Chateaux de la Loire

Bonjour tout le monde!

This weekend I took a trip with the student association (Zephyr) to the Chateaux de la Loire (the castles of the Loire valley). It started off as you would expect any trip organized by the French...late. At first I felt bad stereotyping these things as I should be keeping an open mind while experiencing a new culture, etc., but every time I count on them to arrive on time I am, sadly, disappointed. In this case, it was more frustration as we were told to arrive at the meeting place at 5:30 in the morning and to make sure that we are on time. So, we arrived at 5:20, just to be safe, and we were the only people there. At 5:25, the German students arrived, and in the next five minutes some more of the international students arrived. At 5:30, there were about 30 of the 65 people attending, none of whom were French. In fact, the first French student arrived around 5:45 and the bus did not arrive until 6. While this was slightly annoying as I had woken up at 4 to be sure that I arrived on time, I cannot say I was very surprised.

So, at 6:30 we pulled away on our bus for the trip. We arrived at the Chateau de Chambord around 10:30 and visited for about 2 hours. This particular chateau was an absolutely amazing feat of architecture. It was a bit rainy, but still a very enjoyable visit. While I could attempt to describe it to you, that would take quite some time, so I am going to take the lazier route and show you the pictures.

 View from the path on the way to the castle.

 The winding staircase. There are two staircases that go to each floor and wind around each other, but never meet. Sadly, we could not go all the way to the top of them because the last floor was under construction, but it was still very cool.

 Just one example of the many, many rooms in this castle. They were all fairly extravagant, with gold lining, hand-woven rugs covering entire walls, massive bed frames, etc. with the exception of the servants quarters, which could barely a 4 foot long bed and a small dresser.

 Just one of the many cool crests around the castle. They very much liked putting a representation of their awesomeness in as many places as they could.

 The hunting room. Every wall was covered with the mounts you see to the left of the structure in the middle. There were probably 100 of them surrounding this room.

 Old-school crossbow. Yes, it has a crank on it. There was also a 6-foot tall spear and a bear trap three times the size of my head. They were clearly very prominent hunters.

 A view from the top of the castle. Rainy, but still amazing.

 The center piece at the top of the castle. As you can see, the architecture on this piece alone is absolutely amazing, and this is one of many towers on the castle.

Another view from the the top of the castle. It was quite breathtaking to be up at the top of the castle and see all the open land beyond the castle.

That concludes the trip to castle number one. I would like to show you more pictures of it, but I took 100 so they would take forever to load and take up way too much space. If you would like to see more of them, just comment and I can send them to you.

So, we hopped back on the bus after a short visit to the gift shop and took a two hour bus ride to our second destination: Chateau de Chenonceau. This one was far smaller than the first, but had a much more intricate garden area, farm, and a few other separate buildings. It was also directly on a river, which provided us with some more great views and pictures that are below. They normally do boat rides and night tours with lights in the gardens and castle, but they were not available when we were there. Again, if you would like to see more, just comment and I can send them to you. 

 The path on the way to the castle.

 The moat on the front side of the castle. I imagine it is much more beautiful (and effective) when it is full.

 View from across the bridge of the main building and the gatehouse.

 Side-view from the garden.

 The crest on the door.

 An example of one of the enormous rugs on the wall. They were all over the castle and amazingly intricate.

 View of the river from inside the castle.

 Just one room in the kitchen area. From the looks of things, these people really loved to eat.

Just one of the many garden areas outside the castle. As you can see, they put quite a bit of work into the design.

A painting of what the castle would look like on a nicer day.

From here, we drove another hour or so into the middle of nowhere to the youth hostel where we stayed. The zephyr students cooked us dinner and provided snacks for a night of music and some odd French games. It was a surprisingly nice place, where we stayed in rooms of four, but each got our own bed and closet. There was also a bathroom and shower in each room. After another early morning (8 am) and a complimentary breakfast of bread, coffee and warm milk (which the Europeans love, while we all worried it would put is back to sleep), we headed for the vineyard.

At the vineyard, we got a tour of the facilities and I learned quite a lot about the process of making wine, including some of the biological aspects that go into the creation of different kinds of wine. After the tour, we were lucky enough to participate in a wine tasting for about 5 different wines. The first was a "Methode traditionelle" which they made clear was not champagne (because champagne is made the same way but is legally only from the Champagne region). We also got to try some dry and semi-dry wines, but no reds. This particular vineyard produces only white wines, but they do a very good job of it (Many of their wines received medals from around France). The amazing thing is, unlike in the states, about 95% of them could be bought for under 10 euros! Here are some pictures.

 Outside the "cave" where they make the wine after the grapes come in.

 Our tour guide showing us the special wine made using the old methods. When done, these produce the more expensive wines.

 Yea, they have a ton of wine.

 Wine tasting!

The Not Champagne that we tried. The price is cut off in this picture, but it only costs 5.25 euros.

Following the wine tasting, we had a short picnic and left for our final destination: The village of Azay-le-Rideau. After two more hours on a bus, we arrived and visited the castle, had some ice cream in the village and prepared to head home. After two other castles the day before, this one was beginning to look very similar. Still, it was very beautiful day which made wandering around the inside and outside of the castle much more enjoyable. Enjoy the photos!

 Front of the castle.

 Another moat.

 Yet another crest. They really love these things, huh?

 View of the path leading up to the castle and the village behind it.

 The lake and field behind the castle.

Back of the castle.

Following a four hour bus ride we made it back around 8:30 and crashed in our rooms after an exhausting trips. Nevertheless, it was very enjoyable and definitely worth the 30 euros to see a very important part of European history. I hope this has been an interesting post, and there will be more to follow this weekend. 

A plus,

Tom

Pictures!

Le Parc Thabor!

 The lovely lawn and an artist drawing it

 An interesting statue of the bard of brittany

 Future waterfall

 Narnia lamppost?

Bird Sanctuary!

 Birds!

The lawn (above) and the greenhouse at the top of it (below)

 Fish pond

 Hints of spring!

Rennes v. Nice

 Stade Rennais logo outside the stadium

 Nice warming up (above and below)

 Les rouges (Stade Rennais) warm-up

 Les rouges (Stade Rennais) warm-up

The young ones who played during half-time

 Kick-off!

My room

 Sink area, mirror, shelves, closet

 View from the doorway, as you can see the desk is already a bit of a mess...

My bed and opposite side of the closet


Sorry about some of the pictures being sideways, I was unsure how to rotate them in the blog. Hope these will do for now, I will have more after this weekend!

A bientot!

Tom

Lots 'o Soccer!

Salut!

This post should be the last one needed to get up to date, and after this I will be working diligently to keep from getting behind.

The weather has been improving here in Rennes, though it has generally been far better than in the states even at its worst (about 30 degrees). As a result, I've been able to get out and play a lot more soccer. I've played a few pick-up games on Saturdays and Sundays in addition to playing with the team at the IEP. It has been a lot of fun and very relaxing to get out and get some exercise and have something familiar to do; I've even started learning the terminology! We've only had one game with the IEP team so far, but it went very well. We played a team from INSA, a part of the larger university in Rennes. We won 2-1 off of two great goals, one of which I assisted! I nearly had a goal as well after beating the last defender, but the goalkeeper made a great save and robbed me of my glory. I anticipate we will have a lot more great games with that team and I will have many more opportunities to score playing at center forward. I've been getting a lot of compliments about my play which has been exciting, particularly because they do not have the highest opinion of Americans as soccer players here. Although, were I slightly more confrontational I might cite the French performance in the previous world cup, which was generally abysmal. Nevertheless, many of the students I play pick-up with have taken to calling me "The Brazilian" because aside from Landon Donovan they apparently do not believe it is possible for Americans to be good at soccer. I will admit that, while a bit annoying, it makes it all the more fun to beat them :-).

On another note, we took advantage of the nice weather by going to a famous park in Rennes called the Parc Thabor. It was absolutely beautiful and I plan to visit many more times before I leave since the fountains were not yet filled with water and some of the trees were still barren. Nevertheless, it was a beautiful day and a truly amazing park. We stopped and had a picnic with some of the other international students and enjoyed the weather. I also managed to get some shopping done since it was nearly the end of "Les Soldes", the month long sale of subsequent mark-downs up to nearly 70%. I picked up a great new pair of soccer shoes that are normally 45 euros for only 15! I plan to make us of the ones I have as long as I can and save these for the new season in the fall.

More on the soccer front, we went to a professional game last Sunday for the local team, called Stade Rennais. It was a bit rainy, but our seats only cost 9 euros and were under an awning so we didn't really have to deal with the bad weather. It was an exciting game and Stade Rennais won 2-0 off a great header and a penalty kick. After all of this excitement, I am planning to do my French expose on the differences between sports, mainly soccer, in the United States and France. So, if you have any good information and helpful hints, they would be much appreciated!

Tomorrow, we will be leaving bright and early (4:30 am!) for our weekend trip to Chateaux de la Loire. It promises to be very exciting and the pictures make it look awesome. I will have a post up with the details as soon as possible upon my return.

Pictures following soon!

Tom

Retroactive Blogging

Hello family, friends, professors, etc.!

So, I have been receiving a lot of requests for emails and updates and I have decided that instead of writing dozens of emails it would be far easier for me to cave and start a blog. It won't be nearly as exciting as anything  on Perez Hilton's, but I will do my best to entertain you all with my limited blogging experience. That said, this first post is going to be a bit long as I have been here nearly a month and a half now, so I hope you will all bear with me and power through to the end.

Chapter 1: Bureaucracy and Sleeping

I arrived in Rennes late at night on the 3rd of January after a 16 hour trip (2 flights and a train, which was late, of course). The student organisation here was supposed to meet me at the train station when I arrived, but without informing me, did not come because it was during their exam time and so they were too busy. This was the beginning of a very stressful two week period. Upon my arrival, I went to the first hotel I could find and was subsequently overcharged 300 euros because of a typo by the hotel clerk (He accidentally pressed the 3 while pressing the 4). To make matters worse, he also did not know how to fix this problem despite calling his boss. Lucky for me, his boss showed up in the morning and immediately fixed everything. So, I arrived at school hoping for a moment to relax.

We had an orientation in the morning and a small French exam in the afternoon to determine which level we would be in for the semester. After this, we basically spent the next two weeks bouncing from office to office trying to complete the mountains of paperwork necessary to study here. To give you an idea, imagine all the forms you have to fill out when going to the hospital. Then, imagine doing that everyday, then having to give copies to six different people all working in the same building. As you may imagine, I quickly became very frustrated. In addition to the sheer amount of paperwork, we could really only go to one or two offices a day because everything closes from 12-2 for lunch and then at 5 at the latest. Aside from that, I spent much of my time sleeping off my jetlag and exhaustion from walking all over Rennes and attending our one French class in the mornings. After finally finishing the paperwork, however, I was extremely relieved and life in Rennes quickly became much more enjoyable.

Chapter 2: Settling In

Throughout this entire process, I began socializing and hanging out with the other international students who weren't taking exams. The new group of international students this semester came from a variety of countries including Mexico, Brazil, Greece, Switzerland and Scotland. Interestingly enough, people here are often referred to by their nationalities since it can be quite difficult to remember the names of every person you've met when they are all in various languages you do not speak. For example, the four of us coming from the good old US of A were simply "the Americans" and our neighbors to the south "the Mexicans". As uncomfortable as this was at first, we got used to it pretty quickly. One American in particular who has been here in the fall saved our lives during this time by telling us everything we needed to do and how to get it done. This gave us a lot more time to visit the city and learn our way around.

We walked into town most days and either wandered around aimlessly or saw some of the sites such as the Musée de Beaux-Arts and the Marché des Lices, the local farmer's market that takes place every Saturday morning. This quickly became my favorite place, since I could buy 8 kiwis and 5 apples all for under 5 euros and we could purchase dinner for the group that cost us each about 4 euros. We very quickly took to cooking nearly every night and thanks to Ikea managed to get some affordable communal pots and pans.

After the first couple of weeks, French students started coming out of hiding after exams and we got to start socializing with fewer English speakers. We went to some student organized events, local nightclubs and the famed Rue St. Michel which is affectionately known here as "Rue de la Soif" because of the many bars there. As our assimilation really began, we finally had some opportunities to work on our French in both formal and informal settings, which brings us to the next chapter of my journey.

Chapter 3: The French Connection

While the first week of French classes was relatively low key (doing basic review, getting to know you activities, clothing and law terminology, and of course watching L'Auberge Espagnol, France's favorite movie), things began to pick up after that. I was placed in the C group, which is right in the middle: A is the lowest and E is the highest. We began reviewing more complex subjects like the subjunctive, passive tense and affective tense and doing listening and reading comprehension activities that are more challenging but definitely helping. In addition, we spent a lot of time talking about the "Français familier", which has proved extremely useful when speaking to other students who tend to use a lot of slang.

The third week here, we started visiting the actual courses and deciding what we might want to take. Each course meets once a week for a two hour lecture and some of them split into conferences that require more research on a specific aspect of the course. Aside from our History and Civilization course, we do not need to attend any of the conferences for the lectures we chose. Coming from a place like Beloit where my largest class did not exceed 40 and some even got as small as 5, being in a 2-hour, 200 person lecture where the professor basically reads off of a sheet was at first a little shocking. Nevertheless, I've begun to get used to managing to listen and take decent notes and some of the native students have offered us their old notes as help. So, for those of you who may be interested, the courses I've chosen are the following:

French
History and Civilization (1 lecture and 1 conference)
Constitutional Law of the 5th Republic
Comparative Politics
Sociology of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Introduction to Political Economy 2 (much like Macroeconomics)

The grading system is a little nerve-wracking given that a 10/20 is about a B- on our system but the lowest possible grade to pass, but I think I'll manage. Most of my exams will include an oral presentation, written exam and 4-5 page paper on topics that we should be choosing soon. I'm still a little nervous about the amount of work that I have, but the students here have offered to help us if we have any worries or questions on how things are supposed to be done.

My marraine and parrain (student mentors) have been very helpful already and have both had me over for wonderful dinners. Being able to spend time with them and speak almost entirely French has done wonders for my speaking and comprehension and I anticipate I will continue making good progress as courses progress.

Epilogue

This concludes the longest blog post ever. I hope you made it all the through and didn't just skip to the end, and that my story-telling was not too haphazard to follow. Coming soon will be a much more brief update of this past week (including pictures!), followed by weekly updates hopefully for the rest of my time here. I've included my mailing address below in case any of you feel compelled to send me things and if you need to reach me you can post a comment on the blog or send me an email at slushert@beloit.edu. A bientôt!

Cité Universitaire Patton
Apt 129 A
12 Rue du Houx
35700 Rennes, France

-Tom