#30 - Packing and a package

I am going home for a week tomorrow for spring break! And considering I probably wont come back, I have to pack EVERYTHING. I did a lot of it yesterday i.e. all my clothes so today is left with books and electrical stuff. Hopefully I will be done by early this evening, and then I will reward myself with a nice set for 2 from Pizza Hut.

Hopefully, my suitcase packing is lighter this time too. I had to pay overweight prices for it when I flew out of London, even having to take things out of my suitcase and put them in a big bag to be put on seperate because the suitcase was so over the weight limit's limit that the staff could injure themselves while picking it up. So new plan : fit all the books I can into my laptop case (I had them before in the suitcase...which I am guessing caused so much weight).

Secondly, my dad has told me that the package with loads of presents and all the manga I bought (I love Bookoff!!!) and other such japan paraphenalia has arrived at our house today. Which is great news! It took so long because I had to send it by sea to still be affordable, as air travel and train were so expensive because the box is so big and heavy! So as the post office lady said, it took about 2 months :D My dad has put it in my room (i assume) and it's being left for me to open when I get home tomorrow.

Next will come the part where I forgot which presents I assigned to which friends...I really should have kept the uncompleted list I made. There are probably almost 200 bits of things in that box...

#29 - DAAD website - German courses

Today I thought I would take a look at the DAAD website. This is a website where you can view courses about studying in Germany. My German department back at home use this website, and because I am set to do a summer course in Germany, this is the website we are told to research courses.

So I have been looking through it today, at various German courses, and there are quite a few that I would like to do. The best one that I think at the moment is in Aachen, which is right next to the german-dutch-belgium border, and that would be in August. I have also saved a few others, such as ones in Berlin and Munich which also look interesting.

Of course, I am still waiting (like all other german summer course students) for more information from Birmingham about things such as the length of the course and other requirements. Hopefully if all goes well I would be able to apply for the course in Aachen.

http://www.daad.de/en/index.html

The website doesn't only have summer courses. It also has information on various German universities and articles about living and studying abroad. So if anyone reading this is wanting to study in Germany (and not necessarily just the language!) then check out the website. Just click on the link or picture above!

#28 - and another one...

Yep, this is yet another entry about leaving Strasbourg.

I have been in contact with both the French department and the German department back home. Both of them seem to want me to think more about this decision over spring break which is next week (and which I will be home in England for). I can appreciate that they want me to think about this, but seriously I have. Not to sound arrogant or anything, but I am one of those people who think about EVERYTHING before I make a decision. And I mean everything. I have thought about everything to do with university requirement for Birmingham, fincancial stuff including the possiblility of having to pay back my grants, that I would probably have to pay the CROUS here for the rest of the semester, about how this would impact my other parts of my course, about all the work I have put into my degree the past few years...just about everything.

Sometimes I try to think "maybe if I do this then it might be better" but in the end, I am just plain unhappy about my situation. I understand that this is a "great experience" but frankly, it just isn't so great. I am unhappy here. Isn't that reason enough to leave?

There is the chance that I might be able to enroll in one of the French summer courses by Birmingham, but only if there is movement quickly. But then, it also depends when these courses are as I still have to apply for a summer course in Germany.

Staying in Strasbourg for the next few months would undoubtedly be the easiest option. Leaving causes big problems for not jsut French, but the rest of my degree. It might sound arrogant, weak, or just plain stupid that I want to leave.

The easiest decision is not always the right decision.

#27 - Decisions

I have spoken with someone in the French department at Birmingham quite a bit who has said he will try to find out what effects leaving France would have on my degree. For sure I won't be able to study French anymore because I havn't met the living abroad or academic requirements to enter final year. I have also emailed the German department because it's more than likely that I will be doing German as a major (to fill the French gap) and Japanese minor.

It's a bit unfortunate that I was stuck with Strasbourg. It wasn't my first choice, or my second. I can't help feeling that if I was somewhere else in France then I would be having a better time. Strasbourg university has not helped me in any way even from the start - no information sent to me over the course of a year, no information when I got here, no sort of introduction to France or the university, nothing for Erasmus students including no kind of Erasmus meeting for that semester, troubles with accommodation, and finally the strikes and troubles with not having lessons. Because of all this it has been stressful and not very nice. And because all this has happened it has meant I havn't met very many people, hardly any in fact. As far as French friends (which I hoped to make in class but we havn't had any...) I havn't met any.

As I said, another city in a different part of France would have probably been better. Since I have been in Strasbourg I have wanted to leave, but at the beginning I was trying to think of the ways it is good for me and how to have a good time. There wasn't many. Even long before I got to Strasbourg I didn't want to be here.

All in all I am not happy in Strasbourg and have no interest in the university here. I still want to study French if possible at Birmingham, but that's more than likely not going to happen, which would then mean I wasted 2 or so years doing work I didn't need to do.

It is very sad that I have not had a good time here. I was hoping for adfrenchture but Strasbourg falls hopelessly short. If anyone reading this is thinking about a year abroad in France - avoid Strasbourg. The city is dull and depressing, and you will be on your own - a problem which was shared by my friend who was here the semester before me. I'm not the only one...

So now I am left wondering if I am makign the right choice to leave. On one hand it will severly impact my degree, on the other I am incredibly lonely and almsot depressed here. It's not exactly and easy choice...

#26 - It didn't work

I have jus sent an email to Birmingham saying that I do not want to be in France anymore. Also text my dad the same thing.

I am not going into university tomorrow (/today, it is almost 6am) because frankly I don't care. I'm done with it. Not been happy since I have been here and I have been thinking about leaving for a long time now.

So I don't know what's going to happen now. Not entirly sure if I will be allowed to study French into my final year, but to be completely honest I have lost interest in French and German over the past couple years. All I really want to study is Japanese. Initially I did it because it was different or soemthing to that extent, but going to Japan just showed me that I really do love the country and especially the language, and that's all I really want to be doing. But of course, with only about another year of study until graduation it does feel like a waste of time (and especially money) if I don't get a degree in French. But if I don't then I will still be happy - because I won't be here.

#25 - Is this a French thing?

You know how when you go into the toilet stall, and you have the toilet? There's the white bowl and then above that there is the toilet seat? Well, apparently not in France.

All the toilets I have used in France have not had a toilet seat! And I find this kind of strange. I wonder, is it a French thing? Maybe it's jsut a Strasbourg thing.

Who knows!?

#24 - Monday

I awoke this morning after going to bed needlessly late after doing nothing on my laptop. The air was cold, and as I got up from my bed to turn off the annoying sound that was my alarm, I saw through the window blankets of whiteness. It had snowed again.

I wasn't sure if I could be bothered to go into university today, because it was early, and also because I wasn't sure if I would have lessons yet, or if the strike would be partially over. But I decided to go in anyway. I also took my camera and during the day took a few photos of Strasborug in the snow.

I went to the first class I should have. The teacher and the rest of the class came too! It was a French Literature class. Because I hadn't been there in the first week I hadn't recieved the copies of extracts of various things. It didn't matter too much, as we basically had to write down what the teacher was saying.

This surprised me a little. It wasn't jsut writing down notes, it was a dictation. Suddenly, as if some unheard starting signal went off, everybody's heads went down to their paper and starting writing. I sat there thinking "what..?" and then "oh, I should be writing this down!" and then trying to recover the first half of the sentence that she said, and then forgetting what I was writing while trying to write the next parts. In all it did not go too well for my dictation skills.


At the end of the class, a few students came in to say some things about the strikes. From what I understood they mentioned a blog online where they were keeping up the latest information, and also various meetings and lunches to discuss action to be taken, and such other things. From this small talk and what I have tried to look up online, it all has to do with Sarkozy (President of France) and the economic crisis. There are reforms that are trying to be pushed through to change a lot of things in France. The latest (possibly) is to do with universities and research procedures, and uprooting the whole "disasterous" system (as Sarkozy put it) and going drastically against the way organisations are run in France. Then again, I don't have much of a head for politics so I could be completely wrong.


I decided to stop in the building at my department of Letters to check some class times and places and things. As I was walking around, there were lots of signs and posters saying "GREVE" (strike) and "OCCUPATION ACTIVE". At the time I was there around midday, they were jsut about to start a big meeting of the occupation activein one of the bigger rooms. I walked around, looked at the signs a bit, and took a few photos. I didn't join in because I am not French(!) and I don't really know what is going on so I don't want to brainlessly follow a certain standpoint.

In any case, although the strikes have been a bit inconvenient for me, I tink I now have the luxury of enjoying the time off of studying!

#23 - A New Leaf?

It appears that I can now access the internet in my room! I discovered this while changing almost every setting on my laptop. And now I am not connected to 1, but 5 networks. No, I don't understand it, either.

So it seems as if things are getting better. After my latest Strasbourg Diaries that I wrote, life was pretty horrible. I was contemplating not coming back after my visit home if things would not improve. But, now life is bearable, I have the internet, and I can do a myriad of things! So for today, I am happy!!!

:)

#22 - Strasbourg Diary #7

I can't remember when I wrote these but anything called "Strasbourg Diary ##" was written when I didn't have interent access.

I've had it with France. I am so close to contacting Birmingham and saying you know what, I don't want to do French anymore. With no exaggeration this is the worst time in my life. And if someone has the audacity to say to me "oh, but it should be an adventure. You are just not trying hard enough" or "oh it's just culture shock" that will just push me over the top and I will seriously be hurting them. It is not culture shock at all. I have lived in France before, I do know how things work. And I have tried jsut about all I can to get things sorted by myself and to even meet the people who live next to me. I have tried everything I can to be comfortable here and it hasn't worked.

If the French university can't be bothered to tell me any information at all about them or how I should do things, or even what the things I need to be doing are, then I can't be bothered either. If the accommodation doesn't care enough to respond to my various emails about my moving in date, then I don't care about it either. If the teachers at university have decided not to teach lessons, then I have decided not to apply for them or go. If the accommodation doesn't respect their own time frames and procedures, then I can't respect them either. If nothing improves in the place I am staying, the outcome is simple - I'm not paying. If they kick me out, still not paying. If that results in not being able to come back to France because of debts or something, I'm hardly bothered about that, because frankly, I don't ever want to come here again.

I am frustrated, bored, bordering on clinically depressed, cold, and just had about enough of everything, that soon I really will lose it.

"Study at university in France, it's fun." Yeah, right.

#21 - Strasbourg Diary #6

I can't remember when I wrote these but anything called "Strasbourg Diary ##" was written when I didn't have interent access.

Well at the moment I am in McDonalds. I came to use the internet and to eat. I have now eaten, and I want to use the internet...but I can't find the connection. I think it might be off today but I don't know... at any rate I am not very happy about that as this is the whole reason I came here so I can check to see if I have any mail from uni or from anyone else, and to look up some things that I want to find out. Apparently I won't do that now ! So that's wasted my day. As you can probably tell I still don't have internet in my room so I don't know what to do. I don't know if I am being charged with internet included or whatever, but if I am then I should refuse to pay or ask for money back because it has been over sous 7 jours and evidently I do not have a connection. Yay for France...

I have now ran out of things to do for entertainment alone in my room. I have played DS until the battery ran out, I have played all the games I have on my laptop, and replaying some, I have over listened to the music I have, I have been sleeping probably a bit too much. I can’t do any work for lessons because I don’t have either work or lessons. I can’t do my essay for Birmingham because I can’t look at websites. I can’t go out to do things because there is not much interesting to do in Strasbourg apart from shop and that costs too much money. I can’t go visit people because I don’t really know people here. So it looks like I will be back here on Monday to hopefully do the things I need to do.

The other night when I went out to go to buy food I came across some people speaking English so I asked if they were Erasmus students too and they were, and live at Robertsau. There is one who lives in my building on a different storey, and she also said that no-one talks to each other in the building and that there is nowhere to meet anyone in the building (no room or anywhere with chairs). She also said that she went to one of the other buildings and within 10 minutes she had met more people there than she had met in our building in 2 weeks. Typical. I get stuck with the worst room in the worst building, in one of the furthest away accommodations.

I keep refreshing internet connections hoping McWifi will show up but it doesn’t. I’m wondering if I should move seats and try somewhere else just in case there is no reception in this part for some reason... The chair in the corner with the plug opened up so I guess I’ll go over there for now......

...It didn’t work. If anything, less networks are available. I read the sign on the wall about wifi, it said it’s free and unlimited except for construction purposes, from 2-4 and some time in the evening like 8 o something. Well it is now 17.21. I see no reason why it is not on. Maybe it’s just because it’s a Saturday. I think I’ll just waste time for a few hours to see whether it turns on or not...

I am so sick of France now. I keep looking for good things about Strasbourg and trying to feel positive, but I can’t find any and I can say for sure that this is the worst time I’ve ever had in my life.

Add: Ok there was a really strange man walking about here, and he sat behind me before. I moved seat, and just now he walked around again and is now sat two tables in front of me, and is being very annoying by sitting and tapping his empty cup “to the beat” of the music playing...Now he said something to a little girl in the play area... Creepy.

#20 - Strasbourg Diary #5 - A Gift From the Fairies

I can't remember when I wrote these but anything called "Strasbourg Diary ##" was written when I didn't have interent access.

Yesterday I was going to go into university to see if I had lessons, but in the end I didn't because I wouldn't have had any and I would have wasted another 3 Euros. Instead I just stayed in my room and did various things on my computer. I also didn't go because, as I was about to get ready, I noticed it was snowing outside, so I made an excuse for myself. A few minutes later though it had stopped snowing. But throughout the day there were little snowflakes just floating through the air slowly. Not heavy enough to set on the ground.

I am becoming more annoyed about the strike. I have had no lessons since I have been here which is just under a month. I am also very annoyed that I still do not have an internet connection in my room. It is supposed to take under 7 days. It has been longer than that. I have tried connecting before as it says you can sometimes do, but I can't even find a connection to the network most times, let alone keep it for more than 5 minutes. I am wondering if the lack of progress is also due to the strikes, or if it is because they had sent a form back that I forgot to date (there were two forms).

I have flights booked to go home. I am going on Saturday 28th February, and returning to Strasbourg Sunday 8th of March. I am not skipping term as you may think (not that it matters much anyway with no classes) but it is spring break. I also will take that chance to finish my essays for Birmingham which need to be in March 20th at the latest, and I will have access to resources i.e. internet, and I might try and stay at a friend's for a night in Birmingham so I can use the library at uni. Other perks of England include having a hot meal that is not McDonalds and being able to cook something, having people to talk to, television, being able to switch on a light when it is dark and not French.

#19 - Strasbourg Diary #4

I can't remember when I wrote these but anything called "Strasbourg Diary ##" was written when I didn't have interent access.

I finally got a straight answer from the Lettres department today. I was asking about taking a certain course and if it would clash with another class I wanted to take. She was like, blah blah blah blah blah no you can't - unless you are Erasmus and then you can do blah. And I was like....I am Erasmus. And then she continued to explain things in detail for a few minutes and then added "but if you are Erasmus you can do whatever you like". So basically, I can choose whatever I feel like. But somehow now I have to try and register with the actual German department too.

So about my classes. I had a hard time trying to work this out, and I still haven't worked it out either. You would think that I would be given at least some help or information about how to do it. Not that it matters anyway, as the teachers are on strike (at least most of the 'french' ones are). So in the almost 4 weeks that I have been here, I have had 1 hour of classes - which was German. The one class that I had was the one cours that I was the most unsure about if I was even allowed to do.

I still haven't met any French people! It's too scary to talk to them by myself. When classes kind of 'start' though I am sure I will get to know some people. I talked a little last week with some people who were waiting for the same cancelled class as me but that's about it.

Apart from that, on Wednesday I happened to come across some internationals as I was going to go home, and got invited to go ice skating with them that evening. It was great! I hadn't been in ages but at least I didn't fall over! But I did tear my glove on the wall...And I still failed to get their phone numbers into my phone! So I am kind of still cut off, all lonely in my accommodation which none of them live right at the end of a tram line up north with no internet yet.

#18 - French Randomity

Once again I am back in McDonalds! I sitll don't have access to the internet in my room yet, I shoudl ave it in a week though so I can't wait. It means my evenings will be more interesting as I can actually do things apart from playing Freecell while listening to my music (which I was doing for 2 weeks).

I thought I would write a little bit about the random happenings that I have found in Strasbourg. Firstly, I should mention that on the tram stops, each one has their own little jingle. For example, one is some music, another is the soudn of children and so on. But approaching the European Parliament I thought I heard it say sugi no eki 過ぎの駅　and I kind of sat there for a minute thinking "was that really just Japanese, or has my time in Japan got me thinking and translating things into Japanese in my head?"

Last night, after a long time on McWifi (as I will now call it) I left to go home. When I stepped outside there was a girl who came up to me and she asked "Do you speak English?" How lucky she was. She had literally just got off of the tram from the airport and was looking for an accommodation. The trouble is she didn't speak French. So being the nice person I am I helped her find the place and get to her room and things (it was complicated to get into the building...) and so I made a new friend! Albeit randomly.

The last piece of randomity I want to mention happened today. Because there has been so much confusion and lack of information from my university in Strasbourg, I havn't yet chosen classes for sure. And I havn't been to any. So I thought new week, new start to a happier Strasbourg life. So I went along to go to the class I want to take today and maybe talk to the teacher a bit. So I went there, went in, spoke a little with the French girls sat there and waited. The teacher didn't show up. Another girl who takes the class came in and basically told us there is no class because the teachers are on strike. So...I have no class. And of course no one knows how long this strike will go on so I might not have class next week either. But, I at least managed to get the names of the novels I need to buy/read for that class. They havn't started reading them yet in class though so it's all good!

Oh yes, it also snowed in the night so there is snow everywhere! And not like puny English snow but like a nice even blanket that is not melting or anything. So that means it's COLDer than it should be.



My final note, I just uploaded the latest video blog to youtube so check it out! It is my adventure trying to find where my university is. I embedded the video above but if you can't see it then the url is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYk05z6XZ8Y