching assistantship program-- and most of us were on the lookout for travel partners and day trip ideas. They also found the nerdy humor in the action figures I bought for my fiancé's nephew (Napoleon and Admiral Nelson doing battle). It's a good group. We went for coffee, then the St. Quentin-ites showed us a lovely park with a petting zoo. The park also featured a miniature work-out center for children (literally, see the pictures below) and a little play area modeled after castle ruins.

I wish I could think of a more inventive way to end this post, but it was a good day. That's probably true about any day that ends with a playground.

Teenagers for Retirement

I feel like I have to say something about the recent demonstrations over retirement age reform.

I know that people in the U.S. (and maybe elsewhere) were bombarded with images of burning cars and stone-throwing. I assure you, however, that these incidents were limited to Lyon and the suburbs of Paris. Throughout France-- including in Péronne-- the demonstrations were relatively tame.

So what was the issue, anyway? One of the other teachers explained it to me:

Sarkozy raised the retirement age from 60 to 62. Nobody was happy about that, but the French are aware that they have one of the lowest retirement ages in the world, and the age itself was not necessarily the main cause of alarm. Rather, people felt that the president was robbing them of a treasured social benefit. One they had worked hard to obtain. This generous retirement package was one of the spoils of electing, after a long struggle, a socialist president in the 1980's.

The strikers also floated a sort of domino theory: if the president takes away this right, what will he take away next? Since France tends to be a model for other European countries, people also worried that this move would make foreign leaders feel free to take away the rights of their own people.

But why so many high schoolers, you may ask? What do they care about retirement?

Good question. Indeed, teenagers made up the bulk of demonstrators in streets throughout France. The reasoning they gave to TV interviewers was that, if the older population keeps their jobs longer, then fewer jobs will open up for young people. I think that general anti-Sarkozy sentiment and the sheer coolness of joining a social movement didn't hurt, either.



Strike day in Péronne started at 7am sharp. You would think these teenagers would take advantage of being on strike and, you know, sleep in a little. Instead, I woke up to the sound of cheers, horns, and vuvuzelas leftover from the World Cup.

The teachers at my school had already informed me that I didn't need to bother showing up to class that day. There wouldn't be many English teachers at school, and even fewer students. A rumor floated around that the kids were going to blockade the entrance to the high school so that no one could get in or out. That never happened, but they did crowd around outside the school to chant and make noise. The police were there-- not doing anything, just watching and chatting with each other. They looked bored.

In the afternoon, the students had a parade through the town. They started at the high school, walked down the main street, rallied in the town square, then looped back. They chanted in unison ("Sarko! Sarko! Something Something Something!") and held hand-drawn banners ("Don't Extend Retirement to the Grave!"). The police followed slowly in their cars, just in case. I followed them for a while-- at a distance, since they had small fireworks like Black Cats that they left in their wake.

I took some videos on my iPhone that I'll post here. One is of the rally in the town square. There is also an up-close video of the parade that I took later in the day, after things had quieted down a bit and the kids had run out of Black Cats.

As someone told me, "It's been a few years. . . About time for a big strike!"

Back to the Beginning

Well then!

Welcome to my blog, a record of my seven-month sojourn as a teaching assistant in France. I'm sorry it took me so long to get this started-- I've already been here for about six weeks-- but I have had some internet issues, which would fill a blog in and of themselves. I have already written a few entries in anticipation of creating a blog, which I will post here. I wrote the first one right after arriving in France. I stayed in Paris for a couple of days before moving on to Péronne, the town where I am stationed. I hope to post weekly, so. . . stay tuned. 

"Get yourself a George Foreman grill, they're all the rage in America!"

Today I am visiting the Saturday market. It spans the central square, down a side street, and ends at the chateau. All of the Péronne, and it seems, everyone within a 50km radius turns out for the market. Like them, and for lack of other excitement, it has become the highlight of my week.

Just a few of the things you can find at the Saturday market:
- Clothing
- Furniture
- Mattresses
- Whole roast chickens
- Enough garlic to ward off the Twilight series
- Raw meat
- Fish (or just the head)
- A safety demonstration by your local fire department
- Infomercial demonstrations of cooking equipment

Needless to say, it's quite the spectacle.

However, it's a little disappointing compared to the Grande Foire de Péronne that they had last weekend. There were carnival games, Worlds-of-Fun-type rides (e.g. a giant pendulum that swung people 50 feet in the air over the heads of gawking spectators), and these amazing-smelling snack stands that sold crêpes and beignets and such. I thought they had this sort of Grande Foire every weekend. I've been let down.

But, as I said, this is my entertainment for the weekend, so I'm making the most of it.