Cadeaux and other Christmas joys

For Christmas Eve dinner, I was invited to the home of one of the teachers at my school. I played Wii Mini-jeux with her two kids (aged thirteen and six) and had punch cacahuète (peanut punch) and traditional meal number two of this holiday season.

When I got back home, it was after midnight, and my entire host family was on the terrace, still celebrating. In Martinique, everyone opens their presents at midnight on December 24, and so I got to open mine, too.

The first was a really sympa pair of earrings with little pebbles on them.


The second was a t-shirt, shown below.


In case you can't see it, it says, in glitter, "Playboy," with a picture of the Playboy bunny above.

I wish I were kidding but I'm not.

As I tried not to laugh, my host family explained that Playboy is just another brand here -- and a popular one, too, at that. In fact, I see a lot of my little students wearing Playboy clothes at school.

I wasn't about to tell them what Playboy is in the United States.

Instead, I joked that now I was really Martiniquaise, with my stylish new Playboy shirt, and they all chuckled and said yes, that's right, you'll never be able to go back to the United States now.

The next day, in the afternoon, I ate Christmas lunch with my host family. Tons of people came, extended relatives and friends and such, and for the rest of the day they just sat around, hung out, chatted, played dominoes and watched TV.

So in short, I ate the traditional meal three times this holiday season, successfuly completed a baking project in Martinique, and probably gained a kilo or two in the process. And now, with my stylish new earrings and Hugh Hefner-endorsing t-shirt, I do feel like a real Martiniquaise, truly.

Célébration!

Joyeux Christmas Eve, everyone! Currently a rainy and blah afternoon.

Last Friday, I stayed at school all day but didn't work at all.

But then again, neither did anyone else. The teachers all told me straight up that the Friday before Christmas break is a day of fêtes. And did I want to miss out on that? Hell no.

In the morning, there was a spectacle in the school courtyard, wherein each class performed a song, a dance, or a skit. It was a serious affair, too -- there were costumes, makeup, glitter and music. Because it was outside, the kids not performing were all running around and making noise and not really paying attention. Still, though, it was pretty cute. And I found out some of my students have serious dancing chops.

Here's a picture of them all after the spectacle, dancing for fun to Shakira.


Before they all went to the cafeteria, I was invited into a CP (French first grade) classroom for an "apéritif." We all had a cup of grape juice with ham-and-cheese skewers that some of the kids' parents had brought. Really, it doesn't get much more adorable than that.

During our two-hour lunch break, there was a traditional Martiniquais Christmas meal for the staff. We had acras (below) -- a kind of fritter made with either shrimp, cod, or vegetables -- and paté salé, meat-filled pastry. There was rum and punch coco and champagne, too -- never mind that it was still a work day.


We had jambon Noël, Christmas ham -- a thicker, more tender version of its American counterpart -- and boudin, a kind of sausage that you basically bite into and suck the meat out of.

Here's a picture of one of the teachers preparing the boudin...


...and another of the teachers showing me how to eat it.


We also had rice, pork stew, pois d'Angole ("pigeon peas" in English), a starchy root called chou chinois ("Chinese cabbage"), gratin with christophines and cheese, bananas, peanut and cherry ice cream, and flan coco.


In the afternoon, when the kids had come back from the cafeteria, they had an afternoon of free time. I passed out Christmas word searches, and they all played board games and snacked on cakes and cookies and soda.

Here's a picture of some CM1 (French fourth grade) students drawing Christmas pictures on the chalkboard.



Here's a picture of the school "Christmas tree."


Here's a picture of some petit Jésus candy that a CM1 student gave me. It was part of her prize for being the first to finish the Christmas word search. It is exactly what it sounds like -- pure sugar molded into the shape of our Savior. Christmas candy doesn't get any better than this, folks.