Life
On Tuesday I met up with all the English assistants at secondary schools in the departement - about 30 of us - for a meeting about how being an assistant was going. I got a few good teaching ideas out of it but overall it did seem a little like a waste of a day which was only slightly ameliorated by getting to see people I haven’t seen for a while because they live in tiny villages in the middle of nowhere.
Wednesday was a good day though. I had the day off (as ever) which, coupled with not really teaching on Tuesday, basically meant I had a second weekend in the middle of the week. I relaxed a lot (read: excessive lounging) but did manage to tidy my room. In the evening I met up with Elisa, a Spanish girl who I had organised to meet over the internet for a language exchange. Weirdly, despite knowing loads of Latin-Americans, she was the first Spanish girl I met in Tours. Anyway, it went very well - we luckily seemed to have quite a bit in common, including a love of Flashforward. I’ll therefore be seeing her again in January. We spoke in English for a bit, and for a long time I was speaking in English while she replied in Spanish. This was good for my Spanish listening, but at present I am nowhere near confident enough to speak Spanish, and I think she understood and accepted this. Ho hum, give it a couple of months!
Wednesday was a good day though. I had the day off (as ever) which, coupled with not really teaching on Tuesday, basically meant I had a second weekend in the middle of the week. I relaxed a lot (read: excessive lounging) but did manage to tidy my room. In the evening I met up with Elisa, a Spanish girl who I had organised to meet over the internet for a language exchange. Weirdly, despite knowing loads of Latin-Americans, she was the first Spanish girl I met in Tours. Anyway, it went very well - we luckily seemed to have quite a bit in common, including a love of Flashforward. I’ll therefore be seeing her again in January. We spoke in English for a bit, and for a long time I was speaking in English while she replied in Spanish. This was good for my Spanish listening, but at present I am nowhere near confident enough to speak Spanish, and I think she understood and accepted this. Ho hum, give it a couple of months!