It's been a funny old weekend. I, like millions of others, have spent this month tuned into what is occurring on the roads of France in the Tour de France. France feels homely still. I have always felt a sense of allegiance to anywhere in which I have spent a great deal of time, be that here at home in Flitwick, or at University in Canterbury, or now indeed in France. When something happens in one place, I feel affected by it. I immensely enjoyed my year abroad, and I know that the same can be said for the large majority of those who have done the same experience. Yesterday was the 14th July, or Bastille Day; the French national day where everyone is 'en fete', they sing and dance and enjoy spectacular events.
However, the weekend began in tragedy. On Friday night a train crashed on the outskirts of Paris just as people were heading home to celebrate the holiday. This weekend I spent the weekend in Shropshire visiting a friend, but on the way I picked up a French newspaper 'Libération' which moved me to tears as I sat in Kings Cross station. I've translated the editorial from the newspaper:
A train accident as bad as the one at Brétigny, the day of the start of the holidays, represents a national tragedy. For their victims and their families, for the railway community but also for the entire country. We'll remember the emotion on Guilaume Pepy's the CEO of SNCF for a long time and his tears live on television as he visited the accident site. The train, more than any other form of transport, belongs to the history of the nation, and this tragedy touches all the French, who are all, one day or another passengers on the SNCF. The train is taken daily by tens of thousands of us without concern of its safety. And, in that aspect, the SNCF has an excellent record which it, and it's workers take in pride. Fatal accidents have been quite rare over recent years, which makes the exceptional accident at Brétigny even more tragic. At the moment it would be inappropriate to speculate what the cause of the accident was, and a full and transparent inquiry must be held, not to do so would be to damage the confidence of the SNCFs users.
The newspaper did not make for easy reading with headlines such as "Dans ce wagon, il y a surement des enfants". But major events, both good and bad rally a nation together and this was seen in France (in the negative event situation) and at the Olympic Games in London (in the positive aspect). It almost made the celebrations to come over the weekend much more poignant.
In truth, I've always liked France, their language and their culture (I'm in the wrong degree if I don't), and so have always tried to read French newspapers. But now I feel in a small way I share in their events both good and bad. On the night of the 14th July I watched a wonderful classical music concert at the base of the Eiffel Tower 'Le Concert de Paris' on TV5Monde which was followed by a wonderful firework display, despite feeling incredibly tired, I felt a feeling of joy.
I don't know if others feel a similar way, but perhaps once you've lived somewhere and you've moved away, you've never truly left. A piece of you remains, and a piece of it remains in you.
Well, I'm sat at home, in the United Kingdom. The adventure is over, well I guess if you look at it another way, the adventure is only just beginning.
First off, I had computer issues, but all good now (that stopped me from writing a blog sooner, then I had a busy last couple of weeks!)
First up, it was sunny towards the end of April/Early May in Paris, and I took the opportunity to go take photos in the city. Well, I say take photos, the plan was to go to the Eiffel Tower, then grab the RER further down the city to somewhere else. I ended up walking from the Eiffel tower to Bibliotheque Francois Mitterand (10km apparently). It ended up being a lovely afternoon, I even managed to sneak in a museum where I saw the original ruins of Paris, then sat on the riverbanks of the Ile Saint-Louis. It was quite tiring towards the end, but a memorable day in which I saw practically all the main sights of the city.
I followed this up with a visit to the Chateau of Fontainbleau which was a bit of a long way and saw me going via Gare de Lyon. When I got there I was faced with a 15 minute bus ride, but wow was it worth it. I was faced with this massive palace filled with rooms that were so beautifully designed.
It was the way home though that gave me my strange story of the day. I got back to the Gare and the ticket inspector stood and watched me validate my NaviGo, it made the accepting ding noise and then, immediately. 'Monsieur, veuillez presenter votre titre de transport pour une inspection'. I obligied, but I wanted to say 'BUT YOU WATCHED ME VALIDATE IT!!!'. But onwards I went.
The next week or so was spent saying Goodbye to places and people, and then I ended up in a reflective mood of what a wonderful year I've had. I might even pop back and spend another year here after my final year of university.
Then came the big test, I had to pass an interview in French. I won't go into details of it (let's face it, it would bore you!) but I passed and ended up on what is essentially a waiting list for a contract to free itself up. What a fantastic end of year!
So, that's it, the year abroad is over. I've had a blast and would snap up the chance to do it again. Thank you for reading this throughout the year and I'd love to keep up the occasional blogging. So, this isn't the end. It's just the end of the beginning.
Take the average tourists Paris to do list. On it will be the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, the Sacré Coeur, then a little museum called the Louvre, the Musée d'Orsay is likely to make an appearance and for very cultural tourists the Centre Pompidou is probably on there too. For the people who know Paris they're probably going to check out what's going on at the Hotel de Ville since they always seem to have an exhibition about something or other, there's the Espace Dali up in Montmartre, the Cité des Sciences seems to be up and coming these days. In short, in Paris there is lots to do.
Last week I decided to visit the Louvre, luckily so did a UKC friend Michael. So we went there, saw some sculptures, Napoleon III's apartments, the Mona Lisa etc etc. We also wanted to see Liberty leading the people, which I remember seeing when I went to the Louvre a while back. However the powers that be have moved it to the Louvre Lens, dommage.
The point in this is, I hadn't really once thought of visiting the Louvre whilst I'd been here this year, and then I got thinking; what else is there to explore? Paris is one of the cultural capitals of the world, I've always loved the place. Whenever the question came up where I wanted to go on holiday, it was Paris. I'd holiday-ed in Paris a fair few times and not seen it all, I've spent a good 7 months here now and I've still not seen it all. There's so much waiting to be seen, and not long to do it in. Time to get to it. But I know I won't see it all, it's impossible, Paris is a city that is constantly changing, perhaps that's what I find so exciting about it, and perhaps that's why I'll always keep coming back.
So, that's my short blog. I don't know why I felt the need to write this, perhaps to motivate me to go out and do more things!
It's been an entire month since I wrote a blog! Yikes! I've just been so busy I've forgotten. I'm just going to give an account of what I've done this month... so here we go!
March is the traditional start of the cycling season in Europe with one of the best (in my opinion) races of the year. The 'Course au Soleil', the Paris-Nice. I went down to see the Prologue in Houilles which is a nice little town in the Yvelines departement. I arrived in the town, not knowing where the heck I was going. I ended up walking about 2,5km of the course. It was a cold day, but an exciting one where I got to see many of the riders close up, one by one.
The stage was won by a young Europcar rider Damien Gaudin who has basically come out of nowhere to win. But it was a French win so the local crowd was (obviously) delighted.
The next day I took the long trip to a town called Nemours in the Seine-et-Marne departement, this town is some 100km outside of Paris, a town that has inspired writers such as Honoré de Balzac and Victor Hugo. It's not too hard to see why, the town has a beautiful river, church and small chateau, it was a ideal setting for the finish of the first road stage. Again, this one was won by a French man, Nacer Bouhami (who went and crashed out the next day) in a sprint finish.Those of you reading who may follow cycling will know of a man named Jean-Francois Pescheux who is the route director of the Tour de France and other cycling races owned by the ASO, the Paris-Nice being one. As he was born in Nemours, there was a small presentation to him on the podium after the stage.
Then I had visitors for an entire week, we went to Disneyland, The Eiffel Tower, Versailles amongst other things.It was lovely seeing some friends from Canterbury and doing some very touristy things during my Vacances d'Hiver. Though I felt exhausted at the end of the week. We were blessed with beautiful weather, even going as far as not taking a coat out! (This however, would not last the two weeks of my holiday).
Once they had left, I took a few days to rest up, boy oh boy did I need it. Almost 8 full days of walking around had taken their toll, I was exhausted! Then came Tuesday. By far the most eventful day of the holiday. It snowed. Again.
It wasn't too bad actually, we've had worse snow. However, I got stranded. And had to go from Marne-la-Vallee to Paris, Paris to Meaux to get home! And I was on one of the last trains to make it out of Paris. Lucky me huh?
The rest of the week, I devoted to getting my year abroad essay research into a 800 word summary to submit. Whilst I think my research is at an 'ok' level, my summary was pretty poor and I'm not expecting a good feedback piece on it. But I write my essays by doing all my research first, then all my writing. It's how I work best, I'm not changing it for this piece of work. Especially this piece of work.
Then came the weekend, on Saturday I was visited by my Grandma and Auntie who I met at Gare du Nord at lunchtime, we had lunch, saw the Waterlilies painting at the Orangerie gallery at the Jardin des Tuileries, then had dinner. The next bit is sort of strange, we went to the Moulin Rouge. This was something I'd never really considered doing, but turned out to be pretty great actually. Once you look past the obvious, the costumes and the choreography were top notch. As was the atmosphere. Would I go again? Yes! I laughed, was amazed and entertained for a few hours. It was a great night, ruined by surprise engineering works on my line. It seemed to caught us all out as I went from Paris to Marne-la-Vallée and then caught the 01:20 bus with a full bus of other people. (No photos, sorry folks. Cameras are banned from the Moulin Rouge).
The next day was St. Patricks day, now me not being Irish, I don't really care too much for it. But upon hearing their were some Irish cultural performances and fireworks at Disney, I decided to pop along. I was not disappointed. Well, if you were Irish you'd have noticed their 'pipe band' were actually Scottish, but let's look beyond that! I saw some Irish dancing and stuff like that. I was very entertained by their Leprechauns (who were French of course) who went and turned a mans jacket the wrong way round as his lining was green. 'C'est vert, C'EST SAINT PATRICK HEIN?'. The day had a sour note when I had to argue with a person (in French), as I had to tell them off for pushing in front of me who had been waiting for something for 25 mins, as opposed to their turn up half way through tactic. I had a lovely meal in a restaurant
In short, I had a brilliant day, topped off with some amazing fireworks, followed immediately after by even more amazing fireworks.
The next week, I was back at work having a busy week, but I managed to see two movies during the 'Printemps du Cinéma' (Which is basically where every single cinema place is €3,50). Jappeloup and 20 ans d'écart. I wanted to see French movies to see how much I understood. A good amount, I came out satisfied with my understanding in each film. Jappeloup was very good though, if you are in France, try and see it! I also saw The Place beyond the Pines with my extension vouchers I won through the BNP Paribas facebook page.
A busy, busy month. I'll post more hopefully very soon, as there is always much more to tell. I'll leave you with a photo of me meeting Irish Mickey and Minnie (I couldn't resist).
