Citizen of the World

Matthew feverishly prepped for his final exam, which is tonight - RIGHT NOW! I "helped" him a little in peripheral preps; i.e. he wanted to provide some snacks for them during the exam, give each student a folder with all the materials they need for the 4-hr assignment (YIKES!), and play a sound bite if any of them talk to anyone (which they can't for 4 hours). I created these two sound bites for him to use off his phone when needed:

I also put together his personalized notes to each student. Yyes, he actually composed and printed out VERY pretty notes to each student on this stationery!


Upon walking into the classroom tonight, each student will have gotten a folder with their exam info, a sandwich Ziploc baggie with: 1) M&Ms, 2) a KitKat bar, 3) pretzels, 4) trail mix, and 5) two little gel ink pens. He was so excited about the final exam and giving these kids some encouragement. I think he's really cut out for teaching: He really cares about his students and gets frustrated when he knows they can do better and they're not doing it. He takes measures to make the class and materials interesting, fun, and very informative. I loved hearing about his development process of each class (some of my photography was incorporated! YAY!) and each evening he completed when he got home.

The main drawback (as is mine in the end) is the *lack of* money. With his expertise in the field about which he was teaching (web development), he was making more than 5-6 times more than this teaching gig pays. Who knows? He might decide to get his masters/doctorate and teach full time, but I doubt it, no matter how emotionally and spiritually rewarding the experience is. Been there, done that myself.

Love teaching, but it ain't gonna pay the bills.

Matthew on his way in the elevator to his final exam:


FOLLOW UP: One student at the end of the exam (which apparently stumped LOTS of the students! Even the good ones!) turned in his paperwork, took his hand-addressed card from Matthew and shuffling backwards out of the classroom said, "Uuuh, you're a good teacher..." without looking away. When he got to the door, he turned and left. Isn't that cute?

Hitchhiking was never something I planned to do - ever. I had scary memories of different horror flicks highlighting hitchhikers dying. My father had told me stories from the 1930s of his friends and him hitchhiking up to New York City from rural NC for the Worlds Fair. My hitchhiking experiences started in the 1980s in the north of France. That phrase to me, "The North of France," now carries a chilly, though romantic tone of its own.

Normandy is a little chillier than one would expect in the summer. Even in the summer, temperatures can get down to about 55 degrees in the evening with a wind. The coastal towns are constantly shrouded with fog and haze from the English Channel. The tides are strong and in some areas run very shallow and later very deep.

Caen, Normandy, I learned, shoulders a lot of historical significance from the home base of soldiers in the Battle of Hastings in 1066 (which also set England into the Middle Ages), and William the Conqueror (the Duke of Normandy), to Jeanne d'Arc (Joan of Arc), and eventually WWII. Touring Caen, we passed by a statue of Joan of Arc in the center of town and went walking around the markets where I bought what became one of my favorite jackets in college.

Jennifer and this area of Europe taught me that hitchhiking was, in the 80s, still a safe way to travel. In order to begin hitchhiking, we found ourselves having to walk 2-3 kilometers toward the outskirts of towns and throwing up our thumbs ("Faire de l'autostop", as the French call it - make the cars stop). Walking backwards was never easy for me - even sober! I guarantee that my tripping over things and hitting a couple of vicious signs endeared drivers to pick us up. "If I don't pick him up now, I'll hear about him on the news and feel guilty!"

One day, Tuesday, we wanted to go to Omaha and Utah beaches. First problem: Trains didn't go to the beach in Normandy. In order to get close to the beaches by train, we had to stop in Bayeux. Second problem: We had to hitchhike to and from the beaches successfully timed to make it back to Caen for disco night.

The train ride to Bayeux was interesting (for me) because of all the eye candy. One cute blue collar guy going to work, wearing his dusty clothes from the day before, sat across from me. His jeans were already tight in that 80s way, but made tighter around his crotch because he kept readjusting himself. I lit up a cigarette, a Gauloise Rouge (a little tastier than a Marlboro Light), exchanged a couple of words with Jennifer, and took out my Walkman to listen to the Smiths, trying to nonchalantly glance at the cutey across from me and not be too conspicuous when his hand dove toward his crotch. I put out my cigarette and changed the tape in the Walkman, when I noticed the guy looking at me. With a steady gaze at me and his head bobbing left and right from the movement of the train, he motioned for my Walkman. I thought, "What's he trying to do?" I took off my earphones and asked him what he wanted. He wanted to borrow my Walkman and listen to some music. Cute.

So, I loaned him my Walkman for a few tunes. We exchanged a couple of words now and then, and I changed out the tape once from the Smiths to the Cure. He was moving his head to the groove of the music as he pulled out his light blue pack of cigarettes. I'd never seen these before and he offered me one. To my surprise, they were Gauloise, as well, but I didn't see the filter facing the opening of the pack when I pulled mine out. More to my surprise, there was no filter - on either side! Making sure to "man up", I let him light my cigarette and went to puffing away, stifling rabid coughs, while my face turned a little red. Jennifer, happily, was asleep during this entire exchange. When she woke up close to our stop and saw the guy handing me back my Walkman, I had to explain the whole thing to her. We got off the train before the blue collar cutey. He shook my hand very firmly, which instinctively made me look at his hand, grin, and glance upwards back at him. He winked, smiled, and said, "Bonne journée!" ("Have a great day!")

On our way to and from the train station in Bayeux - the town with a train station closest to Omaha and Utah Beaches - we hitchhiked. The little white truck stopped on the side of the road and the guys in the cab motioned for us to get in back. This was my first hitchhiking experience - ever! My initial excitement, however, was short-lived.

We got in the back of the truck when an overpowering scent hit us: very pungent paint thinner. There were two painters in the back of the truck with no ventilation at all, except from the flapping back door. The painters must have been heading to a job. We had to hold onto the door so that it stayed open for air, but carefully so that neither Jennifer nor I careened out to the speeding pavement behind us.

Jennifer and I smelled paint thinner on each other for the next two hours while we spent the day walking first around Omaha Beach. Then we hitchhiked again on the back of a different truck to Utah Beach. I was on sensory overload with the stories and visions of 3000 soldiers dying on the beaches. So, we walked through the rolling countryside for a while passing cow pastures thumbing for a ride. A local businessman picked us up in his Citroen sedan. He was heading towards Bayeux anyway and dropped us off right at the train station. Sadly, we didn't spend any time in Bayeux because we had to get back to Caen to meet up with the guys from the youth hostel for a night out on the town. We were heading to the American Disco! Couldn't wait.

On July 14, 1989, I was in school in Paris. The Sorbonne was running a 4-week summer course called "French for Foreigners". The opportunity came up for me to choose Cannes or Paris; I chose wisely that year. I had taken a similar course in Germany two years prior, which was two months long. In 1987, I spent three summer months in Germany with friends' families and in school in the Black Forest. Both of these summer abroad experiences were extremely eye-opening for me as a person about who I am and what I'm capable of doing. These periods also slung me into my deep interests in traveling, languages, cultures, and people in general.

The summer of '89 happened to be the Bicentennial of France. The celebration commemorated the time 200 years before when the French stormed the Bastille). France, and in particular Paris, celebrated for the entire year, but most focused that July. There were things going on all over the city that would either not happen again for a while or never again solely because it was the Bicentennial (in the 80s). For instance, many, many, many countries had entries in the parade that went down the Champs-Élysées. Of course I don't believe that for all the other years before or since, the celebration has been nearly this huge.

Friends of mine and I found a pretty decent spot to watch the parade, but we had to stand. I remember seeing the Russian, Swedish/Norwegian, US, and British troops and floats. The Russian float in my opinion was pretty interesting with three huge clocks set on an angle with people in strange costumes walking and dancing around on the clock faces. We didn't take any pictures of the parade, but while I wish we had, our spots weren't conducive to good photos. If we had had digital cams back then, we surely would have! Plus, we were forewarned about taking anything truly unnecessary with us, like cameras. Pickpockets abounded during the entire month and we heard of fellow students (who were alone in decent neighborhoods) getting mugged or assaulted for their money or belongings. So, we had minimal cash and our metro IDs all in our front pockets.

After 2 hours of standing watching the parade, we decided to get a quick bite and then head over to watch the fireworks from Pont Alexandre III. Most all traffic routes in Paris at this point were pedestrian zones. If they weren't set as pedestrian zones, there were substantial blockades along any route in the city center where we were. Even though the best options for getting anywhere in Paris were walking or using public transport, even those options were PACKED. People on the metro were pushing other people onto the packed subway cars - just like in Tokyo!

We got to the bridge I had suggested for us to see the fireworks - Pont Alexandre III - about 45 minutes before the fireworks and had to stand, of course, for that as well. We could see the Eiffel Tower (100 years old at this point with a lighted marquis on its side for the entire year), the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais (museums across from each other), and Les Invalides, the military school complex. It was a very historic location for an historic celebration, indeed.

About 15 minutes before the fireworks, a very handsome, rustic Frenchman pulled up on a motorbike and parked his bike to the side of the bridge. I watched him pull up, park the bike, get off his bike, take off his helmet, and stride strongly up the side of the bridge - to us. He saw me looking at him and noticed me watching him the entire time he pulled up on the bike. My heart and stomach were fluttering the entire time and got worse as he walked up toward us. He shyly stood to the side of us somewhat behind to the left, so that his bike was always in his sights.

The fireworks started and the crowd went crazy all around us. Each time I glanced back toward him, he either quickly moved his head to "check on his bike" or acknowledged my glance with an awesome side grin and head nod. I nodded back and glanced him up and down.

"BOOM!" A burst lit up the crowd around us.

Within 5 minutes, I summoned the courage to talk to him and said nervously in pretty elementary French, "If you want, you can stand next to us; we're closer. Put your hand on my shoulder if you want," which was supposed to be, "Si tu veux, tu peut te tenir à côté de nous; nous sommes plus proche. Places ton main sur mon épaule si tu veux.") and I put my hand on my shoulder. Unfortunately, I really said, "s'assois", meaning "sit yourself" instead of the construct "se tenir". Alas, we had just started learning useful reflexive verbs.

"BOOM!" The crowd went crazy.

He said something back to me very fast, which I didn't quite catch, and motioned for me to stoop down. So, I naturally stooped for the increasingly hot French biker man responding to me. He suddenly put his wonderful left thigh on my left shoulder. Then hoisted his wonderful right thigh on my right shoulder. Suddenly, this man I had watched park his bike and stalked while he took his spot on the bridge to watch the fireworks was sitting on my shoulders!

"BOOM! BOOM! Ba-BOOM!" Our faces lit up.

Of course, throughout the next 15-20 minutes as I slowly started sweating bullets from the weight of him, I had to stabilize him by holding onto his great thighs. He kept his hands on mine and held on. Once in a while, I scratched my back, which understandably made me tap his butt behind my neck. I kept picturing his jeans on my shoulders and neck and was certainly not really watching the fireworks, though I "commented" on them for my friends, who were equally as confused about the whole misunderstanding as I was. But, I was enjoying the result much more.

He noticed that he was getting a little too heavy for me after almost 20 minutes, so he told me to let him off. He got off my shoulders and back down on the ground. He stood there for a few minutes more with his right forearm on my shoulder. Then he tapped my shoulder. I turned around to him. He grabbed my head, planted a kiss on both my cheeks, then a quick one on my lips, and looked into my eyes for a second. He turned and walked like a jock down to his bike. Once on his bike, he looked back at me, threw up his thumb, and drove off. I never got his name nor saw him again.

Of course, the end of the storyline in my head culminated in something that ultimately and unfortunately didn't happen. What did that interaction teach me? It taught me that if I try to speak to a hot guy in his language, I might just come away with a lifelong fantasy. For some reason, none of my friends with me asked me about the kiss; I suppose they all thought, "Ah, those Frenchmen...".