Coming at you from my favorite internet bar

Hello all
Welcome back to Vannes! I know you have missed me over the past few days, so I thought I would check in again just to let you know that all is well here. It has been a busy week for me, filled with work, orientation, and you guessed it, more French paperwork. The bureaucracy is rather impressive; I came here with an entire folder filled with photocopies of all of my important documents, and my stocks are depleted daily. I think filling out forms is some kind of national addiction. They just cannot get enough of it over here.

So my first week of work consisted of two long days at the high school. Now just a bit of background, this is a professional high school, which means that the students are all learning a vocation. Some are training to become chefs, waiters, mechanics, electricians, accountants, etc...the list goes on and on. What that also means is that these kids are not the academic types. In fact, many of them dropped out of other high schools to come here, and they are being prepared for a profession so that they do not have to go to college.

My first days involved me getting to know them a bit and answering questions about myself. They are very shy about speaking in English, but in each class there were at least a few kids who were outgoing and helped translate for the rest. I was open and honest, and of course, faced more than a few embarrassing questions; some of the more curious students wanted to know about my social life, and for the girls, whether I had a girlfriend or not. I fulfilled their dreams with each time I had to answer no.

Today I had an orientation with all of the other teaching assistants in the French department I live in. There are about forty of us teaching English, Spanish, and German. It was a good opportunity to meet some other young people living in the area and receive tips on how to approach the job. And for the French administrators presenting the information, it offered them the chance to get their "fix" of paperwork. I'm talking Social Security, additional health insurance plans, salary advances...you name it, and they've got a form for it.

Unfortunately, while there are many assistants in the department, only a handful actually live in Vannes. So my mission for tomorrow, which is my day off, is to head to the youth center here and find out where I can play sports, and see if this town offers any clubs suited to my cultured tastes. And if I get really lucky, maybe, just maybe, I can find someone in this town who knows how to throw a frisbee. More on that later; hopefully good things to report the next time I can find internet. Well with that, and my daily internet beer dwindling to its dregs, I bid you goodnight. Time for dinner, a good read, and some dvds before I call it a night.