We have met the enemy, and they are ours.

So sorry to have to tell you this in writing, my fellow fun-employers, but I've had a little something on the side for awhile now that, if he were feeling pissy about it, R Kelly might call English lessons. Yeah, I know, it's all very sudden. I just wanted you to hear it from me, first.
So that's it, then: I basically get paid 20 euros an hour to have coffee with a stranger and listen to them talk. I think it's a bit like being a therapist or newly in-love. "Tell me again what your favorite song is, Venanzio.." 
So far I have three students that I've been meeting with regularly. 
Student one is an Algerian French teacher who wants to move to Louisiana to help spread French culture. We practice interview questions and I've been schooling him on academic buzz words, *think, differentiated instruction.* He drew me a map and explained that he believes with organizations like the one he is working with leading the charge, it will only be a matter of time before French culture spills out of Louisiana and into the neighboring states. Don't worry people, I didn't even laugh at him. In fact in the nicest way posible I simply told him that will never happen. 
Student two is an Italian documentary film maker. He is working on a script for German and Italian television. He's been here in Paris for 20 years. His English is fine, but he has to read a lot of source materials written neither in Italian or German mais avec that lofty academic language we are so fuckin well known for in America. Ah, discorse. 
Student 3 is a young lady who hates English but has to learn it to pass her blah blab bah. She is the hardest to work with, and the one I need to lean over the table the most at. But she likes music, and can read fairly well in English. So we're talking about the lyrics of her favorite songs. You were born in the wrong era, kid, not to mention the wrong country.
You know, I think I would have always left my country. But I recognize if there had never been a Sebastien to love, this Erin would probably be lost somewhere in the Americas. We may still end up there, if ending up is really what you call another leg of our journey together. Cross that bridge when you get there, first socks, then shoes...water, water everywhere...Please watch for falling platitudes, at these latitudes, gents


We got the most adorable European coats. Sébastien had this leather jacket that he let get absolutely ratty. It was very soft at one time, but he broke the zipper last winter and it never did anything for his butt.  So now he has this really cute tight fitting gig. He's such a mec now. He may dart-off on his vespa at any time for the coast. 
People keep asking me if I'm English. Guys, do I look English? I'm from New England, granted.

Click to see if I'm English

 But we don't have very much respect for our funny talkin' cousins there.... They were too stupid to put on camo or duck when they heard sniper fire. (Read as musket fire) Plus lets be honest, the battle of Put-in-Bay, gave us mad victory points in the war of 1812. ....I didn't even look that up. Ok, I might have...if Sébastien wasn't here to fill in the deets...Don't you wish you had a Sébastien? (also, I found the é key...who's proud of me?)
We've belatedly been discovering our neighborhood. Refrain from hating me if you can, but we've mostly been shopping at super markets.  Mais, dans nous cartier,  we have four butchers, a fish market, six bakeries--that I've notices so far, five or so vegetable stands, and we just found a great place to buy cheese. All this and a coffee roaster. 
But you don't have to take my word for it. ...

Click to see if he's English

Lonely Planet has this to say about our neighborhood....
"Two sorts of foot traffic give the 10th arrondissement its distinctive feel. The banks of the Canal St-Martin draw leisurely strollers while travelers part (and are reunited) on the platforms of the Gare du Nord and Gare de l'Est. Outside, the cafés and brasseries do brisk trade, catering to travelers and locals. Nearby the Blvd Magenta rushes like a swollen river, the noisy, impatient crowd spreading through the adjoining streets and pouring out onto the place de la République.  
The Buzzy working class area around blvd de Strasbourg and rue du Faubourg St Denis, especially south of the blvd Magenta, is home to a large communities of Indians, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, West Indians, Africans, Turks and Kurds. Indeed, strolling through passage Brady is almost like stepping into a back alley in Mumbai or Dhaka."  I've never been to India or Senegal, but I have been to the passage Brandy... yesterday we even bought Séba a new hat there. Can you imagine writing fluff for guide books? I would punch myself every time I wondered into the semi-romantic...which, were I to write for Lonely Planet would seemily occure with a painful amount of frequency. It's strange, you think they might have at least mentioned the hookers. Boff, all's well that ends well. And sometimes it's better even before that. 
Well, I have to go pick out a love or anti-love song for the Febtober blog swap. It's hard to believe that come the 14th Sébastien and I will have been together 5 years... at the risk of sounding semi-romantic I'll say only, what a long strange trip it has been. 

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