Montessori school shelves with toys. Photo: 3neus

In a three-part blog Camille Bromley describes a day in the life of a teacher at the Montessori International School of Grenoble. Read part I.

7:38 am

Bus stop, Place Verdun.  As the number 31 bus to Meylan: Maupertius approaches I’m hastily devouring the remaining third of my Big Chocolate, freshly purchased for 1 euro from Sandwich House located behind the Maison de Tourisme tram stop, outgoing side. Ordinarily the Big Chocolates from this Sandwich House are not especially good pain au chocolat, but they’re easily the size of two regular pain au chocolat, a good bargain at 1 euro (the American in me is always a sucker for bargains), and in the morning when they’re warm they’re still pretty darn tasty.

The Big Chocolate is the ritual first step in my once-weekly workday as an English teacher at Montessori International Primary School in Meylan, as this is the only day in the week I exit the house early enough to catch one while still warm. The other days of the week I work as an English assistant in public primary schools.

Teaching at Montessori International School is not like teaching in French public school.  It’s vastly different, in fact.  If you’re not familiar with what’s called the Montessori Method, I’ll briefly explain: The Montessori Method of children’s education was originally developed in the early 20th century by an Italian educator named Maria Montessori. It’s an alternative approach to schooling, encouraging a child’s individual self-directed learning using the support of materials and teacher observation. 

From what I understand, while many schools worldwide function under the heading of Montessori School there are no defined guidelines for the specific practical application of this education system. However, the general idea is that children learn best when they follow their natural instincts and interests. In other words, it’s self-study for kids; less academically-put, the kids do what they feel like.

This “do-what-you-feel-like” philosophy is most decidedly not the norm in French public schools, from what I’ve seen in my year’s experience there, the essential part of a teacher’s oral utterances consisting of phrases such as, non, tu n’as pas le droit!; vous levez la doigt pour avoir la parole!; TAISEZ-VOUS! [yelled shockingly loud]; vous êtes insupportables aujourd’hui! [tone of resignation and accompanying sigh]; and finally the much-loved Bravo!, with exaggerated sarcasm. Thus, Montessori International reputedly offers an alternative to parents who prefer their kids to receive more positive encouragement than negative during the first 6–9 years of their educational development.

However, I haven’t given an entirely clear picture of the Montessori International School in Meylan. This school is foremost an international school, with instruction provided in French and English. I am the English-instruction teacher (on Mondays anyways), and a woman with a confounding last name, Martine Grzelak, functions as school director and French-instruction teacher. 

We take care of the primary-age children, age 6–12. The children in this group, about 25 of them, are mostly Francophone, with a solid group of Anglophones and couple French-English bilingual kids. There is another, separate class of students at the school, the pre-school age group (ages 3–6), also Francophone or Anglophone or both, headed by Emilie Ballivy. The pre-schoolers are called Les petits castors, which gives an accurate impression of their work ethic and focused accomplishment under the guidance of Ms. Ballivy.

The school makes use of an impressive collection of Montessori materials and supplies, and the curriculum is organized around the French National Education program, so that children are expected to cover a similar material to public school students. More on the Montessori Method as the day progresses.

Part II

Part III

Part III

12:00 pm

Lunchtime. The microwave cart is wheeled in, desks are cleared, chairs fetched. The students eat in the classroom. The children are expected to be settled quietly in their chairs, ask to go wash their hands, and then ask to get their lunchboxes before they are allowed to eat. Meanwhile, the child in charge of setting the table this week goes to get the silverware and dishes.   

12:30 pm

Everyone is finally sitting and has more or less the complete tableware set in front of them: plate, fork, knife, little yogurt spoon, and plastic cup (Martine’s cabinet has slowly but surely been rid of all the glassware glasses, not intentionally).

The table setting procedure always takes much longer than is logically necessary, probably because the child assigned to set the table is for some reason 90% of the time the same small boy, who due to his diminutive size and severely ADD nature seems the absolute worst person in the room to give the task of distributing various separate pieces of cutlery to students sitting in disorganized clumps around the big room, not to mention that when you see him trying to lug the heavy glass water pitchers around to each table you get the sinking sense of futility of watching someone trying very hard to complete a Sisyphean task. Half the pitcher will have been emptied on the floor by the time he gets to the table, and he’ll be sent to get more in five minutes.

I send the children in groups of two or three to the cloakroom to get their lunchboxes. I imagine that you can tell a lot about the home life of individual children from their lunchboxes. A lot of the older children seem to have the freedom to creatively fashion their own concept of a meal; there’s a group of three girls (who aggressively defy the assertion that social cliques don’t exist in small schools) that bring their lunches in family-style portions to share with each other: a bag of Lay’s potato chips, a Tupperware box of pasta and sauce, an entire sleeve of Speculoos cookies.

The Anglophone children belong to a different breed of household, one that clearly holds in contempt the irresponsible consumption of low nutrient-to-calorie ratio foods and environmentally unfriendly packaging. S—, a six-year-old with extraordinary feminine style (how a child of that age is able to exude such class is beyond me), declares matter-of-factly that she hates ice cream and cake. Her treat of choice is the green pressed seaweed paper that sushi rolls come wrapped in — in French it’s translated as algae, which expresses better, I think, the total bizarreness of a six-year-old reveling in the taste of a seaweed wrap (imagine an apple cheeked little girl saying with a charming missing-front-tooth smile, “My favorite food is algae”).  

1:15 pm

The kids are fairly hopping to get outside after a full morning of being together in one room. They go into the cloakroom to remove their slippers and put on their outside shoes, most of which resemble work boots or what English people call “wellies” rather than the slick bright white Pumas or the metallically shiny girl-sized heels (!) public school children wear. This is because the playground provided for amusement and the venting of various child frustrations during the lunch recess is not actually a playground, it’s an empty field behind the Montessori school building accessible only by a quick jump across a ditch (a wide step for you or me, a brief air-bound thrill for the 11-year-olds, and an unbreachable chasm for the 3-year-olds, who nevertheless enjoy the jump immensely so long as you’re holding their hand.

Supervising, I can’t help thinking that innovative playground developers, with their tangle of curved colored bars and knotted rope systems, are entirely missing the point — the kids have more fun rolling around in the grass and throwing rocks at trees than with any preconstructed equipment education authorities can buy. I’m reminded how innocent and sweet children are at heart when I hear G— and S— playing a sort of tag-zombie game which seems to consist of yelling “I’m going to suck your brain!” and attempting to grab the skull of another player.

2:00 pm

Emilie and I file the children back into school, past the company workers in button up shirts and pencil skirts taking their smoke break. Monday afternoon is devoted to art class and Spanish class, and the children are sent in small groups to participate in those activities. Otherwise, the students can continue the projects of the morning. The students complete impressive individual projects throughout the year that don’t sacrifice depth or quality for the lack of collaborators.

S— is working on a postcard project; she’s contacting friends and acquaintances across the U.S., asking them to send her postcards at the Montessori school address, teaching her about their town or state. She’s gathered a large number of postcards and will organize them into a visual presentation. O— has completed a project about the state of Israel, its history, people, and culture, and the poster is hanging on the classroom wall.

One of the goals of the Montessori school is to effectively link all subjects together in the child’s mind; to create a truly interdisciplinary understanding of the world. This objective makes for very creative project ideas, and the results are evident in the variety of student-made artwork and presentations on display around the school.

3:30 pm

The school day is over, but many students will stay for the next one to two hours, playing the gymnasium or participating in an activity Martine or Emilie has organized. I, however, say my rounds of “See you next week” and am out the door.

The next day I’ll be at one of the public primary schools in Grenoble. Not being an education expert, I’m not going to offer my judgment of the effectiveness of the education system in public schools compared to the Montessori approach. The purposes and needs of the two school systems are vastly different and require different methods of teaching and classroom management. Montessori schools may give more individual attention, but they also provide a lot less guidance and structure. This may or may not work well, depending on the character of each individual child. One thing I do know, however, is that I’ll be doing a lot more yelling in my public school.

Part I

Part II

For more information:
http://www.montessori-grenoble.com/UK/school-montessori-grenoble.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montessori

Part II

8:12 am

Terminus on the number 31 bus line. The bus halts in front of a grouping of new, enterprise-y looking buildings with big reflective glass windows framed in a shade of blue that suggests innovation and forward-thinking. The school is rather unexpectedly housed in one of these buildings, towards the back of the complex, sharing quarters with some kind of company that requires men and women in business attire to enter and exit through the same doors as the free-spirited, frequently-in-high-speed-motion Montessori kids.

The school is essentially three large rooms, the primary schoolroom, the pre-school room, and the gym, which is carpeted and doubles as an art studio and Spanish nook. There is also Martine’s office, a nap room for the preschoolers, a storage room, and a cloakroom where the children hang their coats, bags, and change their shoes into indoor shoes. They are only allowed to wear slippers inside the school, as it is carpeted. This reminds me of Japanese schools, except that here the children are allowed to bring their own slippers. In Japan the slippers are part of the uniforms and must be regulation color and design.

8:45 am

The kids wander in the room one by one and are by this time more or less all present. After some general comments and reminders, Martine starts the weekly routine of designating “responsibilities” onto each child. This is performed by use of a chart listing cleaning tasks to be completed each day and a small canvas sack containing the names of each child on Velcro tabs.

It took me a few months to figure out that the responsibility entitled Muffin referred to the class hamster. Insisting that the responsibilities be assigned by a random pull from the bag, Martine cheats openly on her own rule by fishing for names that she believes merit a particular nasty chore this week. The kids either suffer tremendously from the injustice of this favoritism or get a kick out of it, depending on how you choose to interpret the situation.

The responsibilities I find to be an ingenious system for ensuring an attitude of collective care and respect from all the students towards the cleaning and upkeep of the school room and materials. By being allowed to choose, in a fashion, what chore they do each week the child is given some autonomy and feels like she’s making a voluntary decision to contribute. This is probably a distinctive Montessori touch. Japanese schoolchildren also clean the school as part of their daily duties, although there they are responsible for the bathrooms as well, which I remain convinced is a mistake (imagine how what kind of clean job a second-grader might do on a bathroom — then repeat that every day for the whole year).

8:52 am

Work time. The children are either broken up into groups or sent to a desk to work individually. All the primary school kids, from 6 to 12, work in the same room, some in groups and some independently, and they pursue different activities. Martine keeps an eye on all of them and remains aware of how they’re doing and what progress they’re making, a remarkable feat for about 15 different students and different levels.

There are no set subject periods or age groups. The children have more or less the choice to work on one activity the entire morning or change subjects freely. There’s no morning recess, although there is a snack, which the children are expected to provide, following a rotation schedule. If the children tire of one activity and want to do some less-strenuous but still constructive activity such as reading, it is permitted within reason.

I take the group of English speakers. There are two first grade girls, a third grader, a fifth grader, and sometimes a first grade boy. We either do a language-arts activity all together, harder versions adapted for the third and fifth graders, or I split them up to work in pairs or alone. It’s my choice based on what we’re doing that day and how well the children are working together. When the English speakers take breaks to work on another subject, I choose a group of French children to do an English language lesson.

11:00 am

With Martine in the room, the classroom functions smoothly. With some notable exceptions, the children work quietly, although their rate of productivity is subject to debate. Clearly, some children are more ideal Montessori students than others. A group of three boys writes a bilingual dialogue together concerning an inept motorist and a driving instructor for their upcoming play. Another boy does French grammar exercises on the computer. A girl visualizes multiplication with wooden beads and a counting board.

Meanwhile, little G— sulks at his desk, complaining that his work is “too hard” and he doesn’t “understand nuffing,” and I— doodles on the margins of his essay and gazes out the window. I remind I— to get back to his work and Martine appears over G—‘s shoulder to investigate the veracity of his claim.

Part I

Part III

Grenoble Life editor James Dalrymple shares a few photos and reflections on the Grenoble’s defaced shop fronts and the transformation of the city on a Sunday.

Sunday in Grenoble. All the shops are closed, their shutters displaying garish graffiti. Quite depressing, no? Well, not for me really. I have a curious proclivity for decay and dereliction – as an amateur photographer, anyway – and hate shopping, so Sundays in Grenoble provide an irresistible opportunity for me.

To be fair, though, any casual visitor to Grenoble – particularly on a Sunday – might be tempted to see a city blighted by vandalism: tagging, bill stickers and a recent proliferation of anti-capitalist street art. Or else they might be lead to conclude that the Grenoblois store owners are lacking in civic pride or are overly laissez-faire when it comes to the wanton degradation of their shop fronts.

For me Grenoble’s Saturday to Sunday transformation is a welcome one. Gone are the herds of gabbing shoppers and down come the shutters, with their daubed slogans and spray-painted murals, simultaneously lending the city an air of decadence and “down at heel charm,” as a guidebook might optimistically put it. Sometimes vibrantly coloured, sometimes dingy, the character of the city on a Sunday is undeniably different. Love it or hate it, it invites you to look; inseparable as it is from the visual language of the city.

Here are some of my photos of Grenoble’s shut up shops, and of other defaced or stencilled doors, graffiti and bill sticking around the city. Let me know what you think about the photos and of Grenoble’s “down at heel charm.” 

Radio Activity. Photo: Velocity kendall

In the final English Talk Radio before the summer break, guests include Kristine Minski, talking about global currency markets and Bertrand Tappaz, talking about the history of 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble.

Listen to the show: here

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. There are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

Listen to ETR in your car! 'Pump up the volume'. Photo: Travich

The June 13 English Talk Radio took place at Grenoble Graduate School of Business. The guests are: Thierry Grange, Dean of Grenoble Ecole de Management; Elizabeth Gorilla, Marketing and Admissions Manager; Michelle Mielly, Marketing Programme Director; graduates Beatriz Diez and Denis Coupe; students Ben Pawson, Jay Anandou and Timothée Bardet; and Pat Brans, writer, consultant and time-management guru.

Listen to the full show: here

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. There are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

Helen McEwan (left) with children joining in on English Talk Radio

The May 21 English Talk Radio show features Helen McEwan of ABC Anglais, and took place at Les Petits Bilingues, Grenoble.

Listen to the show: here

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. There are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

Le Créarc - international theatre in Grenoble

The May 7 English Talk Radio show features Anne-Laure Dubois and Marco Andrello of Le Créarc – Centre de Création de Recherche et des Cultures - talking about international theatre in Grenoble.

Listen to the show: here

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. There are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

URSSAF - another elegant French acronym

Patrick Owen shares his experience starting an English teaching business, becoming an Auto-entrepreneur and dealing with France’s particular administrative complexity and love of acronyms.  

So as I come to the end of my ACCRE, I’ve contacted the URSSAF who told me to contact the APCE.  I also contacted the RSI and the CIPAV but had no response.  Therefore I sent an email to the CNAVPL.  I must, also, remember to send my annual report to the DRTEPF.  If all of this sounds like double Dutch, welcome to my world, since I started my own business.  I knew the French administration loved acronyms having lived in France for eight years, dealing with the CAF, EDF, GDF, etc.  However, when I set up my own company I entered a whole new ball game. 

After working in various language schools I decided to work for myself.  Everyone warned me against it; “It’s really complicated,” and, “The charges are really high,” were just two of the comments I heard.  It is amazing that France has so many small businesses, when you hear all the negative reactions.  In the beginning, I wasn’t sure what type of business to create with various projects in mind.  However, I soon discovered that in France, once you have trained to do one thing changing direction is not easy. Changing careers involves financial and time investments that I did not have.  I therefore decided to set up a language teaching business, since this was what I knew best. 

Now, it might be useful to explain why I had decided to set up my own business.  Many language schools will employ teachers on freelance contracts, as I had discovered during my first year in France.  The problem is that to work for a business school or university, where the better pay rates are, you need a principal employer.  In addition, for a reason that I can only speculate at, few employers are willing to sign the paper agreeing to be your principal employer.  There are two solutions: one is to use a société de portage, the other is to be your own employer.  The société de portage acts as your employer, in the sense that they take care of all the administrative paperwork, of course for this service they take a fee.  My feeling was that the fee charged didn’t really justify the work involved,  I therefore decided to set up for myself. 

I attended an event held by my local Chamber of Commerce, which didn’t turn out to be much help.  I was unable to get answers to my questions and, as I was not setting up a commercial activity, they were not the right people to ask.  In the end, it was internet forums that proved to be the most help.  I typed my questions into Google and sifted through the responses.  It was here that I learnt I would have to see the URSSAF.  They seem to be the organisation that catches the companies who are not commercial or tradesmen.  I also discovered that provided I didn’t earn too much and didn’t employ anyone else, the process was fairly simple. 

I printed a form on the internet and headed for the URSSAF.  I had been told I didn’t need an appointment.  This worried me slightly, as I had experienced the queues at the Social Security and the Prefecture.  I was pleasantly surprised to be received within ten minutes of my arrival by a pleasant and helpful adviser.  She rapidly entered my details and answered my questions, in less than an hour I was in business, literally.  She offered me a free appointment with an accountant and, best of all, showed me I was eligible for a dispensation of social taxes for one year.  I left the URSSAF with a whole different image of the French administration. 

The dispensation for one year is important and a big helping hand.  Normally a company’s charges are fixed for the first and second years.  Then the third year’s charges are calculated on the real income of the second year.  The problem is that, although, the first year’s charges are relatively light, in the second they double and this kills a lot of small businesses.  Now, certain categories of business creators, the unemployed for example, can ask for a first year free of charges.  I qualified because, although I resigned, I had been looking after my kids one day a week and received income support.  This taught me that you have to read everything because there is often an advantageous exception which you may not always be told about. 

While surfing the internet, I also discovered that if I wanted to teach in companies I would need to make a déclaration d’activité with the DRTEFP (Direction Régionale du Travail, de l’Emploi et de la Formation Professionnelle).  In France, companies are obliged to pay a tax towards the training of their employees.  This tax is often collected by organisations which manage the training funds.  These organisations will only accept training courses run by companies who have made the declaration.  Many people wrongly refer to it as an agreement, however the DRTEFP are very strict in their literature that it is not an agreement from the state, merely a declaration.  

I discovered that with the right documentation, a curriculum vitae, a casier judiciaire vierge (a document you can order online showing you have never committed a crime), and your first training contract the procedure was straightforward.  It is the contract which can be a little complicated, if you haven’t got a declaration number how can you sign a contract?  I got around this problem by noting that my declaration was being processed, and offering my first client a clause whereby if I didn’t get the number the contract was null and void. 

I treated starting my business rather as a challenge and as time went on it became a puzzle, for which I was never sure I had all the pieces.  To be honest I enjoyed pitting myself against the French administration and proving those who said it would be hard to do wrong.  It must be said that I chose the simplest possible structure and being a teacher, who teaches in companies, I have very few overheads. 

It is worth mentioning in conclusion that a law was passed in 2008 making it even easier for freelance teachers.  The status of Auto-entrepreneur is designed for people who may have multiple employers as well as working for themselves.  The process of setting up is very simple and can even be done online.  The real boost however comes in terms of charges and tax.  The Auto-entrepreneur can choose to declare his turnover each month or trimester.  The social charges and tax are calculated based on what he declares and paid immediately.  This avoids the nasty bills arriving one year after a good year.  It also means that if you have a month with no income you pay nothing.  This regime is much more sensible for someone like me. 

Unfortunately, and here is the downside of my experience, getting information about this new status has been hard.  I have read the law and the Auto-entrepreneur’s handbook.  As a sole trader I can ask to benefit from the same regime, and I have done so which brings us back to the beginning of the article.  The acronyms are all the people I have contacted to ask for help changing my status.  

On the whole my experience has been positive; the principal problem has been people.  Everything one needs to know is on the internet.  When dealing with employees of the various administrations it is a case of pot luck.  The first person I saw was excellent, others have been less so.  I once made the mistake of phoning on the day of a strike, my call was answered after prolonged ringing by a harassed and unhelpful lady.  I blame myself for this one, though, after three years in France I should have known you don’t phone the public service on strike days, I was lucky someone answered.  My advice is to be determined, do your research and treat the experience as fun, and you will be fine. 

Patrick Owen
www.englishcoach38.com
letter-from-france.blogspot.com

A filled blackboard. Photo: Rainer Ebert

In response to criticism of the education system on Grenoble Life and from the Anglophone community in France, Iain Smears mounts a passionate defence of French schooling.

Many people in the Anglophone community in Grenoble will come into contact with the French education system either through their studies or those of their family members. There are aspects about it which seem to draw criticism from a considerable proportion of the English-speaking community.

In this article, I would like to depict how my own experience of doing maternelle, primaire, collège and lycée in Grenoble, then of going to university in the UK, has shown me the many benefits of the education on offer here. In fact, it is precisely some of those aspects of the system which are often criticised which I would argue have been of value to me in my university studies. I will focus on secondary education, or more specifically the Bac Général, as I have only glimpses and second hand experience of French higher education and cannot claim to know much about the other paths in secondary education.

A major concern for some is the long hours of schooling throughout collège and lycée. I did the Bac Scientifique with the OIB (L’option internationale du baccalauréat), and I’m the first to admit that it was demanding. On a few occasions, I’ve been asked by parents with children about to embark on this path if it’s true that I did 50 hours of work a week. Their frowns of anguish are of little surprise to me when I place a finger on my lip, recollect, then declare that it was probably a dozen or so hours more than that.

I do see the sense in many of the objections to long school days and I will readily concede that perhaps the content of lessons from 5-6 pm isn’t what I remember the best – however, little is said of the end result of French schooling: how does it influence one’s experiences in higher education and after that?

I chose to study mathematics in the UK. Bit by bit, I noticed how my fellow students were finding the course more trying than I was – some would find it hard to do their work on time, others found it hard to get out of bed, some needed vast amounts of caffeine or chocolate to feel ready to take on their work. Someone put my thoughts into words by calling it a “great big hangover for having partied for the previous 18 years.”

For my part, I continued at my usual rhythm inherited from Terminale by learning my lectures as well as I could and doing my homework sooner rather than later. I think that strong discipline not only leads to successfully acquiring the material, but also helps to explore the subject to its fullest, satisfy one’s curiosity and therefore enjoy one’s studies.

The extensive testing and harsh grading schemes in French education also attract criticism. Yet I believe that it is instead very beneficial to get substantial practice of long examinations. Being able to focus and to stay sharp under pressure is an important part of exam technique and I am glad I was able to get practice in this before end-of-year exams at university.

As for the unforgiving grading, it made those good grades well deserved – something in which I found satisfaction. I found that for me and other pupils at school, it encouraged a determined attitude towards trying one’s upmost. Compare this to the comments I have heard of several students in the UK about how they were “spoon-fed just to pass exams” and “weren’t proving [their] own ability, but that of [their] teacher”, which has not helped them find self-confidence and belief in their ability. I think that learning that someone can indeed rise up to a challenge is important for him to value and appreciate his work and also helps in face of future challenges.

It is true that some people can find the difficult grading scheme discouraging. But even though grades matter for later progression, it should be remembered that what is learnt matters most. Whether someone gets a B or C on an A-level or roughly equivalently [i] a 10 on the Bac, what they have gained from school will likely be the same. When that person goes onto university, it is what that person has acquired that will be key. I know of some who struggled in a subject throughout lycée, then needed that knowledge to some extent in their later studies, and have told me since that they felt they were at an advantage against others in their group.

However if there is a clear-cut problem with the grading system, it is that it puts at a disadvantage French students who wish to study abroad, e.g. the UK. This is because admissions tutors might not be aware of the discrepancies between the systems and take estimated grades for the Baccalaureate at face value – i.e. they would assume, say, that an A is worth 16 on the Bac. Things are made worse by the fact that high numbers of UK students get the top mark: according to wikipedia [ii], 43.7% of students taking an A-level in Mathematics got an A in 2007. And unlike A-levels, Baccalaureate students cannot retake exams to improve their grades. This can result in disproportionately demanding offers for Baccalaureate pupils.

A final advantage of the French education system, which is not immediately apparent to those still undertaking it, is that it offers flexibility in later choices. Of those who did the Bac Scientifique in my class, some have gone into media relations, politics, languages, nursing… Some feel that the schooling did not suit them, but what they have done enables them to embark on a wide range of paths afterwards.

In conclusion, even though the French secondary education system has its faults, I hope it will not be forgotten that the overall result of the extensive schooling is threefold. First, it is an opening to numerous topics – it showcases vast bodies of knowledge and works to stimulate the pupil’s mind in all forms. Second, it helps to equip its pupils with the attitude, determination, self-confidence and ethos which are important in all walks of life. Third, it aims to keep as many doors open as possible all the way until the end of the Baccalaureate. Combined, I think these three aspects allow the education system to offer what one generally wants: the freedom to choose one’s way through an opening to the world.

Place Grenette, c.1900

In the second part of John Lubbock’s brief history of Grenoble he finds himself scratching beneath the surface of the city and discovering a ”post-apocalyptic 19th century parallel universe,” among other things.

I had long been puzzled by an impressive fortification system which stands near my house on one side of Parc Paul Mistral, completely hidden by trees and currently hosting a bmx/mountainbike track on one side. I had to telephone the resident historian of the Maison de Tourisme to find any information about this structure, which turns out to have been constructed in 1813 by the celebrated military engineer Générale Haxo (who also later reconstructed the Bastille) to protect against a possible southern invasion of France by the Austrian Empire.

The Austrians indeed eventually invaded the same year and were repulsed by the city defences, but returned to occupy Grenoble in 1814 and again in 1815. These walls, or enceintes, as they say in French, (the same word is used for pregnant as well as for hi-fi speakers, which is clearly intended to confuse and frustrate learners of French) were later demolished to make way for roads like Boulevard Jean Pain, leaving them an impressive ruin overrun by trees that makes you feel like you are in some post-apocalyptic 19th century parallel universe.

In the 19th century, modernity finally arrived in Grenoble with the construction of the railways. Aristide Bergès, a paper manufacturer, installed a modern paper factory in the Grenoble valley in 1867, where he invented the first hydro-electric motor to power the factory’s turbines. He called this new source of electricity Houille Blanche, or White Oil, which is still used in French to refer to hydroelectricity.

As I said, there is no statue to mark Bergès’s achievement in Grenoble, except for some ugly student housing and a CROUS named after him. However, one look the disservice done to his memory by the invention of photography will tell you that he’s not nearly as sexy as how French romantics imagined Bayard to look. I mean, he doesn’t even have an English language Wikipedia page, which is actually more of a damning criticism of his historical importance.

Bergès, and Bayard. No comparison.

And so to bring us up to the most important century, being that in which most of us were born: the 20th. Since all history is inevitably self-centred, why not congratulate ourselves for being born in the best century – that is if centuries are judged on some kind of Tarantino-esque scale of awarding points for most limbs severed or ears sliced off.

Exposition Internationale de la Houille Blanche et du Tourisme

After the First World War, Mayor Paul Mistral began various social and cultural projects, including the 1925 Exposition Internationale de la Houille Blanche et du Tourisme. Though what these two subjects have in common is something of a mystery; perhaps they couldn’t drum up enough interest in either one by itself. For the occasion, architect Auguste Perret constructed the Tour Perret in Parc Mistral, whose blue lights can be seen from miles around, shining as a beacon to the ability of architects to create Freudian symbols of power.

It is the sole remaining construction from this exhibition, and was used at the time to transmit radio emissions throughout the whole of France, though probably not with much success considering analog transmissions find mountains to be rather a hurdle to overcome. The tower was classed a historic monument in 1998, and a restoration plan is currently à l’étude.

There was a large wave of Italian immigration into Grenoble after the Second World War to help provide workers for the new factories. They stayed after discovering that the French loved eating cheese and bread, but had never thought of combining them inside an oven.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Nazi invasion was stopped in the south at the Battle of The Alps, though Grenoble was occupied by the Italian army in 1942-3 after they heard how easy it was to get good pizza there. Unfortunately, the Nazis found the Italians to be a little too laissez-faire about rounding up Jews and resistance fighters in Grenoble, and decided to occupy it themselves in 1943, escalating resistance activities, the most spectacular of which was the destruction of the Bonne barracks and arsenal in December 1943.

American tanks in Grenoble, 1944.

After the war, Grenoble rebounded economically by marketing itself as a winter sports destination, aided by the construction of some hideous new brutalist buildings and ski resorts like Chamrousse for the 1968 Winter Olympic Games.

The last half of the 20th century saw the arrival of new immigrants from North Africa and the realization of the globalized and multiethnic modern character of Grenoble.

Well, there you go. That’s as far as Wikipedia will take us, so I suggest you stop procrastinating on your computer and go outside and make some more history, or else there won’t be anything else to write about, will there? Go on, outside, now …  shoo!

The crèche: in safe hands

Grenoble Life editor James Dalrymple blogs on his experience with French childcare in Grenoble and the difficulties getting that all-important place at a crèche.

Handing over your baby to complete strangers is not first on our list of desirable experiences but it is an everyday reality for working parents. France has a relatively high proportion of working mothers and an enviably fertile population, but a surprisingly short basic maternity leave. These are just some of the contributing factors that necessitate widely available and affordable childcare, which in turn do their bit to help get the balance right between being a parent and having a career.

The scolaire system

Getting a place at a municipal crèche, however, is notoriously difficult in Grenoble (and probably elsewhere in France). The largest intake of babies is in September when toddlers doff their mortar boards and graduate to Ecole Maternelle (nursery school), freeing up space for the newbies. Thus, unless you are confident of conceiving in accordance with the demands of l’année scolaire, you may find yourself out of luck when your congé de maternité or parental comes to an end. (For your info, nine months of pregnancy added to around three months of post-natal maternity leave - give or take – would make this September a good time to conceive in order for your baby to get into the crèche in September 2011 – you know what to do!).

Such crèches are subsidised by the Mairie, but parents still pay the bill depending on their means: making them affordable to all. The charges are subject deductions from the CAF before you see them, so that there is none of the time-consuming reimbursement admin which affects visits to many doctors. For my wife and I, it amounts to about two euro an hour. What’s more, thereafter, you can declare this expense against your annual income tax obligations (impôts) which sees this figure drop by a further 50%. In short, the piggy bank can be left intact for the time being.

In my experience the crèches are clean, well-equipped and staffed, with fresh meals prepared on the premises and bubbly personnel. At the end of each day I am given a detailed report on my daughter’s food intake, sleep time and number of nappies (couches) filled with unnerving precision. I am always reassured she is in safe hands, free to explore a terrain filled with ludic objects to peruse, which makes a change from her reordering my CD collection or trying to rewire a wall socket chez moi. 

The nanny state

The alternative is a crèche familiale: effectively smaller groups of children cared for at somebody’s home. This is billed as a municipal service and thus subsidised but is closer in spirit to having a private nanny. In our case, we were desperate for the lively atmosphere of the crèche for our daughter, with the different carers and larger number of children. Whereas many people appreciate the crèche familiale, we didn’t feel comfortable leaving our daughter with only one person: a person who wields such an enormous influence in a child’s life yet does so largely away from the scrutiny from her peers.

Although I’m sure the majority of women who work at crèches familiales are professional, I have heard of instances in which they were not. And if you refuse the woman the Mairie offers you, they immediately blacklist you and you have no chance of getting subsidised municipal childcare. It seemed that if we accepted this process, it was a big step into the unknown. Private nannies were also scarce at the time, and among those we met who weren’t fully booked there were some who didn’t seem to even particularly like children. These individuals were also unwilling to accept temporary terms with us while we waited for a place at the crèche to become available, as they wanted a longer commitment.

In my local quartier, the municipal crèche is situated ideally at two minutes walk from our flat, and would have stood as a mocking reminder of what we had missed if we hadn’t got a place there. Finally we resolved to make an arrangement whereby our daughter attended the halte garderie, which is effectively the same as the crèche but only for up to two days maximum. Normally this is organised on an ad hoc basis or, as in our case, with temporary rolling contracts. Luckily we were able to make other arrangements for the remaining hours that we needed but it allowed us to ingratiate ourselves a little with the staff there and secure our position on the waiting list until a place made itself available. This happened in three months.

Baby betrayal

At first our daughter was crestfallen upon being left at the crèche, acting as if having befallen an enormous betrayal. Traitor! she seemed to cry upon being passed to the crèche staff. There is an integration system by which you can leave your child at the crèche for a couple of hours at a time, gradually building up to full days, but babies are an unpredictable bunch. One day you feel a guilty tingle of satisfaction when your baby cries on being handed over to a carer: yes, my baby still loves me best! The next day your child will cry when you come to pick her up. Traitor! you seethe in silence. In the parental logic, the latter is just the baby ‘releasing tension’ at the end of the day.

The inevitable inconvenience to all this contact with other children is what has seemed like an endless loop of spectacular illnesses. The first time you see a baby projectile-vomit (à la L’exorciste), it is terrifying, but it is impressive what one can become inured to. The winter just past has been a hard one: with the somewhat false alarm of swine flu providing unwelcome distraction from the lurid retinue of tummy bugs and gastros doing the rounds. At the crèche, there is no escape from the steep curve towards stronger immune systems, but this has to happen at some point.

The three days a week my daughter spends at the crèche currently provide most of her contact with French, despite the efforts of certain staff members to speak English to me. As my wife and I speak English at home we hope this will be an effective path towards her obtaining bilingualism; but it is interesting to see the different phonemes she manages in her babillage. Among the distinctly Anglophone syllables we have started to identify some impressively rolled Rs. Once she yelled what was clearly a resounding Merde!, but I’m sure she didn’t learn that down at the crèche.

If you want my advice, persistence is key. Where there is will there is a way.

Grenoble in 1944

Want to impress your friends with your knowledge of Grenoble’s past? John Lubbock has condensed the history of the city into two short blogs so that you can show off about how much you know.

While the French are justly proud of the things their culture does well throughout the country, such as cheese, ignoring things that aren’t their business, and electro-pop, they’re not so fond of regional particularism, and perhaps this feeds into the lack of promotion of Grenoble’s interesting historical buildings and cultural heritage. Have you ever walked past an old building and thought ‘what is that thing?’, or been inside an unassuming bookshop in the centre of town, only to be confronted by a medieval-looking interior? Perhaps it’s just that Grenoble is a city so obsessed with the future that it doesn’t have too much time for the relics of the past.

Well, I for one am a big fan of relics of the past, and if there was a facebook page for relics of the past, I would be lining up to be their cheerleader.  So, Anglophones with a passing interest in ‘istoire, I know you’re busy people, so we’ll see if we can’t cover 2000 years of Grenoble history in the space of just two short blog posts. Ready? Let’s start with those good old Romans then.

Grenoble is at the crossroads of three valleys, and has been a garrison town since it became part of the Roman Empire in 43BC, when it was called Cularo. The omniscient deity, wikipedia, tells us that the penultimate Emperor of the whole Roman Empire, Gratian, was so touched by the welcome of the people of Cularo that he elevated it to the level of a Roman ‘City’ and began constructing walls to protect it.  Cularo was renamed Gratianopolis in 381 in honour of the Emperor. This name transformed over the next millennia to Graignovol and, after its incorporation into the kingdom of France, changed to its modern pronunciation through association with the word ‘noble’ in reference to the King.

After the fall of the Empire, the city was involved in a game of Merovingian pass the parcel, as it became part of the Burgundian Kingdom, Middle Francia, Lotharingia, and was also pillaged by the Lombards in the sixth century, and by the Ummayid Saracens in the eighth and ninth century. In 1030 it became part of Arelat, territory of the Counts of Albon (later Dauphins de Viennois), a protectorate of the Holy Roman Empire. The appellation Dauphin appears to be a noble title of no more meaning than ‘Compte’, due to the medieval belief that dolphins were the kings of the fishes. Modern anthropology carelessly forgot to tell them that Dolphins are not fishes, and one look at the coat of arms of the Dauphiné will tell you that its creator never saw a water-dwelling creature larger than a pike in his life.

The Coat of Arms of the Dauphiné

No doubt the Dark Ages of Grenoble history were full of peasants shouting ‘Help, Help, I’m being repressed’ for many centuries (see Monty Python and the Holy Grail for illustration) without making so much as a stain on the pages of history, and thus we are left with a dull list of the names of royal managers which resembles the Roll of Honour in the boardroom of a third division football team that nobody cares about. But worry not, for with the arrival of feudalism, interesting things were about to happen to Grenoble that would forever be commemorated by histrionic statues of romantic chevaliers.

In 1349, the last Dauphin, Humbert II, negotiated the “transportation” of Dauphiné to France. An ‘ambitious spendthrift’, Humbert supported several religious foundations, founded the University of Grenoble and sponsored a rich court. He went on Crusade and came back bankrupted, his wife and son having died during his leave. Having run out of luck at the medieval casino, he decided to cash in his chips, sell the Dauphiné to the King of France and retire to a monastery which he presumably pimped out and invited MTV over to try the indoor waterslide in his new ‘crib’.

In 1515, King Francis I appointed Bayard, the “fearless and blameless knight” Lieutenant-General of Dauphiné. Pierre Terrail, lord of Bayard, was born in Pontcharra, near Grenoble in 1476. He fought very bravely during the Italian wars, and Francis I asked Bayard to knight him on the battlefield of Marignan (1515). In a brilliant piece of Quixotic irony, Bayard was killed in 1526 by bullet from an early gunpowder weapon. Modernity – 1, Chivalry – 0.

Despite this exciting tale, Grenoble suffered heavily during this period as the city was burdened with having to support a large military presence, and the plague killed many people. A romantic nineteenth century statue of Bayard stands in Place St. Andre, giving encouragement to all the young Frenchmen who aspire to feats of arms such as combat contre neuf Espanyols and laying siege to Naples. As far as I can tell, there doesn’t seem to be a statue to the Grenoblois who invented hydroelectricity, but then that’s just not as sexy as a guy with a sword who excelled at killing foreigners.

In the sixteenth century, the Wars of Religion saw Grenoble caught in the middle of a sectarian struggle about which it is difficult to make many jokes, so we’ll keep it short. The Dauphiné was an important settlement for Protestants influenced by the Calvinist theology emanating from Geneva. The Huguenot leader, the Baron des Adrets, pillaged the Cathedral of Grenoble, destroying the tombs of former Dauphins in one of many acts of iconoclasm.

In 1575, Lesdiguières became the new leader of the Protestants and allied himself with the pragmatic King Henry IV (who converted from Protestantism to Catholicism to gain the throne, quipping “Paris is well worth a Mass”). However, a Catholic movement, the Ligue, took Grenoble in 1590, refusing to make peace. After months of assaults, Lesdiguières defeated the Ligue and took back Grenoble (which he starved into submission), becoming the leader of the entire province.

Lesdiguières served as lieutenant-general of the Dauphiné until 1626 and began the construction of the Bastille in order to protect the city. He also ordered the construction of new walls and constructed the Hôtel Lesdiguières, which faces the river on one side of the Jardin de Ville. But the religious trouble was not over, and when Louis XIV started oppressing Protestants again in the seventeenth century, the emigration of Huguenot gantiers left Grenoble’s glove industry with no competition, and it became the main industry of the city. One can only imagine that the number of duels skyrocketed as aristocrats always found themselves within a few inches of a glove with which to slap the face of a rival who had questioned the honour of their mistress.  

Prior to the French Revolution, Grenoble was the scene of popular unrest due to financial hardship from the economic and financial crises. The famous Journée des Tuiles (1788) in Grenoble is seen as one of the first popular revolts that started the revolution. The government sent troops to put down a meeting of the Estates of Dauphiné which had convened in Grenoble. The people of Grenoble climbed onto the roofs, where they threw down tiles onto the troops, thus giving the incident its name.

Rue Raoul Blanchard, painted by Debelle a century after the event, and today.

These events influenced two prominent Grenoblois, Barnave and Mounier, who represented Dauphiné in the in the Estates General in Paris. Both sought to stabilize the rapidly shifting political ground, and both became suspected of supporting the Ancien Regime, for which Barnave was executed and Mounier forced to flee to Swizerland. During the revolution, the Bastille was renamed in support of the storming of the Bastille in Paris. Grenoble itself was renamed Grelibre, though they wisely changed it back when Napoleon was crowned Emperor, in recognition of the fact that nobody had become any freer, and that the name itself was rather silly.

Since you will undoubtedly be feeling jet-lagged by such a rapid fast-forward through 1800 years of Grenoble history, we will save the last 200 years for a second blog post, and thus leave you desperate to know how the story ends (spoiler alert: Napoleon meets his Waterloo).

Speaker Grill. Photo: Chase Houston

The April 11 English Talk Radio show features Trudi Penkler, a psychologist, psychotherapist and ‘Intercultural Consultant’ with her own practice, Active Adaptation Counselling, in downtown Grenoble. The discussion is about third culture kids, particularly teenagers …

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. There are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

Listen to the show: here

Still searching for the right path in Grenoble?

Grenoble Life’s Shonah Kennedy shares her experience of coming to the city on the “coat-tails” of her husband and discovering she was not the only woman in Grenoble who had temporarily placed their life on hold to be with the man of their dreams.

Heading back to Grenoble after a mini-break in Switzerland I wondered why I felt a little apprehensive. Then it hit me. I was going back to Grenoble AND going back to work! That is right – after what seemed like a formidably long time – I have a job! So, on the return journey to Grenoble, and inevitably to work, my thoughts were consumed by the metaphorical journey I took to get to where I was … it felt like a round-the-world trip, with multiple stopovers!

Until I had coffee with a lovely American girl, I felt that I was on the aforementioned sojourn alone – I imagined I had been the only one ever to have temporarily placed my life on hold to be with the man of my dreams, to live his dreams for a while, as mine simmered on some distant stove-top. However, as we chatted it emerged that she had decided to take a slight detour from the road she was traveling on when her husband received a job offer here. I felt relieved – even though she had been through many of the bureaucratic and emotional ups and downs that I had had to endure – as I was not alone anymore. Actually I would come to learn that the round-the-world was almost over-booked!

Even though my dear husband was very supportive and really encouraged me to get “out there” and look for the job I now have, and be able to write about it here, I really felt as if I had started this metaphorical travel with no preparation – I hadn’t purchased the latest guide book, I didn’t know the sites to see and I didn’t even think to take a language course … so when I ended up on the road, I felt as nervous as if I was going to hitchhike solo the whole way, and just hope that I arrived at the destination I was intended for.

After the coffee with my, now, dear American friend I started thinking there must be others out there like me, wandering around in the wilderness of a round-the-world which wasn’t entirely self motivated. In fact, I found a conglomerate of women living lives they would otherwise not have expected.

Now I have a job, in a profession I adore, and feel a somewhat useful part of society my lost days are few and far between. However, I have spoken to some women who still feel lost, after many years of being here. The decision was not entirely theirs in the first instance, to move to Grenoble, they “followed” – for want of a better word – their husbands here and have never really found their Grenoble feet. These women left good jobs, independence and a place where they felt at home to be with the one they love, but sadly the love of the town has never found them.

Then there are the women who have had a wonderful transition (are these the ones who acquired an upgrade to first class on their round-the-world, I wonder?!) and have not felt as if they have given up their path in lieu of their partner’s, but more taken a segue for a limited period and see many positives in the entirety of the adventure – new place, new language, new friends and an experience they would not otherwise have had.

After speaking to many women (and I know I keep mentioning women, it is not that I assume this situation only happens to women, but during my discussions on the topic of partners following partners, I only heard two separate rumours about men who came to Grenoble because their wives had jobs here) being in Grenoble for many different reasons – marriage, husband’s job, husband’s contract, boyfriend’s research etc. – I came to the conclusion that even though we are all on the same metaphorical journey we will all come home with different travel stories. Some may suffer from travel sickness, while others don’t. Some are in first class, while there are many of us in an overcrowded economy. Some get the interactive TV screens, while for some it is offline for a while, and they must wait for it to be reset. Whatever the situation the journey itself is seemingly memorable.

I would like to thank all the women who shared their stories with me, and I would like to make you aware that each of you has enhanced my round-the-world more than you will know!

Radio. Photo: stigwaage

The March 28 English Talk Radio show features guest Kate Daligault of Banque Rhône-Alpes in Grenoble talking about banking in France, and Mary Zaccai interviews Kristine Minski and Vivian Draper about five years doing the show.

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. We are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

Listen to the full show: here

Trudi Penkler: Active Adaptation Counselling

Trudi Penkler is a psychologist, psychotherapist and ‘Intercultural Consultant’ with her own practice, Active Adaptation Counselling, in Grenoble. In the second of a two-part interview, she talks to Grenoble Life about the experiences families can have adapting to life in France.

Grenoble Life: What kind of difficulties can families have adapting to life in a new culture?

A lot has been written about culture shock, but in my experience few difficulties in adapting to a new culture can be attributed to this alone. Certainly there are some very real challenges to be faced in making our lives work in unfamiliar surroundings. Actually living day-to-day in a new country is very different from a holiday visit. Sometimes we can feel completely ‘outside’ of what is happening around us, disconnected, as if we’ll never understand or be part of where we are. There can be a sense of loss when nothing seems to be as it was before.

Although we have risen to the challenge of relocating to a new country and find the differences we encounter interesting and stimulating, we may not identify with anything within the culture around us to begin with and may feel that we are having to live in isolation, surrounded by a world we have no part in. The social support network of family, friends and people who shared our way of life before, is very much missed and it takes time to recreate this again.

We may feel robbed of the roles that gave meaning to our lives and defined our social identity before. Generally this proves to be temporary as we start forming new habits and patterns, new friendships and connections which bring meaningful structure to our lives again and also when we realize that the previous chapters of our lives are still important. If, however, sustained helplessness, anger or resignation emerge, with continued feelings of anxiety, disorientation, confusion and depression, this requires attention.

When we establish our homes in a new environment, we’ve stepped out of the rut of our own ‘normality’ for a while. Any day-to-day challenge we would have managed in familiar circumstances will require more of us in unfamiliar ones – more concentration, more energy more time. Being prepared for this and accepting it upfront as part of the adaptation process, rather than resisting it and hoping for things to feel the same as before, is helpful.

We also need to be aware that we take ‘ourselves’ with us wherever we go. This means that pre-existent problem areas like fragile marital situations or wobbly self esteem, parenting difficulties or dependency issues will not go away or magically be ‘fixed’ in the new situation. Not only will they re-emerge, but they will be amplified by the stresses of moving. This is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes being brought face-to-face with difficulties that we’ve been carrying with us for years, but can no longer ignore, pushes us to address them.

Education is usually a very important priority for globally mobile families and whereas younger children generally adapt relatively easily, moving older children may be more difficult. Adolescence is of itself a time of change during which young people begin identifying more with their peers than their parents. Resentment, disengagement, helplessness and unhappiness can set in, if these young people feel they have been uprooted against their will and they will need empathetic understanding rather than motivational lectures from their parents. It is important to keep communication lines with teenagers and younger children open, especially about choices concerning them, at all stages of the relocation process.

When couples move, one partner’s career has often been favoured and the other may have renounced their own professional development and feel that they have lost too much, particularly if they are unable to resume a professional activity in the new country, because of language, legal or family constraints.

Leaving parents who are aging or in ill health behind in our home countries may be difficult.

GL: What other advice would you give families considering making a move to a new culture?

We don’t only take our weakness with us when we move across cultures, we also take our strengths, sometimes strengths we didn’t even know we had. We all have the resources within us to adapt to change, if the conditions are there to allow access to those resources …

But we do need to be very clear on the reasons for a move like this. Each individual family member may not be equally enthusiastic or benefit as much from the change, but each will be happier to be part of it all if the reasons have been clearly discussed and they makes sense.  

When we’re going to embark on an adventure like this, preparation is indispensible, not only in terms of the logistics of the move, but in familiarising ourselves with information about the new culture. Knowing more about the documented “do’s and taboos” of another culture is not going to prevent us from encountering obstacles and making mistakes anyway though.

A very important aspect of good preparation will involve also thinking about how we’re going to deal with change. Our emotional reactions and personal experience of a new situation are so much more positive when we’ve considered this beforehand and are consciously prepared to develop a tolerance for difference and uncertainty.

Things will be new and exciting, but the ease with which we did things in a familiar environment will not be there to begin with, especially if acquisition of another language is part of the equation. Simple tasks that we did without thinking before will take more time and effort. Although this may be frustrating, this doesn’t mean we’ve become less effective.

Coming to grips with the language of the country we’ll be living in will be essential, but there is no rule book as to how best or how quickly this should happen – we shouldn’t allow ourselves to be bullied into feeling inferior, while we’re actively learning and not yet proficient in a new language. Adapting to a new culture is not an end-point or a destination. It is a process, a learning process. We’re on the path and we are continuously progressing as long as we keep going. The pace of our own individual progress should not be measured or dictated by self-appointed ‘experts’ we may meet.

We’ll need to be gentle with ourselves, set realistic (yet ambitious) goals and respect the values and protocols of our host culture, without compromising our own. For a while our judgement will be a little cloudy while we’re learning about a new culture. It is important to consciously switch on the ‘data gathering radar’ in our minds, observing curiously all the time and verifying our conclusions by asking questions, rather than assuming we’ve understood what we’ve experienced. Most people will not find our questions bothersome and on the contrary, will enjoy being considered wise enough to be consulted.

Everything is easier when we feel stronger, so looking after ourselves health-wise should be a priority. Children should be kept informed of family decisions all the way (they’ll the need reassurance that their parents are ok, if a little lost and confused, still ok and still in charge).

We shouldn’t give up on the things we love or do well, music or painting, football or throwing a frisbee, but we’ll need to put effort into finding how to continue these activities in a different way. We also shouldn’t push ourselves to do things we don’t really want to, even though everyone else seems to be doing them. Some people really don’t like skiing or really aren’t interested in discovering the wonderful French wines here – and that’s just fine!

Keeping regular and ongoing contact with faraway loved ones will be very important too. You won’t have ‘betrayed’ them by coming to France and the more part of your experience they remain, the easier the separation will be for everyone.

And we’ll need to take the time to have fun and enjoy being where we are. This is not a test of endurance but an adventure and an “Adventure is worthwhile in itself.” (Amelia Earhart)  

                   ————————————————————————

Please do not hesitate to contact me. My office is at 2 Rue de la République, in downtown Grenoble, just off of Place Grenette opposite Haagen-Dazs.

Tel: 04 76 98 93 85 e-mail: trudi@aac-intercultural.com website: www.aac-intercultural.com

Gratin dauphinois. Photo: Marylise Doctrinal

It’s a no-brainer really. Grenoble Life wants your comments about favourite things to see, do, eat and drink in Grenoble and its surroundings.

I have been asked by French Entrée to write a post on what to do and see in Grenoble. Upon tackling this in earnest I found myself baulking at the task. An increasingly poorly written list began with a walk to the Bastille, continuing through the various museums to barely legible mentions of the more attractive squares in the old town. Then, I thought, rather than regurgitating the generic Grenoble itinerary, I thought I would solicit a more idiosyncratic list of Grenoblois pleasures, open to suggestions from YOU. What and where do you like to eat, where do you drink and people-watch? Tell me about your favourite local walks, markets, parks, neighbourhoods.

Here is my idiosyncratic inventory of Grenoble favourites, a by-no-means-comprehensive list of reasons to be cheerful. I’m sorry if this heralds few surprises and all seems a bit generic … please use the comments box for your personal lists below.

• ‘Glacier Gonzales’ (Rue Servan). As good as ice cream gets, in my view.
• Driving along the Voie Sur Berge, with its colourful diaporama of the Quai opposite, reminds me of the climax of The Italian Job, even if my Citroën Saxo is not a Mini Cooper and I’m in the wrong country.
• Cycling the banks of the Isère, with its generous network of lanes.
• The crazy geometric paving stones on the University campus. Far out!
• The crumbling beauty of the St Laurent district.
• Drinking kirs and people watching on Place St André (aka Place du Trib) in the summer.
• Sitting on the sofas at the musée de Grenoble when it’s quiet, which it usually is.
• Tartes and hot chocolate at ‘Tarteline’ (Grande Rue).
• Fromage blanc at the dairy farm at Charmant Som, with bilberry coulis.
• Fondue at ‘A Confesse’ in St Laurent
• Parmigiana at ‘Ciao a Te’ (Rue de la Paix)
• Pizza in general. But if I am to be perfectly honest, my favourite pizzas come from a camionette in Montbonnot rather than one of the many along the Quai or elsewhere in Grenoble itself. However, it is my contention that you can find a good pizza more easily in Grenoble than in the tourist hot-spots in Italy itself.
• The tram. Being on the tram makes me happy, even it doesn’t go anywhere near my home. Watching it glide onto campus or snake through the old town makes me misty-eyed with pride and affection for my adopted home town.
• Bastille Day fireworks at Parc Paul Mistral.
• Being able to watch a football match at the Stade des Alpes and then stroll back into town for a beer. Even if the standard of football from the home side has been appalling this season.
• La Nef and Le Club. Old school cinemas with dependable art house programmes.
• Gratin dauphinois when it is freshly made (i.e., not resurrected after deep-freeze hibernation). To my memory, the best I’ve had in a restaurant was at the ‘Café des Alpes’ on the way up to Le Sappey ski resort.
• La Fête de la Musique. A nationwide event, admittedly, but one that impressed upon me something about the French. In England such an event could not happen without copious amounts of drink and drugs, and thus a heavy police presence – a sentiment echoed in Lucy Wadham’s The Secret Life of France (a book well worth reading by the way).
• The old town. I was surprised when I came to Grenoble how many French people – Grenoblois or not – were dismissive about the city, saying it wasn’t beautiful. It may not have great monuments of individual interest but I like the character of the old town and its attractive squares. You can give me this over the British high street, with its identikit shopping precincts, any day.
• The white-capped Belledonne massif, providing its luminous theatre scenery to the city.

Ok, your turn …

Classroom. Photo: sfar

Gregg West is an American history and geography teacher at Cité Scolaire Internationale. He also handles the school pantomime, organic gardening club, interpersonal communication classes and music club.  In this explosive article for Grenoble Life, he describes his career-long efforts to change the education system in France.

It would be preposterous to assume that any education system in the world does its job correctly, when one observes the amount of poverty, crime, violence, drug addiction, alienation, loneliness, pollution, general unhappiness, and other symptoms of human foolishness, frailty, or limitations.  But one could just say, “Oh well, people do their best and one can’t ask more of them than that.” Nevertheless, when one is a teacher and has to face an educational system day in and day out with its many constraints, it can be very trying, for even if he or she sees many kids succeed and go on to brilliant careers and happy, if not totally unperturbed, lives, there are a lot of others who will live troubled existences.

Over the last 37 years, I have tried to learn to teach and have perpetrated my teaching upon unsuspecting people, both children and adults, in North America, Scotland and France, but I have also had these teaching systems (pardon my syntax) perpetrated upon me. The following observations about the French system are not at all intended to exonerate other systems from similar criticism.

More is better

Since settling permanently in France in 1983 I have witnessed a system which believes that more is better despite the famous saying of Montaigne (loosely translated) that a “well-made head is better than a full head.” Indeed, in the Connexion of February 2010, the minister of Higher Education, Ms. Valerie Pécresse went so far as to say to a journalist “you seem to be contradicting yourself when you cast doubt on the level of lycée students passing the Bac but then suggest reducing the number of hours.”  Really, Ms. Pécresse, this is a national disease, thinking that more is always better. So why not give children 16-hour school days? Children need time for other things than school work to become thinking, feeling, well-balanced individuals. I thought everyone knew that … hmmm.

A second aspect of the French system that is curious for those of us from English-speaking cultures is the belief held by many that school is only for instruction of specific subject matters, does not require a global education of children in terms of understanding their social and psychological context, learning to motivate them, inciting them to improving their citizenship, social relations, and so forth and that, therefore, teachers do not need to learn anything but their own subject matter at university. No interpersonal communication, no group dynamics, no pedagogical methods, no interdisciplinary knowledge to coordinate interdisciplinary projects … It apparently threatens many whose work status and contract only commits them to knowing their subject … even if inspectors put pressure on them to teach better … and the French government has just decided to shut down IUFM (teacher training institutes), something highly consistent with this view.

In this extremely cerebral environment, a third characteristic of the French system, at least insofar as it concerns university-bound students, is that they needn’t develop artistic, manual or day-to-day skills like typing, driving a car, first aid, or cooking at school. (Well, they DO learn road security, but only the theory … ) In short, learning does NOT involve doing things, except writing essays, carrying out a few carefully limited classroom experiments, doing research and other relatively abstract tasks. So these other skills surprisingly only get developed among a minority of people who have the money to do them outside of school or have families patient and qualified enough to help them learn these things. When I see high school kids pecking away with their fingers on a keyboard, when I have to fork out over 1000€ for driving classes, or when I see the beginnings of obesity among French young people like in my native America, I do wonder about these priorities.

Lip service

Finally, as with many other school systems, the French speak of democracy, but practice dictatorship, pay lip service to cooperation and solidarity but practice competition, praise acceptance of differences, but punish those who do not “fit in” with ridicule, humiliating grades, and other forms of social exclusion, lecture people about human rights while submitting high school students to 50 hour weeks (35 hours of class plus 15 hours of homework a week), claim to be ecological while using throw-away pens, producing millions of tons of new, bleached, non-recycled fibre paper waste that are not even recycled, and brag about their great cuisine while abandoning their children to canteens that serve poor quality, poorly balanced meals that contain pesticides, instead of making quality and organic food priorities.  What is the saying, “Do as I say, not as I do?” Problem is, it doesn’t work that way and, as Leonard Cohen said, “Everybody knows…” Kids’ strongest learning experiences stem from doing and from example.

In such an unnatural neurotic environment, is it any wonder then that many French kids suffer from depression, insomnia, smoke a lot of cigarettes, become fashion victims or anorexics, drop out due to a lack of motivation (around 10%), or decide not to care about politics or association activity, plunging into a life of semi-blind consumption as adults, with no personal artistic side that they can cultivate to express themselves healthily? Is it any wonder that they become recalcitrant at suggestions that they drive less (so little physical exercise during their childhood), watch less TV (when did they learn how to entertain themselves?), vote more (when did anyone ask their opinion anyway?), or think about important issues (weren’t they only supposed to give teachers the answers required?), or question notions the media and political elite expound as evident (nuclear energy and genetically modified organisms aren’t dangerous, are they, or THEY would tell us … like our teachers … wouldn’t they?) Once you’ve got people conditioned, it is very hard to change them. Some would even suggest that this conditioning has been done CONSCIOUSLY to preserve the privileges of elite, but I’m not much of a conspiracy theory advocate, so I’ll leave this idea aside. I think it’s just force of habit and past conditioning … an unwillingness to question what came before.

Unfamiliar future

At any rate, all that I have described is what one would call a SCHEMATIC, OVERDRAWN picture of the French Educational system. Of course, there are positive sides, but you all know those; France is one of the world’s leading countries in social programs, economic productivity, democratic freedoms, and so forth … well, for the moment at least … But is this preparing us for an oil-poor, resource-poor future in a world where company relocation to Newly Industrialized Countries may force us to reorganize a great deal of our economy and learn to share, be happy with less, and use our imagination to find new, workable ways of life?

But of course changing things is never easy. People are afraid of unfamiliar ways, they think that what they know is the only way, there are vested interests, it involves calling habits and training into question, it doesn’t suffice to throw money at problems, and even good ideas, if poorly or insufficiently applied will lead to failure. In short, it isn’t a technical impossibility, but it remains a political improbability.

Political debate

I decided in 1987 to try to do something about all this. I spent five years in a minor political party which seemed highly motivated to lead change in society as the chairman of their education commission, consulting hundreds of students, parents, teachers, and others involved in education, as well as union representatives and school directors. We worked out propositions to change school radically (more on what these were later) … something in line with the party’s desire to “create a cultural majority for change.”

I sent the propositions to the hundred or so representatives of various regions in the party’s governing committee a few months before it was scheduled for debate on the agenda. But the day of the debate, there were “more urgent matters” so debate was pushed back till the very end of a Sunday afternoon when one third had already left to take their trains, leaving only 10 minutes to debate a topic that concerns every single citizen of a democratic country. Of those remaining, fully half were teachers … and a plurality of these opposed all the measures which might require them to retrain to handle new functions. So without any guidelines on HOW to change our propositions, we were sent back to the commission to “work on the propositions some more…” Thoroughly disgusted, I resigned as commission chairman.

An alternative school

In the U.S., as a young teacher, I had already experienced the difficulties of even modifying one local system of education, so I reasoned that if what I considered the most progressive political party in France and its host of teachers were unable to be open towards real change, then there was little hope of changing such a huge system from within. I worked for the next seven years on the idea of creating an alternative school, parallel to the system, in hopes that an example outside the system might show people what is possible. But here too I was to be foiled. Among the enthusiastic parents supporting this idea, most were penniless; among the enthusiastic teachers supporting this idea, most, not surprisingly, wanted to be paid! Real estate was too expensive to rent in large towns, and small towns placed obstacles in our path, fearing we might lower already precarious enrolment figures, provoking the closing of their public schools. There were also dreamers who talked about “borrowing seven million francs” from a bank as if any bank would ever entertain such an idea. A subscription among political activists raised some 135,000 francs, but we were never able to establish a three year budget that promised any hope of surviving, even on minimum incomes, so we were obliged to abandon the plan and send people’s money back.

At this point I decided to give up. I had a good job in a public school and began trying to develop extracurricular activities to compensate for the unidimensional aspects of school. I created a music club and later a theater program where kids could learn self-management, cooperation, create, express themselves, develop their confidence, teamwork and self-esteem, associate with older students and adults as role models instead of submitting to age segregation, and receive recognition without grades from those around them.  I found no need to involve parents for the music club, but broke an additional taboo when I got parents involved heavily in the theater program … something few French school teachers like to see … parents in the school working with kids … perhaps because it threatens their own prerogatives to teach as they see fit … but this was only outside of class …

In my own classes, I developed a method of teaching involving considerable debate and discussion, with occasional projects and games, but the program was often so immense that time was always pressing us to return to a teacher-centered curriculum.

Moving the mammoth

I suppose this is why when I was approached by a sympathetic political activist, I accepted getting involved in an association whose goal, like mine, was to move the mammoth (change the educational system) even though I remained very sceptical about the possible success of such an effort.

Over a period of about three years, we developed a support group of some 300 people, including thirty to forty teachers and three school headmasters, and we elaborated propositions very similar to those the education commission I’d managed had put forth only to be rejected. We outlined a plan for creating special schools, particularly in the junior high years (collège), and hopefully one or two in each department, which would function differently and thus serve as an illustration of alternative approaches to education. The basic ideas behind these schools included:

• Only four hours of academic solids per day, so less Math, less French, less language, less science, less history and geography (oh dear!!!). Interdisciplinary projects as a way of exploring basic subjects.
• Groups for enrichment, remedial work and orientation for one hour a day.
• Workshops to learn practical subjects, develop artistic abilities, and physical education 1 hour a day.
• Collective expression and action a few hours a week to put democracy into practice.
• A severe limit on homework and no grading, but still evaluating and testing.

One can like or dislike these propositions, but the fact remains that they allow schools to handle a number of the objections mentioned above and the existence of a certain number of schools of this type in the Northern part of Europe tends to confirm that they can be a positive experience, developing well-rounded, independent, thinking students … if properly applied.

We sent a 10-page summary and a longer 40-page detailed version of the project to various people in positions to make decisions. We met with those in charge of education at City Hall and the Conseil Général, as well as the man in charge of innovation at the Rectorate and the Academic Inspector of Isère. All reacted favorably, saying the idea looked great. When we said we also had a list of teachers and an administrator to run the school though, the Rectorate and Academic Inspection suddenly began hemming and hawing about the fact that they would need to talk to unions about it, that they couldn’t name people on the basis of aptitude or motivation, but only on the basis of seniority points (meaning the death of the project) and that they would have to check with their hierarchy on whether this was all possible (i.e., if it wasn’t pursued, it wouldn’t be THEIR fault …) Despite attempts to get them to put this on paper, they refused and they began doing what bureaucrats do when they don’t want something to happen. They sat on it, refusing further meetings, correspondence or any other indication of their position, killing the project.

Things I can do

So, at age 57, tired of spending so much energy for nothing, I chose to devote myself instead to things I CAN do without political games and support from people higher up. I continued with my teaching job, interpersonal communication classes, the music club with its concerts and CDs, the theater program with up to five shows and 750 spectators per year (our headmaster even had a stage built for us … and other groups in the school to use.) And I created an organic gardening club in our school.

None of this however will make the changes I believe that France (and other countries) desperately need in their education systems if they want to create a vast majority of real human beings capable of adult behaviour, wisdom, commitment, values, and coherent behaviour emancipated from the manipulative, narrow channels that current systems carve for them.

Radio. photo: morberg

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. We are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

The February 7 English Talk Radio show took place at The Bookworm Café in St Laurent, Grenoble. Listen to the full show here:

p'tit vélo dans la tete on campus - photo: www.ptitvelo.net

Are you a student or a new arrival and want to know how to live in Grenoble on a budget? Expatriated Brit John Lubbock has learnt the hard way, and has kindly agreed to share his tips and experience with Grenoble Life readers.  

Grenoble is not a bad place to be poor. But, like a tramp with a favourite patch, you have to know your environment; or like a foraging bear, where the best pickings are to be had. You may need to change some of your bad, foreign influenced habits to make the most of your insertion into French culture (beer is expensive apart from Stella, which isn’t one of the best things about French gastronomy, is it?). 

Tourists, as we all know, are naive sponges who deserve to be squeezed dry, so try not to seem like one. People will often poorly attempt to converse with you in English when they realise you are not a native, but insist, “Je suis en France, il faut que je parle en français“, and they won’t despise you as much for usurping their language as the world’s Lingua Franca. It is mostly from lack of better information that tourists agree to pay higher prices, so I intend to give you some information to help you make better spending choices.

Accommodation

If you do not want to spend your first month in France on a sofa or in a hostel, it pays to research accommodation before you arrive. There is an association called OSE Club which you can join for €30 which will find apartments for you in a designated area of the city, if you want to be near to a university. Then there are websites such as www.appartager.com and www.vivastreet.com, which have petites annonces for flats, but these are generally only useful if you pay the €10 fee to see the telephone numbers of the advertisers and call them up directly as they don’t answer messages on the site.

Watch the French film L’Auberge Espagnole before you go to get an exaggerated idea of being interviewed by your future flatmates and the kinds of hilarious European stereotypes you are likely to be cohabiting with. If you are not a student, it is even more important to find a flat quickly, because without a rental agreement, you will not be able to get a French bank account or contract telephone, and will thus be considered a SDF (Sans Domicile Fixe) by the French. This will mean that you are forced to become a baba cool (hippy) and sit in the street with your dogs holding out a frying pan to ask for spare change.  

N.B. If you are staying for less than a year, it is worthwhile getting a contract phone, which will be cheaper than pay as you go, the phone will be nicer, and there’s little they can do about it when you tell them that you’re leaving the country before the contract finishes and close your bank account. But don’t tell anyone I told you.  

If you have never lived in the socialist paradise that is France, you may not be aware of the kinds of social benefits available to people living there. The CAF’s housing benefit system could pay for some of your rent if you are a student or living on a low wage, although like most bureaucratic systems in France it takes about six weeks to get anywhere with it, and since these forms are all in French, it is more like a test of your reading comprehension which you need to pass to gain entry to French society.  

Learning French

If you are (un)lucky enough to be a political refugee, asking at the Préfecture (a big administrative building which makes you feel like Josef K from Kafka’s The Trial, wondering if you’ll ever be told what you’ve done wrong in order to end up there) or at the Conseil Général can get you free French lessons, which can otherwise be obtained by calling the ADATE organisation. I am not sure if you can get lessons with them without being a refugee, but I am considering telling them that I have been forced to flee from the UK as a result of the impending government takeover by a bunch of Tories with accents so posh and annoying that they constitute a form of social oppression. If you have to go to the Préfecture for any annoying bureaucratic reason, like to obtain a carte de séjour, don’t ask anyone which ‘queue’ you should stand in. The French for queue is pronounced like ‘que’, while saying ‘queue’ sounds like the French word for something rude.  

Transport  

When it comes to transport, if you are poor, the bicycle/vélo will become like your husband or wife, or perhaps the god to whom you pray for benevolence. If it works well, you love it and praise it, and if not you curse it. There are three main places I know of to obtain bikes cheaply. Firstly: on the street. I found three bikes lying in crumpled heaps on pavements in the first month I was here. The problem then is to take them to somewhere you can repair them. So either have a bike repair kit (Decathlon, around €15), or go to the second place to get cheap bikes – Un P’tit Vélo Dans La Tete meaning something like ‘A little bit biked in the head’.

This atelier (workshop) sells bikes that have been repaired for between €15-60, or you can go there to fix your own by paying a €15 abonnement (subscription). It is a good place to practice your French, as there are lots of guys who can help you to fix your bike, and they have a handy board on the wall with a picture of a bike and the French names for every part of it indicated. However, fixing bikes takes time, and if you have a second hand bike, or one you bought at P’tit Velo, it will break down roughly every two weeks. On the plus side, you will get very good at repairing bikes. The third option is Métrovélo, who will give you a generic yellow bike for €75 for six months (plus €50 deposit) and repair it for you if it breaks down.  

Of course, you can always chance a free ride on the tram, but getting caught by the officials will land you with a €65 fine, unless you can pretend to be a totally clueless foreigner. The tram tariff is €24 a month for students, but Grenoble is the flattest city centre in France, and waiting for a tram and slumming it with Joe Public are hidden costs not worth paying in my opinion. That’s why liberté comes before egalité and fraternité: because it’s more important.  

If you want to go further that the city limits, go to www.covoiturage.fr and find someone who is making the same journey as you to go with. It will be far cheaper than any other method of transport, and the people I’ve met doing it have all been nice.  

Food  

Although many people come to France for the food, as an impoverished young person, this will likely be one of the areas in which you sacrifice quality in order to live within your means. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, a man who lives within his means has no imagination; but you will likely be finding your culinary options limited by the exigencies of having little money to spend. Ed is a cheap supermarket, and it happens to bear the name of some of my friends, although since the name Edward doesn’t exist in French, they call it “Ee-de”, which sounds much more corporate and less friendly. It is worth taking a notebook around to the supermarkets to write down prices of items you buy regularly, because while vegetables may be cheaper in Ed, Géant may have cheaper milk, for example. Unfortunately, I have just been informed by my collocataire that Ed is closing down – evidently the world of modern commerce is too cruel for such friendly-named businesses – but Lidl is almost identical in that it has hardly any choice of products and brands you have never heard of, but they are all usually cheaper than the Géant/Casino equivalent.  

Yet if one just bought the budget Casino brand pasta/rice/couscous to eat with with vegetables every day, you might end up wanting to kill yourself. So for the minimum luxury of not cooking the food yourself, you can go to a CROUS canteen, near the gare, or in Domaine Universitaire. These are supposed to be for students, but you can just pay the €2.90 it costs for a meal there in cash without showing any student card as well. You get bread, salad or cheese, a main meal of canteen standard chips/pasta/vegetables/etc. and some meat served with customary indifference and a bad attitude by people who look deeply unhappy about serving ungrateful students who could pay their wages with their tuition fees (those who go to an École supérieure anyway).  

Working  

Of course, if you really want to make things easier on yourself financially, you could get a job. “A job? What’s that?” I hear you cry. “I am a student – they don’t work. Then I wouldn’t have time for all the drinking and Facebook which the energy I consume from crisps and Red Bulls goes into”. Well, you could work part time. If you are a native English speaker, you could get employed by a soutien scolaire company, telling kids what they did wrong with their homework. Believe me, it’s satisfying to be on the other end of this after receiving homework corrected in red-teacher-ballpoint ink for 10 or more years. Don’t be put off if you don’t have a TEFL or CELTA qualification, I didn’t find this a hindrance, though it may help to say you have experience of private teaching even if you haven’t.

If there’s one thing I learned looking for jobs here it’s that it doesn’t pay to be honest: always tell them you are available to work, always tell them you have the experience. It took me a while of offering my services to language companies (Grenoble Life already has a useful list here), universities and other places like the Chamber of Commerce and Rectorat before I was employed, but once you have your foot in the door, you will hear about other teaching  jobs that are advertised within teaching circles.  

The Pôle jeunesse on Avenue Agutte Sembat has a useful wall full of job and accommodation offers. But if you have a degree, they will tell you that they can’t help hoity-toity types like you and that you should go instead to AFIJ who have an office at 29 Avenue Felix Viallet near Cour Jean Jaurès. These guys mostly have offers for internships or well paid jobs, so if you are just looking for a petit boulot, the Pôle jeunesse might be more useful.

You could try working in a bar, but the French can be quite snooty if your linguistic skills aren’t up to scratch. This matters less when applying to one of the studenty bars like London Pub or Sun Valley, but you will invariably have to call a Frenchman ‘boss’ (and thereby lose all the nationalistic self-respect you have built up living in your own great land), and traipse around the campus putting up flyers just for the pleasure of sacrificing most of your evenings for €9 an hour. There are also lots of agencies you can work for who hire waiters and other restauration workers for company or other private functions, but I personally found them somewhat useless, though Adecco is worth a try. Then you can try the listings in Pôle Emploi, which is like the JobCentre in the UK, but with more paperwork.  

Of course one of the reasons why you came to Grenoble is to ski, so if you are a student, join the École de Glisse, and try to obtain some cheap equipment from one of the second hand ski places like Boite aux Skis. There is no way of getting around that skiing is expensive however you do it, but hopefully you will have saved enough money in other areas to afford the silly ski-pass prices. And if you injure yourself, just remember to have your European Health Card handy. Good luck, mes amis.

SFM Traduction online

Sara Maltaverne, founder of SFM Traduction, a Grenoble-based translations and copywriting company. She shares with Grenoble Life her knowledge and advice about the translation business in the area.

Grenoble, where going international just comes naturally

The greater Grenoble area is home to some 450 foreign-owned businesses and is one of the French economy’s leading exporters. So, for many local businesses, enlisting the services of a translator—a potentially risky undertaking—is simply a fact of doing business across borders. But how do you know if the translations you’ve purchased do your product justice when you don’t understand the language? Worse, can you be sure that the translations won’t cause serious damage to your image or result in the costly duplication of work?

Whether you need the latest foreign market research to launch your product overseas or compelling marketing collateral to grab the attention of potential customers, a professional translator or interpreter is an invaluable ally. Remember: translators work with written documents (brochures, reports, correspondence), while interpreters communicate orally.

Here are a few things you can do to increase your chances of getting a successful translation—and your business’ chances of making it in today’s global marketplace.

Penny wise, pound foolish: bilingual does not equal translator

A Grenoble-based building management services provider needed an English version of its brochure for an upcoming trade fair. To save money, the company decided to assign the translation to its in-house staff. One of the gems produced: as an introduction to an excerpt of the company’s lengthy and prestigious client list (“quelques références” in French) the erstwhile translator—no doubt with the help of a French-English dictionary—came up with the translation “few references,” which is the exact opposite of what the brochure was trying to convey. Thanks to their savvy bilingual secretary, who sensed something just wasn’t right, this and other embarrassing bloopers were avoided when she called in a professional translator to check the brochure before going to print. However, in addition to the lost work time the company’s employees spent slogging through the translation, the firm had to pay a rush fee to have the brochure reviewed by a professional in time to get it to the printer.

How can you avoid falling into the same trap? By calling in a professional translator from the planning stages of your project and drawing up clear specifications.

The following three steps will help you get your translation project off to a good start

   1. Decide what needs to be done, when, and who is responsible for each stage. Everyone involved in the production process (from document authors to DTP) should be aware of the timeline and specifications. Put it all down in writing.

   2. Once you have determined your workflow and deadlines, you will need to choose a service provider. As a general rule, professional translators work into their native language only. Referrals from colleagues in your industry are a good place to begin your search, as are professional translators associations. In France, you can try the Société française des traducteurs online directory at www.sft.fr. The ideal translator has a track record both in your industry and with the type of document you need translated and can prove it by showing you examples of previous work.

   3. Once you have selected a service provider, check again to be sure the purpose of your translation is clear. Are you translating incoming texts that your business needs for information purposes only or outgoing material that will have an impact on how your company is perceived by customers? The quality you need—and the cost—will vary accordingly. Discuss this with your service provider and get all commitments in writing. You and your service provider should know and agree on who is responsible for each step in the translation process.

Still not sure you’re ready to cross the language barrier?

You can better prepare your business to go international by learning as much as you can about working with translators and interpreters before the pressure is on. Start with Translation: Getting it right, and Translation: Buying a non-commodity, free downloadable brochures endorsed by language industry professionals. Professional groups like the American Translators Association are also an invaluable source of information. Once you have the tools you need to take your business overseas, the sky’s the limit.

About SFM Traduction

Grenoble-based SFM Traduction was founded by Sara Maltaverne as a freelance translation business in January 2003. SFM Traduction is today a premium professional translation company specializing in creative, marketing, and financial translations and copywriting for high-profile corporate communications. You can learn more about the company and its services at www.sfmtraduction.com or blog with us at www.sfmtraduction.com/blog

Sara Maltaverne

Bread! Photo: Denis Morel

New from our partner Captiv Magazine, this authoritative article about the history of that precious French cultural commodity, bread, covers the history of le pain through to its place in modern French eating habits and ever-evolving baking methods. Read the full article at www.captiv-magazine.fr

Dials. Photo: ericcomando89

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. We are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life.

The January 22 English Talk Radio show features Trudi Penkler, psychologist and inter-cultural coach and trainer, talking about teenagers and moving. Listen to the full show here.

Les Nouvelles de Grenoble

In the latest post in his blog The Franco-American Daily Deconstructionist; History and Culture in Everyday Life,  John Hess leafs through the City of Grenoble Magazine Les Nouvelles de Grenoble. Here’s what he has to say about it.

Many of you who have the good fortune to live in Grenoble, wait breathlessly for the end of each month, because that means a small portion of your tax payments will be returned to you a hundred-fold, in the form of Les Nouvelles de Grenoble, “the city informational magazine.”

For those of you who do not have this good fortune : the magazine is a glossy, super-sized A4 format affair, arriving free in residents’ mailboxes each month. It is published by the municipal government, at taxpayer expense, and purports to provide helpful information about happenings in Grenoble, especially of a political, social, or cultural nature.

Perhaps you enjoy reading Les Nouvelles: it’s professionally produced, there are lots of color pictures, the articles are short and easy to digest, and it’s all so refreshingly upbeat. When I read Les Nouvelles de Grenoble, I realize that I am living in the world’s most wonderful city. Perhaps I have even died and gone to the urbanists’ paradise. Well, then I go out my door, and harsh reality sets in; but o the illusion, however fleeting, is delightful!

But have you ever wondered about the content of the magazine? For it clearly is not just the neutral statement of city-related current facts and goings-on that you would expect from a publicly-funded publication. There is, of course, the natural phenomenon of editorial selection: the magazine is strangely silent about the crimes, mishaps, and dysfunctionalities that weigh on city life; we hear only about the good stuff. The temptation to intellectual dishonesty seems to be too great, however, for the editors to stop there. What they do report on has to be qualified with glowingly positive adjectives.

So does issue n° 131, October 2009, tell us on the front page that in matters of sustainable development, “Grenoble is keeping its promises”, even though this is a self-evidently worthless statement. If one wants to know if promises are being kept, one generally has the sense not to ask the promise-maker, which is sort of like asking the accused if he’s guilty or not–and basing the verdict on the answer.

On page six of the same issue, we find out that the city-engineered renovation of St Bruno Square has “restored its soul as the lively and convivial heart of the neighborhood.” Well, I hadn’t noticed, but if the city engineers say so, then that’s good enough for me!

On page seven, we find out that there is not just a new crèche in that same neighborhood, but a “spanking brand-new” crèche, which is somehow different from a new crèche, though I suppose appropriate for child-rearing disciplinary purposes.

On page eight, we find out that the Philippeville Square crèche is “new, beautiful and environmentally-friendly”, which will certainly be a relief to parents concerned that their children’s day care was aggravating global climate change, though they may regret that the newness is not spanking in this case; and while some local residents find the crèche “butt-ugly”, they were apparently not interviewed for this article.

On page fourteen, we have another “spanking brand new” building, this time a library in the Teisseire quarter, also qualified as “magnificent.” (If the Teisseire library is already “magnificent”, then what adjective remains to us to describe, say, The New York Public Library, or the Great Library of Alexandria ?) It goes on and on, upbeat snippets about all the wonderful and progressive developments in Grenoble, directly or indirectly thanks to the actions of the city government, culminating in the municipal self-love-fest about sustainable development from page 18 onwards.

How can this sort of thing be possible ? Well, in a country where the press is expected to be partisan and indeed captive of a particular interest group or ideology, and where the state likes to pose as the benefactor to all (and never mind where the money comes from), it is not just possible, but considered quite normal. And this is the problem !

But why do I complain ? You know, in fact, the business model of Les Nouvelles de Grenoble magazine has inspired me. Watch this space, as Grenoble Life becomes John Hess Life, full of interesting articles about how wonderful, nay, ineffably divine, John Hess is, all written in breathless prose by John Hess. You will, of course, pay a monthly subscription fee for the privilege.

The French Paper website

Michael Streeter, Editor of theFrenchPaper, talks to Vivian Draper of English Talk Radio, 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. Read the full interview here.

Vivian Draper: Hello Michael and welcome to Grenoble, even if only in print. It is eight months since we last spoke about theFrenchPaper, what has happened in those last eight months?

Michael Streeter: It’s been busy! In addition to the main paper we’ve produced a number of supplements to go with it, including one on sport and another on winter sports. We have also been hard at work trying to promote the paper in various places. Obviously as your readers know France is a big country and targeting our audience of English-speakers is not always as easy at it might seem, so this has taken up a lot of time and will continue to, I’m sure.

The main thing, however, is that we’ve been trying to maintain and improve our editorial quality. Our aim has always been to produce a quality newspaper about what’s going on in France with a design and feel that can compete with, for example, the best of British national newspapers. That’s the level we’re aiming for and we spend a lot of time on getting it right. Obviously nobody’s perfect, but I’d like to think we’re moving in the right direction. Certainly the feedback we’ve got from readers has been fantastic. I think they can see that a lot of effort and thought goes into each edition. Above all they seem to find us a grownup and enjoyable read, which is great – that’s what we’re aiming for!

Vivian: Printing newspapers has changed vastly in the last 30 years, no more inky fingers?

Michael: Yes, things have certainly changed since I first started in Fleet Street many years ago. Back then you needed to wear gloves if you were handling bundles of paper. The quality of the presses and inks has improved so much – as has the ability to price good quality colour pages. When you compare newspapers of today with those of 30 years ago they are so much bigger, more colourful and, I would argue, much better value for money.

Vivian: Where is theFrenchPaper published?

Michael: It’s published in London by the printers of The Guardian and Observer, though we have no editorial or other link with them. Why there? Not for any chauvinistic reasons, it’s simply that not many presses can currently print the Berliner format we use (it’s half way between a tabloid and broadsheet in size).

Vivian: Is distribution of theFrenchPaper going smoothly?

Michael: Don’t get me started on distribution! Much as I love France there are still some things that baffle and frustrate me here and newspaper distribution is definitely one of them. Let’s just say it’s a ‘challenge’ getting the right number of copies to where we want them to go each month … and if people find it hard to get hold of a copy at their nearest outlet please do let us know. Things are getting better, but it’s a slow process.

Vivian: What is your average day like?

Michael: The first thing is to keep on top of the news. I’ll always listen to the radio news bulletins in the morning (France Inter usually) and then catch up on the Agence France Presse wire service. I also read news websites, newspapers and the weekly magazines such as L’Express and Nouvel Obs. Much of my day is spent coming up with ideas, commissioning and briefing reporters, editing stories and where necessary sending them back to be re-written! The final week before we go to press is obviously the most hectic, and the working day is rarely under 12 hours. There are pages to proofread, headlines to rewrite, captions to check, all the time making sure we aren’t missing anything major.

Vivian: Not only French news in English, you have broadened your scope to include many other areas?

Michael: I think these days a newspaper has to offer more than ‘just’ the news. As a monthly paper we both have a round up of key stories that have affected France in the previous weeks and offer analysis and commentary on those stories we think really help tell the reader something about France and how it works. On top of that there are features, real life stories, lifestyle, travel, motoring, sport, puzzles and crosswords, commentary, advice pages, financial information, pages with advice for small businesses, food, gardening, nature … it’s quite a full list! I see our mission as being to entertain and stimulate as well as to inform.

Vivian: Such a variety of articles too, does each newspaper have a theme?

Michael: To an extent yes, especially if it’s linked to a time of year, such as Christmas, or the summer holidays or the start of the skiing season. However it’s also important that we cover a broad range of what’s going and we need to appeal to a wide range of people so I don’t like to get too tied down to one theme.

Vivian: What has surprised you most about theFrenchPaper since the first issue?

Michael: One has been the reaction of many readers. I did expect people to like the paper as it’s something different, but I have been amazed just how much some people say they love it. It’s not for everyone of course and some people have complained that there’s ‘too much about France in it’. Fair enough, you can’t please all the people all the time, I guess. Another surprise has been how popular we are with some French people – I really hadn’t expected that.

Vivian: Talk about the technology used in editing a newspaper in 2010

Michael: Where would we be without the internet and email? Information gathering is so much easier now because of websites, searchable databases and libraries and so on, though I still prefer to speak to people directly for information if possible – you always get more like that. In terms of the page layout and design process, it’s simply a question of using a publishing software package and having the skills to use it properly to produce the pages. These are all laid out and designed by our great design team, including the photos, and once we’re happy with the pages they are simply emailed to the printers ready for printing. It’s that straightforward, though of course you need the right skill to be able to make the pages look good (that’s down to Nadia, our art editor, not me I hasten to add). With an internet connection you could edit the paper from the top of a mountain!

Vivian: Who is reading theFrenchPaper?

Michael: As I’ve just mentioned quite a few French people! But of course our main readership is among Britons and Americans living in France or coming here on holiday or to visit their second home, as well as Irish residents, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans and other nationalities who prefer to read in English rather than in French. As for age groups and profiles … very varied. Lots of pensioners read us, but then so too do young working families with children. I think the common theme among readers, though, is that they are all interested in life in France, rather than just life as a foreigner in France, if you see what I mean. They are people who like to look outside the ‘expat bubble’ and want to know what France is doing and what French people are thinking and saying.

Vivian: Your articles on Work & Money are most interesting; also The Eco Worrier, which can be quite funny, in an English sort of way.

Michael: The Work & Money section is very important for us – we want to give readers advice on running their business, on saving money or even what benefits they can legitimately claim here. As for Eco Worrier’s English wit … Graeme is Scottish so I’m not sure how he’ll take that!

Vivian: The small Ads and KidsPaper are lively too – do children really write theFrenchPaper KidsPaper?

Michael: Yes they do, though naturally they get a helping hand from adults too. It’s a section that’s gone down really, really well with young families, including young French families.

Vivian: Recipes, gardening, and giveaways – talk about the giveaways, please

Michael: Well, food and gardening are part of those lifestyle things that many people associate with their life in France so they are very important subjects for us. As for giveaways, many of our readers come from Britain where they are used to their newspaper offering them a variety of promotions, free goods, cut-price deals on so on. So it’s simply part of the mix, something that readers expect. We all like the chance to win a little treat, don’t we?

Vivian: You also have a part of theFrenchPaper called Real Living; I’m thinking of the article about sheep and shepherds, which was so interesting

Michael: Yes I loved that story. France has such a varied landscape and people, and the aim of our real life stories is to bring to life the many characters who have amazing and fascinating lives here – whether French or not.

Vivian: As Editor of theFrenchPaper, you have final say on what goes out in each issue – does it keep you awake at night?

Michael: As an editor you do get used to that kind of decision-making. To be honest, I have always enjoyed that kind of pressure as an editor. I think the toughest thing for me is that theFrenchPaper is a monthly. On a daily paper, which I’m used to, if you felt you’d under or overplayed a subject one day, you had an immediate opportunity to put it right the next day. With a monthly you have to live with your decisions for quite a while!

Vivian: Lindsey Partos on food prices in your January issue was most informative, can we expect more articles like this?

Michael: Definitely. Lindsey has a good track record in food industry journalism and I’m very keen that we do more of this type of consumer story.

Vivian: Ma Belle France is a great read in The French Paper, also the idea that we use more lipstick when the financial outlook is bleak – how about free lipsticks for your great giveaways?

Michael: Lipstick isn’t my speciality subject but I will definitely mention this to one of my better-informed colleagues!

Vivian: The Big Quiz is a super idea in theFrenchPaper – we can feel really well informed, or if we are not, we can sneak a peek at the answers, right?

Michael: Of course – it’s just a bit of fun! That said, it is also a good source of snippets of information, as well as being a lot of work!

Vivian: Of course you don’t work alone, how many permanent staff does theFrenchPaper employ?

Michael: There are two of us who oversee most of the editorial, with another two who look after the design, sourcing photos and so on. Then there are regular freelancers who work on sub-editing, proofreading, columns and other parts of the paper. The vast majority of the content is written by freelance contributors under our guidance. Then there’s the ad and marketing teams.

Vivian: What is next for theFrenchPaper?

Michael: In the paper, we’ll be seeing more supplements and specials on subjects of particular interest to our readers. Essentially my aim is to maintain the quality and reputation we have established and build from there. A key issue is marketing – getting the paper better known. Having launched in June last year I’m sure that the majority of our target audience still doesn’t know we exist. We have to put that right. Another key area is our news website – it’s under construction and we’ll let you know when that’s ready.

Vivian: How about some contact information?

Michael: Well we do have a marketing website at www.thefrenchpaper.com. Here you can subscribe from as little as €29.47 for 14 issues. And on the newsstands we are just €2.50 an issue – which I hope people agree is pretty good value for money. If anyone wants to contact me they are very welcome to email me at: editorial@thefrenchpapaper.com

Vivian: Michael thanks for this interview and we look forward to the next issue of theFrenchPaper

Michael: Thanks for letting me talk about a subject I love – newspapers!

Freebox: Photo Martin Menu

Grenoble Life editor James Dalrymple has one piece of advice for readers hoping to set up an internet connection in France: don’t use Free. Here’s why.

One of the first considerations when setting up home in a new country is getting an internet connection, nowadays almost as essential a utility as gas, electricity and water. When I arrived, one company dominated combined phone and internet packages: Free - seemingly the only good value alternative to France Telecom at the time. Now there are better value options on the market, but extricating yourself from your contract with Free is not as simple as it should be, to say the least.

Customer service in France often leaves a lot to be desired, but Free goes beyond the normal depersonalised call centre experience to seemingly deliberate efforts to overcharge and stonewall customers that have spawned large internet communities of unhappy punters and consumer associations, but has not apparently done enough to make Free contemplate their reputation.

A Free account is relatively easy to set up, but when you want to cancel your contract, they require you to return the Freebox router by post. All very well, except for the fact that – in our case, and that of many others – receipt of the box is not acknowledged, even if you have paid for a registered delivery service which enables you to track the package by internet to its destination. Free don’t receive the boxes themselves, but subcontract this task to a logistics company.

When Free disputed receipt of the box, our enquiries at the Post office were met with the response (or something to this effect) “Free do this all the time.” Angry consumers in numerous web forums support this, as does the existence of an association named Freeks, dedicated to helping customers untangle themselves from unpleasant disputes with Free, among other internet companies, and who list ‘mediation’ with Free as one of their services. This leads one to suspect Free are quite aware of the situation many of its customers find themselves in, and it is not just a case of logistical inefficiency.

Having claimed that they never received the box, Free then demand that you send them proof of dispatch (i.e., the receipt for registered post) by fax. That’s right, an internet service provider who communicate by fax - everybody’s favourite  21st century means of contact. It gets worse. There is evidently only one fax machine, apparently located at a call centre in Eastern Europe, which is engaged for large periods of the day. As if people don’t have better things to do than spend entire working days trying to send the equivalent of cyber bog roll to the other side of the continent.

Further still, the company insist that you call them within two hours of having sent the fax (assuming you have been able to get through), on a premium rate number. Finally, when we reached the call centre by phone, the operator was both vague and reluctant as to whether they had received the fax – maybe try again tomorrow? (another day loitering by the fax machine, more premium rate numbers). Only on being pressed did the unhelpful operator admit to receiving all the pages of the fax, but claimed it was illegible. Of course it’s illegible, it’s a fax! … we wanted to scream.

It’s a Catch-22, for if we hadn’t rung the bank to halt the direct debit we would probably still be in some daily fax-rage limbo while we almost certainly continued to pay for a service that we are not receiving, and have no wish to receive. We have written to complain to Free’s Customer Services, a postal-only service in France, and they have accepted the end of the contract, but not receipt of the box. They are demanding payment for a additional month’s subscription, and are still asking for the box back, which apparently costs around 400 euro.

Unfortunately you can fight with your principles but short of getting the consumer associations interested, you run the risk that Free will sell the debt on to debt-collection agencies, which really isn’t funny. It’s all over the web, from customers in the same situation as me, to those who never received the box in the first place, and have been paying for a product that was never delivered.

Thus, if you are a new arrival to the country hoping to choose an internet supplier, I strongly recommend that you opt for one of the alternatives. For example Numéricable, the optic fibre cable company, offer a faster connection and a basic telephone and internet package which costs around 20 euro a month, at the time of writing 10 euro less than Free. Numéricable at least have offices in Grenoble with human beings to whom you can speak face to face – which is reassuring – and send a technician to install and remove the router. I haven’t had the pleasure of having to close a Numéricable account, but it can’t be worse than my experience with Free.

Please use the comments box below to share your experiences, good and bad, with internet and phone providers. I hope that this word of warning might help other customers avoid falling into the same trap.

Mixer. Photo: Andrea 'Bau' Pinti

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. We are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and also here on Grenoble Life. 

The 18 December 2009 English Talk Radio show took place at the Grenoble Graduate School of Business and featured GGSB’s Judith Bouvard, Dean and Director, and Mary Zaccai, International Press Officer. Listen to the show here

'Crise immobilière'. Photo: _02_

 Grenoble Life editor James Dalrymple shares his personal experience as a first-time home buyer in the Captial of the Alps – and is happy to report that it’s not all bad news!

Now that I am starting to see a flicker of light at the end of the rather dank and cavernous tunnel called home-buying, I feel compelled to share some of my observations. Whereas I can confirm its status as one of life’s more arduous experiences, it has not been worse than I had anticipated, for no-one ever said it would be a breezy walk in the park with a big piece of cake.

Before deciding to buy a flat I’d had several friends trying to re-educate me on the value of renting for life; unconvinced by the merits of life-long debt and the likelihood of paying the price of one’s property several times over in interest. “Be cash rich and asset poor,” these savvy characters insisted, pointing to the lower home maintenance costs and fewer taxes for locataires (for example the annual taxe foncière is only levied upon owners, not tenants).

One fact of life as propriétaire in a co-property is that one can face hefty fees if the exterior of the entire building has to be repainted, or if there is a shared heating system to be replaced: neither a tenant’s problem. Owning one’s own home, though, is pretty much brainwashed into Brits as a rite of passage, even if we have to accept that we can’t necessarily afford what our incredibly lucky baby-boomer parents had. When my career is over, however, I would like to have paid for my home, and be able to subsist rent-free on whatever meagre pension I have accrued.

To quote a Grenoble Life contributor, Felicity Lodge – whose article Arranging your finances in France is well worth a read - ”buying a property in France is highly regulated”.  I concur, and there are some major pros and cons to the regulation. She goes on to say, “the amount you can borrow is controlled so loan payments and any other regular obligations cannot be more than 33% of your monthly income (net of social charges)”. This may seem strict but the French are a prudent people, and the banking culture befits a country less footloose with borrowing. The kinds of problems that led to the sub-prime crisis in the US couldn’t have originated in France. Likewise, credit is not as easily available as in the UK, and I have the impression that people are more sensible with their disposables.

The upside of a regulated home buying process is that there is less risk. Once you have agreed a price with a seller, you can engage the process via a specialised lawyer (a notaire) who manages the sale from then on. Once you have signed the pre-contract compromis de vente, there is little chance of being gazumped given that the seller would subject themselves to a significant fine if they chose to break it.

In Britain you stand the risk of having incurred legal and surveying costs only for the seller to pull out in the 11th hour to accept a better offer from a rival buyer. That this gazumping is allowed to stand in the UK is obscene, one feature of the county’s rather lunatic housing market. In France, however, the absence of risk comes at a cost: namely 6-8% of the sale price. This covers all legal, tax and surveying concerns, but certainly amounts to much more than the sum of those individual costs in Britain: and most of it goes directly to the government. This fact lends credence to the idea that renting is better value than buying – it is an enormous financial consideration to face on top of one’s downpayment, and a serious obstacle to owning a number of different properties in one’s life.

In the event our notaire was good value for money, something of a showman in fact. Having let his juniors take care of the preliminaries we were marched into his office for the final exchange of contracts. With well-honed comic timing and vigorous gesticulating, his beautifully flowing oration was magnificent to behold: condensing a summary of France’s unsurprisingly substantatial housing law into an hour-long address. Furthermore there were some last minute complications with the bank but he - a force of nature not to be meddled with - was by then sufficiently committed to our purchase to bang some heads together at the bank to keep the ball rolling.

Personally I could see no advantage in approaching an agence immobilière (estate agency). Assuming that you have an idea in which quartier you would like to buy, and the appropriate value for a property in that area, you can search for private sellers online on sites such as Paruvendu and Leboncoin. We negotiated directly with the seller, bypassing the middle man. Given that the notaire conducts a thorough survey of the property and that you can withdraw without charge at the signing of the compromis de vente, then the need to work with an agent did not make itself apparent to me.

If, like me, you are a first time buyer in France, you could be entitled to a zero per cent loan of up to around 30,000 euro. Such loans, and their duration, are defined by your means. We qualified for approximately half of the thirty, and it has to be repaid within the first six years of our mortgage.  However, we found ourselves in the slightly sticky position of having (for reasons too boring to explain here) to apply for this from a different bank to that from which we had agreed our principal mortgage. Of course, the bank from which we were requesting the zero per cent loan held us captive while they tried in vain to beat the mortgage we had secured from our other bank, and upon realising they couldn’t do it, saddled us with a rather inept trainee to administrate the loan.

Trying to get a bank to hurry up (necessary when deadlines have been imposed by the notaire) when there is essentially no profit in it for them is quite futile – more so when you’re main contact hasn’t a clue what he is doing. Amusingly, said bank tried to fob us off by saying something along the lines of “there’s so much admin involved in this loan that it’s hardly worth it”. That’s right, admin not worth potentially thousands of euros – I don’t think so! However, they almost had a point, the sheer quantity of justificatifs required would have impressed even the most hardened of fonctionnaires. Just the photocopying and stapling drew a Herculean effort from our trainee bank manager, who made a clerical task seem like Fort Boyard.

Anyway, now that the boxes that once dominated the flat start to empty and disappear, and life seems worth living again, we can look forward to the much fabled tax credit for first time buyers: apparently the interest we pay on our mortgage is deductible from our annual income tax bill for the first five years of repayment. Rumour has it that if the interest is greater than your obligations, the French government start mailing you cheques. I’ll let you know next September. These advantages put a little shine to the lie that renting is throwing you’re hard-earneds away to a landlord whereas paying a mortgage is like putting money in your own piggy bank. A mortgage is still (in my case) a 25-year burden, but on balance I think it’s worth it.

Musée de Grenoble

The colors of Gaston Chaissac are brightening up the winter season here in Grenoble with the current exhibition at the Musée de Grenoble, Gaston Chaissac: poète rustique et peintre moderne. Camille Bromley of Grenoble Life explains.

by Camille Bromley

Chaissac was a self-taught French painter from the first half of the 20th century, a working class man who was eventually ‘discovered’ by a couple of established artists and introduced to the society of artists in Paris. Chaissac separated himself and his work from the intellectual elite, however, referring to his style as “modern rustic.” The description seems apt; his work is modern in form, in color, and rustic in its simple, even childlike crudeness. In addition to the drawings, paintings, and collages on display at the Musée de Grenoble are sculptures made out of common objects: a bucket, a basket, stones, a personified broom, endowed with Chaissac’s signature awkward smile.

Sans titre, 1957-59, huile

This is a perfect exhibition for children; certainly much of Chaissac’s work actually resembles children’s drawings, and the bright colors and unsteady shapes are immediately appealing. Chaissac’s world is highly personal and isolated as well; despite the rainbow of colors these figures aren’t openly joyous, their uneven eyes and crooked mouths seem to be hiding an inner something. You can imagine an emotional complexity being expressed with unsteady hands. The museum has set aside a room at the end of the exhibition for the Chaissac-inspired artworks done by local children. It is now quite full with colorful figures and bent smiles. There are collages on the wall, faces made with buckets, flower pots, colanders. One of my elementary school classes painted their own Chaissac portraits — what a wonderful way to introduce children to art!

The exhibition will run until January 31^st, 2010.

There’s much more to see than the Chaissac exhibition, however. The Musée de Grenoble is renowned across Europe for its permanent collection, especially that of the 20th century. The museum is over 200 years old (founded in 1798), making it the oldest museum of modern art in France. It houses Egyptian, Greek, and Etruscan antiquities, and a history of Western painting is organized chronologically from the Middle Ages to current day, including significant works by Matisse and Picasso. One of the most pleasantly surprising rooms features former artists from Grenoble and their breathtaking landscapes of the surrounding mountains.

For a small city of about 150,000 residents, Grenoble is home to a rather impressive art museum, and the entrance fee is next to nothing: 5 euro, or 3 euro reduced rate, and only 2 euro for students. Free for children under 18. In addition, every first Sunday of the month is free entry.  

The museum is open every day except Tuesday between 10.00 am and 6.30 pm. Closed January 1^st, May 1^st, and December 25^th. Audioguides are available in French, English, and Italian for 3 euro. Guided visits are also conducted at 3 PM Saturday and Sunday, 3 euro.

On the premises are a library of art history, coffee bar, bookshop, and Sculptures Park. Concerts are held regularly; consult www.musee-en-musique.com

Musée de Grenoble
5, place de Lavalette
38010 Grenoble
Tél : 04 76 63 44 44

Euros. Photo: Zempt

Kate Daligault is a financial advisor at Banque Rhône-Alpes in Grenoble. She talks to Grenoble Life about the banking culture in France, getting financial advice in English, and what new residents need in order to open an account.

Grenoble Life: What is your role at Banque Rhône-Alpes?

Kate: I work with international clients, guiding them through the pitfalls of the French banking system and hopefully making their lives in France easier. I can also help with tax returns and financial planning – even the French find these difficult!

GL: Banque Rhône-Alpes has produced a lot of practical advice about its services in English, why?

Kate: Most of our clients do not speak French or simply feel more comfortable talking about their personal finances in English – the French banks use a lot of technical jargon which can be daunting. We also have part of our website in English, a corporate brochure on Banque Rhône-Alpes, means of payment and different types of accounts in France, and several product brochures as well.

GL: Tell us a little about your background and where you come from.

Kate: My passport is British, but I think I’m what you call one of these third culture people. I was born in the States, and travelled mainly in Europe during my childhood years, due to my father’s career, learning to speak French in Switzerland. I first went to England when I was 12 years old and completed my secondary school and university studies there, and then went to work in The City, London, for Natwest Bank. For my first permanent position, they sent me to France, and I’ve been here ever since.

GL: Why did you come to Grenoble originally?

Kate: Like everyone else – because of my husband’s job! We used to live in the Southwest of France and he was transferred to his company Head Office in Grenoble in 2004, following a promotion.

GL: When did you start working at Banque Rhône-Alpes and what kind of training did you need for the job?

Kate: I’ve been with Banque-Rhône-Alpes for just over a year now, and although I’m a qualified UK Financial Advisor, have a degree in Banking & International Finance, and have been advising expats in France for over 12 years now, I still had to go through the in-house Private Account Officer training! This consisted of four separate weeks of training, spread over three months at the Head Office in Paris. It was difficult to go back to full-day lessons, but very worthwhile.

GL: How can new residents to Grenoble get face to face financial advice in English?

Kate: The best way is to contact me on 04 38 02 38 81 or kate.daligault (at) banque-rhone-alpes.fr and arrange for an appointment. Our branch is right next to Chavant cinema, in the centre of town.

GL: How has the banking culture in France changed since you arrived in the country?

Kate: The main difference has been the introduction of online banking and call centres. Although these provide greater ease of access for clients, they tend to dehumanise banks and make clients feel anonymous. I feel that one of Banque Rhône-Alpes’ great strengths is to move away from this commercial banking model and retain personal contact with clients – I know all my clients by name and see them at least once a year.

GL: How does the banking culture differ from that in your native country?

Kate: Ever wonder why you have debit interest to pay, but your account was never overdrawn? This is due to the French value-dating system, which means that for a cheque for 1,000 € deposited on day one, the funds are not available until day three. Therefore if you write a cheque before that date, you may be overdrawn in value terms.

The other big difference is the legal status of cheques in France. Writing a cheque without having sufficient funds or a pre-arranged overdraft is a misdemeanour, as is bouncing a cheque. This results in being blacklisted by the Banque de France for five years and will affect your credit rating. You will not be able to obtain credit until you have cleared your previous liabilities.

GL: What advice would you give new residents looking to set up an account in France?

Kate: The main difficulty when you first arrive in France is that you cannot open a bank account because you don’t have a fixed address yet, but estate agents will not let you sign a rental agreement if you cannot provide details of a French bank account … it’s Catch 22. At Banque Rhone-Alpes, we have over 20 years’ experience in dealing with new arrivals, and all you need to provide is:

• a valid passport or national identity card if you are from within the EU
• proof of employment / studies in France
• a valid address

Radio On. Photo: Flavijus

English Talk Radio is a talk show in English on 90.8 Radio Campus Grenoble. We talk about film, theatre, finance, restaurants, travel, and have a variety of topical guests. We are four presenters: Kristine Minski talks about finance, Christina Menez talks about China, Mary Zaccai talks about student issues, and Vivian Draper – animatrice/rédactrice – hosts the show. Every Sunday at 12.30pm, and every Wednesday at 7pm on 90.8, Radio Campus Grenoble and also live on www.campusgrenoble.org – and streaming here on Grenoble Life.

English Talk Radio November 27 podcast

Guests on 27 November 2009 English Talk Radio:
Mandy Besson talks about “Peter Pan – a pantomime”, January 20–23 2010 at Cité Scolaire Internationale (information & ticket purchase : gregg.west@ac-grenoble.fr )
James Dalrymple talks about the English language web site Grenoble Life
ETR Presenters Kristine Minski, Mary Zaccai and Vivian Draper, sound engineer Bertrand Tappaz

Rebecca Skillman at work

Rebecca Skillman practices shiatsu from her home near Uriage and also in a well-being centre in Meylan. From the UK originally, she did her practitioner training in Bristol before moving to France at the end of 2004. Grenoble Life wanted to find out more.

Grenoble Life: What is shiatsu and what are the health benefits?

Rebecca Skillman: Shiatsu is a type of massage. It comes from Japan and literally means finger pressure. As well as fingers, I use my palms, elbows, knees – depending on what part of the body is being worked on. I may also include some stretches and other movements to free up the body and release the tensions that many of us develop.

Have a look at www.shiatsuinfo.org to see the range of health benefits (just about every condition can benefit since mind and body are so intricately linked). On the site there’s also a summary of recent research which shows that science is now backing up what practitioners have known for decades about the positive effects of shiatsu. But here in France it’s important not to shout too loudly about this as shiatsu is only recognised as l’art du bien-être – fine as far as it goes, but it can work at a much more profound level for those who want that.

GL: Where did you train and how long have you been practicing shiatsu in Grenoble?

Rebecca: I trained at the British School of Shiatsu, in the UK, between 2001 and 2004 and I’ve been practising in France since the beginning of 2005.

GL: Was it difficult to set up your business in Grenoble?

Rebecca: I am in an association, Chemins du Bien-être, and that works fine because I have a modest level of activity. Since I moved here the auto-entrepreneur statute – a new law aimed at helping small businesses register themselves legally and more simply – has been introduced and I may investigate this further.

GL: Describe a shiatsu session with you.

Rebecca: In an initial session I would spend 5–10 minutes getting to know what the client is hoping for from the session and whatever they want to tell me about what’s going on in their life. The more I understand this the better I can judge what type of session will give most benefit – each session is unique. I think I can safely guarantee that it will always be relaxing on a physical level. But, by putting the receiver in touch with their body, and all the emotions that are bound up with it, shiatsu can also support and release a range of emotional issues and help the person move forward in their life.

A typical treatment lasts 45–50 minutes and takes place on a futon mattress at floor level. The receiver is clothed and the style of touch is a gentle (or vigorous) pressure rather than the sweeping movements of, say, Californian massage. It can therefore suit people who prefer a more neutral and less intimate touch than with oil-based therapies.

GL: Is shiatsu well known in France, compared to in your native country?

Rebecca: Shiatsu is becoming increasingly well known in France. It is supported by professional bodies like the FFST, and if you are looking for a practitioner in any département you can start by looking on their website. Shiatsu is now sufficiently well recognised for mutuelles like Alptis to include it in the therapies they reimburse. That said, the relationship between the medical establishment and complementary therapies is not as developed as in, say, the UK. And shiatsu is not integrated into public healthcare to the same extent.

GL: What reaction have you had from your customers?

Rebecca: People sometimes say they feel lighter – or even that they felt like they had wings! And several have noticed an improved range of movement with muscular-skeletal imbalances. They often sleep better. And the effect can last days or even longer.

Some feedback from my clients:

« Celà a été vraiment très, très efficace, et que je n’hésiterai pas à en parler autour de moi. »

“I felt very good after the massage – positive and energised.”

« Je te remercie pour ce beau travail qui passe par tes mains, tes gestes, ta tête, ton accueil de ta personne et de ton intuition. Une invitation à ce que la vie et l’énergie trouvent un chemin pour circuler. »

“I just wanted to thank you again today for the Shiatsu – it really was a great session. My hips, etc. were really tight yesterday and now I feel great. In general, afterwards, I feel physically better than I have in a while.”

GL: How can we book a shiatsu session with you?                        

Rebecca: You can contact me by email (rebecca_wwng (at) yahoo.com) or phone (04 76 00 06 13).

'my guitar'. Photo: Chewy Chua

Gregg West is an American history and geography teacher at Cité Scolaire Internationale. He also handles the school pantomime, organic gardening club, interpersonal communication classes, and music club, which he has written about here for Grenoble Life.

by Gregg West

About ten years ago, I had a student in ninth grade (3ème) who had stopped working at school. As I listened to her, I discovered a deeper cause.

“My parents have a wonderful house and a swimming pool, but they work 60 hours a week and I never see them. And school is beginning to resemble that for me. I can’t be bothered. I don’t care about these things.  I don’t want to grow up and be like that!”

“Well you don’t have to if you make different choices. You know, one can live with a lot less.  Happiness isn’t about wealth though many confuse them.  But I can see you feel discouraged.  What really interests you in life?”

“I’d love to learn to play the guitar,” she replied “’cause I love music. But the school day’s so long and I live so far away that there’s no possibility. And anyway, everybody says you can’t make a living at that.”

“Well, life isn’t just about money, is it?  You can do music on the side and still learn a profession.  What if I taught you a bit here at school when you have an hour between classes, would that interest you?”

Her face was transformed, “Oh, Mr. West! I’d love that!” So we organized a little guitar class. And this girl began studying again, her motivation back, started a rock group, and finally got her Bac and went on to university.

Soon, the rumour got around and the demand for guitar lessons became a problem because there was no place in the school where we could do this without bothering classes.

But creative, manual and self-run, co-operative enterprises are a sorely missing aspect of education in France. Children need these to round out their personalities, to develop a sense of self-esteem and responsibility, a sense of meaningful activity that they choose for a change that is not imposed, and, of course, to have fun!

So when the new International High School was created in 2001, I immediately identified a place where we could set up a club. At first I lent my own equipment and we built a drum set out of wood and plastic paint cans until concerts brought in enough money to purchase equipment: guitars, a bass, a synthesizer, amplifiers, drums, microphones, cables, and a digital studio. I encouraged all those who knew how to play to teach others and little by little the club grew. The Foyer Socio-Educatif in the Collège and the Maison des Lycéens in the High School also gave us some help buying equipment.

The club now has about 100 members, and 10 supervisors chosen from among the students involved run the club, keeping a check on how members put things away, notifying me of problems, and organizing three or four concerts a year, including one with pay entry to help finance equipment repair and purchase. There are groups that rehearse there an average of about 12 hours each week, free tutorials by experienced members to teach others to sing or play an instrument, and we have even put out two multilingual albums, one in 2006 about AIDS (Sept langues contre le SIDA) with 17 songs which sold about 160 copies and led to a 1000€ contribution by the club to an anti-AIDS association and a more recent album Etat Planète (Et Ta Planète/Et Tape-là-nette) which has sold about 70 copies so far, allowing us to finance an organic gardening club.

The club is only open to our own students for obvious reasons of security and competition for the time slots, but if others want to know how we did it, they can contact me at: gregg.west (at) ac-grenoble.fr

Parents and their Toddler Talkers enjoying a story. Helen McEwan is second from left

abc anglais is a brand new English speaking playgroup in Grenoble for the youngest of children and their parents no matter where you are from. Mums, dads, toddlers and babies are totally immersed in an English-speaking environment during the session, joining in the nursery rhymes and songs, listening to favourite stories, playing age-appropriate games as well as taking part in art and craft activities all conducted in English. It’s run by me, Helen McEwan, a UK qualified Speech and Language Therapist and experienced English language teacher.

Every session is structured around a subject, which forms part of a five week theme, for example, ‘On the Farm’. We always have at least one story, one song, one nursery rhyme per subject, e.g., ‘cows’, and plenty of games and craft activities to keep the children actively interested. There is also a story and a couple of songs on the general theme which we come back to every time to reinforce the learning of the theme and to allow the children (and parents) to familiarise themselves with the English songs and stories.

There are currently three levels – “Baby Babblers” for babies up to 12 months old, “Toddler Talkers” for one to two year olds, and “Chatterbox Children” for two to three year olds.

My idea of exposing very young children to a language they do not normally speak at home is based on the theories of language development in general. There are still many mysteries surrounding language acquisition (and even more so around the thorny issue of bilingualism), but it is believed that a child learns the fundamentals of his/her own language by age three. So, in order to maximise the chances of a child learning an additional language as naturally and easily as possible, it is best to start early.

In addition, there is clear evidence that learning the sounds of language is done in the first year of life, much research quoting just the first six months as the time limit on acquiring the speech sounds specific to your language. So, if you noticed your baby being able to trill or click and make sounds more akin to more ‘exotic’ languages in its early months, this is because your baby was born with the ability to make all speech sounds, but quickly hones into the sounds s/he hears in her environment and continues to practise only those in the babble phase, around six–nine months. Therefore, if you want to pronounce another language well – especially if it sounds very different to your own, (French vs. English!), ideally you need to be exposed to the sounds of that language in the first six months of life, or certainly no later than the first year in order to reproduce them accurately later on!

Making spider bracelets with Chatterbox Children at Halloween

For this reason, I choose stories which use repetition, rhyme, have a strong rhythm, are not very ‘wordy’, but have captivating story lines as well as bold, striking artwork to capture the child’s imagination, even if s/he doesn’t know any English yet. For any form of learning, familiarisation of the subject matter is essential. Repetition is therefore a valuable learning tool, and so we come back to the stories and songs and rhymes during one session, during a theme, and also during the course of the year, but from different angles. ‘Noah’s Ark’ can be used in a session on rain, as well as animals, boats, or counting for example.  In any case, children love returning to their favourite books, toys, programmes over and over again.

The same principle applies to the songs we sing. They are carefully chosen for their ease of learning, and because they are fun, and tuneful and worth singing. Learning through song is almost primeval. Often it is easier to learn a phrase with music or with a strong rhythm – do you remember doing this when revising for an exam, or learning a new language? – as you are allowing your brain more chances of storing the data and hence more opportunities of retrieving it via various routes – the linguistic and the musical. Singing is an almost instinctive response to childcare. Many cultures use music for child rearing, and children respond instinctively to the human voice, particularly their mother’s. In this way singing constitutes a fundamental form of early interaction between parent and child.

I set up abc anglais because of my own experience of coming to Grenoble six months pregnant with my first child. Although I have worked with children, including newborns and premature babies, I had no idea what to expect with my own baby, particularly in a very new and foreign environment. And I was very disappointed to discover that actually there is very little available for parents and babies in particular. It was a very isolating and disorientating experience. Thank goodness for Open House and the Baby and Toddler Groups there, which I quickly became involved with (and I encourage all similar families to). Running the groups there and doing prototype abc sessions at my daughter’s garderie gave me the idea to combine my professional skills with offering something that I feel is lacking in Grenoble – a service for our youngest of citizens. In the UK, I worked in nurseries and clinics for the under fives, and ran parent-child interaction groups which encourage positive communication. I draw on this experience and other principles of my profession in designing and running the abc sessions.

Helen McEwan

So, abc anglais is as much an opportunity for parents to have some quality play time with their young children, as it is an opportunity for the children to become exposed to English at the optimum time for language learning. It is also an opportunity for parents to practise their English, and enjoy being in an English-speaking environment. abc anglais is as much for parents as for children, and this is a fundamental basic principle. And it’s open to everyone, not just Anglophones. Families from USA, Asia, as well as many different European countries, and French families are currently attending.

Sessions are held in two locations in Grenoble – at Les Petits Bilingues, place de Metz, on Mondays and Tuesdays, and at the new English café – Bookworm, rue St. Laurent, on Wednesday and Saturday mornings. The new block starts the week of 9 November. It will run for five weeks, with a special Christmas session in the week of 14 December. Come and join us, it’s lots of fun!

(Check out the Bookworm Café blog and the fantastic Mômes à Grenoble blog for further information on forthcoming events, or contact me: abc.anglais (at) free.fr)

Bikes, St Laurent. Photo: James Dalrymple

New resident Shonah Kennedy – aka Miss Shonah – gets around Grenoble en vélo. She encourages you to do the same. Here is her guide to enjoying and surviving your daily bicycle commute in the Capital of the Alps.

by Shonah Kennedy

Did you know Grenoble is the flattest city in France? This is a statement that I have heard on more than one occasion in my two short months here – and it has indeed been verified by my favourite search engine! What does this fact mean for the residents of Grenoble and its surrounds – Get on your bike(s)!

What better way to commute in the flattest city in France than from the luxury of your own two-wheeler, two-leg-powered machine and – as an added bonus – breathing in the fresh air of the mountainous surrounds?  So, you want to commute by bicycle … there are a few essentials before you peddle off.

Essential 1: A Bike

You can go to the usual suspects – Decathlon, Go Sport etc. or you could try viable alternatives.  Quite by mistake I bought my bike from Carrefour – not even being aware that you could get bikes – and bikes of decent quality with any service – there.  However, my vélo de ville is strong, road-ready, equipped with a cute basket and warrantee to boot! There was even a very helpful bike technician there to tighten a few nuts and bolts before I rolled it through the cash register!

If you wanted to try to commute en velo, but without committing to a bike immediately – Métrovélo can help.  They are very informative and give assistance readily (they also have insider information on where is best to buy second hand bikes, if this is something you want to consider) and you can hire a bike from them for one day or one year!

Essential 2: Protection

So, now you have your machine of choice – be sure to be well equipped! When you drive, or catch a bus or tram to commute – you can run directly from your warm and cosy house into a warm and cosy vehicle (or, of course in the summer months, air-conditioned bliss). There is a layer of vehicle between you and the sometimes inclement mountain weather. Sadly, a bike does not offer this protection so you need to B.Y.O.

Therefore (and from experience of not donning these items) gloves, jacket, head gear and very thick socks will make your commute a more enjoyable experience.  And really, need more be said – it is cold out there (now) and all extremities are vulnerable. It is always better to be able to take layers off than be so cold you can’t operate your machine properly!

With regards to a helmet – there is no question, get one!  It is the only item that will stop you from hitting your head on anything harder than your head in the case of any type of accident. When sitting parallel to a big monster truck, or bus, human insignificance seems to be magnified and these moments make you realise that helmets are good ideas!

Thanks to daylight savings and another Northern Hemisphere winter quickly approaching, it is getting very dark “out there” very early – BE VISIBLE! Yes, look like the “stop/go person” at road works, get more lights than are necessary. Imagine a rolling Christmas tree and this should give you some indication of the level of illumination you need on the roads after dark – or pre-light depending on the hour you need to start commuting.

Essential 3: Know where you are going

There are over 280 kilometres of bike paths in Grenoble.  Not only does this make commuting extremely easy to do, it also allows for many opportunities to get lost! From the Tourist office, Métrovélo, or many online sites you can get a simple map and pre-plan your daily commute, until it becomes as easy and as simple as jumping on the bus.

Now you have your essentials – get on your bike! This is an exciting moment, so considering the following will make it really fun!

Enjoy your daily commute!

**Leave yourself plenty of time to get all your gear on (layers take time to put on and take off!).  Cycle at a steady pace (you don’t want to get to work everyday looking akin to “Mr Messy” because you had to cycle like crazy to get there on time!). For timing purposes I once tried to chase a bus. This little riding experiment resulted in the conclusion that it takes approximately the same amount of time to ride a bike as it does to take the bus. So, to be safe – as I was really pushing the leg power to its limits – perhaps a little extra time should be factored in!

**The road can be a veritable mine-field. There are cars, trucks and buses coming from all directions.  Once you are in town there are trams and pedestrian traffic to contend with. Wherever there is a bike path there are traffic lights, pedestrian crossings, one way streets, Give Way and Stop signs, puddles that cars will always run into just at the precise moment as to splash onto your newly ironed trousers – so all I can say is take it easy. Don’t get bike rage. Take a breather on the footpath and be aware that you and your bike are probably the most insignificant things using the road. The wonderful thing about commuting by bike is that you can go at exactly the speed you want. You want to stop and take a photo – there is no ringing the little green button, just put on the brakes!

**Know your limits.  The other day – in the pouring rain – I saw one brave soul riding along with her umbrella open. This is an absolute personal choice – however when it is a torrential downpour I am on any form of public transport that keeps me dry!

Remember – if it is difficult and you feel out of breath and the cars are just plain ignoring you and all the lights seem to be red – you are doing a wonderful thing for your own well-being, getting to see the city in a whole new light and also you are being very kind to the precious environment! So what are you waiting for – Get on your bike(s)!

Chillis. photo: u m a m i

The French are not known for their love of spices - difficult for Grenoble’s British expats such as Hannah Dee, who comes from multicultural Leeds. Here is her guide to Grenoble Spice: the specialist food stores that hold those treasured, hard to find exotic ingredients.

Coming to Grenoble from a fairly multicultural part of the UK one of the things I found myself missing was the range of foodstuff available. Don’t get me wrong: I think French food is fantastic. The quality of the ingredients here, in particular the vegetables, far outstrips anything you can find in normal shops and markets in the UK. At the local markets you can get truly fresh local produce - cheap, plentiful, and advertising the origin of their produce in terms of département rather than country… Marvellous stuff. No more rooting around Leeds City markets looking at signs saying “Tomatoes (Holland)” or “Beans (Egypt)”.

But what you don’t get is the range of produce, and particularly not the spices. In UK supermarkets you can now get pretty much any vegetable or spice you want, any day of the year. Here in Grenoble, you have to go to a specialist shop (or one of the really HUGE supermarkets) to get fresh chillis and coriander. In urban areas of the UK, they’re in every corner shop. So with that in mind, here is a brief guide to the various specialist food stores I’ve found in Grenoble.

Saïgon Store, 6 Rue Doudart de Lagrée 38000 Grenoble has a range of mostly Vietnamese products – good range of noodles, some fresh exotic vegetables and some frozen stuff, and a huge range of spices. You can get decent hot chillis here and stuff like lemongrass, galangal, and other Southeast Asian vegetables and spices.

Carrefour Asiatique, 88 Cours Berriat, 38000 Grenoble has a similar range to the Saïgon Store, and is handily right next to tram stop St Bruno on the A and B lines.

Rajah Bazar, 15 Avenue Felix Viallet, 38000 Grenoble is a small, packed and friendly store with a huge range of spices and a fairly impressive alcohol selection. They also open late (indeed, there is even a Facebook fan page calling them the “Oasis nocturne de Grenoble“).

World Market, 24 Avenue Felix Viallet, 38000 Grenoble is another small and packed shop, selling food from all over the world. A good range of Pataks curry sauces, Thai and Viet and Japanese and Chinese food, manioc flour, couscous, hummus, falafel… They even have instant “Pão do queijo” packet mixes if you’re after a cheesy Brazilian junkfood snack. And a surprisingly impressive line in hair extensions.

Indian Bazar (Wahey Guru Di Kirpa), Cours Berriat by the junction with Jean Jaures has a small range of Indian foodstuffs – all the dried spices you could want, dried goods, and some chutneys and pickles. This shop doesn’t have the largest range of stock, and isn’t very cheap. But they do have lots of spice!

Supermarché Siam Bangkok, 38, Avenue La Bruyère, 38100 Grenoble is a slightly out of town (on the A tram, stop La Bruyère) supermarket, which claims to be a Thai supermarket but is actually much more international, stocking fufu flour and couscous and a lot of other stuff I don’t know what to do with. The range is similar to that of the World Food Store, but the floorspace is larger and there seems to be an awful lot of dried fish. This one is a little run-down, but still an interesting place to browse.

It’s worth finishing with a mention that the Géant Casino at St Martin d’Heres has a reasonably good section of international food in tins and jars (including Marmite, yeah!) – presumably because of the international nature of the student population.

But what about you? Are there any ingredients you’ve not managed to find? Or any shops that I haven’t mentioned? Do leave a comment if so!

Les Caves de la Chartreuse, Voiron

Gill Baconnier has lived in France for over twenty years – seven of them in Grenoble. She teaches English, works with dyslexic children and, in her spare time, tries very hard to actually finish writing her children’s novel. A former feature writer for an English regional magazine, her articles about life in France can now be found at her blog French Windows. She kindly agreed to share this article about Chartreuse with Grenoble Life.

“They say Christianity is in decay; but no religion that invented green Chartreuse can ever die”  Saki

by Gill Baconnier

Grenoble lies in a hollow encircled by three mountain ranges: the Belledonne, famous for its ski slopes; the Vercors, a stronghold for the Résistance during World War II – and the Chartreuse, home to the Carthusian monks and their famous green liqueur. Now, I’m not a great skier and I wasn’t around during World War II but I do know a bit about the liqueur: it has a beautiful colour; it smells and tastes like a summer’s evening in an Alpine meadow and … it gives you a Day-Glo hangover that you’re not expecting because it is really strong.

A bottle of Chartreuse

The Order of the Grande Chartreuse was founded in 1084 by a German writer and academic, Bruno, who taught at the University of Rheims. Weary of the endless piles of marking, pointless administration and mind-numbingly boring staff meetings – or perhaps simply obeying a call from God – Bruno decided to become a monk. Together with six friends, he scoured France for a suitable isolated spot and happened on the Chartreuse Desert, an inhospitable snowbound place near Grenoble. The group built themselves seven simple wooden cells, a chapel and a dining hall and enjoyed a life of prayerful contemplation and light snacks, thus establishing the first Carthusian (Charterhouse) monastery. Today there are twenty-four of these communities around the world and their way of life has not changed for over nine hundred years.

In 1605, the monks at a Carthusian monastery outside Paris were given an ancient manuscript of unknown origin, entitled An Elixir of Long Life. At that time, few people knew how to use herbs and plants for medicinal purposes and the monks were only able to understand and use parts of the recipe. By 1737, the manuscript had found its way to the Grande Chartreuse near Grenoble where the monastery’s apothecary managed to unravel the complex formula and create the Herbal Elixir de la Grande Chartreuse from the maceration and distillation in alcohol of one hundred and thirty plants, flowers and various other bits of vegetation.

This new medicine was distributed locally, by mule, to Grenoble and the surrounding villages. It became surprisingly popular and the monks soon caught on to the old ‘for medicinal purposes’ routine and adapted the recipe to make a milder drink – that is to say, ninety-six rather than one hundred and twenty-four proof – which they called Chartreuse verte, Elixir de Santé.

During the French Revolution, members of all religious orders were driven out of the country. The Carthusian monks fled in 1793 and as a precaution, made a copy of their precious manuscript. One monk was allowed to stay in the monastery and he was given this copy to look after while the original was given to another monk. Unfortunately, the latter was arrested and thrown into prison in Bordeaux but was able to pass the manuscript to a mysterious hero who somehow smuggled it back to the Chartreuse, where he gave it to a monk who was in hiding near the monastery.

This monk didn’t have a clue what to do with the manuscript – and who could blame him? He had his own problems to deal with (imminent death by guillotine, hypothermia, starvation and so forth), and he promptly sold it to a local chemist, Monsieur Liotard – who didn’t have a clue either, so why he bought it in the first place is anybody’s guess.

The Chartreuse massif

In 1810, Napoleon ordered all secret recipes of medicines to be sent to the Ministry of the Interior, and a relieved Monsieur Liotard dutifully sent in his white elephant of a manuscript. Despite being experts in irrelevant waffle, nobody in the Ministry could decipher the thing, but rather than admit that, they sent it back marked REFUSED. When Monsieur Liotard died, his heirs returned the manuscript to the monastery with, one imagines, a puzzled shrug.

The monks were thrown out of France once more in 1903 under a law that prohibited all religious orders. They were allowed back in 1932, when they began producing their liqueur again. In 1935, their distillery in Fourvoirie was destroyed by a landslide and a new one was built in Voiron, which is where Chartreuse is produced today. The blending of the plants, however, is done in the monastery by two monks – the only two people in the world to be in possession of the formula. Each monk knows half the recipe and because they don’t talk to anybody – not even to each other – it remains a secret. They are linked to the distillery by computer and are therefore able to oversee production while keeping their vows of solitude and silence and doing a bit of online shopping at the same time. Green and yellow Chartreuse – the yellow is sweeter and not as strong as the green – is matured in oaken casks in the longest liqueur cellar in the world.

The original elixir is still used for medicinal purposes today but frankly, you’d have to be pretty ill not to notice the taste. I’m not sure what it’s supposed to cure – although farmers here do swear by it for the treatment of flatulence in cows (note to tourists: do not be alarmed at the sight of staggering cows. They are not suffering from bovine spongiform encephalopathy – it’s Happy Hour on the Prairie). Green Chartreuse, however, is one of my favourite drinks; it is so sweet and fragrant that I hardly notice how potent it is – but the fact that Saint Bruno is traditionally depicted nursing a skull (even if it isn’t his own) should have alerted me. Hmm … If you ask me, these monks have a lot to answer for!

Possibly flatulent Chartreuse cows

You can visit the Chartreuse Cellars in Voiron (less than half an hour from Grenoble by car but if you’re driving, you’d be wise to skip the Chartreuse-tasting part of the guided tour!):

Les Caves de la Chartreuse
10, boulevard Edgar Kofler
38500 Voiron
Tel : 04 76 05 81 77

There is also a museum, housed in 12^th century building that was once part of the monastery, at St Pierre de Chartreuse (half-an-hour’s drive from Grenoble):

Musée de la Grande Chartreuse
“La Correrie”
38380 St Pierre de Chartreuse
Tel : 04 76 88 60 45

Sarkozy & Chirac

In the second post in his blog The Franco-American Daily Deconstructionist; History and Culture in Everyday Life, John Hess asks ”Are you all as bored by the Clearstream affair as I am? If so, then excellent, this blog is just for you!”

Clearstream: Clients, Patrons, and French Political Parricide

by John Hess

For those of you who prefer reading Hello! and Closer, here’s a one–sentence summary: in 2004, in the course of an investigation into a kickback scandal involving the sale of French-built warships to Taiwan, a forged document linking Nicolas Sarkozy (among other prominent politicians) to the malversations was leaked to the prosecutor, allegedly at the behest of Dominique de Villepin, then the Interior Minister and a protégé of President Jacques Chirac.

(Whew! I did it!)

The details are all over the more serious sort of newspaper, and as promised, I shall not bore you with them. Buy Le Monde if you’re interested (it’s cheaper than Hello!, and you get to find out what Left Bank intellectuals did during their holidays in the sun).

What’s really great about this whole affair is the element of pure political assassination, which is unusual in the contemporary Western world, and is more reminiscent of the later Roman Republic than of a modern democracy. Sarkozy and de Villepin are, after all, from the same political party.

Clearstream really began in 1995, when Nicolas Sarkozy, originally a protégé of Chirac, betrayed his erstwhile patron by supporting Edouard Balladur’s rival bid for the presidency. Balladur lost, and both Balladur and most of his key supporters were exiled to the political equivalent of Siberia by the victorious Chirac; the satirical TV show Guignols de l’info portrayed him as John Travolta’s hit man from Pulp Fiction, knocking off Balladur’s entourage one by one, including Sarkozy.

Most of the balladuriens never managed to slip out of their concrete boots and stayed put at the bottom of the Seine, but the buoyant Sarkozy, with his ability to handle the media and generate popular support, proved indispensable, and muscled his way back into the heart of right wing French politics, gaining a ministerial post in 2002 at the start of Chirac’s second presidential term. But for the chiraquiens, Sarkozy was only suffered, not forgiven. During the course of 2004, Sarkozy’s relations with Chirac degraded to new lows, as Sarkozy managed to get himself elected as leader of the political party that Chirac had himself created; and Chirac began grooming de Villepin as his successor, naming him to replace Sarkozy as Minister of the Interior. And, coincidentally or not, 2004 was the year that the Clearstream forgeries were produced. Much of the energy of the three year remainder of Chirac’s presidency was wasted on other fruitless efforts to stymie Sarkozy’s inexorable rise, so as to clear the way for the president’s adoptive “political son”, de Villepin, a brilliant but otherwise politically ungifted man.

This storyline would have been quite familiar to the readers of Cularolife.com, had the internet existed in the first century AD, because it’s a Roman, Latin story: the story of patrons and clients, and the personal favors, betrayals, and vengeances that pass between them; of adoptive heirs and lethal political manoeuvrings.

Anglo–Saxons are used to tribal politics: liberals against conservatives, socialists against free-marketers, etc. Personal rivalries exist (e.g., Brown/Blair), but they are subsidiary to the considerations of the interests or ideologies of the political tribe. In France, it is the opposite, for the Roman tradition of patronage politics is still dominant. Political parties are more like “a loose coalition of personalised alliances, in which everyone belongs to someone.” Ideology is much talked-about, but it’s the networks that really count, which determine who gets access to the governmental goodies. Thus the importance of respecting the patronal hierarchies – and the depth of the anger of the patron when betrayed by the client.

When one considers that Chirac catapulted himself to the top of the French political right by betraying and subsequently destroying his political patron, Valéry Giscard-D’Estaing, it seems fair enough that he should be deprived of the right to name his political heir by the betrayal of one of his own clients.

Now, stay tuned for the inevitable coming drama: who will betray Sarkozy in the eternal quest for the fruits of power?

Nero (left) poisoned his way into the cushy job of his adoptive father, Claudius

Xavier Darcos announces plans to combat stress in the workplace. Photo: Ministère: Travail, Solidarité, Ville

James Dalrymple of Grenoble Life asks why the French – despite sleeping more and living longer than everyone else – are so stressed. Apparently the French government wants to know too …

This month Labour Minister Xavier Darcos confirmed what I had already suspected – France needs to start dealing with stress, which has reached epidemic proportions. The proposed measures may be viewed by some as a knee-jerk reaction to the media storm surrounding the apparently high number of suicides at France Telecom since 2008, which – when taking into account the size of the organisation – may not be much higher than the (admittedly relatively high) national average. However, the new regulations likely to be implemented may not solve deeper issues related to national character: having lived in France for a few years now I feel qualified to say that, contrary to popular belief internationally, stress is endemic to the nation.

Ignore the latest OECD survey that says the French spend more time eating and sleeping than anyone else, a posteriori the French are an anxious lot. As a teacher I have come into contact with a broad cross section of Grenoble’s business community and I am constantly surprised by the amount of furrowed brows and hand-wringing I encounter, and this is not just because of a lack of love for learning English.

Despite the abundance of reasons to be happy in comparison to, say, British people (having quality healthcare, for example, or efficient public transport, good weather, a proliferation of delicious fresh produce, living two years longer on average, being paradoxically slim, etc. etc.) – the French strike me as a far more stressed people.

Call it what the British would refer to as the Blitz spirit (i.e., putting on a brave phizog in the face of abject misery) but we seem to deal with life’s inconveniences better than the French. Maybe our self-depreciating nature would simply not function in a society like France’s where, on the whole, there is much less to justifiably gripe about.

But tell that to the French. I realise now why the French hold that generous stereotype of the Brits as monocle-wearing stoics, bastions of calm in the midst of chaos. It was a view of the Brits that I found laughably alien when I arrived in France as a bruised and bewildered London commuter, but now I see why.

While a Londoner can somehow find it in himself to tolerate entire weekends (and bank holiday periods) of engineering work shutdown on the Underground and dreaded Thameslink, or the limbo of an NHS waiting list, or finding that every shop he knew from his childhood has turned into a Tesco-metro-mini-express … he can probably laugh it off down at the pub.

He may even indulge in that national sport, binge-drinking, but take refuge in regaling his colleagues about the quality of his hangover the next morning. According to recent press, the Frenchman will drink 10% more than his British counterpart, but by stealth – his habit of quaffing half a bottle with every meal perhaps slowly spiralling out of control.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, the French work very hard. Yes, they enjoy unrivalled amounts of extra holiday time, but the only way to deliver France’s much-vaunted productivity is to slog it out at the desk. The French believe this too, they justify their stress by pointing out that they work harder than everybody else, something that might amuse American readers.

But no matter how much holiday is around the corner there is no doubt that the French feel the pressure in their highly regulated job market. Maybe it’s the coffee here – it makes people jumpy and brisk where the British workplace ceremony of making and drinking tea is a big cuddly arm of comfort around the shoulders: there there!

I was surprised to learn that the French sleep more than the international average, since the quality of my own sleep has declined since my arrival; it must be that coffee again. How to cure this? Making sport (sic) is the advice given by most Grenoblois as a cure-all for stress: whether it be slogging it up a 45 degree slope on a bike plastered in lycra or, even less logically, a gym, where the promise of more skin-tight neon and casual nakedness is hardly an attractive prospect to sooth my nerves.

The latter strikes me as particularly pointless in a city where – even if you don’t fancy tackling a near vertical ascent by bike dressed as an extra from Fame – plentiful cycle tracks make it the easiest of cities to work up even the most modest of sweats (my favourite kind!).

On a darker note, the relatively high suicide rate in the country may be representative of a more inherent inability of the French to cope with stress. In France Telcom’s case this has been blamed, by unions at least, on a never-ending drive for efficiency since its 1993 privatisation. The 40,000 jobs that have been lost in transforming France Telecom from public sector flagship to competitive multinational company are certainly not to be sniffed at, but I can’t help but wonder if this constant evolution - more characteristic of the American way of doing business – is a sometimes fatal anathema to a people for whom stability, security and prudence are cherished. How other nationals would react in similar circumstances is a moot point.

However, I find insistence by students of mine – who work at a recently internationalised French company - that in France one person does the job of three people in another country, as laughable. When French workers speak with misty-eyed nostalgia about the not-so-long-ago when they were less blighted by pressure, it is clear they are talking about a pre-globalised world. Is globalisation – France’s modern-era bogeyman – to blame for all this stress?

From a personal point of view, I suppose what I really want to know is: why is everybody in such a hurry? If I’m not being hassled off the road by drivers (often female I might add) for whom driving at the speed limit – or, in most cases, just acceptably above – is not fast enough, I am being harried in shop queues. The French are not quite the monster queue-pushers some Brits – sensitive in this matter - would like to suggest: it’s not quite like (and I’m talking from personal experience here) in India or Morocco, where queues are just for tourists, or in Italy (so the rumour has it), for fools.

Nevertheless, the French don’t like queues, and many try to expedite them, quite unsuccessfully, by standing as close as possible to the person in front of them. Most confoundingly, there are the women d’une certain age at my local primeur who have solved the age-old indignity of being next-in-line by placing their pannier by the cash-till before a desperate (and evidently stressful) snatch and grab job around the shop to fill it up - their place at the head of the queue secured.

I am often tempted to assuage the anxiety of those around me by saying hey, don’t stress: it’s France! when I realise how meaningless this would be. But again, what is there to be stressed about? In Britain, we have surely one of the most hysterical televisual news formats in the world, dramatised by the strokes of Big Ben: BONG! Feral youth on the rampage … BONG!! Knife crime escalation blamed on diet of Fanta and Turkey Twizzlers … BONG!!! Nuclear apocalypse beacons … etc.

How we manage to take this constant diet of failure and self-flagellation in the UK is a mystery, whereas in France the news is suspiciously neutral: 500 cars were set on fire in Paris last night but this is not representative of a wider malaise in French society and you needn’t worry your pretty little head about it.

My conclusion: maybe in Britain we are always being told that life is much worse than it really is and therefore are pleasantly surprised when we can laugh it off. In France, government promises (disseminated almost unchallenged by the television news) that the social state can cure all, can create a gap between the ideal and the reality. Anxiety may lie in between. Careful, it might be contagious!

1. The plateau of St Hilaire, where the Coupe Icare takes place

Suzanne Bonnefond is an enthusiastic amateur photographer and contributor to the Grenoble Life gallery. In the first of a series of posts on local walks, she takes us to a ruined mill near St Hilaire du Touvet.

by Suzanne Bonnefond

An interesting place to go to on a fine autumn day, ideal for those who like unusual historical spots …

Near St Hilaire du Touvet, go to “Les Gaudes” and leave your car in the car park just nearby. It is next to the paragliding launch point – if the weather is fine you can watch them taking off (photos 1–3). Then, follow the yellow signs to “Porte Traine – Cascade des Dioux” a twenty-minute walk across the fields (photo 4). Next, take the little trail that goes down along the stream (photo 5) – be careful as it can be slippery – and admire the waterfall “Cascade des Dioux” (photos 6 –7). A bit further down, cross a bridge (photo 8), and there you will discover this strange place: old millstones covered with moss, a medieval oil mill (9 –13). We would like to imagine this place is haunted by Jacques de Porte Traine, the miller of the Bishop of Grenoble, who ran the place in 1275 and – with Photoshop – it’s possible (photo 14)!

2. Paragliders

3. Paragliding

4. Morning on le plateau des petites roches

5. the path

6. la cascade des Dioux

7. cascade des dioux

8. the bridge

9. le moulin de porte-traîne

10. le moulin de porte-traîne

11. Millstone

13. Ruined mill - we can imagine we were in the jungle

13. le moulin de porte traîne

14. Ghost of Jacques de Porte Traine

Par une belle journée d’automne, une promenade idéale pour ceux qui aiment les lieux insolites : le plateau des Petites Roches, la cascade des Dioux et le Moulin de Porte Traîne … un lieu historique et mystérieux

Prendre la direction de St Hilaire du Touvet,  puis les « Gaudes » . Se garer sur le parking des Gaudes … On est tout près du terrain de décollage des parapentes, alors s’il fait beau, c’est un plaisir de les voir décoller (Photos 1–3). Puis suivre les pancartes jaunes « Porte-Traine – Cascade des Dioux »  20 mn – c’est donc très proche – une courte ballade à travers les prairies (photo 4). Puis on emprunte un sentier (photo 5) – qui descend, et qui peut être très glissant car il longe le torrent, et admirer « la cascade des Dioux » (6 – 7). Un peu plus bas, on traverse un petit pont (photo 8) et voila un lieu mystérieux : un ancien moulin à huile qui date du moyen âge … Il reste quelques meules de pierre… (photos 9–13). On se plait à imaginer ce lieu hanté par Jacques de Porte Traîne, meunier de l’Evêque de Grenoble, qui exploitait ce moulin vers 1275 (photo 14). On en rêvait !! Photoshop l’a fait !!

Gill Baconnier has lived in France for over twenty years – seven of them in Grenoble. She teaches English, works with dyslexic children and, in her spare time, tries very hard to actually finish writing her children’s novel. A former feature writer for an English regional magazine, her articles about life in France can now be found at her blog French Windows. She kindly agreed to share this article about la noix de Grenoble with Grenoble Life.

Nuts about Grenoble

by Gill Baconnier

Walnuts have been around in France for a long time … a fossilised nut dating from the Tertiary era has been discovered in Ardèche and fragments dating from the Neolithic period have been found in the lake dwellings of Charavines in Isère. The image of Stone Age man cracking nuts around the fire is comfortingly familiar, even without the paper hat and the cheap sherry…

The walnut was sacred to the Ancient Romans. They thought it looked like the human brain – the outer husk was the scalp, the shell represented the skull and the crinkly nut inside, the two hemispheres of the brain (this is interesting because my own brain, judging by its performance these days, probably looks and functions exactly like a walnut.) It was the Romans who brought walnut trees to France, after having successfully cultivated them on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius. They established plantations in the Narbonne area, in Perigord and here in the Dauphiné where they thrived.

During the Middle Ages, the walnut was used to pay rent and for a little farmhouse in the Dauphiné region you would have had to shell out a few sétiers (just over a pint) of walnuts. They were so important in mediaeval life that a new profession was created, that of ‘walnut measurer’, although it was a limited career choice as only two posts existed for the whole of France.

However, up until the nineteenth century, the Dauphiné peasants’ main income came from silk worm farms and vineyards. It was not until disease killed off the silk worms in 1858 and grape phylloxera wiped out the vines in 1870, that they turned to walnut cultivation. It was a wise choice. Walnut orchards demanded far less work than vineyards and the new Grenoble to Valence railway line made export easy. Certain species of trees were more prolific than others and legend has it that one in particular was brought here by a young demoiselle as part of her dowry, for her marriage to a local lord. These trees were nurtured and protected so that today, Grenoble produces the finest walnuts in the world. Over fifty percent of the total French production comes from this region while France itself is the third biggest exporter behind The United States and China.

In 1938, the Grenoble walnut was awarded an Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée and – just like fine wine – it meant that the quality was strictly controlled. To qualify, the walnut must be one of three varieties: the franquette, the mayette or the parisienne. These are only three of many. All walnuts look the same to me but to those in the know, each variety has its peculiarities: they are elongated or round, pale or deeply coloured, bland, sweet or bitter. Their names are sometimes bizarre and – like roses – they are often named after events or people: Oswald, Lent or Conference Souvenir; Big John, Fat John or Distaff.

Harvesting is mostly done by a harvester these days but in some places – particularly on the mountain slopes – it is still done by hand. Back at the farm, the nuts are sorted, washed and dried then packed up and sent all over the world. Technology has replaced the veillées of old where the whole village would get together in the evenings to shell walnuts and tell each other stories by the fireside, sing songs, play games and eat together. Now computers bleep, machines whirr and business booms while the ancient nut presses and dryers are quaint ruins left to crumble quietly in the shadow of the Vercors.

Both the tree and its fruit have many uses. The nut is a fertility symbol and in parts of France walnuts are mixed with onion soup and served to newlyweds or they are thrown at them instead of rice – presumably shelled beforehand. Biting on a green walnut is said to relieve toothache and a poultice of crushed walnuts and pork fat cures boils. Walnut oil was once used in lamps or as axle grease, which is hard to believe when you see the price of a tiny bottle of the stuff today. The husk was used to dye hair and clothes and stain furniture and was even used as a self-tanning lotion as recently as the 1950s.

The tree itself was considered cursed: people believed that witches held their meetings in its shade and so they would rip off its branches and throw stones at it as punishment. French folklore warns against falling asleep beneath a walnut tree for fear of waking up with a fever or pneumonia – or perhaps, quite simply, a face full of walnuts.

The wood is of superior quality – it doesn’t split, it is fine-grained and easy to sculpt and polish. It is highly resistant but also beautiful to look at. Unfortunately, it fell victim to these very qualities during the First World War, when all the trees were cut down to provide wood for rifle butts. New trees were planted when the war was over so one catastrophe at least was averted – although not the most important one.

The walnut is omnipresent in Grenoble. Eat it as it is or candied; in the form of sweets, nougat or jam, or made into wonderful tarts and cakes. Savour walnut bread or walnut-covered cheese with a salad tossed in walnut oil. As an aperitif, drink eau de Noix or ratafia, both made from walnuts. I cannot think of a better way to find out if la noix de Grenoble is really all it’s cracked up to be …

Visit a walnut museum at:

Le Grand Séchoir
Maison du Pays de la noix
705, route de Grenoble
38470 Vinay
Tel : 04 76 36 36 10

Michel Has Another Serving of Pasta

In his new blog The Franco-American Daily Deconstructionist; History and Culture in Everyday Life, John Hess’s attention is caught by a recent French road safety  advertisement. 

Michel Has Another Serving of Pasta

 by John Hess

Yes, this is the title of a public interest advertisement. And in most countries, you’d guess that it had something to do with good nutrition, perhaps to counter the carbohydraphobic excesses of the South Beach diet. But no, this is France, and it’s about road safety.

The advertisement appeared on hoardings in the summer of 2009, and may be viewed in full here. The very incongruity of its purpose and content caught my attention as few adverts do, which I suppose is to its credit: an original idea. Sort of like if an advert for Porsche featured a smiling old lady: “since Roger bought his 911T, Dora is finally proud of her son-in-law.”

But I’m afraid it may have given life-saving a bad reputation. In America for example, to be effective the ad would have had to point out the moral significance of Michael’s survival; “Michel Gets to See His Grandchild graduate from College”, or “Michel Calls his Daughter to Say ‘I Love You.’” But here in France, we get the equivalent of “Michel Mechanically Consumes Yet Another Ordinary Meal.” Yes, thanks to better driving habits, Michel is one of the statistics that has been saved, permitting him to mindlessly continue his meaningless, unproductive existence. Almost makes one want to run Michel over, then back up over the corpse just to be sure.

Of course, this is a stereotypically American point of view, and there is something to be said for simply enjoying life as it comes, from day to day, and that this enjoyment should be protected and cherished. But I do think that this is advert is an interesting expression of what I would describe as the dominant French mode of life today: social existentialism – living for the pleasures of everyday life, with as much beach time and tasty food as possible, and as little work, risk, stress, disease, etc. as possible, with a huge assist from socialism. Thanks to the welfare state, Michel has retired relatively young (the advert subtly indicates that he’s a pensioner), and thanks to the nanny state, Michel is alive.

The irony of course is that, in spite of this insistence of the importance of simply enjoying everyday life, the French are not really the most cheerful lot one could meet. While the advert claims that 12,000 lives have been saved over the last six years due to [ahem] our more careful driving, this is the number of depressives who manage to commit suicide every year. Perhaps the advert really should be called “Michel Has Another Serving of Pasta, and He’s Dissatisfied and Grumpy Because it’s not Lobster and Champagne on the Beach – But at Least He’s Alive, For What That’s Worth.”

Not very catchy, I admit. But I do wish that the government would get serious, and sponsor a much needed, and succinct, dual ad campaign: “Stop Driving Like a Bunch of Wackoes”, and “Either Enjoy Your Beautiful Country, or Give it to the English.”

Map of Grenoble - check!. Photo: Ambrosiana Pictures (G)

Shonah Kennedy – aka Miss Shonah – is an experienced and qualified ESL teacher from Australia. She has agreed to share with Grenoble Life the highs and lows of looking for work in Grenoble as a non-EU citizen.

by Shona Kennedy

It was a hot and oppressively muggy day. However, I had given myself a mission and it had to be accomplished.  Job search time!

Now, I could have just sat down in a park with wifi access somewhere (as the internet connection is still in day four of a possible ten-day operation) and emailed schools in the area and waited patiently for replies, BUT I am a little more masochistic than that, so …

I decided to arm myself with CV, confidence, a smile, comfy shoes, a “never say never” attitude and hit the streets – and as many English language schools as my comfy shoes could take.

This was a mission I was not taking lightly.  I prepared my itinerary over a good cup of morning coffee – again a big thanks to James’ post on English language schools in Grenoble. I started with schools closest to my new house and worked my way around in a clockwise direction – and made most excellent use of Grenoble’s more than efficient public transport system.

I was ready: List of schools – check!  CV – check!  Maps – check!  “Never say never” attitude – double check!  Off I went.

There were some “unknowns”:

Firstly, I had been warned of Grenoblois indifference, however after living on and off in Paris for almost two years I thought I would be able to cope with a little Grenoblois indifference – as I was sure nobody could do that as well as the Parisians (and I mean this with the upmost respect – they have indifference perfected and it truly is an art form).

Secondly, cold calling is not an action I personally like.  Cold calling reminds me of the pool game “Marco Polo”.  One person knows exactly what is going on – where in the pool they can move, running around, laughing at the other blindfolded person aimlessly trying to follow the replied “polo”, to their desperate calls of “marco”, when (and if) it is called out. In this job searching endeavour I felt like the one running around the pool knowing exactly where I was going – especially because I had a map!  And the poor unsuspecting English Language institutes were the ones with the blindfolds on.

Thirdly, my French is bad – no actually it is worse than bad.  Can you get worse than bad?  Well, if that is acceptable, that is where I am on the badness scale!  I have taken classes (top of the theory test, please note!) and I can see the words in my head – I can even spell them!  I can hear the sentence perfectly spoken in my fantasy scenario … then there is some sort of malfunction between my head and my mouth, unfortunately they do not co-operate and what emerges is an awful hodgepodge of spoken French with an Australian twang that does zero justice to this beautifully flowing language.

There were some “knowns”:

Firstly, I love teaching English as a second language.  It is fun!  As a teacher I have fun (and learn), and the students hopefully have fun, learn and teach (unknowingly) too!  So, basically I want to work (a very big positive when job searching!), and the quicker the better. By treading the streets I am speeding up the whole process!

Secondly, I have just arrived in this area, so what better way to meet people than to work.  Again, the quicker I can do this the happier life will be.

Thirdly, I have a carrot dangling at the end of a stick – I promised myself a new phone when I acquire a great job!

Oh!  And lastly, I am an Australian.  Sadly I don’t have a European passport, valid ancestry or any magic card up my sleeve that – at the moment – allows me to work in France.  However, I had heard a rumour that companies can “sponsor” people for work; therefore I thought I would see if there was any truth behind this whispering.

So … weighing up the “unknowns” and “knowns” I decided my best bet was to hit the streets.

The first school was curtly efficient.  She was nice, all smiles and positive.  However, she told me directly they were in no need for any new teachers – at this time (perhaps next week, then?!).

After that it was a breeze!  Everyone I met was friendly, enthusiastic and, at a stretch, encouraging.  As expected everyone cringed at my French and most changed immediately to English – I think more to stop me murdering the French language!  Everyone took my CV and said they would give it to the “right” person (which I am sure wasn’t just “a line” as, within the 24 hours post this little adventure I was contacted by 75% of the schools!).

On other positive notes: as a new resident to this gorgeous city, it was a fabulous way to get my bearings and use the public transport system.  I got some exercise walking the streets and I was able to practise my halting French (it can only get better)!

Job searching at street level is definitely a great way to overcome fears of: rejection, isolation, language and getting lost.  I would suggest (as James did to me) to get out there and show prospective employees what you are made of.  And really the worst anyone can ever say to you is “no” and what have you lost then? Nothing!

On that note this teacher of English (still looking for work) is slightly stuffed after all that walking, talking and – I must admit – enjoying.

Testing the off-road performance!

Darren Moss is an experienced climber from Preston in the UK but has lived in Grenoble for the last two years. In summer 2009 he and his girlfriend Cecile took off for Corsica from Grenoble by scooter. They lived to tell the tale on Grenoble Life.

by Darren Moss

All she’d ever done since I bought it was take the mickey out of it. So it came as a bit of a surprise when Cecile, my better-half, suggested that for our August holidays we should ride my 125cc Retro Chinese scooter from our home in Grenoble to Corsica.

I bought it from a supermarket last September for a thousand euros, brand new. Cecile described it’s Italian retro styling as a cross between a Harley Davidson and a plastic bug. Undeterred, I named it Tian-Ma, after the legendary Chinese horses of unnatural power and agility.

We made a pile of only the absolutely necessary items: a fifteen kilogram bag of ropes and climbing equipment, tent, sleeping bags and mattresses, a cooking stove and pots and pans and cans of gas, beach towels, snorkels and masks, inflatable dolphin, swimming costumes and a parasol, warm clothes for the mountains, waterproof jackets, first-aid kit, headtorches, tool kit for the scooter … We looked at our mountain of absolutely necessary items and something had to go. It was painful, but we left the flippers.

With four bulky backpacks strapped to it and another between my legs, the handling wasn’t up to it’s usual Ducati-like standard. The suspension bottomed out over bumps and tight turns were difficult as the handlebars hit my knees. But eventually, in the early evening, doubting our legality, we wobbled onto the open road and kept our eyes peeled for Gendarmes.

Maximum uphill speed: 25kmph

As it only did sixty kmph flat out, maybe seventy downhill with a tailwind and the mirrors folded back and my head tucked behind the speedometer, the autoroutes were a no-go. Even the big Routes Nationales were scary, as cars whooshed past leaving us weaving in a whirlwind of dust and fumes. So we stuck to the scenic route. This was better anyway. On steep uphill sections we couldn’t shift faster than twenty kmph, so we could relax, admire the scenery and converse with passing cyclists. At ten-o-clock, we struck our first camp, under a viaduct near Monestier de Clermont.

The next day we made it to Orange, where we saw Buena Vista Social Club in concert and luxuriated in a three star hotel. On day three we had to make it to Toulon, six hours of scootering away.

What’s that bloke doing in the middle of the road? It was one of France’s finest, Monsieur Gendarme, signalling us, of course, to pull over. I considered gunning the throttle and burning past him, but he looked quite fit and could probably run pretty fast. There were two of them. While the serious one scoured the bike for socially endangering infringements, the friendly one chatted about rugby and his elbow injury and how we reminded him of when his dad had travelled to Corsica on a motorbike when he was a kid and how we should mind out for people driving round the bends on the wrong side of the road, and the pigs – watch out for the wild pigs. By the end we were all laughing like a bunch of mates and they let us off scott free. We warbled away, riding proud and righteous.

On the afternoon of day four, we trundled down the ferry ramp amidst and the roar and growl of a squadron of brother-bikers. Corsica. We’d made it. For the next two weeks we swam in crystal seas, marvelled at the blood red sunsets, climbed the sculpted granite spikes high on the Massif de Bavella. We lazed naked in sun warmed mountain pools. And Tian-ma powered onward, over the highest of passes, along the roughest of roads and around the wildest of pigs.

Sunset, Col De Bavella, Corsica

Amazingly, someone nicked our reg. plate! We crawled out of the tent one morning and there it was; gone. It was undoubtedly already in Italy stuck to the back of a stolen motorbike. The thief obviously had too much respect to steal the whole bike. We reported the theft and fashioned a stylish cardboard replacement.

Then the back tyre developed a crack an inch long down the sidewall, which though not leaking air, could’ve exploded at any moment. Perhaps the designers envisaged that the tyre would last longer than the bike because to remove the rear wheel you have to remove the exhaust pipe, which requires the removal of the plastic fairings, which requires the removal of the seat, the rack, footrests … I’m convinced that manufacturers the world over have a competition to produce “The world’s least user-fixable vehicle”. This thing would’ve done well. So we nervously continued until the sad day that we had to leave Corsica.

On hearing of our epic voyage, the garage owner we found in Nice, his son, the mechanic, administrative assistants and several passing locals shook our hands in congratulation and admiration. He said that as a salesman of this model he knew how bad they are and that we’d made him very proud. He took photos to send to the manufacturers in China. Maybe there are already huge billboard advertisements all over China showing me and Cess astride their trusty steed.

Three more days of butt-numbing trek followed. We even grovelled our way up to Col de la Cayolle on the border between the Alpes-Maritimes and Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, all two thousand three hundred and twenty six metres. Some of the last bikers to fire past us beeping and waving, took our photo when we arrived.

Grenoble. Home. One thousand eight hundred and forty three kilometres and exactly three weeks later. The following Monday I rode the scooter to work. People still laugh at it, but they don’t know anything. Even Cecile is convinced. They’ve never known the joys of warm summer wind breezing through your Bermuda’s, the sweep and swoosh of the mountain roads, the joyful burble of a little low polluting cheap as chips motorbike, Tian-Ma.

Kelly Rigotti writes Almost Frugal, a blog about being smart with your spending, saving and money goals. As probably the only American living in France writing about frugal living, we invited her to share her personal finance tips for her adopted home town of Grenoble. Part I in the series is about food.

by Kelly Rigotti

Although I’ve been writing about frugality and learning how to be frugal since late 2007, this is the first time I’m writing a post about frugality from a local perspective. My blog is called Almost Frugal and most of my readers live in English-speaking countries, especially the United States. I’m American and I’ve lived in Grenoble since January 2000 and I think it’s safe to say that I’m the only American blogging about personal finance and frugality in Grenoble. I could be wrong, but I bet I have the niche covered!

Although I do talk about living in France and the challenges of trying to handle money as an expat (especially paying back my American student loans, most of the topics I cover on Almost Frugal are general enough that anyone can relate to them, no matter where they live. I’m really excited though, to finally be able to talk about frugality and living frugally in my (adopted) city, Grenoble. Today I’ll be talking about the best places to spend less on groceries.

Groceries can make up a significant part of any household’s budget. Certain French grocery chains, such as Lidl or ED are relatively inexpensive, but they don’t always have the best quality food (although I’ve never gone wrong with their canned goods, juice or wine selections). I prefer to take advantage of fidelity programs from stores like Carrefour, Géant or LeClerc. The fidelity programs from all three of these stores are free to join, and if you don’t mind your personal shopping habits being mined by the stores for information, you can recoup significant discounts on your grocery shopping.

Carrefour’s fidelity program offers discounts of 5% on their store brand products, as well as other discounts on time-limited promotions. Often these promotions don’t give the best, cheapest option, but every once in a while Carrefour will have a doozy of a sale – buy one get two free and so on. Carrefour does not put the store credit on your card, instead it mails you a fidelity check at the end of every month, good for use on your next shopping trip.

Géant is the most expensive of the three stores I’m talking about here, and in my opinion, the one with the worst customer service. But it does have one of the best selections of expat foods (Campell soup, anyone) and so I brave the high prices and rude salespeople every once in a while to stock up. Like most grocery stores, Géant will often have loss leaders: products priced quite low to get you in the store to buy everything else. As a side note, did you know that it is illegal in France for supermarkets to price products below cost? Supermarkets are not allowed to lose money on their stock. This is why you won’t find any true bargains at a French supermarket- it would be illegal.

The best supermarket, in my opinion, for customer discounts, is the LeClerc supermarket in the Espace Comboire shopping center in the town of Echirolles. Unlike Carrefour or Géant, which are both chain stores, LeClerc is a series of licensed franchises. This means that the discounts and promotional offers found at one store might not necessarily be found at another.

The LeClerc in Espace Comboire has a series of great, ongoing promotions, a different one for every day of the week. The best is Thursday’s, when, for every €50 of goods purchased you get €5 in store credit on your fidelity card. Combined with other in-store promotions, I often manage to save €20 or more per shopping trip.

Unlike the United States, France is not big on coupons. You will find them every once in a while, either on your register receipt at the grocery store, or as a manufacturer’s coupon, but there isn’t the overwhelming coupon mentality here as in the United States.

Another excellent way to save money in your grocery bill is by buying online – this way you can keep an eye on your total as you go and save money on gas. Both Carrefour (called Ooshop) and the Intermarché in Seyssins have online delivery services. Depending on where you live the delivery charge can be free to quite expensive.

If you’re looking for bio (organic) or locally sourced food, then there are two good online options, neither of which is very expensive and both of which deliver. The first is called The Label Bio and sells a variety of organic and local food. I like them because they sell preselected baskets (panniers) of a variety of food – whatever is in season for €12 to €55 depending on the size and selection of the contents. The second is called The Pannier de Johanna and although they don’t sell preselected baskets of food, they have a wide variety of products to choose from, from patés to flour, all locally sourced or organic.

Here are some of my favorite posts on Almost Frugal on saving money, food and frugality:

Food Shopping and Menu Planning
Stretch Your Food Budget
Your Favorite Frugal Food

Bio: Kelly Rigotti is American and has lived in France for a lot longer than she thought she would when she first arrived. As well as writing about frugality at Almost Frugal, she has a day job as a marketing and communication consultant. In her spare time, she attempts to ride herd over her three children, four cats and handsome French frog of a husband. You can follow her at Almost Frugal, on Facebook or on Twitter.

“Keep walking at rue Saint Laurent”

Prakhar Amba is an avid amateur photographer and regular contributor to the Grenoble Life Gallery. On 18th July 2009 he participated in the Worldwide Photowalk in Grenoble, Grenoble Life invited Prakhar to share his photos and experience …

by Prakhar Amba

“Keep Walking” says the logo of a leading whisky manufacturer. It is slightly difficult for me to imagine the sight of a figure in a black hat and waistcoat striding along with a half empty bottle in his hand. Oops! He tripped and fell down! Anyway, it could serve well for photographers who like to bring out the extraordinary in the seemingly mundane tasks and places which occupy our lives. On 18th July a Worldwide Photowalk was organized where more than 32,000 photographers walked (and shot thousands of photos) in more than 900 cities of the world. I walked in Grenoble.

For me the best way to see a city is not to visit its monuments and museums but to walk in its streets, for it provides a window to observe the daily rhythms of the life of its denizens. So I love to walk, in the rush hour or the afternoon pause, to observe life flow around, oblivious of the clothes lines, the graffiti, the flowerpots on the balcony, the empty beer cans, the rusty paint and so many small things which gives each city a unique character. On July 18th 2009 I walked in the company of 40 other photographers, which made it even more interesting because each individual has his own way of approaching the street. It was a sensory overload to walk the streets of Grenoble through the eyes (or the lens) of so many.

"Kids with cameras"

We started from Place aux herbes and walked towards the Quai underneath snow flake-shaped electric lights and worn-out shoes hanging between balconies. I am yet to understand the significance of the shoes being hung in the city streets – back at home it would be to ward-off evil. We walk through narrow alleyways along shops evoking Aromes D’Asie & D’Orient and several restaurants from all four corners of the world. All around me are people shooting and, well, we are a sight in ourselves. Seeing so many cameras a little boy gets excited and has his moment of fame.

"Rock da party"

A little further along someone is enjoying his cuppa of mint tea in a couscous shop. If the world was black and white, England would be tea and France would be café, but thankfully we live in shades of grey and so in France we can enjoy aromatic tea and tisane.

"Mint tea"

Closer to the Quai Stéphane Jay a girl walks by as the signal turns green. As an Indian, I am told by the French how colourful my country is. No doubt, but I should say so is France, home to the fashion industry which is, afterall, all about colour. In India tea is always brown but here I have drunk tea in shades of vanilla, mint, orange and several others. A glass of red wine adds colour to your meal. And red and green chairs add colour to the streets of Grenoble.

"... and she walks away"

Finally the Quai, to the sight Grenoble is famous for: Les Bulles. There was a photographer who made the same shot with a pinhole camera. He had stuck a hole in a tin spaghetti can and put a black tape to cover it. Inside there was light-sensitive film: peel the tape off to make an exposure. I always saw those in physics books but this was the first time in action. It was difficult to frame shots at the bridge because there were so many photographers around. As I walked across the bridge an old lady walked her four dogs, someone flew a kite in the middle of the bridge and many watched the world pass by from their balconies.

Grenoble - Les Bulles

On the other side of the bridge at “La Cymaise” someone enjoyed his smoke while another his café and croissant. And all the while people kept shooting. There was one crouched on road waiting for the man to light his smoke. As an old photographer’s guidebook says, “one mans smoke is another man’s photo”. Ok, no one says that but I personally find smokers an interesting subject. The way they hold the stick, the smoke breathing out of the nose and the signs of pleasure of their face.

"Café and croissant"

"Smokers at La Cymaise"

"Draw a smoke"

Now we climb towards the Musée Dauphinois, and here its not the artwork displayed inside but the gentle curve of a door knob which makes me wonder of the countless hands which turned it.

"Turn me gently"

Have you seen the movie Amélie (Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain)? In the movie one of Snow White’s dwarves travels around the world getting photographed at all the major sights. People have their idiosyncrasies, they like to get photographed with their Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse at the Taj Mahal or the Eiffel Tower. I met one who liked to photograph his (not her) Barbie doll.

"Barbie on a fence"

We climb down and walk through Place Victor Hugo to one of Grenoble’s well kept secrets, the Garage Hélicoidale just behind the FNAC. You enter it amidst the sooty walls and smell of fumes not expecting to see much really but its so much more than just un parking. Numerous floors wind upwards in a circular helix topped by a glass roof that becomes its source of skylight, emphasizing and illuminating its climbing gradient. The best part of the for me was to see the whole structure reflected in a car parked in the basement.

"Garage Hélicoidale"

Goodbyes said and ‘Au revoir’ wished and we disperse. I walk back home with the thought in my head “Keep walking and keep shooting” – for in each nook and corner of our world are hidden moments worth capturing. Even garages can be more than just for parking your car and then forgetting where you left it.

Tag bus in action! Photo: Ambrosiana Pictures (G)

In previous article for Grenoble Life I bemoaned France’s rather particular brand of service culture, in some instances comparing it unfavourably to the UK. However, there are certain aspects of life in France in which the nation seems to defeat us Brits with an effortless and dismissive Gallic slap: transport. Whether it be the gleaming speedways they call les autoroutes, the super-fast TGV trains or local bus networks that operate with the kind of clockwork, almost Teutonic punctuality - getting around in France can make Britain seem grimly backward in comparison. 

When people ask me about life in France I always answer that one quickly assimilates the positive aspects in a culture but the negative ones obviously take longer to get used to. But one thing that I have quickly integrated is France’s bus network and meaningful time tables. In England we seem incapable of developing a timetable that takes into account the vagaries of the traffic at a given time of day. In London such timetables are mere token gestures that serve no apparent function – and it has been a long time since I have seen anyone try to use one.

In the last ten years LED displays have been introduced to London bus stops to serve you the latest bus arrival times. It is not clear if these are operated by GPS satellite or crystal ball (I suspect they are simply based on the original, obsolete timetables) but they do little to expedite your journey. Instead they serve to heighten your expectation and thus your disappointment too - buses listed as ‘due’ frequently vanish from the radar, never to arrive.

To have, in Grenoble, a bus timetable that you can obtain online and as a leaflet, and plan your journey accordingly, still strikes me as a minor miracle. For someone who has grown up with buses arriving ostensibly au hasard, I still find myself delighted in France that using such transport needn’t be fraught with anxiety. On buses in France I am always at my jubilant best – full of optimism for modern life: in idiotically open-mouthed awe that a bus could actually arrive at the stated time. I suppose I ought to get out more.

Grenoble’s buses are not just efficient but clean. London buses rarely seem to receive more than a cursory rinse around the edges, with chicken wings, apple cores and sodden newspapers often to be found pressure-hosed into a paste around the top deck drainage holes. Not so here, where local operator Tag (Transports de l’Agglomération Grenobloise) circulates buses that positively gleam.

In London bus drivers are not to be bothered with questions or even the smallest of favours. “Well you thought wrong!” one snapped at me after I was foolish enough to query the route destination. Worse even is that many London bus drivers, under instructions not to take passengers except at the official stops, seem to take a sadistic pleasure in ignoring the pleas of sprinting commuters, or even abandoning young women in deserted streets late at night as they didn’t get to the designated stop in time.

I have seen Grenoble’s bus drivers communicating via klaxon to help passengers make their connection – almost unthinkable in London – and wait for running passengers rather than speeding away from them. When I see this happen I get misty eyed about this brave new world where drivers actually conspire to help their passengers reach their destination! “Don’t take it out on us!” says the latest advertising slogan protecting London bus drivers from the kind of abuse enraged commuters often serve up in the rush home, the “it” presumably being a totally miserable journey home, every day.

Maybe bus drivers in London have a demoralising job with less than pleasant conditions but often one is made to feel an enemy rather than a customer. While in France the reception from bus drivers is hardly chaleureux, there seems to be an unwritten contract between driver and passenger to say bonjour and merci, au revoir at the beginning and end of each trip. A wave of thanks on disembarking is always seemingly acknowledged by an appreciative nod in the rear view mirror. French bus drivers probably get a better deal. Considering the number of strikes they have called in the last few years I wouldn’t be surprised.

The main crime of the Tag and Transisère bus companies is not to run a service after half past eight, effectively cutting off Grenoble’s suburbs and neighbouring towns from the city’s night life. As someone who lives in Meylan I can say with some certainty that drink driving is endemic in France. I am apparently the only adult in the ‘burbs who elects to use the single, hourly night Navette from Grand Sablon to Meylan – the only way to get home from Grenoble on Friday and Saturday night without walking or driving.

Packed with carless drunk teenagers from the wealthier parts of Grenoble’s agglomeration, taking the Navette is quite an experience. It is often seen helmed by Marie-Noëlle, the beleaguered and tiny-voiced conductrice who seems comically incapable of controlling the raucous adolescents. “On est perdu!” they scream and sing as Marie-Noëlle wearily navigates the winding back streets of Corenc.

A French friend of mine in London told me she was surprised by the grim acquiescence of Londoners regarding the state of the bus service. One might wait 20 minutes in the rain for a bus only for it to neglect to stop for passengers. The English suffer in silence while the French, she said, would be up in arms remonstrating. She put this down to national temperament, that strangely generous French stereotype of the British (unknown on the other side of the channel it seems) that the Brits are bastions of calm in the midst of chaos.

However, I put this tacit acceptance of inefficiency down to the fact that the Brits simply don’t know any better. Many haven’t experienced a clean and reliable bus system, and don’t expect one. See you on the 6020 to Chavant!

Prakhar Amba is an accomplished photographer and regular contributor to the Grenoble Life Gallery, including these magical ones of Fête de la musique 2009 in Grenoble. The pictures suggested a story, and Grenoble Life invited Prakhar to tell his …

by Prakhar Amba

Whenever I ask the French what they miss most when they visit foreign countries, the most common responses in order of priority are le pain and le fromage. There is never a third response. Now I am an Indian, a country best described by the word ‘diversity’, be it languages, colours, smells, spices or music.  Music is everywhere in India, it is in the loudspeaker playing the latest Bollywood hit, the brass band blaring in a marriage procession, the cacophonous symphony of the tuc tuc’s horn as it criss-crosses the traffic, or the prayers at the banks of holy rivers. Life for us revolves around music. After all, even our Gods are master of their own musical instruments, be it Krishna’s flute or Shiva’s daamru.

Needless to add, the thing about India I miss the most is music. Here in Grenoble, the streets are silent, even the traffic is muted. So I anxiously awaited La fête de la musique on June 21st, and I was not disappointed. But how does one write about music? After all, Victor Hugo said “Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and cannot remain silent”. Words fail me, but maybe images say it better, for they are stuck forever in the moment when the singer lets go and you are immersed in the note never to escape. So I set off for the centre ville in the pleasant Sunday afternoon on my metro vélo with my camera. The wind blowing in my hair, my ears open to catch any musical notes floating by. And the soft notes of violins pull me to the church next to Place Victor Hugo.

Here a group of children played their violins. Ah violins! There already is something mystical about its curves and the mirrored ‘s’. To behold the sight of kids nimbly working the strings and the accompanying gasps from the parents is quite something. After all, music is not only played by the musician but has to be appreciated by the listeners. It reminded me of a poem by Tagore I read in school which spoke of music being born from the crash of the sea waves (player) on the shore (listener). Music of the wind (player) rustling through the forest (listener) and here before me was the same interplay between the player and the listener.

To add to the magic of the moment was the conductress who, through the swish and swirl of her hands, wove tales of love and despair in the music.

I also found a little cherubin sitting in a corner, practicing her violin with her friends. You know the shot which makes you smile, when you know you captured the moment right. For me it was this. I don’t know the music they played, Vivaldi or Beethoven, it didn’t matter for me. For me a smile played on the faces of everyone present. The performance ended, and endless claps and graces later the group dispersed. The violins are packed in their cases for another day.

I move on to another street where a girl sings enchantingly. She sings in English but music knows no language and it is appreciated by all. She sings jazz, or was it blues or maybe folk? I know not. For me she sung from her heart, she sung of love and longing.

Sometimes I wonder why most of our songs are about love and the most beautiful of them are those of love lost.  Maybe it’s because we as humans fare poorly in expressing our love for another through words that we burst into a song to do the same. No doubt in Bollywood every expression of love is faithfully followed by a song. To say ‘I love you’ to someone for the first time is never going to be easy until you practice it a hundred times, setting it to the tune of your favorite song. Even mystically speaking, Sufism is for instance a facet of Islam in which divine love for God is expressed through music. Similarly with Hindus, the Bhakti tradition is love songs for the mystical lover, Krishna.

And now its time for some punk – around the corner a group plays with the lead singer swaying in her skirt causing the traffic to snarl down while onlookers gulp down glasses of beer. I thought France was more about wine but it seems with music it has to be beer. Music beckons me to move forward, somewhere from a narrow alley flows a song in a language which I know not of. Maybe it’s Spanish or Portuguese or Zulu, I care not for I can move to the beats of the drum and the singer, she has nirvana written all over her face. She sings as if she is in a trance.  I imagine she sings of reunion with her lost lover for otherwise I cannot explain her expression.

She opens her eyes and all is silent. We wait maybe for a cue before everyone breaks into applause. A moment of awakening. And then there is guitar solo. The guitar is I believe one of the most versatile instruments, from the Spanish to the electric it has a certain aura about it and can break into the most beautiful and unexpected notes. So here was the guy who performed a duo with the girl with the drums and made people tap their feet.

I move on towards the Gare but the streets are silent so I decide to explore the river side. On the bridge from where you can see the cable car (les bulles) are a group of musicians preparing their gig. So I cross over to reach the lane of Italian pizzerias. I find Grenoble to be a gastronomical delight even compared to Paris, for here you can find good Indian restaurants and also authentic pizza. Coming back to matters of music, a delightful sight beholds me. It’s dancing skirts or, as my dad remarked on seeing the photos, dancing lehengas. Now lehenga is traditional Rajasthani dress worn by the bride at Indian marriages. One can always find similarities between cultures.

I first thought they were Italians – after all I was standing outside a pizzeria – but the music, no, it carried tones of South America and yes, they were Colombians. The music had the energy to make your foot tap but the best part was the swirling skirts, the elegance. Enough to make the passing cars honk to the beats of music. Yes, it felt like India where the traffic contributes to the music of life. It got better when I meet a friend there who introduced me to the group. The girl in maroon is the sister of the girl in pink and the one in red is their mother. The little girl whose expression I call ‘I dream of Jeannie’ is the daughter of the girl in pink. So we had three generations dancing and singing together.

Now, about the little girl. Do you know the American serial ‘I dream of Jeannie’ where the Genie granted you your three wishes by twitching her eyes? This little girl was just like her. I wonder what she wishes me. I was granted my three wishes, good music, good photographs and memories of back home. Later, I joined the group for a drink in a café nearby. See the benefits of the La fête de la musique? Making new friends. So we sat and discussed, I a little humbled in presence of such talented musicians and singers. When the question popped up – what instrument do I play? I replied, ‘none’, for I am the listener, I am the one who appreciates their magic.

Evening falls and I walk in the small lanes along Bastille where different styles of music, French, African, American, and from all nooks and corners of this wide world, fuse together to create a new symphony of harmony. We may have barriers of languages between us but music joins us for we can dance to any rhythm. Another thing I noticed was how there was space for all different kinds in the same small lane, it teaches us small lessons of co-existence with the other.

Later I walked back to Place Victor Hugo and now the space was taken by the rock gigs and an endless mass of people moving around. It was heartening to walk in the city awake even late at night, people breaking into spontaneous dances, some kissing and some holding hands. It felt good to be a part of the crowd, felt like home. To end, my favorite French instrument, I encountered it in 2000 when I first visited Paris. I still don’t know its name but it has its charms. I visited Sacré Coeur in Montmarte and there was an old man with a red cap turning little punch cards into it with a lever and out flowed music that reminded me of childhood. So here it was again in Grenoble.

Photo: mikeandanna

Last Saturday evening was an important occasion for my wife and I. Not only were we celebrating our second wedding anniversary but it was our first evening out since the birth of our daughter, now three months old, who was kindly being babysat ber grandparents. Now I may have Scottish ancestry (albeit watered down through several generations – but hey! I still have the tartan surname) but I don’t mind pushing the boat out once and awhile and spending a little extra on a quality restaurant.

Where I live we are not exactly spoilt for choice, but there is one Michelin guide-recommended restaurant on the border of Meylan and Corenc called Restaurant Le Provence, so we made a reservation there. Just to put it into perspective, there is a restaurant in the same street – not without a decent reputation but which ought to remain nameless here – whose owners have an enormous and very shaggy German Shepherd which I have seen loitering in the kitchen.

Having made our reservation for Le Provence with little difficulty less than one week before, we were pleased when we arrived to be warmly greeted by a bustling, professional waiting staff. Modern and informal, the young, all-female team led by Danielle Gaggio, the chef’s wife, made a refreshing change from the surly owners and disinterested career waiters one often finds in Grenoble.

In fact I noted that the service was not only exclusively female and young, but all conspicuously Mediterranean in appearance: no men or blondes serving table at Le Provence. There was an annonce for a vacancy in this capacity – so I’d be curious to see how applications from anyone male or gold of locks would fare as a candidate. Luckily I already have a job, as I would be particularly disadvantaged on both counts.

We were ushered into a pleasantly lit courtyard of aromatic trees and plants which was quickly filling up with diners. This outdoor dining space, which has a retractable canvas roof, is the perfect ambience in which to fully appreciate Le Provence’s beautifully prepared fresh fish dishes garnished with carefully selected Mediterranean ingredients.

Having ummed and ahhed for a period over which menu to take, we finally opted for the three-course Privilège. At 35 euros, it was the cheaper choice (I am a Scot by name after all!) of the three, the most expensive of which was in the environs of 50 euro and had to be ordered in advance. I chose Foie Gras with a Provençal-sytle salad for a starter; my wife a tartine with roasted Meditterranean vegetables and Serrano ham.

For the main course we both had a Plancha of tuna with a light potato mousse, grilled veg and a kind of cuttlefish chutney. Despite the sensational variety of flavour and texture to indulge in, it was never too busy or rich – a harmonious spirit of Provençal cuisine ran throughout. While certainly gastronomic, the dishes were not pretentious, remaining faithful to Mediterranean ingredients.

Unfortunately we had to rush our equally delicious dessert in order to return to our hungry baby, so were unable to linger in the courtyard as long as we would have liked. But we did have the pleasure of meeting the highly personable chef, Eric Gaggio, as we paid at the reception on the way out. Simlultaneously smart and modern but informal and unpretentious, Le Provence is by some distance the best restaurant I have tried in the Grenoble area. Check out their informative website, where you can find information on the menus and prices but also cookery courses, their range of olive oils and catering options.

Restaurant Le Provence
28 avenue du Grésivaudan
38700 Corenc
04 76 90 03 38

English is increasingly common in Grenoble, not least in graffiti !

I used to wonder why, very often, when I tried to speak French in a restaurant, shop, post office or market, for example, the reply would come back to me in English. Given that I am at least semi-competent in French, I couldn’t help feel offended at being treated as a tourist in the country I called home. I don’t think it would be presumptuous to say that I am not alone in this experience. When I first arrived in Grenoble I made a school-boyish but pardonable error in asking: Est-ce que vous avez du bière? at a café, having not quite nailed down the gender of that favourite English beverage. The waitress looked at me as if I was from out of space, before replying “Not bière”.

However, what has become increasingly apparent to me is that my linguistic skills are not being spontaneously judged and deemed unfit but rather that the French are grabbing an opportunity to practice their English. The look of the woman in the café was probably not one of complete incomprehension but one masking certain grammatical computations, for what it was worth. It is probably a look I wear myself quite often as my brain lags doggedly behind my tongue during an experiment with, say, the French Subjonctif.

On the bus yesterday I was very amused to hear a group of nine or ten primary school children singing in unison, “I like English! I like English!” before a musical rendition of the alphabet that faultered every time they negotiated the obstacle course that is “L-M-N-O-P”. “Yes, it is! No, it isn’t!”, I left them chanting ecstatically, presumably in recollection of their English classes, quietly wishing to myself that I had adult students with such unbridled enthusiasm about their training.

This morning I was delighted to be greeted at the boulangerie by a welcome new face. As I have mentioned in a previous post about Grenoble’s service culture, trips to my local shops have sometimes been fraught with peur et tremblement. Today, however, I was greeted by something extraordinary, a new face whose defining characteristic was a smile from ear to ear. Surveying the empty shelves I asked, “Vous n’avez plus de croissants?“, to which the smiling face replied, amiably and in no poor accent, “Not any more!”. In such situations I prefer to persevere in French while remaining friendly enough to show that I don’t mind a conversation in two languages. As he handed me my change with the kind of extraordinary deference reserved for a foreign dignitary (a half bow, and a “thank you, goodbye”), I didn’t even care that I had no viennoiseries to bring back to my wife on Mother’s Day.

Such exchanges are not always as pleasant, I had an interesting experience at the market in Aiguinards a few weeks back. I was at the fromagerie when a man struck up conversation with me, at first curious about my five week old daughter in a baby carrier: generally a guaranteed way to attract attention in France, for better or worse. Realising I was British, he then used the occasion to practise his English, even though I persevered in French. He told me he had spent time studying in the UK, before complaining about the “Shitty weather”. He went on to add that the “food was really Shitty in England, absolutely disgusting! The food was so Shitty it was the first time in my life that I lost weight. There’s probably more cheese here [gesturing at admittedly fantastic selection on the market stall] than in the whole of Britain”. “I don’t mean to offend you”, he added. Charming!

So, despite the best efforts of the Académie française, English seems to be permeating French culture. At my school the other day I had to evaluate the level in English of a number of employees sent by their company. For many of these, it was their first job and they had just recently completed their studies. Furthermore many had taken the opportunity to live and work in the UK to learn English. The impression I am getting is that while the French are proactively and pragmatically studying English, the Brits have become lazy and complacent about studying languages since English became so internationalised.

Tant pis!, the Brits might say (if they knew how to), except that, as reported in the Guardian, companies in the UK are increasingly turning to foreign nationals for jobs that require more than one language. The article shows how second language study has declined in Britain since the Labour government stopped making it obligatory at GCSE, a serious error in the view of many, myself included. I remember one frustrated colleague when I worked in London reacting to a telephone conversation in stilted English with a counterpart from a French museum with the angry exclamation, “I hate it when people can’t speak English!”. Perhaps the wind of change has already come.

Grenoble University Campus

I visited the Grenoble University Campus for the first time in a while last weekend and spent some time enjoying the Brutalist architecture. As someone who also studied at a university built during the much-maligned architectural wildnerness of the 50s and 60s, and who subsequently went on to work at London’s monolithic South Bank Centre, there is a special place in my heart for these visions in concrete. I think the style has long passed its nadir in terms of fashion and popularity, and we have begun to accept such buildings as part of our urban and cultural landscape. We no longer immediately associate such concrete idealism with the failed high rise housing estates. Walking around campus on a sunny May Sunday, it was easy to appreciate the original vision: the blend of functional concrete and broad lawns. Frankly the abundance of greenery and uncrowded assembly of buildings was refreshing after the more tightly-knit pressures of the city centre. Here are some pictures – let me know what you think.

Opposite the student union

From a strictly feminine point of view, a trip to the hairdresser can be an ordeal, even in your native country. I imagine for a boy it is simply a case of “Don’t take too long” but for us ladies, who often have a lot more to lose, literally, metaphorically and financially, it becomes a trip wrapped in all kinds of trichological anxieties.

First there’s the choice – the scientifically-endorsed, one-size-fits-all cut, bestowed by a tight-jeaned graduate wielding an asymmetric fringe and designer clippers, or a slightly dodgy trim from the local gossips on the corner? Add to that the fact that you never get exactly what you ask for – even when you can ask in the correct language – and I was more than usually nervous about my first trip to a French coiffeur.

I needn’t have been. It was a breath of fresh hair from wash to blow-dry. As my scientific French isn’t up to scratch and having a slight phobia of overly shiny surfaces, I rejected the swish salons of Jean-Louis David for my local snippers in Uriage – two friendly girls who, as far as I could tell, did not leak one village secret.

Desperate to avoid the standard Jeanne d’Arc haircut, I had hurriedly ripped a picture out of Marie-Claire that morning, which was met with plenty of nodding and a flurry of words including « dégradé ». I hoped that “degrading” was not going to be the result.

I went for the standard wash, cut and blow-dry. So far, so good. No coffee was offered, banishing at once the dual problems of dashing to the loo mid-cut, and coffee breath-holding while they do the front. However, unlike British hairdressers, mine was not at all reserved about announcing my hair’s defects to the entire room. « Mais ils sont secs ! Secs, secs, secs ! » she tutted, warning me off straighteners for life, while applying something almondy to my shamed locks.

As usual it was a little shorter than I’d asked for, but I was surprised. Staring back at me was someone who resembled slightly less a frazzled British girl and ever-so-slightly more a glamorous coiffed French lady. It cost €40, around £20 less than I’d pay in the UK.

TIPS

• Big salons are more expensive €30 – €90+ for colouring, but will often give you a package price that covers everything – ask exactly what the price includes.
• At a local hairdresser, study the price list as there can be costly hidden extras. €25 seems cheap for a cut, but washing and blow-drying is often charged separately, at around €5 – €10 each, and conditioner can add an extra €6 to the bill.
• Ask for student or young person discounts if you are under 25.
• Take a picture of the desired result along with you.
• Tipping isn’t obligatory for standard service (without coffee!).

Finally, some handy vocabulary for going to the hairdresser:

Your hair: vos cheveux

A lock of hair: une mèche

Fine: fins / Thick: épais / Oily: gras / Dry: secs / Curly: bouclés / Frizzy: frisés /

Smooth: lisses / Damaged: abîmés

A wash: un shampoing

Hair conditioner: une crème ou après-shampoing

A deep-conditioning hair mask: un masque capillaire

Dyed / to dye: colorés / faire une couleur

Highlights or streaks: des mèches

A haircut: une coupe

Short or long: court ou long

Layered / Layered on top: dégradé / dégradé sur le dessus

A blunt cut: au carré / Asymmetrical: asymétrique

A fringe: une frange

Hair ends: les pointes

A hairdryer: un sèche-cheveux

A blow-dry or straightening: un brushing / un brushing raide

Slightly turned up at the ends: un brushing avec un léger mouvement sur les pointes

Attractive watering hole for a thirsty Englishman - or is it?

As an Anglophone in Grenoble you may, like me, have had something of an adjustment period regarding the service culture in France. There are several deeply instilled beliefs that you may have to abandon like the hardest of bad habits, for instance the not necessarily culturally-translatable motto “the customer is always right”. The customer and server are altogether different beasts from those ‘back home’, wherever that may be, with service ranging from a brutal efficiency that sometimes borders on the violent (I’ve been served in restaurants where the laying of table should be conducted with the warning “keep your limbs inside the vehicle at all times’), to active disinterest (there are occasions in Paquet Jardin where I have practically had to beg to be served) and, occasionally, downright hostility.

Dealing with the first two forms is less problematic, it is easy to put a surly career waiter down to experience, and as shoppers from the UK’s chain-store ridden retail universe can attest, active disinterest is not such a shock to the system. The third variety is, I confess, a rather unpleasant novelty for me. I have become convinced, rather irrationally, that the staff in my local boulangerie hate me. Going there to part with my hard-earneds – which I have done sheepishly for nearly two years – has become a source of dread to me. Not only have I failed to engage in any kind of meaningful banter (more on that later) with the proprietors, but I have become convinced that they deliberately select the poorest quality bread to give me as a way of warning off my future custom. Other customers, especially those with kids it seems, are greeted with the kind of bonhomie that leaves me feeling envious and inadequate, while I am not granted even a flicker of recognition for my loyal custom.

My experience at the baker is born in part, I believe, with my inability as a banterer. While my French improves, my capacity for making casual but engaging small talk remains null. All attempts in this area have ended in shame and self-loathing. It was my brother-in-law, a native of Grenoble, who explained the bantering concept to me. Service is not a given in France, relationships with shop keepers must be forged and tended like fledgling plants: nothing must be taken for granted. If you are fundamentally bantering-averse, like myself, you are severely handicapped in such transactions. From the Lands of the Bottom Line (i.e., the British isles and westwards), where money matters most, this is almost incomprehensible. Furthermore, whereas in the UK I am familiar with facing surly adolescents in shops, in France such casual employment is harder to encounter – owing to high social security contributions made by companies on behalf of their employees – and more often than not it is the shop keeper him or herself who is serving you (with or without enthusiasm). In these apparent crisis times it’s something of a mystery that shopkeepers feel they can afford to be disinterested to your custom; suffice to say that service simply is not in the French blood.

I am exaggerating, of course, but a couple of more extreme examples add a little bite to this fluffy commentary. Once I gave several camera lenses to a camera shop in Grenoble to sell second hand on my behalf. When we finally came to retrieve them, unsold, the owner was apparently unable to locate one of them, which was worth une centaine d’euro. Rather than accepting responsibility, the shop owner lied and turned us away on several occasions