Classes cancelled again... and again...
So yesterday we ghettoized international students were assured that our building and our classes (separate thought linked with the university Marc Bloch) would remain open and in place for today, Tuesday April 4, despite a second nationwide strike that was hoping to be bigger than last week's Tuesday strike. Since we're international students who actually pay to come to this program (yes, indeed, education is public - meaning free, unlike in america - through university levels here in the socialist-influenced republic of France), our language teacher assured us that they would keep on going even if the rest of Marc Bloch stopped. The only problem with this plan? Oh, you know, the fact that when the campus is shut down details like LOCKING THE BUILDINGS are put in order to keep out occupying and/or destructive students. And since our building IS indeed a university building, that includes us.
Two weeks ago the buildings were shut down for thursday and friday after the death of a student (drug overdose induced heart attack) in the main Marc Bloch building on wednesday afternoon. Last week the Tuesday grêve (strike) shut down classes for the day. Yesterday we were told that the president's order was that the campus would shut down after noon... but that the international students shouldn't listen to generic announcements, as we were on a different program, a different agenda. Wishful thinking.
We managed to get through the 1pm and 2pm classes today just fine (Union Européene and Phonétique for me), but half way through the 3pm class (during which I was chilling in the foyer for my hour-long break), official-looking university administrators came in to "evacuate" the premises for security reasons. My translation = the march had started downtown, and they wanted to lock everything up snug so no occupations could take place. Who cares if we're a "special case" being international students... the building is still college property and up for occupation if left open. Hence all of us filed out only to hear that classes will be again cancelled tomorrow, and hopefully re-openned on thursday.
The "lutte" (fight) is never ending here... it's like this country has revolutionary blood that continues to pump when any other nation would have given up ages ago. Now the focus is changed from just the CPE, which was officially signed into law by the president last friday though suspended for pending changes (like reducing the period of possible-to-be-fired-for-any-reason from two years to one, and requiring that firees be told of the reason)... the fight is now against the government as a whole, which is being tauted as anti-socialist and anti-humanitarian. Now the president is embroiled in the mess having signed the law into existance and Sarcozy, presiential hopeful for next year's elections (also to the Right of things, including his preposed "selective immigration" act, which essentially means we'll let you in if your smart and will boost our economy but not if your poor and seeking shelter, etc.) is also about to be pulled in, as he was just put in charge of the discussions with syndicats, unions, etc about revising the law. In other words, just as Villepin's future presidency is now essentially null, some are thinking Sarcozy may be the next to fall if he upsets the people (which is pretty much a definite, as the people are just waiting for the next thing to protest against).
All in all, it's kind of crazy to watch how people take to the streets and to think that, even if good ol' berkeley, people with this much fervor in their demonstrations, etc. would, after a few weeks, be written off as fighting for a lost cause, where as here... taking to the streets and essentially halting much of the country (train travel reduced to 50%, air travel minimized or cancelled, libraries closed, etc.) for various strike days... it all actually DOES make a difference. Maybe not as much as they would like, and maybe they're taking it to an extreme by not willing to compromise... but really, it's a rather amazing to see how the fight has just kept on building... with each defeat or small victory, MORE people go out into the street to fight even harder.
Of course some students are fed up with the striking as much as they are with the government. It's finals period at Marc Bloch and some finals have been cancelled half-way through due to disturbances, some have been undergone in secret so as not to be ruined by demonstrators, and I think the majority have been postponed a full month, as so many days of class were missed a lot of the proposed material was never covered. Some of the international students are scared our finals will get pushed back, but most of us have the feeling they won't be able to do that... frankly, classes are kind of a joke anyway... some are interesting, but taking a final with 2/3 of the proposed information isn't going to really affect anyone. Hence, I'm going with the thought that we'll be finished by may 20 and I can hightail it up to Gretchen's to start our summer ventures up in the Scandanavian regions.
Speaking of Gretchen, she's set to arrive tomorrow around 3 and frankly, I'm almost hoping classes get cancelled for thursday as well so that I can spend more time giving her a whirl-wind tour of Strasbourg instead of, say, studying for thursday evening's test (though, it being on the subject of alsace, perhaps I can do my studying in tandem with showing her the sites...). I'm just hoping rail will be back to normal by tomorrow so that her train in from Bruxelles (where she's visiting Dawson) won't be affected. She'll be chilling until Sunday and then I have a mere four days to get everything ready before leaving for two weeks of france travel (again, hopefully not severly curbed by more striking... but we'll see).
The current itinerary for Easter Break is as follows:
April 14 - April 17: in Paris with the LC & Bryn Mawr group, most of whom I haven't seen for ages...
April 16: Martina is set to arrive and I'm hoping to sneak her into our shi-shi hotel for the night... if that fails, we've agreed to party all night, seeing as how 3:20 the following morning I'll be turning 21...
April 17 - 20: More of Paris with Martina. It'll be her first time! We'll be chilling with my mom's old boyfriend in his Jesuit community in the outskirts of paris for the nights.
April 20 - 24: Heading down to La Rochelle to see the city I've heard so many people say is gorgeous but know very little about. Maybe we'll find away to the sand dunes a bit farther south for a day trip...
April 24 - 28: North to Saint-Malo in the celtic region of Brittany. Gorgeous beaches (though perhaps not temperatures), ancient walled cities/castles, and probably the best cider one could ask for (one of my all-time favorite, however light, alcoholic beverages). Here we're either going to do a hostel or attempt camping with the equipment of an enthusiastic couch surfer who nonetheless can't offer us her couch for more than a night. I think we'll rely on the weather to help us with our decision on that one...
April 28: Eight hour train ride back to Strasbourg.
April 30 - May 1: hopefully spend a couple days and a night researching the Alsacian city of Lapoutroie, with it's own dialect, a whisky museum, goat cheese farm, and beautiful foot-of-the-voges scenery. Will be writing an 8 page report on it for my civilization française class, so i better make it down there...
Whew! Okay, I'll leave off there. One thing all these days off have offered is a chance to do a little work on my own time, with my own pacing. Thus I've been delving into some fascinating Alsacian WWII history on the topic of the evacuated mental hospitals... Alsace was occupied and considered nazi territory during the war after 1940, and it even housed a concentration camp... the university was taken over and one biology/anatomy teacher even took it upon himself to "research" the "soon to be extinct" jewish race, thus ordering "jewish skulls" from various concentration camps for his - and potentially his students - research. Fuck. History does hit you a lot harder when you're standing on the very land it happened on.
Okay, truly going to sign off now. Next entry? Perhaps a little more Alsacian history, to help me with my studies for thursday's potential test.
Salut!
Two weeks ago the buildings were shut down for thursday and friday after the death of a student (drug overdose induced heart attack) in the main Marc Bloch building on wednesday afternoon. Last week the Tuesday grêve (strike) shut down classes for the day. Yesterday we were told that the president's order was that the campus would shut down after noon... but that the international students shouldn't listen to generic announcements, as we were on a different program, a different agenda. Wishful thinking.
We managed to get through the 1pm and 2pm classes today just fine (Union Européene and Phonétique for me), but half way through the 3pm class (during which I was chilling in the foyer for my hour-long break), official-looking university administrators came in to "evacuate" the premises for security reasons. My translation = the march had started downtown, and they wanted to lock everything up snug so no occupations could take place. Who cares if we're a "special case" being international students... the building is still college property and up for occupation if left open. Hence all of us filed out only to hear that classes will be again cancelled tomorrow, and hopefully re-openned on thursday.
The "lutte" (fight) is never ending here... it's like this country has revolutionary blood that continues to pump when any other nation would have given up ages ago. Now the focus is changed from just the CPE, which was officially signed into law by the president last friday though suspended for pending changes (like reducing the period of possible-to-be-fired-for-any-reason from two years to one, and requiring that firees be told of the reason)... the fight is now against the government as a whole, which is being tauted as anti-socialist and anti-humanitarian. Now the president is embroiled in the mess having signed the law into existance and Sarcozy, presiential hopeful for next year's elections (also to the Right of things, including his preposed "selective immigration" act, which essentially means we'll let you in if your smart and will boost our economy but not if your poor and seeking shelter, etc.) is also about to be pulled in, as he was just put in charge of the discussions with syndicats, unions, etc about revising the law. In other words, just as Villepin's future presidency is now essentially null, some are thinking Sarcozy may be the next to fall if he upsets the people (which is pretty much a definite, as the people are just waiting for the next thing to protest against).
All in all, it's kind of crazy to watch how people take to the streets and to think that, even if good ol' berkeley, people with this much fervor in their demonstrations, etc. would, after a few weeks, be written off as fighting for a lost cause, where as here... taking to the streets and essentially halting much of the country (train travel reduced to 50%, air travel minimized or cancelled, libraries closed, etc.) for various strike days... it all actually DOES make a difference. Maybe not as much as they would like, and maybe they're taking it to an extreme by not willing to compromise... but really, it's a rather amazing to see how the fight has just kept on building... with each defeat or small victory, MORE people go out into the street to fight even harder.
Of course some students are fed up with the striking as much as they are with the government. It's finals period at Marc Bloch and some finals have been cancelled half-way through due to disturbances, some have been undergone in secret so as not to be ruined by demonstrators, and I think the majority have been postponed a full month, as so many days of class were missed a lot of the proposed material was never covered. Some of the international students are scared our finals will get pushed back, but most of us have the feeling they won't be able to do that... frankly, classes are kind of a joke anyway... some are interesting, but taking a final with 2/3 of the proposed information isn't going to really affect anyone. Hence, I'm going with the thought that we'll be finished by may 20 and I can hightail it up to Gretchen's to start our summer ventures up in the Scandanavian regions.
Speaking of Gretchen, she's set to arrive tomorrow around 3 and frankly, I'm almost hoping classes get cancelled for thursday as well so that I can spend more time giving her a whirl-wind tour of Strasbourg instead of, say, studying for thursday evening's test (though, it being on the subject of alsace, perhaps I can do my studying in tandem with showing her the sites...). I'm just hoping rail will be back to normal by tomorrow so that her train in from Bruxelles (where she's visiting Dawson) won't be affected. She'll be chilling until Sunday and then I have a mere four days to get everything ready before leaving for two weeks of france travel (again, hopefully not severly curbed by more striking... but we'll see).
The current itinerary for Easter Break is as follows:
April 14 - April 17: in Paris with the LC & Bryn Mawr group, most of whom I haven't seen for ages...
April 16: Martina is set to arrive and I'm hoping to sneak her into our shi-shi hotel for the night... if that fails, we've agreed to party all night, seeing as how 3:20 the following morning I'll be turning 21...
April 17 - 20: More of Paris with Martina. It'll be her first time! We'll be chilling with my mom's old boyfriend in his Jesuit community in the outskirts of paris for the nights.
April 20 - 24: Heading down to La Rochelle to see the city I've heard so many people say is gorgeous but know very little about. Maybe we'll find away to the sand dunes a bit farther south for a day trip...
April 24 - 28: North to Saint-Malo in the celtic region of Brittany. Gorgeous beaches (though perhaps not temperatures), ancient walled cities/castles, and probably the best cider one could ask for (one of my all-time favorite, however light, alcoholic beverages). Here we're either going to do a hostel or attempt camping with the equipment of an enthusiastic couch surfer who nonetheless can't offer us her couch for more than a night. I think we'll rely on the weather to help us with our decision on that one...
April 28: Eight hour train ride back to Strasbourg.
April 30 - May 1: hopefully spend a couple days and a night researching the Alsacian city of Lapoutroie, with it's own dialect, a whisky museum, goat cheese farm, and beautiful foot-of-the-voges scenery. Will be writing an 8 page report on it for my civilization française class, so i better make it down there...
Whew! Okay, I'll leave off there. One thing all these days off have offered is a chance to do a little work on my own time, with my own pacing. Thus I've been delving into some fascinating Alsacian WWII history on the topic of the evacuated mental hospitals... Alsace was occupied and considered nazi territory during the war after 1940, and it even housed a concentration camp... the university was taken over and one biology/anatomy teacher even took it upon himself to "research" the "soon to be extinct" jewish race, thus ordering "jewish skulls" from various concentration camps for his - and potentially his students - research. Fuck. History does hit you a lot harder when you're standing on the very land it happened on.
Okay, truly going to sign off now. Next entry? Perhaps a little more Alsacian history, to help me with my studies for thursday's potential test.
Salut!
posted by Melia at 7:35 AM
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