Friendly French and a nice City

Okay, it has been quite a while since I wrote an update…so that is what happened the last weeks:

I finished my French course on the 27th of July, which also means that most of my international buddies left Lyon to either travel on or to return to their home countries. We have been a really interestingly composed group with Diego from Columbia, Ira from Russia, Tesi from the USA, Kelly from New Zealand, Giada from Italy, Nikki from Thailand and Daniel from Mexico.
Only Daniel who will study in Dijon and Kelly who is an Au-Pair for a year are now still with me…but by now we also know a bunch of great French, especially Lucie, Stephan and Michael.


I got to know the couple Lucie and Stephan via Tesi and I have to say they are incredibly nice and helpful. Besides teaching us French, they invited us to the house of Lucie’s parents, where we had great swimming pool and BBQ days. They introduced us to their friends, showed us the city and the Rhone-Alp area or just hang out with us. Their Lyonaise days are soon numbered as well because they will leave together to Canada for one year…but until then we will have couple more days to enjoy each other’s company.



Michael is my current Hospitality Club host and my third French flatmate overall (Elodie & Hugo in Santander were the other ones). So yes, I don’t live anymore with Myriam and her family even though I good time with them. But after almost 4 weeks I thought that I have been benefiting enough from their hospitality and it was time to move on.
I asked Michael who has been introduced to me by Ira, whether I could stay with him until I will go back to Germany. He accepted right away because he prefers living together with someone and his flatmate is not in Lyon until September…lucky me!


Additionally he invited me last week to go with him for 4 days to holiday house 200km away from Lyon to the big annual reunion with his friends from all over France. So from last Wednesday until Saturday I spent my time sunbathing, reading “Le petit Nicolas”, swimming in the Lou-River, playing chess and French drinking games and just having nice conversations with all the people. It has been a great time and I herby would like to thank all of them once again!





I returned to Lyon last Saturday and I will stay here until the 12th of August. I will try to spend the last days to input some more French grammar and of course meeting with my friends here.

If I had to draw a resume by now, then it is overwhelmingly positive…my French is way better than before my arrival, I met great people and Lyon is a beautiful city! I am already looking forward to return here someday.





As soon as I get back to Germany the final preparations for Madagascar have to be taken care of…which means buying a rain jacket, hiking boots, health insurance, etc….and to see my Konstanz-Crew for a long time awaited reunion!

MGG Fabi

Vocabulary, Security, Storming of the Bastille and of course French

Now that I already passed the half-time break of my French language course I will give you an update about the most recent events.

I am still happily living with the Myriam's family and it is really nice having most of the time dinner together...even though I am not talking that much I am trying make a statement here and there.

Surprisingly I spent most of the time with French grammar, vocabulary and two huge UN security exercises. Those online tests are a mandatory requirement for the internship. The "Basic and Advanced Security in the Field" exercises took me in total about 7 hours and after passing the exams I felt like I am ready to be sent to the worst spots on earth...at least in theory.
The questions covered everything...from "how to deal with child soldiers?", "what is the proper behaviour in a mine filed?", "how do you find out directions in the middle of nowhere?" to "what has to be considered sexual harassment in the office?". It was really interesting and I am serious about it when I tell you that I learnt something!

After finishing the last exam I went to Lyon downtown because it was the 14th July which is the French National Day, celebrating the Storming of the Bastille. I met with my people from school to have dinner together and to watch the official firework at night. The fireworks have been...okay...nothing too crazy, but I felt like I absorbed some real French culture :-)



The last couple of days were more like business as usual besides my 3 major book purchases..."Le petit Nicolas" (French book for children...and adults), "Lonely Planet Madagascar" and "Le Monde Diplomatique"...

Yesterday night my fellow students and I have been invited to French birthday party...it was in downtown Lyon and it was so far the best night out in Lyon. We were about 20 people, cooking, eating, drinking and talking together...and I recognized that I got definitely more confident in speaking French which puts a big smile on my face...so no regrets for coming to Lyon at all!!!

Things are going quite well for me here...so I managed it to organize 1-on-1 French lessons beginning directly after my cours in the school ends. Hopefully those additional and individual lessons will boost my skills even a bit further...and other good news I received: obviously the Malagassy speak a clear and slow French, but maybe my friends just told me that to calm me down...I will figure it out in less than 2 month!

Okay, I have class tomorrow at 8.30am which means that I have to get up at 6.45am...and if I am lucky I will meet the French Astrid for an afternoon cafe in French...yeah, it is all about the "most romantic language" on earth...and I am not talking about Deutsch.

MGG Fabi

Bienvenue à Lyon

It has been almost a week by now since I arrived in Lyon. After a 9 hour ride by my legendary car (it is well known as “The White Rider”) from Germany to France, I finally sneaked through the Lyonnaise traffic to find my accommodation. I stayed with Thierry Martinez, an active member from the Hospitality Club and Couchsurfing Project. If you don’t know what it is then you really have to check it out…because it an incredible good opportunity to crash somewhere for a couple of days and to meet interesting and very kind people.

My French course began on Monday morning 8.30h with and evaluation exam to check everybody’s level of French. I was put in the intermediate group which is totally okay. Obviously I don’t have too many problems when it comes to understanding, but it is the grammar which is giving me a hard time.

I have 4 hours of class every day and it is a mix between grammar (arrgh!), oral expression, listening comprehension and history. So far I am quite happy with my choice of the school….the teachers are good and the fellow students are great (Russians, half-Italian half-Vietnamese, half-Thai half-French, Kiwis, Mexicans, Columbians, US-Americans, Koreans, Chinese…).

On Tuesday I moved to Myriam, the French friend of mine from my Erasmus semester in Spain. So I live with her and her family (parents, younger brother Yannis and their huge dog!) outside of Lyon in a small but nice little Town called St. Quentin Fallavier. It is great living with them, they are very welcoming and helpful. I have my own room and working space which helps me a lot to take care of all the pending preparation which is still lying ahead of me.

To get to the school every day I have to drive by the White Rider to the closest metro station. From there on it goes more or less directly to the school. I use this almost 45 minute ride to read newspaper, which I think helps a lot to improve my French…even though I might look funny with the tiny dictionary in my hands.

Now…after the first week I am still optimistic concerning the benefits of my stay and so I am looking forward to the second week…with more French grammar and a planned international dinner party.

MGG Fabi

The Journey begins...

Hey everybody,

this is the very first post of my new blog, which is about my trip to Madagascar, my preperation in Lyon (French intensive course!) and of course about my time in Magagascar itself.

For the ones of you who don't know what I will be doing on the 4th biggest island on earth, let me help you out...after passing 3 rounds of a pretty though application procedure (and an interview in "French" near a parking lot close to Cologne) 8 students from the Netherlands and Germany have been the selected ones for the "Global Experience Programme (GEP) 2007".

GEP is a joint internship programme from AEISEC (world's biggest student organization) TNT (logistics company) and the World Food Program (WFP) from the United Nations. For the 3rd time this public-private-partnership offers 8 internships in the area of development cooperation all over the developing world...so the students will be sent in couples to Burkina Faso, Zambia, Laos and yeah...Madagascar.

Right now I am getting ready to head to Lyon/France to brush up my French with an intensive course in a language school. I will be there at least for the whole month of July and then...let's see how long it takes until I run out of money. I will be back in Germany at the latest mid/end of August. Then there are a couple of weeks left until the real journey to Madagascar begins...but till then there is a lot to come...and I am looking forward to get it on!

MGG Fabi