Thanksgiving, Beaujolais, Strasbourg and more!

So here it is, my long overdue post! I would prefer to make shorter ones more frequently, but since I haven't gotten around to it in a while, it's going to be a long one : / I hope everyone is having a great holiday season so far! To my surprise, this small town life has been more eventful than I anticipated. The past three weeks have been filled with travels, hikes and the occasional "soiree." I must also say that I haven't enjoyed the winter this much since I was kid. It's on days like this one, when you see the sun creeping up behind the mountains into a blue sky painted with red and pink clouds, overlooking the snow covered forest, that I feel like I'm in paradise. As Imanta so nicely put it this morning, "If this isn't Heaven, I don't know what is!" 

From a couple weeks ago. There is more snow now!

I am still involved with the rowing club, which has begun cross training. Although they still row on occasion, it's usually far too windy and cold. The junior rowers cross train with everything from erging to skiing. They had a regional erg competition in Nancy last weekend, to which I kindly had to decline my invitation. The adults, on the other hand, take it a bit more easy. They do "gymnastics" every Thursday night for a good 2.5 hours, which is more of a body circuit with weights followed by core and ab exercises. I went for the first time a couple weeks ago, when I realized that my diet in France (which is probably a good 80% dairy and carbs) might be getting to me ;)  I was sore for a couple of days, and I must admit, I really missed the feeling! After Christmas break, I intend on getting my weekly dose of exercise on the slopes. The gym teacher is talking about organizing ski trips with some other teachers, and in January, Imanta and I are planning on having a skiing weekend with some other assistants in the area. All we need to do is set the date and book the chalet. Anybody want to join? :)

Apart from rowing, I've joined a choir in a smaller town in another valley over the mountain. I was invited by one of the members who I met at an interesting gathering. It's kind of a funny story. We had read that there's a party for the new people in town, so I was stoked about going and making some friends. When we arrived, however, we were greeted by a sea of senior citizens who had convened in a room in the library to discuss their upcoming bridge tournaments and nature walks. By new people, they apparently meant new retirees. They were surprised to see such young people showing up to join their "club",  originally thinking we were representatives of the Kiwanis. Imanta knew one of the men from choir, who talked me into joining as well.  After about an hour of small talk and various promises to consider various activities, we managed to leave. Staying true to my word, I went to choir the next week. Although I've only gone twice, I've decided to stick with it because it has proven to be incredibly entertaining. The director has an impeccable sense of humor and puts up very well with the wailing little old ladies with short, bright red colored  hair. He also has no qualms about cracking dirty jokes with the other old men in the choir.  I was in tears from laughing last week because of a joke Imanta cracked about one of the songs. The director stopped the choir to ask what was so funny, but we couldn't manage to explain. Instead of getting annoyed, he joined in laughing, along with some others. It's definitely a funny group. I enjoy the singing, but most of all I enjoy the people. This Saturday, we have our Christmas concert in the local church. If I go, I think I'll be saying a lot of watermelons...

Jamming out to the Beatles...or Lady Gaga

The last weekend in November, I had the pleasure of experiencing my second "staff party." The first time was a going away party for the IT guy, but this time the festivities were dedicated to the annual release of the "Beaujolais Nouveau." For the wine industry, it's the commercial equivalent of Black Friday. For the French, it's simply an excuse to party. Almost every bar in town has a little celebration, sometimes with music and food,  always with abundant wine. For those of you unfamiliar with this, it's a wine from Burgundy that is released for sale on the third Thursday of November. The quality varies, but for bigger parties, people buy the cheapest stuff they can find. I couldn't even stomach a small glass of it, and it wasn't long until we abandoned the wine and hit the kegs. That's when the party really got started. All social events are organized by Michel, the French and Theater instructor. I occasionally watch his theater groups and sometimes join in to help. He's an excellent entertainer and certainly never misses a beat when it comes to party planning. To him, no party is complete without karaoke. Sure enough, by the end of the night, we were all singing our hearts out. By 1pm, the only people left were Imanta and I along with several other party enthusiasts.  Lucky for us, we didn't have far to go home.  

Michel, Mattias, and Sylve (The cigarettes were meant for the song)

 For Thanksgiving, I was fortunate enough to have made it to my Aunt Phyllis' house in Germany, where I enjoyed the company of close family and friends along with a wonderful traditional feast. To get there, I hitched a ride with my philosophy teacher friend, who happened to be driving to Wuppertal, Germany that same weekend. We got lost in the Ruhr District, in which a large number of  freeways loop around and intersect through a dozen major towns.  Our combined lack of navigational skills coupled with a major freeway blocking accident and the ambiguous road signs after dark made our loss of direction inevitable. We must have driven through Cologne three times until we managed to get back onto the right freeway. It was to no surprise that I missed my train in Wuppertal, but as luck would have it, there was another one that left ten minutes after we arrived. I hopped right on it and made it to Oldenburg shortly before midnight, where I was greeted by my cousin and aunt.  The ride back was laden with other minor disasters, involving heavy snowfall, traffic jams, and canceled buses. I used what the Germans call a "Mitfahrgelegenheit" to get back home. It's a website that organizes carpools so you can hitchhike with  people who happen to be driving in the same direction. In my opinion, it's economical, ecological, and simply brilliant. I did this from Oldenburg to Freiburg, and from Freiburg to Colmar.  Thanks to my colleague, who picked me up from Colmar,  I made it back safe and sound, ready for class the next morning. Talk about a whirlwind weekend!

A couple weeks later, it was St. Nicholas day, celebrated on December 6th. Saint Nicholas is the patron Saint of Lorraine, so this day is almost more important than Christmas. There are floats and parades in most of the tows, some bigger than others. We were originally planning on going to Epinal for this, a bigger town 40 km west of here, but decided to keep it local in the end. There was a cute little Christmas market in front of the church and a single float with St. Nicholas and Black Peter. The float was followed by huge van filled with buckets and buckets of candy that was handed out to the little (and big) kids. If was fun, except that is was the coldest night yet. Even the hot mulled wine didn't help!

The cathedral in Strasbourg

Our host with his Mini

Wine fields along the hike

This passed weekend, Imanta and I visited Strasbourg, the Christmas capital of the world, as they say. I had another incredible CouchSurfing experience with a host who took us hiking at the foot of the Alsace wine route and even let me drive his twenty year old mini. Needless to say I stalled the car on the middle of road and couldn't start it up again, so it was a short lived experience. One of these days I'll master the stick shift. The Christmas markets hadn't changed much since the last time I visited, though they might have been more crowded this time.  It was hard to move around because of the herds of people that poured in over the weekend, so it was a little overwhelming. We managed to get in some Christmas shopping and some good eats despite of it. The Alsacienne cuisine is debatably the best (tasting) in France because it is loaded with heavy cream, bacon, cheese, etc. All the good things in life. We stayed until this morning because there were no buses to get back on Sunday, as usual. We left Strasbourg at 5am, which almost felt warm for Winter. Three hours later and ten degrees lower, we arrived in our little snow globe. 

Classes have still been going well, minus that one group I have at the end of the day on Friday. I guess I can't complain if just one class out of  twelve isn't up to par, but it would be nice to get them motivated as well! It probably doesn't help that my teacher had me talking about fast food and obesity for the fourth week straight. What a great image these kids are getting of America! Next time, I'm making my own lesson plan. End of story. this week I have the joy of talking about Christmas and sometimes even making my students sing, in ENGLISH of course : D Unfortunately, this only works with the younger ones. This week is the last week before Christmas break and is the busiest one yet! The boarding school kids are having their annual theme party and Christmas dinner tonight; we're going to see a cabaret with the theater class tomorrow; visiting more Christmas markets on Wednesday; have the final choir rehearsal/gymnastics on Thursday, and a staff Christmas party on Friday. It's great to be busy.

Taco Tequila Tuesday!