let me introduce you to 'le roi'

After the immense amount of optimism and positivity I've had on here in recent days, I'm afraid to announce I come bearing a miserable mood.

To be honest, that was a bit melodramatic. The thing is, after having a good old 'bitch' and 'rant' if you like, in French with Sylvie (my host mum) about the incident that has spurred my sudden annoyance, I'm feeling slightly more hopeful now, but I'm still going to complain to all of you, if you don't mind. What's that? You love it when I whine? In that case, full steam ahead...

Yesterday I turned up at school after a somewhat dreary, yet relaxing, three days in bed. My pounding headache was gone, I had managed to keep my eyes open for a full 2 hours already and I was quite happy to see my friends (although I can't really say the same about them... I guess, understandably, when life goes on when Eloise is bedridden) However, my mood completely and suddenly took a turn for the worst when one of them announced that they had to take me to the principal for 'a talk'...

A talk...

with the principal...

in French. 

As if this wasn't intimidating enough, you should know now that le proviseur is one of the most terrifying people I've met in my life. Who knows, maybe it's just the fact that he's a French principal, but the way he leads you to believe he's a young, lenient and hip kind of guy, and then shoots you down faster than you can utter a hopeful"Salut", well that's just damn deceptive to say the least.

 Let me tell you this, my friends, I went in there nervous, yes, but also a little bit relieved, because I thought that after a full 2 months of being here, I was finally going to be asked how I was getting along. During the half an hour I was made to wait for him to rear his ugly head, I was devising little answers in my own head to his imaginary questions, such as "Are you fitting in well with others in your class?" or "How are you finding the language barrier?" heck, I was even ready to talk about how much I was missing everyone in New Zealand, if things got that far.

 I must admit, I was feeling a little bit excited and proud to be able to show him my new found conversational skills considering that on my first day at Berthollet, when he introduced himself, all I could do was stare blankly back, because I hadn't understood a thing. All in all, I have to say, my very first impression of him is still the one I hold today (although it's gotten considerably worse) as in this moment, he thought it appropriate to raise his eyebrows in outrage at Sylvie and express superiorly "Bah, elle comprends rien!" "Ah, she doesn't understand a thing!" 

Yesterday was no exception. I walked into his office and without even greeting me, the delightful man sent another one of his scathing phrases my way, claiming "Alors, tu comprends le Français, mais tu fais rien en classe?" "So, you understand French, but you do nothing in class?"

Wow, hello Monsieur.You've-Only-Met-Me-Twice-Yet-Somehow-Know-Everything-About-Me...

First of all, since when have I understood French? That has got to be the broadest generalisation I've heard in a long, long time. Just because I am able to pick certain words out and guess what the rest of the phrase is does not mean I understand French. I wish what it was true, I honestly do, but in actual fact, I've got a long way to go before I can agree with this statement. One does not just come to France for 2 months and magically understand French, c'est pas possible, je te jure.

Secondly, while it's true I don't do work like the other students in class (this would require me to understand French and, well, quite frankly see above) I certainly don't do 'nothing'. He completely doesn't understand how extremely difficult it is to sit through lessons and try to learn stuff I've never even heard of in my life, in another language... Listening to French every single second of every day is work in itself I tell you, even if it doesn't show with 2/20 averages on paper.

To be honest, standing there in that little office, with this hard-hearted French man (did I mention he's only about 30, which makes his self-acclaimed supremacy even worse... I mean, hellooo, you were practically a student here yesterday!) in front of me, spitting out one discouraging point after another, made me feel completely and utterly small.

I tried to explain in the best French I could muster how hard I'm finding lessons and how in my opinion, for the first 3 months at the very least, I'm at school primarily to listen and learn the language, which obviously, considering I was actually talking to him and not having another 'possum in the headlights' incident, it was making some sort of difference.

He actually had the nerve to tell me that he didn't think I had made any progress with my French. Seriously? You've met me one other time, and I literally said nothing but "Bonjour" and "Au revoir" and yet you think you can come to that sort of conclusion? Blimmin' heck, this man needs to sort out his priorities!

He then went to tell me that since he was "kind enough to accept me into the school in the first place" (oh wow, talk about making me feel welcome), he expects me to do as much work as all his other students, which coincidentally means learning algebra and the rules behind social welfare... Not only have these people been learning subjects like maths and economics their whole lives, they also have the advantage of, you know, being French, and somehow, when you put me into this situation, I think that this is a slightly more than unrealistic expectation. Don't you agree?

By this point, I was seriously hoping for the ground to open up, swallow, and then deposit me anywhere (even Porirua) in New Zealand where I could just take a moment to breathe and relax. I was on the absolute brink of tears, but because I had already stood my ground pretty well in front of my opponent, I didn't want my fair arguments to go to waste by letting my facade down completely.

I walked out of his office feeling like the slightest look from anyone would send me over the rails... At this point, I pretty much had two options, 1. go and have a cry somewhere in the hopes of feeling a bit better, or 2. suck it up and go to French class which I was already over 30 minutes late for. I knew very well what I wanted to do, but unfortunately I also knew that skipping class wasn't going to put me on the principal's good books, so I did the thing I was really, really dreading, and quite frankly, in the end, the rest of my day wasn't so bad.

Naturally, Sylvie and Michel, as well as Jacqueline and Bernard, think that le proviseur is a complete a-hole (to be blunt). I've definitely had an insight into the firey nature of French people when they're discussing something they're passionate about and it's nice to know that I'm not the only one who thinks this dude is being entirely irrational. I'm here to learn French after all, not learn how to find the square root of pie (I know I sound absolutely pretentious here, but that's my lack of maths knowledge for you)...

After talking with Sylvie, we've both agreed that labelling my new best friend 'le roi' is a fair judgement, which is actually really funny, because all in all, he shares quite a few qualities with my French teacher, aka la reine, and I can't help but think they seem to be working as a team in all of this. After all, it really does strike me as odd that this little meeting between me and the principal only came about the day after the teachers got together to talk about their students, where I'm told Mme. Fremond had less than favourable things to say about me... a little suspicious, non? 

Anyway, all of this brings me to the conclusion that le roi and la reine are having a secret romance and are planning to take over the world one lumpy jersey and bushy hair at a time.

That is all from me, I feel I've successfully done my daily dose of complaining! Over and out.

Yours truly,
me, Eloise x