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Published: October 21st 2007
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Bonjour à tous! A lot has happened since the last time I wrote. I started my classes, I went to Belgium, and…I have cable now!
So I guess I’ll begin with my classes. The “inscriptions pedagogiques” were rather painless and I was able to pick classes that I wanted. At Sciences Po, international students pick 2 cours magistraux (which are basically large lecture classes) with their conferences + 2 electives + 1 french as a foreign language class.
Cours Magistraux:
- Espace Mondial: I really like this class. I feel a little embarrassed because I had never heard of the professor before. Apparently he’s an expert in his field. Everyone claps at the end of the lecture. You know, a French genius.
- Monde Arabe Contemporain: I took it just out of curiosity and I am really into it.
Electives: (finally the fun part)
- Gauches Radicales: Where the professor is training us to lead our own little revolt against the oppressing Parisian upper classes. Nah, it’s actually a really interesting class. I’ve only had it twice but I think it’s my favorite one. We study the history of the extreme left in France and, for our
Little street in Brugges
It took me like 20 mins to control the hordes of tourists that wanted to be in my picture. final project, we have to attend meetings at the LCR (Communist Revolutionary League) or the LO (Workers Struggle) and do some research project. And for those who are in doubt, we only study the real left. And no, we do not learn about the Parti Communiste or Ségolène Royal. Please, those compromise-hungry, government-participating sell-outs.
- Révolution urbaine dans les pays en développement: Basically all that I like packed into one class. Maps, the “third” world, urban development, cities, etc.
- French: self-explanatory.
The system here works so much different than Georgetown. I only have assigned readings for one class, and it is still only one short article per week. I literally have nothing to prepare for each of my classes. I do have a lot of projects, exposées (oral presentations), etc. but they are all about random topics that have little or no relation to the lectures.
On a less academic/more interesting note, I went to France’s smaller neighbor to the north-east: BELGIUM!!!
Georgetown paid for everything (ok, so the trip only cost 0,0001% of the money we pay them to be in France, so más les vale que hubiesen pagado el viaje—I think that
sounded better in spanish). It was so rushed but I got to do/see/eat everything I wanted. Basically, we just ate the whole weekend. No, really that’s all we did. Gaufres au chocolat, bierre, moules, frites, bierre, chocolat, bierre. Repeat 6 times in 36 hours. Everything was sooo cheap compared to Paris, especially the beer (why do French people pay 5€ for 25cl of piss-beer again?).
The whole time we were there everyone (and by everyone I mean me) was wishing that a war would break out or something. You know, so our trip would have some historical significance—basically, as an excuse to stay more days and eat more. If you have no clue what I’m talking about, then shame on you. It’s true. We never think of Belgium. It’s always been the somewhat forgotten so-called capital of the EU. Well, they are having major political issues because the Flemish-speaking population and the French-speaking Walloons cannot get along. As I hear, the richer Flemish people are sick of having to maintain the Walloons.
Oh well, basically every other apartment in Brussels had a Belgian flag hanging out of the window, and the Belgians are way too nice to fight
La Bourse in Brussels
That's me trying to do Tecktonik in front of the nice building each other. And I’m not kidding about the nice Belgians. These people were like crazy nice. Well everyone except for the server at a café in Brugges that, after I attempted to communicate in Flemish (or Dutch, as the rest of the world calls it), rapidly told me that if I wasn’t going to pronounce his language properly I might as well speak to him in English. Well next time I wont try at all, and I hope your business crashes and you have to immigrate to France you ungrateful %#^. Haha.
Anyway, it was fun. Brussels was strange as a city. Weird combination of people and a metro map that even I could not decipher (they decided to combine the metro map, bus map, tram map, road map, airway map, bathroom map, shop map, bicycle map, submarine map, escape route in case of nuclear attack map, etc. etc. all in one—yeah, very confusing).
Oh and one more thing about Brussels. I stayed in my first hostel and it was pretty nice. Everything was clean and the place looked relatively new. The location was my favorite part. I decided to nickname the neighborhood Baghdad. You know, since I’m
so politically correct. It was like 25 minutes walking distance from the Grand Place but it looked like another country. When I went to buy something to eat with a friend from the group, we were both the only non-Arabs in the street. Kebab stands, more than a handful of stores selling headscarves, Pakistani groceries (ok, so they’re not Arab but you get my point). The street was unpaved—no, Belgium isn’t a developing country, if that’s what you’re thinking. The city just happened to be re-paving our street the weekend we were there. But all this added to the overall chaotic sentiment that transported us to the Middle East, or Monde Arabe, or whatever you want to call it. I loved it. That’s the Paris I want to see. But I have to take 30min of an RER that would cost me 8€. And the RATP is on strike so no banlieue for me today.
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