Stress

I guess I have to apologize a bit to everyone who reads this and knows me in real life, I've been one big stress recently and it's snowballed from nothing into literally everything winding me up:

As well as upping and moving on from a new life that I created here in Aix-en-Provence, with great friends that I'll hopefully keep for years afterwards and great memories above all else, I've got to start to think about what I'm going to be doing with my time in Spain, while trying not to blow all of my money on having too much of a good time.

I have around 3 months to kill essentially, and I want to find a job and get fit at the gym most of all, but I want to learn Spanish too while I'm there.

Not only all of that but little things here have been annoying me, like neighbours being arseholes, not leaving my room for a few days and the university here being ridiculously underorganised as ever, ending in me missing two of my exams, as well as worrying me to death over whether I might have to pay back my Erasmus grant for this semester, since it now seems on paper that I've done absolutely fuck all.

But I'm back on track and feeling good after spending time with some good friends of mine getting fucking drunk and being idiots and catching up. It's very nice to have everyone back in Aix, and it's gonna be so so very hard to leave.

Journey to Catalunya

After finally getting my student loan and having all my mates return to Aix after the Christmas holidays,   we finally got together and booked our trains to Tarragona in Catalunya (Spain).

I'm really excited about getting to Spain and being faced with something different: finding a new life, apartment and potential job in Spain, with the language barrier and the fact that, at the moment, I speak no Spanish at all. It'll be one mad adventure though!

We're travelling there by train, via Montpellier, and staying the night because of a lack of a connecting train. Good excuse to have a look around Montpellier, which is fashioned as a very friendly, good-looking and very gay-friendly Mediterranean city in France. I originally wanted to go to Montpellier for my year abroad, but our university didn't have any specific Erasmus relations with their universities.

So there you go, one week and a bit left until I move to Spain!

It's 2013.

So I have actually set this blog to post at exactly the time that the clock on the computer changes from 2012 to 2013, because I have no idea yet what I'll be doing. 

I'll most likely be drunk somewhere not knowing what time it is, and missing the countdown like every year.....(it's getting to be a bit of a running joke with my friends after I went to outside a club for a cigarette in 2010 and came back in 2011, totally missing all the countdown and hugging stuff that happens around that time of year).

And now i'm in France.

The coming of the new year, at this moment, signifies two big things to me: I have just under a month left here; and time is going way too quickly on my year abroad. The first semester felt like just a few weeks and not actually 5 months!

With regards to resolution-making, I've got a list of quite realistic goals that i'm likely to do, rather than things like 'i'm going to be a more motivated person' since at the time and place, no-one thinks "oh I must wake up early tomorrow and every day after because it's 2013 and I said I would". No.

I'm going to start going back to the gym in Spain, start learning Spanish properly and try as hard as possible to stick to a monthly budget I've set myself. I'm also going to try and look for a job in the area (although that may be easier said than done given i'm only there for 3 months-ish) and put money away into my savings account by direct debit every month.

None of this, gym every day, be a better person rubbish or that old 'eat less, smoke less' chestnut....it never lasts. I enjoy my vices too much.

Christmas in Marseille: It's not the end of the world.

It's the 30th December 2012, and we're all still here. No zombie apocalypse, or rain of fire in this part of the world anyways, in fact, the weather here is still beautiful, and not seasonal at all. All I wanted for Christmas was a winter wonderland in Aix-en-Provence; Santa you suck balls.

I've not long returned back to Aix from spending Christmas with my mum and sister in Marseille, which was lovely. It's a shame there were no apartments on leboncoin.fr for the centre of Aix for a reasonable price otherwise we probably would have stayed here, but alas, we ended up in the big city.

And even after living here for several months, I've never been to Marseille that often, and I've certainly never spent a great deal of time there. I now kinda like it. It has that slightly local feel (despite it being France's second city), as well as being very multicultural. There are turkish kebab stalls everywhere, and Algerian-style clothes stores everywhere you look, even right next to Hermès, Louis Vuitton and the Chanel store.
It's a bit intimidating though, and the general advice given from our universities to female Erasmus students to be careful of French men in clubs and pubs applies to the streets here as well. My mum commented on how many heads turned when walking past a café, seemingly only frequented by North African men, and how, to her, they looked a bit like they were on the prowl even at midday.
My thirteen year old sister also got hit on by a much older (and drunk) guy near the main train station, but she brushed him off in quite a classy manner nevertheless, which was equally as surprising!

One memory which I will never forget is turning my back for two minutes and then my mum telling me she just accidentally got involved in a drug deal in the middle of the street.

Marseille is madness.

As well as being one of the poorest cities in France with a high rate of unemployment, it can also be the most beautiful and inspiring. We quickly realised this climbing up to the Notre Dame de la Garde, a large cathedral overlooking Marseille and its port. The views were so breathtaking and the panorama of the city is so big that it wouldn't even fit in one photo even from so high up, and they really made us feel small.

Seafood on the port in Marseille

Me, mum and sister in Marseille.

Notre Dame de la Garde, Marseille.

the city doesn't even fit in  the background of this photo. Amazing.

Christmas Day was nice, we had dinner late, watched some trashy films on trashy French TV channels, opened presents and got drunk.

Boxing Day was really interesting though, we went for a walk right down the coast from the Port down by the Calanques [rock formations on the coast just outside of Marseille] and the weather was lovely, there were even people on the beach!

Amsterdam and the Case of the stoners and the missing bicycle.

I don't have much to write about Amsterdam since I don't remember anything, but why have I got tickets to a medieval torture instrument museum and a sex museum ticket for midnight in my pocket? Also where is all my money? Some mad shit went down then? Yes pretty much.

I woke up almost each morning in Amsterdam thinking: oh my god, how did I get back, and which completely defenseless Red light district prostitute did I try to free last night, like freeing slaves or fleeing farmyard animals.
I also lost my bike in Amsterdam after getting too stoned and parking it somewhere without completely remembering where I had parked it. It took a few more joints and a canal tour offered free by Heineken to work out exactly where in Amsterdam I was that one night. Lauren had died in the hostel after eating too much cake, so i'd went for a cheeky joint in the hostel (Flying Pig....which was amazing by the way) and then for a ride into town to have a look at some prostitutes. because it's Amsterdam, and you can do that shit there. Also it was funny to see these girls think that they're luring me into their sex-boxes when I'd more than likely prefer their (male) pimp to them.
I'd went to a bar and sat down next to some American guy on his own, travelling because his friends didn't want to come to Amsterdam too, so he was stoned as fuck and pretty lonely. I took him for a smoke and a beer and from thereafter I can't remember. What I can remember though is almost riding into a canal and having to book myself a taxi home later on!

But I still had sex museum tickets, and I can't remember going there but I do have vague memories of seeing some women do interesting stuff with their nether regions, but nevertheless, I thought I was just in some sort of hell/purgatory for my sins as a gay man. Also that being said, there were definitely not enough half naked gays parading around Amsterdam......

So my first weekend in Amsterdam was bizarre, hopefully going back soon, but I think after my first few days there I need a break and a return to civilisation. Lucky for me then, i've got a massive drop back into the realisations of the modern world: I now have fuck all money until the start of January, Christmas will be fun then.

This is a painting of the wall of the 'Grasshopper' coffee shop. Yes, it's a grasshopper violating a woman.

Europe is worth it though.