hello everyone!
as promised, here is the second installment of my crazy week after arriving back from bordeaux.
not having done the groceries in a week and a half, i had asked a group member if we could pass by the carrefour market on the way to the subway after one of our group meetings. trust me when i say that i have never done the groceries that quickly. within 30 mins, i had bought enough cheese and pate to last 3 weeks, a dried cured french sausage, clementines, fresh salad 2 bottles of wine to entertain with and a bag of petit pains. all part of a healthy balanced diet, no? i knew that i had 2 different people set to visit in the week and i wanted to be a "good host" and all... (turns out that one of them didn't drink wine and the other one didn't come... oh well, more for me :D )
anyway, monday night comes along and i wait in anticipation for my friend to come. she had messaged me at 3am asking if she could a) bring the stuff over earlier and b) tell me that it had taken 3 hours to make "blanquette d'agneau" so i knew something good was coming my way... at 20h35 i hear my phone ring and i quickly run outside to open the door for her. enter charlene, my new friend from edhec, and one beautiful pot of "blanquette d'agneau". blanquette d'agneau is a wine and cream-based dish made by stewing pieces of traditionally tougher pieces of meat in the liquid for hours and hours until the meat is fork tender and fall of the bone. over a bed of fresh rice, the dish is best served along side a healthy dose a friendship and laughter. it truly was delicious, but if anything, the company was even better. for dessert, she whipped up her family's secret melting chocolate cake served with a cup of hot tea. while neither of us could eat for another day, it was a beautiful way to start the week.
the next day, i buy tickets to bruges (a city stopped in the medival times in belgium) and prepare for my first marked anything in france. keep in mind that i've been told that a 12/20 is a good mark here, so when i'm preparing, i can't help but have a little fear in me that my professor, who seems to have taken a liking to me and my educational background, will mark me harder than anything. unfortunately, my mind is split in 2 because the first of my recruitment interviews is the day before the presentation. not having done an interview in a while, i'm slightly stressed all thursday until 15h when i sit outside the in the freezing cold for an hour to find a place of silence to do my phone interview. by 16h i was breathing again and back in class, but that lightness lasted for a grand total of 1 hr before the realization that the big presentation was coming up. after sending off more CVs and cover letters for internships, i turned to rehearsing for the presentation.
note to self: must learn to wake up earlier. especially if your presentation's practice is at 12:30 and you wake up at 12, having only just made your script before going to bed with the promise that youd work on it in the morning.
scrambling out of bed, i rush to get into presentation clothes and quickly do a once over on my sleeping computer screen. no time, just run. 20 mins later, i'm rehearsing my part with my 2 co-presentors and i realize that i'm really screwed. they're prefect and i'm not. english is my first language and i'm still not. i don't know what's come over me, but it's just not flowing the way it's supposed to. too late now. class is about to begin and it's time to go in. god must have been on my side that day because we were at the end of the presentations so i was able to spend 1.5hrs trying to memorize what i was supposed ot say, only to realize that i hadn't retained anything. break passed in a blur and before i knew it, i head "china 2, please come up and set up." thump, thump, thump. i feel like my heart is about to burst out of my chest! the first part passes without a hitch and it's my turn. thump, thump, thump. i enter into the zone and deliver the presentation of a life time. i don't know how i did it, but it flowed and while i could hear the quiver in my voice, after the first few sentences, it was gone and was replaced by nothing by solid authority. passed over to the next presenter, she confidently presented our numbers and the 1st presented concluded strongly with our next steps for Q1. after a few brief questions, he asked the entire team to come up, picked up our printed copy of our presentation and turned to the class and said, "what do you think this team deserves as a mark?" a voice from the back of the class ventures "20?" and we all laugh nervously. but he turns and says "exactly. that is exactly what they'll get. and you know why? it's because this presentation was better than the presentation given in real life. class, this is what i expect for your final presentation." i was floored. 20/20 is unheard of by the french. honest! i was extactic! i couldn't believe it! that, added to the fact that not only one, but TWO of my french applications for internships had be responded to with interview requests, i was on cloud 9! Unilever France was interested in my candidature for a marketing internship and wanted to interview me on monday!!!!!!!!!!!! how could this week get any better?? by a friend being set to come that night of course!!
and that is exactly what she did. lydia (an exchange student who came to live with us for a month when i was 13!) and her boyfriend came for a weekend visit to lille and we spent the days walking the streets in stick-to-your-bone cold following a course set out by lydia's boyfiend before arriving. it was great because it let me hang out with a good friend and catch up while doing all the touristy things around lille without me feeling like an idiot, lol. for lunch, we splurged and ate out where we had all the local favourites like carbonade flammande, potlevjech and "welch". after getting lost in the street of viex-lille, we bought Meert macarons and waffles and a fresh waffle covered in nutella and whipped chantilly cream. by night, we ate at home where i cooked the first night (drunken chicken in tomato and wine sauce, rice and couscous veggies, ice cream for dessert) and lydia cooked the second night (fois gras on brioche with onion confit, pasta bolognese a la lydia and ice cream for dessert). sunday, we saw the "new" lille and climbed to the top of the city hall's tower for an aerial view of the city. a tram ride home and it was time to exchange photos and say goodbye, because the next day was the beginning of recruitment week!
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