I ♥ TECHNO

I really do :)

Hellos! 

Tonight I'm just smashing out a quick blog, talking about the weekend I just passed in Ghent, Belgium attending the frigging awesome I ♥ TECHNO show !!! 

Basically, going to a electro-y music concert at some point during my exchange had been on my to-do list and yet again I can happily state that I have done what I've set out to do here!! Furthermore... well... I used to watch some youtube clips of electro/trance/dance music where the scene depicted would be some massive industrial rave party thing where the strobe lights were numerous and pretty and the industrial-sized venue is just packed out with people dancing - and I always thought to myself "I wonder if that could be me there one day". Well, yes, it definitely was me that night :D :D :D 

Highlights: Digitalism and Aoki. 

Where have Digitalism been all my life? Seriously!! Their performance has got to be one of the best - if not THE best shows I have ever seen. The image I'll never forget is the finale of their set - where the synth member of the band hustled over and stood next to the drum kit and smashed out the last amaaaaaazing beat with the drummer with one drumstick !!!!! There is something orgasmically intense about mixing real drums with synth. Wow. 

As for Aoki - well... that man seriously knows what he's doing - let's just say that. His set literally took my breath away :)

Kate, Alex and I sweated like PIGS inside the venue!! So hot!! But oh so good :D :D :D 

So far I am racking up a ridiculous amount of good memories on exchange ♥

AMSTERDAM|SARAJEVO|VERSAILLE|LOIRE VALLEY

 Folks – I have had a crazy last two weeks worth of travelling and cruisin’ about it!!! I’ll start from the beginning.

Amsterdam

(22^nd - 24^th October)

Oh god – what a f’fest! But in a good way? Everything worked out. The reason why I went to Amsterdam was to do a tour of the Dutch countryside and its main dyke: the Alfsluitdijk! I burned with curiosity over how the Dutch actually fought the sea. Luckily I was able to get on a tour about a week or two before it finished for the season!

SO. My good friend Inés threw a house party on the Friday night and of course I partied-hard :) My bus to Amsterdam was the next day at 4:30pm so I had plenty of time to recover and ready myself for my weekend trip. I ended up spending quite a bit of time at Inés’ on the Saturday just chilling out and helping clean up (haha the house was a mess) but I left just with enough time to get home and get back to the station for my bus etc… well… that was assuming that the public transport was running as per usual! I found out too late that my particular train line was down due to a fire or some other reason. What was normally a 15 minute or so trip home ended up taking about 35-45 minutes with another 35-45 minutes to get back to the city centre on the replacement busses.

You know – I’ve often had this nightmare that I’ve missed a bus and I’ve had to end up running after it – watching it drive off into the distance. I always thought I was too organised for that to happen… well… let’s just say the vision became a reality. I got to the station at exactly 4:30, with just enough time to be running furiously and willy-nilly (and frankly quite dangerously…) through the busy streets of Lille after this stupid bus! But… it got away. I had a “oh god, wallow in misery” moment for a minute or so as I sat on a bollard watching the traffic in dismay. I was shattered! Honestly I paid a fair bit for my last minute Amsterdam trip and I was really really sad that I was going to miss my tour. L L

Then, like how I usually do, I pulled my shit together, made the decision to try to salvage my trip and headed straight to the sales desk of the train station – where I was lucky enough to pick up train tix to Amsterdam for about 54€. Still a fair bit but a very, very good price for an ultra last minute purchase! So this new train was meant to leave at about 8pm but then it got cancelled! I couldn’t believe it when I first heard. I was already sooo drained because of the stress, the party the night before and not having eaten properly. LUCKILY there was another train to Amsterdam an hour after that so I was able to simply replace my tickets without charge. But still. This new train connection took me into Holland at fricking 1am – I was supposed to be there at 11pm the night before!!! Strained, drained, tired, stressed: all suitable adjectives for Jess that night.

The positives of my trip however was that my couchsurfing gig went off without a hitch :) my hosts were very, very nice and welcoming and I felt totally fine staying with them!
The tour itself was also amazing :) I got to see a clog making demo, cheese making demo, some windmills (lol), the enclosing dyke (Afsluitdijk) and some awesome little villages called Edam and Volendam! :D These little villages were amazing… so beautiful and peaceful with really great quaint little houses! Nothing like the suburban uniformity of Perth. Arrrgh :D loved it!

I’ll mention a few little tidbits of info I picked up from my tour :) Holland has ummm some ‘created land’ from this century because they drained more water and voilà – more space. The first section, built in the fifties I think? Has loads of roads and was designed as a driving-area because back then – everyone totally thought that cars were the way of the future! The second patch of land was built later… maybe the sixties or seventies I think? Awareness of the environmental impact of cars was more prevalent and so this newer city/area is a public transport haven – every dwelling in the area was within walking distance to some kind of public transport stop!! It was fascinating to hear about how the design of each area at different times reflected the mainline thoughts of the decade :P

There’s also a region in Holland where traditionally, of course, everyone wore fancy costume-y things and as for the kids, the little boys didn’t get their hair cut until 4 years old and their costumes also involved a skirt! So how to tell apart the difference? The boys had some distinctive embroidery on their clothes :)

I think one of my favourite memories of the trip was when the guide was discussing the four islands that belong to Holland in the north. She was saying that during low tide it is actually possible to walk from the mainland to the island BUT to NEVER go without an experienced guide. I anticipated that she was going to say “when the tide comes up and you’re lost you’ll be swept out to sea”. Instead what she said was “you’re lost, the tide comes up and then you get problems”!!! Hahaha, what a euphemism! Because of course Dutch was her native language – it was just such a funny way to describe the situation! “you get problems” = you’ll get swept out to sea and probably die. Heheheh :’)

Basically – life in Holland would be soo gewd. Damn. Their cheeses are tasty. I rkn they’re better than French cheeses too!!

So yeah, I got back to Lille on the Monday morning TOTALLY exhausted but pulled it together in order to do a linguistics test that Monday afternoon :P I couldn’t really believe it but three nights later I was going to go to Sarajevo! TIME! I just don’t have any anymore.

Sarajevo

So I stepped into arrivals at the airport to be greeted immediately by my long-time friend Amar! I had absolutely NO plans for Sarajevo! All I knew was he was going to meet me at the airport and that I was staying with his friends. It is really quite refreshing to be able to do a holiday like that! Just gooo with the flow.

Just to let you know: food in Sarajevo is cheap! :D

The first stop was the Yu café in the Ilidža district. So quaint J It’s decorated in remembrance of Yugoslavia… They had painted a picture of the mascot of their olympics on the wall :p

Randomly: SO MUCH SMOKING IN BOSNIA!!! It can get overwhelming sitting in a café somewhere and 80% of the people inside are puffing away!

Then on the Friday, Amar and his friends still had some classes so I tagged along to their uni: The International University of Sarajevo. I sat in on a Turkish language class (I couldn’t tell the difference between the Bosnian and the Turkish haha) and also an English language class. Let’s just say the English language class was interesting… The teacher wasn’t a native speaker and uhhh… yeah. I will comment no more on the teaching styles of the uni.

That afternoon was delightful! Amar’s friend Lejla took me to ___________ park (I can’t say/spell it in Bosnian) and it was gorgeous… After all the cigarette smoke of densely populated places in Sarajevo it was so good to be out and about in total nature with fresh air J

Saturday I had cevapi! It’s a traditional Bosnian dish: flat pita-like bread with little skinless sausages and chopped onion to be eaten with some yoghurt. So yummy! I spent Saturday meandering through the streets of Sarajevo with Amar and Lejla and tried sheesha (nagila?). What a headrush! I also went to Sarajevo’s twist tower and had a lovely overview of the city from the 35^th floor!

Saturday night was going-out night! The club was ummm different? There were tables everywhere and no actual dancefloor. The music was definitely different!! A live Bosnian band was playing kind of traditional folky-type Bosnian music? The girls were getting so into it and busting out the lyrics whilst I was sorta bopping along awkwardly on the side. It really wasn’t my genre nor my culture!! Then after 1.5hours of that, they switched back to more electro-y songs that were mixed quite well!

Sunday was a really chill day. In the afternoon Lejla and I went to the ruins of a small castle and again had a gorgeous gorgeous overview of Sarajevo at dusk. :’) Then we had dinner of potato pita (so YUM Jesus Christ) and cherry-choco cake. I was so happy… good food and good company and a brand new city. So happy.

Versaille

So I was back into Paris by Monday night and on the Tuesday was Versaille day! I was so happy because as I was waiting in line to by the 25€ ticket to get in to the palace and gardens, I found out by chance that because I am technically a French student with my visa and student card – I got free entry!!!!! Bam :D

The palace exterior was of course VERY very nice. Very grand. Honestly though: I didn’t like the inside. It was soo crowded with people and each room was jam packed full of luxurious, over-the-top French antiquities! Such as paintings and furniture etc. It was overwhelming and honestly not that special-an experience.

The gardens are another thing altogether though… I spent a good 2-3 hours simply meandering the grounds of Versaille! The gardens are immaculate and numerous… and the trees are trimmed in the cutest CUTEST ways!!!!! Hahah :D T’was a good day after all.

PS I don’t have romantic associations with Paris so much anymore. The first thing that comes to mind when I hear ‘Paris’ is “cher” or “expensive”.

The Loire Valley

So I took the TGV from Paris – Tours just in time for the tour’s 9:30 AM start :) The three other people in the tour were actually Aussies from Melbourne :P

First chateau: Chenonceau! Gorgeous! Totally different to Versaille… the whole place was so tastefully decorated and not overwhelming at all like the palace!

Then lunch. I got to try six different wines in total. Wines here in France aren’t classified by the grape or method of production but rather the region in which the grapes were grown! The lunch itself was a tasting plate of different kinds of meats and cheeses. Yummy!! The freshly baked bread that day was amazing… so amazing.

The second chateau was Amboise – my favourite I think. It was a royal chateau so grand and airy… I mix of gothic and renaissance architecture!

The third chateau: Clos Lucé is a bit difficult to classify as a ‘chateau’ as it’s not too big. Some argue it’s really a ‘manor’. It was the place where da Vinci lived when he was in France!

Basically – I loved the tour. It was just so… nice to be out and about somewhere completely different to Perth where the richness of the land, culture and architecture was just another world…  So yes, I had an awesome mid-semester beak.

My next lot of trips to look forward to is a concert/rave in Gent in Belgium called I ♥ Techno, then after that MAYBE Rennes, after that, Cologne, Barcelona, south of France, Venice, Berlin and London baby!! Oh not to mention a ski trip in there after exams :)

…I don’t know how I’m going to be able to come back home… I’m just having way too much fun.

Quoi? C'est déjà octobre??/What? It's already October??

Bonjour tout le monde!! Hiya everybody…

I think it’s safe to say that I have been a very bad exchange-student-who-has-promised-to-blog-all-of-her-overseas-experiences-in-a-regular-fashion… But yes, I firstly would like to apologise to everyone…

Life here in Lille in the past 6 weeks or so has been sooo hectic!! I honestly just couldn’t be f’ed going into a state of meditation in order to write a meaningful blog. This is a shame, as I know, without a doubt, that I won’t be able to recall my experiences as clearly as I would have been able to had I blogged on a fortnightly basis or so. As they say, keeping track of memories is like trying to contain water in the palm of your hands.

However, the issue of my blog has been nagging me guiltily – and I HAVE been wanting to write this latest update so here we go :)

I would like to forewarn you that this may be a LONG blog… There is just soo much to discuss in many different areas! Should I employ the use of sub-headings? I think so.

WARNING RANTING AND STRONG LANGUAGE AHEAD

The university admin/French admin & service in general

Oh my god. How to approach this land-mine of a topic… Most other exchange students here who come from first-world countries will probably agree with me when I say that the administrative system here at Lille 3 IS SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!! I have literally ranted on and on for days to other students and generally anyone who talks to me about how stupid, difficult to navigate and inefficient the system is here. ~I have to warn, this rant about Lille 3’s admin system is closely related to what I perceive of the French working ethos.~

~side note: French working ethos. AS a general, French service workers etc will NOT go out of their way to make your life easier. Maybe because it’s because of their shorter working hours (another separate rant) or maybe it’s because they have a national staffing issue?? Or maybe it’s just because they’re French and surly, don’t expect that because you’re a client/customer and therefore contributing to the employee’s livelihood that you’re going to receive acceptable service~

I will tie in these concepts of French inefficiency/laziness/poor work culture & practices with my experience at Lille 3. For example: the exchange students all had to go to this big talk/introduction lecture for studies at Lille 3. It was held in a lecture theatre with a powerpoint presentation. This lecture contained SHITLOADS of useful information. In French. With no handouts containing the exact same information as the presentation. Do you KNOW how hard it is to comprehend important information as well as take notes in a different language??? It still bugs me so much to this day that the Relations Internationales  (RI) Office didn’t print out any fucking handouts with the exact same information as the powerpoint presentation!!! I shit you not, after the presentation, about 20+ students surged forwards and overwhelmed the RI staff with questions concerning what was just presented. Then the staff had the gall to look frustrated at us. I was seriously thinking “wow, you’re really stressed and you’re now swarmed by confused students who don’t speak fluent French. Maybe if you fucking printed out handouts we could then take that information home, use a dictionary and understand the material in our own time”. This is just one example of how I don’t think the French understand the concepts of efficiency and effectiveness. I can think of a maxim that loosely says “the harder you work, the less you have to do”. I think the French should bloody learn this! Had the RI office printed out handouts and distributed the information in both a written and oral form – then they wouldn’t have a swarms of students asking in broken French questions that had already been clearly addressed!! The RI staff could simply say “read the hand out and come back if you have a question that’s NOT addressed in the hand out”. So simple!!!!!!! So much duplication of effort here in France ugh.

I mentioned earlier that the French have a “fend for yourself” attitude to service work. This first presentation at Lille 3 is example of that. I.e., take your own notes – we’re going to give you jack-shit in terms of any useful handouts.

 I also mentioned that I was not happy with the fact the RI staff had the gall to look impatient and pissed off with the international students for asking them questions that were related to being bloody international students!!! For those who will spend an extended period of time in France – you will meet those employees who will make you feel like you’re intruding on them, even when it’s their job to look after you. This is especially true for secretaries. It’s horrible to be made to feel like you’re wasting a staff member’s time when really, they’re getting paid to attend to your needs.

Courses

I was SOOOOO confused about how to sign up for classes when I got here. I thought I had to write my name on a list in order to attend a class. I thought it was a system from the dark ages but … I was willing to go along with it.

After much confusion, I finally realised that one cannot ‘sign up’ to classes here at Lille 3!! You have to look at the course guide (some were printed, some only available online, wtf?) choose the classes you want, go to the office of the UFR (i.e., the general faculty office), find the hours of the classes you want and then simply rock up. YOU SIMPLY ROCK UP.

Issue #1: When one is stressed, tired, busy and suffering from university administration culture shock, trying to write down the hours and locations of classes from a pissy little A4 sheet of paper whilst battling the 15 other students trying to do the same thing is FUCKING ANNOYING!! The university only released the hours and locations of classes 2-3 days before the official start of university!!!! What??

Issue #2: Because the university has allowed a free-for-all intake to the classes – teachers cannot anticipate how many students will attend the class. As you can guess – this leads to serious seating problems. My arse REALLY hurt from sitting on the floor for two hours. I suppose they are trying to give students the freedom to move around and try out classes in the first couple of weeks (as there is no roll for the teacher to call out before each class as no one signs up before the commencement of class) but there has got to be a better way!! (In order to finalise classes, one writes their list of courses down on a summary sheet and then hands that sheet into RI office.)

Something I had read about but not really considered when I left Australia for France is that courses here really do not have any structure or planning. It is at the individual teacher’s discretion to teach whatever they want and however they want. This means NO UNIT OUTLINES FOR EACH COURSE!!! This was incredibly – INCREDIBLY frustrating during my first couple of weeks at Lille 3. While I understand the argument “different universities around the world have different ways of doing things”, NOT offering your students a cohesive course program with academic goals and weekly tasks/dates of assessments is just pathetic. Just really really pathetic. Ugh. This makes life particularly hard for students whose French is a second language. If I had a unit outline, I could read up on all the topics in the forthcoming weeks, do some research and then be somewhat prepared for class the following week. With this current system of disorganisation and vagueness – I have no clue! I am constantly on the back foot with the my education and I have no choice but to wait til the next class in order to discover what the teacher will be covering. Also, not knowing dates of assessments is really annoying for trying to plan holidays!!!

I would like to take this moment to highlight how this lack of syllabi is an example of the French working attitude of “fend for yourself, we ain’t doing shit for you”. Of course, after what I had just typed about the French’s lack of organisation – you could argue “oh, why don’t you just ask the professor for more information?”. I would agree, but what that means is that I, the individual, have to do double the amount of work (i.e., taking out extra time to speak to teacher’s privately whilst knowing that they probably can’t be bothered talking to you) in order to receive basic information!! Back at UWA – the teacher gives you a unit outline and BAM that’s all you’ll ever need in regards to the course content organisation and assessment mechanism. Here – everything is vague and mysterious and it’s just tiring and pathetic to have to ask such basic questions.

God, it feels like admin at Lille 3 has this subtle sheen of “let’s make things difficult for you” and it manifests itself in various ways. I will give you an example that may seem a lil bizarre but is frankly very ANNOYING AND INEFFICIENT!! The ARCHITECTURE of this university is STUPID! For example, the RI office. Normally when someone walks into an office anywhere, for anything (in Aus) you walk into a room with a reception area where you can sit down on some chairs to wait for whoever you need to see. Usually there is a receptionist. Here at Lille 3 – there is only one door to the RI office where the two staff members sit side by side and the door has no window. This means that you never know if they’re busy or free. It’s like the architecture reflects the closed nature of the French service-work ethos! I have seen so many students get turned down grumpily as they’ve gingerly opened the door to the RI in order to just fucking find out if the two staff members are free or not. I hate that feeling of trepidation, like I’m hugely inconveniencing the RI staff by having to make them do their job. (RI staff are actually nice though lol). But seriously!!!!!!! The design of the building is so stupid!! This not-knowing if they’re free or not is so inconvenient for the staff and the students. Fark. It’s a small thing – but it’s small things like that that can really piss you off and make you realise that you’re not at home anymore… 

So I don’t like how the courses are run. I hate and scorn the deep inefficiency of the Lille 3 university structure. I often wonder how the university administration doesn’t collapse on itself. But what do I like?

-I like my French language classes. Well-taught and interesting…

-I like the language resources centre… It’s a separate department dedicated solely to helping students learn languages. I.e., there are language exercises and other learning sources available on computers as well as loads of movies etc. It’s a language laboratory and students can use it as much as they like! In fact, I have to do 6 hours of work with the centre as a component of my French language class. I think that’s super cool :) A language centre like the one here in Lille 3 is what UWA is sorely missing.

-I like the sports program!! It is essentially free… I paid 10€ for the semester for the privilege of attending as many sports classes as I like and as often as I like! So I’ve been doing volleyball and pilates and I have been LOVING IT!

Language skills

Well, it’s safe to say that my French has picked up A LOT. In a day I will conduct 98% of my conversations completely in French – and that’s with the other anglophones here in Lille!

I believe that I have achieved my goals in terms of language. I am still not fluent at a professional/academic level, and when other students speak too fast or when professors use big words – I simply won’t understand what they’re saying. Having said that – feel free to have a general conversation with me in French!! I am definitely capable of handling that now which is very, very satisfying. I have found also that since I am using French on a daily basis – certain grammatical points I have never understood before are starting to make more sense now – especially reflexive verbs!

Sometimes I still feel sad that I’m not fluent and that I can’t understand EVERYTHING all the time… but then I remember how far I’ve come along and that I’m only here for one semester. :)

Tip: get drunk in order to speak lotsa French without inhibitions! I was pissed the other night and my American friend introduced me to this random French guy who wanted to hear my Australian accent… The French guy spoke English with a British accent so in my drunken state I couldn’t help but imitate the British accent… Furthermore, I couldn’t speak English properly! It was bizarre! I was using English words with French constructions (e.g., putting the adjective after the noun, e.g., “I am speaking English British” instead of “I am speaking British English”). After that I somehow began speaking my bad English in a French accent and then started speaking in French entirely by mistake. In other words, after drinking booze it was easier to speak French than English. God I love alcohol :D

Social life

I love my Erasmus friends! It’s wonderful meeting people from Brazil, Spain, Portugal and America :D I’ve made acquaintances with some French students but it can be pretty hard maintaining the relationship as we only speak in classes… 

I wouldn’t say I go out partying/drinking every night but usually at least once a week :)

Travels

Unfortunately since it’s been a number of weeks ago that I’ve done a few weekend trips, it’s hard to remember in super great detail how each trip was. I have been to Bruges (very pretty, some pretty hilarious moments lol), Amsterdam (what a trip) and yesterday I went to Calais for the day (amaaazzing!)

Calais was super chillaxed. I saw England from the beach. So happy :)

Next weekend I will be going to Amsterdam again so I can do an AWESOME countryside tour! I’ve always wanted to see the dikes of Holland and ergo how a country can exist partially underwater! Also, windmills and clog factories here I come :)

I have a study break coming up after that weekend so I’ve made plans to be in Sarajevo for a few days (simply cannot wait… I’ve heard it’s an amazing city). During this break I will also visit the Loire valley to do a guided tour of its chateaux (castles) as well as some wine tasting :D. I will also go to Versaille during the pause as well! It is so satisfying to finally get to tick off these locations off my list :)

At the moment, I will have to admit that there are some aspects of this exchange that have left a bad taste in my mouth: that being the French working ethos and the lack of persistent and natural friendliness of the Australian people. Overall though – I am just loving life… Everything is new, different, fresh and I feel as if I am really living :)

Until next time (which I hope is not too long away)

Jessica

Ville de Lille (et Nancy!)

Nancy

It has been a hectic past four days since I’ve arrived in Lille but I wanted to write a quick rundown of my séjour in Nancy :)

During the first night in Nancy Chloe cooked us a yummy lamb (steak?) dinner and we ate together on her ironing board table whilst feeling kind of stunned by the amount of questions we had for each other! It was always our dream to go to France for study and we used to talk about how we could totally meet up in France… 3 years on and it’s a reality :D

The next day we basically went walking about the streets of Nancy, visited the huge park as well as visited the Musée des Beaux-Arts – aka the museum of fine arts. It was my first trip to a museum in my adult life that wasn’t part of a school excursion or something like that and I have to say that I loved it!!! I’m not a particularly arty farty person – and yes sometimes my eyes glazed over when viewing some of the French paintings from the 18^th century or so. However when we hit the glassware/glass art section I was thrilled :D But the overall effect of this first trip made me appreciate art and exhibitions! God… maybe I really WAS so uncultured in Australia? :p Like I said – it’s not even because I consider myself relatively arty farty or not… Art history and knowledge of artists etc etc doesn’t really interest me – but I have suddenly found myself very very interested in visiting museums and other displays/exhibitions in Lille and the rest of Europe! I realised that I liked just LOOKING at things. The exercise doesn’t demand any more or any less than you just perusing and thinking “that looks pretty” or “god this painting is boring”. 

I suppose the follow-on effect of my newfound enjoyment of museums and exhibitions has also made me realise that holidays aren’t just about shopping. Lame and materialistic – I know – but now I understand better how to get more out of a holiday experience. It’s not just about leaving a deficit in your bank account after buying lots of clothes and jewellery that you can essentially buy elsewhere in the world – it’s about soaking up the atmosphere and enjoying new sights :D

I started this exchange with the mindset that I would do bulk shopping… In Dubai/Annecy/Nancy however I was VERY reluctant to buy ANY article of clothing purely because I couldn’t bear the thought of making my suitcase any heavier before arriving in Lille. In those two and a half weeks of restraint – I sort of just… came to terms with not shopping. It was very easy. Also I am going to try to set up a relatively stringent budget – so I guess it was very good-timing that I’ve found so much fulfilment in arts and cultural activities that cost a fraction of the amount of shopping that I intended to do… I would just like to make it clear however that I do still intend to do SOME shopping hehe :p

Anywho. So Chloe and I had dinner that night at an AWESOME Italian restaurant!! Seriously – the restauration (a real word in French hehe) is amazing. Pretty much of all the restaurants I’ve visited offer great ‘formulas’ – aka meal deals where you get an entrée, main, dessert and a drink for some special price. It’s seriously better value than what one usually receives in Australia. Also the food is good quality :D This Italian place is Nancy was not expensive (unfortunately I can’t remember exact prices) but reaaaaalllly yummy. Yummy :D

Oooh as a side note – the French say “hummmm” to indicate yumminess – much in the same way English speakers use “mmmmm” :p

That night we visited Chloe’s friend Alison who’s an artist and had an exhibition on in a gallery. We ended up staying the whole night just chatting and eventually helped her pack up her gallery. In this time we also ducked out to catch the Nancy lightshow (which is btw AAMZINGLY cool J). Spending all night in a gallery with a local artist displaying her work is something I probably would have never done in Perth… You’ve gotta love just going with the flow!

The final full day in Nancy involved ducking into the Musée des Beaux-Arts another time to catch all the stuff we missed from the day before and more walking around town J We finished off that Monday with a nightcap at a bar in Place Stanislas (main square of the city). What impressed me so much was that on a frikn Monday night in a small French city one could easily step out for a drink with a friend! It was seriously nice to be able to enjoy that kind of nightlife.

In short visiting Chloe in Nancy was awesome :D I had so much fun. There is something liberating about travel and just… rendezvous-ing with friends from home just because you can.

Lille

Lille in the past four days has been a crazy crockpot of happenings that seems to me will be hard to describe.

*To any possible Lille-exchange students out there reading this – if you need accommodation in the few days before you can move into uni residence/other permanent residence, I recommend booking with the Premiere Class Hotel http://www.premiere-classe-lille-centre.fr/fr/index.aspx  in Lille’s centre. 19 PLACE DES REIGNAUX
59000 LILLE)  I would say don’t bother with a hostel – they appear to be too far away from the train stations and Premiere’s rates are about the same as a hostel’s if you book early enough – 29euro. The advantages of this hotel is that it’s a stone’s throw away from Gare de Lille Flandres – in the street just opposite the station so it’s DEAD easy to find (which means less less less stress), it’s clean and secure and like I said – if you book early enough it’s as cheap as a hostel. The main drawback is that the reception lady was a bit… meh sometimes…*

Okay – so from my hotel in Lille where I stayed for a night – I contemplated taking the metro from the centre of Lille to my accommodation but eventually decided against it and ordered a taxi directly there. I am SO GLAD I forked out the 20euro for the 12 minute drive over to the residence. My friking suitcase was 27KG!!! Having walked around this area after I’ve unpacked and settled – I just knew for a fact I would’ve been completely lost, tired, stressed and ready to cry.

There’s a front desk at Residence Triolo – with another kind of deadpan meh kind of lady manning it (am I seeing a pattern with Lilloise receptionists?). After I filled out a short form – I was told to head over to the secretariat across the hall where I signed some more forms and paid my 227euro deposit and received my key.

After that the cleaner lady showed me to my room, to the small communal kitchen, the laundry room (where I am now waiting for my clothes to dry in the dryer) and where the big bins were located.

Overall I think the residence is pretty good. It’s clean and well-located to the shops and uni. I have a TINY fridge! It’s like a section of a fridge within a bar fridge! No freezer, no oven. It seems to be pretty quiet here though… I was hoping for there to be an awesome social scene like I know there can be in the residential colleges at UWA but I’ve read heaps of testimonies saying that Triolo can be pretty quiet and I think that I will encounter the same thing. I believe the difference between the UWA residential colleges and Triolo is that at UWA the colleges really foster a community spirit – with orientation for the students who live there and a communal meal plan. This does not seem to be the case in Triolo. It really just does seem like a room where I sleep and a kitchen where I cook… I feel… kind of alone! I received a sheaf of documents outlining the rules etc of life in Triolo but it was all in French so I only understood the general ideas. But… I didn’t (seem) to explicitly receive names and numbers of Triolo staff who I could call in case of emergency… If something happens to me (e.g., lose my keys or something) I’m kinda fucked til business hours the next week :S I guess this is contrasted with my knowledge that the residential colleges at UWA really seem to care for you – with assigned tutors each night who sort of ‘patrol’ the residence and are on call in case something goes wrong with the students or if someone needs aid.

I’ve visited two hypermarchés here in Lille, Carrefour in the city centre and Auchan here in the suburb of Villeneuve D’Ascq where the uni and residence is located. Auchan (and Carrefour) is HUGE. It’s a two-leveled super shop which is like a Coles/Woolies plus a Big W/Target/K-Mart combined!! *clears throat* Can anybody say economies of scale?? The price of stuff is pretty good here so I’ve managed to furnish most of my room within budget! I’ve had to buy a pillow, bed sheet, doona, floor mat, string for a washing line for my delicates that can’t be tumbled dried, plates, pot, cutlery, loo rolls etc etc. Thankfully Auchan is only a 7-8 minute walk from residence so it’s very convenient to buy stuff!!

The topic of Auchan segues into my next notation about life in France. These hypermarchés are SERIOUS about security. Usually in Australia the bored-out-of-their-brain staff does some half-arsed check of your backpack when you exit the store. In Auchan I had a security guard put a cable tie around the zips of my backpack in order to prevent me from hiding stuff in there! The cashier unzipped the container of my doona and dug around in its white depths to check that I hadn’t stashed anything … :/ I guess they just get stolen from a lot!!

THE UNIVERISTY. Don’t get me started about the university!! I am so confused!! Cyrielle Rohart and José Lagos Lama who work in the Relations Internationales office are nice and overall patient but I can see that they get a bit bored/stressed/slightly annoyed by the all the questions that students pose them - but I kind of think it’s their fault as the whole system of enrolment isn’t really that clear!! (Allowing leeway for the fact that I don’t fully understand everything they’re saying yet…) Like past students have noted – things in general just don’t seem as organised… They had a massive orientation-ish type presentation on Thursday but we all had to take notes by hand – why couldn’t thye have printed out all the info they gave us? (Which was on important stuff like how to enrol etc). I understand it kills a few trees but… when you’re a foreign student trying to get by … Notes with full info would help!

As far as I can tell, I literally ROCK UP to the units I want to take, write down the name and details of the class on a summary sheet and then hand that into the Relations Internationale Office…. It’s so bizarre, I’m used to pre-enrolling/signing up for classes where the teacher actually expects me :S  Oh well – we’ll see how it goes!

My actual classes don’t actually start until the 19^th of September – but I have twenty hours of intensive French starting from the 5^th of September for a week – four hours a day. Sounds good! :D But I mean seriously – going back to the whole (relative) disorganisation of Lille 3 – why can’t they give us a timetable of events for foreign students?? Cause I had no idea I had to do the actual INTENSIVE course before the extensive course which is 2 hours per week! I’m so confused! It feels like the French way of doing things is just find out as you go… whereas I’m way more used to a university system where everything is planned out step by step. Hell UWA has their academic calendars out 2-3 years in advance! Lille only released theirs about 2 months before the new semester! Oh well – one learns in a new country! In my heart I believe things will work out.

One other thing I’ve noticed in France are that service workers – especially in supermarkets and hypermarchés do not give a toss about you. In Australia – generally staff are chipper and put your needs first. In France – I swear to god people will just ignore you if it conveniences them. I asked an Auchan worker where the soy milk was and she just looked frightened and shook her head! Wtf?? In Australia that person would’ve stopped what they were doing to either point/show you where the product was or they’d get someone else to help you. When in France – fend for yourself.

Language wise? It’s hard! I have a woefully pathetic vocabulary and when the situation gets stressful my French breaks down completely. I think during the course of my intensive French lessons next week I am going to have to literally look up a website that lists everyday verbs/vocab and learn it. It’s ridiculous trying to have a conversation with someone and stop frequently to gesture stupidly and say “comment dire?” (how to say) and “je sais pas le mot en français” (I don’t know the word in French). Expressions get me as well! I can’t think of any examples at the moment –but it can be SERIOUSLY difficult trying to express complex ideas such as enrolment and one’s feelings…

Anyway I think I should leave my blog here for now – it has been terribly long but there’s been so much happening gah!! Next time I blog I hope things will be more calm :)

A plus tard

Jessica

Post Annecy - in Nancy

Bonjour tout le monde!

So now I am in the city of Nancy visiting my friend Chloe from UWA who is in France doing her exchange at Sciences Po and havin' a u-beaut time :D There was something so liberating when I was organising my itinerary for France to be able to go "yup I'm going to Annecy for two weeks and then Nancy for three nights and then I'll go Lille" :)

I guess I should start with finishing up some thoughts on Annecy. I was incredibly lucky I went to Annecy at the time that I did because I managed to catch the tail end of summer in the beautiful Haute-Savoie region of the south-eastern Rhône-Alpes of France. For a week and a half I was enjoying hot hot weather - 30 degrees everyday! Wewp :D Then, In the middle of the 2nd week - I got caught in a freak hailstorm at 6 in the evening walking home from school... it was scary stuff! A bit exciting too. A few huge trees got struck by lightning and felled too... It was insane how the weather had changed so much in an instant! After that short but violent storm passed - the weather gods decided to introduce Autumn - around the time I was preparing to leave.

In an earlier post - I blogged about how good my classes were. I guess I need to make a slight revision to that statement. Overall it was good - but I felt that in the new group I was placed in I didn't get to do enough grammar - and one of the teachers I had was somewhat harebrained - which made following her lesson difficult. Poo. I think overall the classes did help me - but perhaps my advice is if you want to do classes at IFALPES - speak to the school about your goals from the classes. E.g., if you want to do more conversation - the upper level groups are better but if you're more interested in revising grammar points - perhaps ask to remain in a lower level class - even if they think you're better than it.

My other point about IFALPES is that the quality of the building isn't too great... simply because the walls were very, very thin and if the class next door was being noisy - it could seriously cut into your concentration. Also it would've been nice if the premises had air-con...

But overall - Annecy was amazing - my host family were SO genuinely kind. My decision to come to France is just... wow. Such a good decision.

Now I'm chillin' out in Chloe's apartment in Nancy. Nancy is a slightly bigger, commercial city than Annecy but the atmosphere is very... understated. In a nice way. It's quieter, more laid-back than Annecy - purely because Annecy in summer is very toursity and bustling - with people packing the streets near the canals having lunch etc. Nancy seems a bit slower in comparison - which isn't a bad thing. Oh and of course - it has gorgeous architecture :)

I can't wait to get to Lille though. Not because I'm not enjoying my lil trips in Annecy and Nancy - but because I can't wait to have my own space so I can just EMPTY MY SUITCASE AND NOT HAVE TO LUG THE STUPID THING AROUND AGAIN FOR ANOTHER 6 MONTHS!!! I seriously... I was so lucky lots of people helped me with my suitcase on the train and out about on stairs... I literally couldn't lift 27kg worth of luggage on my own.

A bientôt :)

Jessica

Ma première semaine à Annecy, France

So currently I am just into my 2nd week of sunny Annecy in the south-eastern Haute-Savoie region of France and having a very good (very hot) time!

Annecy first impressions
Although I had seen photos of Annecy before and knew that it was an idyllic holiday village with a gorgeous lake and sweeping mountains as a backdrop - I don't think I actually fully comprehended how gorgeous and idyllic it really is! My host mum is super nice - and so are her two sisters and mum who are visiting as well as her son. The apartment that I'm living in is awesome :) It's a small two-bedroom apartment that my host mum rents just a stone's throw away from the lake (it's possible to see the lake from the balcony) that's filled with beautiful knick-knacks. I think the thing that strikes me about this apartment is that it's filled with stuff but my host mum has managed to make it look all so neat and well put-together! I mean - my room is constantly filled with stuff but it just looks.. ...like there's crap everywhere haha.


I think the best way to describe Annecy is that it's a really, really big town. I wouldn't exactly classify it as a city because it's still got this sleepy-summer-town vibe to it but it's certainly got infrastructure like a shopping district, a handful of supermarkets and car-dealerships as well as a functional public transport system.

Furthermore Annecy's going to host the 2018 winter olympics so I can't wait to watch the telly then and be able to say "I've been there!!"


Weather

 Hothothothothothot HOT! Lol. For the week that I've been here already it has not dropped below 30° celsius !! So good hehe. Sometimes it gets a bit baking to just be wandering the streets at 2PM in the afternoon. I think the weather is something else I did not expect to find in France. I mean I knew it was summer in Europe still and I know that parts of France can have quite a Mediterranean climate but I honestly not expecting how hot it was going to be here - especially since people have always told me how gorgeous Annecy looks in the winter! (Not to mention the fact that Annecy will be hosting 2018's winter olympic games.) It kind of makes me wish that Perth could have this extreme variation in the differences in climate. All we've got is HOT and then eh it's a bit cold - but no snow for me to go snowboarding (or any mountains for that either...) 

Food & drink
Overall food has been pretty good here. I haven't had anything MINDBLOWINGLY OMG WHERE HAS THIS CUISINE BEEN MY WHOLE LIFE kind of meals but yah - overall it's been good. I've been eating lot-sa baguettes broken up into little pieces - the type where it's quite hard on the outside but squishy on the inside. It's been good but maybe I just haven't been that much of a bread fan because I haven't orgasmed over it or anything like that.

I had the best restaurant-steak of my LIFE at a restaurant by the canals in Annecy. Seriously - restaurants in Perth don't know how to cook steak according to rare-med-well!! My medium steak ACTUALLY CAME OUT AS A MEDIUM STEAK!!!!! And it was soooooo delicious. So delicious. (and big)

Also I think here in France they really like their pommes de terre - potatoes! I have to be careful about what I eat with all these carbohydrates like bread and potates lying in sinisterely tasty wait on the dinner table!!

Not to mention I also had a serve of six escargots for an entrée to my delicious steak dinner! Heheh. They were on the good side of interesting - marinated in some green herbs and spices. A French teacher once said to me that if you like eating squid/calamari - you'll be able to handle escargot. And he was right. My next visit to a restaurant will entail me trying some cuisses de grenouille - frogs legs!

Wine. MmmmmmmmmMMMMMmmmm wine. The rosés, champagnes and reds I've tasted so far have been amayyyzing! Yummy. That is all haha. Actually as I type - my host grandma just offered me some cidre rosé - which is basically rosé cider and omg it's AMAZING. I have never tasted anything like that!!!!!! It's sweet but zingy at the same time. Yumyumyumyumyum


People/culture
Overall all the people that I have met in Annecy have been pretty friendly - with an exception of a few grumps who can't be bothered tolerating my slow French. I totally faux-pas'd on my first day in Annecy *facepalm* we had just sat down from lunch after I had been picked up from the train station and I had already started sipping my wine before the toasts!! Faux pas! Glass chinking and toasting is a pretty big deal. Before each meal a santé! is proposed and everyone has to chink glasses with everyone else whilst maintaining eye-contact and saying santé to each other - which means 'health'.

I guess I have already experienced a little bit of that European 'openness' that you hear about - how no topic is sacred and personal questions can be asked from day one. Literally after day 3 or so my host mum's sisters were already asking me if I had put on weight from eating the new food! I just said that I didn't know and rolled with it but I did note that it was something an Australian family probably wouldn't ask so casually to a stranger.



Language/language school
So as you may or may not know - I am actually in Annecy because I have enrolled into a private language course at IFALPES - aka Institut Française des Alpes for two weeks. In short - the language school/homestay decision was a frigging GOOD idea. My classes range from a little-easy to appropriately challenging which is just an awesome mix of grammar revision and challenging grammatical and conversational application of my French knowledge!! I was initially placed into group 4 (out of 8) but after two days it was very obvious to the teachers that the content was too easy for me... I mean at that stage they were learning HOW to form the conditional. Um. Yeah. After 3 years of university-level French I had already had the formation of various grammatical usages down pat - so then I got shifted up to group 5 where they're still revising grammar in general but adopting its usage in more complicated scenarios. E.g., on Friday I had to read an article on voting/politics in France and then we had a 2 hour discussion about it with the class!! Awesome :)


My last point there about 'awesome' segues nicely into what I think about the teaching quality at IFALPES. Basically - I think it's very, very good. I think it's got to do with the fact it's a private school so thus there is enough money there to hire plenty-o French teachers. Also - with my intensive 4-hour classes a day there is PLENTY OF TIME TO DO STUFF!!!!!! I think this is what's made the me the most happy. When I get a sheet with exercises to do in class - I actually have time to do it! As in the whole sheet - without stressing and clock-watching. The atmosphere in the classes is definitely studious but also a lot of fun because we have time to crunch out sentences and exercises and then time afterward to DISCUSS all our questions and concerns!

One thing in particular that I have noticed is that maybe half of the students here learning French already know English as a 2nd language. From this I can gather that having knowledge of English takes precedence over French...

One problem with my French that I've always thought I had was that my grammatical and writing skills in general were waaay too advanced for my speaking and listening skills and now that I'm in France I'm noticing it's absolutely true. I believe I was placed into group 4 based on the oral test where I had to respond to questions and answer but I believe I was moved up into group 5 after two days because I essentially blitzed a small grammar test they gave me. I was finished before anyone else... There is very little else I can do at the moment than work hard to fix up this disparity in my skills.

So how is that fixing up the disparity working for me at the moment? Overall - well. I have definitely been speaking a loooot a lot a lot of French since I've arrived. My host family speak no English at all - so that's been really great for making me use my French. However it's been really hard as well. When they speak slowly/normally/clearly it's very possible for me to understand what is going on and hold a conversation - however they're also a close knit family who at times speak French at a ridiculously break-neck pace whilst I stare on glossy-eyed and slightly drunk during meals from all the various wines I've been drinking haha.

What has ABSOLUTELY improved for me is that I have lost the inherent shyness I had for speaking French since I started learning the language. In Perth I suffered an inferiority complex where I felt that I could not speak French out of fear I'd be ridiculed for speaking wrong (which I knew that I would absolutely do). When in France - you blab out what you want to say otherwise you don't say anything at all!! After ONE WEEK of solid French speaking I feel that I could return to UWA and hold a conversation with my teachers in French non-stop. Although I am 10000km away from being fluent in French - it really has dawned on me that I am able to speak some French and hold a half-way decent conversation. I have all the tools for it stored in my head...



The other thing I have really enjoyed about my enrollment at IFALPES is that all the other students at my level are in the same boat as me... They all have some decent level of French and are serious about improving their French. For the first time in my life I have conducted whole days of continuous conversation in French with other people whose native language is actually English. It is seriously so amazing and it's made me so happy. So happy :)

So now I have another week in beautiful Annecy ahead of me and after that 3 days in Nancy with my friend Chloe from uni :) My confidence in French has leaped up wonderfully and now I am hoping that my vocab and listening skills will too. Sometimes I feel a bit down because my French family speak sooo fast and I don't understand them but then I remember this is the most French I have ever spoken in my life and that I have only been here for 1 week. I still have another 6½ months in here :)

As a passing note - I received an e-mail from Lille 3 saying that they've received my e-mail about my change-in-date for arriving at Résidence Triolo - so now I don't have to stress about that. I am seeeeeeriously keen for my upcoming semester in Lille!!

Jessica

A Paris pour la première fois

Mesdames et monsieurs

I’m smashing out a small blog entry on the 3.5 hour train trip from Paris (Gare de Lyon) to the regional town/city Annecy.

So after a horrific plane trip from Dubai to Paris where the little boy in the seat next to me soiled his nappy not once but twice – I have been haunted by the smell of baby poo!

Everything after the plane trip has been really great though. I had ordered a shuttle transfer from Charles de Gaulle airport to my hotel in the 11ème arrondisement on my own back in Perth and I wasn’t sure what to expect because they couldn’t charge my credit card and told me to pay cash to the driver. This left me kind of … wary of the reliability of the service. However! The guy was there (he was actually the owner) with a sign with my name on it written faintly in a ballpoint pen with a friendly attitude. I expected my ‘shuttle’ to be a blocky van type thing but lo-and-behold Micky (the driver) picked me up in his spanking new shiny black BMW sedan!!!! NAICE!

My hostel was not quite as nice as the Sheraton in Dubai :p The pillows are bizarre – they’re this long flat affair and aren’t very squishy at all… The walls of the hostel were a bit thin but I fell asleep quite easily nonetheless.

I was hungry when I got to the hostel so for eats I went directly across the road from the hostel and got a chicken kebab!! And so I have carried on the tradition of eating late night kebabs on a Saturday night ;) Even in Paris! Hehe.

So I have been trying to speak as much French as possible – as long as the topic of conversation is about inane things I can cope quite well! I am making an effort to start every conversation in French – and only swapping to English if I really do not understand.

I thought arriving in Paris would be more of a shock. I think I was more impressed that my driver drove a BMW! This is not to say that Paris isn’t a completely stunning, ultra-European and beautiful place – it’s more that… I don’t know. I just felt relaxed about being there – as if I went to Paris all the time. It was pretty surreal. Travelling is surreal :D I think maybe it’s because I’ve been imagining this trip for so long that it was easy for me just to slip into the mentality of being in France. Also – speaking French is lots of fun (when I understand and am being understood…)

This morning at my hostel I had a breakfast of what was literally bread with jam and water. I wanted cereal but I didn’t think the milk was soy…

With my frikn 27kg suitcase I decided that I’d better not hoof it to the Gare de Lyon so my hostel ordered a taxi for me – which cost 11euro  - 11euro well spent! I got to the station about 50 minutes early and was stress-free.

So now I’m currently zooming past the French country side which is pretty green with smallish sections of fields with not much growing in them. Interspersed through these fields are little farm houses or lil towns! Very quaint.

At 1:30PM today I will reach Annecy and meet my host family for the very first time! I’m keen :D Then I will go look for food haha.

A bientôt

Jessica