8 Months in Paris: Getting Involved

Birthday blessings to my beautiful, brilliant, and bubbly little sister MALLORY!!! I don’t know where all of those “b’s” came from, but I hope you are having a wonderful day. And we’re still not gonna talk about your age because that means that some of us are getting old ;)

Hope you all enjoy today’s entry, the third one in three days! I’m on a roll! Plus this one has a lot of photos, which is why they're sprinkled throughout the text a bit more haphazardly than usual. We’ll see how long I can keep this up…

Peace – ML

Sunday, October 14 – Testimony in French + Meeting 2 People Who Knew Georgia! + Blog > Sleep

· Wake-up time: 6:15 am (Understandable given that I’d gone to sleep at 11:15 pm – or rather 23:15 – the night before. No, mine isn’t the party rock lifestyle.) Worked on my blog entry covering last Monday (10/8) while listening to gospel music. (One of my mom’s rules growing up was that we couldn’t listen to secular music on Sundays, and I still do my best to follow that rule even to this day, without her standing over my shoulder.)

· Excitement about using my new pan at breakfast caused me to crack my egg on the counter a little too forcefully, making a huge mess. Thankfully, I’m usually the only one in the kitchen at 9:15 on a Sunday morning. Packed a lunch for my inter-church walk and bundled up in anticipation of a high of 50°F. (The temperature readings in °C still mean nothing to me.)

· Actually arrived pre-service at the Baptist Church for once! All smiles as many greeted me with warm familiarity and a kiss on each cheek. The Spirit of the Lord was definitely in that place.

o During the portion of the service where congregants can share Scriptures or personal testimonies, I felt led to tell them about my passing scores on the CSET that would allow me to apply to grad school (specifically, Stanford, but I didn’t go into that much detail; this was the hardest in a series of tests I’d taken towards qualifying for master’s + teacher certification grad programs at various schools; see 10/9-10/10 for more about the CSET). So I did! In French! At the podium in front of the 25 or so folks who were there! And the preacher incorporated my experience into the beginning of his sermon about being steadfast in hope.

o Afterwards, I met a girl who was visiting the church and had been to (get this) Cobb County, Georgia to visit her uncle several times! She knew exactly what I meant when I said I was from Roswell! That hardly ever happens.

o There were also free, homemade crêpes available during the fellowship time at the end of service, which I was finally able to stay for. And I had been thinking of looking for a crêpe stand on my way to the next church. Thanks, Jehovah Jireh, God my Provider, for smiling down on me.

Entryway to The American Church in Paris (Church 2 for me)

· Miserable rainy walk #1 for 30 minutes, largely along the Quai d’Orsay, from Church 1 to Church 2. (In case you’re just tuning in, I’ve decided to attend both a French-speaking Baptist church with a small, largely African-origin congregation in addition to a larger English-speaking Protestant church with a very international congregation that draws largely from the US. I like the former church because it’s in French and for the family atmosphere + worship style that reminds me of home; the latter has a lot of great young adult programming, though. Actually, I kind of belonged to two different churches in Athens for the same reason, minus the language difference.)

To the left of the entryway, trying to show you the grandeur of the architecture

· No church buddy this week, so I was “alone,” but we’re never alone, right? Just before He ascended into heaven, Jesus gave this promise to his disciples: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20b, NIV). I know someone who has the Scripture reference tattooed on his arm as a constant reminder that we have no need to feel lonely in this life. In fact, at the conclusion of this service, I met four new people around my age from Canada (x2), Mexico, and France during the coffee hour. So that was a good reminder for why I was there in the first place.

Street signs indicating area attractions near Concorde

The Obelisk at Concorde, in the rainy weather

· Miserable rainy walk #2 as I ventured a little further from the church trying to find the Concorde métro stop across the river for the first time instead of boarding at Invalides and switching to the line that I needed either at Concorde or Madeleine. Turns out it’s not really worth the walk if the weather’s not nice. I figured that out a little too late. But it was neat to see the Obelisk and Fountains again because I remembered being in this spot back in 2006. I’ll have to go back and spend more time when I’m not trying to escape the cold rain.

· Made my periodic Filet-o-Fish run to McDonald’s later that evening after chilling out at the Foyer (residence hall) for a while. I actually don’t think this was in response to a migraine, as usual; I guess I’ve started to enjoy the sandwich itself. And it’s pretty cheap, so I wasn’t breaking my budgetary constraints. I had to laugh at the advertisement for the new « McBaguette » sandwich on the menu. There was a long line, so I took a picture as discreetly as I could for you. Honestly, I didn’t even look at the camera as I was taking it, so I’m glad it came out.

· Back in the common room at my residence hall, I met a kitchenmate with whom I hadn’t yet crossed paths during my 3.5 weeks there. Amazingly, she had worked as an au pair for a family in (wait for it) Cumming, Georgia! Again with the meeting people who are familiar with my neck of the woods! Twice in one day! It was almost too much.

· Skyped with the family for the first time in the common room. (They’re pretty busy folks, so it’s hard to get our schedules together.) We had already talked on the phone and e-mailed. It was good to see their faces, though. Someone here recently commented that it’s incredible how technology makes it so easy for us to stay in touch with folks on the other side of the world, practically, at the touch of a button. If we had been working or studying abroad a few generations ago, the separation might have been a little harder to bear.

· Although my family had commented on my sleepy appearance during our conversation (it was going on midnight my time), I didn’t feel like going to sleep when I got back to my room. So I worked on my blog post some more because I really wanted something new to be up by the start of the work/school day Monday morning Eastern Time. So, since it was now Monday for me, I turned on a secular music playlist and wrote about last Tuesday (10/9).

· Bedtime = 2:45 am. Bad idea? Probably. And I had signed-up to wash clothes at 9:30 am in the one laundry room that is afforded to us as residents of this Foyer. Which meant that I needed to be awake earlier than that to get my clothes together and load the washer on time. But, as I said in my written journal at this moment, “What’s done is done.”

Monday, October 15 – Doing chores + “Reading about the heritage of a major city” + Joining a new club

· Laundry inspired me to get out of bed. Machine kept pausing mid-cycle while I was eating. Thankfully, no one was signed-up for the next slot or else I would’ve had “some splainin’ to do.” Of course, seeing as this is a Foyer for working women aged 18-25, pretty much everyone is at work at this time on Monday mornings. But since I only work 12 hours a week as a teaching assistant, my mentor teacher arranged my schedule so that I only have to go to Aulnay (they often leave off the “-sous-Bois” part of the city’s name) on Wednesdays-Fridays. She really wanted me to be able to live within the city limits of Paris as a young person.

· Took my clothes to a cheaper place than last time to use a dryer (we only have a washing machine in our building, and I’m not satisfied by the drying rack system), but decided against using my laptop to blog there since the only available seats had my back to the door. Didn’t want anyone off the street to get any ideas about hitting me over the head and stealing my computer. (Doubtful scenario where I live, though.) So I just read a book.

· Did manage to get a partial post up during the 9 am hour East Coast Time, I believe, minus the kitchen video. Not sure why I can’t get the video feature to work on this blog. The entry I posted only goes through last Wednesday rather than the present, though.

· Ate a hearty lunch of couscous with chicken. They ain’t playin’ around in this refrigerated meal section of the grocery store! They have portions that are perfect for single people and that fit my little cubbyhole refrigerator. And just in case you’re wondering, I do my best to select meals that don’t have…what’s the word in English…preservatives? Or a lot of salt. Plus, we don’t have an oven in our kitchen, which has thrown off my game a little. That, and not having my George Foreman grill. There’s an oven in the common room downstairs, but we just have a microwave, toaster, toaster oven, and range in the space on our floor. So I’ll have to work on learning to make new things within those restrictions that don’t require a lot of storage space in advance or afterwards (as in, leftovers). I welcome any suggestions from my readers! You can email me at morglyles@gmail.com if you have any recipe ideas.

· Started looking into the history of New York City. Did I tell you about that? Oh no! I forgot! Okay, so on Thursday 10/11, the History/Geography instructor began the class by asking me to sit down with the students because she had an announcement to make. She said that she had attended a meeting the day before about the choices of topics that the class could cover in preparation for the baccalauréat = huge graduation/college-entry test given subject-by-subject. So, when presented with the topic « Le rapport des societies à leur passé: lecture patrimonial d’une grande ville » (my translation: “The relationship of societies to their past: reading about the heritage of a major city”), the teacher thought it would be a grand idea to incorporate my American-ness by asking me to be in charge of this topic during the trimester that I’m working with the class, specifically covering…Atlanta? No, no. New York City. Because…that’s in the United States, and I’m… from the United…does it make sense to you? I’m still trying to figure it out. But the worst part was that she announced this topic to me AT THE SAME TIME that she announced it to the students, so they got all excited about having my American wisdom to help them ace this part of the exam. So anyway, that’s why I started looking into the history of NYC on this particular day.

· Put away my laundry and went grocery shopping. Ain’t life grand?

Part of my pre-meeting walk to kill time cuz I arrived early: street behind Musée d'Orsay, right by club meeting spot


One of the financial institutions of the government

Looking out across the River Seine (if not for the construction) from the Quai d'Orsay on the Left Bank towards the Louvre on the Right Bank

Remember that Gospel concert I went to on 9/22? They're still on tour!

· Out to Solférino (name of a métro stop) to attend a « Pot de Rentrée » (a gathering involving food/drink in recognition of the beginning of the school year) for which I’d received an invitation in my mailbox at school on behalf of an organization that mainly supports foreign students in Paris, but that also extends its reach to include teaching assistants, as was the case for this particular event. I thought it might be a nice way to meet new people and find out more about the organization, which I’d already looked into online.

The plaza outside of the Musée d'Orsay

o Got there a little too early because I’d allowed too much time for travel. Didn’t see anyone else going in yet, but the sign on the door did indicate that this was the right place. So I walked around the neighborhood and took some photos. It was actually right around the corner from the Baptist church that I normally attend and just in back of the Musée d’Orsay (one of the major Paris museums).

Musée d'Orsay again

o Came back about 10 minutes later and saw an older woman outside who buzzed me in. It turned out that the organization was mainly led by older French women who are interested in giving young people from abroad a venue in which to practice their French in a casual setting every week and the opportunity to see Paris (and sometimes other towns) through various outings and field trips. They also set you up on lunch/dinner dates with French families and offer weekly theater/voice classes to help you work on pronunciation in French in a creative way.

o I was like, “Sign me up!” This was just what I was looking for in terms of a way to work on my French and see the city. There was a small membership fee for the year, but it was worth it to me. Plus I met some neat people there from all over the world who were studying or working in Paris and were also committed to improving their French through this organization. I was definitely in the minority as an American or even an Anglophone; I think the Germans and East Asians had us outnumbered that evening.

One final look at the Musée d'Orsay plaza

o I think that being part of this group will complement my involvement with the American Church in Paris, for example, where I like hanging out with young people in a faith community, but where I regret that our language of interaction is usually English, which I already talk real good ;)

Tuesday, October 16 – Lesson planning attempt + Lots of photos pre/post teacher training + Bible Study

· Didn’t wake up at 7 am as I’d originally planned the night before when making my rough outline of a schedule for the following day. Kept mentally deleting stuff off of my list of things to do. It must’ve been about 9:30 when I got up because by the time I finished a devotional on idolatry and started my lesson planning session for Wednesday, it was 10 am.

o Thought about just rehashing exactly what I did with the other groups, but realized that the 2^nd Presidential debate would occur while I was sleeping tonight, so it’d be nice to incorporate that. Of course, all I could look at now was preview material.

o Worked hard on embedding a short clip on the town hall format and what’s at stake for the 2 candidates into a Powerpoint that I could show on my laptop only to realize that you still need Internet access for such videos to play!

o Planned to go back to the drawing board in the early am post-debate. But I knew that I was already bored of last week’s material and wanted to move on!

· Lesson planning took a little longer than I thought, so I had to hurry through a late breakfast and pack a quick lunch. And that was just for 2 classes that are practically identical since the BTS (associate’s degree) section that I would normally have on Wednesdays will be away on internships this week. I’ll have to keep that in mind the next time I’m tempted to sleep in instead of doing my work. I did see 2 kitchenmates who stopped through briefly around lunchtime, which rarely happens during the day at the residence hall, so it was nice to know that someone could vouch for my existence.

RER train that I took from Haussman-St. Lazare to Bondy with upper and lower floors

Tram shot #1 between Bondy and Gargan

· Actually, a lot of people could do so on this particular day because I had my third of four mandatory teacher training sessions (see 10/3 and especially 10/8 for the others).

o Took the same route to Livry-Gargan as before, departing at about 12:33, but arrived super early (1:40 for a 2:00 session; that’s unheard of in France) in spite of waiting 10 minutes for the 1:01 train (RER E line) at the Haussman-St. Lazare station.

Tram shot #2

Tram shot #3

Gargan in-town shot #1: Market day

o On the tram that took me between the towns of Bondy and Gargan, I did my best to snap a few shots out the window (as discreetly as possible) to show you what the houses looked like in this area. I’ve included the best ones here. Then, after I got off of the tram in Gargan, I took some more pictures as I walked about 10 minutes toward the high school. All of this dilly-dallying, and I was still early! So much for allowing extra time for transportation…

o There was still confusion regarding our room assignment at the high school, but we all just chatted in the hallway about students, getting paid, etc. (In case you missed the other sessions, the other teaching assistants in my group are also assigned to high schools in the Seine-St.-Denis area to the northeast of Paris, but they come from various English-speaking countries around the world.)

Gargan in-town shot #2

Gargan in-town shot #3 (sorry for the car-in-motion)

Livry-Gargan in-town shot #4

o In the session, I felt like sharing a lot re: my successes in the classroom thus far. The phonetic alphabet got everyone frustrated at the end as the teacher tried to show us how to work on pronunciation with our students.

o Traveled back to Paris with the British girls in my group. Talk about our different pronunciations of words and life plans.

My Nutella and banana crêpe (what's that in the top right corner?)

Stonehenge?! What's that doing here?

I thought I was in Paris on Ave. du Maréchal Gallieni, not in England!

Yeah, cuz there's the Eiffel Tower right there! Hmmm....Very curious...

Ah! Here's an explanation! It's an art project.

So the kids are using it as a moon bounce. Right...

· Killed time eating a crêpe and taking pictures near the Invalides métro stop where I got out to go to Bible Study at the American Church that evening. Figured I would’ve been late had I gone all the way back to my residence hall.

o Ended up going through the entryway of the Invalides museum where Napoleon is buried. I remembered going there in 2006. Just as I remembered visiting Stonehenge a couple of times, but I didn’t expect that to resurface during my time in France.


Invalides museum from a distance with tour buses on the side

Like I said, they go crazy with the tour buses over here

A closer view of Invalides, which basically means where the wounded soldiers were housed; see below for more photos

o Packed house in the catacombs of the church for Bible Study (about 40 people or so)! Discussed Deborah from Judges 4-5 as the group continued the theme of “Women of Faith.” Nice to be around young believers who asked questions of the text and sought real-life application. And you’d better believe I was right there in the mix as a newcomer, adding my voice to the conversation.