Pas un adieu, mais au revoir

So this is Laura's last day in Caen, our little group of ERASMUS is slowly starting to separate. Wow that sounds depressing. Before anyone feels more than a shred of sympathy for me, I will be seeing Laura again...not only have I promised Tobias, Laura herself, but also her parents! So I now promise you, at some point over the next year you will be seeing pictures of Munich and Laura once more. There it is, now I've written it I can't take it back.

Some of the more observant of you might notice that this picture is not in fact of Laura. I try and keep switching the people I take pictures of to keep you guys interested, and also, I sat next to her the entire night and didn't want to disturb anyone by moving to take pictures. So instead, here is Kendra and Pawel...I entitle this 'Pawel attempts a flirtation, Kendra is unimpressed'. It is one of those photographs that just makes me smile, even though it might not be the best of qualities, and they are usually a lot more giggly than that I have to point out! Taken in Abracadabra...a pretty fabby pizza place in the centre of Caen. As well as having "normal" flavours, you will also find salmon, potato, cream, and lemons on a pizza (mine!), or a curry, or various other yummy flavours. After this we went to our favourite haunt, Le Vertigo for a final farewell drink. It was so strange actually, as I couldn't quite fix it in my head that I would not be seeing Laura for the foreseeable future. When she left to go home I was trying my best not to cry and I pretty much managed it. It was also Pierre's birthday, so after Laura left Thomas and I joined him and Flavie for a few drinks...and also joined Simon, Galouche, Nicolas, Thibaud, Gaëtan and some other ERASMUS for the evening. The evening was already late, so soon the bar was closing so we headed to l'Ecume de Nuits. Before that, however, Simon and I headed to his so I could finally reclaim my lost phone, and it still works; la chance! After l'Ecume de Nuits a few of us ended up at a really fancy apartment overlooking Saint-Pierre...one of those moments where you walk into somewhere and immediately feel jealous and want to live there too! God knows what time we all got to bed, but was a really entertaining night either way!

So, what about my day? Well, as normal, masses of lessons. No idea how I managed the entire night to be honest, I think I was just so tired that adrenaline took over! My day started with the normal sixième, and as normal, I was not too enthused about wanting to teach them. However, some of them are really rather lovely, and really wanting to work...it is a shame that they are outnumbered by those who don't. These were followed by my favourite class, the troisième INTER, and today we were talking about the Russian Revolution and the League of Nations. Heavy stuff for fourteen and fifteen year olds I know, let alone in English! However, as ever, a joy to work with. The cinquième INTER were knackered when I worked with them, you could just tell from their faces...so I made a split decision and changed my quite challenging lesson on 'Top Gear: Bond Car Special' (where they had to note the facts and figures of cars, and films, and various other things) to one where they just had to watch the programme and tell me what they thought of it. They looked really glad of the break to be honest with you! In complete contrast the troisième EURO club and class was more than up for working. In the club we talked about British music (well, Anglo music found in Britain!), and I showed them a few artists that they would probably not and hadn't heard of...OK Go, Spring Offensive, Jose Vanders, Frank Turner, Kings of Convenience to name but a few. They all wrote down the names of the bands I had shown them, so I can only guess they liked them! The full class (after my club) were working on short stories. They had to write their own story in less than fifty words and then record it complete with a slideshow and music. They all came to me to help them correct their work and work on their pronunciation with them. All French people have the same problems when trying to pronounce English...when "h"s are needed, they can't say them and when they are not needed, they say them; "th" is pretty much impossible for them to say, along with the "stz" sound; a hard "ch" is also a bit of a sticky subject and finally "knife" definitely had a "k"! However, all in all, I was more than impressed...this is probably the other class that I most look forward to teaching. My final lesson of the day was with the sixième INTER and we watched the first half of 'The Golden Compass', complete with worksheet of course...I really hope the film inspires one of them to actually read the book because in my opinion they are so much better than the film!