Carla's 3rs entry - Barcelona, here I come!
Time sure is going quickly here! I can't believe I'm nearly already into my fourth month and it's still getting better everyday. This last month has been really crazy with my travels growing, workload increasing, exams approaching, and bank account figure dropping rapidly.
Living on campus continues to pay for itself time and time again with all the fun we have, and I received a 'housing benefit' from the residence company that rented my apartment out to me which means they pay for half the rent each month - a much needed financial aid! Its ridiculous how easy it is to spend all your money so quickly over here so I strongly recommend to all you future exchange students to budget for how ever much you think you'll need and double it! It's been fantastic though because at least when you 'over-budget' you never have to say no to doing something or going somewhere fabulous!
I just got back from nine days in Madrid, Lisbon and Barcelona - incredible! Had an amazing time and saw some great cities! My favourite was definitely Barcelona - the most beautiful city I've ever seen with a great historic centre full of Gaudi's architecture and its also right on the water, so you've got the marina right next to the city centre. The weather was awesome the whole time; so I spent all day yesterday at the beach in Barcelona, which was so nice... I missed the beach! However, it was nothing compared to good old Aussie beaches - they have got to be the best in the world! We did some day trips out to smaller towns from Madrid and Lisbon.
From Lisbon we went to this incredible small jungle paradise town called 'Sintra' and saw the most breath-taking palace with some incredible engineering drawings and conceptual designs describing how the palace was built and that was really cool to see, definitely my highlight of the trip! The palace was also surrounded by this huge garden with heaps of lookout towers that gave us awesome views!
Also went to this great park in Madrid called 'Parc el Retiro' with this massive man-made lake in the middle and we had a picnic and saw this cool bongo show! Then in Barcelona I did a crazy all nighter, seeing as I was in the 'party city' and all my friends were super keen to do it - got home at 8am in the morning and died of tiredness the next day! Good experience and a pretty cool club with five levels and different music on each level and crazy Spanish dancers. The Spanish people were really pleasant, very polite which always makes a difference!
All the cities had flawless metro systems so it was so easy to get around. We did about 10 hours of walking each day so I'm totally buggered now but don't regret a thing because I got to see so much. I STRONGLY recommend you all visit Barcelona at one stage in your lives because you'll fall in love with it! Stayed at one great hostel in Madrid right in the heart of the city, which made a big difference, then the Lisbon and the Barcelona hostels were slightly dodgier but really well located as well.
I hit Italy the week before and loved it - great weather, great sites and of course great food! I think I must've had a pasta and a gelati everyday to make sure I 'stocked up' on great quality food. I visited Florence, Perugia, Assisi and Spello - Florence with its stunning cathedral in the centre of town, Perugia with its hills and killer views, and Assisi and Spello with their medieval charm and character nestled into the mountains, a perfect mix of cities! Unfortunately the Italians weren't the nicest set of people I have ever come across, but so long as I made sure to 'per favore' and 'grazi' as much as possible it wasn't too bad.
Saw some gorgeous churches throughout Perugia and loved seeing all the impeccable Italian fashion! I caught a 'couchette' train from Paris to Italy and on the way home too - interesting experience but probably wouldn't do it again due to the cost and discomfort, despite having a fold down bed you can hardly get some shut eye when the train is so shaky that all you're praying for is that it doesn't derail.
Back home in Troyes now, getting some much-needed sleep and preparing for the exams. Scary thought doing exams in French and running the risk of not even being able to understand the question let alone the answer, but I'll cross my fingers and hope for a pass! Have some semester long projects that are worth a fair chunk of the overall subject grade so they're coming along nicely and doing a huge presentation on Australia early June to show off our awesome country and try and promote Swinny, so that will be awesome - going to give the Frenchies a vegemite experience!
There are great sporting facilities here at uni, with a massive sports hall that has tennis and ping pong courts, soccer fields, basketball courts, an enormous rock climbing wall, a great gym, fitness rooms and the list goes on! I'm playing in the women's basketball team and we get to travel all over France to play so that's another great opportunity, and you can access the sport hall anytime you want to muck around with your friends either attempting to return a ping-pong serve or even just sweating it out in a 'step' class. However, despite all the exercise encouraged, its hard not to gain a few kilos when you're surrounded by the best, and richest, cuisine in the world! The novelty of a hot baguette, or a crispy croissant will unfortunately never wear off for me.