To the extent that it's absurd

News! Yaar!

2006-07-06T19:13:00.000-07:00

So, not posting in a long, long time has made some of my friends grumpy, notably those who waste all of their time on the internet blogging about how they blog all of the time (Mike, I do love you). Here's the scoop: I have not blogged in a long time because I've been too busy and/or lazy to do so. I plan, however, to start doing more writing soon. Until I get some time off next week, I doubt this will happen, but to throw out an electronic scrap of news to all of my friends, here's a Farisian list of things I have been up to:

1. Came back to U.S. from France and visited Jon Meier in Chicago. Ate good vegan food with him and had the excellent and inspiring conversation that makes our friendship so strong.

2. Visited family in Sioux Falls for a whole day before coming to Ames, Iowa.

3. I've been working at a place called the Flying Burrito, making and delivering burritos the size of your head (not mine), and also working at the Gyro stand. Both jobs are awesome, though lately I've been spending too much time at each.

4. Went to Fort Collins Colorado and hiked and drank beer with all of the Gyro crew. It was great fun.

5. Finally got a girlfriend that rocks.

This is pretty basic, but it covers mostly what I've been up to. More to come soon!

Just to piss off Mike

2006-04-28T10:20:00.000-07:00

In the interest of making Mike even more jealous, I ask you this:
Should I see The Cardigans, or The Buzzcocks on Sunday. In Prague. Sucka. It is either eight grade nostalgia feeding, or punk-influence bathing. Vote, though I will probably end up at the Buzzcocks.

The Toasters in Köln

2006-04-27T01:53:00.000-07:00

Well, the last few days have utterly rocked. The first night I got here we went out drinking, and my friends being German, they basically drank me under the table. I wasn't too hungover on Tuesday, but we did get up pretty late...
I mostly walked around Köln the last couple of days, seeing what there is to see and taking in Germany. It's a lot like France, only with less dog shit. And the people speak English, in general, much better (probably because the accent is easier for them).
Tuesday night we saw a live blues concert at this bar in the town where Bayer, the aspirin, is based. It's one of those crappy little towns that depend almost entirely on the company that is based there for absolutely everything. After the concert we came back home and watched, "Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei" which means, roughly, The Fat Years are Over (fat as in plentiful, not obese). You must see this film. The basic premise is three young people, in the spirit of the youth rebellions of 1968, breaking into über-rich people's homes and rearranging their furniture, leaving a note that says either, "The fat years are over", or,"You have too much money", signing it with, "The Edukators". There are some excellent discussions within the movie about the commodification of counterculture, which is something I've been thinking about recently, and resistance against the fetishization of capitalism. I will be burning a copy for viewing in the U.S.
Last night I got to see The Toasters, an NYC ska band, in Köln. I skanked an almost unreasonable length of time, and was very, very tired afterward. I must say that the Germans know how to skank better than the French by a longshot. I also think I was the only American in the crowd, which made me feel "special".
Today I'm going to the Ludwig Museum and up to the top of the cathedral in Köln, and then tomorrow it's off to Prague for a week to do, er, something?

I'm in Germany

2006-04-24T08:28:00.000-07:00

Ha! I'm in Germany. And it RULES!

Toys R Us Kid

2006-04-19T21:37:00.000-07:00

It's 6:34 in the morning here, and I cannot sleep worth anything. I've been up since five. Last night I cooked dinner for my mom and her friend where they are staying at my friend's apartment. We drank four bottles of wine between the three of us, so you'd think I would have slept well. But no. So now I am looking through all of the blogs of my friends, and have come to discover that Kathleen is getting married, which is awesome. Also, her brother and his wife are having a baby.
A part of me feels really, really old when I hear these things. Everyone I know is getting, like, real jobs, houses, and spouses and kids are popping out everywhere. At the same time, I feel extremely young and immature because I myself don't even have a girlfriend or crush, a job that pays much more than what one would make at McDonald's, a car (not that I'd want one...) or health insurance. I considered paying 20 euros the other day for the shoes that I desperately needed a major purchase decision (the composition of the others was beginning to lean too much towards epoxy and bike tire to render them remotely water resistant). I guess you could call my lifestyle bohemian, and make it all romantical sounding, but it's really just a function of being absolutely free and mostly poor. Walking around the Louvre the other day, or having a picnic on a windy hill overlooking Rouen, I realized that I wouldn't trade any of it for the security/comfort of a house or a car or marriage. I'm fine with living my life the way I do, and feel no pressure to change it. It's nice to be able to say, "I'm going to Prague, and I don't know what I'm going to do there for a week, but I will sure as hell enjoy it." I have no dogs or children (not that I see them as the same amount of responsibility, mind you) to pawn off on someone to take care of, no house that needs watching or plants that need watering, no significant other to placate. So, really, I haven't grown up in many senses of the word, like "Having Responsibilities". But why would you want that, anyway? Now, after having written this blathering nonsense, I'm tired. If the walk home wakes me up, a bike ride is in order. If not, I'll just crash in my bed.

I can't think of much to write

2006-04-14T23:36:00.000-07:00

I don't really know why I'm posting, actually. I have nothing to say, except that I'll see my mom for the first time in about seven months later this afternoon in Paris. My last Friday night here involved me doing laundry and going out for one beer in the cheapest bar in town. My friend Anne and I dug around in some old clothes to see if any were wearable that were in a box on the sidewalk and got heckled by the rowdy crowd in the kebap restaurant across the street.

As for the biking 2000km, well, that's probably out. I've been spending a lot of time saying goodbyes and getting crap ready for travelling the next month, so my riding time has been very little. Also, the weather has been on and off raining for awhile, so that doesn't help. The Camus will be done, I swear.

I recently read Ian McKewan's "Enduring Love", and despite the cheesy title it's fantastic. You could call it a study in the psychology of obsession and love, but it's more than that. I found that he fused philosophy, science and literature in the style of Huxley, but also brought to bear that ancient argument of objective vs. subjective, or reason vs. emotion. His writing is page-turning in the sense that he writes suspense very well. Not the overarching suspense of a detective novel, but the short-burst suspense of a thriller. I often would try to read as fast as I could in some scenes to get to the result of a tense moment, which is something that is difficult to find in writing. I'll maybe review this and other books better at a later date.

Off to my last class. I think I will slack off and play hangmand or something all hour, as I "can't be bothered" to teach something difficult and energy-consuming on a Saturday morning during my last class.

Coming and Going

2006-04-14T01:26:00.000-07:00

Today is my last real day of teaching. I have five consecutive hours of Jeopardy, Clothes Bingo and watching the Brief History of the United States cartoon from Bowling for Columbine. It should be great. Tomorrow I have one hour in the morning where I still don't know what I will do with the kids (probably play games like hangman or something).
It still hasn't hit me that I'm leaving quite yet. Maybe because I'll still be around for another week or so giving my mother and her three friends a tour of Normandy. Then it's off to Köln for four days and then to Prague for a week. After that I'll be back here, then to Chicago via Dublin, then to Minneapolis, then to Sioux Falls and finally Ames, where I will hopefully make some money to compensate for all of this travel. That said, don't expect too many posts in the next month or so, since all of my internet access will be through cafés and the like.
If all works out well, I should be here again next year, so it's more like I'm going on a five month vacation and returning, really. I haven't started to get all nostalgic and sentimental about Le Havre and France, but I expect to. Probably when I'm in Chicago.

Camus and 2000 Kilometers

2006-04-05T05:11:00.000-07:00

I have two goals before I leave here:
1. Exceed 2000 kilometers on the bike that I'm riding (currently at 1350)
2. Finish "L'exile et le royaume" by Albert Camus

I hope I can do both.

Gyros, gyros, gyros

2006-04-05T04:58:00.000-07:00

I have been anxiously awaiting news about a possible job opportunity with a bicycle touring company for the past few weeks. Well, yesterday I recieved news that they do, in fact, want to "hire" me. Notice those quotes around the word hire in the last sentence? Those quotes mean that they do want me to work for them, but don't really want to "pay" me. I would be able to ride and work for them, but they would only pay for my food and lodging and travel expenses, nothing more. Now, if I had, say, 1,000 dollars in my pocket right now, I could swing that. All I would have to cover outside of the tour would be my student loans. But I do not, in fact, have 1,000 dollars. Or any money to speak of, really, that would allow me to work without being paid and then come back to this rather low-paying job. So, it will be back to Ames, IA and the Gyro stand for me.

Part of me is excited to go back to Ames, see old friends, and work at the stand again. I'll also be moving back into my old apartment as well, which is handy. It was never a choice between a good job that I enjoy and a "fallback" one. I had seriously considered not even applying for other things and just working at the stand in the first place. But it would have been nice to do something different, meet new challenges and learn new skills, as well as get paid to ride my bike. Ah, well, maybe next summer. I look forward to busting my ass again at late, late hours and drinking the acrid nectar that is Pabst Blue Ribbon at 6am while the sun comes up. I might also be able to deliver burritos on my bike for another company, which would kick not a little ass, and help me get a few more kilometers under my belt this year.

My school is blocked

2006-03-30T22:54:00.000-08:00

I woke up again today to someone screaming over a loudspeaker in French at 7:30am. I looked out my window into the grey morning with a groggy head and saw that the gate to my school was still closed. And there's a big sheet with writing on it hanging over it. And all of the students were on the side of the gate that is on the street, not revving their mopeds and making out inside like they normally do.

I came in early to check emails and such, entering through the back door like normal. All of the professors, instead of teaching in their classes, were in the staffroom drinking coffee. We can get in and out of the school, just not through the front gate where all of the students come in.

This comes after Tuesday's mass strike and protest, where at least 10,000 people marched in the streets in Le Havre alone. The blockage today is in response to the Constitutional Council's upholding of the CPE yesterday. It went to a vote there, and they gave an "unqualified decision" to retain the law. You can read the newest English article about it here. Opponents of the law had hoped that the council would overturn the law, but now that it has been upheld, there will be more strikes and blockages.

Also check out this article in the Guardian that draws parallels and distinctions between the current strikes and the revolution in 1968. It's quite good and also covers the impact these events have in lieu of the riots in November.

In the interest of balance, here is an article in Slate that paints a not-so-flattering portrait of a protest in Paris while still being nuanced enough to differentiate the violent protesters from the peaceful ones. Intererestingly enough, the author wrote one of my favorite books of all time, Bare, about the stripping/sex entertainment industry.

I would also like to take this opportunity to say that the current protests and demonstrations are not, as the American media complex would have you believe, riots. They are not solely kids throwing bricks through windows and burning things. Much of the demonstrating has been peaceful, and to characterize this movement as solely one of whiny, dispossessed and lazy children taking an opportunity to vent frustration is false. There are opportunists and violent people that ruin the peaceful nature of protests, and of the world for that matter. Because one person in a demonstration swings a bat or throws a rock does not mean that an entire generation of people is "violent", or that the entire protest can be deemed a riot. This issue is complicated, like everything else in this world, and slanted bias and misrepresentation do nothing to help one understand the reasons behind it.

Whitman on the Beach

2006-03-29T06:03:00.000-08:00

After yesterday, today couldn't be anything but better. I went to the beach and the bright sun to read some of "Leaves of Grass", which is definitely all it is cracked up to be. Generally when something from the literary canon is so hyped up it is somewhat of a letdown for me, but this is not the case with good ol' Walt. Here's something that cheered me up today from "Song of Myself"

Trippers and askers surround me,
People I meet....the effect upon me of my early life....of the
ward and city I live in....of the nation,
The latest news....discoveries, inventions, societies....authors
old and new,
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, business, compliments, dues,
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,
The sickness of one of my folks -- or of myself....or ill-doing....
or loss or lack of money....or depressions or exaltations,
They come to me days and nights and go from me again,
But they are not the Me myself.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,
Looks down, is erect, bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,
Looks with its sidecurved head curious what will come next,
Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with
linguists and contenders,
I have no mockings or arguments....I witness and wait.

Needless to say, I feel better. Thanks to all of those who gave me compliments and emailed me. It's good to know you have friends. And someone hasn't pissed in your bed.

Crappy, crappy day

2006-03-28T07:46:00.000-08:00

So today has just plain sucked. Period. I don't think elaborating will sound anything less than whining, but whine I shall. Got up in a foul mood in the first place, and even though I didn't have class this morning, I was still pissed off because I didn't get paid, and there is no news of my possible job yet.

It being the first nice day we've had in awhile as far is the weather is concerned, I thought I might go for a lovely bike ride. The other day, just when I got my bike working perfectly, a spoke on the brand new back wheel broke. So this morning I fixed it, also discovering that the cassette is making a grinding noise when the freewheel is engaged, and that the tire and rim are, after close inspection, tubeless. This means instead of a tube inside the tire, the tire is just one big, thick tube that is glued to the rim and more expensive/a hassle to replace if you put a hole in it. This is my own damn fault and I kicked myself for it, but changed out the spoke anyway and decided to just ride.

When I ride, normally, it takes everything that is wrong with the world and makes me forget it. Biking is my salvation. Today, though, after fixing a spoke on the back wheel and riding down to the beach, I broke yet another spoke on the fucking front wheel. Yes, another one. Riding along at a slow pace. That's two in two days. Why the hell can my bike not just work like it's supposed to? When the thing you use to relieve all of the stress and problems in your life is a constant source of consternation, what do you do then?

On top of it I feel all emo and alone and ugly. It is one of those days where I look in the mirror and see something resembling a monkey more than a human being. Not one of those more simian chimpanzees, but rather an organgutan that is considered ugly even by other orangutans.

Usually when I feel bad about what happens to me and who I am, I try to reflect on the problems other people have in the world that are worse than mine. Like poverty and motherless children and people with cancer and such. Today, it hasn't helped. At all. Nothing has. Or will, seemingly. It's just made me feel guilty that I'm not happy being well-fed, American and privileged. The only midly bright thing that happened today was that there was a couple of good lines I found in Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass". I might post them tomorrow when I'm feeling less sorry for myself.

Same old story

2006-03-24T23:44:00.000-08:00

So, my computer is broken. As in broken broken. As in the Logic Board or Motherboard or Carte Mère is completely fried, cassé, whatever. It would cost 1000 euros to fix, which is more than a month's salary for me, and about 1000 times as much money as I currently have. So that's not an option. I suppose this means I should get a new computer, one with Apple Care that takes care of these problems for free (Well, not free, but not 1000 euros either). I dunno what I shall do. I can't write on it now, or access any of my journals for the past few years, or, and this is the worst part, listen to my music. At all. It's somewhat scary to see how dependent I've become on my computer. In a way, though, it has been my radio and newspaper and emotional outlet and alarm clock my entire time here. I don't have a television or a radio, so I downloaded podcasts and listened to my music. I played DVDs on it, too. Sigh.

The bike, though, is rolling. The new wheel I bought that the cassette broke off of? I got the cassette replaced. And then discovered that it sucked, and was not replaced properly. When I went to the store they were having a sale outside of used bikes and bike parts. I found a sweet Mavic wheel with cassette and tire and tube for only 25 euros, so I sucked up and bought it and now it works marvelously, doesn't skip gears when I don't want it to, and is much lighter. I've ridden 50km every day since Wednesday because it's been both nice and my bike has worked, an alignment of the planets that hasn't occurred in quite awhile. You win some and lose some, I suppose. I think I've generally lost (money, time, effort, computer), but at least I can ride my damn bike.

Burning things in the streets.

2006-03-21T02:44:00.000-08:00

I remember my French classes with Jean-Pierre in college, and how when they raised tuition at our school by a whopping 18%, he said, "In France, the students wouldn't allow something like this to happen. They would be burning things in the streets!", referring to that revolutionary (or whiny, depending on how you look at it) that the French are known for.

It's all true. I got here, and there was a bunch of car burnings. And now, the students are blocking schools and there are demonstrations of thousands of people in response to a law that has been passed and is unjust for the youth of this country. I joined the demonstration in Le Havre Friday with 7,000 other Havrais, and we filled every major street in this town with people, banners, singing, and discontent over the way the government is trying to hose over young people. It was rad. France just appeals to my radical nature, I suppose, and I enjoy the healthy democracy they got going on here.

Despite what you hear in the American news, about 99% of the demonstrations have been nonviolent and peaceful. The few that did turn violent were in Paris, and there was at least one instance where the violence was instigated by people attacking the demonstrators, not the demonstrators attacking people. So no, there are no "riots" here, but people excercising their right to tell their government when they are opposed to an act perpetrated by said government.

Why did I join in, not being a French citizen and all? Well, I am opposed to the CPE. I see it as a way for Villepin to gain favor in the private business sector. Even if he were doing it solely to make France more competetive on a global market level, lowering the bargaining rights and means of recourse for young workers is not a way to go about it.

Currently, Europe is attempting to maintain a balance between the extraordinary amount of social benefits its citizens have acquired and being competetive and productive with other nations in terms of job creation and economy. This is a difficult thing to do, I understand, and there may be sacrifices that have to be made. However, screwing over young people in their first real job and making them pretty much disposable during their first two years is not the way to go about it. I went to the demonstration because I don't think me going on strike will do much, and I feel that by not acting in accordance with my beliefs I am saying to my students, "I don't care about your future because I'm not a citizen of your country, and even though my place here is to educate you so that you can go into the world and make it better, or at the least find a job, I refuse to do something myself to counter something that will hinder your chances."

Blue St. Patrick's Day

2006-03-21T02:32:00.000-08:00

I don't want this space to become somewhere where I whine about how lonely I am, but Friday, the day of St. Patrick and green beer, served to highlight this fact for me and push me further into the emo idea that I will die and old man, alone with my bicycles.

I went to a concert of Irish music at this cool space called L'Agora with a whole bunch of friends. We had a few beers and just kinda hung out. I met this French girl who I'd seen a few nights before and we started chatting, etc. She was cute and kinda flirty and I thought "Finally, if nothing else, I am getting a goddamn groove on." So, I go to the bathroom for the normal amount of time it takes a man to pee, and when I returned she had her tongue down some random guy's throat. It blew me away and made me realize that I was in fact not getting my groove on at all, but somehow doing something completely opposite of said action without my knowledge. I wasn't angry though, or even very surprised. I somehow knew that something like this would happen, and was resigned to the fact that this is yet another manifestion of bad luck with women that has lasted a year.

So, instead of moping or whining, I danced the rest of the night away to Irish music with a bunch of French people. At the very least, I think this is the most memorable St. Patrick's day I've had.

In defense of moshing

2006-03-21T01:42:00.000-08:00

Last Wednesday, I went to a concert of the punk variety. While there, I got to mosh like I have not been able to do for a long time. It was awesome, the three or four other stinky punks with mohawks shoving me around. It got me thinking about why we mosh, and how it's different than other types of dancing.

Some see it as purely an opportunity to push others around or relase anger and violence, but that's not what moshing is truly about. Believe it or not, it's about community and expression. Granted, there are those that go into a pit to hurt others, but they are the exception rather than the rule. There's has always been an asshole that comes along and screws up stuff for other people, and there always will be. We live with that and deal. But for the most part, a mosh pit is a place of community. When someone falls, you help them up. When they lose their glasses or a shoe, you stop dancing for a minute and help them find it. Even in some of the roughest pits I've been in (at a Casualties show, for instance), where I got a few bruises and scrapes, the underlying nature was that of understanding and compassion.

That said, I don't know if one could posit that a mosh pit is a place of peace. It's not. But I wouldn't call it violence either. Rather, active simultaneous expression. Everybody dances at the same time, very close to each other, and a bit of shoving and pushing is what eventually happens. When you shove somebody in a pit it's not to hurt them, as the next instant you'll find yourself arm in arm dancing together. Maybe it is some sort of deep-seated animalistic expression of aggression, but aggression can't be equated with violence in this case. Violence assumes intention of malice, and the shoving, kicking, and pushing in a mosh pit aren't directed at anyone in particular, are a release of a more general sort of aggression and frustration purely for the sake of release.

How does this expression of normally latent aggression culminate in a community? Simple. A mosh pit is a place of expression created by its members, a place where competition and judgement aren't central. If you were to dance by yourself and bump into others who were judging you for your actions, this would be looked down upon. In addition, it's not a competition. You can't really dance "better" or "worse" to punk music. There is no standard template or manual containing different moves that one adheres to or mimics. I've see people do the craziest moves or silliest things, but nobody really cares what you are doing. It's not about seeing yourself in comparison to what other people are doing, but doing what you want for yourself. So, a space is created in which all who participate or enter aren't seen as stupid, macho, etc. but just another member of a group of individuals seeking free, uninhibited expression of the kinesthetic actions they feel called to do by the music.

Why punk music motivates individuals to express themselves in this manner is something I can't answer empirically. I know that when I'm at a concert and there's ska or punk radiating from the stage, and I just feel like doing it and know it's fun. My body moves in the way it does independent of some rational urge to make it do so. It's not so much a rejection of rationality as it is a dissociation between physical expression and intellectual analysis. Moreover, I feel I can mosh as a pacifist because, as I said, the overall aim is not, in fact, violence, but more humbly a physical movement and interaction with others that is mutually understood to be free from malice, competition, and criticism.

More CPE coverage than I thought.

2006-03-18T02:34:00.000-08:00

So, English newspapers are covering the strikes and protests here after all. Here are some links:

International Herald Tribune

The Guardian

The Guardian, again.

From the Greve Front

2006-03-17T05:28:00.000-08:00

Right, so I watched the last hour of "Bend it Like Beckham" with my Premiere students because there was only three of them from my group that showed up. We went with the rest of the students, combined with others from another class, to the teacher's classroom and I got paid to sit and watch a movie in English.

Here's a translation I made of this article from Le Monde describing what's happening:

Hundreds of thousands of youth march against the CPE

The youth mobilised against the CPE have maintained pressure on the government, this Thursday, March 16th, through dozens of manifestations that have brought together 247,500 to 500,000 people, according to our sources, but have occasionally been followed by violent incidents, particularly in the Latin Quarter in Paris.

By way of comparison, at the time of the first large days of mobilisation against the First Job Contract (CPE) – presented by the Prime Minister exactly two months ago – between 218,000 and 400,000 people marched February 7th, and between 396,000 according to the police and 1 million according to the CGT March 7th. But these mobilisations were comprised of both students and workers.

Faced by this mobilisation, Dominique de Villepin declared himself “open to dialogue” within the framework of the law to better the provisions of the CPE, and has indicated that he would receive the presidents of the universities on Friday.

On the national level, the mobilisations against the CPE have often been large: 25,000 people in Bourdeaux according to organizers (6,800 according to police reports), 15,000 in Marseilles (7,000), 12?000 in Lille (6,500), 10,000 in Clermont-Ferrand (4,000) and in Angers (4,200), 8,000 in Lyon (5,000).

Gérard Aschieri, secretary general of the FSU, Principle Federation of Education, and the president of Unef, the United Federation of Students, Bruno Julliard, have found the same words to hail “a real tidal wave of youth.”

Strikes, strikes, and broken bikes

2006-03-17T02:28:00.000-08:00

Again with the strikes! Yesterday I had one class, with 7 of 12 students showing. We actually did something productive. The other ones, though, didn't really happen. One class was with the professor, so I didn't have to go. In the other, three of 14 students came. I asked what they wanted to do, and they were excited to stay for the whole hour. So we played hangman and gave each other engigmas to solve on the board, then chatted about music for ten minutes. It was quite enjoyable.

Last night, while talking to that Farisian Mr. Faris, I saw from where I was across the street from the school students hopping the gate, and entering the school. It closes at 7pm, and this was about 7:30 or so. Then a whole bunch of police arrived. After they rounded up all of the students that entered the school and put them outside the gate, they started chanting and singing in front of the gates, holding up lighters in the waning evening light.

This morning, they blocked the school. I entered from the back door like I normally do, but it's locked so I had to wait for someone from the inside to open it for me. They are still out there now, being pretty peaceful but very loud. Apparently, some of the demonstrations in Paris have turned violent. If you don't read French, I'll translate this article later today and post it here. It seems as if the Prime Minister might go into negotiations to change the CPE, which is at least something. I'm sure I'll have time in my empty classrooms this afternoon to make a translation.

In bike news, the brand spanking new wheel and cassette I bought Wednesday broke today. The cassette plain fell of the wheel. Blah. It's the damn mechanic's fault, but that doesn't make it any easier to get all the way the hell out to the store where I bought it to get it fixed. Stuff breaks I suppose, or to wildly misuse the title of a book that has nothing to do with bikes, "Things Fall Apart".

To do lists.

2006-03-16T03:23:00.000-08:00

In the Farisian style, I have decided to post a to-do list for the coming days. I don't expect this to become something regular, but I thought I would try it since it seems to work for Mr. Faris. At least he occasionally gets something done, unlike myself.

Thursday, March 16th
~~1. Finish lesson plans~~
2. Start translation from Le Monde Diplomatique for Mon.
~~3. Pay student loans.~~
4. Call Cycle America and see if they want to hire me.
~~5. Sketch out next issue of This Plane is Definitely Crashing~~
~~6. Finish article for Life in Every Word on Dadaism and start article on Eyeless in Gaza~~
~~7. Decide where to go on vacation in April/May and start finding tickets.~~

Friday the 17th
~~1. Get up early and ride in the forest~~
~~2. Work on article translation~~
~~3. Buy candy for Premiere at noon~~
~~4. Teach~~
5. Finish Eyeless in Gaza article and begin Travesties article.
~~6. Enjoy a night of carousing for St. Patrick's Day~~

Saturday the 18th
1. Go to class and teach if students are not on strike and school is not blocked (Yes, this is entirely possible).
2. Start writing This Plane is Definitely Crashing
3. Finish article on Travesties and start on Galileo
4. Finish article translation for Monday.
5. Pick up International Herald Tribune at the train station.
6. Email some friends
7. Go see Les Terribles at the beach.

Sunday the 19th
1. Get up and ride with Jean if weather is good
2. Adjust deraileur on bike
3. Finish IHT
4. Finish rough draft of This Plane is Definitely Crashing
5. Finish and touch up all articles for Life in Every Word

the bike lives; the computer does not.

2006-03-15T07:55:00.000-08:00

I had to break down and get a new wheel for my bike. I couldn't track down hub bearings and cones that would fit. But it rolls really, really nice now. As for the computer, well, the man at the Apple Store said, "Il est malade." I might get it back sometime soon.

As you may notice, I've changed the sidebar links to demarcate blogs from news and comics. Also, I've added a few more links. Check out Kasia's Art, Katie's Blog and Dan's Livejournal. Chelsea mentioned me in her blog yesterday, so to be cool I'll link back to her. Wow, I am now cross-linking things. This fire of hell just keeps getting hotter and hotter.

Dirty Atheists

2006-03-14T02:51:00.000-08:00

Here's a link to an opinion column about atheism in Europe. Not too bad for being so short.

Drinking With Students

2006-03-14T02:15:00.000-08:00

On Saturday night, I went out to a couple of bars with the German assistant, Mirja, and an English assistant from another school, Lucy. First we hung out at a cool bar I've never been too, called the Camp Gouru (supposed to be a play on words, sounds like Kangaroo and has an Aussie theme). They played good music, like Bad Religion, System of a Down, Manu Chao and such. There were also young people there, and not young like my students young, but young like me young. After chilling there we went to another, called the Batonga.

Upon walking in I noticed a group of seven of my Terminale students (equivalent to seniors in high school). They invited me to sit down with them. We had a few beers with them while talking in French the whole time. I think they loved being able to teach me some verlangue (slang in which you inverse the way a word is pronounced - for example, merci becomes ci-mer, etc) and listening to me struggle with conjugating verbs as they do in English. They are all bright, mature kids for being 18 and we had a lot of discussions about French politics (especially the CPE I wrote about below), American pop culture and a teacher at Lycée Claude Monet that all the girls have a crush on.

It was odd at first to be downing a Heineken with these people that I normally see in a purely professional manner. I myself have always been a bit chummy with my professors and teachers, and regularly had a cup of coffee with them or went over to their house for dinner even while being graded by them in a class. I had never envisioned myself on the other side, though, being the person that the kids were bashful of mentioning drug use or sex in front of. The lines of authority we draw between teachers and students, adults and children exist outside the institutions which give them power. Students tend to dehumanize their teachers because they only see them in a classroom for a short amount of time each day. The teacher also has the role of making the students learn, whether either party wants to do so that day or not. This makes it such that the teacher is seen not as someone with fears, feelings, and possibly a screwed up life outside the classroom, but an authoritative figure to be a bit feared and respected.

As an assistant, I'm somewhere in the middle. I don't have the power of grading any of the students, nor the knowledge of their language sufficient enough to comprend entirely what's going on all the time in class. They do have a certain amount of respect for me because they think I'm funny and the things I teach are usually interesting on the level of pop culture or singular ideas from a country they revere and mimic. Thus, I think they invited me over to get to know me better, to try and dissolve that line between us. I am more than willing to do so, but realize that I can never truly be their good friend as long as I am an employee of their school. They invited me to come along to the house of one of the students, at 1am, while his parents were out of town and everybody in the group had told their parents, "Yeah, it's cool with S-----'s parents if I stay the night at his house." I decided it would be a bad idea if something were to happen and two of the assistants were at a student's house without or against the permission of his parents. So here the line again became evident.

Yet, at the same time, another student of mine, whom I no longer have because the class had to get exposure to the English assistant's accent, sent me a song he wrote in English to correct. This student was always telling me about concerts going on in Le Havre, cool things to do in Poland, etc. The song he sent is very personal and angsty, has some bad words and is something I would expect from a boy of 15 experiencing the first throes of woe and passion that come with puberty and meeting that alien species commonly known as girls. I feel honored in many respects that he chose to let me see it and, above all, critique the grammar of it. It tells me that he trusts me not to judge him for his feelings - which I don't - and not find fault in the way that he expresses himself. So again, the line dissolves, I am not just a teacher but someone in which to confide and trust on a deeply personal level.

Nipple in French is mamelon

2006-03-14T01:28:00.000-08:00

In the tune of fixing things from an earlier post, I have to fix my bike. Again. For, like, the third time. I broke a few spokes on my ancient wheels over the past few months, and have been stealing some from an abandoned bike in the basement of my building to replace them. On my back wheel, which I had a local bike collective replace a spoke on, the hub is absolutely shot. I did not think, at first, that this was the problem however. See, on the way to take my broken computer to the Apple store here, my bike decided to fall in line with the rest of the oft-used material objects in my life and work in such a way that is not satisfactory. My back wheel started making this horrible grinding noise and wobbling a bit. I rode on it for awhile to see what the problem was, and ended up deciding to take a closer look when I got home.

Upon inspection, I diagnosed the problem as some of the eyelets from the spoke nipples being torn out or loose, thus letting the spokes shift inside the rim when I rode. I tried tightening the spoke tension and truing the wheel a bit better, but this did nothing, really. Thus, I thought it would be necessary to buy a new wheel. If I were in America, I could easily explain the problem to any mechanic and ask for what I want as if I were a professional mechanic. I am in France, though, and sadly do not know many of the words necessary, like nipple, eyelet, it's completely fucked, etc. I looked up a few, and decided I could crudely get the point across that I wanted a new wheel but not a new cassette, and that it would need to be dished properly.

I went to the bike collective, and was able to speak to a mechanic. Sadly, I did not understand a single word that this man said, except to joke that I needed a whole new bike. I tried to explain that I wanted to buy a wheel. He said he'd look to see if he had "something like that". "Something like that" turned out to be spoke nipples, which weren't really the problem. At this point, I had decided that he really wasn't too interested in trying to fix my problem, that I couldn't really understand what he was saying, and that they probably don't sell new wheels anyway at the collective. I thanked him for the 5 nipples he gave me for free and set out for home, trying to think of what to do.

Upon arrival at home I took a closer look and discovered that the wheel shifted without the weight of my on it, meaning that it wasn't the spokes at all, but rather the hub. I took it all apart on the floor of my bedroom and soon found that the bearings in the hub, instead of being small little balls, were a mixture of ground metal and grease. The cones were worn too. All told, these parts should cost under 10 euros or so, not the 40 to 50 of a whole new wheel. I had been all excited about getting a wheel that didn't creak or was a bit easier to true, etc, but now that I know I can fix it for less and keep it rolling for 5 more weeks I am determined to fix it myself. Again.

I write about this because it boosted my ego to know that I solved a mechanical problem on a bicycle that a shop mechanic didn't notice or care enough to try and diagnose. This is not to say that I'm a better mechanic than he, but rather took the time and effort to find a solution to a problem, accepting that my first thoughts on the subject were completely incorrect. I could have bought a new wheel at another shop easily (and may still have to - I asked at one and they don't sell hub parts separately, only the complete wheel) and not known the difference, but I learned a lot about how a hub is constructed from taking it apart and seeing what's up.

Also related to this, I recieved an email from this company concerning my application to be a route planner and mechanic over the summer. They were very interested in my application and wanted more information, which I gladly gave them. If all goes well, I should get paid to ride my bike, plan routes and fix bicycles over the summer all across the United States. Rad.

I love the sound of strikes in the morning

2006-03-09T01:26:00.000-08:00

Normally, right now I would be in class teaching cute little 2nd students the names of different articles of clothing. But I'm not. No, it's not that I'm playing hooky, or sick, but because my students are on strike. It looks something like this:

People holding banners.

Some students blocking the entrance to a university in Provence. (Both images copyrighted by Le Monde)

In my first class today, three girls showed up, out of 12 students. We went to the classroom where their teacher is and had an excellent discussion with the other 4 girls from the other half of the class showed up about the strike, privilege and racism in France.

The reason for the strike is something called the CPE, a new law that was passed through the assembly only yesterday. It basically gives young workers in their first job (so people 16 to 22 or so) a two-year tryout period in which their employer can let them go/fire them for little reason, minor mistakes, etc. What it essentially does is gives employers and companies more hiring and firing powers than they previously had. On the flipside, though, it screws over younger people because at the end of that two years when they are about to enter a normal contract with their employer, they could get fired and a new person hired in their stead. I tried to find an article in English on this, but without any luck because it's still too early in the U.S. for anybody to cover it and the Guardian, Independent, and AP don't seem to be covering it. If you read French, Le Monde is covering it pretty well. Once somebody else has more on it I'll post a link to that.

So, as of right now there are 37 universities that have students on strike, out of the 88 public ones in the country. Le Havre university is closed down because of this. The reason I don't have students is because they are out front of the school right now with signs and banners that say "Non à CPE", chanting, singing, etc. In fact, I woke up to "Non non non, à CPE" outside my window.

It's not as if this is only students, either, or just young people. I didn't have class on Tuesday either, because there was a general strike in all public sector jobs against the CPE, so my teacher that day was absent. As Sylvie, my "prof. responsable" explained, "It's easier for the students to continue demonstrating because they don't have jobs. It's cheaper for them, too."

In our discussion today with the students that showed up, all of them disagreed with the consequences of the CPE, yet thought that the protest was ineffective or a "lost cause". This also led to a discussion of whether their generation is spoiled (they all thought so), if they felt privileged (the two girls who had immigrant families were the only ones to say no), and the state of French society as not unified and discriminatory. In other words, it wasn't the most optimistic of conversations. They fear the CPE because it's already difficult for people to find and hold jobs in a country with almost 10% unemployment. They also think that politicians act out of ambition, rather than for the good of French people, and this one reason for the CPE.

It seems odd to me that Dominique de Villepin, the Prime Minister, is pushing this initiative, considering he will be running for President in 14 months. Sylvie explained that he doesn't really stand a chance against the beloved Sarkozy, the same Sarkozy who called people that live in the ghetto "racaille", or scum, back in November when they were burning cars all over the country. Thus, she sees Villepin as a puppet for business interests and a fall guy if this initative tanks. This article explains the strikes on Tuesday and the opposition to Villepin's initiative.

Today has been fruitful in learning about the French social model. You would never, ever see students in High School on strike in the U.S. against employment legislation. It's invigorating to see that these students care and are willing to act to protect their future. The government is passing laws that affect their lives, and they actually care and discuss these issues. Even those that didn't strike were well-informed and thoughtful about the CPE and the workings of their government. It's this willingness to react and fight to preserve or reform the system that they have going on that makes France fun. They're happy about working 35 hours a week, having vacation, good healthcare, etc., but they're also willing to take to the streets or get their pay docked from missing work to protect this.

As a side note, read this article on Imelda Marcos, the widow of the former Phillipine president Ferdinand Marcos. She was the one with all of the shoes and is still absolutely crazy. I want to make a powerpoint presentation about my life and philosophy incorporating Pacman. I heart her.

I was in Rouen yesterday visiting friends and got to watch about 15 min. of French television there. South Dakota made it onto the news because they banned abortion, and they even had an interview with Mike Rounds. Wow. I'm elated my state made the news in France as a conservative proving ground for anti-choice legistlation that may aid in turning back time for women 40 years. And it was just in time for International Women's Day yesterday! What better way to celebrate that, SD, than to take away the rights of women in your state. Way to go!

Fix Shit Up

2006-03-05T23:56:00.000-08:00

I have this pin that says, "Fix Shit Up". I don't wear it that often, really, only when I'm feeling especially surly. I should have worn it yesterday, though, because that's what I spent the entire day doing. I fixed my shoes, which have huge holes in the bottom of them, by gluing/placing cut up pieces of bike tire over the holes. Now when it's wet outside my feet stay dry instead of wet and numb. I got halfway through repairing a hole in the knee of a pair of pants that my mother would have had me throw away a year ago. If you've ever seen me, you know these pants: the ones with the hole in the crotch that I patched up last winter. They are my old gyro stand pants, and even though the grease stains have faded on the top of the thighs and my pen made a huge stain by leaking all over the pocket on New Year's Eve, I love them and am doing triage to keep them alive.

I also sewed a couple of cool patches on my bag. It only had one that my Grandma and I sewed on this summer with her sewing machine. I put a circular patch with a bright yellow hem that says "Bicycles Don't Pollute" in green letters with the o in don't being a big bike wheel. Anne's sister Kate sent this to me from Illinois and it rocks. I also put a patch that has the coat of arms of Normandy on, too, and plan to put one with the Polish flag on, too, as well as the blue patch with "Bicycles Allowed Full Lane" in large white letters I used to have safety-pinned on.

There's something about fixing things that I really, really love. Maybe it's the reward of patience that sewing brings, or the satisfying feeling that instead of spending money on a new thing or taking it to somebody else to repair I've developed skills that I hadn't had before. When we repair something, we also say that it's worth keeping around for awhile instead of throwing away, giving that thing value. And we don't contribute to the waste that is so prevalent in this world.

I wrote in my 'zine that resourcefulness is born out of want. When you need something but have little means to get it, you have to rely on yourself to obtain it rather than simply expending a resource you already have. You have to develop skills, be creative, keep your eyes open to the world for materials or information or people to help you along towards your goal. Being resourceful and sharing ideas and skills creates community as well.

I think back on the skills that I have accrued in the course of fixing things and realize the relationships I've developed because of this. I got to know my Grandma and my friend Lisa better because I wanted to sew stuff with their sewing machines, and they graciously showed me how. I found a cadre of talented, thoughful people at Skunk River Cycles in Ames because I wanted to fix and build my own bikes. This goes back really far into my childhood as well, when my dad showed me how to fix my first flat tire, my grandpa helped me build speaker boxes for my 1980 Chevette and my mom showed me how to cook, clean, garden, and in essence provide for myself in many aspects of life. When we repair things we make ourselves better as well.

Saturdays at school

2006-03-04T02:42:00.000-08:00

This is my first Saturday working at school. They are about to kick me out of the school because it's closing but I just wanted to write that nobody should have to be at a school on a Saturday ever. For any reason at all, even to check their email. It should be internationally banned.

Why can't I blog like Mike I have way more time than him, yet he manages to write so much insightful stuff every single day. Blah. I'm a slacker, and I dig it.

Good writing, bad weather

2006-03-03T07:50:00.000-08:00

It's been snowing like crazy here. Every day I hope that school will be cancelled, but it never is. They make announcements about the buses over the intercom that I don't understand because I think no matter how well you master a language, hearing it muffled and blared loudly over an intercom is never easy.

I finished Joseph Andrews by Henry Fielding finally yesterday. It's in the same vein as Tom Jones but less funny and with less tangential stories that illustrate Fielding's moral leanings. It does, though, poke fun of other authors at the time, most notably Samuel Richardson and Thomas Cibber. You have to love a guy who wrote a whole novel, Shamela purely to parody another famous novel of the same time period by a different author (Samuel Richardson's Pamela)

Currently, I'm working my way through the third volume of the Prague Literary Review which, though sometimes extremely pretentious and elitist on the part of it's editors, has good writing from people in Eastern/Central Europe and a sweet layout. If you ever want to read a good Canadian author living in Poland, check out Soren Gauger. All the postmodernity, none of the pretention.

I think I'll tackle some Calvino next, or make my way through some French lit. With my computer broken I can't listen to podcasts about the news, so now I actually have to read it online or buy Le Monde and the International Herald Tribune. Suck.

Reflecting on my time spent here, I'm very happy I came. Yes, I am lonely, but I feel like I've really developed myself as a person and had a lot of good thoughts about the world and my place in it since I've been here. Every day I learn something new in French, or another fact about European politics/government/society/life. My writing is still crap, but I have a lot of better ideas on where I don't want it to go, and what I do not want to be "when I grow up". That has to count for something. This is time spent well, even if sometimes I watch too much 24 over at Jon's house or speak too much English during a week. My French is so much better than when I came, and I know that I've been exposed to a million new ideas that I would never have found back in the U.S.

The friendships I've made cannot be forgotten here either. All of the new people I've met are really cool, and the friends from back home that I've connected up with in Europe astound me by how intellectual and confident and thoughtful they are (James, Sheng and Lisa, that's you). This is an inspiring experience I hope to repeat every day the rest of my life.

Back Home

2006-03-01T06:38:00.000-08:00

Getting back to France is nice. When I landed, it was comforting to know what people were saying once again, and to be able to read signs and such. My French isn't perfect, but it's better than my Polish.

As for coming back to teaching, well, it's not too bad. I have a whole bunch of new classes, which is pretty good because then I can reuse old lesson plans until the end of my contract, which is only seven weeks away!

Unfortunately, my computer is busted. I have to take it to the Apple place here, and it will cost money to fix undoubtedly, something I don't have a lot of. I realize now how dependent I am on my little Apple and my iPod. Thus, the next 'zine might be all handwritten. Get yer decoder rings out...

More pictures to come soon and hopefully some better updates.

Poland

2006-02-22T03:27:00.000-08:00

The lack of recent updating has been due to the fact that I'm in Poland. And I was too lazy to go to the internet cafe in Le Havre to type things on the azerty keyboard there. Poland is awesome. No, it is more than awesome. The countryside reminds me of the Midwest quite a bit. Much like South Dakota, with less corn palaces. The language is incomprehensible, and I rely on my friend James to help me get around. There has been much running after trains and drinking of vodka in Krakow pub basements.

The first day I flew into Katowice from the Beauvais airport in France. I tried to flirt with this really cute Polish girl sitting in the same row of seats next to me by making a little paper , drawing racing strips and some adorable little stars on it and throwing it at her. She wasn't havin it. My introduction to Poland was the passport control guy, who instead of being an asshole like the French ones was welcoming and warm. "Good evening!" he said when seeing my American passport. I was so shocked by his cordiality that I could only stutter a "Good evening" back. He checked my passport and stamped it, asking how long and why I'd be in Poland, and if it was my first time here. After doing so, he said, "Welcome to Poland" with an enthusiasm that couldn't be faked.

James and a couple of students of his picked me up in their car and we headed to Krakow to check into our hostel. My name in Polish is Mikolaj, the l in the name being the Polish l with a little line drawn through it to make it look not unlike a t, but pronounced as if it were a w before an o in a word, like word. So it sounds like mikowai. James' name is Kuba. I had not been aware that you recieved a Polish name upon arriving here, but I plan on changing all of my official documents to match.

We arrived in Krakow at about 8pm, checked into our hostel and went out to scope the town. Mostly, we drank a bunch of vodka and beer in a few of the many basement pubs they have there. It was fantastic. Here's a picture of me kinda drunk that James took.

Somehow, we woke up really early the next day and went to this fortress/palace/cathedral complex that Krakow's famous for called Wawel. The w's are pronounced like vs, like vavel. It was neat to see a lot of the palace rooms and part of the cathedral, but mostly James told me a ton of interesting things that I never knew about Polish history. Here's a picture that can't do justice to the largeness of the place.

After Wawel we walked around a bit and took in the architecture of Krakow, found some lunch, and went to this English book store called Massolit. It was bigger and had a better selection than some that I have found even in Paris. While there I saw this gorgeous woman walking around with an Italo Calvino book in her hand. While we were buying our stuff she was sitting at the little cafe they have there and reading LeMonde Diplomatique and browsing through some magazines. I waffled back and forth about talking to her, as she kept passing eyes at me. Finally, I got up enough courage to overcome the paralyzing nervousness and say, "That book by Calvino is excellent. Have you read anything else by him?" "Yeah, I've read The Path to the Spider's Nest," which to my fortune was one of the books I was buying. We started talking about literature and This American Life and then James and I had her show us places to go in Krakow. When we left the store, I immediately regretted not inviting her out with us. We got halfway down the street before deciding that we had to go back. Yes, we did the walk back in, using the excuse that James wanted to find a tobacco shop in Krakow to buy snuff at. She agreed to come out with us and I spent the next five hours becoming smitten with this artist from Chicago that spoke fluent Polish and good French and was so many things that are cool in a woman. That's all I really want to say here. We didn't see her again the next day, but I have a phone number and an email address.

The next day we went to the salt mine in Wieliczka. It is one of the most amazing things I have seen. It used to be a mine until the mid 90's, when they stopped producing salt but continued it as a tourist site. It's full of artificial lakes and sculptures by the miners done in salt, as well as two chapels carved completely out of salt that they still have services in. Here's the only picture James was able to sneak from the place (you had to pay ten zloty to do so without getting yelled at).

In the interest of seeing the rest of Poland, I'm going to end this post with a picture of James Wicka, teen hearthrob, my tour guide of a beautiful country. This is for all of the 14-year old girls out there.

One More Valentine's Post

2006-02-09T00:38:00.000-08:00

Again, we did Valentine's Day cards in the other half of my favorite class. When I asked what the French do for Valentine's day, my favorite student in that class said, "We cry alone."
Another made a card, with a heart on the outside and Happy Valentine's Day, but on the inside it said, "Shut up and smile, Darling."
One boy wrote for his poem, "My eyes are more precious than yours, because without them I couldn't see yours."
And finally, I made a Valentine's Day card in French because I was bored while all of my students were working in one class. Here's the poem I wrote, along with a translation:

Tu me manque, et quand
il pleut, mon coeur pleure.
Tes yeux sont le ciel
Et tes cheveux l'arc-en-ciel.
Lorsque tu es absent
Ma vie est absent.

I miss you, and when
it rains, my heart cries.
Your eyes are the sky
and your hair the rainbow.
When you are absent
my life is absent.

I read this to some of the classes and they thought it was absolutely hilarious, as do I. Some, however, thought it romantic.

Pictures again.

2006-02-02T00:46:00.000-08:00

This is some awesome graffiti near the beach.

This graffiti is right next to the other. I watched the artists paint it when I first arrived.

The boulangerie where I go every day to get a baguette. Well, not every day. Ok, every day.

I go every week to a market near my house. This is my "market lady", who always is very kind and from whom I buy enough vegetables to last a week for usually less than 10 euros. She was happy to pose for this picture when I told her that she'd be famous in America.

The first set of stairs I have to walk up to get home. One of my students (one of my favorites) was walking down these stairs when I was taking the picture. She was relieved that it was just me, being a weird American and taking pictures of stairs.

This is the second set of huge stairs I have to walk up to get home.

"This boat is obviously sinking."

A picture of my school from the front. Cool, eh?

Ah, my bike. I got it fixed yesterday. Beautiful.

I Smell

2006-02-02T00:18:00.000-08:00

Yes, I smell. I smell so bad that children cry, paint peels off of passing cars when they go by, and I roll around in garbage because my smell is so bad that I consider it perfume in comparison. If you are wondering why I'm saying this, you obviously don't know me as a person, or at least have never been within 50 feet of me. Ok, I'll be honest. 100 feet.

That said, I can drink again! I went out last night with Jon and three beautiful French women and we had some beers at a bar called Le Jazz, where the do not, in fact, play jazz music but rather thumping rave music. It's always a treat. I don't think I'll be hitting it hard every night (I really didn't drink that much last night), but it's good to be able to suck back a beer or a whole bottle of wine that only costs 1 dollar again.

There is no transition here between drinking and talking about my students. This morning I had my favorite class do Valentine's Day cards, and they were absolutely hilarious! I wrote "Roses are red..." on the board, and told them that if they wanted to they could write their own version. One wrote, "Giraffes are blue, Platypus are Orange, Stegosaurus are Green, and so are you!" Then, on the back where the Hallmark seal would usually go, she wrote "God shaves the Queen!" Another: "Cakes are burnt. You are glue. I am gardening. And so are you." In response to my sentence on the board, "You have stolen my heart," the first girl wrote, "I had some chocolates to give you but you have stolen them." This is the girl that said Valentine's Day was too commercial. I have to admit that I love these slightly jaded, but witty, 15-year olds, and as it was my last class with them, perhaps will even shed a tear or two. I guess this is the reason people teach.

Some of the other classes did really cute stuff, like write poems with lines such as, "You are the sun of my life, you are my oxygen, without you I cannot breathe. You are the star of my heart," etc, which was outrageously funny. But this class of nerds trumped them all by being sarcastic and funny in a language that is not their first. Speaking of, one wrote "I love you" in seven or eight different languages, and in parentheses said, "Now if I could only know who you are..." Hilarious.

Oh, and I did taste wet dog food, in response to TJ's comment. It was when I was about eight. For all of those who wonder if wet dog food tastes good, well, it doesn't. I remember eating a piece that was mostly light, brown coagulated fat. I don't remember if I swallowed, but I do know that it tasted like really, really bad meat. And dirt. How do dogs eat that? Oh, and why do they always advertise when they change the flavor of a dog food? Who the hell cares, and who will really know besides old, poor women that can't afford regular food? And me.

Long Time, No Post

2006-02-01T03:09:00.000-08:00

So, I haven't posted in awhile. I guess it's because life here has kind of settled down into a routine, really. I read, write, teach, ride my bike (though right now it's broken...Grrr). I don't spend too much time on the internet at school, mostly because I feel lame hanging out here when I have no classes to prepare for.
What's new? Not much, really. Except that I've finished the first issue of my 'zine, "This Plane is Definitely Crashing". If you would like to obtain a copy, send 2 of your hard-earned dollars for postage to Mike Faris at:
P.O. Box 263
Corvalis, OR 97339

Or, if you live in Ames, I will be getting a copy to the wonderful Mr. Eric Henderson to distro. He can be contacted at erhv@iastate.edu, and the price is still 2 bucks (to cover me shipping stuff to the U.S. and the cost of copies since that shit ain't free).

Other than that, I'm just sitting here being excited to go to Poland in the last part of February to see my friend James. Hopefully we won't get too drunk and find ourselves lost in Katowice in Poland in the middle of winter. Or, then again, that would make a great story if we didn't die or lose a major appendage to the cold. We'll see what happens. I only have a week left of teaching after this one before vacation, and then I get to hang out in France for a week before going to Poland. I have no idea where I'll go. Maybe Caen or Dieppe or something?

And really, that's it. I've another idea for a different 'zine, but once it gets off the ground I'll let you know more about it.

Vegetarian Technology

2006-01-21T02:12:00.000-08:00

My friend Dan asked me about why I became vegetarian, and also why I feel somewhat of an aversion to blogging. Since these were excellent questions, I thought I'd respond with somewhat lengthy responses. Here's part of my reply, as I haven't posted in quite awhile.

"As for going vegetarian, I'd have to say it's a good idea. I'm not one
to be preachy about such things, just encouraging. It made me realize
that there is a whole other world of good foods besides hamburgers and
potatoes. I still eat a lot of french fries, however...I first went
vegetarian about, oh, 6.5 years ago. I was vegetarian for three of
that, then vegan for the rest. I became vegan right when I was able to
begin cooking for myself (after I got out of the dorms and a meal plan
and into an apartment), so the only good cooking I know how to do is
that without meat and cheese and eggs. Why did I start? A lot of it
was ethical reasons to begin with: I didn't like the idea of
subjecting animals to such tortures merely to have a good hamburger.
It sort of morphed over the years. My main reasons now are
environmental. I think it's a very wasteful and unnecessary process of
production. I still think it's wrong to inflict pain on animals in
such a manner, but the arguments that I've found are mostly
utilitarian on this subject, and I don't really lean to heavily
towards that outlook on life. Also, it's pretty healthy for you, too,
though if it were discovered that it were more healthy to eat some
meat, I don't think I would do it. On top of that, I really don't like
how meat tastes, as well as milk and such. When people ask if it's
difficult, or if I miss the stuff I used to eat, I respond with a
definite "No." I like the stuff I eat and the way I cook very much. So
there's a half-assed summary of that. Why are you thinking of doing
so? If you want a list of some decent books, I can definitely arrange
that. It was Peter Singer's "Animal Liberation" that made me decide to
become vegan. He's an alright philosopher, though again, a
utilitarian, but I think the facts in the book are pretty solid and
some of his other arguments pretty strong.

As for blogging, it's difficult to express. I guess over my writing
"career" as a student, I always had a specific person/audience in mind
when crafting something, and it was rarely about myself. With
blogging, anyone can read what I'm writing, and it's a bit more
personal. I also have the same worries as you, that the
accomplishments or thoughts I have aren't really that important in the
scheme of things, so what's the point? I mostly started it because I'm
bad about emailing, but wanted my family and friends to know what I'm
up to, so it's more a matter of convenience than anything. I hope to
expand it and include more personal stuff/insight, as this is what a
writer should do, but we'll see how that goes. There is also the
element of my distrust for technology, at least as some sort of
panacea for the ills of the human condition. With paper and books, I
guess there is the idea that there is this tangible thing in the world
that you can hold. The blog is a bit more ethereal to me, so maybe I
have this idea that I am a bit detached from what I write there.
That's why I like doing 'zines (which I have finished by the way. I'll
be sending an email to everyone I know with instructions on how to get
one very, very soon, so I'll let you know about that). I can write a
'zine, print it and it's this thing that I actually give/send to
someone. Also, being a lifelong reader, I have a hard time absorbing
information in an electronic form. I like to read the newspaper on
paper, not on the internet. I get more out of it for some reason, and
have a better attention span. I ascribe it to television – it's given
me a short attention span in the first place, and secondly, my brain I
think is conditioned to accept electronic visual media as somehow less
important than paper. Yeah, that's a decent description. Do you feel
the same? How do you feel about technology? I must say that I'm not
ignorant of it, and on ocassion give my computer a loving caress. But
my faith is limited by the same I have in literature and philosophy
and art to improve humanity. I see technology solely as a tool to
disseminate information and feed people. Sure, it is our rationality
that helps define us as humans, but also our ability to create
something in the world that has an exterior meaning outside of the
matter or symbols it is composed of."

Teetotalling and Huxley

2006-01-12T02:41:00.000-08:00

I've been trying to think of a way to concisely sum up the last week or so. Teetotalling and Huxley sounds about right. I don't drink in the month of January, and it's almost half over! Grandpa Jerry must be proud...I finished Huxley's "Eyless in Gaza" yesterday, and loved it. I think I might do a book review 'zine, since I like writing book reviews and, well, I have to have something to fill my time here...
Other than that, I've been going to a lot of movies at this cool little theater called "Le Studio" here in Le Havre. The other night I saw the wonderfully fucked up "Blue Velvet", and last night went to a couple of films they are showing by a Le Havre director. They were from the late 60's, and were his first films. One of them was set in my Lycée, and it was interesting to see how much it has changed in thirty years. There was a scene at a party full of 60's French youth, and their clothes and they way they danced were hilarious. The sound quality was crap so Jon and I couldn't hear a word they were saying, but it really wasn't to important. They're showing 12 more of his films there, so we might go to a couple more. It will be interesting to see how a director progresses from 50min films about high school life to other, more broad topics, over the course of his life. He was there, last night, too, but there was some film critic asshole that looked like a ferret and kept answering the questions people in the audience were asking the director. Jon and I were really pissed off at him, mainly because he pretended like he knew everything about the films created by a person that was standing RIGHT NEXT TO HIM, and could answer things much better. I hate that. When people act like they know more about another person's creation, life, etc. when they honestly have no clue, and bandy about this information as if it's something they discovered on their own.

How does Mike do it?

2006-01-06T16:20:00.000-08:00

Teaching is seriously hard work. Anybody who says otherwise is a moron. You go from kids calling each other whores to kids that love to learn and know what "fashion victim" means in the same minute. Sometimes it's all yelling and discipline. Others it's pure elation at the difference you are making in some kid's life. Oi!

Portait of a city as an old port

2006-01-04T17:48:00.000-08:00

I promised pictures of Le Havre earlier on. I borrowed my friend Anne's camera and went around for an hour or so on my bike trying to capture what I see almost every day.
This is my view of the city from my window. Pretty, ain't it?

Ah, the sea.

A broader view of the sea.

This is the actual port where boats go in and out.

The Hôtel de Ville, in the center of town. All of the assistants usually meet here when they are going out together.

They decorate the Hôtel de Ville for the season. This means "Happy Holidays."

A picture of my very humble abode in disarray. To the left is my "bathroom".

These little signs are all over the sidewalk in Le Havre. The idea is that your dog poops here, instead of just anywhere, so the guys that clean it up can find it and you're less likely to step in it, being that it's next to a big blue arrow on the ground. Let me just say that it doesn't work; you find dog shit everywhere BUT next to the signs.

My bike! How I love thee. Sigh.

Yes, Eric, I hacked them off myself, using a hacksaw blade with a towel wrapped around it and my brute strength. Boo ya!

This isn't all, but I have to go, so I'll try to get others up soon.

Happy New Year and such!

2006-01-04T16:17:00.000-08:00

I spent the last week in Paris, which is why I haven't updated my blog. I should get some pictures up sometime soon, but my friend Rachael has them all on her camera, and that is in Rouen. Someday, perhaps, I will put up the video of us slugging back Champagne in the shadow of the Arc de Triomphe on New Year's. Here's some details about what I did.

Sheng and Lisa, friends from Ames, were in Paris for the week as well, so we split a hotel room. Most of what we did was go to museums and such, like the Louvre and the George Pompidou center. The Louvre was overwhelming, really. So much art it makes your brain hurt. I believe we spent about seven hours there, and by the end we were dragging ourselves through it. The history of human artistic and technological achievement all in one place is a difficult thing to comprehend, but the Louvre is fantastic nonetheless.

The Pompidou center, a huge warehouse full of more contemporary art, was great as well. They had an exposition on Dada, and there were pieces as well as journals and writings from Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Tristan Tzara, and every single other dadaist. It was really inspiring to see so much creativity and cleverness from a time when, sadly, a lot of oppression and hatred was manifesting itself through war and propaganda. I got a lot of ideas about where I want my own art as a writer to go from this exhibit, and it's the intellectual highlight of Paris for the week. It made me think a lot about Mike, who recently attended a Dada party in a very sexy pink costume. Check out his blog to learn more.

We ate really good falafel in the Jewish quarter, twice, at this place called L'as du Fallaffel. I also introduced Lisa and Sheng to French wine and baguettes and croissants, which they wholeheartedly enjoyed.

Lisa left Friday to go home, and Sheng, though he stayed in Paris, went to a different hostel for the next few days. He's there until the 4th, when he flies home. So, on Friday, my friend Rachael came down. We went to an Indian restaraunt that was in this covered alleway called Passage Brady that had lots of Indian restaurants and grocery stores and clothes shops. It was delicious, and afterwards we went to a little Indian food store where we bought incense and soap and other such things. I never thought Nag Champa soap could be so wonderful...

That night we went out drinking with Mirja, the German assistant at my school, and her boyfriend who was visiting from Cologne, Philip. There was a crazy guy at the bar that the owner was trying to kick out, so he pretended to close the place down with everyone still in it at about 11pm. At 12, the crazy guy came back and shouted a lot, while all of the other drunk people in the bar tried to calm him down. We ended up leaving because the place was closing, and the bar owner (who was tanked, by the way) attempted his best to kick out the guy and everyone else once again, for real this time.

Saturday Rachael and I started by picking a metro stop we hadn't been to before and just going there, seeing where the day took us. We walked around, found a bookstore full of Chinese and Japanese literature, and a street that was full of outdoor food vendors and fresh fruit. Afterward, we went to Chinatown and looked around, bought some teacups and ate lunch at a so-so Chinese restaurant.

That night we decided to go to the Champs Elysees and see the craziness. Beforehand, we met up with Anne and Meg and briefly hung out near the Bastille monument. It was all craziness. We tried to buy some Champagne at one store, but a bottle was 26 euros, so we booked it for somewhere else. The store had put some tables in a barracade around the door, and had a huge doberman behind them. That way, you could only enter into a small area of the store with no merchandise and ask them for what you wanted. It was like they were preparing for war...

We finally found some Champagne at another place and then headed to the Champs Elysees. The metro was free all night, so everybody in Paris was on our train. I could feel the vibrations from the guys chest in front of me when he talked, we were so packed in. A group of teenage boys was in our car, jumping up and down, screaming, and pushing people off that wanted to get off. It was crazy/scary at the same time.

Once at the Champs Elysees, we went to find Sheng in front of some store by the Arc. We eventually found him, a few minutes after midnight. Note: there is no countdown in France, nor is there some huge ball dropping. As usual, Americans tend to overdo stuff. Mostly it was just hundreds of thousands of people drinking in the street and lighting off fireworks. After awhile we found some guys selling champagne on the street out of a shopping cart, and I bought a bottle. Sheng, Rachael and I stood around and drank it, watching the perpetual traffic jam around the Arc de Triomphe. People were dancing on cars and in the street. Eventually, some guy heard us talking in English and struck up a conversation with us. His name was Tibere, and he was from Guadaloupe. He wanted to practice his English, so he hung out with us and we bought another bottle of champagne, passing the bottle around and getting increasingly drunk.

After two hours of being on the Champs Elysees, Rachael called another assistant from Mexico that was in town, he came and found us and we all went out to some bars at another metro stop. The metro was again packed, and we started talking to an English guy with blond spiky hair that had a few wounds on his face. Apparently, somebody flicked a cigarette in his face and he tried to beat them up. All he had to say about that was, “There were two of them…”

I had to pee really, really bad, so Sheng said he’d stand guard while I went behind this little shack that was on the street. I peed, and when I came out some security guard was talking to Sheng, asking him in French if I was going to the bathroom back there. Sheng, not understanding French, just played dumb, saying “I dunno. I’ve just been standing here,” and the guy let us go. If I ever have to pee anywhere on the street again, I want Sheng watching my back.

The bars were too expensive, so we ended up going home after trying a couple of them. I think Rachael and I got back to our hotel about 4:30 in the morning.

I think I will forever remember my New Year’s in Paris. I got to know some old friends a lot better, and make a few new ones. How I think about art and culture were bolstered by the literature I discovered (Aldous Huxley, again, with Eyeless in Gaza) the hundreds of works of art I saw. I hope Poland in February is just as fun.

I'm dreaming of a salty Christmas

2005-12-26T14:32:00.000-08:00

Christmas was spent walking around Le Havre with Anne and her sister Kate. We ate good vegan food for dinner and Kate and I laughed loudly about, well, everything, in Anne's room while she was talking to their mom in Meg's room down the hall. She could hear us through the wall. Much fun, and a memorable Christmas away from home.

Tickets to concerts and drinking at clubs

2005-12-23T05:05:00.000-08:00

Ahhhh...so now I have the time to update, even though I'm convinced that nobody is reading my blog. Sad for me. Last night I went out bar hopping with a whole bunch of French people that I met through my contact in the Tandem program, Caroline. I ended up having a ton of conversations about American vs. French society and political systems, as well as this fascinating discussion about socialism with a guy that works in the industrial sector here named Guillaume. All in all, it was great fun. We started out at Le Bistrot, where there was this performance art show, uh, thingy. A lady read poetry to pictures she had drawn that she showed on a slide projector while this guy that looked EXACTLY like Sean Penn made all sorts of weird sound effects on a computer using ordinary things like a slinky. Sometimes her poetry was really good, even though I didn't understand it all, and sometimes she just screamed very loudly in French. It wasn't the normal jazz, but I liked it. After that we went to three other bars, two that I had been to before. I got a bit tipsy and tried to call my brother after I got home (didn't work for some reason) and then tried to call Brant (also didn't work for some reason), so I ended up screaming at the nasally-voiced operator in a phone booth in France at 3:00 in the morning.

I just finished Aldous Huxley's Island, and it is absolutely phenomenal. I think I'm going to read it a second time. Basically it's the opposite of Brave New World. He envisions science blended with pragmatism and spirituality to create a perfect society. It's a bit East meets West philosophy, and the blending of the two makes the people of the island of Pala completely blissful. Of course there's drugs involved (it's basically the same as soma only it enlightens you, somehow...) and the main character is an outsider to the society, much as Brave New World. Unfortunately, the underlying question of the novel is whether a utopian society can exist, and if so, for how long. You have to read it to find out what Aldous has to say about that.

It's Christmas here tomorrow! So Joyeux Noel and Bonne Année! I'll be heading to Paris Monday for a week, so you won't hear from me for awhile. I may try to put something up tomorrow when I can get free internet at Anne's house. Until then.

Paris and Back

2005-12-22T04:58:00.000-08:00

So I have 'bout five minutes to tell you all that's happened in the last, eh, 5 days. And on an azerty keyboard as well. Guess I'll have to go all Mike Faris and make a list. What has this world come to?

¤Went to Rouen Friday after teaching and watched/participated in karaoke at this club called the Undgerground. There were lots of 17 year old French boys macking on each other.

¤Saturday spent the day in Paris with two other assistants and saw the Eiffel Tower, Arc d'Triomphe and some other cool stuff like the Champs Elysees. Outta time!

Technical difficulties?

2005-12-19T05:21:00.000-08:00

My school is closed for the vacation, which means I actually have to pay for internet access. I'm at an internet café right now, and I'll try to update from here pretty often, but we'll see how lazy I am... Don't expect too much in the next couple weeks. Especially pictures. Or insight.

Yay, Pictures!!!

2005-12-15T04:57:00.000-08:00

So, here are some pictures of my friends, my trip to Provence and other adventures. I might try to get a photo album together somewheres or a gallery or something. Maybe on the prestigious rapidfish.org...

Here's one of almost all of my assistant friends. From left to right, it's: Nora, Mirja, Geri, Lucy, Arthur, Sadie Anne, Meg, and Jon the Limey. This was before I arrived at a party where I got drunk with Jon, and Anne got really, really drunk and made an ass out of herself by trying to do an English accent all night.

This is my best friend in Le Havre, Jon. He comes from England and I make fun of his accent all of the time. We play video games and drink a lot together. He's gone for two weeks, which makes me sad because now I have to hang out with only girls with nobody to save me. Mon dieu!

This is from when we made mulled wine (vin chaud) at my house. Mirja, centered in the picture, is the one that made it. Meg is sitting in the background and in the close foreground is Samah, the assistant from Yemen.

"What is this product?", you must be asking. Well, I saw this sign in Aix-en-Provence and had to take a picture. It was at a little shack that sold french fries and pizza and such. Pussy is supposed to be like a Mr. Freeze or Icee, but the name is much, much better. It comes in two sizes: small and jumbo.

This is a bicycle I saw in Avignon. I just thought it was cool, colorful, and very typically French.

I went swimming in the salty, salty Mediterranean sea in Cassis. I got rocks and sand all up in my pants and pockets and had to take the bus back to Aix with a wet ass, but it was worth it.

We were walking along the promenade in Nice and this was on the wall. It's a tile mosaic of a mushroom (1up!!) from Mario Bros. There were no signs or anything else accompanying it. It was just there next to a beach in the south of France. Make up a story.

This is Anne all gussied up for her birthday. She's my travelling buddy and a very good friend.

Ok, the last one, I swear. This is the Arena in Nîmes from Roman times. It's just there, and you can go inside it and they hold events and stuff still. It's called "Les Arênes" in French. Anne and I went up to the top and you could see all of Nîmes from there.

Buy Chirac!

2005-12-14T20:00:00.000-08:00

Today I went to this meeting at the IUFM, a school for future teachers of primary school. It’s called the Tandem program, and though it has a sort of lame name, it turned out to be pretty helpful. The idea is that you get some future French teachers in any subject together with some English assistants of about the same age, and they speak in French for half the time, the other half in English. Everyone wins! Despite being poorly organized by the lady directing it, the conversation I had was splendiferous. I got paired with these two girls, one named Laure and the other Caroline.
We started in French, and I must say that I rocked it. Today was a good day for speaking French, I suppose, so I got lucky. We were supposed to talk about whatever, but had a sheet in front of us with possible talking points, which included university life and the American and French school systems. It was really informal, and we pretty much just chatted for 45 minutes in French.
When we switched over, it was amazing how these two seemingly confident ladies in French changed so much. Laure was embarrased to talk at all, really, so Caroline, whose English was excellent, and I talked about, well, everything. She studied literature in college, and had read ‘On the Road’ and ‘Catcher in the Rye,’ and detested Samuel Richardson just as much as I, but liked Henry Fielding. We ended up with talking about politics and campaign finance reform in the U.S. That’s where the title for this post comes from. She’d mentioned campaign commercials in the U.S., and how it seemed like they were trying to sell the candidate as a product. “You wouldn’t see commercials in France that said, ‘Buy Chirac’” I couldn’t stop laughing because it is so, so true… “Buy Obama in 2008!” In France there really isn’t this idea of the President as a celebrity or moral leader. He does his job as President, running the country and such, and that’s it.
I talked to my students once about this. They were very surprised at Clinton’s impeachment trial over Monica Lewinsky. They said that if Chirac, or another President, did the same thing, it wouldn’t even be news. In fact, they said, there have been presidents who have had affairs, etc. and it wasn’t a big deal. As long as he’s doing his job, they said, he’s fine. The other matters are his own personal life.
So what does this say about America, then? Are we fixated with the President as a celebrity? I believe so. We want our President to be this looming figure of strength in many senses, morally and physically included. “The cult of personality” applies well here. Who are President is as a person and personality matters just as much, or more, than his actions in office. Why else would each candidate spend about 200 million dollars on their campaign? Why else would we elect Bush or Reagan? Or, to a lesser extent, Schwarzenegger? It’s the idea of a leader as someone not in place to solely go about the task of making laws and governing, but representing the values of our nation to others. What he does in his personal life matters in that regard. I do think that this is part of representative democracy (republicanism with a small r) and part of our Puritan past. We still have a lot of roots in the Puritan ideology, whether we like to admit it or not. You can’t show breasts anywhere in the U.S. without it being considered pornographic, while here they have them on huge signs in the street and nobody really whines.
So I guess the idea behind the President as a hero is something very American. I don’t doubt other countries do it as well, but I think we are particularly susceptible given our proclivities toward celebrity status (Hollywood…need I say more). The French view Chirac as just some schmoe they elected to get a job done. We want our President to save us from the cold, harsh world. Then I must ask, why the hell did Bush get elected?

2005-12-14T02:29:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of me at Les Falaises in Étretat. I look like a dork, but I wanted to see how easy it was to upload photos to the blog...so really, it's a test. Hope I passed.

Bike or die

2005-12-12T05:26:00.000-08:00

So, I finally found a bike. I went to Rouen and met up with this other assistant from Minneapolis, Rachel. We went to their pawn shop there, called Cash Occas', which means 'cash and carry' and I found an old blue Motobecane with yellow striped tires for 39 euros. Not bad. The seat sucked, and the pedals needed to be replaced, but other than that it was in great condition. I happen to have brought a seat with me, and I could buy some platform pedals for cheap. So I bought it.

Really, this post is about the past week or so. It's been busy, which is more than I can say for other weeks here. I went to Rouen on Monday, Tuesday, and Saturday of last week. Monday was for my last training day, and after I went out for drinks with some of the other assistants. Here's what I wrote in my journal for that day:

"I think it’s all been a product of being cooped up in Le Havre with Geri and Anne and Meg and Jon. All of my friends are swell people, just a bit too pessimistic for me. I spent the evening in the company of Jon and Geri, well enough, but with some other assistants who were just so positive about their experiences here, and about everything. They didn’t moan about every little thing like the cold or the bad kids or what have you. They had fun doing whatever and enjoyed themselves. And I am going back to Rouen to see them tomorrow and fix their bikes (yay!).

And of course there’s a girl involved. Named Rachel. From Minneapolis who loves bikes and her city (I love both…). We talked about bikes and Minneapolis and the Seward Café and the Midwest, etc. And of course the girl has a “boyfriend”. Though in a very loose sense, as she admitted herself. Maybe I have a chance, but I’m just so excited to have some new, cool friends to ride bikes with. This has been a great day that started out pretty lousy. We went to the train station, butt early as always, and the trains were late. Well, “indefinitely retarded” to be exact. Why? Because someone had thrown themselves in front of a train between Le Havre and Rouen. So we bought our tickets, hung out a bit with Tina and Dania and Arthur and all of the other assistants. We got on our train that was supposed to leave at 7:56 at 8:02. And waited. And waited. Jon watched me play solitaire, Arthur slept, and Dania took off to get something and never showed back up on that train. Geri moaned about, well, everything. And we waited. And waited. Finally, the train left the station about 9:45. So we got to the training day in Rouen just late enough to miss the morning session and have a nice little chat with Olivier about good ideas we’d had while teaching...
...So we had the rest of the training, and that was all boring and pretty much useless. Then I got to go out drinking with the rest of the assistants, which is where I met these new people and got to hang out with Josh, who is really, really, really cool and we talked about books and literature, something I’ve been moaning about not being able to talk about.
And tomorrow is another day. In France. Where I will get up and translate an article in French into English with a bunch of cool French kids and hopefully find a bike to carry me around with Rachel, her boyfriend, and Karolina. It should be the most fun I’ve had in awhile. This is all coming together, and all it took was a day outside of the monotony that I have created for myself. Last week was a slump. Today I feel vital and alive and busy and crazy smart."

As it turned out, I didn't get to meet up with the others in Rouen on Tuesday, but rather on Saturday. I fixed their bikes up with all of the tools I brought, and we went for a little ride. They made me Indian food for dinner, and some hummus by mashing it up with a fork. Rachel taught me a new way to cut up garlic, where you just let the knife kind of smash it into a mush. It's sweet.

Friday night was Anne's birthday, so we went to a crêperie and had some genuine French crêpes and cider. I had one with tomatoes and mushrooms in it, despite the fact that the batter had milk and eggs. It was yummy. After Saturday in Rouen I came back here and went to a party at Jon's, where I drank a lot and we ended up playing Max Payne until 4 o'clock in the morning.

Yesterday I cleaned my apartment and did laundry. At 4 I had about eight people over to my tiny room, where we squeezed in and had mulled wine (vin chaud) made by Mirja, the German assistant. Geri, Samah, Mirja and I exchanged gifts (we each picked names out of a hat and bought for one other person). I got a sweet scarf from Samah that's really warm, and I made Mirja a picture frame thing to put her photos in for a collage. It was easy because I dumpstered a picture frame and stapled a rainbow-striped material (also dumpstered) on the mat for her to put her pictures on. She liked it. I used the same material to painstakingly hand sew a pillowcase for Anne's birthday. So all of the gifts I've given as of yet were hand-made and free. Yippy! After the wine we went over to Anne's for our traditional Sunday vegan dinner, and had our largest gathering yet of eight people. It just keeps getting bigger...

Well, today. I rode out to the bike superstore and bought a whole bunch of parts for my bike. I wish we had a small shop here, but alas, there is only Go Sport! in the mall, which sucks like Gart Bros., and Decathlon, a huge biking/swimming/running/hiking/everything warehouse that doesn't suck as bad. I had to get a new bolt for my seat post because the other was busted, and the guy seemed put upon to search for it in this one little toolbox tray. They didn't have walls of tools or Buster the cat or Matt Maxwell like Skunk River Cycles, but I guess I got what I needed. Makes me miss Ames...

So, I'm almost finished retuning my bicycle. New seatpost, pedals, brake levers, bar tape (yellow=hot) and everything. I'm going to hack off the handlebars and turn them upside down into bullhorns, but I need to find either a hacksaw or a pipe cutter. I'm hoping either will be very cheap at the hardware store, or I can track down the janitor Febrese and see if he'll help me.

The last week has been phenomenal, in other words. I feel like I've got ahold of the language and the people and I have lots of really cool friends all over the place. We'll see what the Christmas break brings, eh? Pictures to come next week if I'm not lazy.

Punk Rock means tired feet

2005-12-03T02:40:00.000-08:00

First off, Mike wrote: "Why do you have to teach about Christmas? The English language has nothing more to do with Christmas than the French language. And it's not like you have to teach Christian consumerist culture to a bunch of atheist commies - you're in France, not a utopia."

He's kinda right. However, in teaching Christmas what I really do is ask them what they do for Christmas, and then basically tell them we do the same thing with a few minor differences. For instance, most families open their presents at midnight on the 24th here. And they eat salmon and escargot as well. Oh, and leave coffee for Santa, instead of milk. It's good because they can get excited about something they know about, and talk about it. That can be rare.

That said, my idea kicked me in the teeth yesterday. I had one class of about six students. I asked them to tell me about what they do for Christmas, which they did. Then I asked each one what they wanted. Two of the students are Muslim, and when they said they didn't want anything because they didn't celebrate Christmas, I felt like a complete fucking idiot. In the interest of fairness I wanted to maybe ask them about Ramadan, but then I didn't know if they would feel good about me equating Christmas with that month of fasting and celebration. So I basically went really quickly over what we do and moved on to something else. This won't be the last class, as well.

Personally, I usually forget that Christmas is a religious holiday, since I'm not religious. I don't teach about the christian aspects of it, because it's illegal to teach about religion in France, and frankly I don't want to teach about the christian aspects of it anyway. I talk about Santa, giving presents, the tree, leaving cookies, etc. This works pretty well, as they are all still about 15 and have tinges of excitement leftover from when they were younger.

I end up teaching less about consumerist culture than I do about the cultural/traditional mythology surrounding Christmas. I try to focus on what you do with your family, what you eat, when you do these things, etc. Getting them to describe it in English is challenging enough as it is, without me trying to discuss the overconsumption and blatant hypocrisy of the "Christmas Season." It works well to act excited and surprised when each class tells me they open their presents at midnight, or when I get up on the chair to mimic putting up the star on the top of the Christmas tree.

All in all, I'm less conflicted than I was before. I thought they would want to talk and talk about what they wanted, etc., but in actuality they are interested in just expressing the traditions they have with their families, and occasionally distancing themselves from little kids who actually do believe in Santa Claus.

The title of this post needs to be addresses. Last night I was going to go to this anarchist speaker and concert at some bar I haven't been to. The idea was to meet some young anarchist French kids and have some friends. I passed by the bar, and saw it absolutely crowded with 40-something crusty punks. Frankly, I'm sick of going to events where I'm the only person under thirty. I went to a poetry café and this speech about the Sioux Indians at a Literature café, and though they were both cool and I met some neat people, I have yet to make good friends with someone my age who is French. So, I went to this other concert instead. It turned out to be a good choice.

It was at the Mamy Blu, this space pretty far from where I live that is, as I found out last night, punk as fuck. It's a really raw space, all bare concrete pillars and floor blackened by spilt beer and stubbed out cigarettes. They heat the thing with a barrel stove that they burn cut up pieces of palettes in. There was only one kind of beer, in a can, and it was two euros. I got there too early and waited for a long time, just watching people in the near-dark of the room. The entrance was one toy, but I had misread the poster, so I just paid 5 euros. Stupid me. Anyway, the first band finally got up. U'lers was their name, and they were from America and did some cool Ramones covers and some of their own songs. All of the band members were in their early forties, but they rocked pretty hard. The second band was called Double Shot, from England, and they were a kickass punk group. They covered the Clash once or twice, and their own songs were really upbeat. I danced a lot standing next to this twenty-something French guy who was very, very drunk and flailing all over the place. We were the only two people in the mosh pit when he decided we should start one near the end of their set. I left with tired feet from dancing, smoke entwined in the fibers of all of my clothes and dried sweat on my brow.

December means Capitalism

2005-12-01T02:18:00.000-08:00

I get to stop teaching about Thanksgiving (finally!) in my classes, and get to start teaching about Christmas. No more turkey, Pilgrims, (pronounced peelgreems by little French kids) or gesturing and making noises on how you open up a can of cranberry sauce. Now I get to say "Ho Ho Ho" and talk about fruitcake! No, not fruitcakes like Mike and Nik, but the actual fruitcake that nobody likes.

This week I've been a bit lazy. Most evenings I've spent with my friend Jon watching the second season of 24 on DVD. I tell you, that shit is addictive. We're at least halfway through it, because I stayed over at his house until 1:00am last night, and had to get up to teach this morning. Needless to say, the classes I had were really good and liked what I was teaching. They were also very well behaved. I was slightly hungover from drinking a lot of wine last night, but that didn't affect me too much. If anything, it made me more goofy and willing to make an ass out of myself, which is always good when teaching.

There really isn't much more news. Going to Paris for Saturday, which will rule. Maybe I'll find a bike soon, but it's been a runaround with the two people I've tried to get ahold of.

About teaching Christmas: It's hard to teach about gift-giving, for me, because the whole idea of stressing out to buy gifts and spending all of your money on things other people probably don't want in the first place really sickens me. I love making things for people, or finding inexpensive and thoughtful things for them. I hate getting gifts. Yes, I will admit this. I really don't need anything, and when I do need stuff I'm pretty particular about what I get, so I go out and buy it myself. I don't like recieving money because I think there are better uses for it than myself. I sent out a letter about two years ago telling all of my family to just donate what they would give me for Christmas to a charity of their choice. They're not very good about following this wish, though, and keep trying to give me gifts, money, etc. I wish they would just listen so that I wouldn't feel guilty about getting things I don't absolutely need – but am thankful for – while other people starve in the streets. Blah. That is my pre-christmas rant. More is to come, I am sure.

Money, that's what I want

2005-11-29T06:46:00.000-08:00

I got paid! Now all I have to do is get laid and I'm set. Or not. It was so sweet to actually have money to use, and not worry about spending 1 euro because it was half of my entire assets. Now the trick is to not spend it all by the end of December. Will that work? I guess you'll have to come back here to find out...

I should really go do laundry, but I think I might be too lazy for that. I could read Henry James instead, I suppose.

Wine and Stew

2005-11-28T07:44:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving last Thursday was fun. I ate a whole bunch of food and drank a gratuitous amount of wine with my Assistant friends Arthur, Jon, Meg, Anne, and Francine. I made stew and we had mashed potatoes, salad, fried spinach with garlic, baguette, this Jamaican dish called Festival (which was like cornbread...) and other stuff. Insted of going to the protest, because it was raining in the way that Normandy does, I stayed inside and watched a whole bunch of the TV series 24 on DVD. It's addictive if only because of the plot.

The weekend was uneventful. I was so broke, and so was Jon, that we just sat around and drank the rest of the wine from Thanksgiving at his house on Friday night. Saturday night we went to this free concert. Well, concert is maybe being nice. See, normally, if you saw an advertisement for a concert in a paper, you'd say, "Cool, music and stuff. Sounds good." That is what we did. And we were wrong. By concert they meant three middle-aged women doing bad performance art. One played the violin furiously while another would tell a story and try, badly, to act out what they were saying. The first story was about a girl who became a singer. The second was about a girl who became a tree. Or something. I quit trying to translate after about the first ten minutes, and we waited until the intermission to leave, as opposed to these two girls sitting in front of us, who just left after about five minutes. Fortunately, though, we recieved a free glass of wine, which made it better.

Sunday I went on a bike ride in the rain/hail and got really, really dirty. But I got to talk to my mom, and the rest of my family, during the weekend, so that was a bonus. I would have called them on Thanksgiving itself, but I had 30 centimes to my name at that point, which is not enough, alas, to buy a phone card to call home. Getting paid was more exciting than it should have been because I got to actually buy food. Ah, the life of an assistant. I just tell myself that at least I'm poor in France, which is better than being poor in America. Somehow.

Vive la teaching!

2005-11-24T00:12:00.000-08:00

Just came from a class that made me want to teach for a very, very long time. They're Seconde, which is the equivalent of Freshmen, but they were so enthusiastic and good it was fun. We did a Thanksgiving excericise where I split them into a table of adults and a kiddy table, and asked them what they wanted to eat for dinner from a menu I provided. It was awesome and fun. Now I'm going to go to the protest that the teachers are having because, guess what? It's strike day! Again! This means I don't have two classes I normally would, and get to enjoy my Thanksgiving as sort of a day off. Tonight I'm having dinner with about six other assistants. It should be fun, though I'll miss being with my family and having them fret over my vegan diet, much more than I ever would.

Just another day in France

2005-11-23T13:15:00.000-08:00

Wow. So today has been my fullest and most interesting day in France as of yet. I got up early, at 7:15 even. Hit the snooze a couple of times before this, of course. As usual, ate my apple and had a cup of coffee before heading off to a class at 8 in which I was a student (again!). It was a translation class with an English teacher named Fevrese. This is the guy with whom I got drunk and played soccer at the party with all of the other English teachers, mind you. He is absolutely brilliant and witty, and if I teach high school or even college, I hope I am as smart as he.
Anyway, it was a translation from English to French, and he of course taught the class in French, so I learned A LOT. As I found later, it was a great way to start my day because I was already warmed up with the French in the morning, and prepared to speak and listen in the language the rest of the day. The class was two hours long, and in the middle there is a five minute break. At the break a whole bunch of (female) students crowded around me and asked me questions, which I replied to in French. They wanted to know how long I’d been here, if the class was easy, etc. One even complimented me on my French, and asked me if I could record my voice sometime for help with translations, and also if I’d like to have conversations so they could talk in English. I said yes, and we shall see if I follow through. I saw through their interest in learning a language as their interest in the young AMERICAN assistant, which is something that happens to me a lot here. I’ve been asked for my phone number by students twice, and both were about fourteen. Ew. On the other hand, there are some 18-year olds here that I have a hard time reminding myself to not finding attractive, which confuses me and makes me feel like a pervert in some ways. I did, not only a year ago, date an 18-year old, however.
After the translation class I had to go to the prefecture to get this thing called my Carte de Sejour. It’s basically a long-stay visa that allows me to get health insurance. The prefecture is a level of hell, actually, that Dante forgot to add in between the 6th and 7th. We’ll call it level 6.5. It’s where all of the foreigners go to receive their various documents necessary to live in France and not be harassed by the French immigration officials. Needless to say, there are a lot of paper hoops to jump through, so much that my friend Tatiana has termed this process “bureaucrap.” This is the 6th time I’ve been to this place. The times before I had to go simply to set up a meeting to be seen another time.

That other time was last Thursday. See, you bring all of these documents and photocopies, and they give you this shiny little sticker in your passport. Well, they called all of the other assistants to go last Thursday as well. However, after showing all of my documents and such, waiting twenty minutes for the lady that was helping me to talk with her fucking hands to her co-worker, I was told that there was nobody there that could sign the sticker for me, so I had to come back. This is what I did today. I went at eleven in the morning. Silly me, the part that services foreigners is not open until 1:00. Of course! Why the hell would it be open at 11 on a Tuesday?
Fair enough. I went to the library and finished The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, an absolutely brilliant and scary novel about what could happen to women in the U.S. if we are not vigilant about their rights as human beings. It’s very distopian in so many ways, and poignant in the sense that it draws on existing controversies and events and posits what could happen if they continue on the same vein. Very dark and even difficult to read at points, but it makes one morally outraged enough, I think, that they should have no choice but to act in the defense of human rights in general, women’s rights in particular. Blah, sorry. There will be a review of the novel later, somewhere else. By me.
In any case, I went to the library and finished this book. Following this I went to a small kebap restaurant close to the library and prefecture where one may purchase a vegetarian sandwich with an asston of french fries for the small amount of 2.40 euros. I took it to the Hotel de Ville, a central building in the town with a huge park and fountains in front of it, and did some scarfing. There was a seagull there that just hung out around me while I ate with some pigeons and a barn swallow. They watched me eat, hoping that I’d drop some fry crumbs near them. I took one fry that I had dropped near my foot and threw it over to them. I have never seen a bird move so fast on land. The seagull seemed to teleport over to where I threw the fry and gobble it up. After a few minutes of waiting, all of the other birds left. The seagull just stared and stared at me, figuring if I was nice enough to bestow upon him one fry, I’d be benevolent enough to do it again. He kept picking up receipts and pieces of plastic on the ground, tasting them and shaking them in his beak to see if they were food. I gave him some cabbage from the kebap. When I left, he scurried over to where I was sitting and ate the rest of what I had left on the ground.

I went back to the prefecture, waited in line outside in the cold, waited in line inside, got a ticket with the number 37 printed on it and sat down. They started calling at 20, and almost exactly one hour and thirty long fucking minutes later, they called 37. I went up, explained thoroughly and precisely what my situation was in French, and the guy punched up two things on the computer, got my carte de sejour from a little box, had me sign it and that was it. I waited 1.5 hours to say twenty words and spend one minute with the guy, tops. This made me need something to quell my frustration with the stifling bureacracy for which France is renowned, so I went to my local bakery where the lady knows that I buy a baguette almost every time I come in. “Not today,” I said when she asked if I wanted a baguette. I bought a croissant and a pain au choclat, which is a croissant with chocolate inside of it. I ate them both with some coffee in my room, and it gave me hope that being in France is worth all of the pain and suffering of the prefecture.

After this I went to the school and did some boring things on my computer. It was getting on the time when I was supposed to meet a couple of other assistants, Anne and Meg, for our traditional Tuesday-night kebap at our favorite Lebanese restaurant. Yes, I ate a kebap for both lunch and dinner. And French fries. Don’t judge me. We showed up a little early and waited outside in the cold, before Danny, the guy that works behind the counter with a disarming smile and this white frock with big buttons up the front (a chef’s coat) opened the place up. Each time we come he is so very, very nice and we make jokes in French and English and in general just have a good time eating hummus. The hummus there is like what I make in the U.S., so I have an orgasm every Tuesday night. In any case, Jon the Limey showed up and we got to catch up with him on his weekend in England with his girlfriend.
Now, Anne, Meg and the assistants from my Lycée, Mirja and Samah, went to see an American movie called In Her Shoes. I, however, didn’t want to spend the money on said film, or watch something in English on a day when my French was at a passable level both on the comprehension and the speaking sides. So, I went to this little café called “Les Yeux d’Elsa,” which means “The Eyes of Elsa,” or “Elsa’s Eyes.” There was a presentation there on the Sioux Indians in America, their history, and their current state of living. The guy from Le Havre lived on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, of all places, for the summers of 2003 and 2005. Now, Pine Ridge is not 30 miles from Rapid City. So everything and everywhere he was talking about, even though it was in French, made a lot of sense to me. He had photos from the Badlands and the Black Hills, and it really made me somewhat homesick. There was a discussion after he talked about the different Sioux tribes, their history, the history of how us white people butchered them and forced them onto reservations, only to continue to starve and exploit them to the present day. If it isn’t obvious, I think the problems that exist on reservations in the U.S. are the fault of my ancestors and the continued racist attitude that white people have towards Native Americans. Of course it’s complicated. They want sovereignty, but also reparations, and the U.S. government wants to assimilate them completely into the states to get rights to their land. They are in this sort of limbo where they are a separate nation, but within the borders of another larger, more powerful nation. It’s too complicated to outly here.
So, this guy talked about where I came from and the people and cultures that I grew up knowing about, albeit less than I really should. Afterwards we talked a little bit. (I didn’t admit where I was from because I wanted the discussion afterwards to be completely uncensored by my presence. In other words, I thought that telling people right off that I was from the U.S., and from this area, would make them hesistant to badmouth it, etc., and I wanted to see what they really felt. It turns out that they weren’t too anti-American, though there was a bit of that sentiment.)
It was interesting to talk about where I’m from with someone who actually knows. Since I’ve been in France, every time I say where I’m from people have no fucking clue. I have to explain that South Dakota is in the middle of the U.S., and I usually don’t even say which town. But this guy had been there, so I was able to talk about what he had touched on, verify that it was both true and sad how the Indians were living in poverty on their reservations inside an excessively rich country, etc.
After this I talked with the two guys who work there, or maybe even own the place. Akim and Derek are their names, and they were fascinated by the U.S., my experiences in France, etc. Mind you this whole evening was conducted in French, and I got about 90% of what was going on. Derek and Akim made me feel really welcome there, and I know now that I will go back as often as I can for their events, and maybe even to just read and write in their literary café.

Looking over what I have just written, it seems like a pretty normal day. I think, though, I’ve had a number of epiphanies. The first is that I can actually be understood and carry on conversation in French. The second is that instead of going to movies in English with people I already know and see all of the time, I ventured outside of my comfort zone and made a couple of friends. This is something I plan to do more often. Jon talked earlier in the evening about meeting French women, and I wanted to say that it’s possible but it takes both time and fortitude of character. I haven’t been taking the opportunities presented to me to meet people. I usually keep my mouth shut for fear of making an ass out of myself, but tonight I didn’t. I made my mistakes and I live by that. My day was brightened by Akim, Derek, Danny and all of the people at the talk that took an interest in me because of my country of origin. As a side note, the amount of Arab-French people that I’ve met and talked with is about even with the number of actual French people I know. The difference? All of the Arabs are in the service industry (save Samah, of course), which, in all honesty, I have more empathy for than the French teachers, since I just left two jobs in the same field.

This is the beginning of a new end

2005-11-21T14:33:00.000-08:00

So, despite my many protestations against the world of blogging, I have decided, in a moment of unbelievable mental weakness, to create a blog. Oh. The. Horror. I will chalk up my reasons for not doing so earlier out of both laziness and a revulsion towards revealing things about my life in an electronic form. However, since blogging is free and I have this incredible need to communicate with people across the ocean from where I am, which is France I supposed that this would be the best manner for doing so. Maybe other people will read it as well, though that is something which I highly doubt. More to come later.