DICTAabroad
Turan Hursit in Bordeaux, France
Baguettes, Paperwork, and Sunshine:
Memoirs of a Bristol Law Student in France
N
o toilet seat? NO TOILET SEAT?! Observation #1 in France: it is not uncommon to have to urinate in a toilet which was forgotten by the toilet seat fairy. This was the first
in a long list of surprises - not always pleasant
- encountered during my year abroad. Among
them: that France has the highest proportion of
dog excrement to square metre of pavement in
the world, that working hours do not, and God
forbid that they should, span more than two
hours at any one time, and that the French are
far from being the European leaders in the running of educational establishments.
As you may have gathered, not every part
of my year abroad was as expected. Though
warned about the bureaucracy, I did not expect
to require, for example, a three-month backlog
of electricity bills and statements belonging to
the last five generations of my family (and a few
rubbings of their tombstones) for the acquisition of a tram pass. Nor did I think that I would
have to wage World War Three on the Bureau
des Relations Internationales to obtain my admittedly hefty Erasmus grant.
But the experience has not only been insightful in providing me wit