Saturday, October 23, 2010

Living in an apartment/Strike funday


As I mentioned earlier I found an apartment! I was lucky beyond belief in finding a place in such a location with such a price, not even to mention with such an awesome flatmate. Click any picture to see it in its full size.

My stairway


The living room...
ze kitchen...
My room...
We also have a cat (Fluppy [FLEW-py]) who wakes us up with a mid-morning pounce to the face; adrenaline works better than caffeine I've found. The apartment is in an awesome location, just by a tram stop and around a bunch of good restaurants and bars. We have a little nook with a guest bed in it which is currently housing my homeless (till November) friend Beth.



There are strikes everywhere! The other day I tried to go to class, only to find...

a Renault blocking the tram line. So I walked around with the strike (manifestation) for a day...

 Just outside my apartment
 "Less retirement...More joblessness"

 We marched over by the river, to the Place de la Bourse

 Lady yelling socialist stuff
 Burning Nicolas Sarkozy in the street, normal

 CGT (Confédération générale du travail,) one of the largest unions in France. They are super upset over raising the retirement age from 60 to 62, or full retirement from 65 to 67 in 2018.
 Jimbae playing
 "Is it really too late for Nicolas Sarkozy's mother to abort our little dictator?"

 "Retirement of the law on retirement." "Retreat of retreat law"
 "Not happy" -The best sign of the protest

French men, never caught on camera without a pose.


The atmosphere was really just like a day off; few seemed horribly upset. The picture I have of a guy playing a jimbae is pretty representative of the day as a whole-- there were people playing music along the streets and most of the people had a beer of some sort. Then people got too close to a government building...
Super serious...funny hats.



 Glass bottles and fireworks started to be thrown.

 Woman stepped up to protect them.


 "No to a USA system"






 "When the government violates the rights of the people, insurrection is their most sacred of rights and the most crucial of obligations"




It was a good day, and was followed by an awesome mexican party at my apartment.
Do notice the mustache on every guest in attendance.


Thanks for reading. 

Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

South of Bordeaux

The extremely helpful international student office took the Erasmus (+ me) students on a visit of the area just to the south of Bordeaux. We got a lovely tour of a chateau, a motor tour of the wine country, and finished the day with a nice wine tasting. 

Because I know you were asking yourself; yes, every post on this blog will have something to do with wine.

















I have internet again!

Nick