I did not realize that I was leaving my friends and family in France until the night before my departure. I had been delaying my packing until the last moment, naively thinking it would also delay my trip to Germany.
It is not that I did not want to leave, it was more about already having the perfect life where I am now. At the same time, I think too much comfort kills growth, and doing a semester abroad is the best challenge I could have fixed myself.
…The 8th of September was the big day for me. The day I left France for the United Kingdom, the day I took the plane for the first time in my life, the day I made my parents cry as I passed the gates of the airport. I would be lying if I said that I didn’t have some tears in my eyes, but this journey would not be so long after all, especially with my friend and colleague whom I left my country with.
When our plane landed in the London Heathrow Airport, we had a few hours to kill before having to take the train to Swansea, but we had our heavy luggages with us so we just took a Subway sandwich and waited in the train station. Overall, our trip from Marseille to Swansea took us the whole day with some misadventures. We had to take a cab with a shady driver from Swansea’s train station to our accomodations at Bay Campus because of the terrible bus lines here, our packages that we ordered weeks ago containing bed sheets and kitchenware weren’t here, every grocery store were closed and so on.
You could say that we had a nice welcoming day in the United Kingdom.
My building was really quiet the first week, as no other students arrived yet before me, so the nights were quite calm.After a few days of acclimating to our new home, we had the occasion to meet some students living in the same accomodation block as us, and we were quite surprised at the diversity of nationalities here : Cyprian, Indian, German, Arabian (and French of course). We got allong pretty quickly as the nights at the campus’ pub went on.
We had many occasions to visit the campus, explore the city centre and even swim in the sea, but not for so long as the water is as cold as a pool water in winter.
Overall, the first few days here went by pretty fast, and we didn’t even have the time to visit the country as much as we wanted, but I definitely know that we will have some occasion to do some trip around the region, our international coordinator here even recommended us many beaches and other beautiful places to visit during our sojourn here.
And to end this article on a highnote, here is a small overview of my daily view in my room !
My friend Nathanaël and I hit the road on September 2nd for our journey from Marseille to Montréal. We had a long stopover in Paris, 15 hours to be exact, but that gave us the opportunity to hang out there. Nathanaël’s cousin, Wais, picked us up from the airport and showed us around the city. We walked, had some food, and observed the beautiful Eiffel Tower lights at night. As corny as it might sound, we were absolutely dazzled by the view, it sounds overhyped when visitors describe it, but we found that it was totally worth the hype. Every hour on the hour mark, from 8 pm to 1 am, the tower lights sparkle for five minutes. We got to watch this at midnight, not too far from the monument, and it was truly magical.
Our final flight was the next day, to Montreal, Pierre Elliott Trudeau airport. We don’t really have much to say about the flight, it was long but comfortable. Nevertheless, we’d have to say that we were a bit worried about the arrival. Verifications at the airport are usually difficult, and we were arriving in a country that we don’t know, at night.
We landed at YUL airport after a 9-hour trip, not too tired and very excited, but it was just the beginning. We spent around 3 hours in the airport, going from one checking to another, and waiting in very long lines on each step of the process.
Our apartment was already ready, we had found a good rental online in Canada way before getting there, which was a great idea. With classes starting on September first, we couldn’t afford to go on an apartment hunt on our very first days in Montréal, all while attending university and dealing with paperwork, that’s why finding a flat beforehand was very convenient.
Our landlord, Marne, was a very sweet Peruvian lady, whom we stayed in touch with during this journey. We were lucky enough to have her husband, Jimmy, pick us up from the airport, give us some valuable advice about life in Canada, and show us around our neighbourhood.
Jimmy was a Québécois, on the ride home, we talked about diversity in Canada, bilingualism, and living in the French province. He also advised us about everything from groceries to transport and gave us some recommendations and suggestions of places to visit.
Marne and Jimmy welcomed us home, gave us an apartment tour, and left. It was nighttime, so we were very lucky to be picked up from the airport, and welcomed so warmly.
We were very grateful for the welcome, our new friends in Canada were a very lovely couple, they even left us some food in the refrigerator. But our real welcome gift was a can of good old traditional maple syrup.
We definitely needed some rest after our flight, even though our registration at the airport went smoothly, and thankfully, jet lag wasn’t too bad either. Luckily, we got there on a Friday, and Monday was Labour Day, so we had some time on our hands to relax and get ready for university.
The next day was a rest day, Jimmy and Marne visited us and were very happy with the French treats we had got for them.
Overall, our trip to Montreal wasn’t too troublesome, we were well-prepared and in very good hands. And we are so very excited and hyped for this new experience!
Let’s G-Ô Canada !
