they crack me up

Today was a good day. I had a good class with the PL1. They were taking a "quiz", but they kept trying to get me to tell them the answers in French. They were cracking me up. A few times, I would nod if they told me the correct thing in French. Ahh... my boys.

There were a bunch of absences in the TGM (my absolute favorites), because some of them went into town for the sit-in (or as they kept saying the "seat-ing") at the other other high school to protest some of the reforms. However, a few of them returned during the middle of class. As A. said, "Il y avait du monde mais il fait froid!" (There were a lot of people, but it's cold out!). Ahh... yes. My boys really have such perseverance and stamina. And just for the record, it was much warmer today than it's been in the past few weeks. At the end of class, I had to translate all that was written on the board into French. I was like "Oh man", but A. thought I had said "Oh merde", so he was like "Elle connait bien les gros mots en francais" (She knows French swear words very well). "Shannon, il faut que tu dises 'oh mince'." (Shannon, you should be saying 'mince'.) Mince is one of those words that you say when you start to say a swear word but then quickly correct yourself. No matter how many times I repeated myself, he kept hearing "merde" so I finally had to write "oh man" on the board.

The PL2 had exams, so I had an early lunch and went to see the 1GM for the first time this year. I had all but three of them last year. They were beyond thrilled to have me back in class. For one, the quiz they were supposed to have got postponed. There was a scramble for who got to sit next to me. In the end, one of the new kids won out. He spent practically the whole time staring at me and trying to talk to me. He thought I couldn't speak French (that's what Claude said when I first came in, but of course, most of them knew better), so he tried very hard in English. So cute! However, the end of the class saw the return of Torture Shannon Time, so obviously he finally realized I can speak French. We're still working on the whole "R" business. They also wanted me to sing "Le lion est mort ce soir" (The Lion Sleeps Tonight) in English. Yeah, because I know that song by heart. But it was cute, they were like "Sing the lion died tonight" because that's the direct translation for them. When the PL2 are doing their stage, I'll have to return to this class.

This evening, they had a galette des Rois thing for the teachers to celebrate the Epiphany which was last week. It was nice and the cake was delicious! The proviseur (principal) came over to talk to us, and then, when he was inviting everyone to get a piece of cake, he turned all the attention onto us. Argh. So not a big fan of being the center of attention. It's bad enough that I seem to walk around town wearing a bright flashing sign that says "American", I don't need everyone at the school watching my every move more than they already do. But in the end, we had a great time. The head surveillant brought his two and a half year old daughter. She got the "feve" (the treat inside the cake), so she got a crown. She then went around the room passing out crowns. She was getting very distressed if someone didn't have one. There weren't enough for everyone, so people kept handing over theirs, but then she would worry when she realized they didn't have a crown now! She kept going "Tu en as pas une!" (You don't have one!) Adorable! I swear, she is the cutest little girl ever. She used to always try to talk to Katie and I last year. She wasn't even two yet but she had such a good level of language! She's only gotten better since then!

So yeah, very good day. One more day of "work" then it's the weekend!