Languages student: a bigger world (food for thought)

Being a Languages student has some amazing advantages: you can travel and speak to people in their own language, and they’ll let you into a culture “normal” tourists don’t usually get to see. However, all this comes at a price: when the time comes to go back to your “origins” you realise that, while your world got bigger, the previous one hasn’t changed a bit, and you suddenly feel there is simply not enough space for you there.

Every time I go back to Italy I find something new to complain about, and this is just making me sad. This time round it seems to be one of the worst ones. I spent all summer traveling, and the anticipation to move to Spain is killing me, and spending three weeks in a place where there is absolutely nothing to do is not helping my moodiness. And of course the weather isn’t helping: it hasn’t stopped raining a single moment, and it’s got the same temperatures as England in November!!! (Food for thought: I just had to put a throw on my bed in order to keep me warm tonight).

Then of course there’s my friends, whom I’ve only seen once in the past two weeks. And be careful, I’m not at all blaming them: they are simply the victims of the same system I wanted to avoid when I moved to Britain, a system which punishes you just for the fact you are young and a student. That simply isn’t right, and after a series of domino effects I’m the one who finds himself angry for them!

However I do not mind doing things alone: small problem though, around here there is absolutely nothing I can do!! Three weeks is just turning out to be too long to stay here, and I feel the need to leave. Straight away. And of course I still miss my coursemates, everyday a little bit more, and I can’t wait to see them again. I just want something to do to get my mind off things. People who know me know I like to keep busy, and I always am: having nothing to do is turning out to be the most tiring thing ever!

Minus 8. It’s getting here. And I can’t wait. A year of new experiences, some good, some bad, but all to cherish. And I need this moment to arrive, possibly quickly.

In the meantime, STOP BLOODY RAINING!!!

Sorry for the depressed post. The next one will be written from Madrid though, so it should be good!!!

Until then, ¡Hasta luegoooooooooooo!

Traveling on a different scale

Luggage packed. It currently stands at 44 kg, and that excludes hand luggage. Some people may ask: “are you traveling with a house?” Well technically, yes. Considering I am moving to a different country, that’s not bad going I think! However there is a downside to all of this: they started their journey in Norwich, they followed me to France for the summer, came back up to Leicester, and now they’re following me to Italy before actually going to Spain, where they’ll stay for a fair while. My arms can’t take it anymore!!!

However, other than complaining about weight, I wanted to use this post to reflect a bit on what happened and what’s to come. Starting from this summer, it must have been one of the best I’ve ever had! People close to me know that I don’t like having nothing to do, in fact the busier the better, so spending the summer working on average 15 hours a day suited my character! I did a bit of everything: from assisting teachers in the first few weeks, to doing some revision with small kids after that, to manage a small web radio, and finally to having a French class of my own for 4 weeks! The people I met, adults and kids, have been amazing, and left me wanting to come back, and hopefully I will next year! However, after 10 weeks there, I was happy to leave and enjoy being pampered for a short while.

So what’s next? Well, first of all, I need to get to Leicester station. If you go back to the beginning of the post and look at the weight of my suitcases, you’ll realise it might be a bit of a challenge… Then I need to find some space on the train for them, then I need to carry them around St. Pancras, then in another train down to Gatwick, and then, hopefully, someone will actually help me before I fade away? I think, by the time I get to Italy tonight, I will have lost about 4 stones in weight myself…

After then, preparation for my year abroad begins! I need to book my flights, get in touch with the school and my university, find a house… so, lots to do!!! At least I know where I’m going… I’ll be working in Pinto, a small town in the Comunidad de Madrid about 28km south of the capital. It doesn’t look like anything special really, but I’m curious to see. I’ll probably be living in Getafe though, a city closer to Madrid but with easy transport to the workplace: however, being about 4 times the size of Pinto, there are a lot more things to do, and houses are a lot cheaper! So that’s one of the things I’ll be looking into in the next few weeks…

It’s now been 3 months since I’ve seen my course-mates, and you can’t even imagine how much I miss them! Funny thing though, most of them are moving to Spain, so I’m hoping I’ll see them quite soon!! They’re all preparing to leave as well, so I’m guessing I’m not the only one going through all these issues… (at least, I’m hoping so…)

The next post will probably be in 3 weeks’ time, from my new house in Spain (AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!). Until then…

BON COURAGE!

¡HASTA LUEGO!

A PRESTO!

SEE YOU SOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!!!!!!!!!!!

The Story So Far...

Well hello again!!!

It's been a while since I posted the last time, but oh lord I have never stopped for a single moment!!!

What is there to say... work carries on as usual, although it is always a surprise finding out what I will be doing the following week: the first three weeks I was a French as a Foreign Language teacher, then I became a French French teacher (to the small kiddos, kind of Yr 2 and 3), and now I am managing the radio after a (very short) time spent doing sports (never, EVER, again!!!).

In the past few weeks I have been as moody as I can possibly be... the first 4-5 weeks we had an amazing group of kids: all ages (and yes, even the teenagers!!!) just tried everything that was thrown at them!!! I must admit that with personalities like these work just becomes easy and enjoyable! Everything changed last week: a big school group arrived (10 kids), and honesty I can't wait for the moment they leave. They are rude, noisy, spoilt little sods who are just there to annoy me: most of my day is spent shouting at them, while my free time is spent collecting the food they have in the bedroom (yesterday I managed to confiscate a total of 20kg of anything and everything, which incuded breakfast cereals, sugar and milk powder...). This is becoming a nightmare now, and the sooner they leave the better!!! On the other side, the French kids that arrived this week to study English are a really good bunch, and if you forget the normal teenage issues then you can get along really well with them!!!

In other news...

I still have issues with the French keyboard: whoever thought that these symbols ,;:!&é"'(-_çà were more useful than these ?./12345677890 was probably eating to many escargots at the time and had some serious judgement issues!!!! Also all the letters are in the wrong place, and I can't do the accents I want...

I've now been to Paris 4 times, and I'm going again in the next few weeks, and I can't get tired of it!!! Two issues though: no vegetarian food for miles, and impossible to navigate the metro stations with the signs they've put up!!

Still waiting for news from Spain: I'm guessing the Ministerio de la Educacion (can't put the accent on a French keyboard...) is taking a summer-long siesta...

Hopefully there will be photos coming soon, but until then enjoy life!!!!!! :D

La campagne de la Champagne (ou la Champagne de campagne?)

Hello! I must apologise for my silence since the last post, but since I got here I didn't stop for a single second!! But now I've got a day off and time to myself, so I can write down what happened...

The last time I wrote on here I was still in Paris, wondering what to do with my life (especially transport-wise) and getting ready to go to the station. Well, I got to the station! (now that was the easy bit...). Nadine managed to arrive to Gare de Lyon too from Geneva (the only train not to have been cancelled apparently...), and got a snack before starting our journey. Can I just say that €8.50 for a tea and a slice of cheesecake from Starbucks is a bit extortionate?!?!?!? But never mind, that wasn't the most expensive bit of the trip...

We managed to make our way to Gare de l'Est, where someone was supposed to meet us and we would then have taken the train together. Well, that didn't happen... Once there, the amount of people that had already started camping on the floor did not give us any faith at all in the trains that day, and that was soon to be confirmed. After paying €16.50 for a 1-hour one-way train ticket (English people, stop complaining about train fares, you don't know what you're talking about!!!), we found out the train we booked didn't actually exist (yep, you guessed it, it was on strike). Quite panicky, me being used to the relative decency of British trains, Nadine just being Swiss, we started calling the people at the Summer camp for help who, in a very French way, just told us to stay there and wait for A train (hell knows which one...). We later found out that train was 1 hour 20 minutes later than the one we booked, so we just joined the "camp-site" of Parisian commuters... We finally found that person who would take us to Champagne, and immediately told us that we didn't have to buy a train ticket because of the strike. Well, thanks for telling us in advance!! Never mind, the train was there and we could get on!!! Yuppeeeee!!! Pity everybody else had the same idea... Since it was probably the only train out in that direction, half of Paris decided to get on and try to get out of the city. This was the result...

One hour 20 minutes later we could to the train's final stop, which was nowhere close to where we were supposed to be, therefore the director of the company had to drive all the way there to then get us out again. So after incredible amounts of steps (lifts don't exist in France apparently...), we were finally on a car heading towards our destination!!

So now I am here, a tiny village called Troissy, where there are more people buried in the local cemetery than actually alive (quote). However, it's beautiful. The first few days were dedicated to get to know the team and the camp and spend some time together (swimming pool, bring it on!!). Then the arrivals got here on Sunday, the first for the summer! From then on, the week has been dedicated to preparing French classes, evening entertainment and taking way too many photos for the official Facebook page. I had one day off (the kids were in Paris), where me and other colleagues just took a bike and went to the nearest town for lunch. Now it's just a matter of keeping this rhythm going and having clear ideas for the next bunch of arrivals (today, in a few hours, from Spain and Russia) and just get them into the loop of activities we organise!

I'm guessing not many things are going to happen from now on, so updates will be rare. Only if I do some kind of day trip I might do it. Until then, laters!!!

xx

P.S.: here are some photos from Troissy...

Oh, and this is where I'm actually working:

Paris j'arrive!

It should be "Paris je suis déjà arrivé mais tu n'as pas de WiFi", but I wrote the title early yesterday morning...

12 June, 10:30. Location: train Norwich-London.

Well well, it seems the time to leave has finally come! Being a long day I've decided to write bit by bit, I'm guessing many things are going to happen (since it's just 10.50 and they already have...).

So obviously this morning, the only moment in which I wanted my phone to work, it didn't: a 6.30 alarm clock soon became a 7.45 panic wake up moment! Since I still had all the bed and bathroom things to pack plus everything off my bed still had to go in a box, I found myself fairly stressed. Everything was packed LITERALLY at the same time the taxi arrived!!! Never, ever, again...

At last I thought "finally I can relax!". Yep, you wish... with two suitcases and a man bag (totally probably 30kg altogether) not only did I have to try and fit through the ticket barriers, but I also needed to walk the FULL LENGTH of the train, as you can see in this photo (Norwich station is at the very back, you can't even see it!):



But finally I am in the train!! I found a very cheap first class ticket, so at least (I thought) I could enjoy my trip to London! Nope, I forgot this is Greater Anglia... my seat is stuck in a semi-reclined position, meaning sitting down is proving an adventure of its own...

At least I can relax now. I'll probably catch up on the week's EastEnders (simple pleasures...), and I look forward to meet up with my friend Giovanna in London in a couple of hours!!!

13 June, 11:00. Location: Paris, 10ème Arr.
No more WiFi after the last bit, so here I start again a day later. Finally managed to get to London, where I met some of the rudest people on the planet: first they wouldn't let me off the train, then they tried pushing into the queue in front of me at the Tube barriers, then they wouldn't help me with my suitcases up the stairs. Oh and another thing: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD TFL INSTALL LIFTS AT LIVERPOOL STREET STATION!!!!!!

However I got to St. Pancras, where I had a nice lunch and a good catch up with my friend Giovanna:

Then off I went, through security and passport control, where I already had to speak French (and I was still in central London!!!). And then up, on the fullest train ever: you can't really see it in this photo, but it was packed...

Of course I was wishing I could sit down and relax, instead I had to rearrange the entire suitcase rack because people don't know how to travel. Proposition for the government: issue a passport only to people who have been on a practical traveller course, following everything from queuing to using a train!!! (right, I'm getting slightly fascist now...let's move on)

The train journey was amazing, incredible service and seriously comfortable. Only problem? It was going too fast!!! My ears weren't used to it and kept going pop...

Finally, I was in Paris! And within a short amount of time there I was at the hotel: BED, SHOWER, BRING IT ON!!!!

After relaxing a bit and a short Skype call, I decided to look for somewhere to eat. The guide recommended the Bastille area, so I headed off that way. I found a nice little bistrot in that area where they prepared a wonderful risotto. At the end I decided to work out where I was, so I looked for a sign on the square: imagine my surprise when I saw this... (Sacré Théâtre people, prepare!!!)

Honestly, I had no idea, and I was seriously shocked!!!

I then headed off to the city centre and enjoyed a nice stroll to Notre Dame, along the Seine to the Louvre, and then off to the Eiffel Tower (all the photos will be at the end of the post).

But being what I am, I couldn't complete the day without being an idiot: a city I've never been before, of course I had to miss the last metro train of the day!!! So there I was, roaming the streets of Paris looking for a bus... At last I managed to get to the hotel, and I good night's sleep was in order...

In the morning I had planned to go and visit Notre Dame cathedral, but destiny had another plan for me apparently: SNCF are on strike (again!), so I'm spending my time browsing for train connections to get to Champagne-Ardenne. I don't know if I'll ever get there, but we'll see...

See you soon!!!

xx

First post!

Hello and welcome to my first post!!

I thought I'd start today, since the Year Abroad can't really happen with every possible preparatory stage behind it, right?

I am leaving Norwich in 2 days (actually even less than that, in 2 days time I'll be in Paris!!!), so I thought it best to start packing (everything... no really, everything!!), which includes at the moment (still counting) 5 boxes, 1 random bag, 2 suitcases and a gym bag. But obviously they can't really remain in my room, the take up way too much valuable space, so what better place to put everything if not my housemate's toilet? Don't worry though, he's happy about it, I managed to win him over with a Thornton's chocolate... ;)

But yeah, everything is pretty much ready. I've just got the last few things to organise and put away and then we're off!! It's going to be a weird sensation. I moved to this city only recently, but in the past two years so many wonderful things have happened that I am feeling quite sad to leave to be honest! Norwich is beautiful, UEA is brilliant, the lecturers are amazing and my coursemates are, quite simply, the best group of friends I could ever have hoped for! Leaving all of this is going to be difficult (it already is, it'll get worse), so I'll just focus on all the good that's about to come and which will keep me seriously busy for the next 12 months!!

I'll conclude by saying a massive thanks to all the people I've met in Norwich. Moving here, so far away from home, had been a massive leap into the unknown. Yet, within a short amount of time, this became my home. This city and this university have completely changed my life into something unexpected, and I'm loving it! For the first time in my life I am truly happy about where I am heading, and looking back I know that moving here has been the best decision I have ever taken! I'm going to miss you loads, but I'm sure we'll have tons of opportunities to meet up in the near future!!

Until then, enjoy the break!!