Visit to the Poitou-Charentes

This week in France is Toussaints, basically half term... yippeee! When I realised I had a week off, I wasn't sure what to do with myself, although I really, really would have liked to go home, I decided to stay here, for fear that I would undo all the good homesickness related work that I have done! So, as a type of compromise, I decided to go visit my Grandad who lives n
ear Confolens in the Charente region, a sort of home from home! So off Bec and I travelled, via first cl
ass on the TGV (très impressionnant, it has to be said) to Angoulême. We were greeted by my Grand
ad and he d

rove us back to his house - oh, how I have missed the luxury of being driven in a car and not relying on public transport! We stopped at the Resistance Memorial at Chasseneuil (I'm bit of a history geek) and took some photos! The F

rench are very proud o

f their Resistance during the Occuption in the Second World War and it really is a fitting tribute.

Saturday evening we had a scrummy Chinese meal in St. Junien (real, hot food... ahh) and I went to bed very full, happy and content!

Sunday, we went out for lunch and had a 4 course roast dinner, cooked by English people, and it was simply divine. It's not until

you eat these foods

again that you realise how much you do actually miss them... and I don't even have roast dinners at home that often! Later that afternoon, we visited the Lacs de la Haute Charante, stopped at Chabanais by the Vienne river

s to say, lots of photo ops!, needles

I have visited my Grandparents a few times in France but on Monday we visited somewhere I have never been before... Vallée des singes! It

's a monkey park and some of the monkeys can run around your feet and jump from tree to tree above your head, it really was a great day. It had a bit of an educational twist

too when we listened to the anima

l keepers talk about the monkeys etc, who said learning can't be fun? ;) Some of the little monkeys were so cute, I have loads more photos on facebook - so take a look there if you fancy it!

On the Tuesday, we visited Oradour-sur-Glane, which is a martyr village. As I said earlier, I am quite interested in history and the story of Oradour is so sad and tragic that it stays with you for a very long time. If you want to know more, take a loo

k on the wikipedia page, it

explains it there better than I can. The village has been left how it was when over 600 of its residents were massacred by the Waffen SS. It really is very interesting but terribly sad. I have visited

before, but wanted to go back and visit the exposition there. Poor Bec probably didn't realise she was coming for a history lesson when she said she'd like to come with me!

And today I returned back to Pau, having enjoyed myself immensely! Not sure what my plans are for the rest of the holidays but since my Erasmus grant is expected within the next few days, perhaps a bit of shopping... Hurrah!

7 weeks in...

Instead of me rambling along for a few hundred words, I thought I'd do a little picture post :)

Sunrise over the Pyrenees

La Vie Paloise

I'm now only two days shy of being here a whole month. I can't believe how quickly the time has flown. It has been a trying month at times, quite stressful and frustrating. It's also surprised me of how much a culture shock it was to move from England to France. I always had the view that it would be quite simple (apart from la langue, bien sur), considering that France is so close to us, it's a European country that I have visited on numerous occasions etc. But really, it is a completely different way of life. It's so strange to come to live in a town where nothing is open on a Sunday. We have spent the majority of our Sundays sitting in McDonalds because there is really not much else to do. I've also sincerely struggled with the amount of time it takes to get anything done! Like I said, I have been here nearly a month and still not sorted all my paperwork. I have to tell myself to take a deep breath and calm down.

I do feel quite settled here though. Although I'm having trouble meeting French people and speaking French, I don't feel as homesick as I thought I would. I think it's helped having met people that I get on well with, they've almost become my little family here. I feel I am understanding people a lot more but I still need to get over this confidence thing of not speaking French. It's making me feel very frustrated. I want to improve but I'm finding it so difficult.

So, over the next few weeks, my goals are to obviously speak more French and to take more photos!

Bonjour a tous!

So I'm here, in France! I have been here just under two weeks now and the whole experience has been quite overwhelming! I'm starting to get used to the French way of life (in other words, paperwork, paperwork, paperwork) and although I don't feel like my speaking has improved I'm finding that I understand people a little better. It's still early days though so I'm not going too hard on myself!

So, a bit about Pau and the university here. Firstly, I can see the Pyrenees from my university residence window, and in my opinion, I personally think that is really awesome. The Boulevard des Pyrenees truly offers some spectacular views of the mountains and I'm taken aback everytime I go down there... I can't believe I'm living by the moutains! Pau itself is a really nice city/town (? I'm not quite sure which it is yet) and the locals seem very friendly. My accommodation is nice, very basic but it's clean and tidy so I can't complain. The only downside is the lack of the internet, it's driving me insane.. I am currently stealing a connection from the public hotspot but it's so unreliable.. I can't wait for our super-fast fibre optic broadband to be installed in a couple of weeks!

Classes start on Monday although we haven't picked any modules yet... I'm going to take this as standard, haha. I'm going to watch my friends white water raft tomorrow at the Stade d'eaux-vivres (apparently the Olympic kayak-canoeing champion lives in Pau) and I'm going to attempt to surf on Saturday at Anglet, if that fails I will be basking in the beautiful Pays Basque sun.... ahhh!

Will try and upload some pictures soon!

The final countdown...

I am officially 7 days from moving to Pau. To be honest, I'm terrified. There is a tiny bit of excitement in there but most it's fear! I feel like I'm the only one who isn't brimming with excitement over the year abroad but I honestly do not feel confident enough over my French. I think this is my main worry (aside from mal du pays). I'm worried that I won't be able to understand anyone or make myself understood.

I'm very concerned that this lack of confidence is going to affect every part of me living in France. I want to go out there and meet lots of French people, and talk lots of French but what if my fear of making mistakes stops me doing this? I try to go out with this mindset that I will speak as much as possible but what if I chicken out at the last minute? I guess it will be a sink or swim situation!

Apart from concerns about my ability, I'm going to miss my family so much. I guess this is a normal part of moving away. People have said they will come out and visit me and at the moment, I don't have any intentions of coming home during the term. It appears we have a wee off for Toussaints but I'm hoping to go visit my friends in Barcelona and Zaragoza!

On a more positive note, Pau looks beautiful. I'm excited to be so close to the Pyrenees! It looks like it's nice and warm there right now too, they seemed to experience a canicule over the weekend, the temperatures peaked at around 40 degrees! Toasty!

So, what's left to do in my last 7 days in the UK:-

• Sort out some Euros for immediate spending money/upfront rent payment.
• Year abroad insurance.
• Start packing!
• Seeing everyone and say my "see you laters" (I refuse to say goodbye!)
• Book a hotel for our first night in France.

I think that's it... That's not too bad... I've probably forgotten something though!

Bienvenue, bienvenido, welcome...

So here I am, writing my first entry in my year abroad blog. First of all, it feels crazy that in about six weeks, I will be embarking on my year abroad, my third year of my degree course. How quickly has time flown since I started university (again).

So to the matter in hand, if you don't know, I'm going to spend the autumn semester in Pau, France, from the end of August until late December. I will be studying at the Université de Pau et des Pays de l'Adour, I think I have provisionally chosen my courses, I'm not really 100% sure because everything seems so confusing with the French universities. I have learnt in the past few months of dealing with them that they love their paperwork and I'm assured that it will only get worse. I'm hoping to live in university residences although I am concerned that I won't be speaking as much French as I could be, as French students tend to live at home. My French itself is another worry - but I will go into that in another entry!

After Christmas, it gets really exciting for me. On 11th January I am flying into Mexico City to start my six month stint there! I love Latin American culture and when the opportunity presented itself to study in Mexico, I couldn't turn it down. I'll be studying at the Universidad de Guadalajara, living with a host family, travelling around Mexico and hopefully back to Cuba. It's going to be difficult as I'm such a home-bird but I know it will be such a fantastic experience.

I think I will leave it there for today - I just thought I should post something as the blog looked very empty with zero posts.