Christmas at home & Week 14/15

I spent my wonderfully relaxing Christmas time with my family. I can say that I enjoyed the time to the fullest. Finally, I was loud again, played the piano a little every day, watched movies and played board games, visited Grandma, Hubbi and Godi, Jutta and Päter came to us, I walked to Jojo and had apple punch outside with Caro and Klecker. I completed the sound recording of the children's song with my neighbor Ludwig over the phone (he wants to send it to Helene Fischer, no joke), rediscovered Scrabble with Philipp, and cuddled a lot with Nala and Halloween. Nina and Tobi paid me a surprise visit and Anna left the most delicious chocolates in front of my door. It is now official: I am the new fifth member of bubs., a great women's ensemble from Cologne! On the 4th Sunday of Advent, I was able to introduce myself in a short video, and on December 23rd, we posted a small video of "Silent Night". I was also creative because I made a video for "The Book of Love", matching a recording I made exactly one year ago in a recording studio. On the day of my departure, I was very sad that the time was over again. Apparently, our car didn't want that either, so it simply didn't start, and there was a bit of hectic at the start. But in the end, we managed to catch the train in Erdorf and I traveled to Amelie in Cologne on December 31st to start the new year with her. Our self-cooked 3-course menu looked delicious and at least it didn't taste like shit! But I also had to say goodbye to Cologne on January 3rd because then my train from Cologne via Mannheim to Paris was going. The Thalys was fully booked, so I had to take this little detour, which didn't bother me much. It's just annoying that our train to Mannheim was so delayed that the connecting train in Mannheim couldn't wait, but it was the last connection to Paris! Fortunately, the railway is already experienced in such matters and was able to provide me with a hotel with breakfast immediately. Otherwise, I could have stayed with Britta in Mannheim, but with the hotel right next to the train station and the railway covering the costs, it was a very good solution. I had no appointments the next day and so I could really enjoy the evening in the hotel!

On Monday, I finally arrived in Paris and found a self-painted picture on my bed and a silver package in my closet, and I was very happy! I eagerly opened the package to see what was inside - it was just my tea packages. So, my tea packages that were previously on my shelf were now neatly packed in the silver package. It was somehow strange, and especially because I had expected something else, it felt really weird :D A few days later, it turned out that Gloria had worked in a chocolate shop during the Christmas season and had taken beautiful boxes to put my tea in my shelf. Well, thank you!

A few days ago, I noticed a story on Instagram by a dance teacher from Dresden, Luise Knofe, who posted a January dance program. And since I've been wanting to dance since I arrived in Paris and wanted to take advantage of the typical January motivation, I spontaneously signed up. The whole of January, there will be a dance class every Monday and Thursday, yoga on Saturdays, and a workout on Sundays, along with two creative tasks each week and a weekly feedback conversation. We started on Monday evening with a really nice choreography to "Dying 4 your love". It felt really good to dance again, even though the learning pace was quite fast and the others in the group dance incredibly beautifully. First, step out of my comfort zone and send videos so that the feedback can be meaningful. Creative tasks for the first week: a 30-second choreography to a Bollywood song and a 30-second choreography to a song of my choice, but only using the right side of my body. I chose "You&Me" by Meute and had a lot of fun coming up with it!

I also had Tuesday off because my teacher was sick and the class was canceled. Of course, that worked in my favor, and I was able to prepare a lot of lessons for the next few days! For example, my upcoming lessons will cover topics such as fake news, the journey of cotton, and sustainability and energy. I always try to make the lessons as interactive as possible so that the students have as many speaking opportunities as possible. I also attended the bilingual history and geography lesson on Wednesday for the first time. As expected, I learned a lot in that one hour, and I got another completely different impression of the class's German level. I also had a huge surprise in my locker at the high school: my German colleague Julia had already asked me the day before if a certain Spanish colleague had found me. I had no idea who she was talking about, but apparently, this Spanish colleague found my locker and left something for me. And it was a typical French game with little candies inside! So sweet! And at first, I had no idea who Julia was even talking about! We went to the cinema together with a class in my first month and spoke a few times in the teachers' room, but I absolutely didn't expect her to think of me and leave a gift in my locker. I almost feel bad that I didn't leave her any cookies in her locker! Such a lovely surprise. I spent the rest of the week preparing for presentations for university (music education), doing smaller tasks for bubs., and dancing. There are worse things to do!

On Saturday, January 9th, I was invited to Bernadette's birthday party. However, in the morning, I had a video call with my flatmates in Cologne to plan how things will continue there, as there are also a lot of changes happening, transitioning to the master's program, staying in Cologne or not, and so on. It will be interesting to see what this year brings! After the yoga class and an afternoon of reading in cold Paris, I went to Bernadette's. She is also a language assistant in the Académie Créteil, and we know each other from a preparation course. Funny enough, we ran into each other on the train from Germany to Paris, she was sitting right in front of me, and we made plans for the next weekend. She lives in Combs-la-ville, about 30km away from me, in a shared house with 8 people! The evening was really nice. Her roommate Badr made Moroccan couscous, Pierre played Manush jazz on the guitar, and we danced to Bernie's adventurous and varied playlist, from Die Ärzte to the Lotusblume-Ballermann mix. We spent Sunday very relaxed in her living room, and I returned to sunny Paris in the early evening.

Today, on Sunday, I reached a milestone in my relationship with the French language: the personal feedback conversation as part of the dance workshop can either take place at Luise's or with the other trainer, Zhian. He only teaches in English, so we started our conversation in English today. During small talk and getting to know each other, I mentioned that I am currently in Paris, and he asked in surprise if I also speak French. Of course, I confirmed that, and since he is Belgian, he asked if I would prefer to continue the conversation in French or English. And for the first time in my life, I chose TO speak French and NOT English in an active conversation. I only became aware of this after the conversation, but I think it's pretty cool and I'm a little proud. So it will happen!

In the afternoon, Luca and I took an extensive walk in the relatively unfamiliar 17th arrondissement. We had a delicious hot cocoa and ended up in Parc Monceau, which was so beautiful that it felt almost surreal. We sat on a bench, in front of us a small waterfall in an almost botanical garden, it smelled like cotton candy and crêpes, next to us small children were riding ponies through the park, and little puppies were playing awkwardly cute with each other. Unfortunately, we had to hurry because we had to be home by 6 pm! I made it not quite on time, but I ended the week comfortably with sushi.