In which I get situated

Ok, so I know it's been a while since I last posted, and a lot has happened since then. To that end, I will just give a general overview of what's been happening. Since my last update, I have moved into the foyer, and am starting to get pretty settled (i.e. unpacked). My room is, like I said, fairly institutional/dorm-like, but I have sticky tack with which to paper the walls with posters of whatever I can find. I'm hoping that plus perhaps a prettier quilt or duvet for my bed should make it much cozier and homier. For now, this is what it looks like:

As you can see, it's pretty sparse, but I have a kitchenette with two burners and a fridge, so it already beats my college dorm. What's more, there's an oven in the large kitchen downstairs! The upshot of that is that those of us Americans/interested parties who will be in the foyer will attempt to make a Thanksgiving dinner. And I can make banana bread, which is always a good thing.

In some respects, though, living here at the foyer is a lot like dorm life. There's a large group of assistants living here (two American and two English), and another one moved in today (German), so we've been spending a lot of time together, eating dinner in the courtyard (when we still had nice weather; that's pretty much done with now), wandering around Nevers getting to know the city, and trying out various activities. Last night we had a movie night and watched Tangled. Cutest movie ever; I would definitely recommend for anyone who hasn't seen it. Also, two assistants who are placed in smaller cities in La Nièvre came on Saturday for the weekend and stayed overnight in the foyer, and a large group of us went to check out the sole nightclub in Nevers, 'Le White'. It was interesting, to say the least, and certainly better than we were expecting.

That's really how I've been spending the bulk of my time, just hanging out in people's rooms, and making countless trips to the Monoprix or Carrefour to get dishes, pots, towels, whatever. However, today I went to the local pool for the first time, as I'm hoping to swim as often as possible to counteract my diet, which will probably consist mainly of cheese and bread (just kidding...mostly). It was a bit of a let down, to be honest. It was clean, which is good, and open, so better than when I tried to go in Nantes, but the water when I got in was far too warm for comfortable lap-swimming. The pool has no shallow end, and the water level was far below the edge of the pool at the ends, so standing after, for instance, a tiring set was impossible. There were also no lane lines out, just a space roped off in the middle, so I had to be very careful not to run into people head on. All in all, kind of disappointing. There's another pool in Varennes-Vauzelles nearby that I will probably go try, to see if it's any better. If not, I guess I'll just have to suck it up and swim in hot water.

I'm not going to attempt to recount right now everything that's been going on in the past week and some regarding my actual job, because there's a lot to tell, but I will give a brief overview now. I still have not yet started teaching at any of my schools yet. I mentioned earlier that I had two orientations to go to; those have now happened, but I will say more in my next post. I have also visited two of my schools, the two which are in Fourchambault, and met a couple of the teachers. However, I was supposed to start on Tuesday this week, but my schedule is still not worked out, so my start date has been pushed back again, until Thursday. I hope that's the real date, because I'm definitely ready to actually be doing something teaching-related.

I'll end this post for now, and talk about more stuff later, but I promised pictures of pretty things in my last post. I neglected, as I often do, to take pictures of Nevers when it was nice out, so these are stolen from Maria, one of the British assistants.

Actually, I did take this one, while I was in Paris at the Tuileries gardens.

Le Palais Ducal

La Cathédrale St. Cyr

Inside the cathedral

The courtyard at Foyer Clair-Joie