Carnaval among other things
I am beyond shocked that it is already March 29, and in a few days it will be April, which means I have vacation. I am really excited, but sort of overwhelmed for vacation. I will be traveling to Paris, Barcelona, The Netherlands, and Belgium. I guess the overwhelming part is that I will be traveling alone, I am meeting up with people in each of the cities, but between cities I am all alone. I am excited about this though and I did make the decision to travel alone because I feel like this is an experience that I need to have. I know everything in the end will turn out perfectly fine, though things along the way will probably go wrong. The other factor that is stressing me out is money. I am realizing how much money I have spent since being here, and how much more I will spend before I leave. I don't really feel like I am throwing money around like its nothing or spending it on frivalous items, but everything is so much more expensive and I have no income coming in. Then when I remember to convert things to dollars it makes me even more nervous. For example though whenever I buy shampoo and conditioner the bottles are half the size as the bottles in the US, and they cost almost 5 euros, which translates into 7 or so dollars. These are even the same brands as the US, L'oreal or Garnier Fructis. Then traveling is not cheap at all, I have learned.
This weekend though is carnaval here in Nantes, there are parades, a carnival, and yesterday downtown was standing room only b/c there were market booths and the stores set up tents on the street to sell clothes. I had never seen that many people in Nantes before at one time. It was almost like the Soldes all in one day. Then on Friday my students were dressed up in costumes at school for Carnaval. It was really cute, some of them even had face paint, though not every student was dressed up. I teach at a Catholic school so it wsa big there. I don't think I have mentioned this but the part of France I am in is very Catholic and there are a lot of Catholic private schools here, more than other regions of France. Though private schools are not like the states where they are incredibly expensive. Here the state still pays the teachers salaries, so parents pay usually about 50 euros a month to pay for the pricipal and his secretaries and other administrative staff.
Last night my friends and I decided to attempt making Mexican food, because we have been craving it. The first problem was that we could not find jalapenos, so we used the pulp of pimento peppers. The second problem we had was we decided to buy the kit. The problem with that is that the French are under the impression that Mexican food is like BBQ, so you chicken ended up sort of BBQed but not really, I don't know what it was. The next time we are just going to try cooking the chicken with our own seasonings. Then the third problem was our avacados were not ripe, so our gaucomole was not creamy and disgusting! On the plus side our desert was pretty yummy and everything was edible, just not Tex-Mex. Hopefully attempt number two will be better because we will have learned from our mistakes.
I will finish this blog update later, at the moment I am exhausted.
This weekend though is carnaval here in Nantes, there are parades, a carnival, and yesterday downtown was standing room only b/c there were market booths and the stores set up tents on the street to sell clothes. I had never seen that many people in Nantes before at one time. It was almost like the Soldes all in one day. Then on Friday my students were dressed up in costumes at school for Carnaval. It was really cute, some of them even had face paint, though not every student was dressed up. I teach at a Catholic school so it wsa big there. I don't think I have mentioned this but the part of France I am in is very Catholic and there are a lot of Catholic private schools here, more than other regions of France. Though private schools are not like the states where they are incredibly expensive. Here the state still pays the teachers salaries, so parents pay usually about 50 euros a month to pay for the pricipal and his secretaries and other administrative staff.
Last night my friends and I decided to attempt making Mexican food, because we have been craving it. The first problem was that we could not find jalapenos, so we used the pulp of pimento peppers. The second problem we had was we decided to buy the kit. The problem with that is that the French are under the impression that Mexican food is like BBQ, so you chicken ended up sort of BBQed but not really, I don't know what it was. The next time we are just going to try cooking the chicken with our own seasonings. Then the third problem was our avacados were not ripe, so our gaucomole was not creamy and disgusting! On the plus side our desert was pretty yummy and everything was edible, just not Tex-Mex. Hopefully attempt number two will be better because we will have learned from our mistakes.
I will finish this blog update later, at the moment I am exhausted.
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