Life of a Co-op in France

Yann LeDu, French Co-op Veteran

Do you speak French Yann?

Why Yes, I do speak French.

Shortly after the (potentially) traumatic experience of making a presentation to first years about my international co-op in France, I was coerced into writing my first article for the Ensquire. The positive side of it is that I can at least express what I really wanted to say about my trip to France, but didn't say during my speech due to a little (barely noticeable) choking.

In mid January 1995 I went to Lille, France, for a 6 month work term at an engineering school called Ecole Centrale de Lille (EC Lille). I worked in their lab on a system that will test new control algorithms designed by the school's researchers.

I had set my sights on going to France ever since first year and had tried for 4 years before finally finding a way over there. I decided that working in Lille was a good compromise between taking time off to travel and gaining some international work experience. Besides, co-op is kind of like a vacation when compared to school.

I'd already been to France quite a few times and so going there wasn't going to be a cultural shock for me. Basically I just wanted to go and live like the French for a while: go get my daily Baguette from the Boulangerie, watch Jour de Foot for the latest Soccer news, and follow the election of Mr. Nuclear (President Jacques Chirac... funny, he never mentioned nuclear blasts in any of his campaign speeches). By the way, no one there knows anything about Gretzky or hockey but when Canada loses to the French in the International cup, THEN they know. I tried to explain that we only send guys from our second or third best leagues to these tournaments...

While I was there I shared a room in the school residence with Cyril, a French guy from Nice. A real popular guy with the landlord/custodian after replacing the default furnishings with his own 2-by-4 jungle-gym/bunkbed/desk-set, measured, sawed, hammered, and assembled on the spot in his room with custom re-routing of the electrical work. Although clearly proficient in carpentry, Cyril was much more valuable as a cook. We had an understanding: he made varied French meals, I ate them (and cleaned the dishes).

Lille is an hour north of Paris (by TGV), three hours south of Dover (by car and ferry), and two hours west of Brussels (by train). I did my best to take advantage of the overabundance of tra-vel opportunities.

Naturally I traveled Friday to Sunday and worked Monday to Friday. I was grateful for these few work days in between to rest up before hitting the train station again, you'd be surprised how tiring traveling can be! April, May and June were great: there were 6 statutory holidays plus I took 10 days off, and I wasn't home for a single weekend those last few months.

I visited France, Belgium, Hol-land, Luxembourg, Germany, Italy, and England. In addition I did my family duty and managed to visit both grand-mas, an aunt, an uncle, a cousin, and two friends from home that were traveling. Mostly I traveled by train but some-times I got rides from students or friends.

The highlight of my trip was my 10 day trip down to Italy when I visited Venice, Florence, and some surrounding cities. During an outing to Cinque Terre, a grouping of five fishing villages built on the side of the Mediterranean cliffs, I was treated to a display of machismo and bravado unlike any other I had seen. As a group of us, all backpackers stay-ing the night at Mama Rosa's youth hostel, sat around a campfire, a macho "Italian Stallion" got up and proceeded to impress the girls by balancing on a burning log in the middle of the fire. Particularly exciting was the moment when he fell in the fire! The best part is watching how a guy like this tries to keep on looking cool and in control. The old "Nah, it didn't hurt ... heh, heh" response. Bright as he was, he later snuck off to rinse himself off in the sea ... ouch, NaCl + wounds ???

Also memorable were two cycling trips I made in the District of Kent, England and along the Rhine in Germany. In Kent I was cycling with one of the French technicians working at the lab. We stopped by Dover castle, cycled along the white cliffs, through the village of Sandwich (surprisingly there were no inflatable sandwiches or other gaudy Earl of Sandwich tourist attractions... this was definitely not the States, who there could have resisted the temptation?), stopped at a few pubs, like the Three Bells or the Flower Pot, along the way for lunch and dinner (did you know that your typical Frenchman has never eaten Jell-O before and that he finds it ... good?) and saw some really beautiful rolling hills (with sheep).

I have great memories from this trip, met people from many different cultures, ate different foods (Yann KNOWs pastries), observed different ways of life, saw beautiful places ...

I didn't mention that my work in France was unpaid but I definitely feel the experience was worth the cost of such a trip. I suggest you take the chance while you have it and go do something different ... go see the world. There is more to international travel than just Blaine, Washington. Actually, you may well find that Vancouver is a really great place to live (as I always reconfirm to myself whenever I leave town) ... but you should travel, if only to confirm this for yourself.

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