So, as you know, I am starting my Year Abroad in France as we speak. I’m putting that in capital letters because everyone always gives it capital letters and I’m starting to see why. Its a big deal. Moving your whole life from one country to another, leaving the people of Southampton and Leeds to carry on without you and arriving completely alone in an environment where you are required to speak a language which is not your mother tongue is difficult. Because, lets face it, I can't speak French. None of us can. We may have sprung out of bed to skip to our 9am language classes. We may well have toiled relentlessly over our copies of ‘Practising French Grammar’. We may even (in the cases of the stronger hearted among us) have ventured into the unchartered territory of the Avenue library. Nevertheless, the fact remains that the first time a French person in a car/phone/insurance shop proudly presents a sales pitch so finely tuned it would set Alan Sugar’s blood pumping and then raises that internationally recognised and oh-so-nervewracking monobrow which asks ‘vous comprendez?’ and can be translated as 'I'm presuming you have no idea what I just said, do you?' we will realise that the only part of the tirade of information we understood was the starting ‘Alors..’, a few of the numbers that cropped up in the middle somewhere and oh, hey, that was the subjunctive, you mean you actually use that here? Its a scary process and one which I think is hard to convey to anybody who hasn’t experienced it. What I have realised over the course of the past week is that although the temptation to nod emphatically and reassure said salesman that of course you understood and agree wholeheartedly is so strong that it almost falls out of your mouth before you realise what's happening, it really isn't a good idea. I still have no idea what the terms of my phone contract are. I don't know whether it is a trait specific to the Bordelais, though I expect it probably is since it is the antithesis of the French stereotype, but the people here really don't mind if you say no. They tend to smile, say 'pas probléme' and repeat themselves in slower, slightly simpler language. Realising that was probably the most important thing I have done this week. No, wait, that was finding an insurance agency who believed that an English driving licence was a legitimate certification of the ability to drive a car. But it comes a close second.
I've taken the fact that I have had a week before I start working properly as an opportunity to be a huge tourist and see all the sights Bordeaux has to offer. And since this city has prospered fairly consistently since it was settled by Romans, there are plenty of them. The fact that Bordeaux is built on the affluence of its vinyards is obvious everywhere you look, and every building in the centre is exquisite. There are art galleries and cathedrals much like any other French city, and a huge theatre. There is also the 'musée d'Aquitane' which charts Bordeaux's history since the prehistoric times and has incredible cave paintings, bronze and iron age weapons, Roman statues, and a room dedicated to the rise of Bordeaux as a trading port when links to the West Indies were established. All really interesting so long as you politely ignore the cheeky little sign which in an astounding feat of PR plays down any involvement in the slave trade since slaves went from Africa to the Caribbean and then things like sugar and coffee came back from the Caribbean to Bordeaux and so really they didn't have anything to do with the traffic of humans. Though they did send the boats back to Africa but hmm what a triangle? No, no, not at all. Still, dirty money or no - and to be fair a lot of it is from wine rather than slavery, I can’t imagine myself ever not double-taking at the beauty of this town every time I step off the tram.
Good old fashioned sightseeing, complete with trying conspicuously to juggle a rough guide, a camera, a water bottle and a road map and feeling more English than ever before, having been checked off the list next on the agenda was the slightly more stressful matter of establishing myself as a fully fledged français. To commencer was the pressing need for accommodation, which has landed me in a room in the eaves of a big family home in the Chartrons district, famous for its combination of bohemians and students. The deuxième was the need for a car for the commute to work since buses go through the village my school is in approximately 3 times a week. Car secured, this brings us to the mountain of bureaucracy which comes with opening a bank account and finding someone willing to insure you. I imagine its just as bad in England but when you have to do it all in one day it makes everything 10 times worse. Thankfully, once I mastered my fear of speaking to French people - no, seriously, my mum had to physically push me through the door of the bank when she realised that it was 10.30am and I had already ‘left something at the hotel I need[ed] to go back and get’ and initiated two coffee stops - it became clear that everyone was actually going out of their way to make things easier for me. Take that, French stereotype. I will forever be indebted to the bank clerk who told me that I needed to be a student in France to qualify for a student account and its perks, but then decided that, hey, Southampton is sort of near France isn’t it, so she would give me one anyway. Now I only have to pay 1€ for a year’s contents insurance and liability insurance (an insurance you are required to pay in case you ever ‘injure a civilian intentionally or otherwise’ in an all for one and one for all kind of system - hello republican values) and get an overdraft (hum) and a French student card.
Admin done, all that was left was a trip to the ocean, and despite the total lack of spacial awareness that comes with driving on the wrong side of the road and a one-way system which a) makes Leeds city centre look well thought out and b) involves trams which do not stop for man or beast we managed to get there in one piece. If the city of Bordeaux is a feat of manmade beauty, the nearby sand-dunes which stretch almost 200km from Soulac to Biarritz are nature’s equally impressive answer. When the tide is out the beach stretches lazily out in front of you and the water is calm enough for swimming without too much risk of a wave sneaking up behind you and breaking over your head. When the tide is in, however, it is a whole different story. Suddenly, the waves are the size of houses and surfers spring up from every corner. The beach becomes an ideal viewing platform for some insane surfing skills (and indeed the inevitable terrifying falls) worthy of any Californian teen drama. Though I was of course tempted to join in (Izzy I’m looking at you) I think maybe that’s another battle for another day.
So, now that I am fully installé, I have a few days of limbo (read sunbathing) and the difficult tasks of a city dweller such as figuring out how to work the self service machines at the supermarket and learning once and for all how to parallel park in a space 5mm longer than the length of your car, before my introduction to being a language assistant and starting working properly. A tout à l’heure.
