Saturday, February 18, 2012

France : Part Two

On Monday, February 6th, I started my day by waking up at 6:30. I then got ready and headed to the bus stop at 7:20 and got the train at 7:46. I arrived in Paris and took the metro and got to work around 9:05. The HR person "greeted" me and told me to fill out these three papers and to bring this, this, and this in for Thursday. Then she brought me upstairs to my boss's office who was nowhere to be found. So she left me with someone in the hallway, Norbert. He brought me around to meet some of the other people who work there. He then didn’t know what to do with me, handed me off to another guy who brought me on his coffee break with him. A coffee break that consisted of him and two other guys getting instant coffee from the vending machine downstairs. Then he didn't know what to do with me, so he brought me to another guy's office where there was a desk I could sit at. There was a computer, but I wasn't allowed to use it. Don't know why. Then my boss finally showed up to tell me that he has a doctor's appointment and will see me later. I was like just dandy. So then the guy whose office I was sitting in, Florent, starting talking to me in English, which was really nice. He wanted to practice. Anyways, he gave me a quick company presentation and then said well you are going to have to read this book on rubber. So for four hours, I kid you not, I stared blankly at this stupid book on rubber. In the middle, I went to lunch with some of the guys at work. As noon came around, everyone headed out to lunch and I went with them. We walked a couple blocks from my building and entered a cafeteria type place with a bunch of other people from other workplaces. This is apparently where they eat everyday. It was so weird to see so many people dressed in suits and nice attire, picking up a tray and getting a plate for lunch and eating at cafeteria tables. A little before 4:30, Florent said I could pack up and head home. I had never been so happy to leave anywhere before. I caught the train back to Compiegne at 5:20, and didn’t get back to my room until about 6:40ish. It was quite a long day. I was so tired when I got home that I ate something quick, and was in bed by 9pm!

Round two was a little better than round one. My boss was there when I got there and he made some time to sit down with me and give me an overview of the next six months and how the company operated. He discussed my project with me as well. The company makes anti-vibratory and anti-acoustic parts for everything from trains, planes, and automobiles to offshore oil platforms all made from rubber. Some of their parts consist of bike tires, sealings, car suspensions, and insulation. I am going to be working on a project dealing with the vibra/acoustic problems of the electric vehicle. I will be researching how the electric vehicle works, and where the noise and vibration sources are, and working with noise, vibration, and hardness (NHV) regulations. My main project is producing a catalogue of how the company’s electric vehicle works and how their parts prevent vibrations and acoustics in the car. This will be used to send out to potential buyers and clients.

My boss gave me lots of books and articles to read and said to start researching! For the rest of the week and this past week, I have been researching and reading all about acoustics, vibrations, and the electric vehicle. At times it is pretty boring, but I will be learning a lot. Florent says that my desk looks more like that of a PhD student rather than an intern. Everyone at work has asked how it is going so far and I said it’s a lot of research and they have all said, “well that’s Laurent (my boss) for you.”

On Thursday, Florent took me to lunch with another guy at work to this little, quaint Italian restaurant. Florent is originally from Italy, but grew up speaking Italian and French. He knew the owners of the restaurant. A husband and wife, from Naples, ran the restaurant. I ordered an olive, caper, and oregano pizza. It was delicious. They paid for me and everything! The husband gave us lollipops on the way out too!! It was set up with mismatch plates and cups and silverware. Also, everyone sat together. It was a really cute place.

On Friday, yesterday, I went with Laurent to the Research Center site where I met the rest of my “team.” There is a whole team set up within the company that is working on this electric vehicle project. I got to see the prototype of the car and how it was being assembled. It was awesome, and it was green, so I loved it that much more. We had a “board meeting” type of thing and a lunch too. It was a three course meal and it was all fantastic. They ordered a bottle of wine with lunch, but I felt weird drinking at lunch so I politely declined. One of the guys said that it was all part of being in France. After a tiring day, my boss drove me back to the train station and I headed home. I thought it was going to be weird driving in the car with my boss for roughly 3 hours round trip, but it wasn’t too bad. We talked half in French and then he would randomly start talking in English.

Two weeks down, a little less than 6 months to go!

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Chapter 5 : The Gate Thing

Elena and I had already been to Paris, so we were going to do whatever Alissa wanted to see. Before heading to Paris, we asked her, “what are the main things you want to see in Paris?” and she responded with the Eiffel Tower, Le Louvre, and the gate thing. I was speechless when she said this. Elena laughed and asked if she meant the Arc du Triomphe. She did. So we made a plan before of what we would do each day so we had a little bit of any idea upon going there.

When we first arrived, we had to take a bus to Paris because we flew into Paris Beauvais Airport. Then we took the metro to our hotel which was the furthest possible point away from all the attractions, but it worked out just fine. We couldn’t check in yet, so we dropped our luggage off, and then headed to the Rodin Museum. This is where Le Penseur or the Thinker is. It’s a famous sculpture. Unfortunately, the inside portion was closed due to renovations, but we still could walk around the gardens and see the exhibit, which was 300 of his sketches. This is one of my favorite areas of Paris.

After the museum, we headed to the Champs-Elysées to see the gate thing.  We decided to head back to the hotel afterwards, because we were all freezing. We headed back and took a power nap and warmed up and headed back out to see the Eiffel Tower at night. Alissa was amazed at how big the Eiffel Tower was and it finally hit her that she was in France! We ate dinner near the Eiffel Tower and then went down to stand under it. Afterwards we called it a night and headed home.


Monday morning we got up and headed to the top of the Eiffel Tower. Then we went to the Louvre and ate lunch. While Alissa went through the Louvre, Elena and I went shopping and then hung out in Starbucks for a little while where I proceeded to pass out. We met up with Alissa and headed to see the gate lit up at night. We decided to eat on the Champs and went to a really good pizzeria. We then bought a bottle of champagne to celebrate the last night of our Eurotrip. I didn’t particularly like the champagne, so I only drank a little bit, but Elena and Alissa enjoyed it.



The next morning, we packed up all our stuff and headed to the Gare du Nord to put our stuff in the luggage storage while we went adventuring on our last day. We started the day off at Notre Dame, and continued on to the Deportation Memorial, Sacré Coeur, and Montmartre. By then we needed to head back to Gare du Nord so I could catch my train and show Elena and Alissa where to go for the airport. We got our luggage and said our goodbyes.

 It was so nice to see them and go on a trip around Europe with my two best friends!! Only a few more months until we are reunited again :)

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Chapter 4 : That’s Grand; Thanks a Million

After discussing with Elena and Alissa, we decided we were getting to Dublin one way or another so we each forked up 250 euros and boarded the next flight to Dublin. We flew Aer Lingus and the seats were so comfortable (definitely recommend flying with them), maybe not 250 euros worth of comfort, but it definitely helped. Once arriving at Dublin airport, we caught a bus to the city. We were supposed to get off at the second to last stop, but apparently we didn’t know how the bus worked and ended up getting dropped off at the last stop instead. Oh, and to make it better, we got off in the middle of a downpour! Nothing sayings welcome more than a downpour. We trudged our way to the hostel, having to stop in a bar to ask for directions, which was conveniently located in Smithfield. Elena and I were very happy to be “home.”

We checked into our hostel and then headed to dinner because by this point, we were all starving. We saw a pizzeria across the street from our hostel and headed over just to find out it was full and it would be around a 40 minute wait. We decided to keep looking. There was not too much for food options near our hostel, so I decided to ask a random person on the street where a good place to eat was. She told us of a restaurant not too far away so we decided to head there. The place was quaint and the food was delectable. Now that we were all full, we headed back to the hostel to shower and go to bed because we had a busy day ahead of us.

Different Aged Whiskey
Today we were off to the Jameson Distillery. It was a right out of the hostel, then another quick right and located directly behind our hostel. How’s that for location? We decided to stop at this adorable little breakfast place on the way to grab a quick bite to eat, then to start our day with a little whiskey. A tour guide took us through the process of how they make the whiskey, although, currently Jameson is distilled in southern Ireland. We ended the tour with a glass of Jameson on the rocks, with ginger ale, or with cranberry juice. I wanted to be a man and drink it on the rocks; I mean we were there to taste the Jameson after all. About halfway through, I couldn’t take anymore and had to add ginger ale. I guess I failed, oh well. We decided to eat lunch at the restaurant in the distillery and then headed to the gift shop. As we were checking out I started up conversation with the lady noticing her use of the word “grand.” She then sent us on our way with a “thanks a million.”


After the distillery we walked around Dublin on our own and stumbled upon Temple Bar, Trinity College, Christchurch, and the world’s largest clock. By then we were pretty tired and headed to the pizzeria for a second try. We had better luck this time. After dinner, we headed back to the hostel and passed out, well I passed out!

Temple Bar

Trinity College

Friday we changed hostels because the new one had a shuttle service to the airport. After checking in we did the free walking tour that the hostel offered. Our tour guide was a little crazy, but she knew a lot of history. We saw some of the same buildings and a few new ones too, such as the Dublin Castle and St. Stephen’s Green. After the tour we headed to the Guinness storehouse for lunch and the tour. I got beef and Guinness stew – delicious! After lunch we went on the self-guided tour. The Guinness storehouse was huge. We eventually made our way to the Gravity Bar where we all enjoyed a glass of Guinness. I was the only one to finish my pint. Dad, I know you’re proud! Afterwards we went to the gift shop and did some damage. We all spent enough money to get the free gift with purchase. Oops!

Dublin Castle

Church inside Dublin Castle



That night we went on the hostel’s pub crawl. We meet a lot of kids from Florida on the crawl. At the first bar we got a free welcome glass of Guinness. I decided I wanted a glass from Ireland, and what better than to have a Guinness glass, so I took the half-pint glass with me. At the next bars we went to we were given a free shot upon entering. It was a weird pub crawl if you ask me. Usually when you think of pub crawls, you think beer. If I ever make it back to Dublin, I would do my own pub crawl along Temple Bar.

Ironically I planned our trip during the same weekend as TradFest, a traditional festival filled with live music, traditional food markets, and Irish step dancing. On Saturday we went to one of the tents and watched some dancing. We then headed to the little fair at Christchurch where we met a guy from Newfoundland who was selling flavored popcorn. Afterwards we headed to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. 

For dinner we went to the Porterhouse Bar and had dinner while listening to a live band. I ordered the sampler of beer and ordered three different Porterhouse brewed beers : oyster stout, original stout, Porterhouse red. My favorite, by far, was the oyster stout! It was a pretty low key day because we had been going, going, going for a while by then. We also had to get up at 330am the following morning to catch the shuttle to the airport. We were not going to miss this flight too! Early Sunday morning we said our “thanks a million” to Dublin and headed to Paris, our last stop.

Friday, February 3, 2012

Chapter 3 : Tschüssey

After dropping our stuff off and meeting up with Sean, the five of us headed to the school. We went mainly to get our own student ids so that we could use the tram system without having to pay and for Elena and Alissa to check it out. We ate lunch at the Mensa and had Swedish meatballs. Elena was thrilled! Afterwards we headed to the Schloss for a little retail therapy. Elena and Alissa both managed to find a pair of shoes. I, on the other hand, didn’t buy anything! I was so proud of myself.  That night for dinner we went to an all you can eat rib place with a bunch of other URI kids and some of their friends. It felt like we were back at the IEP, although Mark’s ribs are way better! We headed back to Sean’s room to play some drinking games and hang out. It was nice to be with familiar faces.

On Tuesday, all the URI kids had to do a walking tour for class and each had a different topic to talk about. Alissa, Elena, and I joined in on the tour. It was a great way for them to see the city, and we got to watch all our friends give a presentation in German! After walking around for a couple of hours, the three of us veered off and got some food and did some more shopping. Elena and Alissa both bought two more pairs of shoes, totaling theirs to three, and I bought two pairs. We all bought a pair of “Joker shoes” to be warn later that night at the Joker, which is a popular club in Braunschweig. The place is pretty gross, so we all bought a cheap pair of shoes that could get ruined, and in our case, left for Sean to throw out by the end of the night.

For dinner, Nick, Neil, Alissa, Elena, and I went to Schads (not sure of the spelling) to have schnitzel. I got Jaeger schnitzel and it was delicious. After dinner we headed back to Sean’s room for a little, well kinda big actually, pre-party before heading to the Joker. We obviously got all dolled up for our night out and were ready to dance the night away. Unfortunately, our night was cut a little short. After doing Absinthe shots, which are gross by the way, we only lasted about a half hour. Alissa brought Elena home; meanwhile, I was hanging out with Nick when I decided I wanted to go home. Alissa then came back to get me, but I had already left so she thought that she lost me, when really I was in the building next door. I never knew I was lost until the next morning when I went back to Sean’s room to get Elena and Alissa because we had to catch the train to catch our flight to Dublin. Alissa was furious, Elena was hungover, and I put us on the wrong tram so we missed our train to the airport and subsequently our flight to Dublin. This is the epitome of my time in Europe. 

Chapter 2 : New Shit Come to Light


Alissa, Elena, and I finally made it to our stop and realized we were in the ghetto – just dandy. We head to the hostel and on our short, five minute walk, we passed a sign that says “new shit come to light” and from then on that was our motto for Berlin and most of the trip. Once we made it to the hostel we all felt reassured. The hostel was in a beautiful brick building and was legit huge. We couldn't get into our room yet so we headed out in search for some lunch. Not knowing exactly where we were, we headed down into “town.” Little did we know, we were in the heart of the Vietnamese sector of Berlin and all we could find to eat was Vietnamese cuisine and a little Italian restaurant. We opted for Italian. We all had a beer with our lunch and everything was delicious. After lunch, we walked around a bit, but it was raining and cold and we were tired from all the traveling so we headed back to the hostel to shower and warm up. We decided to eat dinner at the hostel and hang out at the bar for bit. The restaurant/bar was an enormous room. The food was good too.

 Later that night we found out that Neil would be joining us. It was quite a surprise to us although apparently I had invited him to come the night before when I wasn’t quite in the right state of mind. It turned out to be a great thought on my part because on Sunday he showed us all around. I would not have known what to see, but luckily tour guide Neil came to the rescue. We toured the Berlin Wall, the Berlin Bear, the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag (Parliament Building), the Jewish Memorial, and ended the day with beers in a local pub. After the pub we headed back to the Italian restaurant for dinner and then to the hostel bar to watch the Patriots game! Alissa and I were wicked excited to be watching the Pats game. We were by far the loudest people in the bar and when they won, we screamed out of pure excitement and then asked to leave. Oops, sorry for being excited that we are going to the Super Bowl!!!! The next morning we got up and headed to Braunschweig to meet up with the rest of the URI kids in Germany. 

Berlin Wall

Berlin Bear

Brandenburg Tor

Officially in Germany!

Chapter 1 : Identity Theft

On Wednesday, January 18th I headed to Charles de Gaulle to meet Elena!! It was already a good day. We then headed to the mall because what else do we do but shop! Elena bought a cute Longchamp bag with the Eiffel Tour on it. Our next stop was crêpes, and onto the Gare du Nord to head back to Compiègne. That night we made dinner at home and Elena thoroughly enjoyed it because she was used to eating noodles and rice. We bought a bottle of wine to celebrate our reunion and being in France. On Thursday I had to study because I had my last final on Friday. It was a very low key day. On Friday morning I took my exam and was finally done with my semester (and I passed all my classes :))! I then had to go to the bank because someone stole my identity. Of course, why not happen the day before I leave for my Eurotrip. I got it resolved but I would be without my French bank card for the whole trip which was not the most ideal situation, but still doable. That night we had champagne to celebrate me being done with school and the start of our trip. We then headed to a restaurant for dinner where we had more wine, and a fabulous meal. We were supposed to go to this bar for Irish coffees after dinner, but we didn’t quite make it.

Saturday morning came quickly and we had to pack up all our stuff and head to the airport. We were leaving for Berlin. Upon arriving at the airport, my metro ticket wouldn't let me through so in a panic, I decided the best idea would be to crawl under the turnstile. I successfully got to the other side only to see this huge black security guy waiting for me. I showed him my ticket and had to go to the desk so they could reissue me a new ticket. Luckily, we made it to the airport just in the knick of time and had a lovely hour and a half plane ride to Berlin. 

We landed and headed to the Hauptbahnhof to meet Alissa who was coming up from Munich. Not realizing how big the Berlin Hbf is, I thought it would be easy to find Alissa. Boy was I wrong. This place was a mini-mall with at least four floors. Elena and I set out in search for Alissa when we heard “Miss Elena Nicole we have a message for you. Please come to (insert some German word).” We rushed to the information desk just to find out that Alissa had just left. Awesome, we were never going to find her. I told Elena to stay there while I went to the Dunkin Donuts (yes, they have Dunkin Donuts in Berlin, who would have thought) which is Alissa’s favorite place for coffee to see if she was there. We must have just missed each other because when I headed back to where Elena was, Alissa was standing next to her with a DD cup in hand.  Either way, we were all reunited and headed to our hostel. 

Eurotrip

My two friends, Elena and Alissa, who are studying in China this year, came to Europe to visit me and we went on a little Eurotrip. Because there is so much that we did and to talk about, I am going to split up the trip into chapters. Hope you enjoy reading about our whirlwind of a trip around Europe.