Slight rant against the French education system

Okay, not so much a rant as a notice of frustration. I’m used to the American education system where you register for classes quite literally months ahead of time. You know exactly when and where your classes will be, and they always start when they’re supposed to. Here…not so much. As I discovered this past week, the likelihood of them starting when they supposedly do is pretty much nil. I finally figured out that the lit courses wouldn’t be starting this past week, so I gave up on them. My Argentinean Tango class, however…that I was expecting to start. My friends’ sports at SUAPS had definitely started this past week, so I was looking forward to meeting some French people and getting the chance to dance for a bit. But…you guessed it. Tango doesn’t start until October, apparently. Now, I’m okay with spontaneity – to an extent. When it comes to academia, however…I miss the structure of the states! plus I just really wanted to dance...

Anywho, the week finished up relatively well, I suppose…I had a total meltdown/panic attack on Thursday, but it’s all better now. I had one of those great aha! moments that made me realize I was being an idiot and trying to make myself be someone I’m not. Yes, it sucks to be an introvert in a situation like this. But…a tiger don’t change [her] stripes, to paraphrase Sawyer (yes I just had a LOST geek moment. Deal with it!)

Today I went to visit L’Ile de Nantes’ very own Babar…and for those of you who aren’t lucky enough to know who Babar is, Babar is a cartoon elephant with whom most French children grow up. L’Ile de Nantes has something called Les Machines de l’Ile…one of which is an enormous Elephant. A mechanical elephant that you can ride! It’s absolutely enormous and an engineer miracle…it moves exactly like real elephants do…to the point that it has a hose in its trunk and sprayed water at the kids watching it walk! Its hard to properly explain it…but it was really fun to watch.

Now for a random observation of France (well, at least of Nantes):

In the states, I feel like there’s an expectation that you have a different outfit for each day –or at the very least, a different shirt. It seems like there’s a pressure to have a large quantity of clothing. Here, however, they’ll literally wear the same outfit 3, 4, even 5 days in a row. Mme Rouchet, I’m sure, has only a few ensembles –but I’ll bet you anything they’re all very nice, slightly pricier, high quality ensembles. It doesn’t phase anyone here to see the same outfit all week, but it seems like in the states that implies having either slept in your clothes or pulled an all-nighter. Like with food, there seems to be a quality over quantity mentality to how they approach clothing. And then there’s the actual clothing itself. Some of the outfits I’ve seen are incredible chic, elegant and timeless –tailored suits, well-made dresses, beautifully cut skirts and slacks. Others, though…I just have to stop and wonder about the people. Their outfits are definitely things you could only get away with in France. There was one woman who had a blouse that had these huge flat-disc-sequin-things on it…the kind of things I remember using to decorate posters and scrunchies when I was maybe six... but there were fringes of these sequins on the cuffs, hem and collar of this blouse…it was si bizarre!