Quiet nights of quiet stars, quiet chords from my guitar, floating on the silence that surrounds us

10 days since my last post and the reasons for this are twofold: i went to montpellier for a long weekend and avoided the internet when i was there and when i returned, i fell sick and didn't want to do anything much less blog about it.

this flu thing i have took me completely by surprise. i can usually tell if i'm going to fall sick and also how bad it will be. this french strain destroyed all that. on monday night i had a glass of wine and snacks with my landlady for around 30 minutes. i came back home and ate, went online and went to bed with a slight sore throat. i woke up in full fledged agony but i was in denial about it. so i went to school and had a miserable day.

tuesday: the kids were loud and plain crazy. they didn't want to learn or listen to me. in one of my classes a girl had the audacity to have headphones in her ears and music playing! i confiscated the phone after much difficulty; she pretended not to understand me even when i spoke in french and then tried to hand me only her headphones without her phone! as if i didn't know that the two went together! the class was so loud and hyper and i had a sore throat and my body ached all over. it was torture.

at the end of the hour, the aforementioned girl walked right up to my desk and picked up her phone and almost made it out of the room before i caught her arm and talked to her. i was really surprised because when i took her phone, i told her i would be handing it over to her teacher and that she would deal with the issue, not me. now if this were me, i would have been embarrassed and scared for the rest of the hour, wondering about my phone and the trouble i was in. not this young lady. she spent the whole hour loudly talking to the boys beside her and not paying even the slightest attention to what i was saying. i was shocked. because of all the kids in the class, she had the most reason to try and suck up to me and she didn't even bother.

so when the class was over, she stood in front of me and begged me to give her a second chance. i returned her phone and headphones not because she was bright red and on the verge of fake tears, but because i absolutely hate it when teachers (at stella) tried to take our phones or belongings and not give them back at the end of the day. it used to infuriate me that the teachers and nuns at stella would confiscate phones and not return them for months! i'm sure it isn't legal. and now in that class, it all came back and i let her have her phone back saying that i would be informing her teacher of what happened.

and i did. i was embarrassed to, and sandrine (the teacher) was even more embarrassed that i had to deal with something like that. things like this really makes me wonder what makes a teacher someone worthy of students' attention and respect. clearly i fall short in some way. i'm not exactly sure what to do about it either. i don't yell in class, i hate yelling. i simply stop talking altogether and observe their various conversations with (what i hope is) a stern look on my face, until of of them realizes and yells for the others to shut up.

yet another observation is how i do not know if they understand or not. the expressions on their faces when they are disinterested are the same as when they do not understand. only when they are engaged and when they understand, do i ever see interest on their faces. and this is rare in some classes.

wednesday: i woke up with a beautiful fever and could barely move. i texted my teacher and apologized about not being able to come in. and went back to sleep. i find it so fascinating how my entire body can hurt when i have a fever. i forced myself to get out of bed by noon to get dressed and go shopping with my landlady. she took me in her car and was very worried about me all the way there. she gave me plenty of advice of how to throw off a cold and what to eat and not eat and all that. i barely heard her. i was trying to find a way to sit so that my jeans would stop hurting my legs. i needed to buy heavy things like milk and flour or i wouldn't have gone at all. i moved so slowly and i think my face must have shown real disease because gladys followed me around with the cart and helped me out a lot. i was wearing 4 layers including my coat and shivering my butt off in the hyper u. fortunately the whole shopping trip took less than an hour and i was home in warm pjs and socks by 2pm. i spent the rest of the day in and out of sleep, heating up water to drink and gargle with.

thursday: i forced myself to go to work. i was feeling better and so i thought i could make it. i no longer had a fever and only minimal body pain. i also had an easy work day. my morning class were angels. they were so very excited to be speaking english and they all participated and told me what they could and could not do. (all the girls could not play rugby and all the boys could not dance). they were so sweet. i had a 3 hour break before my next class so i came home for a nap and lunch. i woke up to hearing gladys say my name, just outside my door. she didn't knock so when i got up to see what was going on, there was a delivery man and a very large box for me! yay! my mommy sent me clothes and spices! and gladys saw that i was still sick and brought me a chickpea and greens soup. it was simple and very yummy. she is one of those people who can do anything they want with ingredients and have it turn out amazing. like my mommy and ashwitha's mom and very few others.

i had a truly horrible ravioli that i bought in case of emergency. it was what i had the night before in my feverish state. it was a simple canned cheese ravioli in tomato sauce. i was in awe of france and its ability to turn even the simplest food into something disgusting. this stuff would make anthony bourdain happily eat chef boyardee and praise and recommend it for the rest of his life! nfortunately i hae another can in my cupboard and this one is a different flavor- mixed vegetable. i followed it down with a clementine and salt water gargling for my throat.

when i got back to work, i felt a lot better and had 3 more classes. i had a cute group of 11 year olds and made them practice numbers by telling me their phone numbers in english. and then we told time with a wobbly clock i drew on the chalk board. the following two classes were the same class just each half given to me an hour apart. they were 15 year olds and i had prepared a fill in the blanks lyrics worksheet for them to the song just the way you are by bruno mars. i really did not anticipate this, but most of them already knew the song! thankfully nobody knew what the lyrics were so they actually learned something. and since they knew and liked the song, they were all highly interested and curious to learn the meaning of the lyrics. they even sang the song at the end! in one group we were lead by a boisterous funny guy named quentin who sang loudly and badly. and the other was a girly drama queen named marie who sang in a funny falsetto throughout. i told them that singing was a really good way to practice their english and they seemed happy to hear it.

friday: i made myself get up to go to the market to buy cabbage and tomatoes and bananas. there were no bananas to be found so i bought a chocolate croissant and a cookie for breakfast instead. i took a very long nap after gargling 3 times (before and after market and after breakfast) and woke up and gargled again. i am determined to get rid of this sore throat but it is putting up one hell of a fight. i helped gladys with an email issue: attaching a file to an email. and cleaned my kitchen after talking to vee. i then made rasam from a mix and cabbage (cose) curry and rice for dinner. 4 helpings later, i decided to blog. and here i am.

craving: an end to my sore throat and a strawberry and banana smoothie
currently listening to: recado bossa nova- hank mobley