So I’ve just become addicted and obsessed with Twitter! I don’t know why? I just watched this really hilarious video about and even though it’s totally true I’m still obsessed with writing tweets! I even downloaded this firefox extension where one can update their twitter by typing in the address bar and submiting it there. Also, by typing the simple three letter tag #fb my tweets are linked and updated on my facebook! You really should consider joining twitter! If you look at the right hand side of my blog page you can see the last ten twitter posts that I have made and just in case you are reading this post on facebook the address to my twitter is http://www.twitter.com/TheGlossophile

Yesterday was my neices 2nd birthday party. Her actual birthday isn’t until this coming Saturday but my sister decided to celebrate her birthday yesterday on Memorial Day and had the family over! It is really hard to believe that she is already two!

Saturday, Georgia, Alissa, and I got up earlier tha most Saturdays and went to the covered market to pruchase some items for the breakfast we had planned to make on Sunday. Sunday morning we got up and prepared our typical North American breakfast of scrambled eggs, hash browns, bacon, and pancakes! We also had juice, tea, coffee, fruit (pineapple, cantaloupe, strawberries) and we had regular, chocolate chip, and raspberry pancakes! We obviously had invited Fernando and Isabel the Spaniards over to try our style of cooking! After breakfast we played Kniffel and Scategories! It was a great afternoon!

I’m currently off for the next two days and was off yesterday as my classes at the school which I’m usually at all day on Tuesdays and Thursdays are on school trips all week. I wanted to go to Carcassonne a very old fortified city but because of financial issues (i.e. I’m poor) I couldn’t afford to go! I’m going to work on getting links to my facebook photo albums while the fotobook application isn’t working and work on catching up uploading all the pictures I need to!

This post is stored in the category of Made in France, Personal Post and was written by Derron Borders

Tags: Alissa Morano, Blog, breakfast, Carcassonne, Facebook, Fernando and Isabel, Firefox, fotobook, Georgia Irving, hash browns, Kniffel, Memorial Day, Neice, pancakes, Rylee, scambled eggs, Scategroies, Twitter

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Today, Alissa and I took a 12h45 train to the Basque town of Donibane Lohizune, known in French as St. Jean-de-Luz. We arrived there around 14h00 and after finding a bathroom we decided to visit the town of Ziburu (Fr. Ciboure) to visit to Zokoako Forta (Socoa Fort) but after walking for a good 20 minutes we realized it was A LOT further than we had anticipated and we settled for taking pictures of it from afar!

We made our way back to St. Jean-de-Luz and walked around the town, visiting the old church and walking along the beach. We decided to take a coastal boat tour but ended up not getting the really good one and really didn’t get to see all that much as it was a bit hazy. The sun was out and it was a beautiful day and St. Jean-de-Luz is a VERY beautiful Basque city!

Tomorrow we are going to the Dax covered market and the regular market to buy supplies to make breakfast on Sunday morning!

This post is stored in the category of Made in France, Personal Post, Written in Basque, Written in English and was written by Derron Borders

Tags: Alissa Morano, Basque, Basque City, Basque Country, Ciboure, Saint Jean de Luz

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Today, I and the other assitants had planned to go to the beach at Capbreton but since it was a bit chilly and cloudy we decided last night that we would have lunch at the Spaniard’s place, Fernando and Isabel, and then go see a movie at the movie theatre. Today was a holiday in France because today is when Jesus ascended into heaven. Alissa, Georgia, and I headed over to Ferisa’s place around 12:30 where we enjoyed ANOTHER amazing Spanish meal. We had this thing that was a bit like potatoe salad but it had green peppers, green olives, and tuna in it. It was delicious, even for me who doesn’t like green olives and green peppers all too well. They also had a cheese plate laid out with an assortment of cheeses and had little grilled bread with pâté spreads and a Spanish tortilla which is potatoes and onions cooked in egg. Lunch was delicious and we of course had our fill. We ended up seeing a 16:30 showing of the movie Millénium, which is based off the book by the same title by Stieg Larsson. It was a very gruesome and bizarre movie. It was two and a half hours long. After the move we walked around the Place d’Arènes where there was some sort of gastronomy festival type thing going on and then we ended up going and getting a drink at a café before returning home! Today was great! Tomorrow, Alissa and I are making our way down to Saint Jean de Luz a quaint little Basque town along the Atlantic coast!

This post is stored in the category of Made in France, Personal Post and was written by Derron Borders

Tags: Alissa Morano, Capbreton, cheese, Fernando and Isabel, Georgia Irving, Movie, pâté, Spanish Tortilla, Stain Jean de Luz, Stieg Larsson

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So, like I always do, I haven’t been on the ball updating my blog! I need to keep up with it I promise! This is an update of my life, like you care really!

Parents came to France!
During the second half of my Easter break my parents came and visited France! They arrived on the 19th of April and stayed one week and returned on the 25th of April! It was a long and VERY exhausting week! I had arrived to Paris two days before and took advantage of free entry into the Louvre and spent the whole day walking around much of the ancient exhibits at the Louvre. I then walked from there to the Eiffel Tower which resulted in tendinitis developing in my feet. The next day I hung out with Morgan, an assistant in my department. It was a dreadfully rainy and we ended up just going to see the movie “Chéri” after indulging ourselves on “kebabs”! Her dad was coming to visit her and so we decided to meet the next morning and take the train out to Charles de Gaulles airport.

I had trouble finding where my parents were flying into and ended up having to take a shuttle a few gates backwards from where the train station was to get them. I was a little late and saw them in the distance as they started to move out of sight. I finally was able to catch up and tell them that I was there and it was really great seeing them, yet strange all together seeing my parents in Paris! We took the train back to Paris and made our way through the metro and finally checked them into their hotel. After that we took my stuff to the hostel where I was staying at and went to Place St. Michel where we ate Pizza. We saw the Notre Dame, went on a Seine boat tour, saw the Louvre after and finally made our way back to their hotel where we called it a night as they were extremely exhausted.

The next morning we met and made our way to the Eiffel tower. We went up in it and then walked to Trocadéro and then made our way to see the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs-Elysées. We ate at McDonalds and then took the metro to see the Grande Arche at La Défense! After that we made our way to Montmartre to see the Sacré Coeur and to find something to eat. We then returned back to our hotels and decided to get a very good night’s sleep for the next morning.

The next morning we met at the Gare Montparnasse and took a train to Dax. We pretty much stayed in Dax all day and relaxed. The next morning we took a train down to Biarritz and visited there all day and returned back to Dax in the evening where I made spaghetti and invited Alissa over to eat with us. That night at 12:07am we were taking the night train to Paris. When we got in the train there were people sleeping in our place, or so we thought. I had accidently bought the tickets for the previous night and thus we had missed our train by 24hours. I think mom and dad were a bit irritated but the conductors on the train were very kind and we ended up getting out own sleeping compartment. When we arrived in Paris the next morning we had to buy tickets to get to Lille as we were taking the train from Lille to go to Bruxelles.

When we arrived in Brussels my third host sister was there waiting for us at the train station. We went to my favorite place, The Cheesecake Café to eat and visited the Grande Place and Manneken Pis and the great Cathedral. My parents really enjoyed Brussels and preferred it over Paris, which made me very happy as I ABSOLUTELY LOVE Brussels! In the late afternoon we returned to my host sister’s apartment and took showers and then headed down to my third host family’s house in Nismes, Belgium. It was great for my parents to finally meet one of my host families and the dinner my host mom made was AMAZING! After the VERY long dinner we went to bed and woke up the next morning to a BEAUTIFUL day in Belgium, which is quite rare! We walked around Nismes and the park and mom and I went back and rested while dad continued to take pictures of my little town. In the evening my first host mom came and picked us up. We stopped at the school where I went when I lived in Belgium looking fro my English teacher, whom we did not see. We did run into Elisabeth, the host sister of my friend Kate Barry who was an exchange student with me in Belgium. That night we had a nice short AMAZING steak meal and my parents really had a great final night to their week in Europe. The next morning we all woke up early and were taken to meet my third host family at the Couvin train station. I said goodbye to my parents as my third host sister was taking them back to Brussesl to the airport and my host parents were taking me to the Charleroi airport to return home to France. Overall, the week was amazing and I’m so glad I got to see my parents and that they got to experience Europe a little!

Sick

It was nice to return to France after the exhausting week but things with my health had not improved. The cold that I had caught in Italy during my February vacation that had turned to bronchitis still lingered and my allergies that turned into a sinus infection was making things worse. On the flight home my ears became really clogged up and when we landed my left ear was clogged so much that I thought I was going deaf. I had planned on returning to the doctor as I was supposed to meet with the Inspectrice (kind of like School District Superindentent) because of all my absences from the 6 weeks before the Easter vacation due to me being ill. I finally decided to go see a otorhinolaryngologist and not just a regular doctor. The doctor told me it was normal that my ear wa clogged up and told me that the doctor I had seen before didn’t prescribe enough steroids to get rid of my infection the first time. I’ve been taking the steroids the past week and a half and yesterday was my last dose. My ear is back to normal and so far my chest feels as if it is cleared up. I no longer have the sinus infection but my allergies are still a bother. That, I can live with I think!

Departures

The week after my parents were in Europe, Alissa’s aunt and sister came to visit her. This week also happened to be the last for Will and Dasia who are two assistants that were on 7 month high school/junior high contracts. We had one last hoo ha with Will and Dasia at Dasia’a apartment and Alissa’s sister came along! We ended up going to this little bar that was completely dead and actually closed as we left it. I didn’t end up going into the Richelieu but I hear they had a great time! It was sad saying goodbye to Dasia when she came to the residence to tell Georgia and I goodbye. This past Sunday, Alissa, Georgia, and I went over to Fernando and Isabel’s for lunch (IT WAS SOO GOOD) and we ended up calling Dasia! It was great to see that she was doing well and readjusting back to life in Mexico!

My website

If you haven’t noticed my stupid website no longer has photos as the applicaiton I use to import them from facebook is currently not working! I’m totally working on this!

I promise to do better…I REALLY DO! I will start posting a blog everyday even if nothing happened! There are tons of topics I’d love to talk about (about France) that I never have and I can take the time to write my thoughts on them now! I’ll be posting about Spain here tonight or tomorrow as well depending on what we do tomorrow!

Tomorrow is Ascension (when Jesus ascended to heaven) and we don’t have school and so that we didn’t have to work on Friday, we did Friday’s classes today! Four day weekend…WHOO! Tomorrow I’m planning on doing something with the assistants. We are definitely going to the beach either tomorrow or Friday depending on the rain weather we are suppose to be getting!

Time to go hang out with Alissa and Georgia!

This post is stored in the category of Made in France, Personal Post and was written by Derron Borders

Tags: Alissa Morano, Biarritz, Blog, Bronchitis, Brussels, Champs Élysées, Charles de Gaulles, Chéri, Chimay, Cold, Dad, Dasia Martinez, Dax, Eiffel Tower, Facebook, Forge-Philippe, Gare Montparnasse, Georgia Irving, Grande Place, L'Arc de Triomphe, Lille, Manneken Pis, Mom, Nismes, Notre Dame, Otorhinolaryngologist, Paris, Sick, Sinus Infection, Website, Will Stinton

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Last night as I was reading through the last chapters of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince I had some questions about some events in the book that I needed immediate answers to. I went online and as per routine I automatically went to my e-mail. I saw an e-mail from a familiar address which states “NO-CONTESTAR”, which means do not reply in Spanish. The subject heading was “Adjudicación de Plaza” which means “Placement Allocation”. When I opened up the e-mail this is what appeared:

Ha sido adjudicada la plaza en – Islas Baleares – España a su solicitud 09_2AXC001533 del programa de Auxiliares de Conversación.\n Si desea renunciar a esta plaza comuníquelo lo antes posible a mercedes.vidal@mec.es\n

The rough translation: “You have been awarded placement in -Balearic Islands, Spain for you applicaiton #09_2AXC001533 of the English Assisant Progam. If you would like to decline this placement please commnicate this ASAP to mercedes.vidal@mec.es.

This e-mail means that I definitely have been awarded a teaching position in Spain for the 2009-2010 school year. The only problem is that I got my third choice place instead of my highly hoped for first choice, The Basque Country. I really had my heart set on learning Basque and Spanish at the same time. The reason I put the Balearic Islands as my third choice was because it was the only other region of Spain that spoke Catalan that was in a separate category from Catalonia and The Basque Country.

If you haven’t noticed, I did say the Balearic ISLANDS! Yes! Las Islas Baleares or in Catalan known as Les Illes Balears! I will be living on an island where the majority of people communicate daily in Catalan and not in Spanish. At first I was shocked to see that I was placed in the Balearic Islands. It is a very big tourist destination and I did not want to be anywhere near where “English” would be spoken. Also, it is an island! Meaning, things will be more expensive and if I wanted to see the rest of Spain I have to take a Ferry or fly to Valencia or Barcelona to go anywhere else.

This also causes more of a problem because all assistants have a week long orientation at the beginning of the year in Madrid. So, I will have to fly to Madrid, take a train to Valencia or Barcelona (which isn’t that close btw to Madrid) and then take a plane to which ever island I am placed on.

I have very mixed feelings about it all. I’m excited to learn Catalan as well as Spanish but also I’m freaked out by knowing that I will be living on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea.

This post is stored in the category of Made in France, Personal Post and was written by Derron Borders

Tags: Assistants, Balearic Islands, Barcelona, Basque, Basque Country, Catalan, Catalonia, Harry Potter, Illes Balears, Islas Baleares, Made in Spain, Madrid, Profez, Spanish, Valencia

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