Right off the plane and into the train station, I bought a carte 12-25, which is a discount card on train tickets in France for young people. I traveled from Paris to Besançon for 30 euros ($45), très bon marché (very cheap). Once arrived in Besançon, I got ahold of a carte bus, a discounted card for youth to ride the bus as much as I want to, which is great because for the moment I live somewhat far away from school and the center of the city, where everything is located.
Next, a carte ESN (Erasmus Student Network), for 4 euros- a card to belong to an association of foreign students that organizes parties, language cafés, and weekend outings in the area. Finally, a carte avantages jeunes (young people's avantage card), which cost only 7 euros but comes with a whole booklet of discounts, free entries to museums, and even a gift certificate for 6 euros to any bookstore in Besançon. Definitely already paid for itself. And you can use the card to get discounted admission to the movies! Which of course I have immediately taken advantage of!
Yesterday I saw "A Visite de la Fanfare" (released as "The Band's Visit" in English) and it was wonderful! A tragi-comedy, it evoked a wide range of emotions, notably quite a few smiles of pure delight. It was in English, Arabic, and Hebrew, with French subtitles. Didn't know a single thing about it going in, what luck for it to turn out to be so very enjoyable!
And a bit more news of a new friend, Christine from Sweden. We met by chance at school during the placement tests, and hit it off right away. Turns out we like all the same music and movies (we went to "Fanfare" together) AND she loves to read and visit bookstores and museums! Quelle chance! I am thrilled, and it is super fun to speak French together all the time. Even when we have trouble understanding each other, it always resolves itself in a laugh.
I have posted just a few few photos of my room here, the cat, the girls, and me as a queen from the party. Check them out at http://picasaweb.google.com/pandasamanda. More to come soon, I promise!
5 comments:
I am always very excited to be the first to post you a comment! :) Yes I think you should be getting by quite cheaply with all of your discount cards! Sounds like you are having a great time and taking advantage of everything just like I knew you would! I haven't tried to email you again so we shall see if the email is still mad at me!
Tout a l'heure! (not really but oh well)
ps i am really not sure whether tout should be toute or not. for a minute i was certain it should be toute instead and then i thought hmm i dont know. i think ill stick to my instincts and say it must be tout. :) who knows. im dumb.
Unless you have a strong aversion to dogs, anyone who reads this entry should immediately go to http://www.linein.org/media/screenclean.swf. You should go there even faster than "immediately" if you need a lol!!!
Reading your postings has been so interesting and fun, I rather feel like I'm on this wonderful adventure with you. Thank you so much for sharing. I'm going to check to see if the movie you saw is available through Netflix. We watched a very good movie the other night that was an HBO movie about the doctor and his assistant who pioneered the first heart surgery on babies with the same defect that Royal had and the doctor who did Royal's surgery was mentioned in the movie. Anxiously awaiting your next post--- love, dw
Darn tout'in! I can never get the tout thing right, either. Ah well, I don't think you're dumb at all, ma chère Am-bear!
Wow, what a story and a movie that must have been, dw! Thanks for sharing. Love you and miss you! -Amanda
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