Strike!

(Riots in Athens, the Greek Syndrome)

People here always ask me if France is different from Canada. I found one difference.

The students are on strike.

For some time, the French government has been trying to reform the school system, reforms spearheaded by the sinister sounding national education minister Darcos. I haven't been able to figure out exactly what the reforms are (their newspapers don't give as much context as ours), but they seem to involve cutting things and are unpopular.

The teachers were on strike earlier. It was a wussy strike, compared to our teacher strikes. They aren't mandatory here. In fact, I still had to teach class during the "strike". Grumblings about the reforms kept on however.

Recently, the government backtracked on a couple of key reforms, fearing an outbreak of "Greek syndrone" (the picture above), in other words a repeat of the recent, endless youth rioting in Greece.

Nonetheless, there still must be something controversial going on (I am a rather informed commentator, aren't I?), because I found there was a strike outside my school this morning.

The students had blocked all the entrances. Occasionally, they chanted. It wasn't Greece, but then again, I'm not in Paris. Since I'm just a youthful English assistant, I easily gained entrance, with only minor controversy. One student (they weren't my student) was annoyed, shouting "but he's a prof!". Strikebreaker am I.

Mostly I wanted to check my email. There wasn't really much for me to do inside in any case. My class had one student. The strike has to block students who want to go in of course, otherwise what's the point.

So I don't anticipate having to do much work today, unless the strike folds on account of "it's freezing out here! Let's go inside." It's happened before.

But things may yet go according to plan, which was, as described to me by an American exchange student:

"They want to reform things here to make them more like the States. People don't like that so they're protesting. They'll shout and block things here for a bit, then everyone is going to the bars."

Oh yeah, that's another difference. They let the young'ins into bars here.

Update: This gets even more hilarious. I had wondered why they were protesting after the reforms were withdrawn. I guess they're just ill-informed. I'm in a far out rural area. They missed the actual day of protests, found out late about them, and decided to show their solidarity.

Despite the goals of the protests already having been achieved.

Oh well. Reminds me of a story a prof told me when I first found out about student strikes (which apparently started only in 1986....it's never too late Canada). Students ran around the halls of the school, telling the others in the classroom to come out, there was a strike.

"What for?"

"I'm not sure, but come on, we've got to strike!"

update 2: Strike is over, in time for lunch.

Obama

A clear victory. Everyone here at the youth hostel is pretty excited about it, except for one demographically improbably McCain supporter, a young American student.

This morning, I kept wanting to read more about what was going to happen. Of course, everywhere it was basically just the same story "he won!", etc. I´m not sure what I expecting. After so much time, I think I´m more impatient than I realized, and that I have some sort of absurd expectation that he would magically fix many things the day he was elected.

I have that feeling, even though, intellectually, I know he hasn´t even promised to fix many of the things I´d like him to fix. In fact, in some areas, he´s promised to continue doing things badly (supported warrantless wiretapping, extend the war in Afghanistan, attack Pakistan). But he just arouses some sort of good feeling. It´s nice to have someone who´s actually intelligent in the white house.

election

It´s election day in America, and the European press is keen with anticipation.

I´m in Spain on vacation, so I´ve been reading El Pais, the main Spanish Daily. I suppose its a waste of time to spend about an hour a day on vacation reading a newspaper, when I could read the same thing on the internet back in France, but I feel it adds to the experience.

Anyway, its pretty clear they want Obama to win. Really, really want Obama to win. The current line seems to be that Obama will usher in an era of transformational change in America. Between the lines, they´re seem to be saying "please, please transform that country". The French papers were much the same from what I remember a week and a half ago, though the intensity has increased no doubt.

An insert in El Pais this weekend had a picture of a "yes we can" obama sign and a headline, "the world is waiting for him". From the contents it could be taken as given that it also meant "we are waiting for him".

One funny article in today´s paper said that the level of votes McCain receives will provide an accurate barometer of the number of idiots in that country. A line from the article mockingly described likely McCain voters as "eager to declare war against countries they can´t find on the map."

You probably wouldn´t find that in the New York Times.

The European papers also have a frankness you don´t generally find in North America, which is nice. Another headline article in El Pais described Obama´s task as "restoring the reputation and affairs of the American empire". Which is correct. The last Emperor hasn´t done a very good job.

But again, probably not something you´d see in the New York Times, at least not put that way.

It went on to describe the number of soldiers America has (several million), and the number of military bases it has worldwide (about 700) and in how many countries (about 150).

That would certainly not be in the the New York Times.

The most annoying thing about being in Europe for this election is the time zone difference. It will be 1:00 in the morning here before any results even start to come in. Which means it won´t be in time to be in the newspapers tomorrow either.

It´s taken a bit of getting used to, its the first time I´ve been ahead six hours. The day after the bailout plan failed to pass Congress for the first time, the main newspaper in France was headlined "bailout expected to pass" and had articles with themes such as "how things will work now that the bailout has passed". The bill's failure to pass was a surprise, and it came around 3:00 pm, too late to make it in the European newspapers. So I guess I will have to get everything from the internet tomorrow.

To end this post, I will make some predictions that will look prescient if they´re right, but hopefully will be easy to forget about if they´re wrong.

Obama victory: John McCain dies of a broken heart. He's old, this is his second failed attempt at the presidency, which he has pursued with every fiber of his being for years. His carefully cultivated reputation is due to his slanderous, hate filled campaign (vote McCain, not Hussein has been a chant at his rallies of late). Losing could take away his will to live. That sort of thing isn´t unprecedented.

McCain Victory: If McCain somehow pulls off a victory today, I predict riots. By whites, too. And a civil war wouldn´t be out of the question. Which could lead to some problems, given that America has several thousand nuclear warheads. Which could end the world.

So, for that and other reasons, I hope McCain doesn´t win today.

Those are your wacky election predictions. Please ignore them if they´re wrong.

vacation

One of the nice things about the French school system is that there are lots of vacations. I've barely started teaching, and I already have two weeks off. I'm in Spain, starting in Barcelona. That's the main reason I haven't written anything here. I may write a bit here or there, but I probably won't be writing much until after the vacations, which finish novmember 5th.

personal ad

Liking languages as I do, some time ago I signed up for this thing called MyHappyPlanet. It tries to let you learn languages by matching you with people to practice with on Skype. That´s the theory anyway, I've never actually used it. Sounded like a neat idea though.

Anyway, I just got an email telling me I had a new message. It was rather funny:

"Hello,
My name is Favour.I am a female I was impressed when i
saw your profile today on (www.myhappyplanet.com), and I will like to established a
long lasting relationship with you. In addition,i will like you to
reply me through my private email box (@yahoo.com)
So i can give you my picture, for you to know whom i am and I believe
we can move from here! waiting to hear from you soonest.
(Remember the distance or colour does not matter but love matters alot in life)
please contact
me here...
(@yahoo.com)

Please correct my message"

breaking down cultural stereotypes - part I

There are lots of good wines and tasty cheeses here.

Bonjour Mesdames et Messieurs

Hi everyone, welcome to my second blog. It’s been quite a while since I’ve written anything, as those of you who read my last, Cuban, blog will know. I wrote solidly for a couple of months, then gave it up due to some combination of lack of time, lack of creativity, laziness and dial-up internet. Hopefully I will be able to keep this one going better than the last one.

Officially, this blog will be about my time teaching English in France. Some basic details about that:

I’m teaching at a lycée (high school) in a little town near Switzerland, and has about 8000 people. It sort of reminds me of Sackville (the small town where I went to school), except that it’s French and there are less young people my age. Perhaps 2500 hundred less young people. I haven’t been keeping a strict count.

I’m going to be here for seven months. My actual job is “English language teaching assistant”, which is what it sounds. I’m rotating between five different teachers at school here, mostly working with novels the students are reading. The main goal is to give them practice talking to a real-live, bona fide, genuine English language native speaker, so they can learn that there is a difference between asking:

“Ow eez zee wee-zher in Fredericton?” *

And,

“How is the weather in Fredericton?”

Generally, everyone seems nice. The program is that it’s run by the French government. They have assistants teaching various languages all over France. There are about 6000 of us in total.

So, that’s the official theme. But, some other things will be sneaking in. For one thing, travels, once I do some of those. Also, look forward to some flashbacks from Cuba. I left a fair bit unsaid after I abandoned my last blog. So, I will be posting stories from that in a random order as I feel like it. I’ll probably give them a date and place, and a Cuba tag at the bottom.

Lastly I don't think I'll be able to avoid writing about “le grande Krach des Bourses” as they call it here. The new financial crisis. I was an economics student, after all, and I’ve been spending an unhealthy amount of time following it these past four weeks. Don't worry, I'll do my best to make it interesting.**

That’s the plan. With luck, I will stick to it, as opposed to getting bored within a week and leaving this as the only post and a shameful monument to my neglect.

*try and read this line aloud, it will enhance your blog experience.

** You do all know there is a global economic crisis ongoing, right?

If not, check your newspaper