Les droits démocratiques bafoués en Espagne

Ce samedi 10 juillet, plus de 500.000 catalans se mobilisent à Barcelone pour
défendre la « mini-Constitution » de la Catalogne. Approuvée il y a plus de 4 ans aux
parlements catalan et espagnol, ainsi que par référendum, cette loi a été sévèrement
mutilée cette semaine par le verdict de la Cour constitutionnelle espagnole.

En tête de cette manifestation, on comptera sur la présence de l'actuel président de
la Catalogne ainsi que de tous ses prédécesseurs depuis la restauration des
institutions démocratiques. La manifestation est organisée par Òmnium Cultural,
avec le soutien de plus de 1000 associations représentant la société civile catalane.

Le verdict de la Cour constitutionnelle suppose un inacceptable mépris de la volonté
populaire, exprimée démocratiquement par référendum, ainsi qu’un notable recul de
cette loi, limitant les compétences du Gouvernement de la Catalogne en matière
sociale, économique, juridique ou linguistique. Ce mécontentement est d'autant plus
justifié que la composition de ce tribunal est formée par des juges élus par les partis
politiques avec des critères purement partisans, et que, d'après la loi nationale, deux
tiers de ses membres auraient dû être remplacés il y a plusieurs années.

Nous, les catalans faisant partie de l’Association (loi 1901) « Casal de Catalunya de
Paris », manifestons notre préoccupation pour ces faits. La volonté démocratique
des citoyens de toute nation doit être respectée. C’est pourquoi nous tenons à
exprimer notre soutien à cette grande manifestation et invitons tous les individus et
organisations qui respectent la liberté des peuples à exprimer leur soutien via
l'adresse : http://www.somunanacio.cat/

Casal de Catalunya de Paris
http://www.casalparis.cat/

Pensant fort à Paris

-Images "stolen" from the internet- Music La Vase from the film Amelie Poulain
1001 reasons to dream and go back, this only shows the most typical, tourist images. . . I could have transformed the video into a never ending thing, just couldnt upload more pics and music or the size was to heavy.

. . . HEC. . .& J.N. KAPFERER + BASTIEN

100% Mr. marketing Mr.Jean-Noel Kapferer...probably one of the best profesors I had at HEC and his own ad on the master program. *sight*

Only two questions remain:
First, since when does he speak with such a good english accent??
Second, (besides exchanges students) are there really that many foreign students at HEC?



Et après ...Bastien et Kapferer dicutent leur nouveu livre.
And to think how hard it was for me to understand them when they spoke in class due to their "speed" ... (ei, gracies eh Miquel)

J N Kapferer & V Bastien (Luxe Oblige) dans Darketing sélectionné dans Actualité et Actu Medias

Alexandra,Miquel,Florian,Marc,Carlos,Marlene,Giulia,Carlos,Elena,Elena M.,Daniela,Bea, Itzel,Fede,Francesca,Minda,Alfonso,Raquel,David,Mitzy,Julia,Elisa,Nadir,Ashik..... just a few names.

Incredible the amount of none french people that you can get to know in less than 1 year in a place.
Incredible that in Paris I met the largest amount of Catalan people in my life.
Incredible that only 1 person is still in Paris, and soon to leave: Ana. 1 Non French Person.
Incredible to think about the amount of people we will meet in the future.
Incredible how similar people that just arrive in the city are lost as you.
Incredible how many different languages people can speak.

Incredible how fast time passes by.

Caos a Londres i a París per la Neu

Doncs si, efectivament ho confirmo. He sortit de casa sense saber que hi havia neu. I quan he obert la porta he vist que tot estava nevat. He pensat que no passava res si no tenia ni els guants ni la bufanda amb mi. Havia nevat feia uns dies, i una mica de fred no em mataria. Nomes tenia que agafar el tren i el bus.... Clar, que no he pensat que per culpa de la neu, el bus no funcionaria.... Me pasat mes de 20min esperant el bus, finalment he marxat a peu...i xino xano assegurant me de no patinar, he arribat a la feina. Tard, com tothom.

6 Billion Others

Only for 1 month in Paris, and yet more than 4 years to build the project.

The exposition 6 millards d'autres can be seen at the Grand Palais in Paris until mid february. Its a project lead by Yann Arthus-Bertrand. He is the famous photographer that did the exposition on the world from above. He took photographs of the world seen from a helicopter.

Now he has done 5,000 interviews in a total of 75 different countries in order to show how different/similar all humans are in this planet. The questions raised in his interviews go from " what are your first memories" to " what does family represent for you", " what is happiness", "what message do you want to pass to the next generation" etc. It is intresting to see the different answers of people from diveresed cultures.

This exhibition is meant to be "moved" around the world, so I highly suggest you pay it a visit when it comes to your city.

Death at the Metro

Last week the metro did not stop at Pereire, there was a dead body on the station. One more suicide, one more accident? Last week one of the people that I meet told me his friend had been killed by the metro. That makes 2 dead in one week that " Im aware" of... However, how often do we hear in the metro "accident grave passanger"? How many suicides/accidents happend in the parisian metros? Im trying to find the data, but I find not much quanitative numbers.... it seems that on average there are two deaths per week in the parisian metros/trains. How crazy is that! Just look around at certain news that are found on the internet.

F mort sur les voies du RER
RER A : Suicide à Nation
Accident voyageur 16/09/08Electrocuté à Juvisy-sur-Orge
Nuit Blanche: un mort dans le métro
Ligne 13 : Accident grave de voyageur à Pernéty
Mort du journaliste italien agressé dans le métro parisien ...
Nothing against people killing themselves, but do they need to do it in the metro. At the end that will only lead to more and more suicides, metro drivers who will be shocked, people who will miss their job interviews, people fired for arriving late at work.....a chain of suicides :) Just a Joke, but the numbers are estonishing. It appears that the RATP (the parisian metro company) has a group of psychologist to assist people that see these suicides take place. According to a Canadian study, the people that commit suicide in the metro are usually people that are living in marginal conditions and have been under the influence of drugs or alcohool before jumping on the rails. Nevertheless, the study notes that for people who live in the metro it is hard to distinguish if their deaths are due to accidents or suicides. Besides all the real dealth, there are also the "temptatives" of suicide.... which leads to us hearing often in the Parisian metro " accident grave voyageur.."

Paris

Paris + Paris + Paris + Paris = Paris
A great weekend, specially with Italian company ;-)

Finally a la tour Eiffel

I can finally say that I have climbed it - and the view was beautiful. Only to the second floor, but it was nice. With a nice fotography exhibition on the first. Paris from above, although nothing will ever beat the views from a low flying plan ready to land at Charles de Gaulle.

- Parisian Kisses-

THANKS FOR COMING OVER!!!!!
FOR WHEN THE NEXT MEETING????

Unconfortable Views 3 - The temporality of international communities.

Dinner again at Strasbourg St.Denis, French, Brazilian, Mexican, Spanish, Turkish, Austrian. . No matter when you go there the apartment is always full of different nationalities. Fun and convivial dinners, with the few people who are left from the HEC times, some of us hadn’t even met at HEC, ironic huh? We end up always confronted with the same question “when are you leaving?” Response: Xmas, February, maybe march. The furthest that I heard was – “maybe April”. Its good to see that like me, many are full of international plans, moves and crazy adventures ahead. The same goes around my apartment “ 22^nd December”, “4^th of January”, “sometime in February”. . . . Yes, hanging around international people is what I am used to we are all in the same situation- new in a foreign country-, however this temporality makes it hard. I’m constantly being reminded that every single person with who I spend my weekends and evenings – except for red cross Tuesdays- will be gone within the next 3 months. I will probably be the last one to leave. And if I stayed? New friends all over again?? I do have some French friends- not many, some also left. In order to avoid all this temporality and sadness of friends coming and going are we meant to stick to local communities? Will we then be assured that nobody moves away from the city within the next 6 months? No. However, maybe then, we will be the ones that will move the fastest and like this feel less the impact of the movement of others on our lives. But let the concept not trap us, at the end nothing is permanent, and even in more local communities things move and change; maybe at a slower pace- but they change too. However, when trying to find a stable life the international community of expats exchange students and international interns might simply move too fast.

The parisian trap - Finding an Appartment

Paris is beautiful, specially by night illuminated. As all cities it is even more beautiful when on holidays than when you actually live in it. When you come on holidays and you like it- the streets- the alleys- the architecture- you might think "wow if I could get an appartment here" Be carefull, finding an appartment in Paris is like going thorough a beauty pagent. If you have an objective, if you try hard you will find something, but the path aint easy and you better not be too picky, specially if you are a foreigner.

In Paris there is an undersupply of appartments, in addittion many landloards are afraid that tenants will not pay up so they ask you to proof that your salary is at least three times that of the appartment. Many people end up moving to a chambre de bonne, which used to be the old maid rooms. These ones have a separate entrance in the builduing and are genearally cold and not too well equiped (at least the ones I visited). They are mainly rented out by wealthy parisians who have a large appartment in the same builduing and rent out their chambre de bonne in a way to invest. You only have to go to www.pap.fr or any website to find out that a shared appatment rents for 500 euros a room, somtimes if lucky 470. If its cheaper its that you are either in an extremly dangerous zone or that something in the appartment is clearly not working well. To continue many lanloards will ask for a granty of you parents or somebody, photocopies of all kinds and proof that you will stay for a long time.

Due to the undersupply of appartments you find yourself going to visit places and being literally interviewied by people- what do you like to cook, what are your habits, what do you do in life, where do you work, how long will you stay. I was even told if I cook using fire or microwave and if I shower more than once a day. Every single one of my interviews finished with ´thank you, we have 10 more visits today and 10 tommorrow´ we will call you if you are selected. It even happened once that I was told " see this girl over here? she came 5 minutes before you and she took the room". As you go back to your hostel you realize that the task aint easy. The demand is so high and the supply is so low that future teanants have no bargaining power, if you ask for anything you are not going to be selected, the landloard is able to choose any other tenant. It is for this reason that many appartments and chambre de bonnes are sometimes in a decading state, and the search for appatments becomes a big neightmare for people who rumbles the streets with their ´dossiers´hoping that the day when they will be chossen will soon arrive.

365 days and 48 hours later... Bienvenue en France

365 days and 48 hours later things have changed A LOT. If 365 days and 48 hours ago you would have asked me where I would be today I would have looked at you with an expression on my face saying “Dont Bother Asking, I have absolutely no idea”. Without having spoken french in 5 years and with only having done 2 years in highschool I decided to move to Paris. I was a bit afraid, i was meant to take exams and study at HEC one of the best, okay modesty apart- the best renowed university in France for Business. How was I going to get out of that with my level of french? But I was relieved, I was heading to what I had heard was a beautiful city plus one which culturally was way closer to “my culture”- the catalan one.

My friend Maria drove from luxemburg to Holland to pick me up and drive me to what we thought was “Paris”, after a 5 hour ride we arrived in Jouy and Josas, place where the HEC campus is found. To simply leave me in my room and drive back to Luxemburg. I think I never thanked you enough for that. On the 8th of september we left the Netherlands at around 5am and underwent quite an odessy to arrive to France. I remember seeing in the middle of the fog the sing “Bienvenue en France”. Neither Maria nor I could believe this was happening, I had openly declared that I was going to move back to Spain after Holland. Yet once again I was overcomed with my desire to keep an international life and experience yet another exprience abroad. And has this one been a great one! Not always easy, starting by the first day in France, but definately a good and enriching one.

I now work in France and in french in the domain that I like- logistics, wouldnt have said that would happen. ( i have had to update my cv in yet another language).

I have learned plenty of french street words and expressions, wow.

Ive been told that my french is good, hahaha that would not have happened 365 days and 48 hours ago when I had to look up half of the words that I would write in the emails.

Yes, I have been told a bunch of times that I have an accent, and I have started to believe that this wount disappear, but no need to. Im happy with the fact that sometimes I start to think in French, WOW!

I have seent he tour de France arrive in Paris

I have been able to enjoy amazing fire works on the 14th of July in Paris.

I have discovered a new city.

I have even managed to live on my own with no flatmates and little friends during 6 months, thing that seemed totally not possible 1 year ago. I thought i could never live completely on my own in a 11sq meter studio.

I have attended HEC. Done and Over.

I have lived the “exchange world”, and met many new friends, many who have once again left....

And although they have all left Paris, 365 days ago ( without the 48h) I met many new friends, catalan friends....ESADE students that came to HEC...it was good, and as he reminded me, 365 days ago we hanged my Catalan Flag in the balcony of room 137 of the B2 builduing of the HEC Campus....thats where it all started, the friendships of the catalan “team”at HEC. At the end even Paris helped me get closer to Barcelona.

Whatever this leads to I now feel “at home” @ Paris. Yet with a sudden sadness when I land at Charles de Gaulle or when the Thalys arrives at Gare du Nord. I might never belong anywhere in the world, but Paris has becomed yet another city where I can at least feel that I am home. This was not the case 365 days and 48h ago.....

Paris et les Parisiens

Once again I will admit that I forgot I had a blog for a while. Once my memory came back to me I then was either too busy or a bit lazy to write a proper entry, and what is a proper entry? I don’t know. However, I’m back and ready to entertain you, or not so much, with a small entry on the Parisians and French Life. One year ago the entries were about trips trips and more trips I was in the middle of my around the world trip and about to embark on a plane direction Bangkok to start the Asia part of my trip.

Now, I’m in Paris but that in itself is a daily adventure with millions of places to discover and see. After all as many people say Paris is magical, for me it still remains as a mix of small cozy Prague and southern European Barcelona. I still don’t find that “romanticism” in the city that tourists and Parisian lovers keep giving to it, but I like to walk through the small alleys and corners of the city. In fact it is these hidden corners that bring the magic to this city rather than the big famous places. I do not like the Eiffel Tower, and I don’t particularly like to walk in the Champs Elyesses. As a tourist it is a Must, but once the must is done I am unable to find the beauty in the metal structure who welcomed its first visitors in 1898 for the universal exposition…. Sure the lighting at night of the tower is nice but. . . .

It is the parks that I like about this city. Only and only if my computer had wifi and would not need to be plugged every minute in order to remain alive would I be able to write this from a park. There are so many parks everywhere and now that the summer has arrived the French love to do their little picnics in the parks and in the bridges, in particular “pont des arts” infront of the Louvre….as they say it “on va picniquer?” (however that is spelled it means “ are we going to do our picnic?”). Their wine, cheese, and of course a little thing to put under their ass not to get too dirty while they drink their wine. The summer and the heat have arrived and the French bring all their class and elegance to their picnics…very cute and nice to see and a great experience to join one of these French picnics. Brining candles, wine ,cheese and foie to the middle of a bridge with a beautiful mantel just makes the Parisians a bit more Parisian. Must be seen with your own eyes.

When I first read the book a Year in the Merde or Talk to the Snail by Stephen Clarke I thought that he was nothing more than a foreigner living in France unable to adapt to the country. He described the French and how hard it was to live here, how shitty it was and in his second book he wrote about how to understand the French. I do have to say that after a 5 month immersion in the French culture I start believing the book had quite a bit of truth in it. I like life here and I don’t seem to find it as hard as Stephen did, but if you want to become a Parisian citizen you definitively have to undergo quite a lot of mental and physical tests. In these 5 months I have wasted a lot of precious time trying to deal with people that work slow, or don’t work and make you pick up a form here and there. Im not even counting my 7 months at HEC as that was an immersion in the world of foreigners in the middle of a forest. However since my arrival in the capital on the 1st of March 2008 I have undergone the pleasant and not so pleasant experience of French burocary. Papers and more papers and another paper in order to get a signature for the first paper. A small anecdote: Changing the address in a French bank in particular in mine took me 5 weeks. I wanted to go on Monday but the agency didn’t open till 9 o clock, making me wait till the next saturday. Next Saturday, I headed to the office early in the morning I was told to return the following Monday as the bank woman was unable to understand that I can not go to the bank from Monday to Friday from 9 to 5 as I also work. So since they couldn’t change my address, I got an appointment to change my address, this appointment was given to me for 3 weeks afterwards. Once I went there 3 weeks afterwards they took 2 seconds to click on a computer screen. Amazingly they were unable to spend these 2 seconds 3 weeks before. I then said “so the transfer of address is done? I’m finally a member of this agency? Can you check if my rent has been payed?” The response-in a blunt tone- was that unfortunately only the electronical transfer had been done, I now needed to wait one more week in order for the official transfer of my “dossier” to this agency and that only then would they be able to help me.

All the respect for the French, I have met some amazing French people, friendly nice and open, but for the rest with their “honnêtement” “donc” “franchement” “ la vérité” “ c est pas évident” it seems like they are constantly complaining. It might just be an issue of language difference, but I have never seen a society complain as much as the French do, or maybe I should say the Parisians? Lord! It’s a matter of sitting in the metro and listening to them… But once again, respect for those people I have met at work and in my other activities which have been relaxed and willing to accept my unfrench accent without looking at me like an idiot cuz I used the wrong article infront of the noun.

Getting to these kind people, I am starting to be taught day after day a lot of words by everybody “avoir la peche” “etre a la deche” “ perdre le froc” “ etre a cote de la plaque” “faire chier” “ etre a la bourre” and many more …I like it, eventually ill move into speaking a more proper street French!! For now I’m writing them all down!! Lets face it after 5 months of being on my own and living on my own in Paris I have started to get used to its routines, my routines and I have started to liked it. My weekly volunteering with the French, working in French with the French and talking in French with my neighbors. It seems that finally I don’t only move around the expat communities, although most of my friends are foreigners, its good to know that at least I have a small foot into the French community. When I stop to think about it, last year I couldn’t really speak proper French while now I can clearly say that “ je me fais chier pour le gogole qui m a dans son colimateur”. . . . With the bad and the good I’m finally starting to “role” in the French society. So the question is, which language to learn next?? I keep my list with Portuguese, Russian, Hindi and the relearning of Japanese. . . Which one to choose???

Chartres

Southwest of Paris lies Chartres, the place where I spend the first and last day of my easter holidays. I was able to escape from the city for only 18 euros retour to visit a gigantic and magnificent cathedral which stands out from a long distance. There is not much to visit in the town besides narrow alleys, a tranquil town atmosphere and plenty of restaurants. Of course the city has also been conquered by the McDonald's, place at which we had our lunch. Later we headed into the church, to which we managed to arrived without beeing too wet. With special lighting that illuminated all the details of the hand crafted rocks that build the church we walked thorugh all the corners of the church. A small concert also took place in the cathedral and we refuged there from the rain for about an hour. Later we took a small strall around the town and missed our train by a couple minutes, having to wait for 1 hour while drinking a nice warm coffee with a typicall french pain au chocolat.

foto by me. Chartres 25.03.08.France

I have to thank all the tourists for staying at Paris,Versailles and Disneyland during the weekend and not following me to Chartres. I tend to take a stroll through the city everyweekend and I have never heard as much spanish as I have this weekend. Im specifically refering to the spanish/catalan, if it wasnt for the eiffel tower I would have thought I was in Spain. At least in Chartres the easter celebrations were not inundated by too many tourists. On my way back I shared the train with a lot of people who were together with me traveling back to Paris to start another week at work. Many of them carring their luggages full of (i assume) cloths for the rest of the week-- until they get to go back home.

My day did have a couple of incidents. Although I had planned to catch the train to Chartres on time as in the stop at Versailles my friends were meant to jump on the same train I almost missed it. First I got lost in one of my multiple metro connections. Later once in the station, the machine was not willing to sell me a ticket to the city. After 10 minutes of queue the person who sells the tickets did not understand that I wanted a two way ticket. So, I had to just buy a one way ticket. I ran and jumped in the train, walked down four wagons to find a nice seat (4 minutes before departure) . At that moment I realized I had forgotten to stamp my ticket. I got off, ran all the way to the beggining of the station,stamped it, jumped on the first open door and heard the messages "ladies and genteleman this is the train in direction Chartres, the train is closing its doors". Relief.

Le Refuge des Fondus à Paris

Last nite I discovered a very fun restaurant in Montmatre, right by the metro Abbesses. Cheap food, loud/familiar/young ambiance, Le Refuge des Fondus offers only 1 menu for 17 euros. You start with a tray of starters (olives,potatoes,peppers,cheese,ham etc) and later continue with a meet or cheese fondue. For 2 extra euros you can get a dessert ( a lemon icecream goes perfect after having eaten an entire cheese fondue). And you even get a small alcoholic drink with your startes. What differentiates this restaurant from others is that your wine be it red or white is served in "baby bottles". The place is small and has space for only two large tables of around 20 people each. So to get to the other side of the table you have no option than to jump over the table. Definately recommendable to go with a group, relax and have fun.

17, rue des 3 Frères 75018 Paris

Tel.0142552265

What to do on a Saturday morning with a sunny sky?
First sleep in till late :-)
Have a nice breakfast and go for a walk. I took my camera to see if I could get some nice shoots, but at the end I only ended up with 10 which werent even that great. Sacré-Coeur, I like the place, you get a view of the city. But, what can I say? I stood there remembering the view of Prague from the Prague Castle, and i think that the view of Prague just cant be beated. Prague has magic in its streets and from the views of the "eiffel tower" (Petrin tower) and the Castle, which cant really be beated by the Sacré-Coeur. Also the tourists at Sacré-Coeur drove me nuts. It had been a while since I hadnt mingled through all those cameras, kids running and maps (although I was caring one myself, but well hidden). Shouts "mira que bonito" " siamo a parigi" " gehen wir" " mooi...leuuk" enough! I took the funicular to which I had access with my orange card (monthly train ticket) and went down the hill. I wonder why they put that funicular, afterall its such a short ride. I guess in case you got leg problems. The funicular was packed with dutch people. Felt good to actaully understand what they were saying, and I wondered if they missed their bikes :D It made me want to get the Thalys and get off at Den Haag HS, afterall I see the thalys everymorning when I pass with the metro by Paris Noord.
So, its time for a change. Ive been told this for the past 22 years, well maybe for the last 13 years... "you have to do some sport" and although I have taken action lots of time, i really hadnt in the past years. The situation is getting a bit out of hand with doctors telling me " its obvious you havent done any sport" and with my neck and back hurting too much. So I went and signed up to the gym. Its going to be hard to keep up with it, i know myself too well. Not only do I not like the gym but I dont like to do sport. ISP Volleyball was probably the highest point in my sport carrer, our tournament in Vienna to which we lost, but the trainings were still fun cuz we had our banana power and the best setters in the team :-) How im meant to keep up with the gym I sitll dont know. It will be a matter of relating it to the trip, I need to loose 20kg if I want to go on my trip. That should be the goal! :-)

What do YOU do on the weekends?

Time Flew - Good bye HEC

I have had this blog abandoned for too long! Too Too long... I left it on my way to Australia for Xmas...

--Had an amazing time in Sydney!
--Then came the trip back to Paris!
--Interviews and more interviews!
--The end of studies at HEC!
--Leaving my room in the HEC residence!
--The finding of an internship!
--The hectic search for an appartment!
--Two trips to Spain!

All this happened in 8 weeks, not to say the less quite a stressfull time! To which I could have dedicated a 10 page explanation of the cause of stress and its moments, but well, I completely forgot I even owned this blog! As you see im a true journalist....

But now, im fully installed in my new little 11m2 studio in Paris, working on the week but enjoying my weekends in the city and trying to discover this city more and more. And ladies and gentlemen I got an idea, im going to go on a trip!! To reply to what one of you has told me "you have seen it all" NO I HAVENT! I still havent been to the african continent, I still have a lot of countries in Asia that I want to see, there is still that part of me that wants to take the transiberian train, I still want to go to RapaNui(easter island) .... so the truth is that while I will live the moment in Paris I have decided to start planning a trip. A trip that will take place once I have graduated from university. Hopefully march 2009, in the worst case june 2009. The planned itinerary for now would be Paris-Buenos Aires-Easter Island-Sydney-South of India-Nepal-Tibet-Bhutan-Burma-Inner China (yunnan province)- back to Europe by transiberian... but god knows, this is nothing more than a rough itineary. And for now im all on my own, so if anybody wants to join you are more than welcome...Dates are also unsettled but the plan would be to start in April 2009 and the return date to be no early than September 2009, maybe October. Who knows! Just wait for me to do a bit of research and you will soon be seeing more names in that list :D So here beggins another adventure, the one of planning the next trip!!

I havent forgotten xiximundis, im back on track! Take Care Mates! Im leaving you with the picture of my HEC Marketing Class!

CDG life or death?!

Its finally sunday night. And I say finally cuz i finally have some time for myself, to do what I want. Most of the weekend has been consumed by working on assignments, cleaning cloths, working at the university restaurant and sleeping till "late" (9am). So what do I really want to do now that I have "free" time? You should know by now... I was just googleing a webpage which I havent seen in a while and which will be

today's recomendation http://www.sleepinginairports.net

This is quite a handy website. In case you have a very early flight and thus you dont want to pay 40 euros or more for your taxi. In my case I have been told that there is a risk of french greve (strike) on the day that I will leave Paris, so I thought I would have a look at this site. I already knew this site from before but I hadnt visited it in a long time. It gives you people's opinion on airports and sleeping in them. How secure it is etc...

The truth is that I haven't been in Paris CDG since god knows when. However, remembering past times I remember it being an old,desorganized,chaotic,ugly airport. Basically,one of those airports where you just dont want to be at. Talking to fellow travelers only reinforced my ideas. I went to this website with the hope of finding some revealing information. With the hope that CDG would be placed as an excelent place to sleep before embarking on a 24 hour flight...However, the results where quite unshocking and depressing...

What you can look forward to in Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport:

• bucket seats with armrests
• cold metal benches
• no seats at some boarding gates
• hot and humid
• washrooms smell
• staff are rude and unplesaant
• frequent announcements
• filthy washrooms
• noisy
• homeless people
• frequent announcements
• a few couches in transit area
• WiFi

So basically, there is WiFi but I dont have a laptop with me to be able to take advantage of the only good thing the airport has. My dream would be that a friend would drive me there, that a sweet gentelman from BA would come and pick me up at the car. They would take care of my luggage and leave me at the business lounge. When I would board my plane they would offer me an upgrading to business class, and when I would do my transfer in Heathrow I wouldn't have to do all the Quees to get to Terminal 4. Later in embarking the B747 (cuz im hoping it will be one..) I dream that I would be able to have a chat with the pilots who would show me their cabin like when I was a kid. I would ofcourse get an upgrade to first class cuz nobody flies in xmas and planes are empty. Lastly, in Tokyo I would meet the CPO of JAL who would offer me an internship position. After more than 24 hours I would reach home - Sydney. A boat would take me to the opera house. From there there would be a red carpet to my appartment.

Back to Earth, Lets hope there isnt a strike.

Bisous.

The parking infront of the builduing has started to get packed.More lights are turned on in the builduing infront of mine, and I'm sure the cafeteria will be packed today. Its sunday and tommorrow a new week begins. Musicovery.com has spend the day with me, together with my slides of "promotion de ventes" and an online french-english dictionary. What would I do without my phone to make free calls from room to room, I dont know. A relaxed weekend. Small escape to the big city behind the forest- Paris....

Arrive to go see the Catacombes, closed for reparation till February. Try and take the metro, not working. Lots of walking, but a nice relaxed walk around the Jardins du Luxembourg, Marche aux Puces, lunch at monmatre (not to break the tradition...) and exhaustion. My 2.97 euro forfait dinner at RU...Why is the chicken and the fish so dry? Getting all the week leftovers? Buff...Looking forwards to monday where I hope the food will be a bit more fresh, or not. Daydreaming again about Bhutan,Nepal my job as a releif logistics agent and an around the world photographer.

Whats next, I dont know? Right now enjoying the day, cuz afterall this is an amazingly relaxed placed to be in for 5 months, surrounded by lots of students, intresting courses (sometimes ;-) ) and no real worries. Who wants to face having to write a thesis?Findin a real job and not having wendsday afternoons off?Not me.

Today's Recommendation http://www.freerice.com/ Quiz yourself in english vocabulary (all levels)! For every word you get right, WFP will give 10 grains of rice. Help save the 25,000 people that die every day due to hunger. Pass the word on.