Bonjour, Kelly!

When armadillos Ruled

I lost my damn cell phone. I have about a 5% hope of someone finding it, but I doubt that's going to happen. When I went to another teacher's house on Wednesday for dinner, I grabbed it and stuck it in an interior pocket in by bag as I walked out the door. Later that night, when I returned to my room, I took it out to check for messages, and couldn't find it. At first I was optimistic, and thought it slid out in the car; however, I saw the teacher who drove me, while he was in his car (small town = awesome), but he couldn't find it. Nobody who was at the dinner could find it. And yes, I asked the other teachers who were merely present. It's basically me clutching at my neck after the lights go out, screaming "My pearls! My pearls are gone!"

Of course, nobody has seen my phone. One teacher, however, offered to lend me the money to buy a new phone. Naturally, I didn't accept, since I am poor but I ain't THAT poor, okay? [I think I paid back all karma from that offer by giving one of my students 50 cents at Shopi tonight when she came up short. Phew.]



Since my family is coming here for Christmas, and since, you know, communication is integral to the functioning of society, I guess I'll need to get a new phone. I went to the store tonight, but they cheapest one they have is 129 euro. Another phone, for 59eur, sold out earlier this week, and they won't get a new shipment until Wednesday.

(small town = sucks)

Alas, I am without phone. Normally, when I call the US, I do so from a pay phone in the center of town. Recently, most conversations end with me getting too cold, and promising that I'll get a phone for my room. Easier said than done, considering I'll have to take a train to another town to have that set up, but now it's coming back to bite me in the ass, since now I have no phone at all.
Anyway.



Oh boy, I like teaching! Not only do I get to teach students my own arbitrary selection of Good Words to Know, I also get to plan any lessons I see fit.

Of course, I saw writing letters to Santa as the best course of action for today, specifically because I would get letters like this:

"Dear Santa,
Hello
Are you feeling?
Me, good. The school, it's good because I have good grates. I'm a good daughter to my parents. I'm tidy in my room. I'm very nice so as far as I am concerned for Christmas I would like a money. And lot of chocolate. Thank you santa clons. Kisses for your lepruchans.

GOYARD Morgane"

Love it.

This is a picture of a well-known (in France only) village called Baume-les-Messieurs. It's rather beautiful in the town, also, with the cliffs on either side; well, also because it looks like Snow White lives there. If one continues to the end of the Reculee (the dead-end of the valley), it becomes more and more thick with damp forest. I rode my bike there in September, and I actually felt a bit nervous that I would encounter some Megafauna*. Megafauna Country!




*I download the podcast for "Living on Earth" (from NPR). Last week, they did a piece on Madagascar, and how there's area of forest that have never been explored by people. Apparently, there were Megafauna which thrived in this ecosystem, even more so than other places, but they were quickly hunted out.
Hello! They were hunted? People actually saw these things? I'm pissed that I missed all the action.

posted by kelly @ 6:14 PM