travelling

So, i am back quite fast because i thought that it is maybe a good idea to give a brief summary about my first three weeks in Viet Nam.

It all started really with a hustle with the reason that the airline decided to cancel my diving luggage as well as my sports luggage just a couple days before the flight. so my adventure was to try to fix around 50 Kg into 20 and the fifty allready was only the important stuff. If you go for half a year to work somewhere you need to carry a bit of things. But anyway, found somebody who carried some things for me and eventually i managed to slim it down.

First thoughts on Viet Nam: It's bustling, smells like a poultry shed and everybody uses the honk... And that is one thing i still don't get used to it. It is used like the accelerator, just nearly constantly...

What i really like is the food. First because i am really into seafood and Nha Trang is something like the seafood capital of Viet Nam. Beside that i love noodles as well as rice, both of them plenty here... Ok duckchick in its egg or rotten meat is not everybodys favorite... but the average food is really good. Also here they it spicy it is not that spicy like other asian countrys... I can eat it and normaly i don't like hot food.

later on i will continue, but know i have to work a bit...

I had the opportunity to see Rotterdam a little. The city has been mostly destroyed in WW II and has been rebuilt in a very modern way with futuristic looking buildings.

Oh and I shouldn't forget to mention the impressive immense port, of course, the food (yummy ) and the typical windy and rainy weather.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

After an amazing week in Fitou at my parents', I am now back in the city of love (even more more more love... ) and spend New Year's Eve with loads of international students somewhere outside Paris.

Sepideh arrived on Saturday night

We crashed at a Hotel Party close to the hostel and talked until 6am...slept a little, had lunch with opera ticket sellers (Italian, Macedonian), went into Stephansdom, sat in the Café Sacher and talked and talked and talked...

When we came out it was already dark. We walked around, took pictures, did a round trip in the tram and talked..

and on Monday morning we caught the plane..knackered and happy.

Oh yes, it snowed and it was freezing!

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

I am going to Vienna the coming weekend and will ( I imagine) have an amazing time with Sepideh, who is doing a semester abroad in Bulgaria. We are meeting so to say in the middle. I have already read about where we could go and we'll get a manual by an Austrian student .

Here is what I have been told:

• 1st district --> drink coffee in Haas-haus where you have a view on the Stephansdom
• Schönbrunn Palace is a must
• if weather is nice --> Donauinsel and "people-watching"
• party --> Schwedenplatz

Besides, there are obviously houses by Hundertwasser, the KunstHausWien, maybe? The Freihaus district, or a trip around the Ring (former city walls) on a tram to see some bits of the city....

Loads to do and that is just my list ...

We are going to be housed at the Westbahnhof.

Yes I am back in Paris after a wonderful, exhausting, thrilling, exciting and instructive summer.

The train was late, had to wait 1 1/2 hours for a taxi and finally was in bed by 2am...Now it's grey and "cold" here in Paris and I am noticing a constant hissing noise that would most likely come from the cars.

Guess it will take a bit to adapt from yellow to grey and hot to cold...

I was supposed to arrive in Montpellier (France) yesterday (Wednesday) at 2pm. Unfortunately, my first plane that I took had to do a loop, as too many planes where landing in New York. And a few hours later we had to land in Pittsburgh instead to get some fuel. (I forgot to mention the minor thing that we were also out of water!) At that point we were already about an hour late. And we waited for over an hour to get permission to leave to New York. Finally, I arrived in New York at around 11pm. Rasmus (seen in the video) waited for me all this time, as we were going to meet during my two-hour-stay in New York and his departure back to San Francisco.

After my studies at university reading French literature and languages, I worked and lived a year in Spain. Then I worked and lived 5 years in England. I learnt the languages much faster and better than at school. Furthermore, I met a lot of nice people, I discovered new ways of living and thinking. I even found my husband!

So I decided to give back what I had enjoyed by providing French teaching in a friendly atmosphere to francophiles: I offer intensive individual immersion courses in my home. This way, I keep meeting interesting people from all over the world and it is very pleasant to show them my culture and my country as well as teaching them French.

After finishing the pilot questionnaire, at late saturday afternoon, we visited Castle Howard.
It's an 300 years old house and estate, one of the most magnificent place in the York area.
Castle Howard covers 10.000 acres within the Howardian Hills, a designed area of outstanding natural beauty.
As well as being a visitor attraction the castle is also an working place, including farming, forestry, property, retail and holiday park.
More than 100 permanent and 150 seasonal members of staff employed there.
After visiting Castle Howard we drove to Witby for dinner in the most famous fish & chips restaurant.

Today we start our work at the projects tasks for the first year.
The aim of this project is to give some recommendations for methods to retain disadvantaged learners into education.
To find out what are the barriers and motivation for learners could be we start creating a questionnaire for asking them.
It seems to be simple but it isn't. We all have different backrounds, different learners and we live in different educational systems.
For me it was especially interesting to hear and see the way britains go in adult education. The british government decided to give the support only to one central union in a region. Going this way they avoid competition on learners costs and force local administrations, private companies, schools, colleges and universities to going together and coordinate their activities. Therefore they have founded an private association with governmental shareholders in Yorkshire. This system works in whole britain.