And the teaching continues

Last week I started teaching a three year old English. I was a little unsure if she was going to be interested or not, but she seems to enjoy it. I'm using a book that came with a CD. After two lessons, she knows a few animals and likes to say 'What a noise in the zoo!' Hopefully some of this will stick even after I've left the country....

Spain pics

We stayed here one night. Not bad for a view!
This is a big chuch in Barcelona. It's been under construction since 18something and it's architect (Gaudi) was runover by a tramway in 1920 somethingafter having been on it for forty years. They're still working on it!
This is Barcelona's Arc de Triomf. It makes a great hat.
Laurent immitating the flamenco dancers we just saw.
Me on a bike in Barcelona. Aren't I pretty?

Vroom vroom!

Just got back from a little vacation in an RV. We spent a couple beautiful days in Bordeaux, but it was a holiday so none of the trams were running. This was very convenient as we could take the bicycles through the city on the tramway without having to worry about traffic or pedestrians. After Bordeaux, stayed in Foix and saw an enormous old castle. It was preserved extremely well, not at all in ruins even though the first foundation stones were laid sometime in the 11th century. I wondered how this could be, but it turned out that this castle was never attacked. It cost tons of money and time but it was never used. Haha!

After Foix, we went to Andorra. It is a tiny little country in the Pyrenees. The lanscape is so rugged it was easy to see why neither France or Spain wanted it! Let the Andorrans dig themselves out the avalanches! It's a good place to go to stamp a passport because it is not a part of the Schengeun States. That was handy for me, even though all I got was tourist stamp, so I doubt it will count as valid. Hopefully I don't get deported. We also bought gas for about 40 cents less per liter (this is a BIG difference, what, a euro fifty per gallon?) We left Andorra on the Spain side which was good because Laurent had bought tons of tax free cigarettes in Andorra and wanted to avoid French custums. He plans on reselling them in France . In Andorra it was fifteen euros per carton while in France it's fifty. OUCH!

Soon we were in Barcelona where we toured a bit on our bicycles. The highlight was definately the Flaminco dancers! We didn't spend time on the beach as we had planned because it was RAINY. We headed a little north where I saw the Salvador Dali museum. It was amazing to see the diversity of his talents, but I was a little disappointed when I realized many of his most famous works (or at least many of the ones I'm familiar with) weren't there. But never fear, there were plenty of melting clocks. Unfortunately, Laurent got kind of sick and he wanted to come home, and with the rain it made sense. So, here I am back in Capbreton where there isn't a cloud in the sky! Not too shabby!

Andrew's here!!

Found him!!

We spent some time in Paris and now we're in Capbreton. It's really nice to have him here. AND he's eaten things. Everything's pretty much been some variety of ham and cheese for him, but hey, he's found something. And the hamburgers are edible!

We got some good pictures in Paris, so he'll be putting those up when he gets home. Yay!

la sncf == sorry andrew

carolyn's train is delayed at list two hours
if you read this, buy a calling card and call me

temps de merde, quoi!

Everybody's been cooped up inside the past couple days as the sky has mercilessly hammered the region with wind and rain. Not a big fan. Andrew is coming soon, and, by the way, eight AM is not a convenient time for me to be in Paris!!!!! I'm thinking I might make him get on a train and meet me in Bordeaux and then we'll have our Paris adventure at the end of the week instead of the beginning. I wonder what he thinks of that....

100 days before the Bac...

This is my last day at school, but it is definately eclipsed by the fact that the seniors are all dressed up....as chickens, Native Americans, candy bars, Robin Hood, n'importe quoi. 100 days from now they will take the big test that determines whether or not they have the future they want or not. It's kind of the equivalent of the ACT/SATs, except everyone takes one form or another of it and it decides whether or not they graduate high school. If they don't pass this test, many of them will come back for a second year senoir year or they will not have the option to pursue certain tracts of higher learning. Sooooo, this is kind of the last day for the next hundred days that they get to play around, supposedly now the studying begins.

I've got to clean the apartment today before 3:30, That's what, a good five and a half hours from now? I should be fine. Maybe.