The Summer I Enjoyed

Hello and welcome to the blog. By golly it's been a while! I've had a rip-roaring summer (do we still say rip-roaring? I believe the Spanish would say muy animado) Anyway, bit of a summary:

• My holidays actually started around June 16. School only just re-commenced this Wednesday, which means I enjoyed a generous 12 week holiday. In France there are actually more school holidays than in any other EU country (however, french students, on average, spend more hours at school during the week than other EU students... Pick your battles kids!)
• That week I went on a day trip to Montpellier, bought some sunnies and hired a bike for the afternoon. I had lunch with a duck that day too.
• My host father (who is a pilot for fun) took me on a tour of the region in a snazzy little jet. I wasn't even a little nervous. Nope. Not at all. It was a hot day, that's why I was sweating so profusely...
• June 27th went to Paris, met up with (half) the family (they came all the way out from Oz, did I mention that?) at CDG airport. We hung out in Paris for a week, doing the whole "tourist thing" Thoroughly enjoyed it I might add...
• July 3rd we trained it down to the south of France (my domain, as I've come to think of it) where we hired a car, met up with Irene (my fairy Godmother) and hung out chez Anke in Cabannes, just outside of Avignon. We also did the tourist thing down in the south too.
• Then we headed out to Greece (via London, it was 12° and drizzly, in the middle of JULY, their summer) Loitered around Athens for a few days, saw the Acropolis (thats the Parthenon, not to be confused with the fiery horsemen thing...) and then headed out to Naxos island, in the Cyclades. We stayed there for a week then Michael and Mum had to go home back to Australia. I stayed longer in Greece (wouldn't you? comment now!)
  
• Watched the Doctor Who season 4 finale, as it happened on YouTube (hey I thought it was worth a mention - Davros was back!)
  
• After travelling a bit through Greece (destinations including, but not limited to: Ptolemaida, Plati and Thessaloniki) I had to come back to France. Imagine that moment at the airport "oh, I don't wanna go back to FRANCE! I wanna stay here in GREECE" It wasn't all bad, I got to hang in Fiumicino for the afternoon as I waited in between flights (Fiumicino in Italy, I've gone to Italy again!)
• When I got back to France I discovered it was the Summer fête votive season. Basically big town parties, one town at a time, and exclusive to this region in the south. I also piloted a boat (are boats piloted? If they are, then I did)
• Then we all headed up to the mountains, to do some good old fashioned 4x4 in the brand new Hybrid Lexus with Regular Road Tyres. It was cold as Hell (again, nothing Biblical, there is a town in Norway called Hell. The mercury there regularly drops below -20: this means in Winter, Hell literally freezes over) up there, at the top of St Martin De Belleville it was 8° and foggy... Brrrr! The mountains were actually quite spectacular in summer, even without snow (although the tops of the taller mountains actually have snow all year round, such as Val Thorens and Mont Blanc. The latter peak has an altitude of over 4800 m, sorry Kosciusko)
  
• And to top it all off I thought I'd ride my recently repared push bike to the Pont Du Gard, a mean 30 km ride. Watch out for me in Le Tour De France next year...

Oooh! Dot points! Love m'dot points. That about does it for now I think, best not to over do it in one go. I'll try to post some more details up later on (and some piccys) and I WILL send another e-mail, I swear. Those "what happened to those Travel Newsletters" comments are REALLY starting to pile up ;)
FrenchSimon Out.

Oh, and Happy Fathers Day!

Travel Newsletter

This post was originally an email I sent to family and friends twice by accident. You too could receive two accidental emails, scroll down to the bottom of this post to find out how to get on this rich list.

You'll never guess what happened at school again, the Blocus. I brought my camera to take photos this time, but it was less spectacular. I was rather disappointed. What had actually happened was that Thursday was actually a teacher's strike which we were warned about well in advance so that people could stay at home. This makes the Blocus redundant and explains why nobody's quite sure why it happened in the first place. So anyway, this made me think about some of the differences between high school students in Australia and in France, how French students have the right to strike and protest and stuff like that. This is what I came up with:

1. French students don't have to wear a uniform to school:

• Upside: They don't have to muck about trying to find their tie and can concentrate on getting to that crazy 8 o'clock class
• Downside: Much more awkward if you and your best mate rock up to class and realise that you're wearing the same outfit; it's also much more difficult to get away with wearing the same thing everyday

2. French students are only assessed by exams:

• Upside: With a school day that lasts from 8 am and goes until 5:30 pm, they don't have much time to research, draft and edit assignments for the 9 or so subjects they take
  
• Downside: Exams create a stressful environment that's not great for student well-being; a lack of independent study tasks can't be great either.
  

3. The canteen here offers a hot, three course meal for lunch for only aorund 4€:

• Upside: Students can enjoy a hot, three course meal for lunch (during their one and a half hour break)
• Downside: I can't really think of one, except that it costs 4€, but it's oh so convenient
  

4. Stress: There's no difference here, everybody stresses. I know it's easy for me to say this, because I've already finished high school, but everybody needs to just chill out. Whatever happens, happens. Just do your best and have fun. Although, chilling out and having fun will not let your best be higher than a 7.

Another funny thing happened at school the other day; this group of people came into the school and started playing music and getting people to dance. I figured it must be a traditional thing, so I got up and danced too. It was harder than it looked but I didn't step on anybody's toes, so I was happy (and so were they, I was wearing Blundstones). Although I just did one dance and left (they didn't ask me to stay and do another), there were people performing all lunchtime. It was one of those nice, unexpected things that only happen in France and only when I don't have a camera.

The weather here has been grey and rainy recently in France, which is fine for me, I knew it was going to be grey and rainy the whole time in Europe, but it makes most people cranky. It's not all bad news though, with summer just around the corner (scheduled to commence June 21), things are sure to heat up and replace these pesky clouds with the scorching Mediterranean sun. We do get some nice days though and I have taken some photos to prove it. There are a lot of flowers growing around this place, I'll attach some photos to prove that too.

Oh, and I thought I'd better mention this: please forward this on to people who may find it interesting (like you good people who are reading the blog). Don't get me wrong, reading the blog is great, but you could be receiving the email, with pictures! Email me here to get on the list at emyk.nomis@gmail.com

The Cake I Baked

Hello everyone, today I baked a cake. Yup, a cake. Me. Baked one. Here's the recipe if you want it:

semolina cake recipe:

3 cups semolina
1 cup sugar
1 tbs baking powder
4 oz or 125 grams butter
2 cups milk
4 oz nuts

combine dry ingredients
melt butter and cool before adding
mix well and stir in milk
pour into greased cake tin
bake for 30 to 40 mins at 350 degrees...or until cooked through...test it with a knife
while hot, pour syrup over slowly so it spreads through

SYRUP:
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
1 tbs lemon juice
heat over low heat....

If there's any problems with the recipe, consult my mother (that's not some sort of insult, she's the one who gave me the recipe). Here are some problems you may run into, you may find that 350 degrees is hot enough to burn the outside edge of the cake and leave the middle uncooked. That's what started happening to my cake, but I caught it in time and turned it down to 250 instead. It worked out for me. Anyway, getting all the ingredients together was a bit of a nightmare. First of all, my host family didn't have any semolina in their house, or a lot of sugar, so I had to buy that stuff. And nuts too. If you can, get nuts that are already crushed into itty-bitty pieces, this will make things much easier. I didn't and so I had to crush my own nuts and that was a whole other thing. I ended up using a baking tray and a jar of pasta sauce. If only I had had a sonic screwdriver to cheat my way out of that situation... So I had to walk to the shops to buy that stuff. I didn't mind the walk, but it's getting a bit hot these days. Poor me, suffering in this hot French weather. So I get to the shop and try and buy the stuff and there's a 15€ minimum for eftpos. I think that's too much. Who spends 15€ at the local shop? Certainly not me. She didn't give me a bag either. It didn't get much better after that, I misunderestimated the sheer volume of mixture that 3 cups semolina, 1 cup sugar, 1 tbs baking powder, 4 oz or 125 grams butter, 2 cups milk, 4 oz nuts makes and had to keep changing mixing bowls. Also had to keep changing cake tins too. Syrup went perfectly though, no complaints there. Feel free to add a little bit more lemon into the syrup mix, to make it just that little bit more tangy. Well I'd better go, I need to hide before my host family sees the mess I left for them in the kitchen...
I'm kidding, there's no good spots to hide in this house anyway.

Travel Newsletter

This was originally a group e-mail I sent out, it had pictures and was very nice. If you would like to be on the list, there are instructions on how to join up at the bottom of the blog.

The month of April, busy busy. The only month this year that I haven't gone skiing! But I went to other places like Avignon, Toulon, an old preserved town you aren't allowed to drive in and my host family's private olive tree patch. And also I got some photos of their second house, the one they're doing up. Apparently it was the old post office at Sernhac, now it's a home in the making. But by far the most exciting thing that happened was the Blocus at school.

• A Blocus does exactly what it says on the tin, all the students get together and block up the entrances to the school, then they protest

• This time the Blocus was about the president's new education reforms which will result in teachers losing their jobs and class sizes going through the roof

• During Blocus instead of going to class the students march down to town hall and demand a room to speak with the mayor (I think that's the go, everyone was shouting so it was hard to tell)
  

• When that didn't happen they stood out front and made a lot of noise for a couple of hours

The Blocus, although quite fun, is not quite as effective as calling up channel 7 (although it seems most of the media are already supporting the students and teachers on this one). I didn't bring my camera to the Blocus, and so I haven't got any proof that it actually happened, you'll just have to trust me on that. I did take some pictures with my phone but they're all small and blurry and I can't figure out how to connect my phone to the computer to get them out... The Blocus was pretty good though, as far as stiking students go they put on a pretty good show. However French students have the right to protest when they're unhappy about changes. It's not just the students either, everybody does a lot of striking over here in France.

Next on the list, Avignon, lots of fun! Just a day trip, so I couldn't do everything, but I tried all the same. First we were just walking around a bit, went to a few shops, then in the afternoon we went on a tour of an old castle. My host mum knew the director so we got admission, audio guides and parking for free. Pretty sweet deal. Anyway, this place was commissioned by popes hundreds of years ago and was actually where they lived (at least when they were in France anyway). It was pretty impressive. I won't bore you with the history lesson; I'll just attach a few pics.

Toulon though was lots of fun and I didn't learn any history. Another day trip, this time mostly by myself (my host dad gave me a lift in, he had a work conference). I started by just walking around, but I eventually bought a map (I later received 2 FREE maps from the tourist info place). I went to the market, it was mostly fruit and veggies. There was a boat tour of the port. That was good fun, I saw all the military ships docked there and some other cool stuff too. Then in the afternoon I just walked around a bit and hung out in a park. Oh, and I went to the beach too. Picturesque.

Now, the private olive tree patch was pretty cool. A couple of weekends ago we all went up there to dig out and replat some of the trees. Sounds like a lot of work but my host dad knows someone who owns some big heavy earth moving machines, it was a bit over kill but fun to watch (when I say big heavy machines I really mean it, when they were driving the machines to the olive trees one of the trucks broke the little road and they spent the entire morning recovering it). That was lots of fun, but I forgot to bring my camera so no pics of the machines in action, althoughi do have some pics of the olive trees being burnt.

Anyway that's it from me. They've gotten rid of the virus on the computer so hopefully I'll be able to post more blogs, so keep checking back. If you would like to get on the mailing list and receive Si-Mail straight to your inbox when it comes out (it's not that often, believe me) then e-mail me at emyk.nomis@gmail.com or here and you'll be on the list quicker than I can write the next blog.