Hitting the slopes!

It was my first time on the slopes here on Saturday! What an experience! I’m afraid to say that the snow wasn’t great as there hasn’t been any fresh snow for about a week and so towards the bottom, there were a few rocky patches! I got up at 5.45am after a late night the night before celebrating the last Friday in Grenoble for one of my friends. That meant not much sleep and then a very twisty bus journey! Not the best start to the day! However, when we got up there we hired skis and got on with it. I wouldn’t be exaggerating when I say that I spent more time on my bum than on my feet! The first slope I ended up rolling down the hill! Not fazed, I stood up and got to the bottom. The next slope, I decided was too challenging for me and so sat down and slid down it! However, I did not realise that one of my skis would escape me in this process! So whilst I was sliding down the hill and scrambling after my ski, there was a class of people standing watching, and laughing! At least they had some enjoyment out of my way to get down a slope! After many more falls and tumbles, and some success at getting down slopes on my feet, it was time to get the bus back! Needless to say, I was exhausted and couldn’t wait to get into bed that night!

On Sunday, we decided to go ice skating! It was very busy but it was fun to go skating again and do something different. That evening we all met up to exchange our secret santa gifts and to go out for a meal. It was a great way to finish off a lovely weekend!

This week is time to organise everything ready to go home, do some studying and enjoy the Christmas atmosphere!

More Christmas fun!

Well it is finally December and therefore not long left before I go home for Christmas. Classes are finishing and focus is turning to studying and revising for exams instead of being in classes learning new things. Although most of my exams are after Christmas, I am trying to do some studying before I come home so that I have more time to spend with family and friends when I am back. However, as I mentioned in my last blog post, I can’t sit and study all the time!

On Saturday we got on the train and headed for Annecy. It is a lovely town about an hour and 45 minutes away from Grenoble. When we got up and got the tram on the way to the train station it was snowing - definitely a good way to start a festive day! We visited the Christmas market in Annecy and had a walk around the town whilst trying to keep warm! This was a failed attempt as by the time I got back to my room, I could no longer feel my feet and so got into bed in an attempt to warm up! That evening we headed to Stade des Alpes to see Grenoble RFC take on Toulouse. I have to say that the French could teach the Scottish a thing or two about the atmosphere at a rugby match – it was amazing! There were free flags put next to the seats and so there was a sea of red supporters for Grenoble! It was a surprising but great result seeing Grenoble win 22-15!

Yesterday we headed into the Christmas market in Grenoble again to buy Christmas trees! It is only tiny, but still my attempt to make my room festive!

Difficulties in the run up to Christmas

Another week has finished and I find myself ticking the days off until it is time to pack my bags and head home for Christmas. Many people may think that this is the easiest time of my time away so far. I only have 3 more weeks left until I can come home, classes are winding down, Christmas decorations are beginning to appear and the ski season is about to start. It would be silly of me to disagree with this. Yes, this is all true, however I can’t say that it is the easiest time so far, in fact, I would go so far to say that it is the hardest time. As classes are beginning to finish to leave time for studying it means that I have less things to do and therefore less of a routine. This means that I have more time to fill and while I should be filling all this time with studying, it is not possible to study every waking minute of every day and therefore there is more time to dwell on what everyone is doing at home and what I would be doing were I at home.

It is coming up to Christmas, a time for family and a time for friends. I am lucky to be able to say that I have met some great people while I have been here and we are all able to share different experiences with each other and lean on each other for support when we need it. It is an interesting experience to see how another country and another culture celebrate the Christmas festivities. However, I can’t wait to get home and do things that are ‘normal’!

Enough dwelling on the difficulties and time to move onto what I have been doing and what I have in store to try to enjoy all of this extra free time that I have! Of course, I still have to do some work and concentrate on university. However, in addition to that, I visited the Christmas market yesterday in Grenoble. It was quite spread out but it was nice to have a wander around the different stalls, whilst drinking some mulled wine (of course!) and see the Christmas lights all on. However, it was very cold and so we didn’t spend loads of time having a look at different things.

Tomorrow I plan to buy some Christmas decorations and attempt to make my room slightly more exciting and festive than it currently is!

We have planned to go to Annecy next Saturday as it is the first weekend of their Christmas market and I have heard many great things about the town. When we get back that evening we have got tickets to go to see Grenoble take on Toulouse at rugby in the Stade des Alpes. The following two weekends will hopefully be taken up with some trips to the ski centres and then, finally, we have a trip to Paris to look forward to before flying home.

The start of the Christmas season

Another week gone by and therefore another week closer to going home for Christmas! Where has the time gone this semester? It feels like only yesterday that I was writing about moving into my room and finding my feet in Grenoble!

This week I found out that I am able to come home sooner than I had originally planned. I paid the fee to change the date of my flight and I am now officially going home 4 days earlier than originally planned! We are heading up to Paris the day before we fly and are going to spend a day and a half exploring Paris at Christmas (I did this last year and absolutely loved it!) and seeing the various Christmas markets before heading out to the airport and flying home! I am unbelievably excited about seeing all my lovely family and friends again!

Next weekend we have made plans to go shopping for Christmas decorations so we can decorate our rooms and get into the Christmas spirit here! I feel that as I have heard that some of the Christmas lights near my hometown have been turned on, it is acceptable for me to decorate my room! And I am also not ashamed to admit that as I am writing this, I have Christmas music playing!

This week hasn’t been very eventful here. I went to a cooking course over on the other side of town on Thursday night which was good. It was nice to do something different. However, while we were there, one of the bus drivers in town got attacked and therefore all of the tram drivers and bus drivers exercised their droit de retrait. This means that they could all stop working and go home. A bit of an issue for us on the other side of the town! Thankfully we finally managed to get hold of a taxi company and although taxi’s cost a fortune here compared to at home, we got back to our rooms safely!

Today has been a day of doing university work and cleaning interspersed with a much needed trip out of my room to get a coffee! I know that it would be too easy to stay in my room without leaving some days as I have everything I need in hear. But I make myself go out at least once a day as I know that I would end up driving myself crazy!

Tomorrow evening we are heading through to Lyon for a meal for one of our friend’s 21^st birthdays.

I think that is all my news for now! However, on a side note, I have just read this back through and realise that I always refer to ‘we’. For those of you who don’t know, I am here with one of my friends from university at home. Without her, I am pretty sure I would not have been able to deal with living in a different country, speaking a different language and studying law in said different language. However, I do also have to thank those who continuously make the effort to keep in touch with me, you all know who you are and it means so much to have so many people supporting my adventure here!

Weekend of travelling

First of all, I should apologise for not writing on Friday! I am afraid to say that Friday was a very long and tiring day! I had a three hour exam from 9-12 and then a lecture from 1-3 and another class from 5-7. The exam left me feeling exhausted and it was a struggle to keep concentrating for the rest of the day!

On a more positive note, I did some travelling this weekend. I made a last minute decision with one of my friends who is living in Perpignan this year to meet up in Avignon for a night and then stay in Aix-en-Provence the night after. Those of you who know me well will know that I spent the summer of 2012 working in a hotel not far from Avignon and therefore visited the town on a few occasions. I love it and it was nice to know that I could still find my way around without a map! Again, for those of you who know me well, you will know that my sense of direction is not good and therefore not having to have a map is a big achievement for me!

It was a lovely day in Avignon and it was great to have a wander around and see all the sites again. I met up with a school friend, who is currently living in Avignon, for a coffee so it was lovely to catch up with her again too. We stayed in a youth hostel in Avignon that night and after being woken up by some noisy guests at 4.30 and 6.30 it was a good thing that we were moving on! We got on a train and headed to Aix-en-Provence. I had never been there before so it was great to discover a new place that I had heard a lot about. The town is well known for its many fountains which are dotted all over the town. The main street is lined with trees with some cafes, bars and restaurants at the side. We were very lucky that the threatened rain stayed off and we could have a wander round and explore the town a bit more. We decided to walk out to our hotel that night as the bus that would have taken us there wasn’t running as it was a Sunday! It seemed to take forever and so we decided to eat at the hotel instead of doing that walk twice more that evening! The next day was Armistice Day. It is a bank holiday in France and so it is like a Sunday – not many things are open. Unfortunately we both had to head back to our respective French hometowns and so at lunchtime we said our goodbyes and each started our fairly long trips back.

This week is quieter and calmer than last week – thank goodness!

La toussaint holiday!

I don’t know where to start with this blog post! I feel like so many great things have happened since I last wrote!

So firstly, my Mum arrived on Friday. It was so amazing to see her and be able to show her round Grenoble. She brought a big case with her, mostly containing goodies for me! I didn’t think I would ever be so excited to see baked beans, squash and chocolate (OK, I knew how excited I would be to see Cadbury’s!). We went up the cable car to la Bastille and looked at the amazing views. Then we went to the University campus and did a lot of wandering around the streets while I pointed out my favourite place for coffee, and my favourite place for wine and my favourite place to eat……no wonder this year is turning out to be expensive! I realised whilst showing Mum around how much I have come to know Grenoble and how much I have come to love it. It will never replace home in Britain, but it is definitely my French ‘home’!

After I saw Mum off on Monday I headed off to Switzerland with Hannah for a little holiday. First stop was Geneva! We had found a cheap hotel and decided to book it for 2 nights. When we got out to the hotel, we discovered why it was so cheap! There wasn’t a separate bathroom in the room! There was a cupboard with a toilet in it and the sink and the shower weren’t in separate rooms! To keep a small bit of dignity, the shower had a frosted strip over the door! Thoughtful! We did all the tourist sites in Geneva and looked round the city centre! It was amazing how many glamorous people there were walking about! I did not fit in wearing my turquoise waterproof jacket!

After 2 nights in Geneva, we bought train tickets up to Lausanne. Neither of us could believe how expensive it was for a return train ticket for a journey that took 40 minutes each way – 40 CHF!

However, Lausanne was an amazing place and I really loved it! After checking into our hotel (luxury compared the last one!) we went up into the old town to explore and see the cathedral and then went down to the lake before going back into the centre and having the best, but most expensive, hot chocolate I have ever had! Nothing will compare now! The next day we explored the centre a bit more and then headed out to a big park where there was supposedly a lake, a tower and an animal park! Naturally I thought that meant there was going to be elephants and giraffes etc. When we got to the animal park though, we were greeted by cows, pigs, rabbits, sheep and goats! Not what I was expecting!

Unfortunately our holiday had to come to an end at some point and we got the train back to Grenoble. At least I still have a few more days off until I am back to classes! Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Trip to the mountains and holiday

At 3pm today it will finally be the holidays! We have a week off university and all the school children are off school for La Toussaint (All saints day) which is next Friday (1^st November).

Last weekend I went into the mountains with a group of 7 other people. 6 of whom I had never met before! We had a guide with us and after what felt like a very long journey in a mini bus up very twisty roads, we were all thankful to arrive at our destination! The views were amazing! We walked for a few hours, passing some spectacular views and stopped for some lunch by the side of a little lake. The sun was shining so we had a little siesta there while eating lunch and drinking coffee that our guide had brought! We then moved on and after seeing a lot of ‘eagles’ we walked back down the side of a mountain to the mini bus whilst pretending to be ducks! We found out that what we had seen weren’t eagles at all and were vultures instead! Nevertheless it was still great to see them come so low! I have put some photos at the bottom to try to show some of the views (although I have been informed that my photography isn’t very good, so I apologise!).

Wednesday was the first time that I had slept in whilst being here! I woke up at 7.40 and realised that I should be on my way to university! So after arriving in lectures an hour late (in the break), forgetting my laptop battery and pencil case, I knew it was definitely a good thing to have this holiday coming up!

This evening, my amazing mum is coming to visit me for the weekend! I’m so excited to have a visitor and to be able to show her Grenoble properly. Thankfully I have a phone contract which allows me to phone UK landlines for free so I have been in contact with home a lot – I don’t know what I would have done without it, especially as my internet is very temperamental and so skype doesn’t work very well. But it is still really exciting to have a visitor!

On Monday, Hannah and I are heading to Switzerland to do some travelling and see somewhere different! It’s only two hours on the train to Geneva and so doesn’t take very long at all! We went to try to get some Swiss Francs the other day, only to realise that you can’t just pop into Marks and Spencer’s to the bureau de change like you would at home! We went to one post office who informed us that they didn’t do currency exchange so went up to the other post office and finally, after about half an hour waiting and paying 5 euros, we got our money!

Wine tasting, trips and french stereotypes

Well it’s been a hard week this week. I feel that some lectures I can sit in and feel that my French has improved and I am beginning to understand a lot more. However, in some lectures I feel that I really struggle. I think this is down to the lecturer. I find that it is easier, in general, to understand women’s voices. They tend to be clearer than men's voices.

Yesterday felt like a very French experience! We went to a wine festival in the middle of Grenoble. It was held in Place Victor Hugo. It was free to get in and 7 euros to get a glass which meant you could try any of the wine! Naturally, we paid the 7 euros to get the glass so we could pretend to know what we were doing with the wine testing! After going round a few stalls it was clear that we had no idea what we were doing! It was a lovely afternoon and there was some live music so we sat and listened to a bassoon trio for a bit and then decided to go to a session called initiation à la dégustation in an attempt to learn what we were meant to be doing! After sitting through the session for almost an hour in French, I would by no means say that I was a pro at wine tasting now! I do however know more than I did before!

Tomorrow I am heading up into the mountains on an organised, guided walk! It’s meant to be lovely weather so hopefully I will get a lot of nice pictures! Unfortunately the trip that I was meant to be going on to Chamonix-Mont-Blanc on Sunday is no longer happening as a result of the weather. I really hope that I will get a chance to go at another time!

I don’t understand this weather that is going on though! Last week I was writing about the snow fall and the ski centres opening and this week the temperatures have risen again to almost 20 degrees in the afternoons! Bizarre! How are you supposed to know whether to put winter or summer clothes on in the morning?!

In other news, I thought I would consider some of the French stereotypes that many people have!

French are bad drivers – well this is true in most cases! I have seen cars reversing down roads, cars speeding up towards you while you are crossing the road on a zebra crossing, speeding and definitely impatience whilst waiting at traffic lights!

French wear stripy tops, wear berets and carry baguettes – So far I haven’t seen anyone in this dress! However, many people do go out to get fresh bread each day as the bread here does not last much more than a day before going stale!

French smoke a lot – this is also true in the majority of cases. In each lecture there is a break every hour. During these 10 minutes most people get up to leave the lecture theatre to go outside to have a smoke. If it is raining outside, people gather round the door and smoke, this means that some people invariably end up smoking inside! If you are trying to get somewhere whilst another lecture is having a break, you have to cough and splutter your way through a cloud of smoke!

However, I would like to point out that these are purely stereotypes and it is just a different culture with different rules and regulations.

The French culture is definitely a lot more laid back and relaxed than the British way of life. And whilst in some cases it has driven me to despair about the lack of urgency for things, it is a way of life that the British could definitely learn from.

A change in seasons and the French administration system

What an eventful week it has been! Started off with a trip to Lyon to catch up with some friends from uni! It was a lovely weekend exploring a new city and seeing new sites! Unfortunately we had to come back to reality on Monday and face the French administration system again! Who knew that it was possible for anything else to go wrong?!

We tried to go to see the international coordinator on Monday with a few questions, but of course, she wasn’t there! We went back on Tuesday and waited outside her office while she was talking to another student and finally it was our turn to speak to her! It was then that she dropped the bombshell. The courses that she had originally told us were 6 credits were actually only worth 5. The information was in her big manual all along but it had taken her up until then to look in it to check! I began to add up the number of credits that I would then have at the end of the semester and discovered that it only added up to 29 and not the 30 that we are meant to have. As we are now 4 weeks into the term we knew that it would be impossible to pick up another class. Panic set in! After a phone call to our home university we calmed down! We were told that we can pick up the extra credit next semester and after more emails exchanged, no more paperwork has to be done! Thank goodness!

On another subject; the clouds had been down right over the mountains as it has been a bit rainy this week. Last night the clouds cleared and the mountains appeared. It was beautiful! What had been falling as rain down here had been falling as snow up there and so the mountains have a covering of snow on them! How strange to think that last week I was cycling around the town in 30 degree heat and this week I have got my gloves and scarf out and there is snow about! Next weekend we are going on a trip to Chamonix Mont Blanc. I hope it is a nice day so we can fully make the most of it and take lots of pictures! Fingers crossed!

That’s about it for now! Just want to say a massive thank you to everyone who has sent me post! I’m like a small child at Christmas when I go to look in my post box! I am getting round to replying to everyone, I promise!

                                                                 A view of Lyon

 View out of my bedroom window of snow covered mountains

The start of tutorials

Well the end of another week has come, which means another week of classes has successfully been completed! This week saw the start of tutorials which meant an hour and a half sitting in a class of 30 students being terrified!

The tutorials here are assessed on your input to class. Each week there are exercises to complete (which usually involves writing at least one essay) which may or may not be collected by the tutor. Also, there are 3 written exams to complete. The first of these is in two weeks time. We have to write an essay under exam conditions in half an hour. This seems like a task similar to exams in the UK, however, the French style of essay writing is completely different. The essays have to be written in two sections, with two subsections per section. Each main section has to have a specific title which you have to think of within the time limit. Add to this the stress of using a dictionary (which thankfully we are allowed) and you are left with a very stressed and worried ERASMUS student! There are two exams like this and a third one which is three hours long! I have not yet found out how many have to be written in this time, but I’m sure I will find out soon enough! Unlike our other exams, we are treated the same as all the French students. So a lot of studying will have to be done! Our final exams for each subject are done orally. This seems, to me, to be a much better way to do our exams as there is less of a stress on the correct grammar etc. Thankfully though, we still have a bit of time before worrying about them!

On Tuesday we decided to hire bikes to see Grenoble from another perspective. We paid 3 euros to have the bikes for 24 hours and after the initial worry of not knowing where we were going, in addition to not having ridden a bike for a while, we soon got into the swing of things! We were not offered helmets so the prospect of cycling on the roads seemed like a scary task! Sticking as much as we could to quiet roads and cycle paths, we made our way to Parc Paul Mistral which is right next to Stade des Alpes and the Opera House. It was a lovely day and was nice to have a cycle round the park. In an attempt to find the river without going on busy roads, we got quite lost and ended up cycling into a nice area of town that we had never been to before (I probably couldn't get back there now if I tried!) before tackling the centre of town again to take our bikes back to the shop at the station.

This weekend sees the start of our travels as we are heading to Lyon tomorrow!

University life

Well time seems to be flying by now! It is now 3 weeks today since I moved into my room here – it definitely gets better as time goes on, although I would give anything to have a sofa and a proper kitchen now!

Looking back on the past 3 weeks, I feel that a lot has been achieved – we have (almost) conquered the French administration system and can understand (the majority of) French lecturers!

Many people may be wondering what the university is like so I thought that I would give you an insight into the campus. There is not just one university on campus but a whole collection of them. The University I am studying at (Université Pierre Mendès France) is for law students and economics students. There are roughly 60,000 students on campus which means there is always a great atmosphere. There are big open spaces surrounded by views of the mountains which invite many students to sit and have a spot of lunch or do some work on their computers etc. I even saw one man juggling the other day! There are plenty of places to get food on campus ranging from the university restaurants (3 courses for €3.15) to sandwich and salad bars to cafes, to fast food places. In addition to all of these places to eat, there is a post office, a selection of banks, a place to hire bikes and a little shop.

The tram line goes straight through the middle of campus and into town which makes it a great way to get around Grenoble. I bought a year tram pass which has already been used more times than I can count – definitely a good investment!

My halls are about a 10-15 minute walk away from the law building and lecture theatres. It makes it a very easy to get into uni and still be able to come back to my room between classes if I need to.  The walk into university and back is by a footpath lined with trees which is lovely at the moment as all of the leaves are falling off and there are a lot of conkers!

We have been very lucky with the weather so far as it is still very hot and sunny! We had one day of storms a few weeks ago, and when it rains, it pours!

Surviving week 1!

Well we’ve managed it! A whole week of classes and we have come through the other end in one piece! I can’t say that it has been easy – it most certainly hasn’t, but it has taught me a thing or two:

1) French lecturers talk really fast

2) You actually have to concentrate on the whole lecture to understand what is going on

3) You long for the half way mark as there is a break so that the smokers (majority of the class) can have a cigarette whilst we can get a cup of coffee for 50 cents (bargain!).

The classes on the whole have been manageable and it feels like a huge achievement to get to the end of a lecture and realise that you have actually learnt a lot. Going through my notes today, I realised that most of the horrible red squiggly lines telling me that there is a spelling mistake were for not putting in accents which means that the majority of the words I typed were almost correct – bonus! However, I can’t say that it all makes complete sense! There were a lot of times when the lecturer would say a word that I did not have any clue what it meant – cue guessing how it is spelt and turning to google translate!

Yesterday we went to try to buy our ski passes. We went to the sports office and asked to buy them. We were swiftly instructed that we were in the wrong place and had to go to the swimming pool (obviously we should have thought that we need to buy ski passes at the swimming pool……!). When we got there, we were informed that we need a photo to put on our card. As we didn’t have one with us we could not get a card – wasted trip!

This morning we got up bright and early for our last 8am lecture of the week. As our timetables did not tell us where the class was and the portal was not working, we decided to go a bit earlier to see the secretary to see where it was. Her response was ‘look at the screens in the lecture theatre hall’. I hadn’t even realised there was screens in there, so we decided to trust her and went off to find out. When we got there the screens weren’t turned on (of course!) so our next step was to hang around and hope to see our lecturer appear so we could follow her in. This didn’t happen and so we have no idea where the class was! Next step: coffee! We waited until 9am so we could go to subscribe for our French class and then discovered that the secretary’s office in the language building was not open! Next step: buy stamps for Britain. As our morning was turning out so badly, we should have guessed that they would have run out (I will get round to writing to people soon!). Finally, our last thing that we thought we could do was to try to sign up for our tutorials, but when that secretary wasn’t there either, we decided to give up for the morning and head back to our rooms hoping that the afternoon would turn out better! Thankfully there were no hiccups this afternoon - just 4 hours of sitting in a hot lecture theatre!

It’s a lovely sunny evening here so we are heading off to get some pizza and wine!

 

Settling in and finding our way!

Well I can safely say that I have learnt a whole new meaning of the word ‘unorganised’! Who knew that going to university in a different country would require so much paperwork?! Maybe I should have guessed! Let’s just say that the university staff aren’t exactly speedy at getting anything done! The first week has gone by in a blur of standing in queues, being confused, getting stressed (and eating ice cream to cheer us up) and gazing in awe at the magnificent views of the Alps. We have spent our first week without our student cards. This means that we couldn’t get on the internet in our halls of residence, we couldn’t get money cards and so couldn’t eat in the university restaurants (3 euros for a 3 course meal!) and we couldn’t apply for CAF (funding from the French government for accommodation) – one little card is so important! We took our laptops to university most days last week to get on eduroam using our Aberdeen login details – times are tough! But when you look past all of the administration, the university is amazing. It is set in such a great location and everyone is so cheery. Hannah and I have been out exploring the city and trying to become French (including plenty of wine!).

On Sunday we decided to do the tourist thing! We went up la bastille on the cable cars and the views are breath taking! After having some lunch at the top, we came down to go on the tourist train round the city. Definitely worth the cheesy music and funny looks we got from people as we went round the city.

Yesterday our classes started - no amount of French language classes could have prepared me for what was in store! All you can do is try to type as much as possible! It was helpful to sit behind someone who had a laptop as I could make sure I was on the right lines with some things! Hopefully it will get better – watch this space!

Today I got my student card – hurray! The internet is finally working and I have submitted my application for CAF. Next step: money cards!