Lads are back on tour

I have officially now been in French Guiana for a full month. And in that month I have worked around 15 hours. But, I have also visited two islands, slept in two different hammocks, visited 3 different rivers, and had my passport checked on the road from Cayenne to St. Laurent approximately 6 times. Every single time they ask me if I have dyed my hair... when I explain that it’s just the sun they look at me all suspect like I must be some kind of English drug mule, and not in fact a primary school English teacher, who, to be honest isn’t at all qualified to teach English. Maybe that’s reason enough for them to question why I am here.

Why am I here? That is a question I find myself asking more often than I should. Obviously l am here because I chose to be here, but in general, I am assistant-ing because Bristol University told me to go away for a year, take a good long look at myself in the mirror and come back knowing more French than I did before. In terms of the job itself, aside from an English accent, I feel I am offering very little to the children here that they could not get from their normal teacher. It’s hard to explain much of the culture side of England, when they cannot even point to Europe, let alone England on a map. Probably because they have never needed to, and probably will never need to know. Looking down the class list, all but one where born in St. Laurent du Maroni, and their idea of a foreign land is Cayenne, a 3-hour trip down the main highway. When you explain England is another continent entirely to French Guiana, the response is usually- oh, so it’s in Métropol (mainland France)? In their minds, the capital of Brazil is Oyapock- the border town- or if they are feeling very adventurous, Belem, one of the larger cities in Northern Brazil. I was discussing travel with a friend of one of my flatmates. I explained how I work really hard for a short period and then travel. His response was: I don’t really have any desire to travel, I prefer to just live my life and spend my money on that. This took a lot to get my head round. We had another bizarre moment in class last week when the teacher was trying to explain the concept of a border. Somehow, the concept of racism came up, which, was explained, by one of the only white children in the class as when “the white people hate the blacks”. The teacher chose not to explain properly. Great.

Generally the teaching is going okay, although the lack of access to a photocopier, printer or even internet means teaching materials are few and far between and generally the class is limited to me writing on the whiteboard or singing a song. This week I’m planning to do a class on Halloween if I can get my act together and sort something out for it. This morning, however, was the hardest class I have taught by far.  I showed up at a new school for my first day, offered (basically begged to have a day of observation)... “No, no, no, don’t worry you go ahead and start”. Brill. The teacher then, introduced me to her class of 8 year olds, explained, this is your new English teacher Polly.... go! Before walking out of the class and leaving. She seemed annoyed after the class when I told her, that it was generally okay except that no one listened to me, everyone was shouting, and when I asked a boy to sit down, some of the girls recommended that I needed to hit him with a ruler. NOT MY JOB! They asked me if I was a teacher in England... NO! But.... do you have a curriculum to follow for this year..... NO! Sort it out dudes otherwise it looks like I’m going to be having a bad case of Mondays blues for the rest of the year.

It didn’t help that I was incredibly tired and sore-throaty when I woke up at the ugly hour of 6:30am to get ready this morning (ok, so admittedly, I snoozed for another hour, yet another lesson plan NOT done...). The reason for this? The epic weekend we have just spent in Kourou. I was worried that I was losing a bit of Polly J loveforlife due to the limitations of speaking in French and generally not having much to do, but that was forgotten this weekend. It didn’t start ideally however, as we decided to experiment with some public transport in Guiana. I now see why people are willing to drive their friends four hours to the airport and back, or why Yoga is cancelled tonight because the teacher has to drive one of the other teachers half way across the country.

I finished work at half 12, headed back showered and by 2 we were ready to go. We had been informed that not only was there a bus at half past 2, if not there was a taxi at 3. Perf. We got to the station at 2, not wanting to miss anything. Not only were we the only people there, there was also a severe lack of vehicles, i.e none. 2:30 came and went, as did 3, and even the homeless guy in the corner walked off. We were about to admit defeat when a white mini-van drove on a nearby road. We stood up to hint that we wanted to get on, and he came over. Im leaving at 6 he explained. No, there is nothing before. Right, back home for a nap, before trying again at 6. To be fair, he rocked up at 10 past, not bad for Guyanese time. On the way there, I received a slightly worrying text from Olivia, errrr, so, we have nowhere to sleep tonight. Slightly awkward. Luckily we managed to sweet-talk the lovely German (a Spanish assistant we had met in training) into letting 4 random English girls quadruggle in his bed and kick him out onto the sofa. Mega thanks needed. We arrived around 9 to Kourou and he took us out, first to show us the best burger van in town (yep, he was right about that one), and then to hit the town. We tried a couple of bars, found some 3 euro caiprinhas. Lucy (remember her from training? The crazy one...) asked the barman if she could pay on a card because she had no cash. He said no, but as you girls are so Jolie (pretty) you can have two rum punch for free... banter.

We requested Gangham style (our theme tune) and, as always, it was played straight away. We went outside for a quick bit of air, while it was still playing, and a random guy got out of a car (whilst he was driving it :p) ran over, and joined the dance. JOKES! Even more jokes, turns out he is a rocket scientist here to launch a casual satellite. More on that later. We cut Friday night short at 2 am as we had a boat to the Iles de salut, the one place in Guyane with clear blue water, at 7.15 the next morning. 

Shades on, pain au chocolat in hand, we boarded the boat. Cheeky catermaran (no idea how to spell that). Lovely chilled boat ride chatting to the girls, having banter with yet more rocket scientists. I should probably explain that French Guiana is the location of the European Space Agency, and this is likely one of the only reasons that France continues to pay for it, hence all the crazy scientists. Upon arrival, the chilled out boat man was like, give me your stuff and swim to the island. Er, yes please! I have been waiting a month for clear water. It was like something out of Pirates of the Caribbean. With rocks, palm trees and falling coconuts awaiting us when we had swam to shore. I don’t need to go on, but it was an awesome day, although checking out the old prison cells, particularly the solitary confinement ones was WELL eerie. Anyone read/seen papillon? Nah, me neither.  But apparently all that stuff went down here on these islands. I did get an awkward bit of dehydration going on (anyone who knows Polly J well, knows that this is serious times) but luckily Lucy was manning up and carrying the picnic box to save my pathetic self from having to do it. The dehydration made the free rum punch on the boat even more delicious.  Feeling very sun-kissed (read: crème bruleed), we headed back to the port, and back to Germans for a shower and a nap.

Couldn’t nap too long though as it was dinner party time with some of the Brazilian assistants- nice! Being classic Brits abroad, we, well, Lucy and Olivia (I was sleeping) rocked up with two bottles of cheap rosé, 6 cans of extra strong beer, 8%, diet coke and paté (admittedly more French than brit abroad) to add to the party. It was such a nice night, chatting to all the other assistants –all in French as this is the only common language. And then, when sufficiently loving life, we clambered all 8 of us into a 2-door Renault Clio. Obvs me and Lucy chose to sit in the boot, not quite sure why, but ducking down to hide from the gendarmes is quite a challenge when your knees are already tangled in your shoulders. We rocked up to the same bar as the night before. Ok, there may be nightlife here, but a different bar each night is just too much to expect!  What should be playing as we walked in but.... Saturday night... school disco classic. We cleared the dance floor and did the routine for everyone in the club. They loved it. The bar lady was not loving Lucy so much when she tried to buy a desparados, explaining, ok I have two cards, and they probs both don’t work but can we try??? Big smile. Sure enough “the transaction cannot be authorised” so... bank of Polly had to be called upon. Pretty jokes, as I had tried to take out 20 euro that morning and the atm had said insufficient funds. Awkward. Between the three of us anglais, we left Kourou on Sunday with about 40 cents to our name. 

The night continued, and at some point, everyone else went home and me, Lucy, and Olivia ended up in another bar/ pizza place with the rocket scientists. We were, no exaggeration, the only white people there. The Dj had never even heard of Jay-z, that is how gangster he is! We ignored the funny looks and decided the only way they would accept us would be for Lucy to do the worm in the middle of the floor wearing a short white dress and granny panties. Even this had no reaction. She then chose a victim and was all, I want to learn to dance like you. After the women replied, quoi? Lucy grabbed Olivia, pushed her head down and started grinding like everyone else in the club. Luckily the fire alarm went off soon after to save us humiliating/ risking our lives even more. There was only one thing left to do that night, so we drove to the burger van, to find it was out of burgers. Awkward. We then headed back to the hotel of the rocket scientists for a midnight (more like breakfast) feast. This consisted of goats cheese, baguette, chocolate covered almonds, and a very poor attempt at popcorn. How tres cosmopolitan. Turns out rocket science must pay slightly better than language assisting as the company pays for them each to have a suite and a rental car.

The conversation over the picnic went something like this : So... rocket science, is it actually hard? Because really you guys seem like a bit of a joke... Reply: Erm, yeh, actually it is quite hard and we are actually quite intelligent.... Oh... awkward pause... (me and lucy): yeh, but, have you ever had to play simon says in English with a bunch of 8-year old Guyanese kids, because that is actually quite hard. Rocket Scientists: No, to be fair, Im sure that is harder. Back to Germans for another quadruggle. Hungover morning with some delish chocolate and banana crepes – cheers German!- and then the awkward moment when Lucy was like, German, where did you put my camera last night? Er, Lucy, you had your camera. SHITTTTTTT. By some crazzzzzzy stroke of luck, Olivia had saved the number of one of the rocket scientists on Friday night. We rang him and were like... heyyy... do you possibly have the number of your Taiwanese friend??? 20 mins later, the camera had been found in the car of the rocket scientists. What an absolute ridiculous stroke of luck. We went for ice-cream to celebrate and then to the beach before everyone pretty much crashed in the afternoon. Me and Katie got a lift back to St. Laurent and I have basically been sleeping ever since. The room needs a clean, I need a shower, rent is due, and I still don’t have a French bank card, and basically I am falling apart. Just have to make it to Friday and it is time for Trinidad and Tobago. Oh, and the casual holiday I just booked to Miami for new year. Top Bants.

Adios amigos POLLY xxx