Spring Fever

Read the title. Now you know how I feel, except it's worse than any spring fever I have ever had. The combination of beautiful weather and the fast-approaching end of my teaching assistant contract has done a number on my motivation. It is not that I am counting down the days until I leave France; rather I am counting down the days until I don't have any more lessons. Unfortunately, those two dates go hand in hand.

Here we are over halfway through with my last work period in Vannes. After today's classes, I will have completed four out of the six weeks between February and April vacation. And after the holidays, I have one week of work, and then I fly home. I find myself full of mixed emotions as this point. While I am excited to see friends, family, and familiar American culture, I am also aware of how great a year this has been and how much I will leave behind. With that in mind, I have been trying to do as much as possible during the last two months that I have in Vannes.

Suscinio

So to recap my last few weeks. Aside from the daily grind at school, where my remaining lessons seem to pass slower and slower each day, I have taken a few trips on days off. Two weekends ago, I spent a night at a fellow teacher's house, met her family, and was introduced to a part of the Brittany coastline I had not seen yet. In addition, Mireille lives a short drive from the beautiful Suscinio castle. So despite experiencing severe foot pains at the time, I sucked it up and jumped on an hour and a half tour of the castle.

Now, you might be wondering about that casual reference to severe foot pain. Is he ok?
What happened?

Let me calm your fears. I may be the first person ever to get tendinitis in the foot from walking. I can tell you it is very painful, but when I try to explain why it happened I have no good story. One minute I am walking to school, and the next, my foot decides it wants to feel like it is on fire. So after a week of gimping around Vannes, the other English teachers decided for me that I should get an x-ray and see a doctor. Four hours later, it was determined that I have tendinitis, and I was prescribed some medication and told to rest.

After taking care of my foot, I moved on to other fun, adventurous activities. On a beautiful, sunny, and warm Wednesday morning-one of my days off-Cyril, another teacher at the school, took me kayaking in the Gulf of Morbihan. I have to say it was the best Wednesday I have spent in Vannes. It was both my first time out on the water here and first time realizing that kayaking does involve work. But the best part of the day came after we beached our kayaks for lunch. As we searched for a good spot to eat, we came upon a group of retired teachers who also happened to be picnicking. Before long, we sat with them and enjoyed a glass of the red wine they brought. A perfect cap to a wonderful trip.

Giorgio de Chirico

Finally, March has not been without great company from home. Last weekend I took a trip to Paris to see friends from UGA. While I was not wild about returning once more to the city, it was wonderful to get away from Vannes and see some familiar faces. We enjoyed beautiful weather and visited the Centre Pompidou, an enormous museum full of art from the 20th century. All in all, a great weekend and a great halfway point until my last vacation in France.

Now that you know what all I have been up to, perhaps you can understand my mindset. So much to do, so little time. But I have not been playing the whole time. This month I have written several articles for "Like the Dew," an online journal of Southern culture based in Atlanta. Below are the links to the series of stories. Enjoy! I will be sure to check back in soon.

Ciao
Tommy

http://likethedew.com/2012/03/20/feels-like-home/
http://likethedew.com/2012/03/08/inside-teaching-english-in-france/
http://likethedew.com/2012/02/06/searching-for-a-taste-of-the-south-in-france/

The Bledsoe's Do France

All you film makers out there, take notice! "The Bledsoe's Do France" is a blockbuster just waiting to happen; all it needs is someone to take a chance on it. The story is complete with tension, drama, love, and most of all, humor in every shape and form. We had engagements, rental car rides from hell, and your stereotypical embarrassing American at French restaurant adventures. But most of all, we had an excellent two-week vacation for my February holidays.

Maybe you can tell..it was freezing

On February 10th, the Friday of the first weekend of vacation, mom, dad, and my brother Roger flew from Atlanta to Paris for the start of our tour de France. The first weekend, spent in Paris, was mostly a battle against pickpockets. However, none of these so-called professional thieves were prepared for Robin Bledsoe's line of defense: safety pins. After a few of our backpack zippers were found half-opened during a metro ride, those zippers were never without pins again. The strategy worked quite well, except when we went to the Auguste Rodin gardens, and security asked dad to open his bag. So while he struggled to fight his way through mom's handiwork, we all stood aside and did the only appropriate thing we could. Laugh at the tourist who locked his own backpack! Needless to say, we never had any problems after that.

Escape from the Louvre!

After seeing many of the incredible sights Paris has to offer, including Montmartre, Sacre Coeur, the Louvre, et Le Marais district (which Roger and I found is totally different at night from the Jewish district it is during the day), we made our way down south to Cahors. We chose this town because of its proximity to a nearby cave filled with prehistoric paintings. Unfortunately, we would never make it to this cave. After a wonderful birthday celebration for dad at a local French restaurant, we rented a car the next day to drive to the caves. Our goal: Hit one cave named Font de Gaume and then drive back and see the cave closest to Cahors in the afternoon. When our one and a half hour drive turned into three hours to get to the first cave, complete with an instructional episode of how to push a car on an icy road, we knew this was the only cave we would see. So despite the difficulties in getting there, the sight was amazing and worth the effort. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, to see these 15,000 year old drawings.

Font de Gaume

Our adventures continued in Tours, a town located in the chateau region of France. From there, we took a train to nearby Chinon castle. Chinon is famous for being the location of Joan of Arc's first encounter with King Charles VII. Luckily for us, this journey provided no unforeseen surprises, aside from an embarrassing dinner in Tours. I will admit that being the tour guide got the best of me in this situation. Ordering dinner for everyone resulted in ordering one too many pasta carbonaras. Also, we learned the hard way that the concept of a doggie bag is still foreign to the French, so if you want one, you may have to make do with their leftover ice cream box.

Following our chateau excursions, we made it to Vannes and rested for a few days. Roger stayed with me, however my parents stayed at my teacher Francoise's house. But the big news arrived from Paris. My sister Joanna and her brand new fiance Idan met us in Vannes, fresh off the Eiffel Tower and newly engaged! We celebrated the news, and spent the weekend allowing Francoise to show us the good life in Vannes. On Monday, we all left and headed to Mont Saint Michel, the second most visited tourist spot in France. And it is worth all the hoopla. Surely it must be the inspiration for the Magic Kingdom. This abbey sits on a rocky island out in the middle of a bay; at the foot of the abbey is a small medieval village. And once all the tourists part at sundown, leaving only the cool ones-us included-who were staying on the island, you have this deserted fairytale place to yourself.

Mont Saint Michel

We spent the last few days in Paris, checking out must-see tourist spots and chasing down souvenirs for friends back home. After my parents and Roger left on Thursday, I hung around with Joanna and Idan through the weekend. In fact, I left them before they left Paris, as some of us had work to get back to. It was a fantastic vacation, wonderful to see my family, and one that recharged my batteries for the end of my work here in France. Five more weeks lie between me and my last vacation. After that, one week until my position is over and I return home. So time to live it up! With that in mind, I'll leave you for now, enjoy the downtime till we meet again.

Tommy