So the other day I decided to do something different, just for a change. I have three ways of getting to Sorbonne: I can take a bus from my apartment to the metro at La Courneuve and ride line 7 to Censier-Daubenton near Sorbonne; I can walk to the station in Le Bourget, take the RER to Chatelet-Les Halles and change to line 7 for the trip to Censier; or I can take the RER all the way to Port-Royal and walk to Sorbonne from there. Until now I've been taking the metro all the way, since walking is minimal and it's very convenient, though a little time-consuming - travelling two-thirds of the line takes around 40 minutes.
I made a fortuitous discovery last weekend, though. When visiting my friends at Martin's house I discovered that it's only 20 minutes from Le Bourget to Denfert-Rochereau, making it less than that to Port-Royal or Luxembourg, the stations nearest Sorbonne. Accordingly, on Wednesday afternoon I walked the 10 minutes from my apartment to the station, bought a ticket and hopped on the next train into Paris.
Less than half an hour after I'd left my apartment, I was standing outside Port-Royal RER station in the south of Paris. All that left was to find my way to Sorbonne. It turned out to be a longer walk than expected - around half an hour, though that may decrease as my mobility increases. I found Sorbonne easily enough, but my next task will be to look out the shortest and easiest route there - I think next week I'll try walking south from Luxembourg rather than north from Port-Royal. I also tried option two yesterday, changing at Chatelet-Les Halles, but it's the biggest metro-type station in France and just walking between the two platforms took a good 10 minutes.
Classes are getting better - my brain is now more used to hearing three hours of chatter about the Bible and raising Lazarus from the dead in French, so I'm understanding more of my classes and the structure of the courses and as such feeling a little more comfortable all in all. I will say, though, that I will be eternally grateful that I did (most of) my degree in Australia and that I'm still officially an Australian student. Not a lot seems to happen in classes around here and how much learning gets done I still haven't figured out. At least during my insane number of contact hours at Monash a large amount of information was imparted into my brain. I'm beginning to see that organisation, efficiency and burearucracy are three things for which you should never hire a Frenchman. Anas is totally on my side, too. He's already wondering why he left Switzerland for this, which made him laugh when he remembered I spent a day and a half on planes and moved halfway round the world for this. Sigh.
History of French orthography is still my favourite class. Once I finally arrived today (bottleneck at Gare du Nord, my RER was held up for 45 minutes or so) we were discussing writing systems - Sumerian compared to Greek, Latin, Ancient Egyptian, Arabic, Hebrew - and how they each expressed language, i.e. pictures versus representations of sound, and how well each system worked. This culminated in an explanation of why French is such a hard language to learn, specifically because every grapheme (written thing) has multiple pronunciations and every phoneme (spoken thing) has multiple transcriptions. It sounds very similar to history of English classes - "Our language is just generally screwed up!"
I had an argument with Paul today. It turns out that we both finish class at 11 on a Friday, and since I don't see any of my friends regularly anymore we took the opportunity to hang out. This ended in us agreeing to reserve judgement on which is the best Disney movie until we've each had time to view the other's nominees (I have to watch Robin Hood, he has to watch Tarzan and Beauty and the Beast). We also came to the conclusion that Paul's antipathy towards The Lion King may be due to the poorer quality of the German version, a theory we'll have to test. There may also have been some extensive quoting of Finding Nemo around this time. We ended up in the middle of a Park League soccer match, too - the bench we were sitting on at the park near Sorbonne was frequently looped as the kids chased the ball out from behind or underneath us - that is, when Horace doesn't take matters into his own hands and just bounce the ball back (yes, it did bounce off me once or twice). It was hilarious watching how intense these six-year-olds were and trying to figure out which tiny soccer star was playing for which team.
It's now definitely bedtime. Tomorrow I'm going into Gibert Jeune again for another textbook and hopefully meeting some friends for hot chocolate, not to mention starting to plan and book some of my trips over the next few months...I love having a four-and-two-half-days weekend!
Showing posts with label Le Bourget. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Le Bourget. Show all posts
Friday, 12 October 2012
Tuesday, 25 September 2012
Anecdotes
So I found out yesterday why Sorbonne Uni doesn't have a big fancy sign at the entrance. It does. The university building takes up the whole block, but most of the south side is currently undergoing renovations, and the main entrance to the uni is conveniently obscured by all the scaffolding in the courtyard out the front. It's actually quite a nice entrance, too - big letters saying 'SORBONNE UNIVERSITY', the EU and French flags and some pretty-coloured wall panels. I feel a little bit diddled now. Fingers crossed they finish building before I leave so I can get a photo for posterity's sake!
First trip to the Le Bourget post office yesterday - and I escaped alive! Strange, though - their post office is also its own bank! It wasn't too far to walk, either - I keep forgetting that Australia is BIG, and Paris is small, and therefore maps lie to me when they tell me how far things are. I re-learned this fact today (as I'm sure I will many, many times) when I headed for the post office in the 5th arrondissement, also nice and close. It's all so little!
My other handy discovery of yesterday - turns out my bank, which is a nice, two-minute walk from uni via the shortcut I've discovered, also has branches and ATMS in Le Bourget (between the pharmacy and the post office, I forget exactly where, but it's a short walk, naturally) and at Place du 8 mai 1945 in La Courneuve, where I change from the metro to the bus.
Speaking of buses, they're crazy around here! Even the bus drivers themselves fail to see the logic of a 20-minute wait at the terminus for three buses to then leave at once. My poor, unmathsy brain is also bamboozled by the way the trip to the metro in the morning (during peak hour, please note) takes the five to 10 minutes that it should to cover the relevant distance, yet said trip in the other direction at 3pm takes at least 20 minutes (from when I started counting...). It's actually faster at 5pm, I've found! They also build buses differently here - most of the centre of the bus is given over to standing room, which makes sense since every bus I've been on while here has been so full it was standing room only...
Our teacher mentioned something about the metro last week that I've noticed applies elsewhere as well. All rubbish bins in the Paris metro, and in many public areas around Paris (even footpaths in Le Bourget) are clear plastic bags hanging from a metal ring. Why? So that you can't hide a bomb in the rubbish. I kid you not. Paris rubbish bins are designed not to be conducive to terrosist attacks. It's a little sad that we live in a world where you have to think this way.
I've also discovered that, according to the popular opinion of my friends and Erasmus peers, group E is thought to be the top class is our French stage intensif. Apparently, A is the bottom and E is the top. Needless to say, I'm more than a little confused and concerned by this concept...though I'm equally concerned by the other way round!
Mind you, they told me this after I complained how bored I was because my class was really easy (today we conjugated the two most common verbs in the four most common tenses! Yay!). Hmmm......France makes NO sense at all.
First trip to the Le Bourget post office yesterday - and I escaped alive! Strange, though - their post office is also its own bank! It wasn't too far to walk, either - I keep forgetting that Australia is BIG, and Paris is small, and therefore maps lie to me when they tell me how far things are. I re-learned this fact today (as I'm sure I will many, many times) when I headed for the post office in the 5th arrondissement, also nice and close. It's all so little!
My other handy discovery of yesterday - turns out my bank, which is a nice, two-minute walk from uni via the shortcut I've discovered, also has branches and ATMS in Le Bourget (between the pharmacy and the post office, I forget exactly where, but it's a short walk, naturally) and at Place du 8 mai 1945 in La Courneuve, where I change from the metro to the bus.
Speaking of buses, they're crazy around here! Even the bus drivers themselves fail to see the logic of a 20-minute wait at the terminus for three buses to then leave at once. My poor, unmathsy brain is also bamboozled by the way the trip to the metro in the morning (during peak hour, please note) takes the five to 10 minutes that it should to cover the relevant distance, yet said trip in the other direction at 3pm takes at least 20 minutes (from when I started counting...). It's actually faster at 5pm, I've found! They also build buses differently here - most of the centre of the bus is given over to standing room, which makes sense since every bus I've been on while here has been so full it was standing room only...
Our teacher mentioned something about the metro last week that I've noticed applies elsewhere as well. All rubbish bins in the Paris metro, and in many public areas around Paris (even footpaths in Le Bourget) are clear plastic bags hanging from a metal ring. Why? So that you can't hide a bomb in the rubbish. I kid you not. Paris rubbish bins are designed not to be conducive to terrosist attacks. It's a little sad that we live in a world where you have to think this way.
I've also discovered that, according to the popular opinion of my friends and Erasmus peers, group E is thought to be the top class is our French stage intensif. Apparently, A is the bottom and E is the top. Needless to say, I'm more than a little confused and concerned by this concept...though I'm equally concerned by the other way round!
Mind you, they told me this after I complained how bored I was because my class was really easy (today we conjugated the two most common verbs in the four most common tenses! Yay!). Hmmm......France makes NO sense at all.
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| At the CROUS canteen - Rafael, Lisanne, Martin |
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| My chocolate mousse (and Luis Felipe's arm) |
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| ...then the world would be a much more sober place (pun intended) |
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| The bus stop in La Courneuve |
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| Sorbonne's library, which has a HUGE collection of Spanish and French literature... |
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| Wandering east through Le Bourget |
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| A new take on 'Beware of the Dog' ('mechant' means 'wicked')... |
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| The clear plastic bag bins - see story above. |
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| The west end of Rue Rigaud, looking east |
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| The clinic next door from the west side |
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| The bottom of Rue Santeuil (where Sorbonne is) |
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| Guess where...no, you'll never guess... |
Saturday, 22 September 2012
Life's little dramas
As usual, I'm blaming the boys for all my misfortunes, justly or not. This time I'm blaming Martin for the mild (but nasty) cold I seem to have caught - after all, he was complaining of a sore throat yesterday morning. Needless to say, the kettle's getting an extra workout, and my productive day of getting stuff done has turned into a lazy feeling-sorry-for-Firefly day.
Yesterday was pretty much a normal day. I saw Martin before class and we made plans to have lunch after class. Of course, it occurred to me during break, after I managed to carry a hot chocolate from the ground-floor canteen to our third-floor canteen all by myself, that I'd forgotten to put any more money in my wallet that morning, and I wasn't sure how much I had left. Lucky for me, I had my metro fare home and enough over for lunch.
I got out of class, though, to find a message from Martin saying he'd left some stuff at home and had to go back for it, but would be at uni again later. Having no idea whether Paul and Lisanne's class had finished or not, I went for lunch with a bunch of other girls from my class that I hadn't really spoken to before - three Germans, two Czechs, an Austrian, and my Ecuador-born Italian friend. For the first time the common language really WAS French (except for the bit of English that Julia and I used since German and English are so compatible).
Returning to uni, I finally managed to speak to someone in the Spanish department about language levels and then headed for the library, where I borrowed my first book - Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days - in French, of course. Martin was still nowhere to be found and I was getting frustrated when he messaged me to say that he wasn't coming in as he had to go to the hospital. Naturally, given my recent experiences, this caused a mild panic attack on my part. Turns out the genius walked into a door at home and wound up resembling the fruit bat from Mum's favourite joke that flew into a tree, and the pharmacist had recommended getting stitches.
Having been reassured that the poor child didn't need me to come and get him since he'd already been discharged from hospital, I dropped in to visit Brigitte at my residence on my way out to the shops. She quickly furnished me with an attestation de logement to give to my bank so I can get my bank card, and while we were at it we sorted out the direct debiting for my monthly rent, which I'm sure made her happy. I also gave her the large pile of mail I had for my apartment's previous tenants, which greatly outweighed the mail for me...nothing like feeling loved.
Having woken up this morning with Martin's little cold, there was very little motivation to do anything but sit around in my pajamas and mope til 2pm, which I did, and did very well. It was sunny outside, so I decided to go for a walk to get some sunshine - and some Vitamin C tablets if I could find them. The pharmacy was closed on Saturdays, unsurprisingly, and there was no sign of vitamins in either of Le Bourget's two supermarkets - yes, I said two. I found another one on my walk. It's bigger than the Franprix supermarket that I've been going to and it sort of resembles Aldi on the inside - except for the bread section, naturally, which resembles a neat, well-stocked little bakery of its own.
I was trying to find the local pool, which is supposedly at the end of my street, but having found my way to the local sports complex which was five minutes in a different direction without seeing any sign of a pool, I decided it was time to head home to mope again. That was when I saw the sign - literally. "Publique piscine". I continued heading home, but I had a pretty good squiz from the other side of the road so I knew where to look on my next walk. It was only a 200 metre walk home, and once I've crossed Rue Jean Jaures I'd estimate another 50 metres to the pool - really not a problem for a person with two feet (which I will have by the time I'm allowed to swim again).
The cripple thing goes down a lot better here than it would in Australia. Everyone offers me a seat on the bus or metro, even when I'm not looking for one. I even got ma'amed the other day by an adorable 10-year-old boy offering me a seat. "Excusez-moi, madame, voulez-vous s'assessoir?" "Excuse me, ma'am, would you like to sit down?" I almost laughed. I have to remember that to someone of his age I'm an older person, and they therefore have to be unfailingly polite, using 'madame' and 'vous' (the polite form of 'you'). The worst part is I don't know how to address him back! Monsieur - perhaps?
The crutches do have downsides, though. It rained yesterday afternoon, and apart from the obvious difficulties of using crutches on wet, slippery streets (even worse when you enter buildings with polished floors - 'slipped on a banana peel' comes to mind), a girl who's using two hands on her crutches can't hold an umbrella! When I'm heading home alone I just have to put up with it and get wet. It's still summer, though (just), and the mosquitoes here think I'm just as much of a rare delicacy as did the ones at home. Damn thing got me on the metro yesterday morning twice before I noticed he was there. I had a nice red spot on my face (and hand) to try and explain when I arrived at uni. Course, they match the fading mozzie bites from my first few nights here, when it was as hot as the Outback at Christmas and I had the windows open of an evening...
In a minute I'll grab a needle and thread and finishing patching my jeans and watching Bones before bed. Every night before I go to sleep I look out the window at the Eiffel Tower all lit up. I'm not sure why, since it's not even a monument that I really like, but it looks kind of magical at nighttime. She seems like some kind of golden guardian angel, watching over the city of Paris in its sleep. It's reassuring to see her standing there every evening like an old friend, especially on the days when I miss Australia just a tiny little bit - like today.
Yesterday was pretty much a normal day. I saw Martin before class and we made plans to have lunch after class. Of course, it occurred to me during break, after I managed to carry a hot chocolate from the ground-floor canteen to our third-floor canteen all by myself, that I'd forgotten to put any more money in my wallet that morning, and I wasn't sure how much I had left. Lucky for me, I had my metro fare home and enough over for lunch.
I got out of class, though, to find a message from Martin saying he'd left some stuff at home and had to go back for it, but would be at uni again later. Having no idea whether Paul and Lisanne's class had finished or not, I went for lunch with a bunch of other girls from my class that I hadn't really spoken to before - three Germans, two Czechs, an Austrian, and my Ecuador-born Italian friend. For the first time the common language really WAS French (except for the bit of English that Julia and I used since German and English are so compatible).
Returning to uni, I finally managed to speak to someone in the Spanish department about language levels and then headed for the library, where I borrowed my first book - Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days - in French, of course. Martin was still nowhere to be found and I was getting frustrated when he messaged me to say that he wasn't coming in as he had to go to the hospital. Naturally, given my recent experiences, this caused a mild panic attack on my part. Turns out the genius walked into a door at home and wound up resembling the fruit bat from Mum's favourite joke that flew into a tree, and the pharmacist had recommended getting stitches.
Having been reassured that the poor child didn't need me to come and get him since he'd already been discharged from hospital, I dropped in to visit Brigitte at my residence on my way out to the shops. She quickly furnished me with an attestation de logement to give to my bank so I can get my bank card, and while we were at it we sorted out the direct debiting for my monthly rent, which I'm sure made her happy. I also gave her the large pile of mail I had for my apartment's previous tenants, which greatly outweighed the mail for me...nothing like feeling loved.
Having woken up this morning with Martin's little cold, there was very little motivation to do anything but sit around in my pajamas and mope til 2pm, which I did, and did very well. It was sunny outside, so I decided to go for a walk to get some sunshine - and some Vitamin C tablets if I could find them. The pharmacy was closed on Saturdays, unsurprisingly, and there was no sign of vitamins in either of Le Bourget's two supermarkets - yes, I said two. I found another one on my walk. It's bigger than the Franprix supermarket that I've been going to and it sort of resembles Aldi on the inside - except for the bread section, naturally, which resembles a neat, well-stocked little bakery of its own.
I was trying to find the local pool, which is supposedly at the end of my street, but having found my way to the local sports complex which was five minutes in a different direction without seeing any sign of a pool, I decided it was time to head home to mope again. That was when I saw the sign - literally. "Publique piscine". I continued heading home, but I had a pretty good squiz from the other side of the road so I knew where to look on my next walk. It was only a 200 metre walk home, and once I've crossed Rue Jean Jaures I'd estimate another 50 metres to the pool - really not a problem for a person with two feet (which I will have by the time I'm allowed to swim again).
The cripple thing goes down a lot better here than it would in Australia. Everyone offers me a seat on the bus or metro, even when I'm not looking for one. I even got ma'amed the other day by an adorable 10-year-old boy offering me a seat. "Excusez-moi, madame, voulez-vous s'assessoir?" "Excuse me, ma'am, would you like to sit down?" I almost laughed. I have to remember that to someone of his age I'm an older person, and they therefore have to be unfailingly polite, using 'madame' and 'vous' (the polite form of 'you'). The worst part is I don't know how to address him back! Monsieur - perhaps?
The crutches do have downsides, though. It rained yesterday afternoon, and apart from the obvious difficulties of using crutches on wet, slippery streets (even worse when you enter buildings with polished floors - 'slipped on a banana peel' comes to mind), a girl who's using two hands on her crutches can't hold an umbrella! When I'm heading home alone I just have to put up with it and get wet. It's still summer, though (just), and the mosquitoes here think I'm just as much of a rare delicacy as did the ones at home. Damn thing got me on the metro yesterday morning twice before I noticed he was there. I had a nice red spot on my face (and hand) to try and explain when I arrived at uni. Course, they match the fading mozzie bites from my first few nights here, when it was as hot as the Outback at Christmas and I had the windows open of an evening...
In a minute I'll grab a needle and thread and finishing patching my jeans and watching Bones before bed. Every night before I go to sleep I look out the window at the Eiffel Tower all lit up. I'm not sure why, since it's not even a monument that I really like, but it looks kind of magical at nighttime. She seems like some kind of golden guardian angel, watching over the city of Paris in its sleep. It's reassuring to see her standing there every evening like an old friend, especially on the days when I miss Australia just a tiny little bit - like today.
Saturday, 15 September 2012
Paris photos
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| Orientation day at Sorbonne |
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| The other kids in the class |
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| Paul and random people |
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| The tramline near my house - on the way home from the Carrefour |
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| My uni's metro station - Censier-Daubenton |
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| The Paris metro |
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| More photos of Paris metro trains |
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| At Pigalle metro station, they label which direction you're going...gorgeous tiles. |
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| Meet my cacti - McPedro, Spiderplant and Dumbledore! |
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| Telling me how high I'd climbed at the Tour Montparnasse |
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| The Tour Montparnasse at night (I went aaaaall the way up!) |
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| Sebastopol! |
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| Looking towards Paris from my window. |
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| Dead centre- the Basilique of Sacre-Coeur and the Eiffel Tower behind it. |
Thursday, 13 September 2012
Paris passages
So I just made my first trip downstairs to the laundry, coins in hand, since I'm almost out of socks, only to find a sign announcing that the laundry is out of commission until next Monday. A peep inside revealed a bunch of washing machines being replaced - which, come to think of it, explains the delivery truck I saw the other day (I thought they were fridges, but maybe not). As such my plans for the evening have now fallen through and I'm free to recount some of the episodes of the past few days.
Yesterday began with the alarming realisation half an hour beforehand that I was meant to present at Sorbonne to complete my administrative enrolment (as opposed to my academic enrolment in my subjects, which is done independently within each department). I clearly wasn't going to make it on time, so I figured there was no hurry. I blame the boys for that - I specifically asked on Tuesday if there wasn't something we were meant to go to on Wednesday, as I'd written the date, time and room down from the orientation Powerpoint, though without an event, and Anas assured me there was nothing. He had a point, given he, Martin and Paul are Erasmus students (European inter-university exchange program) and the enrolment was for international students majoring in the LLD department (languages, literatures and something-or-other).
I rocked up an hour and a half late to the LLD office, really not sure what on earth was happening. The office lady who was triaging the students sat me down once she realised why I was there, asked for my enrolment papers and then asked me to choose from the social security companies offered. I tried to get her to explain the whole social security thing and why I had to pay another 200 euros for it after paying for an $AU1000 travel insurance policy with unlimited medical. The answer (as I understood it) was essentially that it's a French government requirement, and if I've learned one thing over the past few weeks and months it's that you don't question or mess with the bureaucracy around here, imbecilic though it may be.
It took a remarkably short amount of time and very little effort on my part, but subject to handing in a docket at the nominated social security company's office downstairs, I was then enrolled in Sorbonne and handed a student card with a copy of my passport photo in the corner. Naturally there was no-one in the downstairs office, and a quick trip to the very understanding people in the disability office yielded a personal elevator code to spare me using the stairs, thankfully.
I went to Anas's place in Montmartre last night - even though I only texted Martin to tell him and Paul what was happening as I left Le Bourget, they somehow beat me there! Anas also neglected to mention the number of stairs I would have to climb or descend to get through the metro and Montmartre...I was not impressed given the numbers was in the hundreds, I'm sure. We headed to a nearby bar for a drink and then found a little Italian cafe with amazing spinach and ricotta ravioli (note: spinach is epinard in French). I think the language of conversation for the evening was about 60% English, 30% French and 10% German (though I keep telling them they can only speak German if they teach me to speak it too!) We're slowly getting ourselves into gear on the French. I had to explain to Martin as well that since I switched the language of my phone over I can now only text him in French. It's OK, his French is about as good/bad as mine so it doesn't matter if we make mistakes!
Today was the day when I made the long-awaited, much dreaded trip to the prefecture about my carte de sejour - the residency card. My cycnical side wondered just how sincere was the sign that welcomed me to Seine-Saint-Denis, just outside the prefecture's town hall. Well, my cynical side was right. After an hour or so of waiting, half of it standing in line on my crutches, I was told that you have to go somewhere else - Raincy, I now think he was saying - to get a carte de sejour, despite being told EXPLICITLY by the people at the Le Bourget town hall to go to the town hall at Bobigny, even going so far as to write down the address and how to get there. Given I was on crutches, they eventually put me through to a window anyway, where the fellow on the other side took one look at my passport and told me that my visa WAS a valid carte de sejour, pointing to the signature from the French Embassy in Australia and some key wording. Apparently the dolt to whom I showed my visa at the bank doesn't recognise a valid carte de sejour, or maybe the prefecture lied to me - it's France, who knows.
I consoled my tired, upset self with the choice of yummies at the boulangerie - I plan to try them all over time. My tarte aux framboises (raspberry tart) was made with lovely fresh raspberries, and was pretty nice, though I wouldn't get it often. Other than that I'm now caught up on emails and have a pretty clean and tidy room, as well as being pretty bored. I'll have to see if I can rouse the boys to do something tomorrow night. I leave the rest of this entry to a series of random observations and other events from my time in Paris:
- I discovered the other day (though only after someone pointed it out to me) that you can see the Eiffel Tower from my window. Yes, the thing I'd noticed shining a spotlight on the Paris night sky is actually the Dame du fer, the original Iron Lady. I checked this morning - visible in the daytime, too! When the world's most renowned landmark, something of picture-postcard fame, forms part of your skyline, it really drives home the fact that you live in Paris. Every time I look out the window now I get a chill when I see the Tower and know it for what it is. I struggle to believe what's happening and that I'm actually here. It still feels like the two-week dream adventure from which I first remember this city, over five years ago.
- Emergency sirens in Paris are out of tune, I swear. They hurt my ears, Mum!
- I bought my cactuses! Photos soon to come of McPedro, Spiderplant and Dumbledore in their new home.
- I went to the metro station at La Courneuve on my way home today to ask about getting an Imagine-R Navigo pass for public transport. They were out of application forms, but at least I had the right idea, so I'll try a different metro station tomorrow.
- There is so much going on in Paris. Anas and I are already thinking of going to see Les Mis in the 20th arrondissement in October and Lord of the Dance near Christmas. There are music festivals and all kinds of things and I only hope I can find the time to see everything that I want to.
- Paris drivers are crazy! There are no lane markings on the road at intersections, and they get really impatient really quickly, so it's not uncommon to see traffic in crazy patterns at intersections all honking at each other!
- I screwed my courage to the sticking place today and went to the local tabac, a small store inside the local bar. 'Tabac' means tobacco, and certainly the place sells cigarettes, but they also sell innumerable other handy items, like phone stuff. I successful bought a recharge voucher today and not only proved to myself that I could do it but that there was somewhere I could buy them close to home - good to know.
Yesterday began with the alarming realisation half an hour beforehand that I was meant to present at Sorbonne to complete my administrative enrolment (as opposed to my academic enrolment in my subjects, which is done independently within each department). I clearly wasn't going to make it on time, so I figured there was no hurry. I blame the boys for that - I specifically asked on Tuesday if there wasn't something we were meant to go to on Wednesday, as I'd written the date, time and room down from the orientation Powerpoint, though without an event, and Anas assured me there was nothing. He had a point, given he, Martin and Paul are Erasmus students (European inter-university exchange program) and the enrolment was for international students majoring in the LLD department (languages, literatures and something-or-other).
I rocked up an hour and a half late to the LLD office, really not sure what on earth was happening. The office lady who was triaging the students sat me down once she realised why I was there, asked for my enrolment papers and then asked me to choose from the social security companies offered. I tried to get her to explain the whole social security thing and why I had to pay another 200 euros for it after paying for an $AU1000 travel insurance policy with unlimited medical. The answer (as I understood it) was essentially that it's a French government requirement, and if I've learned one thing over the past few weeks and months it's that you don't question or mess with the bureaucracy around here, imbecilic though it may be.
It took a remarkably short amount of time and very little effort on my part, but subject to handing in a docket at the nominated social security company's office downstairs, I was then enrolled in Sorbonne and handed a student card with a copy of my passport photo in the corner. Naturally there was no-one in the downstairs office, and a quick trip to the very understanding people in the disability office yielded a personal elevator code to spare me using the stairs, thankfully.
I went to Anas's place in Montmartre last night - even though I only texted Martin to tell him and Paul what was happening as I left Le Bourget, they somehow beat me there! Anas also neglected to mention the number of stairs I would have to climb or descend to get through the metro and Montmartre...I was not impressed given the numbers was in the hundreds, I'm sure. We headed to a nearby bar for a drink and then found a little Italian cafe with amazing spinach and ricotta ravioli (note: spinach is epinard in French). I think the language of conversation for the evening was about 60% English, 30% French and 10% German (though I keep telling them they can only speak German if they teach me to speak it too!) We're slowly getting ourselves into gear on the French. I had to explain to Martin as well that since I switched the language of my phone over I can now only text him in French. It's OK, his French is about as good/bad as mine so it doesn't matter if we make mistakes!
Today was the day when I made the long-awaited, much dreaded trip to the prefecture about my carte de sejour - the residency card. My cycnical side wondered just how sincere was the sign that welcomed me to Seine-Saint-Denis, just outside the prefecture's town hall. Well, my cynical side was right. After an hour or so of waiting, half of it standing in line on my crutches, I was told that you have to go somewhere else - Raincy, I now think he was saying - to get a carte de sejour, despite being told EXPLICITLY by the people at the Le Bourget town hall to go to the town hall at Bobigny, even going so far as to write down the address and how to get there. Given I was on crutches, they eventually put me through to a window anyway, where the fellow on the other side took one look at my passport and told me that my visa WAS a valid carte de sejour, pointing to the signature from the French Embassy in Australia and some key wording. Apparently the dolt to whom I showed my visa at the bank doesn't recognise a valid carte de sejour, or maybe the prefecture lied to me - it's France, who knows.
I consoled my tired, upset self with the choice of yummies at the boulangerie - I plan to try them all over time. My tarte aux framboises (raspberry tart) was made with lovely fresh raspberries, and was pretty nice, though I wouldn't get it often. Other than that I'm now caught up on emails and have a pretty clean and tidy room, as well as being pretty bored. I'll have to see if I can rouse the boys to do something tomorrow night. I leave the rest of this entry to a series of random observations and other events from my time in Paris:
- I discovered the other day (though only after someone pointed it out to me) that you can see the Eiffel Tower from my window. Yes, the thing I'd noticed shining a spotlight on the Paris night sky is actually the Dame du fer, the original Iron Lady. I checked this morning - visible in the daytime, too! When the world's most renowned landmark, something of picture-postcard fame, forms part of your skyline, it really drives home the fact that you live in Paris. Every time I look out the window now I get a chill when I see the Tower and know it for what it is. I struggle to believe what's happening and that I'm actually here. It still feels like the two-week dream adventure from which I first remember this city, over five years ago.
- Emergency sirens in Paris are out of tune, I swear. They hurt my ears, Mum!
- I bought my cactuses! Photos soon to come of McPedro, Spiderplant and Dumbledore in their new home.
- I went to the metro station at La Courneuve on my way home today to ask about getting an Imagine-R Navigo pass for public transport. They were out of application forms, but at least I had the right idea, so I'll try a different metro station tomorrow.
- There is so much going on in Paris. Anas and I are already thinking of going to see Les Mis in the 20th arrondissement in October and Lord of the Dance near Christmas. There are music festivals and all kinds of things and I only hope I can find the time to see everything that I want to.
- Paris drivers are crazy! There are no lane markings on the road at intersections, and they get really impatient really quickly, so it's not uncommon to see traffic in crazy patterns at intersections all honking at each other!
- I screwed my courage to the sticking place today and went to the local tabac, a small store inside the local bar. 'Tabac' means tobacco, and certainly the place sells cigarettes, but they also sell innumerable other handy items, like phone stuff. I successful bought a recharge voucher today and not only proved to myself that I could do it but that there was somewhere I could buy them close to home - good to know.
Tuesday, 11 September 2012
La Sorbonne
So today was my orientation day at Sorbonne Uni. I was up much earlier than I wanted to be (6am) to make sure I was there on time at 8.30. I left the residence at 7am and was on the metro by 7.30. It's a 35-minute trip from La Courneuve - 8 mai 1945 to Sorbonne's nearest metro station, Censier-Daubenton - I timed it. When you know where you're going, Sorbonne's Censier Centre is a five-minute walk from the metro, even on crutches. I walked into the foyer 20 minutes early and took up residence near the entrance to Amphitheatre B, near a bunch of chattering students who I assumed also weren't from France.
As it approached 8.30 and the foyer began filling with people, I found myself in a conversation with a group of other exchange students, mostly from Europe (though I did have a southern hemisphere compatriot from Brazil). What was the language of conversation, you might ask? English! I got a few laughs when I pointed out to everyone that despite the fact that we had come all the (for some a very long) way to France to learn French, we were talking in English even though it was only the native language of about two of us.
At about a quarter to nine everyone began filing into the amphitheatre, and I found myself in the company of three lovely young fellows - a French Swiss named Anas, an Austrian named Paul and a German called Martin (trust me to fall in with just about the cutest guy in the room - just don't tell Silvio he's been replaced in my Deutsch affections!) We sat through the standard welcomes from the President of the university (I'm impressed - I doubt even Ed Byrne welcomes the Monash exchange students, let alone Alan Finkel) and various people from the Service des Relations Interational for us foreign kids (by the way, they have two classifications for exchange students in France - when they say 'international', that means 'anyone not cool enough to be part of Europe'. Anas kept nudging me whenever they mentioned it since I was the only one it applied to). There was also the usual information about how and when to enrol (I repeat the joke about the French inventing the word bureaucracy) and then they let us out for a quick snack break. Only in France would a university orientation provide chaussons aux pomme (little apple puffs) as a snack.
The second half of the session began with some information about the CAF - it's French housing assistance, available to anyone living in France. They could probably have done the whole presentation in 5 minutes from what I heard, since I was falling asleep for most of it. Martin laughed and agreed when I said my head was hurting from the extraneous French with which we were being bombarded. It presented us with another problem though - EVERYTHING in France requires a bank account: CAF, your electricity bill (which is worth nearly as much as a passport in France), phone sims, even some transport ticket machines only accept bank cards, you name it. The problem is that opening a bank account is damn near impossible - and some banks ask for an EDF (electricity bill) to open the account...talk about a catch-22. I'm going to bank number #2 tomorrow, and Anas has an appointment with HSBC. Chances are whoever opens an account first will tell the others and we'll all get accounts with whichever bank is kindest to exchange students doing their very best to navigate the ridiculous bureaucracy!
At the end of the session they had us collect the documentation we’d need for enrolment, and then Martin, Anas and I headed across the road to a café with free WiFi for lunch. Anas lives in Montmartre, not far from me, Martin lives in Montparnasse, just south of Sorbonne (though he keeps saying Montmartre by accident, and we keep giving him grief for it) and Paul currently lives in a youth hostel, so none of them have Internet at home. In fact, I’m probably the most well-established of us all so far, which is a really sad statement on our lives. If you ever want to go on exchange, make sure you go to a country with a minimum of bureaucracy – seriously.
Just before 1:30 Martin and I headed upstairs for the 2.00pm French language test that was on offer. I have no idea if it will be useful, especially since I’m not intending to enrol in any of the specialised exchange-student-French courses on offer, but I figured it couldn’t hurt. After a 45-minute wait (in which we couldn’t find Paul) they finally posted the room lists and let us go in. It wasn’t too bad, test-wise, since I’ve always hated listening comprehension work (it’s so not realistic), but my grammar has always been excellent and my reading comprehension is pretty good, even if the questions got harder as we went along.
I did find Paul in the end – as the assessor called our names in pairs to hand in our tests I discovered that surname-wise Paul was the guy after me! We had no idea if Martin had finished yet (given he’s a native Swiss-French speaker, Anas opted out of the French ability test – fair enough), so we headed downstairs (turns out there IS an elevator, which I may just end up using) and went home, discussing plans for tomorrow (the party’s at Anas’s place – he’s got his own actual apartment). I headed off through the drizzle towards the metro for the trip home. I did detour via the Carrefour again (I say detour, but really it’s another excursion all of its own) and got my coat-hangers and cactuses, among other kitchen items (I’ve stuck with the purple and green theme, by the way - and Grandma, I don’t hold with the ‘purple and green should never be seen' – I quite like it!).
I ended up going down to the pizza shop for dinner again, since I’m out of spaghetti ingredients temporarily and my kitchen doesn’t run to much just yet (I’m seriously beginning to crave vegetables though!). The pizza guy down there must like me, because he threw in a drink for me, and he even remembered which one was my favourite! It is _definitely_ bedtime now, since it’s past 11 and my body currently thinks bedtime is 9:30pm, an arrangement which I rather like…
Tomorrow I should probably go to the prefecture about a carte de sejour, since Paul is house-hunting and Martin is enrolling in his units, though we’re meant to be meeting at Anas’s tomorrow evening. This is going to be fun. We’re already planning road trips – Anas wants to go to Montpellier, in the south of France, plus he can show us around Switzerland and Martin around Germany – and Martin and I are planning a trip to Disneyland Paris once I’m off crutches, since we both love Disneyland. Anas is doing everything he possibly can to derail the expedition, since he knows he’s getting dragged along and he HATES Disneyland. Like I said, this is going to be fun!
As it approached 8.30 and the foyer began filling with people, I found myself in a conversation with a group of other exchange students, mostly from Europe (though I did have a southern hemisphere compatriot from Brazil). What was the language of conversation, you might ask? English! I got a few laughs when I pointed out to everyone that despite the fact that we had come all the (for some a very long) way to France to learn French, we were talking in English even though it was only the native language of about two of us.
At about a quarter to nine everyone began filing into the amphitheatre, and I found myself in the company of three lovely young fellows - a French Swiss named Anas, an Austrian named Paul and a German called Martin (trust me to fall in with just about the cutest guy in the room - just don't tell Silvio he's been replaced in my Deutsch affections!) We sat through the standard welcomes from the President of the university (I'm impressed - I doubt even Ed Byrne welcomes the Monash exchange students, let alone Alan Finkel) and various people from the Service des Relations Interational for us foreign kids (by the way, they have two classifications for exchange students in France - when they say 'international', that means 'anyone not cool enough to be part of Europe'. Anas kept nudging me whenever they mentioned it since I was the only one it applied to). There was also the usual information about how and when to enrol (I repeat the joke about the French inventing the word bureaucracy) and then they let us out for a quick snack break. Only in France would a university orientation provide chaussons aux pomme (little apple puffs) as a snack.
The second half of the session began with some information about the CAF - it's French housing assistance, available to anyone living in France. They could probably have done the whole presentation in 5 minutes from what I heard, since I was falling asleep for most of it. Martin laughed and agreed when I said my head was hurting from the extraneous French with which we were being bombarded. It presented us with another problem though - EVERYTHING in France requires a bank account: CAF, your electricity bill (which is worth nearly as much as a passport in France), phone sims, even some transport ticket machines only accept bank cards, you name it. The problem is that opening a bank account is damn near impossible - and some banks ask for an EDF (electricity bill) to open the account...talk about a catch-22. I'm going to bank number #2 tomorrow, and Anas has an appointment with HSBC. Chances are whoever opens an account first will tell the others and we'll all get accounts with whichever bank is kindest to exchange students doing their very best to navigate the ridiculous bureaucracy!
At the end of the session they had us collect the documentation we’d need for enrolment, and then Martin, Anas and I headed across the road to a café with free WiFi for lunch. Anas lives in Montmartre, not far from me, Martin lives in Montparnasse, just south of Sorbonne (though he keeps saying Montmartre by accident, and we keep giving him grief for it) and Paul currently lives in a youth hostel, so none of them have Internet at home. In fact, I’m probably the most well-established of us all so far, which is a really sad statement on our lives. If you ever want to go on exchange, make sure you go to a country with a minimum of bureaucracy – seriously.
Just before 1:30 Martin and I headed upstairs for the 2.00pm French language test that was on offer. I have no idea if it will be useful, especially since I’m not intending to enrol in any of the specialised exchange-student-French courses on offer, but I figured it couldn’t hurt. After a 45-minute wait (in which we couldn’t find Paul) they finally posted the room lists and let us go in. It wasn’t too bad, test-wise, since I’ve always hated listening comprehension work (it’s so not realistic), but my grammar has always been excellent and my reading comprehension is pretty good, even if the questions got harder as we went along.
I did find Paul in the end – as the assessor called our names in pairs to hand in our tests I discovered that surname-wise Paul was the guy after me! We had no idea if Martin had finished yet (given he’s a native Swiss-French speaker, Anas opted out of the French ability test – fair enough), so we headed downstairs (turns out there IS an elevator, which I may just end up using) and went home, discussing plans for tomorrow (the party’s at Anas’s place – he’s got his own actual apartment). I headed off through the drizzle towards the metro for the trip home. I did detour via the Carrefour again (I say detour, but really it’s another excursion all of its own) and got my coat-hangers and cactuses, among other kitchen items (I’ve stuck with the purple and green theme, by the way - and Grandma, I don’t hold with the ‘purple and green should never be seen' – I quite like it!).
I ended up going down to the pizza shop for dinner again, since I’m out of spaghetti ingredients temporarily and my kitchen doesn’t run to much just yet (I’m seriously beginning to crave vegetables though!). The pizza guy down there must like me, because he threw in a drink for me, and he even remembered which one was my favourite! It is _definitely_ bedtime now, since it’s past 11 and my body currently thinks bedtime is 9:30pm, an arrangement which I rather like…
Tomorrow I should probably go to the prefecture about a carte de sejour, since Paul is house-hunting and Martin is enrolling in his units, though we’re meant to be meeting at Anas’s tomorrow evening. This is going to be fun. We’re already planning road trips – Anas wants to go to Montpellier, in the south of France, plus he can show us around Switzerland and Martin around Germany – and Martin and I are planning a trip to Disneyland Paris once I’m off crutches, since we both love Disneyland. Anas is doing everything he possibly can to derail the expedition, since he knows he’s getting dragged along and he HATES Disneyland. Like I said, this is going to be fun!
Monday, 10 September 2012
Domestic adventures
So yesterday Mademoiselle Firefly learnt the importance of always carrying her camera with her, even on a simple trip to the supermarket. I was walking back from the pharmacy (closed on Sunday, by the way) when I noticed…something down a side street. I decided in the interests of cultural experiences that it was worth investigating.
In the Place du…I can’t remember what, I found a market, some sort of annual or semi-annual cultural and sporting exchange of the town. All the local sports clubs as well as various community organisations had stalls around the edge of the square, and a stage in the middle hosted bands singing in, while I was there, English. Seeing as it was lunchtime, after a brief walk around the square I joined a queue to buy some lunch.
Ordering a drink and some French fries (kind of tasteless, by the way – our chips are so much better), the (kinda cute) guy serving me suddenly asked “Do you speak English?” A little surprised, I told him yes, and burying my face briefly in my hands at being caught, I asked, “How can you tell?” “Your accent,” he told me. “I have an accent?” “Yes, just a little bit.” Damn! Apparently my French contains traces of English speaker – enough (along with my broken French) to identify me as ‘please speak English’. Ah well. I sat down and ate my lunch before heading to the supermarket to buy my long-awaited broom! I now have a clean apartment!
I’ve started cooking my own meals, tentatively using the pot provided, though I’m still using my own plastic crockery and cutlery until I can buy my own. Yesterday I even bought a demi-baguette (half-baguette) to go with my pasta-coated-in-cheese-and-basil. I’ve also done most of my unpacking now (yes, Mum, I found the birthday present as well) so my room actually looks neat, presentable and bedroom-like – more photos to come.
I have the windows wide open, as usual, to let the cool Paris air in, and I have my usual beautiful view of the Paris sky fading into night, sunset included. The planes are leaving white streaks across the late afternoon (8pm) sky as they head to and from the airport just north-west of here. I’ve been rising and sleeping with the sun – I conk out around 9.30pm from a combination of exhaustion, sleep deprivation, emotional stress and jet lag, and wake up just after sunrise around 7am, which is after all 3pm in Australia. Tomorrow I have planned the long-awaited and much-dreaded trip to the nearby Carrefour (large supermarket/shopping centre) to try and buy some much needed items, and if I have the energy I might just go for that walk to find the local swimming pool.
Day 5 - started with the usual conversation downstairs with the family on Skype. I then packed my bag for a morning trip around town - the pharmacy for some antiseptic and bandages, the supermarket for some tissues, the town hall for instructions on how to get a carte de sejour, and the bank (no.2, that is) to open a bank account. It was closed. On my return to the residence I was grabbed by Rony, who, after a bit of polite conversation (in French! Now he knows I actually can speak the language when not jet-lagged!), sent me in to see Brigitte.
Brigitte went through and formally signed and stamped all the contractual stuff we'd emailed her, then had Rony make photocopies for me, saying I'd need the for the bank account. We did a little more paperwork and then talked about my studies and my plans to become a cycling journalist (since Brigitte assumed I wanted to be a teacher with my languages) before Rony accompanied me back upstairs to put the final touches on my apartment. After hanging the curtain for me (since cripple can't do anything for herself anymore) and fixing the cupboard door as well as adding the handle, he noted that my fridge still doesn't close properly and headed downstairs to grab the internet cord he had for me. When he came back, he was pushing a fridge.
We traded my dying model for a brand-new mini-fridge before Rony left me to sort my room out and connect up the Internet cord. Success! I now have Internet in my room! A long conversation on Skype with the parents from the comfort of my own room and some ministrations to my ailing foot and it was already lunchtime and I had chores I couldn't put off. It was time to go to the Carrefour.
Carrefour is sort of like...imagine Coles meets Big W with a little bit of Harvey Norman thrown in for good measure. It's a supermarket and general goods store that does food, electrical, computers, furniture, kitchen, clothing, stationery...the works. Damn! I forgot my cactus! Never mind, more about that later. Anyway, Carrefour has just about everything, so it was definitely where to go to find the kettle and coat-hangers that I so badly needed.
The bus to Place de 8 mai 1945 in La Courneuve again and then I got to take my first trip on the tram. Paris has four tram lines with very limited routes, compared to the rest of their public transport system, and one just so happens to go through Seine-St-Denis, my prefecture. A four-minute trip two stops east to Drancy-Avenir found me outside the Avenir Centre Commercial (Future Shopping Centre) in the suburb of Drancy. A Carrefour usually has a few other specialty shops attached to make up the shopping centre, but it's Carrefour that's the most comprehensive. I wandered along outside just staring for a while, before diving into the kitchen section.
15 minutes later I had some basic cutlery of my own and a mug and bowl, but no sign of the kettle. I'd also located the plant section with cheap little cactuses for sale. I'd even chose the trio that were to come home with me (though I hadn't decided which one was going to be named McPedro), though as you can see above I forgot to go back for them. I'll be returning in the near future, so I'll collect them then.
I scooped up a teatowel, flannel (or what passes for a flannel/face cloth in France - this pair of fuzzy gloves that look sort of like those bath loofah things...whatever. Mine just got a new life sponging sweat off my over-worked left leg), and even found coat-hangers for both my skirts and my blouses. I stumbled over the kettles (though thankfully not literally) quite by accident while inspecting the kitchen knives (though without a chopping board, the knife still isn't much use...). I'd been going for a purple theme, which was kind of thrown out by the lime green kettle, though since it was much more attractive than the orange one, I didn't mind too much. A funny French version of Blu-tack and I was ready to go (though I did pick up something else at the counter - Mum, show Kiri the photo below...)
Of course, I then had to lug my spoils home in my backpack (after stopping for a late neglected lunch at the boulangerie). Needless to say, it was a longer trip home than it was there. I was so exhausted from the funny-shaped backpack I was hauling that I collapsed at my desk and watched music videos for an hour (in English and in French. The new songs from Simple Plan and M. Pokora are great). I finally found the energy to hang up _most_ of my new wardrobe (I need more hangers...told you I'd be going back soon) and disseminate my new kitchen gear. In a minute, once Ive finished tidying up after dinner, I'll attach the recent photos of my clean apartment, along with new ones of my Tommeke poster on the wall and my newly-semi-furnished purple-and-lime-green kitchen. Over and out! (that is to say, au revoir, mes amis...)
In the Place du…I can’t remember what, I found a market, some sort of annual or semi-annual cultural and sporting exchange of the town. All the local sports clubs as well as various community organisations had stalls around the edge of the square, and a stage in the middle hosted bands singing in, while I was there, English. Seeing as it was lunchtime, after a brief walk around the square I joined a queue to buy some lunch.
Ordering a drink and some French fries (kind of tasteless, by the way – our chips are so much better), the (kinda cute) guy serving me suddenly asked “Do you speak English?” A little surprised, I told him yes, and burying my face briefly in my hands at being caught, I asked, “How can you tell?” “Your accent,” he told me. “I have an accent?” “Yes, just a little bit.” Damn! Apparently my French contains traces of English speaker – enough (along with my broken French) to identify me as ‘please speak English’. Ah well. I sat down and ate my lunch before heading to the supermarket to buy my long-awaited broom! I now have a clean apartment!
I’ve started cooking my own meals, tentatively using the pot provided, though I’m still using my own plastic crockery and cutlery until I can buy my own. Yesterday I even bought a demi-baguette (half-baguette) to go with my pasta-coated-in-cheese-and-basil. I’ve also done most of my unpacking now (yes, Mum, I found the birthday present as well) so my room actually looks neat, presentable and bedroom-like – more photos to come.
I have the windows wide open, as usual, to let the cool Paris air in, and I have my usual beautiful view of the Paris sky fading into night, sunset included. The planes are leaving white streaks across the late afternoon (8pm) sky as they head to and from the airport just north-west of here. I’ve been rising and sleeping with the sun – I conk out around 9.30pm from a combination of exhaustion, sleep deprivation, emotional stress and jet lag, and wake up just after sunrise around 7am, which is after all 3pm in Australia. Tomorrow I have planned the long-awaited and much-dreaded trip to the nearby Carrefour (large supermarket/shopping centre) to try and buy some much needed items, and if I have the energy I might just go for that walk to find the local swimming pool.
Day 5 - started with the usual conversation downstairs with the family on Skype. I then packed my bag for a morning trip around town - the pharmacy for some antiseptic and bandages, the supermarket for some tissues, the town hall for instructions on how to get a carte de sejour, and the bank (no.2, that is) to open a bank account. It was closed. On my return to the residence I was grabbed by Rony, who, after a bit of polite conversation (in French! Now he knows I actually can speak the language when not jet-lagged!), sent me in to see Brigitte.
Brigitte went through and formally signed and stamped all the contractual stuff we'd emailed her, then had Rony make photocopies for me, saying I'd need the for the bank account. We did a little more paperwork and then talked about my studies and my plans to become a cycling journalist (since Brigitte assumed I wanted to be a teacher with my languages) before Rony accompanied me back upstairs to put the final touches on my apartment. After hanging the curtain for me (since cripple can't do anything for herself anymore) and fixing the cupboard door as well as adding the handle, he noted that my fridge still doesn't close properly and headed downstairs to grab the internet cord he had for me. When he came back, he was pushing a fridge.
We traded my dying model for a brand-new mini-fridge before Rony left me to sort my room out and connect up the Internet cord. Success! I now have Internet in my room! A long conversation on Skype with the parents from the comfort of my own room and some ministrations to my ailing foot and it was already lunchtime and I had chores I couldn't put off. It was time to go to the Carrefour.
Carrefour is sort of like...imagine Coles meets Big W with a little bit of Harvey Norman thrown in for good measure. It's a supermarket and general goods store that does food, electrical, computers, furniture, kitchen, clothing, stationery...the works. Damn! I forgot my cactus! Never mind, more about that later. Anyway, Carrefour has just about everything, so it was definitely where to go to find the kettle and coat-hangers that I so badly needed.
The bus to Place de 8 mai 1945 in La Courneuve again and then I got to take my first trip on the tram. Paris has four tram lines with very limited routes, compared to the rest of their public transport system, and one just so happens to go through Seine-St-Denis, my prefecture. A four-minute trip two stops east to Drancy-Avenir found me outside the Avenir Centre Commercial (Future Shopping Centre) in the suburb of Drancy. A Carrefour usually has a few other specialty shops attached to make up the shopping centre, but it's Carrefour that's the most comprehensive. I wandered along outside just staring for a while, before diving into the kitchen section.
15 minutes later I had some basic cutlery of my own and a mug and bowl, but no sign of the kettle. I'd also located the plant section with cheap little cactuses for sale. I'd even chose the trio that were to come home with me (though I hadn't decided which one was going to be named McPedro), though as you can see above I forgot to go back for them. I'll be returning in the near future, so I'll collect them then.
I scooped up a teatowel, flannel (or what passes for a flannel/face cloth in France - this pair of fuzzy gloves that look sort of like those bath loofah things...whatever. Mine just got a new life sponging sweat off my over-worked left leg), and even found coat-hangers for both my skirts and my blouses. I stumbled over the kettles (though thankfully not literally) quite by accident while inspecting the kitchen knives (though without a chopping board, the knife still isn't much use...). I'd been going for a purple theme, which was kind of thrown out by the lime green kettle, though since it was much more attractive than the orange one, I didn't mind too much. A funny French version of Blu-tack and I was ready to go (though I did pick up something else at the counter - Mum, show Kiri the photo below...)
Of course, I then had to lug my spoils home in my backpack (after stopping for a late neglected lunch at the boulangerie). Needless to say, it was a longer trip home than it was there. I was so exhausted from the funny-shaped backpack I was hauling that I collapsed at my desk and watched music videos for an hour (in English and in French. The new songs from Simple Plan and M. Pokora are great). I finally found the energy to hang up _most_ of my new wardrobe (I need more hangers...told you I'd be going back soon) and disseminate my new kitchen gear. In a minute, once Ive finished tidying up after dinner, I'll attach the recent photos of my clean apartment, along with new ones of my Tommeke poster on the wall and my newly-semi-furnished purple-and-lime-green kitchen. Over and out! (that is to say, au revoir, mes amis...)
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| Tea and a bikkie - a Petit Ecolier is like a Nice biscuit with Cadbury on top... |
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| My room, post-clean-and-sweep |
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| The view from my window - I'm on the 4th floor! |
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| My wardrobe, partially cleaned and unpacked. |
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| Toys and gadgets at the foot of my bed. |
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| My kitchen. |
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| Look a little cleaner? |
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| I've arranged the bathroom now. |
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| Domestic enough? |
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| In the Le Bourget town hall. |
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| The Carrefour in Drancy. |
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| The tabac in the Carrefour - I see this sign everywhere, Mum! |
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| My new purple-lime theme...like it? |
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| My Tommeke wall - feels like home now! |
Friday, 7 September 2012
In the beginning
So - day 1 in France. After a lovely refreshing 10 hours sleep, I woke at 7am to a cloudy Paris sky outside. I was praying for a sunny day for my first full day in France. Luckily, Mother Nature obliged.
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| My first French crepe. |
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| The Le Bourget library. |
I headed out for lunch again to a nearby cafe, where I had my first French crepe filled with cherry jam as I watched the scene on Avenue de la Division Leclerc. Despite my professed desire for a quiet afternoon at home , cleaning and unpacking, I decided to go for a little exploratory walk around the neighbourhood to see what was there. Passing another little pizza-place, I found the bibliotheque (library - yay!) which looked quite nice, and the hotel de ville - town hall. The other side of the street was less exciting, though I spotted a newsagent, and it was only when I ventured down a side-street that I inadvertently saw what I'd been looking for - the local boulangerie, or French bakery!
No girl on crutches ever moved faster. I stared at everything in the shop with increasing awe, before walking away with a grillet pomme, some kind of cross between an apple slice and a huge wedge of apple pie. With my treasure in my backpack, I headed home again, attracting the customary stares for the girl with crutches and a giant rainbow-stickered boot. I then proceeded to spend my afternoon cleaning and unpacking while watching numerous episodes of Castle.
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| The local boulangerie. |
Day 2 - began with eating my grillet pomme for breakfast (I'd been too full to eat it the day before). Then a nice long conversation with Rony, the site manager, about the intricacies of living in France, during which I discovered the wonderful catch-22 of needing an electricity bill (EDF) to get a bank account, but needing a bank account to set up your electricity bill, and which culminated in Rony saying (edited for PG rating) that French bureaucracy is screwed up. Yep, got that memo loud and clear, thanks.
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| A map of metro line 7 on the train. |
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| Near my uni... |
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| Apartments in the Quartier Latin... |
The strangely labelled French streets had got me, so I started again and this time made it to Rue Censier, looking for Rue Santeuil, which I eventually did after walking right past it to the next crossroad. Annoying (please remember I'm still on crutches for all of this...). I finally found Sorbonne - a fairly plain building that makes the Menzies look attractive with only a pair of small signs to distinguish it. Given how beautiful the rest of the Quartier Latin is, it was fairly anomalous.
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| The only signs saying Sorbonne Uni... |
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| Directions to the departments. |
Six flights later and feeling hotter than Uluru, I began to think this wasn't such a good idea. I wandered around the 3rd floor for a while, having completely forgotten all the relevant room numbers, before beginning the long trek back down and getting myself a cold drink. I decided to defer my excursion to the Australian embassy and instead headed for the metro again to take line 7 to Les Gobelins to seek out the phone shop I'd been told of.
Well, I found myself some lost American tourists (and sent them towards their hotel) but no sign of the SFR shop. I stopped to grab a croissant for lunch at a nearby boulangerie, pleasing the Paris pigeons with the half that crumbled onto the ground. I eventually asked directions from a nearby shop, and was there in two minutes. My limited French was enough for me to buy one prepaid French SIM card before heading to the metro, all worn out for the day. I needed a small supermarket detour to obtain the necessary coins for my ticket (these French are crazy!) but home I got and hopefully won't have to leave again. Crutches really are exhausting, but..ah well.
Tomorrow, with luck (or not!) I'll be up way early to take a train to Soissons, just north or Paris, to see the start of Paris-Brussels. It'll take a bit of work on the public transport...we'll see how I go.
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| My croissant lunch, sans pigeons. |
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| Yes, Mum, I've been to Goblin-town! |
Tomorrow, with luck (or not!) I'll be up way early to take a train to Soissons, just north or Paris, to see the start of Paris-Brussels. It'll take a bit of work on the public transport...we'll see how I go.
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