Introduction to the middle of nowhere

Hello

Well this is my 1st post in my new blog, I had the idea of doing a blog while I'm in France, it means I can keep in touch with everyone easily, and you can all find out what I'm doing!

Well I'm obviously not in France yet, but I thought I'd start at the beginning, with the build up to going to France, (How often I write here when I'm actually in France will be another matter, but I hope I can update it regularly!)

Just in case anyone doesn't know why on earth I'm going to spend 7 months of my life in France, I'd better explain: As part of my French degree at Uni, I have to spend a year in France, I had the option of either going to a French university or being a Language Assistant in a french school. As soon as I was told the options, I knew that being an assistant was exactly what I wanted to do. I sent my application off in December, and then began the long long wait to find out where I was going. In April I found out that I would definitely be going to 1-2 primary schools in the 'Acadamie' of Lille, but that wasn't very helpful as the area is quite big and I still had to wait to find out exactly where I would be going.

Then yesterday I got an e-mail from someone in France saying that I had been posted to 2 primary schools in the town of 'Aulnoye' (pronounced All-nwah)

I was really excited and immediately looked on multimap to find out where it was, it was then I found that it appeared to be in the middle of a big white space! After searching online I could only find a few sites about the town, (which has a population of 9,000) and appears to have practically nothing there apart from a train station!
(actually tell a lie, It does seem to have a swimming pool somewhere near by!) I think in a few hours I had exhausted all the sites possible and I still wasn't any the wiser about what I could actually do there!!

The only bright spot is that after posting on a forum for assistants I was told that it is only about 1 hour away by train from Lille and Paris, and 1/2 hour away from Valenciennes which is the nearest big town, and quite a few assistants are posted there, (in fact I know of 3 from the facebook group) which is good and hopefully means I shouldn't be too lonely!

I sent an e-mail back to the women saying that I accept the post, and asking about accommodation, haven't heard anything back yet, hopefully will soon, I must say they were leaving it a bit late, The schools break up for the summer today!! And apparently it's really hard to get in contact with the teachers during the summer, and they don't go back until 4th Sept!! All I want to know is whether I have somewhere to live or whether I need to find somewhere myself!!

Anyway, I might try posting some maps so you can see where abouts I'm gonna be! Right now I guess I'm feeling a little disappointed, I was so looking forward to finding out where I'd be and I guess kinda hopping for a bigger town or at least a bit closer to Lille, but at least I know now, and I'll just have to make the best of the situation.

Will post more soon, I'm going up to Lancaster next week to learn how to actually teach the 'wonderful' little children, so hopefully I'll get some idea of what I'm actually meant to do, and maybe find some more people who will be living near me!

Becca