Le travail éloigne de nous trois grands maux: l'ennui, le vice et le besoin

Two weeks in France and I'm already quoting Voltaire. Boooooooom! It means 'work delivers us from three evils: boredom, vice and want'. Apparently. Last week, I started work.

My college is like Waterloo Road, only worse. One of the teachers told me the other day that if a student gets expelled, no other school will take them. And a child is only expelled if he/she poses a 'dangerous risk' to fellow pupils and staff. Gulp. Over 80% of the students have unemployed parents and many don't even speak French that well, given that so many of them don't even come from France. Teaching them English should be a hoot then! One of the students has a dog called Sniper for heaven's sake!! I'm glad I haven't seen bad-ass French film The Class, as I fear it would have scared me off this 'assistant business' for good...

Despite all this, I remain (assez) optimistic about le travail. All of the staff are lovely and they always make an effort to talk to me in the staff room at breaktime. I get my own set of keys, photocopying card and a pigeon hole!! I have arrived, clearly. Now all I have to do is plan lessons, as I'm going to be teaching these bad-ass kids for 12 hours per week...

The last week has wholeheartedly reinforced the whole 'Brian is in the kitchen' thing (see previous blog). Bloody Brian is everywhere!! And not just in the kitchen. Today in class 'Brian' was waiting for the bus and last week he was at home doing his homework (pimping himself out, clearly). He's the Myleene Klass of foreign language learning, always popping up here and there-whether you want him to or not!

The French are on strike today. Encore une fois! Is there anything they don’t strike about?? I’ve heard the word solidarité so often these last few weeks I feel like the bloody word will haunt me in my sleep. When a student was asked to take his pencil case out of his bag today, he facetiously replied ''I can’t- I’m on strike''. I had to laugh...

It's not all work though. There's been plenty of time for fun and games. Had a LOT of fun last Thursday at a French house party. Through Couchsurfing, Jackie (my flatmate) and I got in touch with a group of law students at Université de Nancy 2 so we went to one of their parties! The host had made sushi for everyone which was amazing and we played French Ring of Fire 'Gros Poulet' before dancing to a lot of Phoenix and Daft Punk. Woo! French friends! We're going out with them all this Thursday night which should be good- plus I don't have to get up on Friday for work! (Had to wake up at half seven last Friday after getting home at half three-just horrible!).

Seen the other assistants quite a bit too- we all went out on Sunday for lunch and then went to the free jazz festival in the park where we saw lots of French rap, which was an experience (if you know me at all, you will know I have a strange fascination with French rap. I will say no more). Went out with an American assistant on Saturday night who was here last year as well (and he lives in my foyer) so he knows all the good bars! One drink quickly turned into four (quelle surprise), but found some pretty cool hangouts!

Tonight, I'm going to meet some engineering students randomly! I replied to an advert in the American library asking for weekly English-French conversation and some students from the Ecole des Mines have invited me to their petite soirée! We're making crepes apparently. Mmmmm.

I'll finish there- places to go, people to see, etc. I'll leave you with this. There was a fight at school yesterday between two students: the kids have been learning all about violence this week in their English classes. Somewhat ironic, I feel. Definitely puts a new spin on 'active learning' anyway!