More Facts From Frogland

So, it has been quite a while since I posted; and a lot has happened!

Before the half term I was invited to a Raclette party, it was incredible! Raclette is a type of cheese that melts perfectly on the grills that are especially designed for it. They look like this:

It’s kind of like the opposite of fondue (revelation: fondue comes from the French word “fondre” meaning “to melt”), so instead of dipping food into the cheese you pour it over meats, potatoes etc. You can see in the photo a slice of raclette waiting on the top to go into the grill (and lots of empty plates!). If I take anything away from this year abroad it will be me buying one of those grills and taking that bad boy home!

The next week was half term and Bekah and I headed back to the UK for the week:

Matt picked me up from the airport and had his ears talked off in the car with stories of my gap yah. It was amazing to see everyone, and perfectly placed too being the week before my birthday. This meant my grandma, aunt and uncle could visit (along with various other people from the village) when we threw a little open house afternoon. I stayed in Warwick until the Thursday and then drove down to Swansea with my mum and grandma. We had an amazing lunch in Gower Kitchen:

After that I spent most of my time catching up with Chloe, Gareth and Rhys:

I miss that lot! And all of that was before attending my second 21st birthday party at Lizzie, Rosie and Kate’s:

I particularly enjoyed seeing Emma, my best friend, who trekked half way across the country that weekend!

Although, she did steal this picture as her profile picture before Liz or I got to it!

I was quite sad when it came to leaving the UK again but devouring four chocolate croissants as soon as I got back to Rennes made up for that! When we go home for Christmas we’re planning to take the ferry, it’s less expensive than flying and we can take more luggage but it takes a lot longer. To be honest I think I could have taken as much through the French “security” as I wanted, they really didn’t care too much at Rennes whereas in Southampton I set off the mental detector and had to wait to have my hand-luggage checked (only for them to put it through the machine a second time and decide not to).

Back in Rennes I celebrated my actual birthday. Obviously this called for yet another party in the third country I now call home! On my actual birthday we all skipped lectures and went for Swedish meatballs in IKEA for lunch, later we went to a pub quiz and came third. We actually drew with 2 other teams for third but the head-to-head question I had to answer was on the TV show ‘Friends’, so they really stood no chance! It was really fun, the bar served some amazing cocktails (even “screaming orgasm” Chloe!) and I also got a free birthday shot:

I was told the only rule was I had to drink it without using my hands… challenge accepted. I lent over the bar, picked up a straw (without my hand, of course) but then the barman told me that wasn’t allowed and I had to use the classier method of picking the glass up with my mouth and shaking the contents past the whipped cream. Easier said than done I must say and unfortunately I believe there’s now a rather unattractive video of me attempting this. I still stand by the fact I should have been allowed the straw; excellent problem solving skills is all I’m saying! So Wednesday, my 21st birthday was incredible and as it had been extended over a week in order for me to see all my loved ones, we though screw it, let’s go out Thursday too. I won’t post any pictures of that night however (Liza, you can breathe a sigh of relief!) as it is now referred to as “the night of ugly pictures”, and believe me, they’re ugly.

I think it’s safe to say this will be a birthday, and year, that I will never forget!

Am I proud or embarrassed?

When having to listen to French in my lectures for over about 10 minutes, especially when I can see that other students aren’t writing anything down, I tend to phase out. Yesterday this happened, as it does almost every day, but then everyone quickly jotted something down. I still have no idea what.

I decided it would be a good idea to ask the teacher at the end if it was about a room change for next week as that seems to happen a lot here. Apparently they email your student account about it if they don’t tell you in class. That information would definitely be more useful to me if I could actually sign in to my student email account. Anyway, getting a little cocky with my language skills (I don’t think “skills” is in any way the right term) I decided to ask her in French. Now, normally at this point it is blatantly obvious that I am in fact English and often people will just speak to me in English despite my attempts at speaking in French. However, that did not happen, she answered me in French. Awkward. At that point I realised something: just because I managed to form a question and say it in a manner and accent that doesn’t scream “I’m English and my French is atrocious”, does not mean I will understand an answer. 

I also think if I hadn’t been a tad proud of my slowly increasing French skills I may have paid more attention to the information I needed my brain to translate! I’m sure the answer can’t have been that complex, it was only a few sentences. So, now I’m back to embarrassed and awkward, and feel that will continue until next week when I potentially go to the wrong room…

Hey ho, you live and learn!

I’m practically French

This week I took the metro home from a little bakery, baguette in hand. I now officially fit in here! It sounds like a very stereotypical concept, but wandering about with baguettes really is something I see on a daily basis now. p.s. It was probably one of the best baguettes ever. Now I mention it, many of the stereotypes we have aren’t far from the truth. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying the French wander about in stripy t-shirts with garlic and wine, and I have to admit of all the French people I have asked, none like/have tried frogs’ legs or snails! However, they don’t smoke just as must as we perceive them too, they smoke more. Like chimneys! Every place we go to there will be groups and groups of smokers around us. I actually think I’ve lost about 5 years of my life expectancy just from the passive smoking I’ve endured over the last 5 weeks. Oh and don’t even get me started on this idea of “the language of love” and the “romance” of it all… try to tell me that when you’re in a sweaty club with guy shouting in your ear cheesy phrases like “are all the British girls this beautiful?” and other phrases us Brits would never dream of using. No, just no. I do really love Rennes though, I feel very at home here (and not just because of the baguette!).

My mum, brother and I enjoying an evening of cheese, fresh bread and wine.

So, it’s been a while since I last updated my blog and that’s just because so much has been happening again. In particular, my mum and brother came to visit for a few days on my dad’s anniversary. It was lovely to see them and we went out for galettes (which my brother couldn’t remember the name of so referred to them as “gillettes: the best the French can get”). He ate his own, then polished off the rest of mine and my mum’s, and finally had a crêpe with icecream for dessert. I don’t know how he isn’t fat. We then ran into the girls and joined them for a drink in Sainte Anne. It was so much fun that we ended up out almost until the bar shut (despite my family’s travel tiredness setting in a good while earlier!) I also bought a Cosmopolitan magazine in French not long ago as I figured reading that will be far more interesting than my French books and, you never know, I may still learn some French! Today is Bekah’s birthday but as I left my camera at hers while she has a little nap to settle her very unhappy stomach (and liver) I’ll have to wait and dedicate a new post to that with some awful, awful pictures!

All Settled In

I think I’m all settled in here in France now. I’ve even made some French friends (who would have known!) it’s quite useful actually because they teach me some French and I correct their English so it works quite well.

Cute picture of Fanny, Ann-Sophie, myself, Bekah, Sophie, Liza and Jen (left to right) at the Mayor’s welcome.

 

Sophie and I with Luke (a Brit who’s lived in France for 9 years: an excellent translator!)

I was told on one of the first few ways that being in the kitchen was a good place to meet people; I was sceptical but it’s true. I met various people predrinking/playing poker/maybe actually eating in the kitchen! It seems to be the social hub of the floor. It’s always heaving with people and they tend to speak a bit slower when they realise I have no fricking clue what they’re saying – which is handy! There’s a drastic change on the weekend though as all the French student go home. I wouldn’t be surprised to encounter tumbleweed in the kitchen it’s that quiet. The weekend is therefore an excellent time to do washing (if you can work the machines… if we’d found the language setting earlier we may have saved about 10 minutes umming and arring!)

The kitchens are locked after 11:30pm, which I thought was strange but I think they’re trying to crack down on kitchen parties. There was one on Wednesday due to be on my floor which, due to the sign, was shut down before it started! We assume the cleaner saw the note and locked the kitchen early. Because of this it was moved to various places before everyone just went to chill outside. It was interesting, nothing like a house/flat party in the UK: there was just as much wine but nothing was broken and no one was sick!

We then went out on Thursday night (I’m definitely learning too, not just drinking… ) which is student night here, so it’s always rammed. We are still yet to make it to any of the bigger clubs as we don’t ever seem to make it past Rue de la Soif/Place des lices! We then somehow ended up at a rock gig, which was really good! I had to ask in French the name of the band to look them up afterwards: they were called Monty Picon.

They came out with some trombones and stuff which somehow worked! Also, the huge skull prop had a cable attached to it so in the chorus it could “sing along”. Weird. But cool.  Later there was a DJ set which was equally as epic:

I got some nice edgy photos of the occasion. I don’t know how, but the guy did the whole set in a morph suit! It was hot enough in there with everyone smoking cigarettes and weed inside, let alone a full-body tight attire! We eventually retired and got the night bus home.

Now I’m going to attempt to upload some long awaited photo’s onto Facebook!

A bientôt!

Visit to St Malo

Beautiful place on a beautiful day!

Sun, sand and bikinis in September!

10 days later

So, it’s been a while since I last posted and I apologise but I have been very busy having fun and getting drunk so I’m not that sorry!

I really love it here, even with my despicable level of French and apparently even worse accent. The weather is lovely; the buildings are gorgeous (Sorry Chloe Crisp!); the people are amazing (albeit I’ve met very few French people so far..). The one thing I haven’t got on board with yet is the cheek kissing. I’m sorry but no. You squeezing your sweaty cheek against mine, not once but twice, whilst seriously invading my personal space is not a normal way to say hello. It’s very odd. Many of the other conventions they have here are lovely, for example, saying bonjour/bonsoir/etc to everyone you pass in the halls. It’s a lot more friendly than I’m used to but it feels nice that everyone smiles at you and wishes you a nice day.

My halls are quite nice, although the stairwell is very clinical and my room is quite small, my room is very well designed. There’s so much storage space packed into little cupboards and corners. It’s blue and grey and my huge window looks out onto a grassy area that people sit and have picnics on occasionally. The bathroom is tiny but again there’s so much storage space in there. I have all my good luck cards up on my shelf but I do need some more pictures of back home on the walls though! The corridor contains about 30/40 rooms but it’s not like in Britain where everyone leaves their doors open, the rooms are very much a private space. The kitchen is communal and quite big. Because it’s shared by so many people we each have a fridge fitted in our rooms. There are 2 microwaves and 4 sets of 2 hotplates but no oven. Weird. I can’t understand why but it’s very much an inconvenience! 

Okay so mid way through writing this the fire alarm went off. Now it feels more like when I was in halls at Swansea and every Tuesday they’d do a test. But then I thought, is it not a test? Awkward because I’d just got out of bed and was no where near appropriately dressed to go and stand outside the building… I threw some clothes on and went out my room. There were 2 other girls who poked their heads out their doors but other than that no-one even batted an eyelid at the ridiculously loud siren! They can’t be that heavy sleepers, and surely not all 30/40 people can be out on a Sunday at 11am. Anyway, I went downstairs and a handful of people were waiting outside, I joined them and 10 seconds later the alarm stopped. There was nobody from the university there to explain what was going on, we weren’t warned there would be a test alarm, and I’m almost certain there wasn’t an actual fire (if there is, someone take care of my cat!)

There was a lot of confusion over modules but I think I finally have mine sorted. The system is strange, you see the catalogue online (though it doesn’t have all of the modules in, great!) then in a department meeting they give you basically the same information in a little booklet, you then have to find your department building and look for the timetables after picking 30 credits from years 1, 2 and 3. Sounds complicated already, no idea why they can’t put the timetables online! After that you must pick groups for your lectures so they don’t clash with others, I believe then you go to the lecture and tell them you’re an ERASMUS student in order to sign up, and finally you kill a few more trees by handing in an abundance of paperwork about your modules. Well, they start tomorrow so we shall see!

I did a tour of the city on Thursday but after 10 minutes of attempting to translate what the guide was saying, I gave up and just decided to take some pictures. I’ve figured I’ll go again in the next freshers’ week in January to see if I can understand then! Thursday night we then went to an ERASMUS party after predrinks in my kitchen. Some people on the floor above were jumping on the floor so apparently we were loud. Also, there’s now a note on the door of our kitchen just casually reminding students that kitchen parties are not allowed… 

On the Friday morning Bekah, Ann-Sophie and I had signed on for a library tour, unfortunately we didn’t take into account going out the night before so I swayed my way through that tour! Strangely enough I understood almost every word… I think drinking seriously improves my French! 

Saturday was a pretty productive day, I completed my timetable, did my food shopping, signed up for a travelcard (I think. I may have signed my life away for all I know because I struggled to read the forms…) Now it is Sunday and I have no plans! Time for a bit of a chill I think!

A little bit of Dutch/French courage

Morning!

So it turns out I have to set an alarm here because with the shutters closed my room is pitch black no matter what the time of day! At least I’ve learnt that early on. Oh well, I’ve only missed a meeting about bank accounts and insurance that would probably be another 2 hour meeting in seriously fast and technical French followed by another mountain of forms and papers; I’ll stay in bed!

So after my last post I said I was in my room with no plans for the evening but then Chloé asked me on facebook if I wanted to meet so I could improve my French and she could work on her English. She invited me to have a drink with some other Erasmus students. I checked with Bekah, Liza and Fanny and we headed to the metro, got off at Ste Anne and then this “drink” escalated. “A drink” I didn’t realise meant a visit to the infamous “Rue de soif” (I don’t even know the street’s real name but I much prefer street of thirst to whatever it really is! We were all told to go into any bar, get a drink and then meet again outside. Obviously that is not the done thing in Britain, but it was awesome. We had such a good night! The drinks were cheap and everyone was congregating in this large open space where some people had brought huge speakers and improvised their own dance floor. We later adjourned to one of the bars as it was warmer inside. At this point I witnessed my first French flirting… I was told in French I have pretty eyes. I understood and said thank you only to have the guy say are you Spanish (not aware I look or sound remotely Spanish..), I told him I was English which he said he loved. This started to get a bit creepy so I said goodbye and turned back to my friends. He then moved closer to our group and said to me “sex”, I replied “six?” confused. He then went on in broken English: “I like the sex, and you?” At this point, about 10pm, I was so shocked I couldn’t speak (which says a lot about me, I know!) I told him I was going to leave and all my friends asked what happened. On hearing the story they couldn’t stop laughing at him and he left! Maybe he should work on his lines…

We started our rather civilised night all talking in French to each other (well, trying) but 2 drinks down and we were all back in English! Oops. Another few drinks, including a lovely Belgian cherry flavoured beer, and we met some guys from Brazil who had been here for a month doing an intensive French course before university. Their English was not good so with a little Dutch/French courage in me: I spoke for about 2 hours in French! Score! I feel Bekah and I may have ruined the allusion when we both went and got some chips to end the night; apparently it’s a very British concept.

Yesterday (Sunday) we went to an ESN picnic for international and Erasmus students. It was lovely weather in the gorgeous Parc du Thabor. We played a game to meet people where you have to write on a piece of paper “trouvez un(e) etudiant(e) avec…” so for example, find a student to has a hat on/has 2 brothers/from Germany. Mine was to find 3 students wearing red t-shirts. This was relatively easy but my next I couldn’t even understand, something about economics I think. This was a great way to meet new people but with so many people, and I’m so bad with names, I think I will stick to my little group for now!

So we are managing a bit in French and apparently drinking helps. Lucky there’s more welcome night out events on Tuesday and Thursday then! For today, the plan is the go to the supermarket (after I get out of my pajamas!) then I have a room inspection (maybe I should tidy my room…) and after that we meet our tutors (I should also probably find out who my tutor is…). I’m so unorganised!

Bises x

Je suis arrivée!

Ah, bonjour!

So, today has been an interesting one… we got the ferry into Caen at half past 9 last night (Wednesday the 4th) and stayed at an F1 hotel supposedly 20 minutes away from the port. Awkward that it took my mum and I an hour and a half to get there as we forgot to print off directions, also, it was dark, AND everything was in French. Shocking. Anywho we headed off this morning and drove down to Rennes. When we eventually found Rennes 2 Villejean campus (not an easy task I tell you!) my mum parked up near building I, the international office. I went to find room i107 as I had been told only to find out prior to this I needed to enrol. Right, back to the car to tell my mum then head to room s202 to fill in some more forms; the French sure like their paperwork! Almost completed the form but apparently I’m missing my term time address. Well, I’m aware of that, I don’t have my key yet. Now I find having a room number is obligatory to enrolling, excellent… Off to building P where apparently a colleague will help. Will they though? It’s been a shambles so far.

I then met Chloé outside building P who basically saved me as I still felt reluctant to speak French, although I wanted to, every time I tried I just stuttered and then headed back to slow English with exaggerated hand gestures. Chloé took me to the residence reception and helped me fill out yet more forms. It was all looking up when I was told I needed insurance to get my key. At this point I was starting to worry because in half an hour the key office closes! I go back to the car to get my ID and just broke down in tears. There’s so much paperwork, it’s so complicated, moving to another country for a year is hard enough! After a few minutes calming down I decided I need to man up. Right then Chloé comes back over and tells me I don’t need insurance details as long as they’re in by the end of the first week! So I finally got a key and the next task (possibly the hardest task of the day) began… moving all my stuff up three flights of stairs due to the lack of escalators!

When finally settled (ish, there’s still full bags and suitcases everywhere!) we went to get food and I ran into some other Erasmus schemers! Fanny from Finland (who lives right near my cousins!), and Liza and Ann-Sophie from Belgium. They invited me out to have food and we found crêpes. They’re a first for me, like most foreign food and in fact a lot of British food, but I gave them a try and mine was lovely. I even ordered in French. Not well, that’s a given, but it was a good try! We had a really enjoyable evening and had a variety of different languages going on all at once, which I’m sure doesn’t help us learning our French but it was good fun.

I’m now back in my room and am retiring to bed after a quick few skypes to Emma and Matt back home. Overall, I’m happy now. Today could have gone a lot worse, and I only cried once. And only a little bit; it hardly even counts!

Au reviour x

Can I change my mind?

So, it’s Sunday (the 1st of September)  today and I leave on Wednesday morning. I haven’t packed yet and I don’t know nearly enough French to live there for a year. I think I’m even less prepared now than I was when leaving for university two years ago! The French seem to be obsessed with paperwork and it doesn’t help that I can’t understand the majority of it

I went out last night with some uni friends and people from home which was lovely, and some of my friends have been sweet enough to get me little going away presents. Okay, I don’t think I can write much more or I’ll set myself off crying…

Note: This has been posted a few days late due to an almost mental break down!