Apples are red
Bananas are yellow
The coconut is brown
And I like fruits!
Another oddity of the French education system is the need to constantly "evaluate" the students in all subjects. Including English, of course. In Martinique, all the CM2s (fifth graders) have to take an académie-wide test, à l'orale et à l'écrite, written by a group of Martiniquan English teachers. And guess who got to administer it?
In short, it was a huge headache. I was in a horrible mood all week. Reading the above poem aloud and listening to fifty different kids recite it (all with the exact same pronunciation mistakes, I might add) is a little mind-numbing after awhile. And that was just one part of the test.
Also, as a side note, one of the other assistants and I told my tutrice that you don't really say "fruits" au pluriel, and this led to a long-winded discussion about why not. If you say, "I like apples" and "I like bananas," why don't you say, "I like fruits"? I didn't have an answer. There are certain things you know as a native speaker...which is why these teachers perhaps should have consulted one when writing the test.
Here's another gem:
New York, May the 15th
Dear friend,
I introduce myself: my name is Tom, I am 13 and I live in New York, USA. My teacher's name is Miss Peterson. I have got a little sister, Meg, she's 7 years old, and another sister Sarah, she's 14. I have got a hamster and a big black dog. I play tennis and the guitar. I like pizza and fish but I don't like carrot. My favourite sport is tennis, my favourite colour is blue and my favourite animal is the dog. At school, I like Mathematics and Geography but I don't like History.
Write me or call me.
See you soon.
TOM
I had to read this aloud to my students, like a dictée, and then they had to answer a bunch of vrai/faux questions about it. I'd pointed out the errors to my tutrice beforehand, but somehow they all still made it onto the exemplaire. And while we're on the subject, if Tom really lives in New York, why is he spelling everything the British way and using British constructions like "I have got"?
The French système de notation also mystifies me. There are three different grades you can give for each exercise: 1, 9, or 0. One is good, nine is mediocre, and zero is no response. Why is it this way? Why did they choose those numbers, in that order? My tutrice couldn't tell me. Apparently it's just been that way since the beginning of time or something.
After I'd finished évaluer-ing, I had to enter all the kids' scores into an Excel spreadsheet with all kinds of crazy formulas calculating each class's "taux de réussite" and "compétences." There was a bar graph and several extensive tables and charts. It was all so complex and official-looking.
But at the end of the day, I realized, the entire process of évaluation is just that: official-looking. A collègue told me that the évaluations have absolutely no bearing on the kids' passing onto sixième, that the English teachers in collège don't even look at the kids' évaluation scores, and that in sixième they start English from scratch anyway. So what was the point of all that, then, I wonder? A lot of paper and effort and energy and time wasted, pour rien, it seems to me. But then, that's the story of the French bureaucracy in general, isn't it?
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Canne à sucre
Olivia told me a long time ago that I should blog about sugarcane. Now that it's la récolte, I'm finally getting around to it.
Here's what it looks like when it's just been harvested from the fields. It's rather like bamboo, actually. You use a knife to strip off the exterior and cut it into slices so you can eat it.
Here is what it looks like, ready to eat.
As you can see, it's very, very fibrous, and you have to bite/chew a little bit to suck the juice out. I can't really explain what it tastes like. It's sweet, of course, but also tastes like the earth somehow. These days, when you drive along the highways in Martinique, the smell of it permeates from the fields. I've grown to love it.
Here's what it looks like when you finish, the part you throw away.
Sugarcane juice is another pleasure I've discovered. It's universally kind of a nasty brown color, but it's actually pretty delicious. (Again, stolen from Google.)
Here's what it looks like when it's just been harvested from the fields. It's rather like bamboo, actually. You use a knife to strip off the exterior and cut it into slices so you can eat it.
Here is what it looks like, ready to eat.
As you can see, it's very, very fibrous, and you have to bite/chew a little bit to suck the juice out. I can't really explain what it tastes like. It's sweet, of course, but also tastes like the earth somehow. These days, when you drive along the highways in Martinique, the smell of it permeates from the fields. I've grown to love it.
Here's what it looks like when you finish, the part you throw away.
Sugarcane juice is another pleasure I've discovered. It's universally kind of a nasty brown color, but it's actually pretty delicious. (Again, stolen from Google.)
Tours
Remember Marine, my exchange students from Sophomore year? Well, I made a visit to Tours, near where she works now, and she is getting married in August! I was 15 the last time I saw her! There was a lot of catching up to do. After high school she spent a year in South Africa, a whole year, which sounds so impressive given the time I've spent away from home this time. She studied biology at university, and is now doing a master's in animal behavior. She's in Tours, or a small town nearby called Crotelles, because she has an internship with an agricultural research institute.
It was great spending the weekend in the countryside. She lives by these huge expanses of wheat and colza fields. The air is unimaginably fresh, and going on walks with her, I learned a lot about insects and farm ecosystems, all in French. We also visited some castles, no big deal.
It was great spending the weekend in the countryside. She lives by these huge expanses of wheat and colza fields. The air is unimaginably fresh, and going on walks with her, I learned a lot about insects and farm ecosystems, all in French. We also visited some castles, no big deal.
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| Tours |
La Rochelle
Lots and lots of catching up to do!
Two weekends ago I met up with Miss Natasha Baker in La Rochelle. I got there and it was beautiful and sunny, even though I was expecting the rest of France to still be winter. It was a cute town, but as I am discovering more and more, it's really the people that make voyaging fun.
Of course I got to see Natasha, but I also hung out with her friends from Limoges, Tina and Kris. They had a host named Timothé who lived in a big big house with a bunch of other students. If you've ever visited Synergy or a Dead House in Palo Alto, then you know how the house smelled and looked. But it was cool! People who do communal living usually are.
Pictures:
Two weekends ago I met up with Miss Natasha Baker in La Rochelle. I got there and it was beautiful and sunny, even though I was expecting the rest of France to still be winter. It was a cute town, but as I am discovering more and more, it's really the people that make voyaging fun.
Of course I got to see Natasha, but I also hung out with her friends from Limoges, Tina and Kris. They had a host named Timothé who lived in a big big house with a bunch of other students. If you've ever visited Synergy or a Dead House in Palo Alto, then you know how the house smelled and looked. But it was cool! People who do communal living usually are.
Pictures:
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| La Rochelle |
Friday, April 8, 2011
La Caravelle
I've been on some pretty sympa hikes in Martinique, but I think my favorite is the hike along the Presqu'île de la Caravelle, right next to Tartane, a quartier of Trinité. If you look at a map of Martinique, it's the little arm-like peninsula that juts out from the northeast coast.
On Wednesday I did it for the second time, and it was perhaps even better than the first. I love it because you dépasser so much diverse scenery in just a few hours. Dramatic cliffs, foamy blue sea, forest, a swampy mangrove, a tranquil swimming beach. The sweeping ocean views from atop the cliffs are just breathtaking.
Sympa lighthouse you can climb to.
Looking north. Just miles and miles of open ocean.
The cliffs, covered in green.
The mangrove. A huge swampy, muddy area.
You can also go and roam the grounds of an old plantation, Château Dubuc, now in ruins.
On Wednesday I did it for the second time, and it was perhaps even better than the first. I love it because you dépasser so much diverse scenery in just a few hours. Dramatic cliffs, foamy blue sea, forest, a swampy mangrove, a tranquil swimming beach. The sweeping ocean views from atop the cliffs are just breathtaking.
Sympa lighthouse you can climb to.
Looking north. Just miles and miles of open ocean.
The cliffs, covered in green.
The mangrove. A huge swampy, muddy area.
You can also go and roam the grounds of an old plantation, Château Dubuc, now in ruins.
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Le rhum
If there were a national beverage of Martinique, it would be rum.
The popularity of rum certainly isn't unique to Martinique -- most of the other islands are quite prolific as well, simply due to the ideal growing conditions and subsequent ubiquity of sugarcane in the Caribbean. But in any case, people take their rum very, very seriously here. Nearly every commune in Martinique has its own marque, its own rum-producing distillery. You can get bottles of high-quality rum in all the supermarkets for just a couple of euros.
By far the most popular drink in Martinique is the ti-punch ("ti" is Creole for petit, or small), which is rum, cane sugar, and a lime, usually squeezed and then dropped into the glass. No two ti-punches are ever the same; everyone has their own way of making them, their own opinions about the proper ratios of sugar to rum, rum to lime, and whether to add ice or not.
Here's a picture I stole from Google, since I haven't had occasion to take one myself. You're supposed sip it like a drink, even though it's essentially a cup of hard alcohol.
Over the weekend I visited a distillery, Depaz, next to Saint-Pierre. It was interesting to learn about all the different steps that go into making rum. I think it's just as much of an art as winemaking, en fait.
The grounds were absolutely beautiful. Because this time of year (between February and May) is la récolte, the harvesting of sugar cane, the fields were all empty.
The water used to make this particular marque of rum flows from Montagne Pelée, and so is apparently quite pure.
The usine, or factory, is where all the action happens. You can see the fermentation containers here, where they somehow ferment sugarcane juice and molasses to make (apparently) a kind of winelike substance.
This is the machinery they use to crush the sugarcane.
Distillation tanks, meant to extract the portion of the liquid containing the alcohol and flavor.
Vats for aging white (light-colored) rum.
Barrels for aging dark (golden-colored) rum -- usually 1 to 3 years!
There was a free dégustation inside the gift shop. Just for everyone's enjoyment, here's the English translation of the explanation of the bois lélé, the stick you're supposed to use to stir your rum.
The popularity of rum certainly isn't unique to Martinique -- most of the other islands are quite prolific as well, simply due to the ideal growing conditions and subsequent ubiquity of sugarcane in the Caribbean. But in any case, people take their rum very, very seriously here. Nearly every commune in Martinique has its own marque, its own rum-producing distillery. You can get bottles of high-quality rum in all the supermarkets for just a couple of euros.
By far the most popular drink in Martinique is the ti-punch ("ti" is Creole for petit, or small), which is rum, cane sugar, and a lime, usually squeezed and then dropped into the glass. No two ti-punches are ever the same; everyone has their own way of making them, their own opinions about the proper ratios of sugar to rum, rum to lime, and whether to add ice or not.
Here's a picture I stole from Google, since I haven't had occasion to take one myself. You're supposed sip it like a drink, even though it's essentially a cup of hard alcohol.
Over the weekend I visited a distillery, Depaz, next to Saint-Pierre. It was interesting to learn about all the different steps that go into making rum. I think it's just as much of an art as winemaking, en fait.
The grounds were absolutely beautiful. Because this time of year (between February and May) is la récolte, the harvesting of sugar cane, the fields were all empty.
The water used to make this particular marque of rum flows from Montagne Pelée, and so is apparently quite pure.
The usine, or factory, is where all the action happens. You can see the fermentation containers here, where they somehow ferment sugarcane juice and molasses to make (apparently) a kind of winelike substance.
This is the machinery they use to crush the sugarcane.
Distillation tanks, meant to extract the portion of the liquid containing the alcohol and flavor.
Vats for aging white (light-colored) rum.
Barrels for aging dark (golden-colored) rum -- usually 1 to 3 years!
There was a free dégustation inside the gift shop. Just for everyone's enjoyment, here's the English translation of the explanation of the bois lélé, the stick you're supposed to use to stir your rum.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
La Montagne Pelée
One of the most significant events in Martinique's recent history was the eruption of its volcano, Montagne Pelée, in 1902.
The volcano is situated in the northwest corner of the island, next to a town called Saint-Pierre. At the time of the eruption, Saint-Pierre was the capital of Martinique, and, as the sophisticated art and cultural center of the Caribbean, affectionately known as the "Paris of the West Indies."
The eruption killed all but one of the 30,000 people living in Saint-Pierre at the time. The lone survivor, a prisoner in the Saint-Pierre jail, lived only because of his exceptionally thick-walled cachot (cell).
With the total destruction of Saint-Pierre, the capital was moved to Fort de France, about 30 kilometers south. Though the town was eventually rebuilt, Saint-Pierre today is, so they say, but a shadow of its former self.
Mount Pelée is still an active volcano, and apparently one of the most dangerous in existence. Though I’d never even heard of it before I came here, it's actually quite famous in the geology world -- the 1902 disaster gave rise to the term "Peléan eruption.”
Here’s a picture of it from Saint-Pierre, in all its glory.
On Wednesday, I climbed it with some other assistants. As you can see from the photo above, the mountain is perpetually obscured by clouds, so it was like one of those foggy days in San Francisco, where you can't really partake of your greater surroundings. Thankfully, though, this also means you’re not pummeled by the blistering sun. The hike to the top, nearly 1400 meters in altitude, was hard enough as it was.
The grasses, shrubs and trees along the path were short and low-lying and growing out of rocks – quite a change from the lush rainforest on the interior of the island. And the sentier was steep. At times, we were using all our limbs, like l’escalade. And though the top was windy – almost cold -- every so often, a break in the clouds would afford a spectacular view of the north coast, the town of Saint-Pierre, and the Caribbean Sea, stretching infinitely west. It was, without a doubt, one of the awesomest things I’ve seen here. How many people can say they’ve climbed an active volcano?
And then this weekend, I visited the ruins of Saint-Pierre. It’s cool how they’ve just left them there in the middle of town, untouched, for people to see and walk amongst. It was an absolutely gorgeous day. It was hard to imagine that a century ago, everything around us would have been en ruines.
Here's what's left of the prison.
Here's Louis-Auguste Cyparis's (the sole survivor) cachot.
And here are the ruins of the theater stage, right next to the prison. Jolie, n'est-ce pas?
The volcano is situated in the northwest corner of the island, next to a town called Saint-Pierre. At the time of the eruption, Saint-Pierre was the capital of Martinique, and, as the sophisticated art and cultural center of the Caribbean, affectionately known as the "Paris of the West Indies."
The eruption killed all but one of the 30,000 people living in Saint-Pierre at the time. The lone survivor, a prisoner in the Saint-Pierre jail, lived only because of his exceptionally thick-walled cachot (cell).
With the total destruction of Saint-Pierre, the capital was moved to Fort de France, about 30 kilometers south. Though the town was eventually rebuilt, Saint-Pierre today is, so they say, but a shadow of its former self.
Mount Pelée is still an active volcano, and apparently one of the most dangerous in existence. Though I’d never even heard of it before I came here, it's actually quite famous in the geology world -- the 1902 disaster gave rise to the term "Peléan eruption.”
Here’s a picture of it from Saint-Pierre, in all its glory.
On Wednesday, I climbed it with some other assistants. As you can see from the photo above, the mountain is perpetually obscured by clouds, so it was like one of those foggy days in San Francisco, where you can't really partake of your greater surroundings. Thankfully, though, this also means you’re not pummeled by the blistering sun. The hike to the top, nearly 1400 meters in altitude, was hard enough as it was.
The grasses, shrubs and trees along the path were short and low-lying and growing out of rocks – quite a change from the lush rainforest on the interior of the island. And the sentier was steep. At times, we were using all our limbs, like l’escalade. And though the top was windy – almost cold -- every so often, a break in the clouds would afford a spectacular view of the north coast, the town of Saint-Pierre, and the Caribbean Sea, stretching infinitely west. It was, without a doubt, one of the awesomest things I’ve seen here. How many people can say they’ve climbed an active volcano?
And then this weekend, I visited the ruins of Saint-Pierre. It’s cool how they’ve just left them there in the middle of town, untouched, for people to see and walk amongst. It was an absolutely gorgeous day. It was hard to imagine that a century ago, everything around us would have been en ruines.
Here's what's left of the prison.
Here's Louis-Auguste Cyparis's (the sole survivor) cachot.
And here are the ruins of the theater stage, right next to the prison. Jolie, n'est-ce pas?
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