Bonjour tout le monde!
Sadly last Saturday we said goodbye to an American friend, Christy, who was in Rennes for 1 semester. She often stayed round here in Manqi’s part of the house and we went to church together etc, so we got to know her quite well over the 4 months. On Christy’s penultimate day, Manqi and I went shopping with her and in the evening we made home-made pizzas and cookies in a larger group. On her departure, breakfast was American pancakes followed by a send-off at the station. There were 6 of us there of 6 different nationalities! Christy is next to me and then in the middle there’s Jana from Slovenia, followed by Ruth from Holland and Manqi (Chinese), with Loïc (French) behind the camera. Unfortunately we’re also getting ready to say goodbye to Ruth too who leaves us next week, who, similarly to Christy, has spent a lot of time at our house. I’m going to miss them both a lot, but Manqi will even more so, as the three of them were particularly good friends.
I had the pleasure of discovering something this week which doesn’t exist in England (to my knowledge), it’s called a ‘ludothèque’. I’m sure you all know the word for library is ‘bibliothèque’, well this is the same kind of thing, except for games. So I’d call it a ‘games library’ in English. You step inside and there are shelves lining the walls packed full of games, and there are also some table games, and children’s toys laid out on a carpeted area. It was Michèle’s son Loïc who took me along to show me and he knows the people who run it a bit, they were really friendly. They can teach you how to play games and join in with you or they’re happy to leave you be to play games amongst yourselves. Much like a library, you can also set up an account and rent games for 1€/week. We learnt 5 or so new games in an afternoon which was nice, I really enjoy playing board games.Post-Christmas my life in Rennes has changed a lot. I’ve now switched to the second semester timetable, which (if you remember me explaining before) is a lot lighter. I now teach for 6 hours a week on just one day, 2 of which are overtime hours! So although there is prep for my lessons and some marking to do, my job has turned very much part-time. This will allow me to enjoy some time which I didn’t have last semester to explore the area, get involved in new things and spend more time maintaining or making friendships.
We are preparing for a party next week at church, which will be a celebration of both Chinese New Year (for Manqi and her Chinese friends) and Michèle’s 60th birthday (Michèle = the lady who's house I’m lodging in). For Chinese New Year the tradition is to eat a fondue, but it’s a bit different to the cheese or chocolate fondue that comes to mind when we mention that word. You chop up a heap of vegetables and meat in small pieces and the fondue is basically water bubbling away which you cook the meat and veg in (and sometimes noodles or pasta too). But the water is flavoured either with some meat on the bone or a spice mix, so you can have anything from a mild fondue to a very spicy fondue. You kind of chuck the food in and leave it to cook for a bit then take it out again. With chopsticks of course! So we’ve tried the mild and spicy (though not as spicy as the Chinese would normally have it) versions in our house. I was present for the latter and it was nice to share in the experience. It’s going to prove difficult to roll it out for 50 people next week though. Tomorrow I’m going to help to make Chinese dumplings that we can freeze ahead of the party.
Earlier this week I contacted one of the local organisations which provide activities for over 50s in Rennes, because I’d spotted that they have an English club so I thought I might like to volunteer and help them out with that. I got a positive response so I’m going in on Monday to help and see what it’s like. I’ve also taken on helping out with the kids work at church as they needed people to help out with the 3-6 year olds. I’ve not done much with 3-4 year olds before but I’m hoping I can adapt quite easily from previous experience!
Fiona x
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