Working Girl

Yesterday, I got up at 4:30am to get ready to head out to teach in Lyon. When I got back home around 11:30pm, Sylvain was waiting up for me and greeted me with a "fin de semaine?!" ("end of the work week"). Yep. One really long day, but only one day (two days next semester) away from home. That's what I went to school for! I got to Lyon early and went to HR first thing to sign my contract: I'm officially hired until August 31, 2013! The paperwork only took about five minutes, so I had a lot of time to kill since my first class didn't start until 2pm. Even counting an hour for the tram ride out to the campus where my classes are held, I still had a lot of time on my hands. I walked around a bit, over the river (the Rhone), and found Brasserie Georges. It was nice and quiet and I went in for a cup of tea and some calm reading time. It turns out the Brasserie Georges is actually a brasserie, a micro-brewery, on site so you can sit and observe the work as you dine or drink. I'll have to go back for some tasting in about eight months or so. About ten-thirty, I decided to head out to campus and have an early lunch out there. When I arrived at the campus in Bron, I discovered that there is basically nothing around the campus, so I had a small bad tuna fish sandwich at the cafeteria and then walked around acquainting myself with the campus, my classrooms, the bookstore. I also went and introduced myself to the secretary. My classes were from 2 to 7:45pm: two grammar classes and one translation class for freshman students of langues étrangères appliquées (applied foreign languages). They went relatively well. Most of the students weren't prepared, a lot of them were new, so we had to use class time for them to work on the exercises we were supposed to be correcting. After the last class, I took a taxi back to the station (public transport unfortunately can't get me back in time for my train), ate a sandwich for dinner, and got on the train back to Marseille. And so my Mondays in Lyon have begun . . .