London Calling ♥
Pascale History More

Howdy!

I am Pascale and will be living in London for a while. You can read all about my brain-dead tourist situations, embarrassing cultural mistakes and see all the pictures and videos I make. I will also post some proper blogs about the work I do to please my parents and teachers. I'd appreciate it if you left a comment. Use the links underneath the top picture to navigate.













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Birmingham!

Saturday 12 February 2011 14:23


Joly, me, Nadda, Saskia

Greetings from Birmingham!

I arrived here yesterday and was welcomed by Saskia, Joly and Nadda! I walked straight into a goodbye party for one of their housemates that's leaving today. It was such a laugh to actually joke around in Dutch! After a little drink-and-chat in the house, we all went out with about 12-15 people. There was a LOT of picture taking, so I'm pretty sure I'll show those to you later!

Today we're looking at a sunny day, chilling out, maybe going to the park for a walk and tonight a chill night out in a pub. They might also give me a little tour of their school. The internet in this house isn't working at the moment, so I'm sharing my T-Mobile dongle with everyone so they can all check their e-mails and update their blogs and stuff. You know, just casually saving the day as one does.
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Channel 4 Documentaries

Thursday 10 February 2011 19:42

I already knew that Channel 4 did the most amazing documentaries, but I never actually got to see any of them. Since the day I arrived I have been following Big Fat Gypsy Weddings - it's so shocking but I love it so much. It's basically a camera crew following different gypsies, or travelers as they're called, and see how they get on. Oh, and of course, there's alway a wedding involved where 5 year-olds get fake tans and dance like Beyoncé in bikinis. It's horrible, but very entertaining!

Yesterday at work my timetable started to take shape. I have a couple of pupils that I see every day to do reading, phonics and comprehension with. It's a lot of fun now that I know a lot of names from children in all different classes of the school. The children call me Miss Pascale (because Miss van der Burg usually ends up in Miss Thunderbird). One of the big differences with English pupils and Dutch ones is that I don't have to earn respect - I just receive it because I'm an adult and they are obliged to respect me. It's pretty awesome.

Today was fun too! There was a gymnastics display of Year 5 and Year 6 today which admittedly was little bit boring to watch for an hour, but I could definitely see how much the girls enjoyed showing off what they had learned in P.E. It's a bit like a stage performance, the parents come to watch as does the rest of the school, and they have spent lesson after lesson to prepare the routines.

Justin, the Year 3 teacher, finds it very amusing to throw me off my English by suddenly saying all these Dutch things to me; yesterday when I was walking downstairs, ready to go home, I passed his classroom and peeped in to say goodbye. He then casually went: "Fijne middag! Tot morgen!" I was so stunned that I didn't even know what to say back. I just stood there, awkwardly in his doorway as he smiled at me. Then he burst out laughing, and said "Sorry, was that a bit out of context for you?!" I guess it shouldn't really be weird, but it REALLY is the oddest thing to hear someone speak your language when you really don't expect it.

Tomorrow I'm off to Birmingham. I might get my face on TV tomorrow as well... Comedy Rocks, ITV1, 9pm. Check it... or don't - it'll all be on youtube shortly after anyways :)
♥ 19:42 share!

My own timetable

Tuesday 8 February 2011 20:18

Had I already told you that Joselyn isn't going back home after all? She went down to her work on Monday to initially tell them that she wasn't coming back, but instead of letting that happen, her supervisors are now trying their best to find something that's better and more fun for her to do. She's completely changed her attitude towards London as well - she used to keep going on about how much she disliked it here, but now she's really happy to live in London.

Elena, the Italian student who works as a classroom assistant in Year 4, and I are becoming good friends. She's going back to Italy at the end of March slash beginning of April, but she feels like she hasn't learned enough English yet so she's desperate to speak with everyone and pick up as much as she can. Because her English is so poor, it makes my English stand out more - a day doesn't go by without a compliment on my English.

Today I have started to create my own timetable. There are a couple of moments each week that I will be in and out different class rooms to work closely with a couple of pupils. Helen has also told me that she has informed all parents of foreign children she works one-on-one with, that I will be taking over. So far all parents have been very glad since it's quite easy for me to jump in where children have problems as I am studying to become a teacher of English as a SECOND LANGUAGE. They all do want to meet me though, so I'll be introduced to a lot of parents this week. When eventually my timetable will be filled up, I won't have to walk around looking for Helen (so she can tell me what to do) anymore.

For now I'm not allowed to take pictures in the school because there's a special 'Photograph Policy'. Nathalie will hopefully tell me more about that tomorrow!
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Secret Passageways and Creme Eggs

Monday 7 February 2011 18:12

Today was uneventful. It's becoming pretty ritual already. I spent some time in Reception where I will be spending more hours since there's three children in that class that are far behind on all the other children, so I'll be going in there to do some extra work with them. I also work closely with a girl in Year 3 where I go into the classroom and sit down with her and basically be her one-on-one special teacher. There was also one-on-one work with the two French sisters and a Russian girl who is incredibly homesick. She's flying back and forth between Moscow and London and every time she has spent 'too long' in London, she becomes a little bit depressed - today was one of those days and she wasn't really up for anything, so we just talked about Moscow and about the differences between England and Russia. It's nice to build a band that way.

Anyway. More exciting; I had my first Creme Egg today. Oh my God. What an experience. I only ate half of it and I got nauseous, BUT IT WAS SO GOOD! Someone needs to introduce these amazing things to The Netherlands. In fact, I volunteer!

On my way back from school I made some pictures of the tube ride. I also found a secret passageway on Bond Street tube station - basically there's two ways you can go if you want to go onto the Central Line, but there's only signs pointing to ONE of these two directions, so whilst everyone is going right and squeezing their way down to the platform, I went left and was all by myself - check the pictures below;


St. John's Wood and the Beatles Coffee Shop


'To Trains'


'Train approaching platform. Please stand behind the yellow line.'


The secret trespass! No one there but me and Bieber.


Bethnal Green


'Stand on the right. No smoking.'


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Chinese New Year

Sunday 6 February 2011 20:59

So we went a little late - still lots of people everywhere! I met Maddie (who's from Norway) at Oxford Street, then we walked through Soho to China Town. We had dinner at New China - which was DELICIOUS by the way - and then onto Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus. It was really fun meeting Maddie, or Ida which is her real name, face to face since we met through the internet years ago. It was just a coincidence that we both ended up living in the same place!


China Town looking lovely!


There were people handing out sweets and balloons


Maddie!


Absolutely amazing food!


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Birmingham Trip Booked!

13:15

I wasn't planning on planning a trip to Birmingham, but when in conversation with Joly on MSN she basically said 'Why wait until April when you can come over next week? Trip are incredibly cheap if you travel by coach.' And so it started. I am now booked on a coach from London Victoria to Birmingham The Priory Queensway Stop PC on Friday and I'll return the Sunday after. Really looking forward to hanging out with Sass, Nadda and Joly!!

Today is a boring day. I have to do some food shopping and I have to go down to the T-mobile store to fix something on my dongle. I need to remove content lock - I am over 18, but it won't accept the proof I give, so hopefully showing my ID in the T-mobile store should do the trick. Content Lock is blocking the most random things - like the chat box at the top of my page. Yesterday I had my sister and my mum send me all your messages since I'm not able to read them.

My neighbour Joselyn is going home. She only arrived last week, but she is not enjoying herself here. It's getting pretty normal to hear her have phonecalls with her mother about leaving, accompanied with heavy inhales from crying. Her workplacement isn't fun and this building that we live in is the most boring one you can possibly find in London, so there's not much that's keeping her here. She's gonna go down to her workplacement on Monday to tell them that she's not coming back and she'll fly back to Holland soon after that. It's such a shame, but it's also making me feel happy with my workplacement - I'm lucky to work on a lovely school with lovely people.

Anyway, I was meant to go down to China Town later, but I'm not sure I will. The lazy-monster has taken over. I am still meeting Maddie around 5 though - should be fun!
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