brownies, migrant workers, French writing, and Greece

It's been a while, eh? I know, I know, I've been very bad about updating, but it's not because I don't love you all anymore. I'm just having a great time here in Paris when I have free time, and getting crushed with work the rest of the time. So I don't write many emails, and I certainly don't blog. I don't even know why I'm writing today when I have to turn in my thesis in two weeks, and we've barely got anything written.

Anyway, what's been up lately? Lots of cafes, lots of boring pasta. Last night was special though. Claire and her sister came over, and we had a brownie making contest. My recipe is a little unconventional and because of a technical problem my batch turned out a bit soggy. But they were still good. By the way, if you've never had pasta carbonara, definitely try it. The egg really does cook on the pasta.

Other than that? School. And lots of it. The database for our Colombia study is finished, and we're finally analyzing everything and getting some interesting results. It turns out the last year of work on this project wasn't for nothing! Otherwise, I'm doing work for my other classes.

Speaking of which, it may seem a little late to be realizing this, but it's really hit home in the last two weeks how much easier it is for me to function in English. Out of three presentations this semester, the one in French I absolutely bombed (I have the worst grade in the class), whereas the ones in English were half improvised (i.e. not read verbatim like many people do), and they went very well.

The moral of the story is that going to school in France can be great, but don't go because you think the classroom education might be better -- it's a different style that's hard to adjust to, so you don't get as much out of it. Thank god I had a fair amount of classes in English, because those are the only ones I did well in. I just don't get the French academic writing style, or how to do a 10 minute presentation on anything, or create an amazing outline before starting any writing project. They're obsessed with outlines (plan in French), and while I know how useful they are I just can't bang them out like the French kids do.

Related to this ... we're doing the thesis in French, English, and Spanish. I refuse to write it in French, because it slows down my brain too much and it turns out badly anyway. But Margot doesn't write very well in English and will probably be writing a bit more than me. But a French thesis is absolutely useless to me, so I'll translate the whole thing into English. Then we have to publish it in Colombia in Spanish. This should be fun.

But when that's all done, sometime in July, I'm taking off for a Greek island for two weeks with my Greek buddy (malaka!) who was with me in Colombia, along with a few friends. After that? Who knows? I'm interviewing for gigs in SF and DC in particular, but nothing is decided at all. So I'll probably be back sometime in August, but not necessarily in the Bay Area. Life will surely throw out some surprises, so maybe I could even end up in Guatamala or Argentina or China or something!!!

Anyway, back to work now.