"It is necessary that you sit"

Jardin du Luxembourg
Sacre Coeur- Montmartre district(sewing store area)



I've just finished cleaning up my room; organising all my clothes and fabric and papers and all that sort of stuff. I have more paper than anything else. Funny how being here in this foreign country seems to generate a lot of paper. There have been papers to be legal in the country, birth certificates, passport copies and all sorts of things. Then there is the paper from getting a bank account and now from registering for school. I finally got all signed up for class and I'm really excited to start. I enrolled in classes heavy on group discussion becuase I hear French constantly day in and day out but I don't speak hardly any. I had a real sense of accomplishment after taking the placement test, choosing the courses, enrolling and paying all in french. And by the way, I'm sorry if I miss capitalization from time to time, the French never capitalize anything.

I anticipated a sort of mildly bad day today for some reason. The kids, though good natured, can be very difficult at times and often fight and generally wear me out a drive me crazy by not listening. But today was an improvement and I think it is because I'm more comfortable with the authority and can see better what works. I helped all of them with their homework, made them snack, did laundry, played games for a couple of hours with my three plus two girls from downstairs before making dinner and getting them to bed on time. It was very efficient and satisfying.

I'm starting to find some of the places I like and Hillsong church has been a real blessing. On Sunday I went with a couple girls from church to the Jardin de Luxembourg and Les Halles. We also went to Starbucks. I actually haven't made it into any cafes yet. Theres a great boulangerie with the most beautiful culinary creations right around the block but it's always kind of crowded. Maybe I'll take Agathe and let her show me the ropes. Ordering in general goes like this "Moi, je prend un...." For some reason there is a lot of "moi, je" in French dialogue. It doesn't translate to English very well, "me, I like this", "me, I'm an athlete"....There are lots of things that make for awkward translating - like the subjunctive. Subjunctive is fairly rare in English but it is plentiful in French. They are constantly prefacing advice and orders with "Il faut que tu", which means something like "it is necessary that you" although 'faut' is a form of the verb 'faire' which means to do or to make. So constantly people are saying to their children or friends what sounds to me like "it is necessary that you sit", "it is necessary that you wash your hands." It's very odd for me to think of incorporating this into my own dialogue when all I'm inclined to say is "sit", "wash your hands". Not only that, "il faut que" has a very obscene sound to in when spoken in a fluent manner.

So theres a little lecture on the French language, hope you aren't too bored with it.

Maybe I'll have someting more entertaining in the future but I'm usually only entertaining if I'm frustrated and right now I'm pretty peachy.