Le Cercle De La Vie

     Ello! Welcome to my blog! This week I shall start off by apologizing for being a bit late with my post. It has been a long week, and my lateness is due to the fact that the internet was rejecting my computer last night. But don’t worry I used the time to practice my French (and *cough* organize my iTunes), and all that fun stuff. It seems like everything happened so long ago, but really it has only been a week. Hey, at least we are halfway through January, right? 

The inside of the Galeries Lafayette.
So this is what money shops in. 

     I started my new class schedule for this semester last week, and it is awesome! I have amazing teachers. I have decided to step up my game this semester and add another French class. I now have four French classes a week, and finally after so many years of attempting to learn French the language is finally starting to stick (at least I hope so). My teachers are much better at paying attention to what I am doing and what I need to learn. It has been really nice. I even had a test! Ahhh! In one of my classes the teacher is a woman who was the teacher for my mom and me when we came to Paris for a month last May. The amazing thing was that she remembered who I was and my name!

     My other class has very interesting circumstances. I am the only student. It was really funny watching the teacher walk in to the room and only finding me sitting there. After a short interdiction, he turned to the empty seat next to me and asked “et vous? Qu'est-ce que vous aimez?” (and you? What do you like?). So the rest of the class was him asking me questions and me answering them the best I could. He would help me with what I didn’t understand, and that was how the class went. Awesome! Private lessons! I do know that my friend is going to join the class, so it will be even better for us to study and practice together.

     Ever since the family asked to extend my contract and have me stay another year and I accepted the family has been REALLY excited. I had a few questioned about Alain’s personality from my last blog. Alain is a very mellow person. He plays with the kids, makes a few jokes ever now and again, but is mostly a calm relaxed guy. So his reaction to me staying another year (jumping up and down) was a complete surprise for me! I have never seen him react to anything that way, and I take it as a wonderful complement. Both Cecile and Alain have been talking about what I could do for school next year. I think they feel a bit bad that I would be staying another year away from school. Alain has been talking to his internships on what I should do for school. It's really funny how excited and involved they are. I'm still trying to decide for myself what I would like to do with school. I know that will still continue to do online classes with the University of Utah, and I don't think my French is anywhere ready to jump into a French University. Plus I don't mind the online classes. 

     Did you know there is a holiday here in France called Epiphany – Fête des Rois. It commemorates principally (but not solely) the visit of the Magi to the Baby Jesus, and thus Jesus' physical manifestation to the Gentiles. They eat a cake or a gâteau des Rois (made of brioche) or the galette des Rois (puff pastry with almond cream), which has a little toy or figure in it. Then the person that gets it in their slice of cake is crowned king (or queen) for the day. My family did it twice this week. Cecile is tricky and wanted to give each child a chance to be king. She is very sly. All the bakeries have the gâteau des Rois in their shops and they even come with a paper crown. Very fun!

     For Christmas my parents got the Percy Jackson books for the kids. Well I started reading the first one to Daniel on Thursday of last week, and we are now on chapter 15. He LOVES the books. I have lost my voice by the end of the night several times in a row now, but it is worth it. The only problem is that Aimée doesn’t really like me reading to Tommaso. I still haven’t quite figured out why, but my best guess would be that she doesn’t like that he is enjoying a story that she hasn’t read yet. Bizarre, I know.

    Aimée's meltdowns are getting fewer and fewer now that I am learning how to handle them. I know what the signs look like before she blows up, and I help her before she loses her temper.

     This weekend Alain and Cecile went to London and Milan for three days. Alain's mom came to help with the kids, and it was a bit odd. It’s a bit hard to figure her out. She is very sweet with me, but sort of hard on the kids. It creates thing never ending circle. Aimée doesn't listen to her because she doesn't like her much, so then the grandma gets mad and says things to Aimée that make her not like her. Bad circle.

So turns out, they aren't really horses, just ponies. :) 

     The other wonderful trial of the week was…. HEAD LICE! Yay!! They think Aimée originally got them from the helmet she was wearing while skiing a few weeks ago. We thought we had gotten rid of them. The school called and said that they found more head lice in her hair, so we needed to keep working at getting them out. All this happened the day Alain and Cecile left on their trip. It was a PAIN. Lucky, she was the only person in the family to get them, and they are gone now.

     Here is how my weekend went with Aimée, Daniel, and Grandma:

6:30 AM: *Knock Knock

Daniel: "Olivia can I have your iPad to play a game?"

Me: "...What? Daniel? What time is it?"

D: "Can I see your iPad?"

Me: "Yes Daniel... it's by the door." (He had asked me if he could play with it the next morning the night before, this is a special treat).

D: ".... I can't find it."

* I get up and find it by the door.

Me: "Daniel it is right here."

D: "Oh... Thanks!" (He runs off).

7:00 AM: *Knock Knock

D: "The game isn't working Olivia..."

Me: "Here you didn't push the right button."

D: "Oh right thanks!"

7:30 AM: *Door busts open

Aimée: "OLIVIA! are you awake?"

Me: "No....."

A: "OK!" (Door closes)

8:00 AM: * Door busts in

A: "What are you still doing in BED?"

M: "Aimée! It's Saturday! Please can I sleep?"

     Basically every Saturday, even Cecile and Alain sleep in until 9:30. I'm usually up between 8:30 and 9. And the kids never bug me. This week was not the case for some reason. Sunday started even earlier. Sorry kids, no more playing on my iPad during the weekends.

     Saturday, Aimée was a NIGHTMARE!

     As I said before, Aimée and her Grandma do not get along. I think it's because they both like to be in charge, and so they have a power struggle. Plus, I think the grandma is impatient with her. I tried to help, but usually it's all in French and my French isn't that good yet.

     Aimée has horseback riding lessons on Saturday, and the plan was that her grandma was going to take her and I was going to watch Daniel . This is a normal Saturday for me. Well Aimée refused to go because her grandma was taking her. It got to the point where her Grandma was calling Cecile, who then yelled at her to go.

     At this point Grandma was done, she had had enough. She didn't want to go anymore and that I needed to take her. Great. Well I have never been to the horseback lessons before. The plan was to take a taxi there and then walk home. That would be fine if we were in the city, but we were on the edge where basically we are in a giant park with no Metro stops.

     Aimée was so excited! I was not. There was so much tension in the air from her grandma. I had basically 3 minutes from the moment I was told I was going until I was in the taxi. I had no idea where we were going or how to get home, but how do you explain that in French. I had my map with me, and that was the best I could do.

Aimée and her pony. 

     Aimée then got a headache during her lesson, and before I knew it, she was off the horse, and the trainers came to put it away. What now? No one even tried to talk to me about it. At this point I have given up. I was done with Aimée and her awful behavior towards her grandma.

     We just start walking. I chose a direction that seems logical (it was the wrong way, but whatever). The whole time I am explaining to her the best that I can how disrespectful she has been, and how I am disappointed in her behavior. It was a long walk, and even after we figured out that we needed to turn around and go the other direction we were still very lost. It's a giant park so none of the roads have signs on them. Eventually we made it to the road that we knew, but still needed to take a metro home. Turns out it should have been a straight shot, but I had NO IDEA!!

     She was good for the rest of the night, well until Daniel said something that made her mad. Then she wanted the Percy Jackson book back, claiming it was hers. Ugh. So then I go through this whole thing with her where I explain that yes they are her books, but it is something that we are all doing together so she can't use that as a threat. It doesn't work that way. She made me miserable the rest of the night. I have had enough of it. She had been doing this all weekend to her grandma, and now she was doing it to me. To put it in Cecile's words "The nine year old is the one who has been in control."

     I gave her one last warning, she either gets her act together or I turn into mean nanny. She didn't. For the rest of the nightly clean up I treated her exactly the way she was treating me. I did everything that I am required to do. I showered her, dried her hair, and got her in her pj's. But I was more aggressive. I didn't let go of her the whole time so she wouldn't run off, all the while not saying a word. As soon as I was finished she ran off, and I was done for the night.

     The only good thing that came from the whole night was that she was a lot nicer to her grandma. She had me as an enemy, and so she could enjoy her grandma. That's a good way to end the grandma's visit. I think during dinner she realized her mistake, because after she apologized. She was much better after that. It's been a process, but I think I'm getting through to her. I just might be able to help her out of this teenage phase. Maybe.

Why! Is this a style right now?
I'm all for rain protection,
but this just looks like a garbage bag
was sewn into a jacket.  

     Paris had these big sales. Apparently France will only let them do two big sales a year. So when things go on sale, they are REALLY on sale. It's nice. I’m not a big shopper, but I got myself a sweater and new pair of boots since I needed both of these. I might go out and see if I can score a good pair of jeans before it’s over, but I might have missed my chance. Oh well. So, for future reference, if you want to come to Paris for good shopping, look up when the big sales are. There is one usually in January and one in June.

     The last trial of my week came from home. Good ‘old Salt Lake City. I got news that my brother’s rage had passed into an overwhelming limit for my family. I feel guilty. Guilty for moving here, for planning to stay another year, and frustrated that there is nothing I can do to help them from so far away. It was during this time that my dad sent me an email; he talked about many wonderful things. 

     “We have to trust and have faith and hope that we will overcome the trials in our life through God's help and not just leave it to our own understanding. There is so much that makes life complicated and it is way beyond us to understand it all. We must have compassion for those we come in contact with, because we have no idea what sort of problems they have to deal with” 

     He explained that I shouldn’t feel bad about not being at home to help, and this was a trail that I didn’t need to face. There were so many things that I needed to learn and grow from during my adventure here. I am so lucky to have two of the most wonderful parents, who are so encouraging of everything that I do.

     On that note, I would like to end by thanking everything for following my blog this whole time. You don’t know how happy it makes me when I hear that others are enjoying my adventure with me. Oh and... the title for the week Le Cercle De La Vie, means The Circle of Life, which refers to the endless battle of power between Aimée and her Grandma. It also refers to my guilt over leaving my family, that no matter what I chose, life will go on. Until next time then!