Thinking outside the Triangle

Picture: Constance Malleret

Bristol is a wonderful city. Whiteladies road offers a plethora of bars, coffee shops and lunch options, Stoke Bishop is a fantastic rowdy mixture of freshers awkwardly finding their feet and returners promoting their ‘organised fun’, while Cabot Circus is a hot spot for clothes shops and chain restaurants. However, putting irony aside, do Bristol University students know anything other than the straight line from Halls to town? Do we really know our city like the locals do?

As a 4^th year languages student, I have spent the last 12 months exploring the French city of Bordeaux and the Spanish city of Malaga. With only 6 months in each place to lap up the rich culture around me, spare Sunday afternoons were spent in art galleries, days off work involved whistle-stop tours of local landmarks and hangovers provided little barrier to my desire for exploration. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the 2 years I had spent in Bristol previously. I imagine the most exotic voyage I ever made was to watch a French film at Watershed or perhaps the one time I climbed Cabot Tower.

Aware of my generalisation, I feel strongly that a large majority of Bristol students have their blinkers fixed firmly to their faces when it comes to exploring the city. The well-heard complaints that, ‘the Student’s Union is just too far away’ or the stereotypes that 2^nd years live in Redland, while 3^rd years opt for Clifton seem restrictive and unnecessary. With a host of sights to see and things to do, why do we all seem so apathetic about our surroundings? There is more to Bristol than the University and a really nice bridge.

Inspired by my year abroad, I have made a plan. With only one year to go in the pearl of the South West, my 4^th year is to be a second attempt at my 1^st year (with maybe a little bit more studying thrown in). Back to being an inquisitive fresher, back to square one. Day trips to Weston-Super-Mare, Bath, Stonehenge and Salisbury are all on the list. Lecture-free afternoons will be spent at M Shed, St Nicholas Market, Ashton Court and SS Great Britain. Fewer Friday nights spent in Lounge, and instead exploring the variety of cocktail bars and the occasional speak-easy for which Bristol is actually quite famous.

In the future, if I am ever asked by a Bristolian where I went to university, I would feel a sense of shame if I was unable to engage in a conversation about our city other than the well-trodden roads around the university. If, as seems likely, I am to move away after graduation, I want to feel that I have made the most out of my time in this beautiful, arty, yet very rainy city that seems hooked on much more than just hot air balloons and valuable graffiti.    

This article was originally written for Bristol University's newspaper, Epigram. The article can be found here. 

   

Pay For Your Time, Not Your Coffee

Take your pick!

A recent contribution I made to my company's blog about a concept café that has just opened in London... 

In London’s alternative centre, Shoreditch, a new café has just arrived with a new concept in tow. Your coffee and cakes are free, but you must pay 3p for every 60 seconds you spend there.

Ziferblat is a new café to hit the streets of London and has already been praised by Time Out as one of the best cafes to open in 2014. The popular chain hails from Russia where they have opened more than 10 branches in the last 2 years to an incredibly positive response. The café’s name, ‘Zierblat’ means ‘clock face’ in Russian (Zifferblatt in German) and the idea is simple; pick up an alarm clock on your way in and clock out as you leave.

The owner, Ivan Mitin hopes to make a community from the café, with customers having access to the kitchen to prepare their own food and helping themselves to the professional coffee machine as well as a plethora of snacks. The café even provides its coffee-drinkers with a piano, where visitors are encouraged to show off their musical skills. The communal feeling seems to be a success too, with customers lining up to do their washing up and even that of others despite no obligation to do so.

Ziferblat has sparked criticism from some consumers who don’t favour the idea of being guarded by a watchful timer sat on the table in front of them. Although perhaps making your own coffee is a slight disadvantage of the coffee shop, for £1.80 an hour it is arguably fantastic value.

For those who feel guilty about buying just one coffee and nursing it for two hours while they get on with their work, Ziferblat might be the perfect café to be your new local.

☞Ziferblat Facebook

☞Ziferblat Twitter

☞Ziferblat Website

Find the original article on Com by AVM's website here.

Office Antics - Year Abroad #4

My next article for Inter:Mission about the fun of an inappropriate office... 

Upon embarking on a 6 month placement in a French marketing and PR agency in Bordeaux, I was fairly confident of what to expect; lots of coffee-making, plenty of scanning and many embarrassing language-barrier moments. Officially only an intern in the ‘Community Management’ department (my job description in French … really), my expectations of tedious and trivial tasks were quite wrong.

It goes without saying that the communication issues were incredibly prevalent at the beginning of my placement, often leading to hesitant nodding in the affirmative to tasks even if I didn’t have a clue of the instructions. However, the scanning and barista tasks were few and far between. Instead, I was treated like a fully capable employee, reflected in every part of my life at the agency, except rather unfortunately, by my salary (a big thank you to the European tax payers, the Erasmus grant is a wonderful thing when your salary just about covers your rent). This means that although I only earn about 2 euros an hour, doing ‘real’ work means that I am getting to know my colleagues quite well. Perhaps too well.

An eclectic group of personalities, made up of more interns than full-time staff (no, I’m actually not joking), by the end of the first week I realised that formality was not necessary in this office. The telling moments included being added on SnapChat by more than one colleague in week 1, over-hearing someone in the creative department ask someone on the PR team if she was pregnant in front of the boss and a client (she wasn’t) and being offered something quite strong at our first work soirée. Needless to say I am always on my best behaviour, much to their disappointment and often pretend to find understanding French a little harder than it is.

Although my first few weeks were made up of memorable and fantastically inappropriate moments, my most amusing occasion in the office so far has to be the day when I stumbled across the profile of one of my colleagues on an online dating website (I know you’re wondering what I was doing on there myself, well you can read all about my online dating experiencein France in my previous article). Thinking of this as the perfect way to contribute to lunchtime conversation and get a foot on the banter ladder, I prepared to bring it up over a baguette-induced silence the following day. I perfected my speech, ensuring I had the right vocabulary to hand…their response? “Oh, of course we know all about it, our previous intern found him on there too!”

I could not have asked for a better year abroad job, and I’m not just saying that through fear that my boss will read this article. My colleagues are patient with my language gaps and encouraging of initiative and responsibility. Usefully for me they don’t speak any English (except the mandatory Friends quotes) and they are rather keen to teach me both formal and informal French. Although I do make plenty of cups of tea every day, they are mostly for me and, as of yet I have never been asked to photocopy anything. 

Dangerous Domestics - Year Abroad #2

My second column for Inter:Mission, this time I decided to talk about moving in with strangers...

When you make the decision that you want to live with other people (rather than in a studio flat) on your year abroad, you put your hand into a lucky-dip of unknown personalities. You may create future friendships that are to last, or you could find yourself slap bang in the middle of disaster. When you decide, as I did, to live in an Erasmus flat where the people change every few months, you are multiplying that risk by 10 and adding a pinch of communication trouble into the melting pot too.

When I first moved into my 4 bedroom, ‘this’ll do’ apartment in Bordeaux, the first person I met was a lovely Austrian girl studying French in the city. We immediately hit it off, chatting about lots of things we had in common and about how beautiful Bordeaux was. Perfect, at least I’ll have one friend. Not so, she soon informed me that she was in her last week, and she didn’t fail to add that the other guy, a Slovakian, was an interesting personality.

She was right, the Slovakian guy was an interesting personality. Although rather charming, especially if you’re into the Russian/eastern European accent, I soon discovered that he was affording his travels through blogging. ‘How interesting, I like to blog too. What do you blog about?’ He has 100 webpages apparently, and one of the most prominent money-makers focuses on a lovely group of 5 English boys called One Direction. Ah. The second eyebrow was raised when I asked his age and he responded that it is a, ‘secret that even my ex-girlfriend doesn’t know’. Of course I headed straight to Facebook, (I’m slowly discovering that an obsession with Facebook stalking is a decidedly English attribute) and after much searching of birthday posts and graduation years, the most I could deduce is that he’s older than 33. He still won’t tell me.

The next to enter my flat of eclectic eccentricities was a French girl who couldn’t understand a word of French that either Mr Slovak or I said. Although I am well aware that my French is not perfect, it is at least comprehensible. Whether I was confused, insulted or mildly irritated, her bedtime of 8pm on the second evening told me everything I needed to know about the longevity of our friendship (or lack thereof). Even Slovak said he didn’t fancy her, and that’s saying something.

Despite the mystery of an Erasmus flat, I truly believe that my year abroad is designed for experiences like this and I love it. When else will I get the opportunity to learn about different cultures so intensely and be able to shout Britain’s praises to others? ‘The Olympics was just such a huge success, you see’. Also, my room has a lock. That helps.

You can find the original article on Inter:Mission Bristol here.

The Things the French Got Wrong

Image: Waldo

My self-prescribed mission was to embrace French culture as far as is possible while in Bordeaux. My assignment thus far has been fairly successful; I buy bread most days from the Boulangerie, I spend 5 minutes kissing all my colleagues every morning and I’ve completely forgotten how to drive smoothly. However, as much as I am enjoying temporarily denying my true nationality, there are some things that I miss about Blighty…

QWERTY Keyboards. I fully accept that other countries should use other keyboards to fit with their languages. Accents are common in French, so therefore putting an é on the keyboard makes sense. However, banishing a full stop from its place causing it to be impossible to find is frustrating and being rid of a £ sign when constantly needing to write prices in English is infuriating. Needless to say, within a week, Amazon.fr was my new friend and the AZERTY keyboard was exiled to the shelving unit.  

Strikes. I know that we’re not entirely innocent of this at home, but the French take it to the extreme. The news must be checked daily to ensure that public transport is all running smoothly and an extra 20 minutes must always be left just in case. I found it particularly amusing when I was in Paris 2 years ago and there were large strikes over raising the retirement age from 60 to 62. In England, it’s currently 65. I kept my mouth shut…

Sundays. It may be unfair to say that the French get Sundays wrong, perhaps it is fairer to suggest that they simply haven’t updated their Sunday system along with the rest of us yet. If you wake up on a Sunday morning without anything in the fridge, you have two choices; no food or restaurant food. Shops still believe in a full day off in the south west, however, it may be interesting to note that the wineries are all open…

The Internet. The only one of my list that has actually been less of a nuisance and more of an annoyance. Our internet provider was genuinely proud of the fact that they take less than two weeks (10 days specifically) to deliver the box after we purchased the internet. When I, and the Austrian girl I was with, explained that our internet at home is installed immediately, I think they got a little bit offended…

As much as I have now become a regular user of the phrase, ‘this would never happen in England’, I imagine that the moment I step off the plane and step into a long queue back home, I shall utter the words, ‘this would never happen in France…’ 

Living With Strangers

So as part of my attempts to slip seamlessly into the French way of life on my year abroad, I opted to live with French (or at least ‘non-English’) people as part of a, ‘colocation’. I have now lived with 3 different French people, an Austrian girl and a Slovakian fondly known as the, ‘Slovak’ and I have learnt quite a lot about living with people you don’t know much about…

It’s what English people do. The wonderfully useful thing about living with people from different cultures is that you can be as strange as you want to be, and simply blame it on your culture. Want to eat supper at 5pm? ‘It’s normal at home’. Want to take a shower for half an hour? ‘What, you don’t do that in your country?!’

Unfortunate awkwardness. I had the amusing, yet rather frightening situation of a flatmate wanting to be more than just friends. Discovering that I could lock my bedroom door was certainly a delightful relief but I was a little nervous about the atmosphere in the flat afterwards. Luckily, it all turned out fine as he soon met a Brazilian girl who was far more exotic and the off-putting glances stopped.

Flatshare fridge- good idea or bad idea?

Meal times. As a group of four who didn’t know each other very well, we tended to be fairly antisocial when it came to food. Although there is nothing wrong with an episode of badly streamed Masterchef providing the only entertainment of the meal, the problem lies in the cooking. Lack of communication often finds four people wanting to use the oven at the same time. And we only have 2 baking trays.

Communication barriers. A group of people who all speak different languages is a wonderful experience as a mixture of Frenglish and Franglais can provide for many amusing moments. My mentioning that decoration in the loo would be nice subsequently led to Slovak investing in an enormous One Direction poster. Also, many a laugh can be had upon hearing a Frenchman utter the word, 'beach'. 

The French Don't Like Cupcakes

Image: Zazzle

I am not a very good cook, nor am I a baker. However, the one thing I know I can do is whip out a pretty good batch of cupcakes which have usually all disappeared by the next morning. It goes without saying, therefore, that 6 weeks into my time in Bordeaux, I felt it was about time to treat my flatmates to a sweet surprise. The plan was made, I would go to the supermarket after work and make them that evening. Of course it was a nightmare, here is why…

The Supermarket. It wasn’t until I headed to the 3^rd supermarket that I found everything that I needed. When I say supermarket, think the hectic atmosphere of Oxford Street’s Primark mixed with the overwhelming size of most IKEAs. It is practically a department store, and they still didn’t have everything that I wanted.

The Flour. Perhaps I should have looked up the word for, ‘self-raising flour’ before I headed off on my adventure, but I figured it would be simple right? Wrong. Self-raising flour doesn’t exist in France, the closest thing I could find was titled, ‘Farine pour gateaux’ (Flour for cakes). Hmmm…

The Cases. After two rounds of the supermarket, by which time the guy behind the cheese counter was starting to recognise me, I decided it was time to ask someone where to find cupcake cases. I was led to another floor (yes- multi-story supermarket) where I found them hidden amongst kitchen utensils and bed sheets.

The Baking Tray. You know what I mean, with all the holes for the cakes? The French don’t know what I mean. That doesn’t exist in France.

The Oven. Okay, so I won’t blame the French for this one. In my flat I have a very old oven and unfortunately I didn’t realise that it lied about the temperature and so a lot of guess work was involved.

The Result? Squidgy, misshapen squarecakes with burnt bottoms.

But they actually tasted quite nice!

The Challenges Of Moving Abroad

My recent big move has been a fairly smooth ride as far as these things go, but it hasn’t always been completely bump free. A voyage across the seas for an extended period of time can be an incredibly worthwhile thing to do; independence, initiative and interest can all be acquired while you’re away. However, it isn’t always plain sailing (perhaps you learn how to make travel related puns as well), here are a few reasons why...

Image: cartoonaday

New People. Meeting people is often one of the hardest parts of moving away. Meeting fun, nice and normal people is often even harder. However, don’t forget that while you’re abroad, you have the perfect opportunity to meet a huge variety of people. Why not approach a randomer on the street and ask them to show you around? If they think you’re weird, just tell them it’s what all English people do.  

New Habits. Getting used to a new routine can be a very confusing thing, but it’s very important to embrace the culture of the place where you are living. Waiting until 9pm to eat dinner, as the French do, was practically impossible to get used to, but now I prefer it. Clubs not even opening until 2am was even stranger but I finally felt like I fit into French culture when I discovered that I can start work as late as 9.30am.

New Living Arrangements. Moving into a flat with strangers and a kettle-less kitchen can be a daunting thing. Discovering how to make the washing machine work provided a particularly deceptive challenge (the washing powder and the freshener look identical!), but making mistakes and learning how to not burn yourself when lighting the oven is all part of the ‘broadening your horizons’ experience.  

Had to invest!

New Language. Without a doubt the most nerve-wracking, nail-biting pre-year abroad jitters for me came from my fear of not being able to understand those around me. Of course it was a struggle at first, and I still occasionally nod my head when someone looks at me expectantly without a clue what I’m agreeing to, but over time it occurs less and less and you begin to understand more and more. 

Heineken: Would You Play Departure Roulette?

If you were given the opportunity to drop your travel plans at the push of a button and head to a new and unknown destination, would you take it?

Heineken has launched a new instalment to its ‘Voyage’ campaign to test people’s sense of adventure. After setting up a departure board at New York’s JFK airport, the beer company persuaded the passing travellers to take a step into the unknown…

By pushing the green button, they would have to cancel their flight and forgo their original plans, whether it be going home or away, and head to the destination nominated by the machine, all expenses paid for by Heineken.

It is no wonder that the video has become viral on YouTube, with over 2.5 million views having only been launched less than a month ago. Heineken’s social experiment is able to capture the hearts and minds of travellers and adventurers alike, and the cleverly made video builds a sense of anticipation as those who turn down the opportunity are revealed first before the brave few step up to the podium. 

Heineken’s brand director, Belen Pamukoff believes a legendary trip requires spontaneity, “It should welcome random experiences where improvisation is the only way forward. This summer, in a variety of exciting ways, we are plucking guys from their everyday lives and dropping them into a world unlike anything they've ever seen”.

Would you push that button?

A Moment from a Movie

This weekend I had a plan. I was to travel back to England for a total of 23 hours in order to celebrate the 21^st birthday of one of my closest friends. Planned far in advance, rather keenly so, I had booked my trains to take me from Bordeaux to Paris and then the Eurostar from Paris to London, acquired so far in advance that the sizeable cost was almost forgotten. She had asked me to do her speech after all.

Of course there was a thunder storm the night before. Of course all the trains to Paris were cancelled due to floods. Of course I didn’t let this stop me.

After deciding that the airport was the way to go (both metaphorically and literally), I jumped in a taxi and exaggeratedly shouted, ‘take me to the airport!’ Dramatic, I hear you say. Well, the fun didn’t stop there. Upon arriving at the airport, I had my movie moment. The moment that allows you to have a story that you know you will always remember and over-tell for a long time to come. That story that your friends will get pretty fed up of hearing but you’ll keep telling them anyway.

Me: ‘Your first flight to London!’

Easyjet Lady: ‘It’s in 40 minutes’

Me: ‘I’ll take it!’

…

Me: ‘Wait, how much?’

An experience and a half, I was whisked through the airport, ushered through security and was sat with my seatbelt on within half an hour. Now that is efficient airporting.

Perhaps it is not the best advice to say arriving at an airport to buy your ticket 40 minutes before a flight is incredibly successful, but stress-related feelings aside, it was rather effective- I didn’t have to wait around for even a minute. Needless to say my friend’s party was incredible and I can only thank her for both the amazing evening, but also for providing me with my very own scene that could have been taken straight from a script.  

The Places of Bristol: The Bierkeller Theatre

Part of Bristol’s charm are the quirky, tucked-away little theatres that I seem to come across sporadically every now and then. No exception is the fantastic Bierkeller located in the city centre that opened only a year and a half ago. Slightly bigger than the likes of The Wardrobe and The Alma Tavern, this theatre gives an arguably edgier feel to its shows and has a capacity of 400.

On meeting the Artistic Director Alex MacMillan, he was eagerly telling me that it is in fact the last Bierkeller that remains and their stage, the very same one that sits there today, has played host to the Stone Roses amongst other big names. His enthusiasm for his theatre was in keeping with the general Bristol theatre vibe, and The Bierkeller is as friendly as they come.

The auditorium being their only downfall, I was reliably informed that they are soon to receive tiered seating from The Tobacco Factory which will hugely improve the experience. From university shows, professional theatre to improv and more, The Bierkeller has a busy schedule of entertainment, unsurprisingly booked up until November already.

If you’re in a theatre-going mood and stuck for options, don’t forget to check out the Bierkeller website. There’s a plethora of performances going on and a bar that serves bizarre cocktails named after them. 

Nostalgia for MSN Messenger

Image: chyang313

Do you remember the days of Friday night MSN? You’d spend all day at school with your friends and then as soon as you were home you’d log onto the family computer, sit through that old dial up noise and log on to MSN Messenger just so you could create a huge conversation where you and those friends sat around sending each other smiley faces and slices of pizza. 

Perhaps you had a more productive childhood than me and my friends, but when I heard the news that MSN were putting an end to their Messenger, I did feel the slight tinge of nostalgia for the days before Skype, but then I remembered that nothing has changed…

The drama of the webcam. What a nightmare. When you’ve got no plans for a whole day except watch Masterchef and paint your nails, it’s an absolute disaster when you hear the Skype noise coming from your computer: you’re not wearing any makeup. You don’t want to appear vain, but your hair looks like it went through the car wash backwards. “My webcam seems to be broken…”

The emoticon battle. This one isn’t unique to the video messaging, Facebook chat is a culprit as well and it can get out of hand. It starts with the cheeky :P, it turns into the XD and it escalates to so much more. You can get dancing ninjas, the afore-mentioned pizza and my favourite for Facebook, type in :putnam: and press enter. I KNOW. 

The abbrevs. (Abbreviations for those not in the loop) Most of them make sense, brb for ‘be right back’ lol for ‘laugh out loud’ to everyone except my dad who stands by ‘love you lots’ even g2g as ‘got to go’ is acceptable. However, as tweenagers we took it too far, starting with LMAO, then came the naughtier LMFAO and then the absolutely ridiculous ROTFLMFAO. Just no. 

The games-athon. I’m pretty sure that I learnt how to play chess, checkers and battleships through MSN. Unfortunately this one hasn’t survived the shift to Skype and sadly long gone are the days of ‘waiting for player 2’...

The choice!

The Places of Bristol: Boston Tea Party, Park Street

Image: Trip Advisor

Although this may not seem like an original choice, the reason I have chosen this dainty little coffee shop is for its garden. Already loved for its ethically-sourced products and family owned atmosphere, the Park Street branch of BTP was in fact its flagship location set up in 1995. The café boasts a large collection of teas and if you’re lucky, the baristas even put a nice leaf pattern on your coffee. 

The secret of this place, however, is only to be found when heading towards the toilets in a ‘The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’ style-moment. Heading through the tattered door, you come out the other side to a beautiful tiered garden. With lovely rock tables and heaters for cold mornings, the garden really does charm its customers. 

This picture doesn't do it justice!

So next time you fancy some Red Berry and Hibiscus Tea or a Get your goat, you’ve pulled! toasted sandwich, why not head to Boston Tea Party on Park Street? Find the old door that takes you through to your own peaceful garden, stealing you away from the hustle and bustle of city life just for a little while.