Updates

So it's been well over a week since my last entry and well to say the least things have been a little crazy. School was nuts last week as we were in class approximately 8-10 hours a day each day last week. On top of that, normal classes are beginning to start so we have to meet with groups of real French people and do some real work, needless to say I haven't had a whole lot of time to write, however tonight, I have found some free time and plan on making this a fairly lengthy entry.

So onto the happenings of Clermont-Ferrand, like I said, last week was a busy week with lots of class and meetings. We finally were assigned our Pepiniere groups, which is the groups in which we will be working on a real life economics research project. There are 13 different topics of which we have to choose and then we have to research the feasibility of this project in the areas that the business person wants the project to be launched. The topic that we would really like to work on is a man who wants to start building environmentally friendly houses in the Clermont region.  We all talked and felt like not only does our group have some background knowledge on the topic but it's the project that is the most feasible in the region. We won't find out until next week which project we have to work on but hopefully we will receive the one that we want.

As a side note, in the past week or so there has been a couple of us Americans who have had a bit of difficulty in dealing with the French students. A couple of the girls were basically exiled out of their groups for simply being American. In addition we tend to get heckled a bit at bars if we are speaking English around people who seem to be a bit younger than us. This is a rare occurrence however and like I said only seems to be a problem with those who seem to be a bit immature. The more apparent problem is in the classroom where we have to work in groups and if people are being exiled on the first day we can only imagine what it is going to be like in another month or so for some of us Americans. I can almost see where the French are coming from though. This business school is a select school for the French, it is a private school that families pay for, in addition, this pepiniere project is probably one of the biggest projects that they undertake at the school and it is a competition. So if I were French, and had an American who was not an economics student in Michigan and who didn't speak French all that well I might be a little upset if they were in my group. However, at the same token I would try to make them feel welcome and could go about the situation in a much nicer manner than some of the French people did last week.

Ok so enough of the rant on that, the rest of the week was pretty monotonous although we were all definitely starting to drag a little bit with the 10 hour days at school and all. Our professors took note of this and kindly let us out early both and Thursday and Friday. This was extremely nice and extremely needed and most of us just went home to relax.

Friday was an interesting day at the apartment. Bernard had some friends from New Zealand over and who planned on spending the weekend at his apartment. If I haven't said this before Bernard's apartment is small. There are 5 rooms in the apartment, two small bedrooms, a small living room, small dining room and a bathroom/closet. So, with having 4 New Zealenders over on top of his son Pierre, things were a bit crammed. I was extremely happy though, that being from New Zealand, they spoke English and I got to play the role of translator. Bernard and Pierre both speak very very good English but even still there are words that they don't understand or French phrases that they can't really translate into English. That is where I came in and I had to be the middle man in the conversation clearing up any miscues or anything like that. We had a great conversation and I found out that they are travelling Europe while attending every single All Blacks Rugby match in the world cup except for one. This is pretty amazing and pretty expensive because while they are at it they are going to do the whole sight seeing thing as well. I kind of wish I could have tagged along because they are going or have already gone to basically everywhere that I want to go. Anyways, while watching the rugby match I found out that New Zealand is actually a great place to go if you are looking for a job, especially for laborers. They are importing laborers from all over the world and are paying as much as they do if not more than what people get paid in the US. On top of that the cost of living is extremely low, even if you are on the other side of the world. I think I might try and land an internship with one of Bernard's friends over there who is the President of this conglomerate corporation in New Zealand.

So Friday night was spent with the New Zealanders watching rugby and talking and then about 11 oclock that night it was time to start packing. Saturday morning, bright and early at 5am, I took off for Toulouse, France. Toulouse is located in the south west of France about an hour from the Mediterranean and 2 hours from Spain. It was a 6 hour train ride to Toulouse where we met up with Cathy's friend's sister who lives there. (Cathy is from Kalamazoo). Her name was Lorenne and her along with her boyfriend Tony picked us up from the train station and took us to their apartment. They were awesome hosts and took us out to lunch after we got there and then showed us around downtown Toulouse. Toulouse is a beautiful city but is very different than Clermont. We noticed right away that it was definitely a more modern city and the houses and buildings look accordingly. Saturday was spent mostly sight seeing in Toulouse and then was followed by a wonderful dinner and conversation back at the apartment. Sunday we did more sightseeing in the morning and then Sunday night was pretty cool. That night, France was playing Namibia in a world cup match, in Toulouse. Now we did not have tickets; but what we did have was a big screen TV on the banks of the Garonne River. There must have been 8,000 people sitting on the side of this river watching the match on this giant TV. The bars in the area set up tents and there were vendors all over the place, it was absolutely amazing to see and be at. France won, and won big so everyone was very happy as we left.

Monday was an extremely cool day. Lorenne took us to Carcassonne which is about 45 minutes away by car. Carcassonne is an old medieval town which is still in tact and it was a very cool place to go. We walked around the castle and took a tour of the Basilique there. While I was there I also took a tour of the museum of torture which was an oddly cool thing to go to. The creativity and reasoning behind some of the torture methods is wild… I did take some pictures of some of the instruments they had there. Monday night was again basically a great dinner and conversation night especially because it started pouring rain on our way home from Carcassonne. Tuesday was spent packing up and getting to the train station at noon for our 6 hour ride back to Clermont. All in all it was a really great weekend and I look forward to possibly heading back to Toulouse for another trip before all is said and done.

Another thing that I have finally set in stone is what my ICRP is going to be. Joelle Carroll, one of the professors here at the ESC found me a position with this sports association, the head of which just so happens to the coach of the American Football team here in Clermont. So Thursday night I plan on going to practice to find out exactly what I am going to be doing while here.

Tomorrow starts regular school and here are the classes that I am going to be taking:

European Civilization
French Langauge and Culture
Economics
Pepiniere
English Conversation (I am going to be a Teaching Assistant for the class)
ICRP (Inter-Cultural Research Project) – American Football
Italian (Yes I am going to take Italian, which is taught in French)

I think that is enough for this entry, and I believe I have caught everyone up to speed. I am going to upload pictures tomorrow and hopefully have everything operational tomorrow evening!

Love to all,

Jon