You Know You Are in France When...

You are walking across a busy intersection where pedestrian right-of-way is not recognized and it’s raining and your umbrella gets blown inside-out by the wind. But at least there’s Nutella waiting for you at home. Seriously though, pedestrian right-of-way is only recognized when European drivers feel like being nice and recognizing it. The green person will be all lit up for you to start walking and then, out of nowhere, a moped or a car comes zooming by and most definitely does not put on the brakes for you. Many a time have I seen a person’s friend pull them back by their sleeve to avoid a catastrophe.

However, after learning that European drivers do not yield—some people from almost first-hand experience—it’s quite easy to remember to look both ways (and then again, and maybe once more for good luck) before crossing the street.

Now onto a slightly different topic: the difficulty of my block schedule. Now, some people might think, block schedules are really easy to deal with…. What’s the problem? And while overall a block schedule is not generally difficult to handle, it is a rather different story when there are limited number of classrooms, a very rigid morning schedule, and an overall shortened schedule on Wednesdays to deal with. That having been said, I think SYA did a wonderful job juggling all these issues. However, problems did arise with certain classes and now it is simply a matter of dealing with them.

To finally aid you in seeing what I mean, I am going to walk you through my weekly class schedule, confusing as it is (no joke there). Since everybody is divided into two language level groups, and then divided in half again, there are 4 groups and you have all five French-based classes with your group (shout out to Group IIA!). So that leaves Math and English (or frees) for interaction with people not in your group. This is going to be a really long post, so bear with me here.

Monday:

Arrive at school at 8 a.m. after taking the bus. 1^st period begins at 8:10, so I get my stuff together for my morning classes.

1. 1^st period French Literature. Super hard class because it’s difficult to argue the themes of regular literature, let alone in a language where you have the vocabulary of a five year old. Just never forget your dictionary. It’s a work in progress you could say. Ahem ahem.

2. 2cd period French History. Currently we are re-reviewing world history, but this time it’s in a different language, so everything appears new until you figure out that one word means cinnamon and that other word means nutmeg, and now everything the teacher was saying about why Columbus sailed the ocean blue suddenly makes perfect sense. Ta-da!

3. 3^rd period Art History. JP (the teacher) is amazing. Enough said. But really, I couldn’t get through the day with out his multitude of American music references. But I could go without his really difficult quizzes over the floor plans of cathedrals. But I do enjoy knowing what I’m looking at when we go to those cathedrals on school trips, and the fact that I don’t know half of the cathedral vocabulary in English. But I know all of it in French. Oh, and his mutual love for Arcade Fire.

4. 4^th period Monday Assembly. Basically we all sit in the common room and listen to announcements, hear about the latest strike and which busses it will be affecting, and who has birthdays that week.

5. LUNCH. Normally an HOUR AND A HALF (!!!) from 11:30 to 1 p.m. I’ll explain shortly why it’s not “ALWAYS” and hour and a half. There are four different options for lunch (all near SYA), which is nice, but sometimes it’s hard to choose what to do. There is a public school where we can eat, which has really good food, but it doesn’t open until 12 p.m., which can be annoying when the French kids try and (successfully) cut you while waiting in line. Then there is a private school that has a nice atmosphere, but the food is bland… so yeah. But, if you are in on the secret, you know that you can eat “downstairs” at the private school where there is a café-style menu and seating that is all REALLY good. Like today for instance; I got a hot Panini, a salad, a cookie, a hot chocolate (it was raining all today, I needed a warm drink), and a bottle of water. All with the swipe of my lunch card. Lovely! And then, the fourth and final option: go to a bakery or pizzeria near school and grab a quick (huge!) French sandwich when you have….

6. Lunch period ENGLISH. Horrible, I know. It really is because when you get used to an hour and a half for lunch, 45 minutes just doesn’t cut it when you have to walk multiple blocks to the closest place to eat lunch at. But whining completely aside, English Literature is quite interesting. We just finished reading Going After Cacciato, a book I found quite intriguing even though I am not one for war-type stories, but, as the book cover says, GAC is not a ‘war’ novel, just like Moby Dick is not another whaling book. Or something to that extent. After many informal Socratic seminar-type discussions (I truly appreciate the practice from last year, Mrs. Williams-Eddy. It’s been enormously helpful!), I found that I really enjoy discussing literature even more than I originally thought.

7. 5^th period French Society and Culture. Basically we’ve been learning how France was originally divided, how it changed and how it is arranged today. We also have been learning more specifically about Bretagne (Brittany; where Rennes is). I think everyone really wants to get to present day events so we can have a better handle on understanding the things are host families discuss, what’s going on with all these strikes (seriously!), etc.

8. 6^th period French Literature. I have double French Lit. on Mondays and Fridays, so that means I don’t have it on any other day during the week.

9. 7^th period Free. Usually used by the majority of people to catch up on English reading, study, or do what is most fun: run to the nearby Carrefour for gummi cacti (don’t ask), candy or cookies or even whole baguettes if that’s your style. But know this: if you want it, Carrefour’s got it.

10. 8^th period French Language. Similar to French class at home with grammar and sentence construction, etc. But of course, the whole class is in French and the teacher does not ‘speak’ English, so don’t even try to speak English in the French-speaking classes, because, usually, the teachers really won’t understand or they will pretend like they don’t understand so you are therefore forced to speak French anyway.

11. 9^th period Honors Pre-calculus. Last period on Monday, which by the end of you are just dying to get home because it is now 5:05 p.m. and you can’t believe you are still in school that late in the afternoon.

And so concludes my Monday: a nasty day where I have 8 classes. Yuck. But now that the long winded description is thankfully over, I will just run through the rest of my schedule and be done with the deed.

Tuesday:

1. 1. Free. Arrive at school at 8:30. Check over homework from Monday night, study for any upcoming quizzes/tests.
2. 2. French Langue
3. 3. French Culture And Society (CESF)
4. 4. Art History
5. 5. Lunch
6. 6. Double French Hist. part 1
7. 7. French Hist. part 2
8. 8. Free
9. 9. Hon. Pre-Cal
10. 10. English. Finish at 5:05. Again.

Wednesday:

1. SHORT DAY!!!
2. 1. Free
3. 2. Free
4. 3. Free. Not kidding. Three frees! Arrive at school at 10:20 (or earlier depending on the amount of studying necessary for quizzes/tests).
5. 4. Art History
6. 5. Lunch/English (half lunch like Monday)
7. 6. Hon Pre-Cal. Done at 1:35 p.m. Wonderful for going to downtown Rennes with friends and getting hot chocolate and crêpes at a crêperie while people watching!

Thursday:

1. Double French Langue. part 1. Arrive at school at 8 a.m., class at 8:10
2. French Langue. part 2
3. Free
4. CESF
5. Lunch
6. Universal Free. Usually consists of advisory meetings, assembly meetings, or the sometimes a “free” period. Ironic, no?
7. Art History
8. Honors Pre-cal
9. English. Out at 4:15. I’m going to be starting rock climbing soon and I will be doing it on Thursdays, but more on that later.

Friday:

1. 1. CESF. Arrive at school at 8 a.m., class at 8:10
2. 2. French Langue.
3. 3. French Lit.
4. 4. French Hist.
5. 5. Lunch
6. 6. Art History
7. 7. French Lit. (again). Out at 2:35. Perfect for getting the weekend started early!

And there is my schedule! I don’t know how I will ever memorize it, but thankfully I have a paper copy to keep until that day which I believe is far off in the distance.

Next up is a recount of the school trip we took to Morbihan and Finistère!