january 21 - 13:39:29 - back from french camp
back from french camp - a weekend filled with rude korean golfers, meter sticks, cool oreos, and a lot of singing. it was without a doubt the best field trip i've ever been on.
the camp was held at sawang golf resort, which is a beautiful and ENORMOUS place. ( pictures: 1 2 ) we stayed in 2-story bungalows with huge rooms and bathtubs. that's not the reason we had fun, though - the 4 juniors, arti, mrigaa, angie and i, had to live with the 10 or so sophomores. at first we couldn't decide whether mimi, a very snippy tenth grader, was amusing or annoying, but after a few hours we settled on the latter.
MIMI:
i came in here to tell you guys to shut up. but i can't do that, because now you're quiet!!!!
we had a couple of hours to kill before dinner, so we sat around and shot the crap for a while (shot the bull? what expression was that from "the catcher in the rye"?). arti was excited about the fact that her favorite teacher was a chaperone, mrigaa was excited about the fact that her favorite senior was two bungalows away, angie was - as usual - excited about nothing in particular, and i was excited about the fact that our rooms were just so cool.
MRIGAA:
whose clothes are those?
ARTI:
they're angie's.
MRIGAA:
why don't they cover her midriff?
KATHY:
i don't think she's actually going to wear them.
there was a burst of laughter from the morons who didn't understand what i meant ("so what did she bring them for??")... what i meant was, that they were sports bras! anyway, at that point, angie came walking down the hallway, which brings us to another quote:
ANGIE: (opens the door to the shower)
oh. sorry.
anyway, at dinner, arti kept trying to make eyes at mr. tim , her love muffin, but unfortunately, she was faced with an obstacle.
ARTI:
nat is so full of shit!
ME:
why?
ARTI:
he's blocking my view!
after dinner, we went to the conference room where we played amusing icebreakers. mr. jeff, who i ended up sitting next to during one of the icebreakers, seemed a bit tipsy, as he was making strange comments and playing on somebody's skateboard. mr. tim was all over the place, including one of our groups, and ended up sitting next to me as well. and just so you know, the man is a love muffin. he can't help it.
in one of the games, we had to walk around with cards on our foreheads, not knowing what was written on them. each card had an action on it, and after having seen people carry out that action (e.g. if your card said "serrez les mains" everyone would shake your hand) we had to guess what it was. mine, i learned in annoyance, was "tirez les cheveux". everybody pulled my hair.
mr. tim 's said "mordez-moi", which means "bite me". at the time, nobody knew what "mordez" meant (especially not the clueless french 1 eighth graders who had to ask us what "tete" meant), so mr. was not bitten that night. we later had a discussion about where we would have bitten him, if he had asked us to. arti decided she would have bitten his arm. don't ask why. i would have bitten his neck. mrigaa would not answer our question, so we decided that she would have bitten off his penis. anyway.
the games ended at 10:00, and the eighth to tenth graders went to bed. at about ten thirty, the juniors and seniors (brooke, dear, marc, vivek, rajitha, et al) decided to go to the bar - no, not to drink, but to sing karaoke. when we got there, we found the teachers sitting outside, having drinks. while we realized it was irresponsible of them, we were amused. well, we stayed inside and sang early nineties songs ("if we hold on together" and "eternal flame" were the most fun) until midnight. for some reason, the videos (made in thailand) were soft porn - women in bright lipstick, gold jewelry and skimpy neon bikinis were rolling around on the beach. one at a time, i mean! there were two, and they alternated back and forth.
afterwards, we were walking out and saw the teachers, who were all tipsy.
ME:
madame, est-ce que vous etes ivre?
MADAME:
quoi?
ME:
est-ce que vous etes ivre?
MADAME:
pas encore. (walks in to get more drinks)
we went back to our room, where vivek and marc took our box of what we called Cool Oreos (they were covered in white fudge). we then tried to scare the eighth graders by knocking on their windows (it didn't work - they were dancing to "pretty fly for a white guy"). defeated, we went back to the seniors' bungalow, where we talked and played cards for a few hours, until we got tired and went our separate ways.
the next morning, after a good breakfast (we had lucky charms), we started our rotation of activities. they weren't activities, really, but preparations for the "spectacle" that night. each grade level was to sing a song, recite a poem, and other assorted things. we four juniors were put in the seniors' group, and in the space of three hours we learned a song ("O Champs Elysees", a wonderfully fun song that we could not stop singing for the rest of the afternoon) a poem (actually, a rap song taught to us by the control freak and lecherous bastard mr. thierry) and planned an improvised skit, which of course defeated the whole purpose.
after lunch, we had more rotating activities. all i will say is the two seniors that planned it are sadistic bastards - we had to walk all over the 900,000-rai (or was it 90,000? 9,000? practically the size of a small city) golf course from station to station. the activities included - a scavenger hunt, potato sack jumping while conjugating french verbs with mr. tim (he spoke pathetic french :) the eighth graders pronounced their words better than he did) and an interesting game where we had to take all of our possessions and form the longest line possible. we used our shoelaces, all the cards in our wallets, the guys took off their shirts, etc. our line was thirty-two meters long. we made kenneth, an eighth grader, add his belt to the line. his pants promptly fell down - he was wearing HUGE, black, baggy fubu jeans, and had to hold them up until the game was finished. it was adorable - as he held them up, the waistline of his pants came up to his chest. well, as you might have guessed, his belt got stolen, and he was running around in panic. here is a picture of kenneth, who had taken off his pants and had his shirt tied around him.
on the way back from the game, dear and i were walking ahead of mimi, the snippy sophomore, and her friends.
(eavesdropping)
MIMI:
so, like, once i was wearing these pants which came below my belly button... and this guy put a ruler down my pants.
(dear and i exchange a glance and try to hold in our laughter)
MIMI:
so, i was like -
DEAR:
mimi... how long was the ruler?
MIMI:
it was a meter stick.
we got back to our bungalows, where arti, mrigaa, and i memorized our lines frantically - we had been given three (scripted!) skits to perform - along with the song and the poem and the "improv" skit! after a barbeque dinner outside, we went to the conference room to practice. mr. tim had stolen marc's guitar and sat in the back of the room playing random chords. we learned , when trying to play it later, that he had very rudely changed the tuning.
anyway, we held our performance.
highlights:
- madame's son is the most adorable thing... in a cocky and obnoxious way.
- come on, eighth graders... everyone knows that "est" isn't pronounced like "west" without the w...
- i knew my four lines to the poem so well. but when it was my turn, i was so nervous my mind went blank and i ended up making up parts of it :)
- our song went well. our skits went perfectly. mrigaa had to do a song and dance in the middle of "le corbeau et le renard", and the audience went beserk. (it involved the mr. bean dance).... her indian sitar sound effect (the closest thing to spelling it phonetically would be "paowwwwwww") caught on, and by the end of the night, madame's son was saying it.
after the show, the teachers lavished praise on us (we really do find mr. thierry a lecherous bastard) and mr. tim ran around looking pretty. angie and mrigaa went back to the room to do their homework, while arti and i went to the seniors' bungalow to shoot the crap. for the record, vivek is the world's funniest person. we sat there in stitches as he told us anecdote after anecdote - he's a very charismatic storyteller. then we played french pictionary and made fun of mimi.
ARTI:
the other day she said to us, "you haven't gotten laid yet? i lost my virginity last year!"
DEAR:
who'd want to f*** her?
MRIGAA and ARTI: (simultaneously)
a meter stick.
then madame came in, drunk, and kicked the boys out. then she fell asleep.
:)
the next morning, after a fantastic breakfast, we took the golf carts out for a spin. mr. olivier drove rajitha, angie and i around the golf course, where he drove recklessly over the small hills and right into the woods, scaring the hell out of angie and i, where we were standing at the back.
(we scream)
ANGIE:
this is what i get for not going to church!!!!!!!!!!
we missed the inauguration.
"bush and cheney, sitting in a tree, doing n-o-t-h-i-n-g."
during lunch, the juniors and seniors sat and drew stupid pictures (boats, houses, dinosaurs) with crayola markers while the eighth graders walked by wondering what the hell we were doing. then we sang "if we hold on together" on the karaoke again...
GROUP OF EIGHTH GRADERS:
how do you say "can we switch buses" in french?
VIVEK:
here. (writes "est-ce que vous voulez un arrosage?" which translates into, "do you want to be hosed down?")
EIGHTH GRADERS:
thanks! (go over to mr. olivier and repeat the phrase)
MR. OLIVIER:
non, non, et non.
then we got into the bus and left. this is the group picture we took.
this was kind of a dry recap of everything, but i mean it - it was the best field trip i've ever been on. there was not one second where i was unhappy. we laughed and sang. :) that was all it took.
