Hey, Teacher, Leave Those Kids Alone!

I cannot express how excited I am to go back to university teaching (as opposed to teaching adult professionals as I do now). Late nights of course prep and grading, paid vacations, students who delight you and also make you roll your eyes so hard you think you might hurt yourself. It's worth it, though, to have something semi-intellectual and creative to do with your time. So far, this latest university teaching experience, a new adventure for 2011-12, has been very positive.

I'm Writing To Apply For the Position Of...

I'm pleased to report that Job Hunt 2011-12 is offically OVER and (even better!) that I have a good full-time (yay!!) university position in Paris starting this September! I'm 100% relieved to no longer have to attend job interviews, send out resumes and wait breathlessly for job decisions. The wait is really the worst and I had butterflies in my stomach every morning when I cranked up the old computer to check the old email to see if there were any decisions in my inbox. And I'm also so so grateful for practical details of my new job, like the fact that I'll have a fixed monthly salary and paid vacation next year! (With private language schools like the one where I currently work, these are NOT luxuries that they offer their woefully underpaid and exploited staff). I'm also delighted that I won't have to change the dates of my American vacation from mid-August to mid-September since the French academic year begins at the end of September.

Unfortunately, although next year should be great, I WILL have to go through the job hunting process again next spring, since my job is only a 1-year position, but I'll have another year of university experience, hopefully some new contacts and the place where I'll work is the largest uni in the Parisian region, so I naively hope that this means that they have lots of available jobs each year... I was also suprised by how many full-time jobs I saw advertised and how many interviews I was invited to, so I feel optimistic for next year. And next spring seems faraway now.

Now that this major life hurdle has been cleared, I can think about other goals for next year, besides repeating Must Find Better Job. Despite the obnoxiousness that is the metro, people in crowds, how neglected my apartment building is, etc., I'm so glad to be staying in Paris. That job I mentioned in Scandinavia? It was in Stavanger, Norway. (Google/wikipedia at will). What I can tell you about it: 3rd largest city in Norway and the oil capital of the country. And dark and cold in the winter.

I honestly thought that if it came down to another year in my current job or a better more stable position even if it were in Norway, I'd take Norway. But felt a little desperate about it, like it wasn't really much of a choice-- like when you have to decide between 2 presidential candadates, and it comes down to the worst and the not quite as bad. I'd still love to visit Norway, but I'm pleased that my final options didn't come down to these 2 possibilities only, as I'd feared.

This year in Paris should be a very different experience from last year, thanks to better pay and financial stability (i.e., the SAME salary every month!) I'm really excited about the possibility of traveling (since it's not something I can afford at the moment) and I already have a list of places I want to go! I took 1 trip all last year to Strasbourg for the weekend and it was ONLY possible because my lovely friends knew I couldn't swing both train fare and a hotel, so they paid for the hotel.

Anways, now that the job situation is taken care of and I should be able to afford both trains and hotels next year, I can move on to some other questions. Like what do I want out of next year in the city of light? Since I love list making and goal setting, (they make me feel so organised and in control), indulge me here.

Professional goals for next year, in no particular order:
-Prep excellent classes for next year!
-Work some extra vacataire hours on the side (at another university where I interviewed but didn't get the job of my dreams). This would be in online distance learning and I'd like to get some experience in this area since it's up and coming.
-Plan some career moves. I attended a TESOL workshop yesterday about career development and decided that what I'd ultimately like to do is be Ken Wilson. Which if you're not an English Language Teaching geek, means more specifically, write/edit ELT textbooks. I decided that I want to have a job in this field in 5 years (since I'm sure you need 10 years of teaching experience) so my deadline is June 18, 2016. Why not send CVs to the ELT companies next year when I'm job hunting, but I imagine that you'd need more than 5 years of teaching experience. I chose my 5 year goal b/c in 5 years, I'll have 10 years of teaching experience.

And some more fun goal setting...

Personal goals for next year:

-Little running goal: run a 5K on a Delaware beach the day of my 33rd (gulp) birthday. I think this would be a lovely way to spend that birthday.
-Big running goal: train for and run the Paris half marathon in March 2012! I plan to join a marathon training group in Sept/oct when their season starts and I'm already on their contact list.
-Continue to work on Spanish and take a class with the Mairie de Paris, as well as keep up my language exchange with a Spanish professor. Hope to place into the advanced beginner level and finish the year with an A2 level (elementary).
-Try to make this blog a little more focused and organised. With different tabs (um, however you do that!!) for running, health (like receipes and also management of a metabolic problem that I have) and funny stories about France and ELT teaching. Maybe these subjects are too varied, and I'll have to figure out the best way to organise them, but I think it's better to have 1 well-organised blog instead of devoting a different blog to each subtopic... I'd also like to get a digital camera so that I can post photos.

Let me just reiterate that it's really a pleasure to be able to move on and think about other things for next year, like blog organisation instead of job hunting!

What are your goals for next year?

Walking in an Alien World

"I feel like I'm walking in an alien world. But then again, that's how everyone describes themselves. We're all walking in an alien world. For our own reasons." -- From a Middlebury college recruitment video titled "How Did You Get Here?"

How indeed?

City of Light and the Land of the Midnight Sun

I've been feeling conflicted lately. I suddenly have the possibility of a good, stable possibly well-paying job-- which continues to be the elusive holy grail that foreigners can never find abroad. Unless they are very lucky or know with/date/sleep with the right people.

Since I don't have a stable job with paid vacation and a fixed monthly salary (I'm paid depending on how many hours I work, which just depends on the demand for English classes that month), they've become the most important things that I'm looking for in a job. Especially in a place where the job market is really tough post financial crisis. In France, you have to have VERY specific training for each job; foreigners usually don't have the equivalent of the exact degree necessary, not that the equivalent would even necessarily be recognised abroad. Foreign degrees and professional experience don't seem to count for much. And your great qualifications (like a BA and a BS from prestigious American colleges that are really impressive in your home country) don't mean anything.

However, this job? Yes, it would provide stability, but temporarily (a 1 year contract and the possibility to renew it once). It would probably pay well. It would have a fixed monthly salary (which I don't have now...), housing would be included and there would be loads of paid vacation (which I also don't have now). But the ironic thing is that I don't really want it. Because although it's in a French school, the job isn't in France. It's in Scandinavia. And thinking about this possibility, a temporary year in a country that I have NO connection to, where I don't know the local language and where the culture holds no particular fascination for me, made me realise that there are things I like a lot about where I live now, like:

-picnics in the spring
-stand up comedy (I LOVE this)
-free outdoor movies
-my friends
-speaking French
-free jazz festivals
-running in Parc Monceau, and doing organised races, something I just started in May.
-although I don't always realise it, I do feel a connection to France. When compared to leaving for another completely unknown country, at least.
-my balcony with its lovely view
-my neighborhood

I mean, I could also do a whole list of things I don't like, too. Like the metro, being in a crowd, the HIGH cost of living and the LOW salaries. But these suddenly pale in comparison when faced with the unknown-- especially when I'm not necessarily dying to know about it...

I also realised that there are some things I'd like to do here next year, like:

-keep learning Spanish-- continue my language exchange and take an evening class at the Mairie.
-perfect my French some more. (In the absence of a French-speaking boyfriend at the moment, I think I'll have to take an advanced language class).
-run the Paris half marathon and train with a local marathon group

It also makes me think that if I left France to teach abroad temporarily, I'd like it to be next door in Spain for a year. That would be fun, close to France for easy visiting and it's still mediteranean culture which I'm kind of used to by now. If I left more permanently, I'd like it to be someplace more familiar, like Montreal (still North American, but with a francophone influence). Some possible ideas to try to line up for next year...

Overall, this possible working abroad opportunity has been a very healthy and much-needed reminder of reasons NOT to leave Paris in impoverished disgust, disappointment and not necessarily financial ruin but definite inability to save any money and get ahead. It makes you re-evaluate your current city and realise what the positives are instead of just focusing on the negatives, as we so often do. Especially in France.

A study in the Economist recently named the French as among the most pessimistic people in the world. A stand up comedian I saw recently said it best, the French are never impressed by what's good and don't enthuse about it. "Pas mal" (not bad) is a huge compliment. But they have the rare ability to get extremely animated and excited about negative things, like how bad traffic is, what a jerk their boss is or how rude other parisians are. Parisians are fun to hate sometimes-- and of course, after saying something like that, I have to mitigate it by adding that I have lovely French friends and people are individuals and not cultural stereotypes. At the risk of being reductive again, the French are also often the first to admit stereotypical French shortcomings (since French culture is very critical). Scandinavians might be less fun. Or less endearingly irritating.