Un vrai pot de colle

It was Barry’s and my turn to start school this week. We arrived at the university at 9:00 a.m. to write our placement tests, and were met with some disorganization.

The students had to unstack desks and move chairs before any of us could sit down. After the room was arranged, we waited 10 minutes while the tests were quickly run off. Despite the very loud construction directly out the classroom window, and the questions typed in extremely small font, we both finished writing in just over an hour. The test included multiple choice and fill in the blank questions and 2 short essay questions: one about our arrival in France and first impressions, the other on the effect of television on children.

The next morning we went to check our placements: Barry had been placed in group 3, and I in the highest group, group 4. Some of you may, very legitimately, be surprised by my placement, as I was. Or perhaps panic would better describe how I was feeling. How could I have been placed in the HIGHEST group?! I knew, for instance, that an American women taking her masters in French was in this group. Barry laughs, but I swear it’s because I threw in this one subjonctif phrase while writing one of my essays that I had just heard Lily’s teacher use while speaking to us that morning (“il faudrait qu’ils sachent”). Nevermind my understanding of the subjonctif does not extend beyond this one phrase as anything that I may have known is long since forgotten. The only thing that stopped me from going and confessing to them that I had been messing around with French that was out of my league, and that really they should reconsider my placement, was that Group 4 had no classes on Wednesdays. This solved a huge concern for us, as the girls also are school free on Wednesdays (this is very common in France).

Alors, Groupe 4. Welcome your weakest link.

Remember all that wise advice I was feeding to Grace about trying her best even if it is difficult /it would get easier, etc.?? Well, it’s been my turn to take my own advice for a test drive. On that very day I had one class that discussed for 2 hours Sarkozy’s policy concerning the expulsion of the Gypsies and his plan to raise the retirement age. I guess the good news is that I understood some of it; it was just the other 50% percent that remained incomprehensible that had me slightly concerned. Yesterday for another class, we had to listen to 5 minutes of a news report and answer true or false and short answer questions based on it. This was a humbling experience to say the least; if I was grading it back home my result would be way down in the “not yet meeting” category, (and I must confess even including some lucky guesses). But, Grace appreciated hearing about Mom’s struggles and how I am trying to be as brave as she has been.

Grace really continues to impress us with how well she is working at adapting. In addition to the higher level of French (and math, we are finding out), all the children in her class write in handwriting (at the beginning of Grade 2!). She had been working on her cursive writing some this summer, but it’s still very slow and new for her. She says she is sometimes alone at break times, and she is putting on a brave face about it, but I think she feels lonely sometimes.

During all my classes this week, my thoughts often drifted to the girls and how each was doing. My classmates have had to hear me describe, for each new class we started, the scene of Lily crying and clinging to me everytime I drop her off. One professor said that the french phrase “un vrai pot de colle” (a real jar of glue), would describe such a situation.

Luckily, with Barry and I having different schedules, Lily doesn’t have to stay at school for lunch (“le cantine” wasn’t such a hit with this daughter...for starters, they made her wear a bib!!), and although the morning drop off remains “un vrai pot de colle”, she hasn’t cried returning after lunch and returns home quite animated and singing .....yay Lily!

Barry has Tuesdays free which worked well this week as the schools were closed due to the large strike against Sarkozy’s plan to raise the age of retirement from 60 to 62 (Barry and the girls saw hundreds marching just outside of the university). Also, it allows him to accompany Lily on her very first field trip next Tuesday; 25 four and five year olds are walking 20 minutes through downtown Avignon to the train station, taking a 25 minute train ride to Arles, and then walking 10 minutes to view a photography display (!) - all paid for by the school. Barry is as excited, if not more so, than Lily! Afterwards, her class will be participating in a photography project. I am very interested to see what this entails.