Friday, September 23, 2005
Last weekend as a free woman
Today I was a tourist. Man, my feet hurt.
Yeah, considering I found out yesterday that school actually starts THIS Monday, and not the Monday after, I decided I should actually get in as much "vacation" time as possible. Climbed a small mountain (ok, a hill), chilled at a café with a glace à la banana split, strolled the beach, wandered the 'spensive tourist shops, got hit on by gross french guys, and tried a Nicois specialty, socca. It's basically like a salty crepe, made with pois chiche (cornmeal?). It was alright, but too much is like dipping your tongue in the Mediterranean. Too salty.
I need to get friends. Today was cool, sure, wandering around town on my own schedule, but well, the downsides are obvious. That's okay, I think next week should be better. I'll be spending the week in a cohort of about 40-50 other CS students... maybe one of them will want to be my friend? *puppy eyes*
Orientation was yesterday. It was pretty much as I expected. Got to the lecture theatre early, where 68 guys and 4 girls milled around, waiting for the doors to open. They were all in their little groups, slapping each other on the back, joking around, fait-ing la bise all over the place. It just didn't seem right to march right into their reunions, so I leaned on the wall.
Once inside, I grabbed a front seat, determined to understand every frenchy word coming out of the directrice's mouth. Behind me I heard murmurs of someone wanting "du chewing gum" and his friends coming up dry, so I turned around and offered up some Trident. They looked surprised, but gratefully accepted, and voila! Ice Broken. Introduced myself to a couple guys named Jonathan and Fabian, but got cut off by the prof who was starting the orientation.
I was in for a few surprises.
First of all, as I mentioned, school apparently starts on Monday, Sept 26 (Surprise #1). For some reason I thought it started on Oct. 6, you know, considering they scheduled my registration on Oct 5th!! Kinda weird to go to school before completing my registration, but whatever. They had my name because I'd pre-reg'd online, and that's what matters.
Then she told us our compilers class would be done in Scheme, stressing that although "you've used it for a long time now, you better revise". So, I have to start looking at Scheme this weekend (Surprise! #2)... oh well, no biggie. And not really a surprise either.
Anglais would be taught every Wednesday for the whole day.... Hmm... and something else about "TD"... what was that?
Actually there weren't too many other big surprises, I guess I just felt very enlightened by the end of her speech. And full of questions, but as a gigantic crowd of students pounced on her after she finished, I decided to line up for pictures and talk to her after instead. As I waited, I thought I'd get one question out of the way, so I poked the guy in front of me:
-"Euh, pardon... vous savez c'est quoi le 'TD'?"
-"Traveaux dirigés, mais j'sais pas comment ca marche ici, j'suis pas de cette fac."
Ah, so TD are labs. And he's a newbie too! Turns out he's a transfer student from Toulon named Denis. Cool, so here's the plan: find more french-speaking transfer students, and that way I can get both the culture aspect and the I'm-alone-and-need-social-involvement bit. French friends, my dream come true. Hm, overthinking this much?
Yeah, considering I found out yesterday that school actually starts THIS Monday, and not the Monday after, I decided I should actually get in as much "vacation" time as possible. Climbed a small mountain (ok, a hill), chilled at a café with a glace à la banana split, strolled the beach, wandered the 'spensive tourist shops, got hit on by gross french guys, and tried a Nicois specialty, socca. It's basically like a salty crepe, made with pois chiche (cornmeal?). It was alright, but too much is like dipping your tongue in the Mediterranean. Too salty.
I need to get friends. Today was cool, sure, wandering around town on my own schedule, but well, the downsides are obvious. That's okay, I think next week should be better. I'll be spending the week in a cohort of about 40-50 other CS students... maybe one of them will want to be my friend? *puppy eyes*
Orientation was yesterday. It was pretty much as I expected. Got to the lecture theatre early, where 68 guys and 4 girls milled around, waiting for the doors to open. They were all in their little groups, slapping each other on the back, joking around, fait-ing la bise all over the place. It just didn't seem right to march right into their reunions, so I leaned on the wall.
Once inside, I grabbed a front seat, determined to understand every frenchy word coming out of the directrice's mouth. Behind me I heard murmurs of someone wanting "du chewing gum" and his friends coming up dry, so I turned around and offered up some Trident. They looked surprised, but gratefully accepted, and voila! Ice Broken. Introduced myself to a couple guys named Jonathan and Fabian, but got cut off by the prof who was starting the orientation.
I was in for a few surprises.
First of all, as I mentioned, school apparently starts on Monday, Sept 26 (Surprise #1). For some reason I thought it started on Oct. 6, you know, considering they scheduled my registration on Oct 5th!! Kinda weird to go to school before completing my registration, but whatever. They had my name because I'd pre-reg'd online, and that's what matters.
Then she told us our compilers class would be done in Scheme, stressing that although "you've used it for a long time now, you better revise". So, I have to start looking at Scheme this weekend (Surprise! #2)... oh well, no biggie. And not really a surprise either.
Anglais would be taught every Wednesday for the whole day.... Hmm... and something else about "TD"... what was that?
Actually there weren't too many other big surprises, I guess I just felt very enlightened by the end of her speech. And full of questions, but as a gigantic crowd of students pounced on her after she finished, I decided to line up for pictures and talk to her after instead. As I waited, I thought I'd get one question out of the way, so I poked the guy in front of me:
-"Euh, pardon... vous savez c'est quoi le 'TD'?"
-"Traveaux dirigés, mais j'sais pas comment ca marche ici, j'suis pas de cette fac."
Ah, so TD are labs. And he's a newbie too! Turns out he's a transfer student from Toulon named Denis. Cool, so here's the plan: find more french-speaking transfer students, and that way I can get both the culture aspect and the I'm-alone-and-need-social-involvement bit. French friends, my dream come true. Hm, overthinking this much?
# posted by Unknown @ 3:10 PM 
