Défiler (Monday, 2011 February 14)
Défiler means to march. Not to be confused with marcher, which means to walk. And the youth day festivities ended with a march at the "stade municipal", which is a soccer field at one of the secondary schools here. Every school in the area showed up — and there are a lot. Apparently a country-wide policy has been implemented to the tune that the smallest administrative unit is no longer a district, but an arrondisement, so my village is now an arrondisement. No practical changes, as far as I can tell.
"Let’s work for the future of the nation!"
Anyhow, lots of schools. We started with the smallest and worked our way up. There are even a couple of école maternelle, pre-school sorts of dealies, here, and their kids were the cutest.
The woman in the pink dress is Madame Dorothé, and these are her students.
The little pumpkins didn’t really "get" the idea of a march, and one or two of them just sort of wandered off to do its own thing. This is their teacher, herding him or her back.
The majorettes at my school. None of us know what the ring-y things are. They’re not hula hoops.
I think this is a private school. They’re pretty gung-ho about informatique, apparently. Look at them carrying around their keyboards and scanners and flat-panel screens! I’m pretty sure these are teachers and not students.
This is the phys ed teacher at my lycée. Love the pink shirt.