Half through what the Swedes call sensommar, the period between summer and autumn, I thought it's about time to write a transition-post. Let me talk about the past 3 summer months and close this blog with my plans for the future...

SUMMERTIME

StudentLund Nations.

Since midsummer, I have been working at BrandProx, in Lund, Southern Sweden. BrandProx is a very young start-up created by two graduates from the Master Program in Entrepreneurship of Lund University. They developed a platform, BrandProx.com allowing Facebook users to merge their profile pictures with a brand's logo and get rewarded from the corresponding brand in exchange. I was in charge of business development and marketing operations.

Ideon Gateway, Lund.

Daily-life in a start-up is fun! There is always something happening and stuff to be taken care of: whether it is a meeting with business angels, potential partners or future customers; a fika or a ping-pong game with colleagues at BlackPearl; the design of a logo, poster, presentation or website; applying for funds and grants; writing web content, getting involved in other projects, etc.

This 3 months experience was really beneficial for me. I learned a lot about entrepreneurship and I extended my professional network.

Eventually, it granted me access to the European conference Innovation in Mind which, for the 5th time in Lund, hosts diverse keynotes and workshops (Sept. 18th-20th).

Post by Innovation in Mind.

Living in Lund was quite enjoyable too during the summer. There were less students than usual, the weather was particularly nice and warm, and there were a handful of great events in the region. My weeks were punctuated with good week-ends among friends in the city, but also in Copenhagen, Malmö or even Lomma Beach! I thought that a few pictures are worth more than words here...

Christiania, Copenhagen.

Usual evening in Lund...

Nyhavn, Copenhagen.

Smørrebrød, Copenhagen.

Best Restaurant in Lund.

Malmö Festivalen

#emptiness
Moving-in, Moving-out. 

Way Out West, Göteborg.

HOLIDAYS

I managed to get away one week-end to Berlin, Germany and two weeks back to France. It's been 6 months since I didn't go back home. Thus, I was pulled apart in between family dinners, friends' reunions, events and so on. I had a great time :)

Paris.

Berlin.

Home...

Sunset, Île-Tudy, France.

Ph.D STUDIES

My thirst for learning new things seems unquenchable and I am constantly looking for opportunities to develop my thinking skills. I wanted to continue doing research and that is why I applied for doctoral studies at the Department of Management and Engineering of Linköping University. I enjoyed writing my Master Thesis but one semester was too short to conduct an in-depth study. I want to be able to holistically investigate a phenomena, profoundly analyze practices and use more insightful methods, which require more time.  

I got accepted as a Ph.D. student in marketing at FEK — the division of Business Administration. I will start on October 1, 2013 and my supervisor is Lars Witell.

I am really happy about it. I will be moving back to Linköping, where I have a few good friends. I will have my office in the same corridor as my former-professors-slash-my-new-colleagues. I will be able to continue learning Swedish. A new chapter of my life is about to begin and I am looking forward to it!!

IN A NUTSHELL

During the last 2 years, I was writing about my daily-life experiences as a French expat in Scandinavia, as an Erasmus student in Belgium or as a student of a MSc. program. Half of it in French, the rest in English. 

50.000 views is quite rewarding for such a blog and I thank you all for reading my blogposts. This audience allowed me to put my ideas together, share information and practice my thinking and synthesizing skills. 

Now it's time for me to move on something different. See you next time!

A Scandinavian Journey!

In France, there are the Spring Holidays, beginning at the end of april, which allowed my friends to pay me a visit. It was a great deal of organization to combine sightseeing and thesis-working, but it was definitely worth it! We managed to spend a week-end in Stockholm, visit Linköping, travel to Lund and have a day in Copenhagen :)

Gröna Lund, Stockholm

Moderna Museet, Stockholm

We began with 2 days in Stockholm where we walked around a lot between Södermalm, Djurgården, Gamla Stan, Skeppsholmen and Norrmalm. Even though it was pretty sunny, the blowing wind was exhausting us!

I brought my friends to some nice places as Vigårda Barbeque for the greatest  burgers in Stockholm, Kelly's for cheap beers (a challenge in the city), Café String for a big brunch, Koh Phangan for an exotic dinner, etc.

Kanelbullar

Then we came back to Linköping for a short while but I had to go to the university and let my friends alone. Anyway, they visited Gamla Linköping, the Valla forest and the city center until the Stångån river.

Also, they were asking me what was the typical dish/food in Sweden... I couldn't answer anything else than the köttbullar (meatballs) :/ We tried to find some kinda moose-meat but didn't succeed. Yet, they got to try the kanelbullar :)

Caro in Lund

Then we went to Lund where my friends discovered Valborg! It was quite something... Hopefully, we had time to walk around the city in between the Stadspark, the old university (dating from 1666), the botaniska trädgården, and in the colorful cobbled streets.

View from the 'Church of Our Saviour', Copenhagen

Christianian demonstration

Unfortunately, two of my friends were flying back to France from Copenhagen on the next day. I thought it was a good opportunity to spend the morning there. We went around Tivoli, in the touristic streets towards the Church of the Holy Spirit, and we continued until Christiania, passing by Slotsholmen.


I believed my friends enjoyed their trip to Sweden, even though it was only a few days, these days were quite busy!!

Bike-ride throughout Linköping: Trädgårdsföreningen, Gamla Linköping and Tannefors lock.

Me and my friend who stayed for five more days, went back to Linköping once again. The weather got way warmer and we could enjoy bike-rides, forest walks, play kubb, and chill-out in the evenings around BBQs with friends!

I'm really glad my friends paid me a visit! That was a really appreciated "break" in the thesis schedule. Much appreciated!

A grey day on the Belgian coast: Nieuwpoort seaside

Because of a day-long seminar on Human Resource Management in a hotel in Nieuwpoort, I had a chance to discover a bit the Belgian coast. Eventually, there's not much to say! I mean, have you ever heard of the Belgian beaches? Me neither. Only Belgian citizens enjoy the summer season there...

The Flemish coast is rather small (65km long) and counts 13 resorts: Nieuwpoort is one of them. However, its marina called Eurojachthaven can host 2,000 boats which makes it one of the biggest in Northern Europe! It's also "famous" since the WWI where the Yser river was used as an obstacle against the German army.

Nieuwpoort-Bad: Beach & pier.

I took a walk on the empty beach. There was a fog and a light wind, but no rain. A weather like Brittany, France :) But the landscape wasn't as good as my home region! There was an endless line of residential buildings all over the coast. Ugly concrete bar! I went to talk to some fishermen on the pier...

Nieuwpoort-Bad: Beach & residential buildings.

They weren't successful. Just a passion for them. A 2h window of fresh air, a few days a week. Indeed, the boats and professional fishermen with nets take everything out of the sea. The only things left are the mussels to pick up at low tide.

Nieuwpoort-Bad: Entrance of the marina.

I don't think Nieuwpoort is a must-see on a visit to Belgium. But how can I say that after a short walk on the beach? A solution would be to visit Ostend or Knokke, and make a pit-stop in Nieuwpoort in between! These two other cities are way bigger ;)

So yes, 

all of these pictures,

they're from my phone. 

Sorry for the quality.

BIRDY NAM NAM - Live in Brussels

Birdy Nam Nam

Friday night is the best day to go out. Even more as I'm talking about going out of town, heading to Brussels for a concert! Festival des libertés is an anti-crisis event composed of debates, concerts, theatre, films and exhibitions, taking place in Brussels National Theatre. For 10 autumn days, it mobilises all forms of expression in order to offer an overview of the state of rights and freedoms around the world, to point out lurking dangers, to bring people together in a fun, relaxing atmosphere, to encourage resistance and to promote solidarity.

« Festival des Libertés 2012 will invite citizens to view the multiple crises not just as paralyzing and blinding catastrophes, but also as opportunities to refine our critiques and to become aware of how our economic, political, social and cultural systems are running out of steam, opening up the field of possibilities for other ways of seeing, doing and articulating liberty, solidarity and equality. It's an invitation to take the risk of novelty, complexity and uncertainty in order to escape the dead ends, the tensions and the denials. »

Impressive light show!

I know Birdy Nam Nam since a few years. DJ band among others from the French electronic music scene I care about: Air, C2C, Laurent Garnier, Daft Punk, Vitalic, David Guetta, Breakbot, Wax Tailor, Chinese Man, Brodinski, DJ Mehdi, Beat Torrent, etc. Composed of four great talentuous French dudes DJ Pone, DJ Need, DJ Little Mike and DJ Crazy-B; they are quite famous as they won the DMC world DJ championships in 2002. They also won a Victoire de la Musique in 2010 (beating David Guetta). This last summer, the very famous DJ Skrillex released a remix of Goin' In, which made Birdy Nam Nam even more popular worldwide. That's why yesterday was a great opportunity to see them again. I bought my tickets with some friends and we decided to spend the night over in Brussels...

The concert was great! Deep music. A unique mix of jazz, hip-hop, groove, rock and techno. The light show was emphasizing every drop in the song. We really enjoyed it, and the rest of the crowd as well, the theatre was boiling from the inside! The walls were trembling even more when Lil'mike said "You like that? You want more? We'll continue and smash your heads!".

And so they did.

1h30 of intense live music, I loved it.

After that, we enjoyed the photography exhibition Congo in Limbo of Cedric Gerbehaye, whose photos were hanging on the walls while the Wax Dolls were playing.

All in all, this night turned out really well!

PS: for our Spanish friends, check out my friend Cristina's blog and her video:

Hiking trip in High Fens - GR 573

The natural parc of High Fens is located on Belgium and German lands. Both countries collaborate to preserve the authenticity of its nature and its landscapes, in accordance with the inhabitants. Unfortunately, in April 2011, a fire led the parc authorities to close down some parts of the nature reserve.

With some Erasmus friends, we planned a hiking trip over a day: from Eupen (near Liège) to Signal de Botrange, the highest peek of Belgium. It should be a 22km hike. Last Sunday we left Ghent by train (2h30) and we started our walk around 10 o'clock from Eupen's train station.

The plan was to follow the GR 573 trail from Eupen. But it took us almost an hour to find it, in the border of the city. The trail follows the Hill River, through forestry tracks and woodland paths in the forest. As always in Belgium (I've been told), it was very humid. Luckily, it didn't rain.

GR 573 stripes

However, when we met other hikers in the forest, they told us different discouraging stuff:
   - Signal de Botrange? Sorry I don't know.
   - You go there on foot? I'll take you 3 days!
   - You cannot go there. But you can go to Ternell if you take that way. 
   - Signal? Oh it's about 50kms from Eupen!

Maria

We hiked for 5 hours in the forest, trying to follow the red/white stripes of the GR, the feet covered with mud and having no idea where we're heading. Then we left the trail and walked one more hour towards Ternell. We didn't know what it was until we arrived to some kinda farm, with a restaurant and a small information office.

That's when we figured out we shouldn't have left the trail for Ternell but continued straight South to Signal de Botrange. But it was still 2-3 more hours of hike. Instead we were stuck 8km away from Eupen where we had to take the train. Eventually, we also missed the last bus by 20mn. That's why we decided to ask the restaurant clients to take the three of us by car to Eupen. A German drove us downtown in 10mn.

Hill River

We got back in Ghent at 20.30 after a fun day in a Belgian forest hiking for 7 hours! Next time, I wanna do it straight until Signal de Botrange, even though the other Erasmus students — that actually did it the same day — said it wasn't worth it at all. Maybe some early winter snow will enhance the scenery a little :)

PS: live webcam of the High Fens:

Summer is over!

Hello world. What have you been up to this summer?

I got a quiet and silly summer job in my hometown for July. I spent my time catching up with old friends and wandering around Western France. Same old same old. 

August was far more interesting! I was in the Western United States with my family for almost a month. My dad spent a few months reading blogs and touristic guides so that he planned the whole journey ahead of time. 

We started with a few days in San Francisco, California. Really different from the rest of the U.S. and I loved it. I might look for some internships or jobs there next year. Then we headed East and visited Yosemite Park, Bodie, Mono Lake, Salt Creek, the Death Valley (...) until we got to Las Vegas, Nevada. 

That city is unique! What can I say? Nothing. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas! Then we went further East to visit the Valley of Fire, Zion Canyon, Monument Valley, Bryce Canyon, the Grand Canyon, the Arches National Park, the Valley of the Gods, Horse Shoe Bend, the Lake Powell (...) Eventually, after two intense weeks, we headed back West on the Road 66 towards California: Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Monterey, Carmel and finally back to San Francisco where we took off for Europe!

The whole trip was great! Each city has its own character, with lots of different atmosphere in their neighborhood. The parks are impressive, telling the Earth's history, quite wild and with wonderful landscapes. I will definitely get back there, sooner than later!

Photos here (on my page dedicated to photography). 

WWOOF WWOOF! - Episode 3

Me voilà rentré du Portugal, après deux grosses semaines passées dans la région d'Algarve où j'ai eu ma première WWOOFING EXPERIENCE !! Comme prévu ( - épisode 2), nous avons travaillé pour Reguengo, un hôtel allemand perdu au milieu des montagnes de Monchique, un endroit encore un peu sauvage, où la nature semble avoir été plus forte que le tourisme de masse.

Notre caravane aménagée, isolée des clients et dans un cadre magnifique.

On peut dire que l'hôtel a vraiment répondu à toutes nos attentes. D'ailleurs on se sentait plus comme des clients que comme des employés. À vrai dire, on ne travaillait que 5-6h par jour, sauf le dimanche. Et encore certains jours, notre travail était avant tout une partie de plaisir, par exemple : monter à cheval pendant toute une matinée chaque semaine ! 

Paquito, 15 ans, un jeu d'enfants (débutants ?) 

Le Monchique et ses plantations d'Eucalyptus virulentes pour la production de papier...

Pour résumer, une journée type se déroulait ainsi :

• 7h30 - 8h30 : arrosage des plantes dans un endroit du jardin
• 8h30 - 9h30 : séance de yoga avec un prof pratiquant depuis 25 ans
• 9h30 - 10h30 : petit déjeuner façon buffet avec les clients
• 10h30 - 12h30 : jardinage avec une tâche spécifique par jour
• 12h30 - 14h : pause déjeuner avec l'équipe du jour
• 14h - 15h30 : jardinage ou autres projets (peinture, rénovation, cuisine, etc.)
• 16h30 - 19h30 : libre, avec une voiture à notre disposition pour visiter la région
• 19h30 - 21h : dîner avec les clients

La nourriture était préparée par Margit, la chef allemande, et son équipe composée de 3 "mamas" portugaises adorables ! Tous les produits étaient archi-frais et locaux (certains légumes provenant du jardin des "mamas"). Les plats préparés étaient limités mais succulents avec des épices indiennes ou d'autres destinations exotiques... Bref, un régal à chaque repas de la journée !

Assu & Maria, nos "mamas" portugaises !

L'hôtel commençait tout juste sa saison donc le nombre de clients augmentaient chaque jour jusqu'à en avoir une vingtaine lorsqu'on est parti. Tous étaient allemands, nous les côtoyons tous les jours, ce qui m'a permis d'appendre plus leur langue que le portugais, original non ? Pendant notre temps libre, nous rejoignons la civilisation après 15mn de piste. Nous avons visité les petites villes voisines, à la recherche du "vrai" Portugal, non sans difficultés...

Sagres, point le plus Sud-Ouest du Portugal, et donc de l'Europe !

Ilha Deserta, île la plus au Sud du Portugal, près de Faro.

Avec des températures naviguant entre 30 et 35°C à l'ombre, nous avons pas vraiment eu froid ! Les grandes plages, dont plusieurs équipées d'un centre de surf, sont quasi-désertes : parfait pour prendre quelques coups de soleil en fin de journée...

Même petit, voir son projet évolué de A à Z est vraiment plaisant !

Bref, nous avons passées deux semaines formidables à Reguengo. Une prémière expérience vraiment positive pour nous, et pour l'hôtel qui accueillaient ses premiers wwoofers. Puisque nous y sommes invités, nous y retournerons bien un jour, le plus vite sera la mieux ! Je recommande vivement le wwoofing à n'importe quelle personne souhaitant partir loin de son confort quotidien pour découvrir et visiter un pays inconnu, rencontrer des personnalités introuvables en d'autres circonstances, apprendre à vivre plus proche de la nature, et aussi passer des vacances à moindre frais !