"The rain rain rain came down down down, in rushing, rising riv'lets"... Anyone would think I'm not even in the South of France!

So everybody thinks that soggy November days and countless flash floods are a curse that only befalls Britain. Well, I can officially now say with confidence that such an assumption is completely and utterly false.  To say that the past week in Montpellier has been 'damp' would be a giant understatement.  But before you start silently rejoicing and telling me that I am finally getting my comeuppance for my smugness during the thirty degree heat in October, hear me out on this one - this is no ordinary spot of rain.

Place de l'Europe.  Image taken from the BBC

On the 4th of November it was reported that over a year's worth of rain had fallen over the Hérault department of the Languedoc-Roussillon region since the start of November.  That's 700mm of rain, or for those of us still fervently sticking with imperial measurements, that's over 27 inches.  Predictably, Montpellier can be found in the aforementioned Hérault department.  What started out as "alerte orange" being announced on the local news and weather programmes, very quickly became "alerte rouge", and has remained at 'rouge' for several days.  "Alerte rouge" means an absolute vigilance is necessary; dangerous weather conditions of an exceptional intensity are expected.  During "alerte rouge", parents are expected to collect their children from school, and every one is advised to be very careful when travelling, avoid outside leisure activities, and take shelter away from wooded areas.  Its basically an equivalent of what everybody is advised to do if there is a particularly heavy snowfall forecast in Britain, minus the bit about going to the woods of course.


Ironically, I can still remember when the rain first made an appearance a couple of weeks ago.  I was walking from the centre of Montpellier back to the flat when it started spitting, and as I hadn't seen any rain since I moved to Montpellier on the 20th of September, I hadn't anticipated it and therefore found myself brolly-less.  Nonetheless, it would seem that you can take the girl out of England, but you can't quite take the English out of the girl; I actually enjoyed walking along in the rain with my iPod on.  The French who were all scurrying past, hoods up and heads down, seemed to look at me with a particularly incredulous look as I practically skipped past smiling to myself.  There's something comforting about a spot of rain after four, maybe even five weeks, of solid sunshine.  Particularly when you're in one of those moods when everything doesn't quite seem to be going your way; the constant sunshine sometimes felt as though it was mocking me somewhat, but the rain seemed to put Montpellier into a bit of a grump, much to my satisfaction.

Tram ploughing through the water

Having said that, one afternoon of showers and my British desire for a spot of rain had been quelled.  Sure enough, the sunshine did return for a little while after that.  What I wasn't expecting though, was for the sunshine to disappear just as quickly as it had re-appeared, only to be replaced by a week and a half of solid rain and thunderstorms.  I know I haven't been brilliant at keeping track of time since getting here, and time does have a nasty habit of dragging past at snail's pace, but when I say that I can't remember the last time we had a dry day, I really do mean it.  The rain has simply been relentless.  Every now and then it gives up leaving a small window of respite, but before you know it, it will be pouring again.  It's not just the rain though; its the thunder and lightening that goes with it.  I think everyone has become accustomed to the sound of rolling thunder in the afternoon, and flashes of sheet lightening that illuminate the night sky of an evening.


From a day-to-day point of view for me it has provided some minor inconveniences; getting to the supermarket has become quite the effort, going to the pub in the evenings is pretty much impossible without risking life and limb, and given that I only have one pair of waterproof shoes with me, outfit choices have been somewhat narrowed (there's only so many items of clothing that will go with bright pink patent Dr Marten's).  That's not exactly much to grumble over when you consider that many of the towns surrounding Montpellier are currently flooded and without power, whilst school transport has been cancelled and roads have been blocked by falling trees.  This might sound like a fairly standard week for a village in the South West of England, but it would seem that its not entirely normal for Montpellier.  

Aqueducts pre-flooding

As it turns out, the entire of Montpellier is actually built on a flood plane, and to deal with this, there are aqueducts criss-crossing across the length and breadth of the city.  The fact that they have even built the aqueducts signals that flooding probably isn't entirely out of the question, yet it still feels as though this latest deluge of water has come as some sort of a surprise to the Southern French residents.  Perhaps it is uncommon for this time of year, but my housemate Marco has assured me that it does normally rain quite a lot in November.  Then again, when he says it normally rains quite a lot, he might mean once a week;  the French idea of 'quite a lot of rain' is probably pretty different to the English one.  For now, I think we're fairly safe where we are.  I may have accidentally stumbled into a few ankle deep puddles (it was dark and I did swear quite a bit about the fact that I would spend the rest of my evening wearing a soggy sock), and remarked that the water level of the near-by river is exceedingly high, but I don't think I'm in danger of floating away in my bed overnight.  Then again, this rain isn't due to give in until the middle of next week, so I may be needing a dinghy yet...


(For more of the BBC's images, go here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-15613133)

"No time for losers, cause we are the champions - of the world"... OK, so it felt like the world, but honestly, we were just champions of the pub quiz!

Its been two long months of pub quiz attendance at The Shakespeare (well, a month and a half for me because I arrived later than the others) and Tuesday was here again.  Tuesday the first of November, known to most of the French speaking world as "Toussaint"; a national holiday, a day of rest, a day of family time, and for the members of the Quizpy Fried Duck quiz team, it was a day of victory!


We arrived to a slightly more empty pub than usual.  I've become accustomed to associating Tuesday nights in The Shakespeare with stifling temperatures, a fight to get to the bar, and a distinct lack of seating.  Last night seemed somewhat more refined though; we had a table towards the back of the room, and all members of our team were comfortably seated.  As usual I was the last to arrive and even I managed to get a seat.  Not to say that the pub wasn't busy of course - for a Tuesday night after two days of national holiday and the prospect of returning to work tomorrow, it was still fairly busy.  Busy enough for there to be thirteen teams in fact.  I did note that our team was looking a little depleted though; usually, the ERASMUS kids come out in force for the quiz, but we decided we would be fine to soldier on with a team of eight.


At around 9pm, the familiar bell sounded across the bar to signal that the quiz was about to commence.  One member from each team immediately leapt up to go and collect the answer sheets, whilst the quiz master ran through the rules from his usual spot atop the bar.  For those not familiar with the infamous Shakespeare quiz, it consists of four rounds.  The first is a picture round in which you are given ten images of famous people and you have to name them.  The second is a general knowledge question round, normally consisting of ten questions, with the odd bonus point thrown in here and there.  The third is another question round, but this time with a twist; there is normally one or two themes that run through the questions for this round, and in the case of last night the two themes were 'buildings' and 'numbers' (five questions on each theme).  Finally, the last round is a music round; they play ten clips of ten different songs and you have to name both the artist and the song title.  Simples.


The picture round went surprisingly well, with us only missing three answers.  For the first time in quiz history I even managed to successfully contribute a correct answer... Many hours of watching Hellcats last year instead of writing essays had finally paid off as I identified number four to be a blonde Ashley Tisdale.  Sadly "Paco Rabanne advert man" didn't quite cut it as the answer to who the chiselled, attractive man was, but you can't win them all!  Despite Sean's heroic efforts, we still didn't get the name of the blonde pouting woman either.  I think she was an actress, but frankly I'd never set eyes on her before.  Sean was our guest team member for the week - he's Liza's boyfriend, thus it was necessary for him to have travelled nine hundred miles to attend a quiz in a distinctly English pub.  Not that he was complaining.  He very swiftly entered into the spirit of things, and since they announce the questions in both English and French, there weren't any language problems either.  He also coined the phrase of the night:  "I'm back".  This was said each time he got a question right, and soon dragged us into a slightly alcohol fuelled association of "I'm back" with the nineties hit "Backstreet's Back".  See, whoever said pub quizzes aren't fun has clearly never been to one with us.


The first round also brought the dilemma of the team name.  Some debate over the name of the Asian duck dish had arisen before the quiz began; some said "Crispy Fried Duck", some argued "Crispy Aromatic Duck"... Come to think of it, I've also heard "Peking Duck", or is that a different dish altogether?  Chinese dishes aside, when it came to a team name, Luis had the pen, and having been the chief advocate for "Crispy Fried Duck", thus took the executive decision that we would hereby be known as "Quizpy Fried Duck".  Genius.


The second and third rounds went past without too much of great note.  Sean was the only one who managed to name the two teams who played in a Major League Baseball match, and by the only one, I mean the only one to get the question right in the entire pub.  Pretty impressive.  Alex was then able to name the tallest sculpture in the world and its exact height.  Also pretty impressive.  Liza gave the names for the 50th, 60th, 70th and 80th wedding anniversaries, whilst I jumped in with the answer to the bonus question; the 1st anniversary is known as the 'paper' anniversary (that was two things I'd answered... I was on fire!).


The final round was probably the one that posed the most problems, but then again, the music round always does.  We didn't do too badly though and even I managed to recognise two of the artists/bands.  One was a little bit of an embarrassing one to admit to, but the other was Blink 182.  Hearing a Blink 182 song being played as part of a quiz in a pub in the South of France did slightly make my night to be honest.  Alex and Luis had to step in with the song name, but it really was on the tip of my tongue... Honest.


So, an hour and three quarters, four quiz rounds, and several pints later, and it was time for the results!  As is customary, the results were read out in reverse order.  By fourth place we still hadn't been announced and we were all a little bit astounded to be honest.  With the team in last place having a mere six points, and the numbers now being up in the twenties, we figured we had to be third.  The quiz master then took it upon himself to build the tension and announce, in no particular order, which teams were in the top three.  We knew we were in the top three - we just wanted to know where!  Several nail biting seconds later, he announced third place.  It wasn't us.  This instantly made us very happy, since even if you come second, you still win free alcohol.  Next, second place... And that wasn't us either.   Which could only mean one thing: we'd won! We'd finally won!  And not even just marginally either.  We were six points ahead of the team who came second, achieving a final total of thirty points.  Epic.  Especially given that the team who came second were stood behind us and had been looking over our shoulders for half the quiz.  They should clearly look a little more often next time! Victory was finally ours!


The prize for first place is a bottle of whisky, complete with a bottle of Pepsi and enough plastic cups and ice to go around all your team members.  To be honest, I wasn't that bothered with the prize.  I don't even like whisky.  It wasn't about the prize though, it was about the fact that we'd finally won something.  Montpellier had finally given in and let us have our little victory.  We'd hunted for days for places to live, we'd queued for  hours for tram cards, we'd devoted days on end to organising bank accounts, and finally, we'd made it!  Anyone reading this will  probably think that we're/I'm completely nuts, but I defy you not to spend two months in a foreign country and then get a little bit over-excited when you finally win the pub quiz.


So, same time next week guys?! If anyone needs me, I'll be scouring French and English newspapers and gossip mags alike for obscure little facts that might pop up next Tuesday...

The winning team, minus Helen (she was taking the photo)

"In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight"... Not quite the jungle actually, more a zoo in the South of France on a sunny October day

After three and a half weeks in Montpellier, my boyfriend Hallett finally came to visit! He travelled down on the train so that he could get here on Thursday and leave on Sunday.  Flights are all well and good but it would seem that EasyJet and RyanAir aren't too fond of scheduling flights to Montpellier on a Thursday in the middle of Autumn.  Hallett speaks French to about pre-GCSE level, so changing from Gare du Nord to Gare de Lyon in Paris had the potential to be quite the debacle.  However, some precise instructions from me and a couple of carefully selected pictures from the internet of things like what the Metro ticket looks like, and the whole affair didn't seem to cause a problem at all.  Until security.  Apparently security at Gare de Lyon immediately picked out my boyfriend to be English (shockingly enough a 6'2" Dorset farmer doesn't exactly blend into a crowd in the middle of Paris), and thus took it upon themselves to drag him to one side and start speaking to him very quickly... In French.  Having identified him as English, you'd have thought they would have the sense to realise that he probably wouldn't understand all that much French.  However, when faced with a blank and confused look from him, they merely continued to repeat themselves in French, at a rapidly increasing volume.  It turns out its not just the British who assume that talking loudly at someone will help them understand when they don't speak the language!  Luckily, a bi-lingual girl rescued my poor confused boyfriend and he was allowed on his way.  It was her who later explained that apparently they wanted to check his passport and his belongings.  Its a good thing that they didn't rummage too deep into his bag though to be honest, because the dozen bottles of Weston's cider and two dozen packets of Hula Hoops might have raised some questions.  That, and the size four Carvela heels.

As I've already mentioned in my other posts, Friday was the day of the Dorset reunion.  With my parents still being here and Hallett having arrived, we'd decided to take another trip to Aigues Mortes after I finished work at twelve.  Come Saturday; however, we were left to our own devices as my parents made their way back to Blighty.  We decided that Saturday was to be the day for general sightseeing; the Keta Hunt Mystery Tour of Montpellier Round 2, if you will.  We'd already walked through Antigone the previous day, and sampled a Kinder Bueno milkshake from the French answer to Shakeaways; Shakestars (rue de l'Aiguillerie for anyone who finds themselves in Montpellier in need of a milkshake fix).  Saturday was therefore reserved for a general wander around some of the old town, and a nosy in a few shops.  A general wander on a Saturday afternoon wasn't exactly going to be complete without a swift beverage, so I introduced Hallett to the wonders of The Shakespeare pub... And its €6 pint of cider!  Sady, that's probably the cheapest pint of decent cider that I've found in Montpellier.  Apparently half a pint was all I needed though as I promptly slipped on the steps as we left, thus finding myself very nearly flat on my face on the concrete, with a slightly twisted ankle and a bruised knee, in a bustling town centre at about half four in the afternoon.  Smooth Keta, real smooth.  I then spent the rest of the afternoon limping around feeling like a prize prat, with Hallett outwardly sympathising but probably inwardly despairing of my clumsy nature.

Sunday managed to go by without any trips, slips, scrapes, or falls, which was a definite improvement.  Nonetheless, the day wasn't without its little hic-cups courtesy of the wonderful transport system provided by this country on a Sunday.  We had decided to go and visit Hallett's distant relatives at the zoo, which should have been about a twenty to thirty minute journey on two buses.  It being a Sunday, one of the buses wasn't running at all, whilst the other was running on a limited timetable.  As a result, the journey then sadly consisted of two trams, a half an hour wait, and a bus.  I should have known better by now than to try and plan something on a Sunday!  We still arrived in enough time to have a leisurely amble around the majority of the 'african' areas though, and since it is free to get in (yes, that's right - completely free for everyone! You can see where every single person who visits me is going to get dragged to), it didn't really matter that we were only there for a couple of hours.  The zoo is rather cleverly divided into different colour routes, with each route corresponding to a different area of the world where the animals along that route originate from.  The 'africa' route seemed to largely consist of lots of different types of antlope... Or at least that's what we assumed they were.  It would seem that my French animal vocabulary is somewhat lacking, and as all of the signs are in French, we resorted to categorising them according to how streamlined their antlers were:  very stremlined, a bit streamlined or wiggly-antlered antelope 'things' were their official names.

Mostly I had wanted to follow the 'africa' path so that we could see the big cats.  We managed to catch a glimpse of the lynx type-thing with fluffy ears, and one of the cheetahs made an appearance which was well-received by me.  The cheetahs also provided endless amusement as I discovered that in French they are known as "guépards"; cue me wandering around repeating the phrase "gay-paard" in a very posh British accent.  Incidently that was the only new piece of vocabulary that I managed to pick up that day.  We deviated from the Africa path to go and try and find the kangaroos, but apparently the kangaroos have been moved to a new home which I was most indignant about.  Why make people pay fifty cents for a map if your only going to fill it with false advertising?!



We also went off on another path to find the bears, who had clearly decided that Montpellier zoo was still an adequate home and were residing exactly where the map said they would be.  In fact, the bears are such a permanent feature at the zoo that they have built wooden statues of them for children, and twenty one year old boys, to have photos with.  What you don't see in this photo is the little boy who we had just scared away, and the two little girls who were being told to wait their turn by their patient French parents.

Last but not least, we dropped by the lions on the way out, all three of whom were really taking life in their stride and soaking up the last bit of the afternoon sun.  We then opted to do the same and headed off to the rooftop of the Corum building so that I could show Hallett the view from up there.  Our romantic endeavour was slightly disrupted by a less-than-romantic pitstop beforehand at McDonalds to share some potato wedges, but nonetheless, we still caught the majority of the sunset and despite Hallett's apparent inability to smile nicely for a camera, we even took a nice photo or two.

The weekend was all rounded off by a rather lovely dinner out.  We kindly declined Francis' hospitality and offer to cook dinner, and instead went to a little Italian restaurant that one of my friend's had drawn my attention to.  Conveniently, 'Arezzo' is located near the Virgin Megastore just off Comédie, almost directly opposite a cocktail bar.  It seemed rude not to indulge in a pre-dinner drink, so I ordered a Tequila Sunrise, whilst Hallett went for the rather more manly option of Desperados (on a side note, it would seem that this town is obsessed with Desperados, and sell at least three different types of it in every vessle imaginable at every supermarket I have come across.  Très bizarre).  Dinner was followed by a twenty minute walk back to the flat; in true Sunday style, line two trams were running at a rate of about one every half an hour.  Probably a good thing we walked though, as I don't think my overly full tummy would have appreciated a tram ride.

Before I knew it, it was Monday morning and we were back at the train station waiting for the TGV to Paris.  If we were really cute and soppy then we'd have said an emotional goodbye, with me all tear-y eyed, saying that it was fine because he'd be back visiting again in twenty five days.  But of course I'd never be that soppy... I was of course focussed on the fact that I only had a twenty four day supply of Hula Hoops.  Well, mostly focussed on that.

"I'm a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride"... Well, they were cowboys and probably would have been safer riding on steel horses!

Aigues Mortes.  A picturesque twelfth century Medieval walled city, impeccably preserved and still inhabited today.  Once a year, around mid-October, the town pays tribute to its location in the 'Petit Camargue' and plays host to a Camargue festival.  The traditional 'Fête Votive' illustrates the amalgamation of Hispanic influence, Camargue traditions, French culture, and bulls.  That's right, bulls.  Twice a day for the duration of this festival, they let bulls rampage through the cobbled streets of their beautiful medieval city.  When I say bulls, I don't just mean the things you see ambling around with cows in your standard West Country field (or in our case, the bulls you find living in your back garden when they escape from the field behind your house), I mean proper, full-sized, angry bulls.  With horns.  Big horns.


On the Tuesday when my parents were visiting, we decided to explore a little of Montpellier's surrounding area.  My Dad was insistent that he wanted to visit Sète, an old port about a half an hour drive to the west of Montpellier.  I must admit that I wasn't overly impressed with the town; we had a bit of a wander, and although the town is pretty, the overwhelming stench of dead fish mixed with thirty degree heat was somewhat off putting.  Francis, one of my French housemates, had recommended that we visit Aigues-Mortes.  So, after a small argument with the sat-nav (not only can she not speak French, but apparently she's also incapable of correcting your spelling when you miss an 's' off the end of a place name), we set off on the drive to Aigues-Mortes; about a half an hour's drive to the east of Montpellier.

We arrived at around five in the afternoon/evening to discover that there was a fair on outside the walls of the city.  Some other sort of 'event' was also taking place, causing a couple of hundred caravans to park up in the fields outside of the walls, whilst the grassy areas surrounding the walls were filled with parked cars.  Interesting.  Still, unperturbed we parked up and marched through the nearest archway into the city.  We were just admiring the quaint little cobbled streets and the impeccably maintained cottages lining each and every one of them, when we came across the main street.  The town seems to have been built in a rectangular shape with a 'hatched' design; the main street runs directly from one archway to another, whilst the other streets criss-cross out around it.  This would be the main street that, when we arrived, was in fact blocked off by iron gates at each and every entrance.  The bars on the wrought iron gates were wide enough to slip through, and there were people on the other side, so of course we stepped through to find out what all the commotion was about.


An announcement over a tannoy system soon informed us in English, albeit through a thick French accent, that they would shortly be running bulls through the main street.  Me, being the fearless Brit that I am, immediately leapt back behind the gates.  Once the blind panic had subsided and I noticed that several small French children were still running around on the pavement of the main street, I thought I'd better come out of hiding.  A fanfare signalled the start of each 'run' and upon hearing the first one, we looked to the archway and could only see horses.  Now, I had definitely heard something mentioning horses over the tannoy so assumed that perhaps something had been lost in translation; how silly of us! They wouldn't actually let bulls rampage through the streets! Oh no, actually, they would.  Three horses and a bull came hurtling along the main street.  About two minutes later, the same thing happened again.  And again, and again.  In total, at least about a dozen bulls ran through the streets of Aigues-Mortes on that perfectly unsuspecting Tuesday afternoon.  The men (and the occasional woman) were using horses to surround the bulls and keep them in check, so that they ran directly from one archway to the other.  Or at least for the most part they ran directly between the two archways.  On occasion, the bulls got a little, er, distracted, or made a bid for freedom and strayed from the path a little.  No big deal though - it was only a full size bull veering into a crowd of people.

The best part was trying to photograph the whole charade.  Once you'd managed to heave yourself over the general fear factor, the desire to actually dare to capture this amazing feat on film (or memory card as it were) kicked in.  The trouble is, when you have your camera set to 'preview', you can take the photo, then be so intently engrossed in looking at the preview that you blithely forget that the bull and three horses that remain motionless on the photo, are in fact still hurtling towards you.  I definitely made that mistake at least once.  On the bright side, I got my cardio work-out for the day and burnt off the calories from the afternoon's ice cream in pure adrenaline!


Once the cowboys had finished taking the bulls for their afternoon run, we headed outside the walls, to discover a make-shift 'arena'.  The day's events had evidently finished, as everyone was making their way to the main square in order to dampen the adrenaline with large quantities of Pernod.  Finding the main square wasn't difficult either as you simply had to follow the distinct, overpowering smell of Pernod, mixed with a subtle hint of beer.  Lovely.  We agreed that we would return on Friday afternoon with my boyfriend, who would be with us by then, so we could see what it was that had been happening in the 'arena'...

Friday rolled around and we arrived to the same scene of caravans, burnt out and bashed up shells of cars, dusty terrain and hundreds of people looking forward to an afternoon of daredevil antics.  It turns out that the 'arena' was used to release the bulls into.  From there, it seemed that it was common practice for the teenage members of the community to play 'chicken' with the bull.  We were standing where we presumed it would be safe, behind a four foot high solid wood fence.  As it turns out, the bull was quite happy to 'ram-raid' into said fence when some body waved a red sweater in its face (cue my mother and I immediately using my 6'2" boyfriend as a human shield).  On this occasion, the bull managed to jump a fence of similar height inside the ring, before later jumping another barricade of similar height and escaping from the ring entirely.  That's right, a fully sized and well horned bull was running free around the make-shift car park.  We left the ring after a tense twenty minutes, assuming the bull had been captured.  On returning to the ring about ten minutes later, we realised it hadn't been captured at all, as we bore witness to it finally being ushered back into the ring, complete with half a motorbike hanging off of its horn.  We went to have a look at the motorbike in question a bit later, and let's just say that is going to be quite the insurance claim: "Mais, bien sûr madame, ma moto a été attaqué par un torreau!"  Yeah, right mate, on yer bike.  Or your half bike as the case now may be...


I can't say I entirely agreed with the goings-on in the ring.  There was something that just didn't quite sit right as I watched a bull, getting increasingly more frustrated, being taunted by the younger members of the community.  Insane?  Yes.  Ethically and morally correct?  Maybe not.  But traditional?  It would seem so.  The running of the bulls through the streets, however, really was something incredible to witness.  There was just something awe inspiring about the sheer power and strength of the bulls being contained by three beautiful Camargue horses and their fearless horseback riders.  I know this has been a ridiculously long post to have dedicated to one day, but it was something I don't think I'll ever see the likes of again.  Well worth a visit if you're ever around the South of France in October, just remember not to wear red.

"Down by the riverside"... Down by the lakeside actually, with lots of fish!

Following our relatively unsuccessful trip to the beach, we decided that perhaps we needed to find a new sunbathing and paddling spot.  Liza had heard about a lake where both of these things were possible from a friend, so on a Thursday afternoon, Liza, Jenny and I embarked on a trip to find it.  Worryingly, Liza originally told us that it was at the very end of tram line two, but by Thursday had discovered that it was actually two stops before the end of the line at Via Domitia.  Nonetheless, Jenny and I didn't question Liza's mystery tour, and blindly followed her off of the tram at Via Domitia.  Following the instructions that Liza had received via text, we knew that we needed to cross a bridge from the tram stop, but after that we were a bit lost.  The instructions merely said that at the other side of the bridge, we needed to ask for directions!


The bridge was pretty easy to locate since it was the only one we could see and it was at the end of the tram station platform, directly in front of our faces.  The bridge brought us to a car park for a huge sports centre, that was full of cars but distinctly lacking in people to ask for directions.  Helpful.  We spotted a friendly looking lady not so far away, which sparked a thirty second debate that went a little like this;

"Shall we ask her?" "I don't know, we could ask her?" "But she might not know where the lake is!  She might just think we're strange English girls wandering around looking for a non-existent lake!"

Finally, Liza bit the bullet, marched over, and asked the friendly looking lady where the lake was.  It turned out that the lake definitely did exist, and she knew exactly where it was.  She explained that it was about a fifteen minute walk away and would be quite simple to find.  The friendly looking lady then became even more helpful than we had ever anticipated and offered us a lift!  Apparently she was heading that way anyway, and had three spare spaces in the car.  With a chorus of "merci beaucoup" and "vous êtes très gentille" we graciously accepted her offer and clambered into the little white three door car.  She explained that it was her husband's car and she didn't normally drive it which is why her driving might not be entirely up to scratch.  This filled me with the utmost confidence, given that the French aren't exactly known for their road safety, but I couldn't exactly complain - she had just offered us a free lift.  All in all, this mission to sunbathe was proving a lot more successful than our last trip to the beach.


A short, three minute journey and we arrived at the lake in one piece.  She pointed out where we would have been able to go into the park if we were on foot, and thus, where it would be possible to leave from.  As we were in a car, however, she dropped us off at a slightly more official, gravelled entrance to the park, with instructions that we needed to go "upstairs" to get to the lake.  She had attempted a little bit of English for our benefit which was sweet, and we could only assume that by "upstairs" she meant "up hill".  So, we headed off up the reasonably small hill that lay ahead of us, and sure enough, at the top we were greeted by a beautiful view that looked out across the lake and the park surrounding it.

Once we reached the water's edge, we decided to walk round around the lake to reach the grassy area on the other side.  We could just make out a few people sun bathing over there, and decided that they must have the right idea; the rest of the lake seemed to be edged with gravel which wouldn't exactly make for a comfortable sunbathing spot.  It probably took about less than ten minutes to walk to the other side of the lake, and although it wasn't exactly an unpleasant walk, I think we all breathed a joint sigh of relief as we settled ourselves onto our towels, bikinis on, facing the sun.


Liza had been told by her friend that it was absolutely fine to swim in the lake, and as a few of the other French sun seekers there seemed to be having no problems with diving in, we thought we would follow suit. Well, when I say swim, I of course mean paddle.  Jenny and Liza were aiming to swim, but swimming really isn't my thing.  I paddle, and that is all.  However, Liza and Jenny soon came round to the idea of paddling upon discovering that the lake is actually filled with fish!  Jenny had a definite aversion to the fish but Liza took a shining to them.  I remained fairly neutral in my feelings towards the fish; they were quite small, slim little things, but they did have a habit of getting a little close for comfort if you stood still for too long.  Liza was delighted by this and very quickly settled herself in the water, before proclaiming herself to be 'Liza, friend of the fishes' as they all started gathering around her.


Once Liza had satisfied her fish loving tendencies, and Jenny and I agreed that we were quite done with paddling, we dried off in the sun before gathering our things and heading back to the tram stop.  We guessed at which way we would need to walk to join the road, and decided to continue walking around the lake and then veer off into the park, rather than walking back the way we came.  This allowed us to stumble across a waterfall on our way out, and also discover that even when the weather doesn't allow for sunbathing, it really would be worth coming back simply to walk around the park.

Sure enough, the walk really did only take about fifteen minutes back to the tram, and from there it was only half a dozen stops back to my stop, Charles De Gaulle.  I must admit, the novelty of living in a city has fast worn off for me (I can handle small towns, like Egham, but you give me a population of more than about 20,000 and I start to get itchy feet), and it was comforting to discover that there's a little green patch of tranquillity a stone's throw away from all the concrete, for those days when the cars and quarter of a million people all start to get a bit much for this country bumpkin.

"Working 9 to 5, what a way to make a living"... Or rather working 9 to 12, not getting paid at all

This week, life in Montpellier really began... I started my work placement.  But, as seems to be the pattern recently, things haven't exactly gone smoothly.  In fact, I'd deign to say that this is officially the aspect of life here that has given me the most grief.  And yes, that does mean that it has been even more frustrating than finding an apartment, opening a bank account, having a wardrobe but no hangers, or discovering that they sell Heinz Spaghetti in the Casino Géant for €1,50 a tin.


For those who don't know, I didn't decide to live In Montpellier for four months just for the fun of it - I came out here with the purpose of taking up a work experience placement for a mere twenty hours a week at Paul Valéry University.  When I was offered the placement back at the start of June, I was sent the following job description...

Most of the job will be related to the organization of the Master Degree in “International Cooperation” within the Politics department, and will involve:

• Following-up on students and alumni;
• Promoting the degree (website, leaflets, etc.);
• Helping organize meetings and events;
• Helping students develop their communication skills (presentation of their project, interviews, etc.)

On the face of it, this looked like a great opportunity for me to gain a bit of experience in a vaguely relevant field, given that I want to work in Events Management after uni.  However, somewhere between that email, and me travelling 900 miles for that job, the outline of my placement magically transformed into the following:

• Library work: helping the students in the library of the Department of Political Science find relevant information, helping organise resources, and assessing the quality of the bibliography offered as regards courses (for instance, international cooperation).
• Archive work: reading, selecting and organising relevant dossiers from online resources (to be used by Master’s students); press reviews on particular topical issues.
• Elaboration of bibliographies on specialised research themes.
• Data collection: location of the internships offered in the International Cooperation Master’s Degree.
• Helping students present and enhance their individual career projects.

Its funny how that happens really, isn't it?  When I was presented with this 'new' job description, having been in Montpellier a mere week, I thought that I would give the whole situation the benefit of the doubt.  I signed the 'Training Agreement' needed by both Holloway and Montpellier University, hoping that somehow it would all work out.  So it may not have been the placement that I travelled 900 miles for, but I was here now and as they say, "Everything happens for a reason".

In hindsight, my 'optimism' was probably just 'blind stupidity' as things took somewhat of a turn for the worse.  I arrived at the Politics department at 2pm on Monday the 3rd all prepared to meet the librarian who would show me around and explain the 'library' aspect of my placement.  I'm pretty sure that 'lost in translation' can't surely even begin to excuse the fact that the Politics department mistook a room with four bookshelves in it as a so-called 'library'...

In the 12 hours that I spent in that room this week, a sum total of six people came into the library, and two of them actually came in at the same time!  My vocabulary didn't stretch much beyond "Bonjour" and "Merci, au revoir", which I'm 99.9% certain I could have coped with before spending two years at university studying French.  With no sign of the three other riveting tasks that I had been assigned making an appearance, I decided it was high time I should see if I could get some clarification on the whole situation.  However, this is the part where it gets really complex... There are three universities in Montpellier: the inspirationally named Montpellier 1 and Montpellier 2, and Paul Valéry (aka Montpellier 3).  Each of these universities supposedly run as separate institutions, but have agreements on certain things such as sharing sports facilities.  The work placement was offered to me by Paul Valéry, but I am actually working in the Politics department of Montpellier 1.  This means that I have a work experience 'co-ordinator' at Paul Valéry, and a work experience 'supervisor' within the politics department at Montpellier 1.  Just to really put the icing on top, I am also being overseen by the gentleman in charge of the library at the politics department.  To keep things simple, and so as to allow them to remain anonymous, these people shall be known as the following:

Work experience co-ordinator at Paul Valéry - Madame Mécontent, aka Mme M
Work experience supervisor at Montpellier 1 - Monsier PetitGraveetChauve, aka Mr PGC
Library manager for the Politics dept at Montpellier 1 - Monsieur FontaineD'Information, aka Mr FDI


Mr FDI is in general a lovely man who appears to have visited the South West of the UK before and takes great delight in commenting how lovely it is every time he sees me.  He is also the one who encouraged me to speak up and see if I could revert my placement back to what it was once supposed to be.


Mme M is most unhelpful.  I went to go and see her to ask why everything had changed so much, and she seemed convinced my placement hadn't changed at all!  She was under the impression that Mr PGC still wanted me to help his students with their projects, and that collecting data on internships counted as 'following up on students and alumni', which I couldn't really argue with to be honest.  However, she sarcastically commented that I can't help organise events if there aren't any to organise (well why put it on a job description if its not actually going to be a regular feature of my job?!) and had no real answer as to where the activities involving promoting the degree had disappeared off to.  She claimed that I knew that the intern's tasks could vary from the start, and the addition of a load of library work, archiving, and creating bibliographies apparently counts as 'a little variation'.  In short, "c'est la vie".  Well merci bloody beaucoup.


I've saved the best for last though; the delightfully charming Mr PGC.  So delightful in fact, that he even gives Pete the Creep a run for his money (see post number 4).  A meeting with him today finally gave me an explanation for why everything has changed so drastically.  Apparently the intern who was in the department last year was much better at French than I am, and therefore had the opportunity to help the students with the many events that are apparently taking place within the department (surprise, surprise Mme M's sarcastic comments weren't even founded on any solid knowledge of the politics department or my placement).  Sadly, my French isn't good enough, so I have to work in the library.  In a couple of weeks I (might) get the chance to help some of the students with their projects etc, but that depends on how much my French improves whilst I am sitting in an empty room with four bookshelves.  He of course explained all of this in French.  The fact that I was then justifiably a little upset and not fully capable of focussing on what he was twittering on about, meant that each time I didn't understand something he re-itterated the fact that this is the problem - my French just isn't good enough.  Lovely.

So, for the foreseeable future I shall be sitting in the library doing some kind of research work.  I'll keep everyone updated on the headcount, but something tells me it wont be anything to write home about.  By the end of this week, I was half wishing that perhaps even a stray cat might wander in to keep me company.  By the end of next week something tells me that I'll even take the odd lonesome mosquito for companionship... Perhaps I could accept it's constant blood-sucking tendencies as a sign of affection?!

Every cloud has a silver lining... This is the outside of the wall that runs along the front of Rue de l'Université and the Cité International de la Danse (above), and the archway that leads to Rue de l'Université (below).

"Let's start at the very beginning. It's a very good place to start."

The 20th September.  D-day had finally arrived.  After months of living in denial and a fleeting couple of weeks when I finally accepted my fate and began organising, here I was - Gillingham train station.  Perhaps not the most glamorous of starts to a journey to the South of France, but nonetheless, I was there at 09:18 with a jar of marmite, 80 Twinings tea bags, two stolen Boursin sandwiches (much to Mummy Hunt's disdain) and an eleven hour journey ahead of me:

Departing Gillingham (Dorset) at 09:18 - Arriving London Waterloo at 11:19

Departing London St Pancras at 12:28 - Arriving Paris Nord at 15:50

Departing Paris Gare de Lyon at 17:20 - Arriving Montpellier at 20:45

Th first part of the journey I did with my Mum.  With a rucksack half the size of me and a suitcase that is quite frankly twice the size of me, I didn't fancy taking my chances with the London Underground by myself.  We had just over an hour to get from Waterloo to St Pancras, but what they fail to tell you when you book online is that they actually want you to check in for the Eurostar half an hour before it departs.  I arrived at the Eurostar terminal to find that boarding for my train was closing... PANIC!! The signs were of course lying and people were getting on the train even after me with seemingly no hassle.  So, the very fleeting goodbye that I was forced to say to Mummy Hunt didn't actually have to be quite so fleeting.  Then again, it was probably a blessing in disguise - Standing at the barriers at St Pancras saying goodbye to your Mum for 3 months as you toddle off to a foreign country with no where to live, all of your worldly possessions crammed into two bags, and nothing but €100 in your back pocket isn't exactly easy.

Next stop: Paris.  Now, although I had opted for assistance across London, I had little choice but to go it alone in Paris.  It turns out that the Parisians are actually quite helpful when they see a 5'7" English girl quite clearly out of her depth, struggling with two bags.  Either that, or they're quite helpful when said girl and her bags are blocking their way and they're in a hurry to get somewhere.  With hindsight, it was probably the latter, but at the time, it was nice to have so many people showing a little bit of kindness/pity.  After a small mishap with a lift (I definitely stopped at all floors in Paris Nord station), and an argument with an underground barrier (me and my luggage definitely won that one), I arrived at Gare de Lyon and boarded the train for Montpellier...

One issue of Cosmopolitan read cover to cover, one issue of More! read cover to cover (yes, I'm quite the academic), and a short nap later, I arrived in Montpellier.  It was dark.  I was ushered into a taxi by a seemingly nice cab driver, who regretted ushering me over the moment he saw the size of my bags!  We drove through the city and all I remember being able to make out in the dark were palm trees.  He was driving in a left had drive vehicle on the right hand side of the road, through a city I had never been to, passing signs that were all in French.  We could have been going anywhere.  We weren't going anywhere though, we were going to the Centre Millénaire Hôtel Etap, for €50 a night with free Wifi.

Finally, I had arrived and the long awaited year abroad had begun.

Gare Saint-Roch.   Not my photo - I was far too exhausted and emotional to take photos that night!

The Year Abroad

The Year Abroad.  The phrase that has been thrown around for the past two years of my degree with a mixture of excitement, trepidation and all-out terror.  One year of your degree.  Abroad.  Sounds simple, right?!  Well I'm about to find out as I embark on the third year of my European Studies degree.


This is for anyone who knows me, wants to keep in touch with me, wants to find out why they haven't heard from me, or simply wants warning on when I'm coming back to England!  Its also for anyone who doesn't know me but wants to know what a year abroad in Montpellier might be like.  I can't guarantee that I'll be able to give you any great words of wisdom, or provide you with quick-fix answers to all of your worries and doubts, but I can be honest.


They claim that your year abroad is the best thing that you'll do in the entire of your academic career...  We'll see about that.