And the Countdown Begins Once Again...

Twenty-nine days before I hop on a place and leave the beautiful scenery of the French Riviera behind me. It will be such a bittersweet moment. Until then, I will try my best to enjoy everything while I still can.

On Sunday, a very special friend of mine arrived at the Nice Cote d'Azur Airport. Do you know who it is? It's Connie Wong! For the past few days, I acted as her tour guide, showing her the beauty of Cannes, Juan-les-pins/Antibes and Nice. Today, the both of us visited Marseille for the very first time. The city is gorgeous. It reminded me of Paris, but with a Port.  We visited forts and castles. Marseille is an old city. It's filled with history and stories. We spent a full day there and unfortunately still didn't get the change to see everything we wanted to visit. I guess that will be an extra reason to eventually come back to Europe. I have to say though, I am exhausted from this short one day trip. We spent the entire day on foot, and had to run to catch our train! The last TGV leaving from Marseille for the Cote d'Azur was scheduled to leave the train station at 7:59 PM. At 7:35 PM, we were still in Galeries Lafayette, buying food for our two-hour train ride. Obviously, walking back to the train station would have caused us to miss the train. We decided to take the metro, which is requires only a ride of two stations. As we arrived on the platform, the metro had just left. The next one was only coming in six minutes. 7:40, and the clock is ticking. The metro comes and thankfully we arrived the station Gare SNCF Saint-Charles a little bit before 7:50 PM. We ran, ran, ran, ran and ran. We finally arrived at platform G, where the train is at. Walking towards our cart, we found out that Car 7 is actually situated at the very end of the long train. We ran once again. Let me tell you, the freaking TGV was long, LONG.  We made it to our seats, sat down, and the doors closed. WE MADE IT! Lesson learned thought. Do not leave for the train station 20 minutes before it leaves! All in all, it was a great day filled with discoveries and sunshine.

I have to say though, after living on the French Riviera for three months, nothing compares to it. I LOVE IT.

If Island

Gare SNCF Saint-Charles

On the ferry coming back from If Island

Vieux Port

Vieux Port

Spring Time in France

Ah Spring! :)

Usually, Spring is not my favorite season. Back home in Montreal, this is when the weather is mean to me. One days it's sunny and the next it's snowing. The snow melts creating floods of water and it all because ice as the temperature drops. Once it get warmer again, all the snow and ice melt, creating a wet and slushy environment.On the other hand, Spring on the French Riviera is warm and beautiful ! For the past three days, I have been hanging out at the beach, working on my tan. Since we are so used to a colder climate, Courtney and I have been walking around in shorts and tank tops while most locals are still wearing boots, scarves and jackets! On the beach is another story though. Old French ladies like to tan...topless. Yes, topless. Often, the beach is filled with little children and you see these grandmas lying in the back, completely uncovered. Some of them also put themselves in really unflattering positions. It's really not great to see. Oh well. Bienvenue en France!

Besides that, the weather is warm and sunny. Walking on the white hot sand is lovely. The water is freezing cold, but gorgeous to stare at. You can see every shade of turquoise and blue. It's magnificent. I can't believe I will be soon leaving all of this behind. Only 36 days are left to my French journey

What Do You Do When It Is Sunny Outside & You Have No School?

The answer is simple. You go to the beach !

So the weather this past weekend was A-MAZING! On Saturday, Tristan (a local student at SKEMA) took me, Carol , Emily & Nasser out on his boat! The sun was bright and the water was beautifully blue. It was a perfect day to go boating. Tristan took us to the Ste-Marguerite and St-Honorat islands, near Cannes. We spent the afternoon walking along the shore of Ste-Marguerite. Then the clouds decided they would started ruining out day and started to pop out for everywhere. The wind started to blow, and the temperature was slowly dropping. It was time for us to go home. 

Ste-Marguerite Island

Ste-Marguerite Island

Nasser, chilling and the back & Tristan, our Captain

Cannes in the background

As first said, when it’s sunny, it’s time to go to the beach! But the problem is, I didn’t pack a bathing suit with me!! :(   This brings us to my little story…

Since Courtney and I have the entire week off, we decided we would go to the beach every day. Since I didn’t bring a bathing suit, I thought I’d just go to Carrefour and buy some a cheap bikini. At Carrefour, there weren’t many choices of bathing suits. I tried on a black one-piece with white polka dots and a leopard print bikini at Courtney’s request. The leopard bikini was cute, but I thought the polka dot one looked nicer. When I get home, my roommate asked me to model my new bathing suit for her. I go in the bathroom and start changing. I pull down my jeans and realize... I still had the bottom of that leopard bikini! When I tried the bathing suits, I wore them on top of my underwear! I totally forgot the take off the bottom part! I felt so bad! This is the second time I had accidently stole from Carrefour. The first time, I accidently packed the 0.99 cent broccoli in my reusable bag before the cashier charged it. Shame on me! Seriously! Now I’m scared of going back to Carrefour :( I will definitely be more careful next time.

I hope everyone will have a great week! For the Montrealers, I hope you won’t get too much snow! I shall enjoy the great beach weather on your behalf!

PS –Berlin pictures are here!

The Connie Wong Countdown: 12 Days

Twelve days before the famous Connie Wong lands in Nice! I can't wait! March is rather quite for me this year. Last month, I traveled so much that I wanted to stay in Juan-les-pins and actually discover the city - something I haven't done...even after two months! Shame, I know. Although, I am very tempted to leave for London with some friends this weekend, but money is starting to run a bit low as the end of the exchange approaches. Well, I also had to book my mom’s and my tickets to Paris, Barcelona and Rome and that wasn't planned in the budget! At least from now on, I'm pretty sure I'll be my mom favourite child! I certainly have never seen my siblings pay for our mother's plane tickets to anywhere. Ha!  It's okay though. I'm glad I get to give back to my mommy, who has given me everything. Except for one thing: height! Just kidding! But honestly, I always knew I was shorter than the average, but when I went to Berlin, everyone was just so tall. I felt like a dwarf.  Going back to the subject, I plan to stay here in March, go to the beach, and walk around. Although that won’t be happening this week because the weather sucks! It’s raining all week. Plus this week, my roommate is back on Montreal, so I am home alone. It’s alright, project deadline are approaching, so that will give me the opportunity to get a head start! 

I finally uploaded pictures from the February trips. To see the pictures, click on the links!

Here is a little preview. 

Baguette fight under the Eiffel Tower

21st Birthday Dinner

Manneken Pis

Architecture by Gaudi

Sagrada Familia

Park Guell

Click on the links below to see picture from: 
Paris, France
Brussels, Belgium
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Barcelona, Spain

Guten Tag!

It is almost half way through March, meaning I am leaving super, super, super soon. I can’t believe it. I feel as if I left Montreal just yesterday.  Time flies!  At least I am productive during my time here.  Just last week, I went to Berlin Germany. At first, I didn’t know what to think of Berlin. A few friends of mine had planned to go, so we decided to tag along. As it turns out, Berlin is among my top favourite cities! The place is rich in so rich in history. The people are so nice and the service is fast (unlike France, where people tend to take their time)! Traces of WWI, WWII and Cold War are everywhere and it’s really cool to see.  The food was also good in Germany. I had an authentic German pig knuckle and currywurst. A currywurst is a sausage with ketchup and curry. It sounds quite nasty, but it’s delicious! Currywurst is a really popular street food and it’s really cheap!  

I definitely want to go back to Berlin one day. I was only there for a weekend and there is so much to see!  For example, I wasn’t able to visit the concentration camp located on the outskirts of Berlin due to time constraints. There are also many great museums in the city that I would love to visit.  Berlin is now among the top of my “Cities You Must Visit List”.

*I know the photos from my last trip are still not posted. They will be very soon along with those from Germany! Sorry! *