fat man, big city
Feeling mieux about dreary ol' Normandy.
upon catharine's invitation, I went to a concert last night in a high school that looked like an arc where I got to laugh heartily and my self from three years ago... her son, donovan, is the lead/singer guitar player for "ziklights" (in high school I would've been their roadie); they played teenangst-toned bob dylan, jimi hendrix and deftones- and everything loud with elastic arms. lots of lyrics in english here. lots of english period here. my friend clare goes to a gym called: cool sun gym.
in the states, I was always so engulfed in my love affair with romance languages, I neglected to appreciate how cool english is. aside from the verb "to get," there's a lot that french just can not capture. (psst, it's because english is a mutt of a language... with germanic and latin roots, and a knack for borrowing words like it's 1999, you've got a super supply of synonyms)
on the other hand, french is great... it has a great way of making ridiculousness serious. every sentence is most accurately accented with a general sentiment of disapproval. of moderate disappointment. and at least half of what you say should mean nothing. example of a typical french conversation:
"Bonjour! Comment ça va?"
"Ben, ça va, mais,"
"Mais bon, oui je sais... pouf,"
"Bouf, bah oui, eh?"
"Bah,"
"Ben, voilà."
and then you kiss each others cheeks a thousand times so your awkward goodbye is separated into shoulder-top syllables.
"I've got to admit it's getting better..."
yesterday I taught, who knew "fri-day (clap clap) the twen-ty-first (clap clap) oc-to-ber" was such a groovy rap? it's totally the next "brush your shoulders off." they loved it. out of my eight classes there's only one that I see posing un grand problème... but even that should be manageable. they're huge on THE AUTHORITY OF THE INSTRUCTOR here. when I tell them to write something they ask "where? what page? what line of the page? what pen should I use?" and when I say "I don't care, wherever you want" they look at me like an elephant has just wiggled out of my nostril. "n'importe où?" they gasp...
upon catharine's invitation, I went to a concert last night in a high school that looked like an arc where I got to laugh heartily and my self from three years ago... her son, donovan, is the lead/singer guitar player for "ziklights" (in high school I would've been their roadie); they played teenangst-toned bob dylan, jimi hendrix and deftones- and everything loud with elastic arms. lots of lyrics in english here. lots of english period here. my friend clare goes to a gym called: cool sun gym.
in the states, I was always so engulfed in my love affair with romance languages, I neglected to appreciate how cool english is. aside from the verb "to get," there's a lot that french just can not capture. (psst, it's because english is a mutt of a language... with germanic and latin roots, and a knack for borrowing words like it's 1999, you've got a super supply of synonyms)
on the other hand, french is great... it has a great way of making ridiculousness serious. every sentence is most accurately accented with a general sentiment of disapproval. of moderate disappointment. and at least half of what you say should mean nothing. example of a typical french conversation:
"Bonjour! Comment ça va?"
"Ben, ça va, mais,"
"Mais bon, oui je sais... pouf,"
"Bouf, bah oui, eh?"
"Bah,"
"Ben, voilà."
and then you kiss each others cheeks a thousand times so your awkward goodbye is separated into shoulder-top syllables.
"I've got to admit it's getting better..."
yesterday I taught, who knew "fri-day (clap clap) the twen-ty-first (clap clap) oc-to-ber" was such a groovy rap? it's totally the next "brush your shoulders off." they loved it. out of my eight classes there's only one that I see posing un grand problème... but even that should be manageable. they're huge on THE AUTHORITY OF THE INSTRUCTOR here. when I tell them to write something they ask "where? what page? what line of the page? what pen should I use?" and when I say "I don't care, wherever you want" they look at me like an elephant has just wiggled out of my nostril. "n'importe où?" they gasp...