The "manifestation" (demonstration) continues... After almost a month of student strikes over a new law which threatens the autonomy of universities by allowing businesses to give them financial support, the university is open again... at least, so I was told. This morning I turned up at the front of the building to find that the entrance was blocked with bike racks, trolleys and a jumble of other odd items and was being guarded by a few diehard left-wing students. I was ready to turn back but was then informed by a scruffy young idealist that I was welcome to climb through the window and have a look at their "work". Inside I saw that the usual bored looking students and notice boards had been replaced with camping gear and tables covered with communist flyers. A friendly girl advised me that normal lessons were still not on but had been replaced by "classes" organised by the students: discussion groups, watching inspiring movies etc. After nodding politely and feigning interest for a good few minutes, I climbed back out the window, still quite undecided on my opinion of the whole thing. Generally a supporter of left-wing causes, I'm having trouble taking sides this time: while I would usually oppose such a law; the French university system seems to be in such desperate need of reform and who's to say that the support of businesses wouldn't improve the quality of French unis? I can't see them getting much worse... then again, maybe my experience in Grenoble is not a true representation of university standards over here.

Everyone is on the strike: the train drivers, the gas and electricity workers, the students. Since 14 November, I have come to know the joys of that wonderful French tradition of "la grève". The uni has been blockaded by students who refuse entry to all and are now camped out there day and night. This morning I received a rather dramatic e-mail from one of my teachers updating us on the situation and enquiring as to whether anyone happens to know anyone with a spare room in which we could hold the class as unfortunately his house is too small. He then went on to say something about his liberty and freedom of speech being suppressed through threat of violence and that we should all maintain our solidarity. So, I may not be learning French in the intended, institutionalised way but I'm definitely getting a taste of the French lifestyle!

Basque Country Adventure

Day 1
Awoke at an ungodly hour at Romi's apartment in Paris to catch the funky IDTGV train, in which there were uncomfortable but very modern looking blue and purple chairs and a DJ playing loud music. Perhaps they though that the loud music would put us in good moods and encourage us to purchase the overpriced caffeinated beverages on offer... they were right. Gema met us at the Hendaye train station in France and drove us over the mountains to Spain. For lunch we stopped in San Sebastian where we ate "pinxos" (a Basque specialty, similar to tapas) and drank cider, which apparently has to be poured from a great height in order to create lots of bubbles, which is somehow meant to enhance the flavour (I'm not fully versed in the science supporting this theory...) After driving around for some time getting completely lost whilst trying to find the house we would be renting, we temporarily admitted defeat and went to Gema's mother's apartment for tea and cake. Here I was presented with my first opportunity to test out the phrase which I was to repeat often for the next 5 days: "no hablo espagnol". Later in the evening we finally managed to find our house in a lovely small town called Sorauren.


with Gema, San Sebastian, Spain


Romi, Elena & Gema, San Sebastian, Spain

Day 2
An extremely culture-filled day. Excited to be in a country where clothes are cheaper than in France, Romi and I ran off to a shopping mall. Due to lack of time I then ate McDonalds for dinner, I'm ashamed to admit. Gema then drove us back over the mountains to pick up Marie from Hendaye. Task accomplished, we returned and spent the evening watching a rockabilly band in a local pub.


with Marie (apparently sleepy after 8-hr train trip from Nantes)

Day 3
Went for a morning stroll up a hill in the surrounding countryside. Unfortunately we decided to do this walk pre-coffee, so we didn't get very far before deciding to head down to the small village for caffeine and oily Spanish food. In the afternoon we went to Pamplona to visit the old town and see Gema's bar (which is on the street where the running of the bulls takes place).


with Marie on a hill in Sorauren


Sorauren


in Sorauren


Argh, locked out of our house!


Marie in "Bar la Granja" where Gema works, Pamplona


Gema demonstrating the Basque way to pour cider

Day 4
Gema took us on an overnight trip to the Pyranese where we stayed in a gorgeous house owned by her friend's father - the view was incredible! Romi stayed up half the night playing guitar but Marie and I were exhausted and crawled off to bed after several glasses of wine.


Town in the mountains

Day 5
A scenic drive back to Pamplona!


Gorge

Day 6
We left Spain and headed back north into French Basque Country, where we met up with Camille who is originally from Basque Country and was on holiday visiting her parents there.


Camille, Romi & Marie, Guethary, France


in Guethary


beach in Guethary

Day 7
Sadly, Marie had to leave us but Romi and I still had a few days to relax in Camille's parents' beautiful old restored farmhouse.



Camille's parents' house, Bidart


Camille's parents' house, Bidart


Camille's parents' house, Bidart


Seaweed harvesting in local fishing town




Camille & Romi in front of window display featuring mango espadrilles! Any Kath & Kim fans will know what I'm talking about...


in Bayonne


Bayonne


"No cheese and salad on the same sandwich allowed" cafe, Biarritz

After Denmark I went to London to visit Em and Beren. I was joined by Pierre for the first half of the week then Rose for the second half. I didn't keep a diary but you're probably all sick of my blog anyway :) A few key words which summarise the week are Soho, beer, Indian curry with beer, Westminster Abbey, squirrels, camping in a weird caravan park with a giant RSL club in the centre in which a scary paedophile-like man performed and asked the small children to dance like they were stubbing out cigarettes and then drying their backs with towels, ferry. Here are some photos:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=58745&l=fd0c3&id=902465056

Rose then came back to Grenoble with me:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=58748&l=1f926&id=902465056

Random album including Grenoble, Denmark & England:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=56244&l=b3349&id=902465056

Jylland Trip, Denmark

After four and a half years, I decided that it was high time I returned to Denmark to visit friends and relatives, and to experience that great weather the country is so famous for :/
After having been battling with French for five weeks, I was quite happy to be going to a country in which the grammar of the native tounge is relatively simple. For once, I made it to Charles de Gaulle airport without incident, only to discover that my flight had been delayed due to a freak mass of fog which had descended on Paris. To keep me entertained, Romi texted me helful suggestions for passing the time, including buying things I didn't need and couldn't afford and repeatedly going to the information counter and asking the same question. While the second suggestion did sound rather fun, I decided not to risk further damage to French-Anglo relations and so rather sat down next to all the other discontented travellers and tried in vain to decipher the occasional garbled messages coming from the loudspeaker. Eventually I made it onto the plane and breathed a sigh of relief as I thought "Thank god, from here on it's all Danish and English!" Just seconds later I found the pilot standing in front of me saying something that should have been Danish but for some reason I could hardly understand a word of it. My immediate reaction was panic - I had already forgotten even basic Danish! No, wait a minute, that wasn't Danish, he was speaking Swedish; trying to confuse me I'm sure, the bastard! When I settled into my seat and pulled out the in-flight menu, I was surprised to see that the entire thing was in English, even though I was flying with a Danish carrier. Amusingly, they seemded to have taken English slang to the extreme, so that it more closely resembled "Engrish" than anything else. In an attempt to be hip and down with the times, the word "stuff" had been tacked on to the end of every heading, so that one could purchase "snack stuff", "drinks stuff" and "jewellery stuff", to name a few categories.
No long after, I arrived at Copenhagen airport and was greeted with that wonderful Danish efficiency. A sign above the conveyor belt in the baggage reclaim section told me exactly how many minutes I could expect to wait before the bags from my flight would arrive. And just in case I felt unable to wait that length of time, a hotdog and beer stand had been conveniently placed just ten metres away. Carsten, an ever reliable Dane, was waiting for me when I walked out with my bag and we returned to his apartment for some open sandwiches and a cold beer.

Roadtrip
Day 1 - 28/08/07
We left Carsten's apartment and caught the train to Nykøbing on the island of Falster, where we were to spend the night at Carsten's parents' house before stealing their car the next morning. That evening, we walked across the road to borrow some camping gear from a neighbour. It was here that for the second time this trip I felt doubtful about my ability to speak Danish. When Carsten's neighbour found out that I was Australian he looked happy and said "Ah, har du nogle fugle med?" Surely, I thought, I have misunderstood... he cannot possible be asking me whether I have any birds with me. As it turned out, that's exactly what he was asking me - apparently he is some sort of bird enthusiast and wondered if perchance I had brought an exotic parrot along with me.

Day 2 - 29/08/07
Carsten got up bright and early while I lazed around in bed until late morning (honestly, what's the point of a holiday if it's not relaxing?) An obscene number of coffees later, we were on the road. We crossed the sea on a ferry and drove through picturesque towns on various islands before stopping in Kolding, a town on the peninsula, "Jylland", where my grandparents grew up. We set up camp for the night in Ribe, a former viking trading port and allegedly Denmark's oldest town.

Day 3 - 30/08/07
Little did we know it at the time but this was to be the first of many days of rain. We woke up in our cramped tent which the rain had managed to penetrate quite effectively. Unfortunately we were using the tent I had purchased years ago from the discount supermarket for less than AUD10.00 and had never been intended to survive more than one or two Roskilde Festivals. For some reason, I had decided to leave this tent with Carsten when I left Denmark rather than incinerating it as I should have done. (To my horror, Carsten still even had in his cupboards some of the (by then weevil-ridden) food I had left with him, but that's another story...) We packed up the tent for good and spent the morning in Ribe, where we saw a viking museum , wandered around the quaint cobbled streets and ate lunch in a typically Danish part-timbered house. In order to fight the cold (and satisfy my caffeine addiction), it was imperative that I buy a coffee before leaving town. It was in the coffee shop that any confidence I had in my Danish-speaking ability was to receive its next assault. I ordered a coffee in Danish (quite competently, I thought) and received a response which for all I could tell was in ancient Greek. The lady repeated the question and I honestly thought I had completely lost the capacity to understand Danish until Carsten rushed to my side and, addressing the shop assistant said "No, she speaks English, not German!" Evidently Ribe, being close to the German boarder, receives a large number of German visitors and seeing as my accent was not Danish, I had been assumed to be one of them.
That evening we drove through Esbjerg, Denmark's fishing capital, in order to buy a nice fresh fish for dinner. Tragically all the fish markets were closed, so we had to settle for frozen fish from the supermarket - an extremely poor substitute. We spent the night in Grinsted - not in the still sopping wet tent, but in a cosy little hut in the camping ground.


View of Ribe from church tower


Sunny Ribe


Part-timbered house, Ribe


Part-timbered house where we ate lunch, Ribe


Cold!!!!


Cathedral, Ribe

Day 4 - 31/08/07

It started out looking like it was going to be a pretty miserable day and I had fairly little desire to leave the comfort of the car when we pulled up outside Legoland in the pouring rain. However, we had come to Billund specifically for the purpose of seeing Legoland and we were on a tight schedule, so we got out and braved the rain. Fortunately, the rain cleared after a couple of hours and we were able to enjoy a sunny afternoon looking at the minature towns Legoland is famous for. We also went on some rides, the most interesting being the "Power Builder", which you program yourself. It was probably unwise of me to choose the second highest level of nauseating fun, but at least my neck didn't snap despite my head being thrown about in an alarming manner for the duration of the ride. After a day of amusement rides and junk food we found a hut in a camping ground in Resenbro.

Castle of which I have forgotten the name, Legoland


Paparazzi-style photo of Princess Mary & Crown Prince Frederik, Legoland



Nyhavn (Copenhagen, Denmark), Legoland


Extremely overpriced novelty lego-shaped chocolate, Legoland


The "Power Builder", Legoland

Lego Flamingoes, Legoland


Fredensborg Slot, Legoland


Statue of Liberty, Legoland

Day 5 - 01/09/07

Visited Silkeborg museum, where by far the most interesting exhibit is "Tollund Man", the naturally mummified corpse of a man who lived in circa 400BC. He had been hanged and thrown into a peat bog, where his body was remarkably well preserved due the lack of oxygen and the acidity of the peat. The detail of the face is amazing; even the wrinkles on the man's face are clearly visible.

Tollund Man, Silkeborg

The next stop was Himmelbjerget ("Sky Mountain"), which at 148m has the honour of being one of the highest points in Denmark. The strenuous climb to the summit took 5 minutes (including the walk from the carpark to the bottom of the hill).

Himmelbjerget

We then continued on to Aalborg where we met up with Kristian (an old friend from the dormitory days) and his girlfriend, Rikke. After an enormous dinner, we ventured out to Jomfru Ane Gade, a street famed for its ridiculous number of bars and discos interspersed with kebab shops. The party was still in full swing when Carsten and I left Kristian and Rikke amongst the vomiting, urinating drunk people at about 3am and headed back to the camping ground to spend the night in the most basic hut we had encountered thus far.

Kristina, Elena, Rikke & Carsten, Aalborg

Day 6 - 02/09/07

After a greasy breakfast eaten in theory as a hangover cure (for me), we went to see Lindholm Høje, an old viking burial ground, before continuing on to Lisbjerg, a town close to Århus. As the day's final cultural even, we went to see the Simpsons movie, as I really didn't fancy seeing the dubbed version back in France. The idea of a cartoon that epitomises American culture with French voiceovers is a contradiction I just find way too hard to get my head around.

With hangover in front of hut, Aalborg


Budolfi Cathedral, Aalborg


Lindholm Høje


Viking grave, Lindholm Høje

Day 7 - 03/09/07

The last day of our road trip. We stopped briefly in Århus where there was a festival going on, part of which involved a ferris wheel-like construction on which small children sat on toilet seats and wore amusingly large train driver style hats which fell over their faces. We then took a detour to Jelling, the site of the two famous rune stones which were engraved over a thousand years ago under the instruction of Harald Blåtand (Harald Blue Tooth), a Danish king who ruled in ca. 960 AD and who converted the Danes from worshippers of the old Norse gods to Christians. That evening, we arrived back at Carsten's parents' house in Nykøbing, where I was fed stuffed pigs hearts at Carsten's special request (apparently he thought I needed to experience some authentic Danish cuisine apart from the usual duck, pork and meatballs that I'm used to).

Burial mound, Jelling


Jelling Stone (Jellingstenen)

With Carsten on ferry to Falster

I had never been more relieved to get off a plane than when I arrived in Paris after a long journey throughout which I felt feverish and nauseous. Was met at the airport by Marie and after a nutritious French breakfast of croissants, pain au chocolat, baguettes and coffee, moved on to Pierre's father's apartment in the middle of Paris, where I joined a Frenchman (Pierre), two Italians (Silvia & Chiara) and a Dane (Carsten). The soldiers patrolling the local train station with machine guns (an anti-terrorism measure) added to the sense of unreality induced by lack of sleep anad jetlag. My first night was almost sleepless and was filled with semi-conscious delerious nightmares that I had to sort out the bedsheets and figure out which ones could be submitted to Medicare for reimbursement (evidently there are scars from my time as a Claims Handler...)


Eiffel Tower, Paris, July 07


"Bastard Family" in Parisian cemetary, July 07


With Rose, Paris July 07


With Isabelle, Yasin, Silvia & Carsten, Paris July 07


Notre Dame, Paris July 07


View from Pierre's father's apartment in Montparnasse: Eiffel Tower by night, Paris July 07


With fake smile & Silvia, Paris 07


Drinking a Kronenbourg 1664 for Mike: Montmatre, Paris, July 07


Montmatre, Paris, July 07


With Pierre, Montmatre, Paris, July 07


Montmatre, Paris, July 07


My new workplace, Paris, July 07


The Catacombes, Paris, July 07


The Catacombes, Paris, July 07

Some cheerful thoughts from the Catacombes:

"Pensez le matin que vous n'irez pas etre pas jusques au soir et au soir que vous n'irez pas au matin" (Think in the morning that you may not make it till the evening and in the evening that you may not make it till the morning)

"Heureux celui qui a toujours devant les yeux l'heure de sa mort et qui dispose tous les jours a mourir" (No translation for fear of inaccuracy and consequential taunting by cruel Fwenchman...)

"Il est quelquefois plus avantageux de mourir que de vivre" (It is sometimes more advantageous to die than to live)


Romi arrived in Paris at some point, as is evident from subsequent photos...


With Romi, Paris, July 07


Fine specimen of an arrogant Frenchman with croissant, Paris, July 07


Romi dressed for Parisian summer, July 07


Romi & Pierre, Paris, July 07

Reluctantly I left Paris on 29th August and headed down to Grenoble, a town in the French Alps where I am to spend the first half of my year in France. As usual, I had a stupid amount of luggage.


With stupid amount of luggage yet again, Paris July 07


View from dorm room in Grenoble, Aug. 07

I arrived exhausted and discovered that I was to live in a dorm that takes the concept of"basic" to the extreme, but at least the view was good!


View from dorm room in Grenoble, Aug. 07


With Alex in Nimes, Aug. 07

It soon ( I would go as far as to say almost immediately) became obvious that I could not tolerate the dorm for half a year, as much as I enjoyed the odour of sewerage from the bathroom plumbing and oil from the deep fryer in the kitchen. To my great joy, I have just moved into an apartment in what appears to be the kebab district. I share the apartment with a Frenchman, a cat ('Chausettes'), a gerbil and often, the majority of the town's gay community (a lovely bunch of guys who call me "Mademoiselle"). The view from the apartment is also quite spectacular and I take much pleasure in sitting on the terrace dunking my baguette into a large bowl of coffee.


View from apartment, Aug. 07

Slowly I am adapting to my new lifestyle, though my French is still far from fluent. Fortunately my French class has just been given a new teacher, who is far less pushy and more cynical than the last, and to whom I took an immediate liking. The university semester starts in one month; trying to follow courses in French will be challenging but hopefully not impossible.