On fait la greve

Hello again everyone!  A lot of things have happened this week that I should tell you.  So, first of all, I went to Lille for the first time since I first got here.  Well, I was there last Wenesday for the orientation, but that wasn't really too exciting and I didn't get to see any of the city that day cause we spent the day in a high school auditorium.  It was nice to meet some more assistants, but all of the stuff that they talked about at the meeting was stuff that we already knew and so it was slightly boring.  But, last Saturday I went back to Lille with a friend of mine, Ruth, who is an assistant in Lievin (really close to Lens).  We took the train, and it wasn't too far, about 30 to 40 minutes, so hopefully I'll be able to go back a lot.  Lille is really nice, I'd love to live there- it's close but just too far to commute every day, and I'm happy in Lens.  It's kind of like a little Paris- the architecture is neat (both French and Flemish) and there are lots of shops, bars, restaurants, and a few museums.  We walked around vieux Lille, the oldest neighborhood and then stopped and had a Stella Artois at a cafe- Stella is everwhere here cause we are so close to Belgium.  Then we did some shopping and went to see the house where Charles de Gaulle was born.  I hope to go back soon to check out one of the art museums. 
Also, this week I joined a choir!  And it was probably one of the best choices I've made so far lol.  So, the directeur (principal) at the school sings in a choir and asked me if I'd like to join.  I went with him last Tuesday to the rehearsal, and guess what, the entire program is in English!  And, they haven't had anyone help them really with pronunciation, so they were happy and embarrassed that I was there to listen.  The songs that they picked just make it even more ridiculous- let me just tell you that it is fricken hilarious to hear French people trying to sing spirituals and Andrew Lloyd Weber!  I could barely keep from busting out laughing!  I'll definintely go back, cause the people in the choir are really nice, and I think they could use me to help with pronunciation.  It's just a group of amateurs that sing for fun, but we are going to have a concert in Lille in May, so hopefully I can stay for that.  I'll definitely go back next Tuesday- but we didn't have practice yesterday, this Tuesday, because of another greve.
So, I thought that the greve (strike) this week was trains and buses, since we didn't have choir practice.  I thought maybe that with trains and buses not running people wouldn't be able to make it to choir, so that's why practice was cancelled.  But, apparently not.  I'm pretty sure once again (second time so far since I've been here) it was a strike to protest the fact that Sarkozy wants to up the age of retirement.  I don't really know why we didn't have choir practice because of this lol.  But at school on Tuesday Jessica wasn't there- she was apparently on strike.  All the other teachers were there, so I was a bit confused.  I guess they have these arranged days of strikes which seems to be every other week haha and you can choose not to work if you want to protest.  I wonder if next time I could just do that too :) I mean, I'm not really a huge fan of raising the retirement age, even if I'm not French.