God Help the Girl

Hello again, dear readers. First off, I was mentioned on someone else's blog, after I mentioned her on mine while blogging about the same series of events, which is pretty fun: I'm hoping this will lead to the creation of a greater expanded bloggiverse, incorporating my blog, Naomi's, Emma's, Ella's and eventually leading to a giant clusterfuck of blog posts akin to The Avengers, wherein we fight Sir Laurence Olivier or Sarah Siddons or some other ridiculously overqualified thesp.
Also, note benne: I'm typing this on a French keyboard which I've modified to work like an English one, so I should be making fewer spelling errors, as long as I stare fixedly at the screen and don't think about what I'm doing or where the keys are or, God forbid, look down, at which point I get a form of vertigo and lose a few braincells.

So, after two false starts, I had my first class that was just me today. My mother told me that I'm not a real teacher and shouldn't refer to myself as such, but screw her, lecturing eleven nonplussed French teenagers about social mobility and an economy of scarcity qualifies me to call myself whatever the hell I like. It was awful and nervewracking and I have a new respect for teachers, because it is extremely difficult to try and communicate with teenagers at the best of times, let alone when they're in a situation they're predisposed to hate. I felt like I asked 'does everyone understand' a hundred times and recieved a chorus of indifferent 'yes'es but they still retained that glazed look of noncomprehension in their eyes afterward. However, at the end, they were all able to speak relatively eloquently about the topic at hand, so maybe that's just how they always look. Also, I did feel very self-important writing words on the board and underlining them and then turning dramatically, picking on someone random and making sure they were paying attention.
"But what were those false starts?" I hear you ask; well, you know how sometimes you can't read your timetable because it's not only in a language you don't understand but in a truncated form of said language so you have no chance in hell of knowing what's going on, but you don't want to seem like a moron or, worse, a nuisance, so you nod when you think they ask if you understand?
That.
In my defense, four students showed up at these various un-classes, and I taught them all half a lesson apiece until the secretary came and asked what I was doing. So, I'm not the only one who can't read the timetables and also those students are now ahead of their peers academically, and so will now be heroes in their eyes, right? That's how that works in school, I believe.

In other news, the incredibly convoluted web of lies I've been weaving when the students have been interviewing me for class has already started to unravel: they've evidently been talking about me to their peers outside of the lessons, because some classes come in anticipating my answers and asking ridiculously specific questions, for example 'do you know pamplemousse?' (no, it doesn't make anymore sense in context) without the preceding line of enquiry to lead them there. They also seemed puzzled by some of my answers to questions like 'do you like rugby' because they clearly were expecting the answer I gave to the last class, but they haven't counted on my cunning: to prevent them copying from other groups, I'm presenting a different persona to each set of students, Roger-Smith-style.

I save Rory Spanish for the really difficult classes.

I've also told the students I don't speak any french, so as to discourage them from talking to me in their native tongue (although it's also increased them insulting me in French and then laughing behind their hands at my supposed lack of comprehension). This blew up in my face when one of the teachers, upon hearing me engage in a conversation en Francais, shouted 'but you said you didn't speak French! You LIED!'

I'm also getting caught up in the face needs of French people: apparently, you're meant to say 'bonjour' to everyone in the room when you enter, even if you don't know them and you have no and never will have any business with them. Also, I've been referring to all my colleagues as 'vous' because they're older than me and I don't really know them, but apparently this comes across as me wanting to put distance between myself and them. This is really confusing.

On the plus side, I was asked in one class what my dreams were and I answered 'I want to win an Oscar', because I thought it would make the children laugh and it's also kind of true.This lead to the Head of English asking if I wanted to help out with the school play this year and maybe lead some readings of plays with the more advanced kids. So I guess what I'm saying is...look out for more info on the Rob and Roberta 2015 European Premiere! I swear to God, I'll do that play in every country on earth.