I always don’t like to use the word “fine” when describing things because I find it vague. But today was indeed a FINE Sunday. For the first time there were 3 people bathing in the bathing area at one time this morning. Me (always in my favourite cubicle. I also had a favourite cubicle for toilet), a lady and another man. At first I thought the lady and the man were bathing in the same cubicle because they came together and were constantly talking while bathing. I always thought that the Europeans were more open-minded, especially so in the hostel. But in the end I realized they were in different cubicles.
After my bath (which was pretty long because I took more time to wash my hair which was getting longer and dandruff prone), I went back to my room and started translating the yellow handbook given by the office of INSA (it is very uncomfortable typing now with the table vibrating. Idiots are at work with their music again). Now I was having less trouble reading French and had to use the dictionary less often. However, my conversational French is still atrocious. A particular paragraph caught my attention. It says that there is internet connection in every room here!!! What the F**K! The lady at the office told me that there wasn’t any internet connection on my first day here even though the residents have been requesting for it constantly. Perhaps I made a mistake in my translation. Anyway I would catch anyone walking by the corridor and check with them. Or bring the handbook to IRISA on Monday and ask the guys there.
I read on and realized that no cooking is allowed in the common kitchen during weekdays because the residents are expected to eat at the student restaurant. Since the restaurant is closed during the weekends, we would then be allowed to use the kitchen. This is a stupid rule. Plain dumb and I was not going to care about that. It took me 2 hrs to finish reading that small handbook and that’s when I heard some sound from the corridor. I quickly opened my door and saw a shadow entered the common kitchen and I followed in. A pleasant French guy was preparing his food and I asked him to explain to me the section about internet connection from the handbook. This guy spoke good English (as compared to other French), and told me that I could get the internet connection by going down to the Multimedia Centre and giving the personnel there the MAC address of my network card. I told him that the admin lady said that there was no internet in the room but he was sure that I can get one.
I also asked him about the rule of using the kitchen and he said that no one cares about that. You just use the kitchen whenever you want. I thanked him and return to my room and realized that I had forgotten to introduce myself. I was just too delighted to know that I would get internet connection soon. So I went back and make a self-introduction. He said that his name was Jay Hard (I couldn’t spell it. It could be Jihat, or Jaihard or even Gerard) and he is in his fifth year in engineering. At first I thought he “daobao” until fifth year but later he said that in France, the engineering courses all last for 5 years. I was very glad to make another friend here (first one was Amelie whom I hadn’t seen for a long time. There was a girl who said “hello” to me instead of “bonjour” the other day and I wondered if that was her because she knew I could only speak English. I can’t really remember her face). However, he said that he would be moving out next week because he had to go to the south for training. It was really a pity because he was such a helpful guy.
Back in my room, I began to think how wonderful it would be to have internet access soon. Another thought crept into my mind. Why did the lady say that there was no internet? Did she genuinely do not know that? Doubtful. Or did she purposely want to cheat me because I was a foreigner? And Anatole was there on day one and he was the one who asked for me about the internet access. He mentioned that he once stayed here for a few months last time. Was he aware or not about getting the access done at the Multimedia Centre? Or was all this a test to see if I would bother to find things out on my own? Perhaps Anatole purposely left me by myself for 10 days just to test how independent I was. I remembered that before I arrived at Rennes, Mathilde said that she would accompany me to the bank and prefecture in one of her corresponding emails. But in the end, I did everything on my own. Was this all a test also? Maybe the cashier at the supermart does speak English but purposely spoke only French to me because he was also part of the plot. Haha. Sounded like Jim Carrey in “The Truman Show”. It was easy to have imaginations running wild when you are alone in the room, and especially so when you are in a foreign country. Anyway, conspiracy or not, tomorrow we shall have an answer.
There was an SMS from my mobile phone which read “Wat are u doing” and the number was unfamiliar. I replied, “Who this” but until now, there was no reply. Probably a mis-sent of SMS I guessed. But I was really hoping it was from a friend in Singapore because that meant someone was thinking of me there. As planned, I left the room after lunch (bread again) to take some pictures of the place. Today’s weather was the finest so far (that’s why the title was “A Fine Sunday”), no wind, cooling but not cold and I did not have to hide my hands inside my pockets. It took me a bit more than an hour to tour around Campus Beaulieu (I guessed I should have completed almost the entire campus with perhaps a few areas that I failed to discover). The entire campus was deserted on Sunday and it was a pleasant and serene walk. Fresh air, greeneries and ponds, chirping of birds, seagulls above my head, it was a paradise.
For most of the time I was trying to take a close-up picture of the blue birds that I mentioned before but they were extremely alert when I approached them. In the end I did take some pictures but they weren’t very close-up. For most of the other times, I was taking pictures of the trees and flowers here because I am a nature-lover. Most of the trees here were barren (had not a single leaf on them) perhaps because now it was winter. Maybe it would come a time when their leaves would appear when the weather was warmer. By then, it would also be the time that I would be leaving here. It seemed like I almost sounded sad to mention about leaving this place even though I really really missed Singapore a lot. This was a good sign as it showed that I was beginning to feel attached to this place. It was a miserable sight to see the ponds in poor condition with weeds and dead grass all around them. There were benches beside the ponds but I guessed they were left empty for most of the time because there really was nothing to see in the pond except perhaps for larvae.
The trees here were planted in straight rows, almost as if they were being aligned by a ruler. Although they were leafless, they were very tall and sturdy. I took pictures of almost everything I find unusual (even though it might be common sights to the locals), things that I could not find in Singapore. I took picture of a funny weird-looking slide too. While typing the word “weird”, I found that it is really a weird word. There is this rule in English grammar about the position of “i” and “e”. The rule is “’i’ before ‘e’, except after ‘c’”. For example, “thief” has “i” before “e” while “receive” has “e” before “i” because there is a “c”. But look at “weird”. It has “e” before “i” and there is no “c”!!! You might think I am trying to “haolian” (show off) my English or I got nothing to write for my journal and am just trying to fill the spaces. But this is the essence of writing journals. You write whatever thoughts that come to your mind. Be candid, be truthful.
Anyway, before I called it a day, I also took pictures along the path that I always take to get to the supermart. The cottages along the road gave me a sense of cosiness as I passed by them and I could smell the firewoods burning. However, I wasn’t able to take a good picture of them because they were partly concealed by the bushes. Privacy I guessed. I often wondered what lives do the occupants had inside these cottages. Carefree perhaps? Lastly, I took a picture of a gigantic tower (its function I do not know) which was like some 30 storey high. This is an important landmark for me because during the first few days when I constantly lost my way inside Beaulieu, I would walk towards the tower and I would find INSA easily. The tower was so huge that I was confident that even if I got lost outside Beaulieu (but not too far as in the city centre of course), I would still find my way back. Perhaps next week I would explore the areas around Beaulieu.
The last picture I took was the little finger on my right hand. It got a small blood clog at the tip, something like a mole. I got it on day one when I dropped my luggage and got my little finger crushed. It hurts no more now, but the mark was still there despite how hard I tried scratching it off. Perhaps it could serve as a little memento to remind me of my stay here in France. It would be perfect to finish off the day’s journal with this paragraph but I just realized I forgot to mention about the woods at the edge of Beaulieu! There was this woods that I encountered while exploring the campus and there were constant croaking and screaming sounds made by the birds inside. It was kind of eerie like in the “Blair Witch Project”. I wanted to go in but the gate was locked. I could in fact just climb into it since as I said before; there was absolutely no one around. I even thought of pissing at a corner halfway through my walk because it was rather urgent. In the end of course I did not. Anyway, visiting those woods at night would be extremely adventurous and exciting but I would never dare to do that.
After my bath (which was pretty long because I took more time to wash my hair which was getting longer and dandruff prone), I went back to my room and started translating the yellow handbook given by the office of INSA (it is very uncomfortable typing now with the table vibrating. Idiots are at work with their music again). Now I was having less trouble reading French and had to use the dictionary less often. However, my conversational French is still atrocious. A particular paragraph caught my attention. It says that there is internet connection in every room here!!! What the F**K! The lady at the office told me that there wasn’t any internet connection on my first day here even though the residents have been requesting for it constantly. Perhaps I made a mistake in my translation. Anyway I would catch anyone walking by the corridor and check with them. Or bring the handbook to IRISA on Monday and ask the guys there.
I read on and realized that no cooking is allowed in the common kitchen during weekdays because the residents are expected to eat at the student restaurant. Since the restaurant is closed during the weekends, we would then be allowed to use the kitchen. This is a stupid rule. Plain dumb and I was not going to care about that. It took me 2 hrs to finish reading that small handbook and that’s when I heard some sound from the corridor. I quickly opened my door and saw a shadow entered the common kitchen and I followed in. A pleasant French guy was preparing his food and I asked him to explain to me the section about internet connection from the handbook. This guy spoke good English (as compared to other French), and told me that I could get the internet connection by going down to the Multimedia Centre and giving the personnel there the MAC address of my network card. I told him that the admin lady said that there was no internet in the room but he was sure that I can get one.
I also asked him about the rule of using the kitchen and he said that no one cares about that. You just use the kitchen whenever you want. I thanked him and return to my room and realized that I had forgotten to introduce myself. I was just too delighted to know that I would get internet connection soon. So I went back and make a self-introduction. He said that his name was Jay Hard (I couldn’t spell it. It could be Jihat, or Jaihard or even Gerard) and he is in his fifth year in engineering. At first I thought he “daobao” until fifth year but later he said that in France, the engineering courses all last for 5 years. I was very glad to make another friend here (first one was Amelie whom I hadn’t seen for a long time. There was a girl who said “hello” to me instead of “bonjour” the other day and I wondered if that was her because she knew I could only speak English. I can’t really remember her face). However, he said that he would be moving out next week because he had to go to the south for training. It was really a pity because he was such a helpful guy.
Back in my room, I began to think how wonderful it would be to have internet access soon. Another thought crept into my mind. Why did the lady say that there was no internet? Did she genuinely do not know that? Doubtful. Or did she purposely want to cheat me because I was a foreigner? And Anatole was there on day one and he was the one who asked for me about the internet access. He mentioned that he once stayed here for a few months last time. Was he aware or not about getting the access done at the Multimedia Centre? Or was all this a test to see if I would bother to find things out on my own? Perhaps Anatole purposely left me by myself for 10 days just to test how independent I was. I remembered that before I arrived at Rennes, Mathilde said that she would accompany me to the bank and prefecture in one of her corresponding emails. But in the end, I did everything on my own. Was this all a test also? Maybe the cashier at the supermart does speak English but purposely spoke only French to me because he was also part of the plot. Haha. Sounded like Jim Carrey in “The Truman Show”. It was easy to have imaginations running wild when you are alone in the room, and especially so when you are in a foreign country. Anyway, conspiracy or not, tomorrow we shall have an answer.
There was an SMS from my mobile phone which read “Wat are u doing” and the number was unfamiliar. I replied, “Who this” but until now, there was no reply. Probably a mis-sent of SMS I guessed. But I was really hoping it was from a friend in Singapore because that meant someone was thinking of me there. As planned, I left the room after lunch (bread again) to take some pictures of the place. Today’s weather was the finest so far (that’s why the title was “A Fine Sunday”), no wind, cooling but not cold and I did not have to hide my hands inside my pockets. It took me a bit more than an hour to tour around Campus Beaulieu (I guessed I should have completed almost the entire campus with perhaps a few areas that I failed to discover). The entire campus was deserted on Sunday and it was a pleasant and serene walk. Fresh air, greeneries and ponds, chirping of birds, seagulls above my head, it was a paradise.
For most of the time I was trying to take a close-up picture of the blue birds that I mentioned before but they were extremely alert when I approached them. In the end I did take some pictures but they weren’t very close-up. For most of the other times, I was taking pictures of the trees and flowers here because I am a nature-lover. Most of the trees here were barren (had not a single leaf on them) perhaps because now it was winter. Maybe it would come a time when their leaves would appear when the weather was warmer. By then, it would also be the time that I would be leaving here. It seemed like I almost sounded sad to mention about leaving this place even though I really really missed Singapore a lot. This was a good sign as it showed that I was beginning to feel attached to this place. It was a miserable sight to see the ponds in poor condition with weeds and dead grass all around them. There were benches beside the ponds but I guessed they were left empty for most of the time because there really was nothing to see in the pond except perhaps for larvae.
The trees here were planted in straight rows, almost as if they were being aligned by a ruler. Although they were leafless, they were very tall and sturdy. I took pictures of almost everything I find unusual (even though it might be common sights to the locals), things that I could not find in Singapore. I took picture of a funny weird-looking slide too. While typing the word “weird”, I found that it is really a weird word. There is this rule in English grammar about the position of “i” and “e”. The rule is “’i’ before ‘e’, except after ‘c’”. For example, “thief” has “i” before “e” while “receive” has “e” before “i” because there is a “c”. But look at “weird”. It has “e” before “i” and there is no “c”!!! You might think I am trying to “haolian” (show off) my English or I got nothing to write for my journal and am just trying to fill the spaces. But this is the essence of writing journals. You write whatever thoughts that come to your mind. Be candid, be truthful.
Anyway, before I called it a day, I also took pictures along the path that I always take to get to the supermart. The cottages along the road gave me a sense of cosiness as I passed by them and I could smell the firewoods burning. However, I wasn’t able to take a good picture of them because they were partly concealed by the bushes. Privacy I guessed. I often wondered what lives do the occupants had inside these cottages. Carefree perhaps? Lastly, I took a picture of a gigantic tower (its function I do not know) which was like some 30 storey high. This is an important landmark for me because during the first few days when I constantly lost my way inside Beaulieu, I would walk towards the tower and I would find INSA easily. The tower was so huge that I was confident that even if I got lost outside Beaulieu (but not too far as in the city centre of course), I would still find my way back. Perhaps next week I would explore the areas around Beaulieu.
The last picture I took was the little finger on my right hand. It got a small blood clog at the tip, something like a mole. I got it on day one when I dropped my luggage and got my little finger crushed. It hurts no more now, but the mark was still there despite how hard I tried scratching it off. Perhaps it could serve as a little memento to remind me of my stay here in France. It would be perfect to finish off the day’s journal with this paragraph but I just realized I forgot to mention about the woods at the edge of Beaulieu! There was this woods that I encountered while exploring the campus and there were constant croaking and screaming sounds made by the birds inside. It was kind of eerie like in the “Blair Witch Project”. I wanted to go in but the gate was locked. I could in fact just climb into it since as I said before; there was absolutely no one around. I even thought of pissing at a corner halfway through my walk because it was rather urgent. In the end of course I did not. Anyway, visiting those woods at night would be extremely adventurous and exciting but I would never dare to do that.
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