One of the best things about having a blog is that you have to give every post a title - which is something I actually get pretty excited about. When on the tram, the metro... or even walking home, I often think about what I'm going to call my next post. I've gone a bit blank today, so when I do end up naming this you should all get pretty excited.
I somehow managed to survive another crazy crazy week. Oral presentations that were somehow improvised and essays that were written late at night apparently had to do. Surprisingly my professor for my writing class told me that my French was at a higher level than my other classmates and I will thus be put in the highest level class - you can imagine how astounded I was considering I had no time to complete the assessment properly. That was a nice end to my hectic 10 days of linguistic classes.
Thursday brought with it its own adventure. First of all, I went to get my public transport card with another girl from Melbourne University who is studying at Lyon 2. We then made our way onto campus to join the horrendously long line of non-European students aka loud Americans who were trying to enrol. I waited about 2 hours and the whole process took around 3. Afterwards I had the option of going to the other campus (an hour away) to try and find my timetables (yeah, they aren't uploaded here), or going home and breathing. I opted for option A, even though it was growing late in the afternoon.
On arrival I was a little shocked about the physical appearance of the university's infrastructure. I'd seen plenty of pictures before and wasn't too bothered...but in real, it just looked like it needed a lot of work. A LOT OF WORK. I don't think anyone's touched it in 50 years and I had the impression that it may collapse at any second. Anyway, I told myself it was a cultural experience and went on through to find building 'K', which is the building for anthropology and sociology. All was fine - but then when I reached the secretary where I had to get the timetables, there was a long queue....story of my Thursday. I waited, the lady told me she was closing in 5 minutes...I waited. I waited until she told me that it was the office for Political Science and not for Anthropology. Fantastic. So she took me to the office for Anthro....which of course was shut. Tired and disappointed I decided to make the long trip home. First of all I needed to use the uh....amenities. The toilets at my university are on the ground. They are squat toilets. And the dirtiest I have ever seen...reminding you all that I have travelled quite a bit in Asia. For the purpose of this blog I wanted ever so much to take a photo....but then the prospect of being caught was too high. Needless to say I forced myself to 'hold'. I was feeling a VERY long way from the University of Melbourne at that moment.
Friday started off well with a pic-nic with a friend from church. We went to a park and we could sort of see some of the city across a lake. We possibly ate too much delicious food and discovered as 'country' as Lyon gets. The afternoon came and I went back to campus. I found some of my timetable! Slowly, slowly I am moving up in the academic world! I made a trip out to see Gladie and her family that night. We had a nice dinner together and I had a very comfortable sleep. Yesterday Gladie showed me round her town a little. Her house is from the middle ages...and her family have lived in it for over a good hundred years. They also own a hardware shop which is beneath their house. So cool to say the least. Her little town is simply gorgeous too. There's an old bridge...and well have a look.
Afterwards we went to Chambéry and looked inside the chateau there, as we could this weekend (it's a special time where you can enter certain buildings that you can't usually, so that was cool. There was a jazz band and all the usuals...like a HUGE queue outside. It rained in the morning, but by the afternoon the sun had come out, so we had a nice time walking around and enjoying the atmosphere.
I somehow managed to survive another crazy crazy week. Oral presentations that were somehow improvised and essays that were written late at night apparently had to do. Surprisingly my professor for my writing class told me that my French was at a higher level than my other classmates and I will thus be put in the highest level class - you can imagine how astounded I was considering I had no time to complete the assessment properly. That was a nice end to my hectic 10 days of linguistic classes.
Thursday brought with it its own adventure. First of all, I went to get my public transport card with another girl from Melbourne University who is studying at Lyon 2. We then made our way onto campus to join the horrendously long line of non-European students aka loud Americans who were trying to enrol. I waited about 2 hours and the whole process took around 3. Afterwards I had the option of going to the other campus (an hour away) to try and find my timetables (yeah, they aren't uploaded here), or going home and breathing. I opted for option A, even though it was growing late in the afternoon.
On arrival I was a little shocked about the physical appearance of the university's infrastructure. I'd seen plenty of pictures before and wasn't too bothered...but in real, it just looked like it needed a lot of work. A LOT OF WORK. I don't think anyone's touched it in 50 years and I had the impression that it may collapse at any second. Anyway, I told myself it was a cultural experience and went on through to find building 'K', which is the building for anthropology and sociology. All was fine - but then when I reached the secretary where I had to get the timetables, there was a long queue....story of my Thursday. I waited, the lady told me she was closing in 5 minutes...I waited. I waited until she told me that it was the office for Political Science and not for Anthropology. Fantastic. So she took me to the office for Anthro....which of course was shut. Tired and disappointed I decided to make the long trip home. First of all I needed to use the uh....amenities. The toilets at my university are on the ground. They are squat toilets. And the dirtiest I have ever seen...reminding you all that I have travelled quite a bit in Asia. For the purpose of this blog I wanted ever so much to take a photo....but then the prospect of being caught was too high. Needless to say I forced myself to 'hold'. I was feeling a VERY long way from the University of Melbourne at that moment.
Friday started off well with a pic-nic with a friend from church. We went to a park and we could sort of see some of the city across a lake. We possibly ate too much delicious food and discovered as 'country' as Lyon gets. The afternoon came and I went back to campus. I found some of my timetable! Slowly, slowly I am moving up in the academic world! I made a trip out to see Gladie and her family that night. We had a nice dinner together and I had a very comfortable sleep. Yesterday Gladie showed me round her town a little. Her house is from the middle ages...and her family have lived in it for over a good hundred years. They also own a hardware shop which is beneath their house. So cool to say the least. Her little town is simply gorgeous too. There's an old bridge...and well have a look.
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| View from Gladie's house |
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| View from the bridge |
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| Gladie with her family (minus her brother) outside her family's shop/house |
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| The old bridge |
We went into Etam, a shop here that I love a LOT and we tried on hats. Gladie bought them for us.
Last night Gladie's mum made 'raclette' for dinner. It's a cheese that you melt (there's sort of a bbq-type thing placed in the middle of the table) and then each person has something that looks like a shovel that you put the racelette on...and then you melt it and then pour it over potatoes...Yes. It is far more amazing that it sounds. It's simply delicious. I said my goodbyes and headed back to Lyon...
Home is great. Everything's going very well - except for Mr. Whistle here who is continually getting on my nerves. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir has been on full blast the last day as an attempt to drown out his whistling. It's working thus far. Tonight I have a fire side in Écully, over the other side of town, and then Chloé is swinging by for the night...because she can! Well, and because she has some things to do on this side of town too. I'll let you know about classes soon and I hope things are well where you all are, wherever you are!
Love, Alice
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