The Inappropriate Vegetable Seller And Other Tales...

The last ten days I've been travelling around the North of India, between Delhi, Agra and Jaipur, so my internet's been pretty flaky. Delhi hasn't had any monsoon rain like the other cities I've been in, so it's baking hot and has produced what are easily my sweatiest photos to date.

We've only had three days to explore Delhi in, so we've packed in as much as possible. That said, I can't help but feel like I've spent a large part of my time here being frisked. To get into the bazaars, cinemas and temples, the security is seriously tight. This can really only be a good thing, but thorough is an understatement for these frisks, which actually feel pretty Jesters worthy.

Once we'd got past all the security, we managed to get in trouble on the Delhi metro (incidentally the cleanest and coldest metro I've ever seen), whilst on our way back to the hotel, for taking a photo. We were reprimanded by a very angry Delhi policeman who conveniently spoke no English so we feigned innocence and hopped on the next metro. We never quite got to the bottom of his problem there, unless they're worried someone will steal their underground ideas, which they don't need to be too worried about. That said, they do have a 'women only' carriage which would be a handy addition to the Tube.

After that palava, once we arrived back at what must officially be the world's dampest hotel room, my
moist suitcase and I would probably have been better off staying on the metro. Just to add insult to the fact I owned nothing dry any more, a begging child pulled down my trousers in the street because I said 'no' to him. Hope that doesn't catch on with Big Issue sellers.

On our last night in Delhi we decided to follow Lonely Planet's advice to go to Old Delhi. It was then that I lost my faith in guide books.

Our rickshaw dropped us off in a very dark, delapidated neighbourhood with bodies littering the pavements and down the middle of the road (hopefully sleeping). It turns out that our guide book did actually mention, right at the back, that this area suffers from serious drink and drug problems, and we all ended up feeling a bit like prey in an unsafe area that evening. Perhaps the author of the 'Danger' chapter and the one who recommended visiting that area at night would like to collaborate a bit more next time they write books together.

On the plus side, dinner was actually good. On the downside, the poverty there means that men sleep in whatever their job is (I.e. ice cream cart, newspaper stand etc.), so on the way home we stopped in a traffic queue next to a man going commando in a skirt, facing away from us, having a very public balls adjustment at eye-level. This was shortly followed by a man having a wank in his vegetable cart. In short, Delhi taught me two things: don't always trust your guide book, and never buy vegetables off the street.

After all that excitement, we headed off on a train to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. I was prepared to be disappointed after all the hype surrounding this Seventh Wonder, but it actually didn't disappoint at all - it was amazing. The Taj and it's grounds are stunning, and I'd recommend it to anyone.

On the downside, while Indians pay 10 rupees entry, foreigners pay 750 rupees. Apparently this rule is acceptable in India, because they enforce it at all landmarks etc. They also wander around shouting 'NO CHINESE!' at taxi ranks, which probably wouldn't go down too well in England either.

It was in Agra that the 'photo-bullying' started. I don't really know what this is about, and I actually don't really want to know, but we couldn't walk anywhere there without men asking for photos with us, and then being far too handsy, or just walking right up to us and taking the photo anyway if we said 'no'. We worked out that at least 350 photos of us were taken that day, so if you ever come across me on an Indian Facebook, give me a shout.

The Taj is the only thing worth seeing in Agra, so we spent one night there before catching the 6am train to Jaipur. This was one of my favourite cities so far, aside from the men, where the groping and not-so-sly photos continued. In fact, my automatic response to 'hello' has now become 'don't touch me', a habit I ought to drop before I head home.

The marketplaces in Jaipur are great though, and there are some gorgeous buildings including the famous Pink Palace, but the real highlight was going to a Bollywood cinema. The fact that the guard on the door carries a baseball bat says it all. Indians just get so over-excited about the cinema, and some boys, in their early twenties, even felt the need to wear glittery gold elf shoes and sunglasses.

Of course, as soon as we got in, one very short cinema-goer hassled us for gropey photos to the point of shouting and chasing us up a fire escape. This actually worked out in our favour somehow, as we found a back door to the posh upper lounge. Sneaky.

After much screaming and scarf waving action, we had an early night to prepare ourselves for what was an exciting day for me, because elephants were  involved. We got to ride a baby elephant (with hilariously big eyebrows) up to the Amber Fort, which I found so exciting that I went and bought an elephant bracelet and earrings in a mini elephant-frenzy.

I'm now back in Delhi, clad in various bits of elephant jewellery, elephant Aladdin pants, and an elephant scarf in case I'm ever lucky enough to come across air con (unlikely). We're spending one night here before we fly down to Kochi in the South, and we managed to pre-book another cracking Delhi hotel - this time with no name on the front, and with four male staff sitting outside our bedroom door for no reason. Not only is this a bit disconcerting, but both they and I were shocked when I opened the door in my vest and underwear, spraying DEET insect repellent everywhere outside, because it's horrendous to breathe in. That'll teach them.

It's impossible to fit everything here into a weekly blog, and right now I'm going to try and drive away the corridor lurkers again (perhaps with the very dodgy Indian deodorant I bought the other day...), so I'll post again from down South soon!

Rickshaws, Rabies and The Runs....My 21st in India!

It's been about two weeks since I wrote my last blog, and India's still been as crazy as ever, to the point where the last week has become fondly known as 'near death experience week.' It all started with the craziest monsoon rain I've ever seen, which I've now learnt is far too dangerous to go out in. I wandered out of the hospital, from visiting my friend Marie, looking like the ultimate moron in my emergency poncho and decided that I could deal with the rain because I'm English and was wearing a bin-bag with arm holes. This was one of the stupidest things I've ever done, and I would have actually been better off spending the night in an Indian hospital.Within thirty seconds I was knee deep in filthy black sludge-water, not helped by the fact that it was dark, I was wearing flip-flops in Indian sewer water, and I couldn't quite remember the spot where I'd seen a dead dog a few hours earlier...

All I could do by this point was persevere, so on I waded, losing flip-flops, paddling desperately back to get them as they floated away, and ignoring the groups of locals gathering in doorways, pointing and laughing at my poncho, which was now maniacally flapping in the wind. Progressing at a rate of 400m in ten minutes, I realised I didn't stand a chance and did the most disgusting thing ever - I took off my shoes. Soon, the piles of rubbish, cowpats, and pretty much any other substance you can think of started rising higher up my legs until I had no choice but to just stop, cling to a roadside water-pump and accept that is was Monsoon - 1 0 - Jen. After a while, once he'd made sure all his friends had had a good laugh at my expense, a local man waded in, lifted me out and cycled me home. That was the best 25p I have ever spent.

This was then followed by the best shower I have ever had, even if it was in the pitch black from a power-cut (probably best, considering what I was covered in). There's always the risk in power-cuts that if you put a foot wrong, you're straight down the toilet hole, but that's fairly irrelevant when you're already covered in sewage.

Toilets seem to have become a running theme in India, as both Becky and I have had a stomach infection for the past week. Our Indian family decided it was finally time to call a doctor, which didn't inspire much confidence in me since the last doctor Marie saw in hospital told her that if she did enough sit-ups, it would cure diarrhea. So, expecting our home visit to be an equally amusing waste of time, we were actually prescribed five different tablets and some pineapple syrup (fairly sure this does nothing, but I enjoy it as much as Calpol so I'm going with that) which means we can finally stop fighting for the toilet. I also have a sneaking suspicion the stomach issues weren't helped by the fact that it's impossible to buy in-date food in India, and if you happen to come across something that went off in March, that's a pretty sweet find.

I've also managed to narrowly avoid (I hope) catching rabies this week, since back home in Bath I decided to pay £170 for a course of vaccinations against a tick-borne water disease often carried by wild pigs, but decided against rabies jabs in a city full of stray dogs and monkeys. Good one.

My first monkey incident was probably the most painful one of the two, when I walked up the stairs in the house only to have an open sack of rice pelted at me by a large, smug monkey on the top step. Being the mature, competent traveller that I am, I dealt with the situation by screaming for Sanjay, the house servant to come upstairs with a broom, and ran back downstairs to play Angry Birds in safety (incidentally a game that India's gone mad for, and Angry Birds t-shirts and rucksacks are pretty much as cool as you can get here.)

Angry Birds aside though, monkey attack number two was the scariest, as I was carrying a lotus flower in the famous Golden Temple and a baby monkey, using the facade of being all cute and tiny, lunged at me and scratched all down my arm. While I was in a sweaty flap about my monkey mauling, the locals found it too amusing to help, and the sneaky little thing soon snuck away with the knowledge that he scratched my arm up just to get another leaf for his monkey-bed.

The Golden Temple in general's not really a place that inspired much confidence in me, as it suffered a terrorist attack in 2010, killing eighty people, so an official took all our passport details on entry, telling me quite cheerfully that it was a very efficient way to inform the British Embassy who was now dead, if it happened again

Gruesome but true, dead people have actually become another recurring theme I've noticed in Varanasi; they are everywhere. As Varanasi is India's holy city, many people pilgrimage here from all over India to die, so each day 400 bodies are burnt on the banks of the Ganges. We watched this ceremony from a boat on the river, and then got out to wander amongst the dead, wrapped in silks on burning pyres. (below: wood used for burning the bodies.)

 This sounds horrendous, but it was fascinating. At least it was all fun and games until our boat got stuck in the way of a dead body they were trying to wash, and we had to awkwardly reverse.

In fact, my next near death experience happened sitting on the banks of the Ganges, watching the nightly prayer ceremony at the main ghat. I started off sitting far too close to the man haphazardly twirling fire batons around, and then moved aside to safety, only for a cobra to slither down the steps by me. Sneaky.

The irony of all this, however, is that after my run-ins with rabid monkeys, filthy water and cobras, I decided to treat myself to a pedicure. The woman immediately put my foot in a bowl of scalding water and it's been the most painful thing to happen to me all week.

I can't complain though, as I've had an easy week of painting at work (aside from when a monkey stole my paint pot). Becky and I have spent ages painting an animal for each letter of the alphabet, only to go to the lamination shop (where they wore bizarre headbands and no sense of personal space) and have the guy excitedly pick up our zebra and yell 'THIS IS CAT!', and then refusing to stop until everyone nearby agreed that I wrong and this 'was cat.' 

This week's also been a good one because I had my 21st out here. Both the family and my friends bought my some gorgeous presents, James sent me a card addressed to 'Tikka Masala Street', and I had a birthday breakfast of apple pie and Immodium.

This was the first (and probably last) birthday where I've had my toes measured (for Indian toe rings) and got on a stranger's moped, who insisted that it would ''be her pleasure and honour.'' Finally, deciding it was too dangerous to walk home in the dark after my last sewage-tainted night-time walk, we hopped in a shared tuk tuk costing 10p each, and somehow managed to fit ten people in a three-seater, much to the sharing Indian family's delight (probably because they got to enjoy half an hour of me hanging out the side, having numerous near misses with oncoming cows, and, of course, another tuk tuk speeding towards me with a dead body strapped to the roof.) Probably should have walked.

After an amazing birthday, this morning, however, was a difficult one. Although the prayer ceremony on the roof was a great start, (photo below) we had to leave the family and the orphan girls at the school, who started crying. I've loved Varanasi, supposedly India's craziest city, and the Little Stars school is something I am going to continue supporting in England, starting by running a half-marathon in March (I'll pester you all for sponsorship soon). That said, i won't miss being told I have hair like straw (the girls' favourite line) or having to use a nit comb in a paranoid manner every day after work (all clear, just in case people start avoiding me in lectures next year.)

Anyway, I'm currently writing this from my bunk on a sleeper train to Delhi, on my way to do a few weeks travelling, and it's time to brave the toilet, so I'll blog again soon.

Oh, and for those who read my last blog, you can sleep easy, because I finally found Gaylord's ice cream. It was everything I had hoped and more.

Monkeys, Monsoons and Mad Angles: The start of India

It's been nearly three months since I left France, and my blog's been really neglected, so I thought I'd bring it back into action while I travel around India this Summer.

We sneakily managed to get upgraded to business class on our flight to Delhi, and that turned out to be the last moment of calm I've had since we touched down over here. India's an assault on all your senses the moment you leave the airport, and the most ridiculous things happen to me here so often that I could easily fill a daily blog (if it weren't for the constant power cuts!)

We managed to knock up a mosquito net den in our room pretty quickly (which I'm actually so fond of now that I might get a similar one on the go in Southampton next year). It turns out that our den doesn't only stop us getting bitten to death but also provides another layer of protection against the angriest monkeys ever. They lurk about in gangs (think of the Cravendale cats clicking their thumbs...) and last night they tried their hardest to batter my bedroom door down.

Right now it's monsoon season so there's generally a manic daily downpour, although it's held off for the past couple of days. The first day I was here in Varanasi, where we're living for a while, I was still learning that you have to dodge the rickshaws, motorbikes, school buses and cows going in all directions if you want to get anywhere. Unfortunately, whilst avoiding death-by-rickshaw I lost a flip-flop in a monsoon induced puddle of sludge (think rubbish, chewed tobacco, cowpats, urine and other delights). After fishing this out, I managed to disgrace myself by walking straight into an oncoming cow. I've learnt quickly now that as India's holy animals they take priority, even if you are wrist deep in shit.

I've tried my best to keep in touch with home this week, although power cuts across the whole of Northern and Eastern India meant that yesterday I found myself trying to Skype whilst competing with a blender in a cafe for a good half an hour. Another Indian novelty is that they always turn the router off when they're finished with it. I might not take that particular habit home with me, but I really like the family I'm living with. Every morning I eat breakfast with a mouse and lizards, and the family helps out with all the little things which should be straightforward, but aren't, such as applying for an Indian SIM card (basically impossible if you aren't Indian) involving numerous passport photos and ID photocopies.Even the passport photo process here is classic Indian, where I ended up in the back office of a camera shop, with one guy holding a camera and his whole family instructing me to smile 'a medium amount'. There was also all round shock that I went for the premium 'immediate option', where 8 passport photos came to a grand total of 30 rupees (about 40p).

I also started work in a junior school and orphanage hostel this week, arriving on the host family's motorbike  the first day, which was a bit precarious with all the cow-dodging but a good experience nonetheless. Work itself has also been an experience. In a week I've found myself teaching 'The Wheels on the Bus' to  a very confused bunch of non-English-speaking 3 year olds, having one of the hostel girls paint my henna on for one of many Indian festivals, and doing my best to paint goats and lions to decorate a classroom, which ended up coming out more like a cross between a walrus and a sunflower. On the plus side, I've mastered the Indian hole-in-the-ground style toilet, so you win some you lose some.

Although, on the topic of losing, India's power problems are running into their third day now which means the fan in my room doesn't work, and sleeping in 34 degree heat isn't easy. So much so, that unfortunately last night I sleep-walked on to the roof (doubly risky because of the possibility of a monkey mauling) and thought I'd found a dead body there. It turned out Sanjay, the house servant was equally unnerved by his 4am rooftop wake up call as he tried to peacefully sleep al fresco.

I'm writing this wearing my new set of 'salwar kameez', (traditional Indian clothes) which the tailor made in a huff because I am apparently 'annoyingly thin'. You would have thought this would have made his work easier, but I've decided to just go with it and eat a few more poppadoms, because I just nod along to everything here now.

Everything, that is, except the nurse's attempt to give me a blood test today, despite only being a visitor in the hospital where my friend is staying. In fact, as I'm writing this from my visitor's bed (and enjoying a packet of my new favourite crisps: 'Mad Angles: Tomato Mischief'), I have just been weighed and a lady's carefully sweeping around me with a twig broom for the fifth time today. They like to make visitors feel included here; so included in fact, that I was chased by 4 police officers and a doctor when I left last night, asking why I was leaving. Oh, India.

Anyway this has now become the world's longest blog and I've got a lingering feeling I may have locked Pedro, our Brazilian neighbour, out of our shared bathroom again (this happens amusingly frequently), so I'll write more and hopefully add pictures soon. However, next week is mainly dedicated to finding the most fantastically named business ever, lurking somewhere in the labyrinth that is Varanasi: 'Gaylord's Ice Cream Parlour.' India, I love you.

Barry White, Bra-Bowling and Brie Sandwiches

I would be the first to admit I can be a bit of an absent blogger, but leaving it this long’s been a record even for me. As normal, I’ve got no excuse but at least I can say that I’ve been doing a bit of jet-setting recently.

One of the few bonuses I can see to being a teacher are the school holidays, so in my Easter vacances (which were actually nowhere near Easter, classic French) Mum and I went to Gambia. We spent the week wandering on the beach, being harassed in equal parts by a group of men on horseback, and a gang of monkeys.

However, that wasn’t the weirdest thing to happen in Gambia – the new craze over there is for young Gambian men to try and snare any (literally any) English woman, and get her to take him home with him. You wouldn’t believe the amount of obese British grandmas on the arms of young Gambian twenty-somethings until you see it for yourself. 

The confusion continued when I realised that if the locals can’t remember your name, they will just pick one out of the blue and that will become your name. Thanks to this, we spent the holiday being called, Pauline, Hilda, Moira, Hannah and my personal favourite… Jonnifer.

In fact, a lot of the people travelling in Gambia were a bit weird too. I spent one lunchtime watching a couple having the ultimate mid-life crisis as they bathed a stray puppy (against its will) in the sea, and then wrapped it in a towel and forbade it to leave their sunbed. 

Shortly after, a spindly bloke who introduced himself as Barry White appeared and beckoned me into his wooden hut full of material. Most people with an ounce of common sense would have been straight off back to watch the puppy show, but off I went and before I knew it I was putting down a deposit for him to make me a pair of African trousers and a maxi dress. For all you of little faith that said I’d never see that money again (or Mum's maxi dress which I lent him after seeing the look on his face when I said 'maxi dress' and he clearly pictured a smock for the obese traveller) I’ve gone high-tech and popped a couple of pictures of my new African garmz below:

As for life in Lille, it’s all ticking over as normal. In true Northern France style, we went to a ghetto party last week and got more attention on the metro than I’ve had since I moved here on October. It’s probably worth mentioning that most of this ‘attention’ was from a surly trackie-clad teenager who shouted ‘’I have the big balls’’ down the metro carriage at us, which reminded me alarmingly of being back at work with the more challenged pupils who have disregarded ‘hello’ in favour of ‘motherfucker’, no matter what the circumstances.

As any of you who know me will be aware, a blog of mine isn’t complete without a health fail of some sort, and as usual you won’t be disappointed. A couple of weeks back I went to the doctor with sinusitis and he prescribed me a cocktail of tablets and ended our rendez-vous with ‘and OF COURSE you will be desperately needing a nasal spray.’ Of course.  Just as I was starting to feel better, I headed over to Angers to meet up with the usual Soton gang, and had a classic ‘’to faint or to be sick’’ moment in the Grand Place, which everyone enjoyed (particularly Will, who had to carry me like an invalid).

The same evening, drama over, we all went bowling and even though I won spectacularly, my top fell down and left me bowling in just my bra. Swings and roundabouts though, and I rolled with it because it’s tough being a hero and something had to give.

Once the glory wore off and I was safely installed back in my Lille pad, I’ve been considering what to do with my Summer, fairly certain I didn’t want to spend it in England. Not that England’s all that bad, but I’d much rather experience something new while I can than get excited about returning to Waitrose and 4oD. I’ve been considering all corners of the globe, trying to work out what the most beneficial thing I could do would be, until yesterday when I ordered a tuna sandwich and a brie baguette from a stall and the woman replied: ‘’OK, so one chicken bagel yes?’’ On that note, I reckon the best thing I can do is stick around in France, and hopefully move down South – looks like leaving Lille won’t mean an end to my French faux pas.

Definitely time for me to love you and leave you now, as the flush on our toilet’s broken and I made the unwise decision of having a cup of tea when I started writing this, which means time for another sneaky mission to an unsuspecting café. Oh, France. 

Foot on the mouse, Foot in the haggis, Foot in the face...

Salut! It’s been a ridiculously long time since my last blog post (as ever) but this time I have an excuse, since I’ve spent what must be nearly the entire past six weeks in the CAF office (France's answer to benefits). Oh, and still haven’t received any money, just in case you were wondering. Classic France, at it again. 

The job’s still exhausting as ever – turns out the trick is to stop caring and let the ones who want to learn English do so, and let the ones who just want to sing ‘I’m sexy and I know it’ over and over again for an hour get on with it too. Everyone wins. I also only found out the other week that most of my pupils are going out with someone in the same year, which is why there’s constantly so much drama and storming off in my classes. This all became clear last week when one poor boy got dumped by his girlfriend and the other boys started singing ‘Goodbye my lover’ to him throughout the whole class. I also found this more amusing than my worksheets on Fair Trade Coffee, so yet again I left them to it. I think I’m fast becoming one of Nord-Pas-de-Calais’ least professional teachers.

On the upside, in my second week back after Christmas, we had a ‘galette des rois’ party at work, which is where you all have a piece of frangipane tart, and there’s a little toy hidden in one of the pieces and if you have it, you get to wear a crown and feel all proud. I use the term ‘party’ loosely here though, because firstly the tradition states that the youngest person has to call out the names of who gets each piece of pie from under the table, so I spent my party under the table in the staff room. Secondly, one teacher started crying halfway through about her timetable and then the others started complaining about how much of a choking hazard the small toy is, and it all got a bit awkward so I took my cue to leave.

I’m currently writing this blog from my death bed since I’ve had to take another day off work thanks to some grim French virus, and my teachers can’t get their heads around why I insist on doing things the English way – i.e lying on the sofa watching Peep Show and taking paracetamol rather than going to various doctors around the city getting second opinions and filling in bundles of paperwork. This might have something to do with the confusing phone message I left at the school office this morning to say I couldn’t come in. I had it all planned in my head, to explain to the secretary that I’m still taking paracetamol and resting but don’t quite feel right yet, but speaking French on the phone still baffles me a bit and instead what came out in a jumble when she answered was : ‘Hello, I am the English Assistant and I have vomited.’ Lucky woman.

Life outside school, however, is plodding along nicely. On one of our (still rather frequent) trips to McDonalds a few weeks back we decided to get on a train somewhere that night and stay the weekend, and picked Brussels. This was a particularly proud weekend for me, because after the FrenSoc trip last January I somehow still managed to guide everybody around without one single fail – I regularly get lost on Highfield Campus, just to put this miracle into perspective. Highlights of the trip were Harrie screaming for an ambulance for stomach pain as soon as we reached the hostel, but actually settling for a glass of wine five minutes later, my standing on a dead mouse in a Kenyan restaurant and all of us managing to be under 12 years old to get a child’s ticket for the tour bus.

We had our own little Burns night celebrations last week too, where I was quite happily nibbling away at my haggis until Graeme told me it was made of intestines, lungs and heart, and the fun was spoiled. I also ended up standing in a disturbing amount of haggis that had made its way to the floor, but nevertheless, I did get to play with Graeme’s sporran, so the evening was not wasted...

However, the final major incident of the past couple of weeks is one that I fear will never leave me. I still have sleepless nights thinking about the two hours Cathy and I spent in some woman’s attic in the outskirts of Lille, surrounded by moaning men and women who don’t feel the need the shave, having my legs forced behind my head. Never have there been two bigger victims of false advertising than Cathy and I attending this ‘yoga’ class. As if this wasn’t disturbing enough, at the end of the ‘session’, the woman made me lie down and wrapped me up (chipolata in bacon style) in a suspicious looking blanket. Shortly after, a man started wailing and shoved his foot in Cathy’s face, which was almost worth paying the €7.50 for. All in all, this didn’t even come close to a yoga class. It was, in fact, attic abuse, which I was even more bitter about when I couldn't sit down properly and developed a kind of waddle for four days afterwards.

All in all, it’s been a standard few weeks of confusion and awkward misdemeanours, but I reckon you can’t go far wrong in France if you just generally watch where you put your feet, and never let anyone ‘teach’ you anything in their attic. Especially if they’re wearing an embroidered waistcoat.  

A little sapin ridin' on the metro...

It’s been a shamefully long time since my last instalment of French Fail. This has nothing to do with the fact that my ‘vie en France’ has become less embarrassing, but more likely due to an increase in my intake of ‘vin rouge’ and (therefore) napping. So it’s about time I got the blog up to speed again, helped along greatly by the fact that I have nothing to play with because both mobile phones and my camera are currently submerged in a bowl of rice in a desperate attempt to dry them out after the ‘Juice Explosion of 9^th December 2011’ hit my handbag hard.

Lille’s recently been invaded by a few of Southampton’s finest, who exploited the fact that French nightclubs haven’t quite cottoned on to the fact that any decorations that aren’t nailed down will be pilfered fairly casually by the average drunken English student. We learnt it’s definitely not acceptable to be carrying a pineapple around with you like a baby at 4am but it did make a cheeky fruit salad in the morning.

In more fruit and veg related issues, never ever jump around with a broccoli in your hand if you don’t have a firm grip. Harrie hasn’t quite got the hang of taking big enough bags to the supermarket yet, so broc was riding solo in Tom’s care for approximately 30 seconds before his excitement for the Lille Christmas Ferris wheel got too much, and one leap sent it flying not only into the face of the woman behind us in the queue, but then rebounding onto her nice expensive camera. Turns out this woman’s festive sense of humour had escaped her, especially when she was asked ‘err sorry but where is my broccoli, I have now lost it?’

As if the Ferris wheel wasn’t enough excitement for one week, my favourite SDF has started dressing up as Santa – it’s probably not acceptable to have asked to have a photo with him, but I went there. I went there.

That said, my general festive spirit was killed off by a nice bout of flu which meant I had to brave the French doctors, and immediately having walked through the door, had already made myself the most unpopular person in the waiting room.  After walking in and sitting down, like a normal person, I realised afterwards that you never enter a waiting room without greeting EVERYONE in there and waiting for their amen-like chorus of hello’s back before you sit down. Technically, as ever, it was me that made a fool out of myself, but this is definitely far too retro a custom to be OK in 2011.

Another area where the French are stuck in the 1930s is their choice of names. I will never ever get a French boyfriend if I can’t keep a straight face when they tell me their name. I know it’s not personally their fault, but there are only so many ‘Wesleys’ and ‘Cyrils’ I can take. Sort it out.

Aside from accidentally being fairly offensive here and there, the biggest embarrassing incident of the last week has been my and Harrie’s trip to buy a Christmas tree (or a ‘sapin’ en France). I don’t know if the issue is that the French aren’t big on the needle-dropping little things (considering this is a country that employs an entire workforce to hand-wash the pavements every day) but it was near-on impossible to find anywhere to buy one. In a final impulsive moment of desperation, we hopped on the metro for half an hour to go out to a trading estate, and never has a plan been so poorly thought through. Also, never have I had to run to catch a metro with a Christmas tree under my arm, and never have I missed said metro, but just caught everyone on it applauding as it moved away. And when the wrapping snapped and the little thing broke free, I vowed never to catch the metro with a ‘sapin’ in tow again; a decision probably supported by the bloke sat next to me with a branch in between his face and his newspaper.

All this considered, the moral of this blog can only be: keep a close eye on your fruit and veg, and you haven’t lived till you’ve taken a ‘sapin’ on the metro. Joyeux noël à tous!

Breakdancing, Brass Bands and Bins

The past couple of weeks have been spent generally trying to sort my life out French-style, which, in short, means a ridiculous amount of paperwork teamed with a ridiculous lack of efficiency. The high point of all this was when Harrie had to send off two photocopies of her passport to Orange in order to receive her €5 free credit on her Carrefour phone.  A week later, she’s still waiting with a phone that is far less useful than the biros and razors dear old Bic should really stick to making.

Technology has also let us down in the form of the Neufbox, the all-purpose (but actually does nothing at all) router . We’ve been dismally watching the orange ‘erreur’ light flash for three weeks now, and even made two wasted trips back to Carrefour where were firmly told to wait some more for technical checks, because in France it’s OK for internet to take three weeks. The only plus side of this was that it made it OK to go to McDo daily, which I’m now missing an unhealthy amount.

 Today I whipped out my domestic goddess and rummaged around in the wires for a bit, and ten minutes later we had English TV, internet and free phone calls to England. Cheers Carrefour. Domestic goddess didn’t survive for long though, as I immediately got too cocky and tried to stick up my picture board, and ended up super gluing not only two fingers together, but my shoe to the floor, and, thanks to some rogue splodges of super glue, my foot in my shoe. It was all painfully reminiscent of the time I tried to dry my shoes in the oven after a rainy day and ended up with a ruined oven and a very small pair of shoes.

There’s been none of this pathetic behaviour in class though, I’ve stepped up my game there after coming home after my first day with an invitation to visit a boy’s family in Morocco and ten Facebook friend requests. This would have actually been my second day, but the pupils casually went on strike the day before, and the day after that, the trains did the same thing. There’s nothing quite like a good strike in France; they’re averaging two a week since I’ve arrived.

In my classes this week we’ve been going through news articles and having vague debates about the topics, but I remember being in classes like mine and thinking it was all a massive doss. To try and get the students out of this mindset, I worked out you don’t need to shout or get angry, you just need to calmly tell the student who claims he ‘doesn’t need to know English because he can breakdance so well’ that unless he gets up and immediately demonstrates, he can do the work like everyone else (or go back to Tonga as I was thinking myself, but I don’t think Summer Heights High’s really hit France hard yet.)

Despite all this, I don’t really feel like an English teacher, and ‘don’t look like one either’ according to the bloke selling metro tickets, who has no idea when he isn’t part of a conversation.  I’ve actually spent an unusual amount of time in gay bars this week, and the other night, after the long struggle of wheeling Harrie’s granny shopping trolley back from Carrefour in the rain, we whipped out the 1 euro wine (lethal) and headed to La Plage, my favourite bar in Lille. There’s just something about the sand on the floor, the absinthe, Sambuca and red wine mixure that is a ‘flaming dragon’ and the barman who will take 5 minutes to make your drink because he wants to show you what he learnt at bartender school that is beyond funny. This only gets better when a brass band barges in, complete with trumpeters and a tuba bigger than me, and insists on playing ‘hot stuff’ over the DJ until he gives up completely. Vive la France.

There are plenty of other ridiculous occurrences that I could go into, but the final pathetic issue in ‘ma vie francaise’ is that we can’t find our own rubbish bins so we have to nip out under darkness and deposit our plethora of empty wine bottles and pasta sauce jars in the neighbours’ bins, which they are so tragically obsessive about that they employ someone to monitor them during the day. They probably have a point though, as like some kind of grubby trackie-clad Santa, it’s time once again for one of my frequent illegal bin trips followed by an unhealthy (but very French) amount of cheese for dinner. A bientôt.