Marseille and Immigration

Marseille is an up and coming city. 

It's a quick 30 minute ride from Aix by bus or train and the third largest city (by population) in France after Paris and Lyon.  Marseille was chosen as the 2013 European Capital of Culture.

Marseille is unique for France because of the significant numbers of immigrants from North Africa.  They are coming to France for work and for better lives, especially with France's social benefits.  It poses an interesting opposition to the city of Aix where there is immigration as well... however the immigration to Aix is of wealthy Parisiens from the north who now have access to living in southern France on weekends and holidays while working in Paris during the week due to the great advantages of the high-speed TGV trains.  

Speaking of immigration: after seeing the results of the recent French elections, I have to admit that I'm a bit shocked.  

First let me explain a little about the French political election system.  To be a candidate, one must be French and get 500 signatures from mayors throughout France.  These signatures are called parrinages and they are basically a vote of confidence.  After a bit of campaigning and presenting their platforms (which legally must be the same for each candidate - same amount of money, same amount of time on TV, etc), there is a national vote.  This year of 2012, there were 10 candidates including Sarkozy (the current French president), Hollande, Le Pen, Bayrou, Melenchon, and Joly.  After this vote, the two with the highest percentages (in this case Sarkozy and Hollande), will proceed to have a debate this coming Sunday and then there will be a final national vote that decides the French president.

Now, what surprises me from this election was not the results for Sarkozy and Hollande; it was the high result for Marine Le Pen who heads the Front National, an extreme right party, at about 18%.

Her firm stance against immigration and desire to pull France out of the Schengen zone seems extreme and unreasonable.  I find her stance to be almost anti-multicultural and very exclusive to many people throughout the world.  However, her strong numbers (with support of many immigrants and youth in France) demonstrate the need to bring these issues to the forefront.  

I see this as an opportunity to recognize how important of an issue immigration is for building relationships and helping the world's populations.  However, my business professor doesn't have such an optimistic view; she thinks this is only the beginning for the Front National and is worried for the future of France.

What do you think?

Strasbourg Conference

About a month ago I applied and was accepted to join a conference on the environment in Strasbourg.  It was a conference between U.S. and European students to discuss environmental issues and what we can do to help.  Our keynote speaker, Polly Higgins, is currently working on making ecocide the 5th Crime Against Peace in the United Nations (http://pollyhiggins.com/Polly_Higgins/Welcome.html).  Another speaker was from IUCN, a leading organization in environmental efforts (http://www.iucn.org/about/).
One comment that really stands out to me from the conference is that we, as individuals, are not working to save the planet.  The planet would be just fine on its own.  What we need to do is save the planet from our own destructive ways.
Well yes! That is true.  Time is running out (as you can see by all of this wacky climate change - and you can't deny that things are changing, this has been a pretty wacky year for weather for example!) and the environment shouldn't be a this-side/ that-side political issue.  It is something that affects every single person whether you think you care about it or not. That is why it matters.

The conference went all weekend, but I still took some time to get to know the other students as well as the city.  Here are some pics!:

Grenoble

For Easter weekend, I made a trip to Grenoble to visit a friend I met during my adventures in Oslo last summer.  I stayed with her and her family during the weekend and enjoyed meeting her friends and family, visiting Grenoble and having a moment to slow down after some nonstop action.

Luberon with IAU

Sunday was an excursion for my entire school (Institute for American Universities).

We had the opportunity to see some pretty things in the Luberon such as...

The cute little town of Loupmarin - They have a cool castle there with a winding staircase.  The streets of the town are winding and cobblestone.  Since we went Sunday a lot of things were closed, but it was enjoyable nonetheless to spend some time in this little village.

 This sign was outside of a boulangerie (bread store).  It says "the only artisan bread and pastry shop of the village."  Then the dog says "I wait here!"  with the arrow pointing down to a water bowl.  Cute!

 This is where we had lunch... at the top of a village next to the chateau of the Marquis de Sade.  He was the person who coined the term "sadism."  Not such a happy reason to be famous for, but it was a beautiful day and this spot overlooked the countryside with all of the cherry trees in bloom.  There was also this cool artwork at the top!

 Last we stopped at the Ochre in Roussillon.  It's a spot where the rocks have beautiful red, orange, and yellow colors.  We took a walk/ hike around the area... it's very beautiful.  If you're thinking it looks like Red Rocks in Denver, it does a little but it's a bit different color (more yellow) and it through me off when there was sand all over the place!

 The village of Rousillon imitates the colors of the cliffs!  Here I enjoyed a delicious violette ice cream.... yes, as in the flower. Different, but yummy!

Avignon

Saturday my history class went to Avignon.

There we went to the Palais des Papes (Pope's palace), some little museum to see the statue of the Guerriere Vacheres, and the Musee du Petit Palais.  At the end of the day, we had a minute to dance on the Pont d'Avignon!

Honors Program Excursion

Well I just wrote all about my weekend, and then it deleted itself, so let me try again...

This weekend, I...  went to a wine tasting, toured a winery, ate lunch with my Honors Program at the director's house, toured an abbey, listened (and sang along) to Gregorian chants, found the sweet spot in the chapel, went to Avignon, saw the Pope's Palace, saw a famous statue I've studied called Guerriere Vachere, ate lunch in the beautiful sun, experienced some amazing paintings, danced on the Pont d'Avignon, explored an old chateaux in Loupmarin, saw the house of the Count who was responsible for the creation of the term sadism in Lacoste, and saw the beautiful ochre in Rousillon.

Whew! Let me break that down for ya... (in a couple blog posts).

Friday, I had an excursion with my honors program.  It's a program specially made for students wanted to excel in French, so we try to speak 100% in French.  With that, we also get some nice perks, such as this excursion.
We started of the morning by going to a winery, well going to a winery after stopping by Brad and Angelina's driveway.  Yep, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have property outside of Aix with a vineyard and a nice driveway at least!  We saw some guy outside that stared our bus down as we sat there (awkward), so yeah, saw the security detail of Brangelina.  That's how I roll.
We arrived at the winery and walked down the driveway framed by trees up to the grand house, then past the vines and into the winery itself.  The chef de culture (guy in charge of the wine) explained how wine is made from the vine to the bottle.  It was really interesting to hear how rose, red, and white wines are all made differently, and they all take a different amount of time to be ready.  We toured the grounds to see the vines themselves, then sat down for a nice wine tasting.  Keep in mind that it was still morning at this point.  We tasted a rose with hints of grapefruit and white flowers, two types of white, and ended with a red wine.

With everyone having enjoyed our morning, we were off to the director of the program's house for lunch.  His wife prepared us a wonderful lunch of salads, rice, breads, and ham along with some heavenly desserts.  Meanwhile, their 3 daughters were sneaking up behind us and taping fish to our backs!  In France, they celebrate Poisson d'Avril (April Fool's Day) by putting fish on people.  Weird, right?  We were all packed full and had some time to spare so then we sat out in the garden and made daisy chains haha.  I loved the house... it was like from a fairy tail with a yard full of daisies, children's playhouse and swings.

Next we were off to l'Abbaye du Thoronet, an
abbey once inhabited by monks.  We received a
tour of course where we saw where the monks made wine, slept, and especially sang.. this abbey is most known for the incredible chapel where the monks would sing Gregorian chants at almost all hours of the day and night.
Once in the chapel, our guide sang a song to demonstrate the incredible acoustics.  He walked around the entire room, even into the nooks and crannies where we could no longer see him, and it was like he was right in front of us.



After that, we continued to receive special treatment when a friend of the director's came in who just so happened to sing Gregorian chants at Sunday mass.  He sang beautifully and then he also showed us some cool things about the chapel... such as the importance of hitting the right notes or else you hear "wa wa wa." He also showed us what I call the "sweet spot."  There's one tiny spot in the chapel, that if you sing there, you hear everything all at once in your ears.  It is like you are speaking into your own ear.  Obviously difficult to explain, but super cool.  We ended off the day by all singing a Gregorian chant together (because we're cool like that) before hopping back in the bus and returning to Aix.

All in all, definitely a fantastic day and highlight of my trip.