30 April, 2007 | 8 Comments

Your truly is truly a nervous wreck this week. The tutor that is now evaluating me and my teammates while we do our teaching is a real hard-ass. We met him today for the first time. After one of my teammates got done teaching and our students left, our tutor asked him:

“What were you doing up there for the past 40 minutes?”

“I was teaching.”

“Oh, is that what you call it?”

In his critique of another teammate, he said: “You talk too much. You love the sound of your own voice.”

She said: “No I don’t! I don’t talk too much.”

“Oh really? Next time you teach, try videotaping yourself.”

Last week, Essex woman told me that he told her: “Your whole entire lesson gave me a f–king headache.”

And this is the guy who will be evaluating my teaching for the next two days! Poor me!!! He is going to rip me apart. I can’t even control the class. Whenever I teach, they all start chatting with their friends. There’s a block of very naughty Brazilian and French boys who try to disarm with me with their flirtatious charms. And this isn’t very hard to do. The other day one of them said: “Miss [insert my name], I never hear your name before. It’s so pretty. I love it.” I’m such a sucker for a Brazilian guy with a ponytail.

So anyway, tomorrow I expect my life to be ruined. On the bright side, this week I discovered peanut butter Kit Kats.

30 April, 2007 | 1 Comment

In “Is my crush gay or straight?” news, today:

He told me I have a beautiful accent. [Good.]

He asked what brand of shoes I was wearing. [Bad. Very, very bad.]

In other news, today two new classmates started winking at me — one of them a 60-year-old woman. I just don’t get it. Also today, I got into an argument with the guy who winks at me all the live long day (one of my teammates). This little dust-up (more of a mini-argument) wasn’t about his winking, but about him being a very macho “I must dominate” control freak. And he accused me of being a whiner! So I gave him the cold shoulder for several hours and then we started speaking again. And then he started his winking crap once more.

We were talking after class and his mobile rang. He told me he needed to take the call so he could “break up with this Russian bird.” Who talks like that?

29 April, 2007 | 6 Comments

Right now I sort of have a schoolgirl crush — as in, a crush at school. Am I too old to have a crush? What should I call it then? Hmmm. On Friday I was discussing this term with my classmates. They told me that in British English, only very young people use “crush” and that when you’re older, you “fancy” someone. But unlike “crush,” I don’t think “fancy” can be used as a noun. So it’s far less versatile. You can say, “I saw my crush today,” but the same isn’t true of fancy.

While a crush can be innocent (not that mine is!), they told me that “fancy” always has a sexual component to it. I’m not sure I agree with this. So I asked them what on earth is meant by, “Do you fancy a cup of tea?” One guy told me this means, “I want to shag a cup of tea.”

I think it’s best for me to avoid this terminology all together. I’m so confused. In more ways than one.

You see, I wasn’t entirely sure if the guy I like is straight or not. My gaydar simply does not work in London. I think it just completely broke in Paris, that’s my problem. The men there tend to be very well-groomed and stylish and it was just oh so confusing. [And by the way, the men in Paris confused me in other ways as well. It's like, okay, you're kissing me. You're brushing your hot lips against that tender spot near my ear, lingering there, breathing, then moving slowly to the other side and doing it again. Are you saying hello -- or are we engaged?]

So I came back to London with a malfunctioning gaydar. And there are a lot of metrosexuals in London too. And men here sometimes say and do things that many straight men in America would never do, so it’s just confusing for me.

[And btw -- this has nothing to do with gayness and straightness, but why do so many men in London wear such tight trousers? I mean, come on! I don't see how some of these guys can even breathe.]

A well-oiled gaydar is a necessity for a single girl, because crushes on gay guys are a waste of time. So I had to seek assistance from others on the burning question of whether the guy I fancy I’m interested in is gay or not. Two male classmates I consulted were in shock that I was wondering. They didn’t even hesitate to tell me no. [Though the favorite pastime of one of these guys is getting stoned in his bathtub, so I wasn't sure how reliable he is.] But the good news is that the straightness of my crush was [pretty much] confirmed by the man himself a few days later. I didn’t ask him! He just managed to reveal some personal information.

But I’m not sure I hold out high hopes for anything happening with this bloke anyway. I think he feels that I’m flirting with him, but he’s not entirely sure. When we interact, he laughs and acts sweet, but it’s like “Are you flirting with me or do all Americans act this way?” And at the same time, I’m thinking, “Gee, I really hope you’re straight.”

Life in America. Sometimes…it’s just simpler.

28 April, 2007 | Comments

I have tons and tons of work to do this weekend and I desperately needed to do laundry too. I hate doing laundry more than just about anything on earth. The mere thought of laundry fills me with the worst sort of dread imaginable. I think in a past life I must have been some sort of laundry slave. So anyway, to make my hellish workload just a bit lighter, I am paying the laundrette down the street £9 to do my laundry for me. That’s about $18. Yes, that’s right. I could buy a book or go to a movie for that price, but I don’t care. I dropped my clothes off this morning and I will pick them up later all washed and dried and folded. That, my friends, is money well spent.

27 April, 2007 | 9 Comments

It’s my two-week anniversary of being in London…and I finally went to the pub. I went with my classmates because right now I have no life besides this course. On the first day of class, I made the mistake of saying I’m from California. That’s where I was born and spent the first eight years of my life…so that’s where I’m from, right? But people have taken this to mean that I just stepped off the plane from LA last week. So in class I am known as a California girl, which brings with it all sorts of horrific stereotypes. Tonight at the pub I was drinking ginger ale (oh be quiet!) and they were like, “Oh, she’s not drinking because she’s a health fanatic from California!!! And she’s so empowered!!! Then another guy told me I have a weird first name, but he imagined it was because I have New Age hippie Californian parents. Yes, my New Age hippie name…comes right out of the Book of Genesis.

I’m beginning to feel like some sort of cartoon character. The person they think I am — based entirely on stereotypes — has no relation to who I really am as a person. And I’m not imagining this — they really do tease me a lot. One girl in the class told me that earlier this week, she told them to stop it! So you see, I’m not making this up.

The moral of this story is: British people are mean.

But I get them back by talking in my British accent…which they say sounds like Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins. One woman, who tells me all the time that she is from Essex (as if I am supposed to understand the connotations of this) said: “Every time you open your mouth and talk like that, you sound like you just stepped out of the East End.”

Well good. Now that I know they don’t like it, I’ll keep doing it!

26 April, 2007 | 9 Comments

When did young men start winking at women? This happened to me twice on the métro in Paris — a young man (under 25) winked at me for no reason. It was utterly strange.

I mention it now for a reason. In the class I am taking, besides being a student myself I also teach courses. I am in a teaching team with 3 of my classmates. We take turns teaching a class and while I’m teaching, the other team members (and my tutor!) observe me from the back of the classroom. It’s a nerve-wracking experience. There are two young guys on my team and while I’m lecturing, if I make eye contact with them they always wink at me. They do this because they know I get very nervous and they want to reassure me that I’m doing okay. It’s cute in a way, but it also feels a tad patronizing. I mean, they’d never wink at a man. They’d never wink at our female teacher. It makes me wonder if they think I’m not as capable as them.

Neither of these guys is British (well, one is half British but raised in Italy). Maybe it’s normal for French and Italian men (and men from some other cultures) to wink at women? I always associate winking with old men, since my grandfather used to wink at me. And that’s obviously a completely different dynamic. But the Italian-British guy sometimes winks at me at other times during the day, not just when I’m teaching. He’s 24! It’s just very odd. It’s not flirtatious, but I don’t know why he does it. I know some women get annoyed when British men call them love. I thought that was cute when I first arrived, but now I can see how it’s condescending in certain contexts. I think a wink is sort of similar to that.

25 April, 2007 | 6 Comments

I have three languages inside my head — American English, British English and French. In Paris, I totally reverted to using American English, so it’s been an adjustment to begin using British words again. And sometimes they just don’t come into my head fast enough.

Today at school I was running for the elevator — or lift — and the doors were closing, so I wanted to call out to the people inside to hold it for me. And my poor brain is so confused. I called out “Hold the….,” “Uh….hold the phone!” You know, there’s no way to recover from that error, so I just rode up three floors staring at my shoes.

In more English-language hilarity, I was observing a class the other day with a few of my classmates/co-teachers. In the class we were observing, one student was well below the level of his classmates and was holding up the whole lesson with his bumbling and confused questions. The born and bred Londoner sitting next to me leaned over and whispered in a tone of grave seriousness, “He should be put down.”

This made me laugh so hard I had to actually leave the classroom. What this woman meant was that the student should be moved down to a lower level class. But of course, in American English (but apparently not British English?), “put down” is a euphemism for killing an animal that is sick or dying. For example, “Our dog was really sick so we had him put down.”

It was the end of a very long and tedious day and my classmate/co-teacher leans over and essentially says, “This student isn’t as smart as the others. He should be KILLED.” I just lost it. I haven’t laughed that hard in at least a year.

24 April, 2007 | 12 Comments

Today in class I used the word “empower” and my British classmates rolled their eyes. They said only an American would use a word like “empower.” Hmmm. I quite like that word and use it often. They said British people are too cynical to use such words and that Americans should stop being so happy and positive.

Well fine.

Then later, my teacher (sorry, tutor) told a guy in my class he was being stroppy. What is that?  I have a feeling my classmates were being stroppy with me today.

23 April, 2007 | 6 Comments

Happy 40th Birthday to one of the dearest men I know. I wish I could be there to celebrate with you, Wills! Alas, living on the other side of the Atlantic is sometimes inconvenient. [But at least you got the Eiffel Tower boxer shorts I sent.]

There are so many things I could write about my friend William, but there’s something I’ve been thinking about lately and I want to express that here on his birthday.

Our relationship is free of romantic interest and sexual politics and all the complications that can bring. William is gay and he doesn’t want anything from me besides my friendship. We are honest and genuine with one another — there are none of those stupid games that men and women so often play. But still, my friendship with him has taught me a lot about what I should expect from a man in any relationship. I didn’t realize this until recently.

(more…)

22 April, 2007 | 7 Comments

[Paddington Station]

I’ve already been back in London for one whole week. And what a week it was. You know, I can’t remember the last time I was so happy to be anywhere. I mean really, truly happy. After I move somewhere, I usually feel depressed (sometimes mildly, sometimes in a major way). This is the first time that hasn’t happened to me. I can’t tell you what a relief it is. It’s just further confirmation that my time in France changed me in so many positive ways. I’m approaching life much differently now than when I arrived in London in September 2005. I do feel like a completely new person.

Coming back to this city anew is a real gift. I see everything with fresh eyes. This is the third time I’ve moved to London (the first time was in 1996, when I lived here for a year). I know the honeymoon period won’t last forever, but it’s so lovely. The stupidest things make me happy. For example:

I live on the top floor of my residence and my building is taller than any building I can see from my window. So what do I see when I look outside? Chimneys. Lots of sooty London chimneys. How romantic.

I live on a square that’s off a very busy street. And when I fall asleep at night, I can hear taxi cabs driving down the road, one right after the other. London taxis make a very distinctive sound, much different from other cars. It’s sort of like if cars purred like cats do. Yes, like that. When I’m walking down the street with my back to oncoming traffic, I can always hear when a taxi is approaching. I’m very fond of this sound. At night, it lulls me to sleep.

(more…)

21 April, 2007 | 2 Comments

Wake up very late on Saturday morning, make myself semi-presentable and walk down to the dining hall in flip-flops. Eat a fully cooked breakfast. (Cost: £1.40.)

While eating my eggs, I read the magazine that comes with the Friday Evening Standard. Princess Beatrice looks like Prince Andrew in drag. Poor girl. I converse briefly with the Jamaican guy who is one of the cooks. He doesn’t believe I am American. He is convinced I’m from Spain. When I asked him why, he said, “Because you look like a Spaniard.” I wonder if Spaniards have very pale skin? Perhaps.

I leave my dirty dishes for someone else to wash up and go back upstairs to read the newspaper.

Oh, and did I mention I have maid service once a week and don’t even have to wash my own linens? I’m not living in the lap of luxury — they insist on cleaning our rooms once a week to ensure health and safety standards.

See, the life of a student has its perks. Yes, I’m in my thirties and I don’t have a kitchen. But I don’t have to shop for food, cook it and wash up. See how that works?

20 April, 2007 | 9 Comments

Okay, I am now terrified to ever move out of student housing. This monstrous wicked boy I met this week said that London apartments are filled with rats. He said that every London resident has at least one rat as a roommate. He lives near White Chapel and he told me that when he wants to sit in his back garden, he has to fight off the rats with a stick.

Someone please tell me this isn’t true.

19 April, 2007 | 15 Comments

Okay, this is a mega-rant against Eurostar. You have been warned. I wrote them an e-mail upon my arrival in London, after I had been subjected to one of the worst travel experiences of my life. Today I finally received a response from them, which was a joke. So in light of that, I thought you might enjoy reading this little doozy that I wrote when I was fresh off the train last week and still suffering from post-traumatic shock.

In my post on Friday, I alluded to my horrific send-off from Paris. That was all thanks to Eurostar and Gare du Nord (the train station in Paris). I had heavy luggage, as you know. There were NO trolleys (luggage carts) in the entire station. Apparently, they were all being used, though I didn’t actually see many people pushing them around. My taxi driver walked around the station to try to find me one (yes, I swear he did) and he was very pissed that there were none to be found. So I had to cart my luggage around by myself, which was nearly impossible. And this involved going up and down escalators a couple times all the while being harassed by gypsies begging for money.

None of the Eurostar employees I encountered bothered to help me at all. They didn’t bother to help me find a trolley, they didn’t call a porter to help me — zilch. Not only that, they appeared to have complete contempt for me and all their other passengers. Their attitude was like this: You want to take the train to London? Well, Eurostar is your only option. If you don’t like it, tough.

I really can’t begin to describe what this was like. For example, I was waiting to check-in and my suitcase fell over. A Eurostar employee was standing there with his arms folded, doing nothing (as usual). He was perhaps six inches from me. He saw I couldn’t handle my baggage alone but he just looked at me. It was surreal. Another passenger walked up and he immediately helped me. Isn’t that what normal humans do? I asked several Eurostar employees for help. Most just stared at me, looking right through me as if I were invisible. One guy said he was helping someone else and walked off. Another guy said there was nothing he could do — it was a holiday week because of Easter, the train station was crowded and everyone was busy. Busy? I don’t think I saw one Eurostar employee in Paris actually doing any work. In fact, this is what a classified ad for a Eurostar job could very well look like:

Do you enjoy standing around and doing nothing?

Would you rather spend time chatting with your fellow employees than working?

Have you perfected a look of complete uselessness (facial expressions and body language)?

Are you generally ill-tempered and rude?

Can you look at people who need assistance and completely ignore them, all the while secretly delighting in their pain?

Has anyone ever told you that you might be a psychopath?

Are you an asshole?

If you answered yes to all these questions, Eurostar wants YOU! You have a fabulous career ahead of you in our Paris offices.

(more…)

18 April, 2007 | 7 Comments

I’ve had a long day, I think I’ll take a bath. Let me just pull back the curtain. Ahhhhh…

HA! Think again, sister!!!

What is the meaning of this? Once again, I can only ask, WHY? WHY, GOD, WHY???

And on Saturday, my toilet broke. There is no maintenance crew here on the weekend, so I was given the key to another room downstairs so I could use the loo there…five floors below. Who doesn’t like an elevator ride at 3 a.m. when you really have to pee?

So I called my dad. I sent him photos of the inside of the toilet tank via IM, then talked to him on the phone. He diagnosed the problem from 6,000 miles away and talked me through the repairs. And I fixed it! It was quite cool. I think we should retell this story in an AT&T commercial. What a heartwarming tale of the global telecommunications industry bringing families together and solving problems. Awwwww.

Given these descriptions, you may think the place I’m living in is a dump, but it’s not. I actually like it a lot. It’s a student type of residence. I have a large room with an en suite bathroom, but no kitchen. It’s only temporary and I’ll have to move out in July, but it’s a nice transition place. It’s very centrally located yet quiet — apparently too quiet for some. Coincidentally, I met a guy this week who lived in this same place last autumn, but fled after one month. He now lives near Brick Lane and prefers it there because it’s livelier and “people get shot.” Hmmm. I think I prefer my room here, which comes with a lovely view of the square below, including a garden of tulips and trees with blossoms.

The only bad thing about this place (besides the plumbing!) is the décor. Imagine the scene: It’s 1975, you’re visiting Detroit and you’ve just checked into the Holiday Inn. Yeah, that’s how this place is decorated. But you know, it’s starting to grow on me…

16 April, 2007 | 3 Comments

I was going to write about the amazingly beautiful spring day we’ve had in London. But then I got home and saw the news about what’s happened in Virginia. I started class today. And I live in a student residence. So this all hits close to home.

So instead of a post, here’s a photo I took this evening in Trafalgar Square. It was so lovely to stumble upon this scene, my first London sunset:

Today’s events are a reminder that it’s important to appreciate such moments, which are no less extraordinary just because they happen every day.

15 April, 2007 | 4 Comments

People make fun of British food, but I’m finding it to be quite a nice treat so far. Yes, I’m serious! The place where I’m living has a dining hall (and I have no kitchen). So far the food has been pretty good. Here is what I have eaten today:

Breakfast

Poached eggs and hashbrowns. They tried to give me baked beans, but I successfully avoided that.

Lunch

I was out and ate a bagel sandwich (bagels! yay!) that I ordered with chicken, guacamole and sun-dried tomatoes. Yum!

Snack

Krispy Kreme donut. It was so good. It was chocolate-glazed and had sprinkles on it. Sprinkles! I never saw a sprinkle in France.

Dinner

The dining hall served a roast chicken that was honestly better than any roast chicken I had in Paris. Way better. And I had a salad of cucumbers and tomatoes with salad cream. (I can’t eat lettuce.) Last night they served duck curry. I couldn’t face that, so I went out for Korean food.

Dessert

I skipped the chocolate cake they had for dessert in the cafeteria. I’m not sure why. But I just ate a Cadbury Creme Egg. They don’t have those in France either.

All in all, yours truly has had quite a piggish day.

15 April, 2007 | 11 Comments

My bathroom sink:

WHY??? WHY, GOD, WHY????????

15 April, 2007 | 4 Comments

Several people forwarded me links to this story about Dickens World, the new Charles Dickens theme park opening this week in Chatham, Kent, about an hour from London. At first I thought this was a joke, but it’s real. Yippee! Yes, before you ask, I am definitely going to this. Oh shut up.

13 April, 2007 | 14 Comments

I am SO HAPPY to be here! Wow. I wasn’t expecting to feel this way. I feel pretty euphoric right now and honestly, I can’t remember the last time I felt this way. It’s strange, but I feel like I’m…home. Today I experienced this feeling for the first time since I left the US 19 months ago. It’s such a lovely feeling. I’d forgotten what it feels like, to be home.

I already ate fish and chips. There’s a shop right around the corner from where I’m living — how could I not? I eat fish and chips in London, I take photos of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Mine is a clichéd existence. [The guy working in the shop has heard of the Yankees but not the Boston Red Sox. Wah???]

I could not have had a more horrific send-off from Paris, let me tell you. But I won’t get into that right now. Suffice it to say that I was so excited to get to London that I filmed my arrival. I know that’s dorky, but the fact that I’m a dork is nothing new to any of you.

Right now I’m fighting the urge to go to sleep. I’m so tired. But I will try to go out and take a walk…maybe. Before I go, I must tell you that the taxi driver who picked me up from Waterloo said my big red suitcase is the heaviest suitcase he’s ever lifted in his 24 years of being a taxi driver. If you didn’t believe me before when I told you I am insane when it comes to packing, I hope you believe me now.

Here’s to new beginnings and fresh starts! Hurrah!

12 April, 2007 | 5 Comments

I’m leaving early in the morning…but there’s always time for one more sunset.

And what a sunset it was. The perfect ending.

Thank you for sharing this journey with me.

Au revoir, Paris. Vous aurez toujours un endroit à mon coeur…

xx