Two weeks ago from today the weather forecast predicted snow. Woohoo--- snow for the first time this winter. (Previous to that weekend, the temperature was hovering around 40 or 45. Warm enough where I can still go running). That Monday it was supposed to snow in the evening. So, around 2 o’clock the students and the teachers were dismissed early to go home. My first class is at 2:30 on Mondays so I didn’t even have to work. Yay. It only snowed about 2 inches and the buses didn’t run again until THURSDAY. To clarify, when the buses don’t run, it does NOT mean that school is closed. It means that any student who can get to school can still come and the teachers are still scheduled to come too. Also the boarding school students are expected to come (there are around 50). So, every morning, I’d wake up throw on a hoodie, check if any students were waiting for me (none of which were) and I’d go back to bed. In all honesty, I have no desire to teach only 3 students! Not worth it. So as I said, the buses started running again on Thursday. I have 4 classes on Thursday that I taught and then Friday is my day off so I only worked 4 hours that week!
Friday I headed to my friend Stefanie’s apartment in Montmorillon and was planning to stay until Sunday. But then in snowed…this time maybe 4” of snow or so. At 6PM it was announced that the school buses weren’t running for the following day so I stayed over on Sunday night too and headed back on Monday.
Now, 4” of snow really isn’t much at all but in Bellac, it is. This time the buses didn’t start running until Friday. And what do you know, I am off on Friday so I didn’t work at all last week! The main reason that the buses didn’t run is because although the streets in Bellac are clear, students from the countryside come to my school. Apparently the roads in the countryside are very dangerous because they don’t get plowed until the important roads get done (and we are near some small mountains). And then by that time, after the snow has been sitting there for a few days and melted from the sun only to re-freeze at night, the roads become an icy, slippery mess. Thus, no buses. And the best part of all this is that I GOT PAID as if I worked the entire 2 weeks! So I figured it out and the 4 hours that I worked the previous week ended up being 100€/hour if I average it. Not too shabby if you ask me.
So, you may ask…well what do they do with the snow? The answer you’ve all been waiting for: NOTHING. They look at it and say “I can’t go out in that” and “Oh, it’s so pretty.” They also have NO CLUE how to drive in the snow and only a small portion own snow tires. In their benefit, they are not equipped to deal with the snow. For example, I saw a tractor with a bucket driving down the road. Not even a plow! The following week I saw a tractor with a plow, at least they are getting somewhere. But I am not complaining, I will take (another) 2 week paid vacation only 2 weeks before my next 2 week paid vacation.
Now we are caught up until today…tomorrow it is supposed to snow. It hasn’t yet but you know what, the buses are already cancelled for tomorrow. Of course I have a class tomorrow at 8 I will have to get up for and check for students but oh well. I was already told I don’t have to do my 2 hours at the middle school. So I’m only working 1 hour (at the most) tomorrow!
I will keep you updated as to the bus situation this week, it all depends on how much snow we get!
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