The first 2 weeks back at work have actually flown by, and there's now only 4 weeks left until the Christmas holidays. It's crazy how I've just gone back but will be finishing again soon! 

Most of my lessons have been going well, there's just one teacher who really annoys me!! Most of the time, she has nothing planned so I have started preparing the whole lesson. However, half way through the lesson she likes to take over, and make the kids recite everything I've just taught them. I feel so sorry for them, they're 6/7 years old and being made to remember words they've just learnt, they really struggle. It's definitely not the best way for them to learn! Also, she never makes it clear what she wants me to prepare for next time, so I'm always left wondering what to do for the best...

Other than working, this week I've been babysitting. On wednesday, the baby was poorly and literally cried most of the day. It was so tiring and there was just nothing we could do to comfort him, see as though we're practically strangers to him and he hasn't fully warmed to us yet. God knows how we would have coped looking after him all weekend. Thankfully, the parents realised that it was too big a responsibility to place on us and are going to take the baby away with them, and get friends to look after the other kids. Lucky escape I think!!

Also, on tuesday we had fajita night at Harriet's. It was deeeelicious, and nice to be able to sit around and eat a meal somewhere comfy, clean, and without being laughed at when you open the kitchen door! (That's another story - basically, one night someone had their friends over and they were eating and chatting in the kitchen, fair enough. What isn't so fair is laughing at me and Abbi when we walk in to our own kitchen to cook our tea!! They were just really rude, made no effort to speak in French or English to us, and basically made me feel unwelcome in my own kitchen, ugh!)

Last night we went out to a restaurant for tea. We've been there once before, for Beth's birthday. The service was awful but the food so yummy we decided to give it another try. This time, not only was the service awful, but so was the food!!! They got our order wront (a burger, how hard can it be?!), and I ended up with a basically raw in the middle burger. Anyone who knows me will know that this is definitely NOT how I eat my meat. Luckily, Jess had been given my well done one, so we managed to swap half. Even that half didn't taste too good - not impressed! I find it really weird how the waiters here aren't bothered if you're unhappy with your meal. In England, we would have been apologised to, and probably something knocked off the bill. Here, the waitor tried to blame it on us and insisted that we ordered the wrong dish! I know my French is far from perfect but I definitely didn't ask for a double burger and I did ask for it 'bien cuit'!

I know I seem to be moaning a lot, but it was still a good night, after all it's the company that makes a good evening, not the place, right? I'm lucky to have made some really good friends here and we have a lot of fun. We're looking in to going canoeing before Christmas, which I'm sure will be lots of fun, and skiing after, since we're so close to the Pyrenees. I'm really looking forward to skiing, just hope I don't come home with a broken leg!!

Bisous

Kirsty xx

Pau looking beautiful in November

More Mexican food - it's my favourite restaurant!

Pretty view while waiting for my bus home from school

PS. I can't believe how nice the weather has been for November. It's not boiling or anything, but much warmer than I thought it would be, and most days it's so sunny. Not like England which I imagine is grey and dull round about now?!

Toussaint

Today was my first day back at work after the Toussaint holidays, it went surprisingly well, but anyway, I'll tell you about the holidays first.

The first week, as I mentioned in the last post, I spent at home. It was so lovely to see my friends, family and boyfriend, but also just lovely to be back on English soil again, with homecooked food (thanks mum), a comfy double bed, and to just be back to normal life for a while! I spent alot of time with my sister, as she was on half term too, which was lovely, I went to the pub quiz, which I have missed a lot since being in France!! We even managed to win the bonus round choccys and the music quiz (thanks to Hannah the music expert!). We also had the annual family firework night, which was good as I saw a lot of family at once. All in all, I'm glad I made the last minute decision to fly home, as I had a great week catching up with everyone.

I flew back on the Sunday afternoon, and arrived 2 hours early for my train from Biarritz to Pau. I saw that there was an earlier train, and so paid something like 6Euros to switch to this one. The customer service guy failed to tell me that actually even though the train left an hour or so earlier than my original train, it did stop for 40 minutes somewhere, and so in fact got me home at THE EXACT SAME TIME!!! Waste of 6Euros much?!

Anyway, I was happy to be back in the flat, and excited for Adam arriving the next day.

I spent the second week of the holidays showing Adam around Pau, and we also spent 2 days in Toulouse. It's so pretty there, the river at sunset was beautiful. We ate out every night except one when I made us fajitas, I'm not sure Adam enjoyed the experience of cooking in the hellish kitchen which after a week of not being cleaned was pretty filthy. I think we tried most of the restaurants in Pau: Mexican, Indian, Chinese, etc.! They were all very yummy!

I did make one faux pas in an Italian in Toulouse however. Somehow, I had a really dumb moment and forgot that 'thon' means tuna in French. I don't know what possesed me to think it was pork, as 'porc' is pork, so it's not that hard! But anyway, I assured Adam the pizza would be good, and it arrived with a mountain of tuna on - he was not impressed!! I blame the waitress for rushing me, and the fact that I had to read out all the ingrediants to Adam because they were in French, it's not my fault I got confused!!

Thankfully, I didn't make too many other errors, and we managed to eat well the rest of the week. It's a shock to have to start cooking again this week, but I can't keep eating out so much, I'll end up A) the size of a whale and B) skint!!

We spent a lot of time chilling this week, and stuff such as bowling with my friends. Managed to get through the whole 7th season of How I met your mother, which I've been waiting forever to watch - it was worth the wait!!

It was a brilliant week, I can't wait to have more visitors and show them round my adopted home :). It was sad saying by to Adam this morning, but it's not too long until Christmas, and I'm sure the time will fly, it has done so far!!

I'll leave you with a couple of pictures from the week, and I will try and update more regularly, I've just been pretty busy lately! And I'm too tired to write much more now, it's been a long day.

Amusing ourselved with warped pictures!

Toulouse

Merry go round at Toulouse

Evidence of the tuna pizza

Toulouse by the river

Ready for our night in Toulouse

River Garonne - so pretty

The bridge lights change colour

River Garrone

On our forest walk

Ciao xx