Snow! oh my!

Yesterday, we had our first major snow.  Luckily, I left for my school just as it was starting, so I was spared the "abominable snowman" look when I arrived at my lycée.

I've decided to learn how to say "hello" in obscure languages.  My students always say hi to me as I pass, but just saying hello like a CD recording is getting dull.  (My American accent sounds CD perfect next to theirs--even though it isn't).  I've decided to completely confuse them.  Maybe I should learn a sentence or two of Japanese, or some African language.  *cue evil laugh*

Funny story: Last week, one of my terminale students said "bonjour" instead of hello like all the other students do.  I responded with hello because I had just said it to the group of students right in front of him.  Later, I thought, I should have answered in French.  (I don't think that students should be forced to speak English outside of English class.)  Anyway, I felt bad about it.  "No wonder they're scared of me!" I thought.  (True story: I had 18 and 19-year-olds running away from me in the kitchen because they didn't want to speak English with me--even the ones who are twice my size.  Get a grip on it, people!).  Well, this week he said "now I'm going to say hello."  Progress in teaching?  I'd like to think that.  With all the "horrible teenagers" I have to deal with, I sometimes feel like I won't make a difference in their miserable lives (yeah, their English is that bad, even though they've studied it since primary school).

Plus, teenagers are just large children.  I don't find them to be as difficult to deal with as the teachers seem to, but I think that's because I'm young and new and interesting and they really don't have a good enough command of English to thoroughly insult me (but they try, believe me, they try.  They got very close to a tongue-lashing from me once, but I was too speechless to respond the the comment). My lycée students are just kids, really.  They are kind of cute and charming (as much as teenagers can be) and they remind me of larger versions of my collège students.  They do things in class that they think I can't see (but I TOTALLY can).  In case you can't tell, I'm liking my lycée experience a lot more than my other school.  It's not that the teachers are nicer in one than the other or the students are better, I just seem to get along with my lycée (plus, it's more interesting and I have some freedom in what I do). 

This is a rant; I'm sorry for that.  It's because I'm faced with my other school for the rest of the week and I'm not looking forward to it.  Sigh.