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Culture, Socialising

The French university ‘concours’/entry exams.

(Image by LucasTheExperience Flicr)

If you ever thought that the UCAS application in the UK was a challenge, think again. Having recently had a lengthy conversation with French students about their university application process I have realised how easy it is for British students to apply, and get a place at UK universities.

Currently in France all the students are preparing for what they call the ‘conours’ or the ‘competitions’ in English. These are countrywide competitions that will decide these young French student’s futures by means of the university selection process.

According to what subject a student intends to study they must do a ‘concours’ all the medics for example will do one kind of ‘exam’ while architects or politics students will do another. These tests are condutcted in huge public halls with thousands of students in the various rooms.

Once marked all the students in France are put in a list of how good they are in their chosen subject. From that list the universities choose their students. According to my French friends HEC (Haut Ecole de Commerce), the most reputed business school in France only offers places to some 200 students. If these students decline the offer they do not accept anyone who had a lower grading than those top 200 students.

Due to the ruthlessness of the universities, the students are equally as cut throat. They will do all they can to improve their chances of getting into the best universities. This is because, according to some friends, the better the university the better the job will be after and therefore the better the pay. They also regard the university alumni network very highly, adding to the desire of getting into the top schools.

As a friend said to me ‘the network is everything, if you have the network you get extra job opportunities, more consideration when applying for jobs and just a foot in the door generally. The university you went to mean everything in the French job market.’

In order to maximise the odds of reaching their highest potential many French students attend ‘les prepas’. These are intensive summer courses that aim to prepare students for the ‘concours’. Students choose their ‘prepa’ course according the success rate of the university or private company course.  According to many these classes can be good, but they are extremely expensive.

With prices as high as 1500 Euros for a 2week session it could be said that some students are being excluded from the opportunity of getting into a top end school. ‘Anyone who can afford it does a ‘prepa’.’

In the ‘concours’ many students have strategies to put off the other students. One guy I talked to said he and his friend would shout out things like ‘YES, man look this is exactly what we studied, OMG this one is SO easy’ etc… at regular intervals during the exams in order to put the other students off. Another strategy is to disrupt people as much as possible when leaving the exam hall, and generally causing as much chaos as possible to distract and disrupt everyone else. The aim of this is to ensure other students’ failure in your subject in an effort to ensure you get a better mark.

Another astonishing fact I was told was that there is 1 school that allows its male ‘prepa’ students to choose a number of its future female students.  The reason for this is that the director apparently believes that if women who will ‘maximise’ their potential surround the male students they will perform better in exams.

So what about the less well off students who cannot afford the ‘prepa’ fees, or who have to work all summer, students who cannot perform in the stressful environments of mass examination halls, and female students who are put off because they are being treated like bits of meat?

Are the French students and education system abiding to the age-old French motto ‘Liberte, egalite, fraternite’ (Liberty, equality, fraternity) or is it every person for themselves?

Travel

Ryanair at Edinburgh airport and bringing a Guitar on Ryanair

(Image by Sparkes from Flicr)

Yet another Ryanair adventure, this time from Edinburgh to Brussels. It was the first time I had flown with Ryanair from Edinburgh airport, and it was quite nice as it is a significantly superior quality airport than Prestwick, and it takes pretty much the same amount to time to get to from the centre of Glasgow.

To get to Prestwick airport you need to take the train that goes to Ayr from Glasgow Central and get of at Prestwick airport which takes aprox. 45 mins.

To get to Edinburgh airport you take the 900 Glasgow to Edinburgh bus from Buchanan Bus Station to Maybury, (aprox, 40mins), then cross the road and catch the 100 Airport express (aprox. 5mins).

We had checked in online, essential to avoid the £40 check-in charge! We had however decided to check in bags to try and bring some uni stuff home for the holidays. Unlike other airlines where the “bag drop” has about 10 people waiting, the Ryanair desks had a queue of around 50 people!

The reason for this was of course the weight restrictions. In an effort to speed things up before I got to the actual check-in desk I asked at another desk which was not serving to allow me to weigh my bag. (If my bag is overweight I always transfer things into my hand luggage. You are allowed 15kg in your hold bag and 10kg of hand luggage which also has to fit in the bag sizer thing).

I was of course not allowed to weigh my bag; I was nonsensically told I would have to wait until I was at the beginning of the queue. This of course meant that every time someone was even a tiny bit overweight on luggage they held up the entire queue of people removing things from their luggage, and putting them into their hand luggage. A completely avoidable situation!!!

(N.B. In Brussels Charleroi airport there is a giant scales where you can weigh your bag before you go up to the desk, it should be near the door at the departures.)

Annoying as this was I foresaw it would happen, and due to the ridiculousness of the airline I suspected a situation like this would be unavoidable. I therefore crouched down at the desk and sorted out my entire bag in the full view of everyone, got it to the right weight, and headed to security only slightly irritated.

Someone who was notably more irritated, fuming would probably describe him better, was a young guy in his early twenties who had foolishly decided to bring his guitar with him. So naïve! When asked to pay up the extra £35 he was livid, yelled that he could have bought an entirely new flight for that price, and remained enraged till he got to the departure gate where the staff very rudely directed him to yet another desk to pay for the transportation of said guitar.

Lessons learnt:

-Ryanair should have scales BEFORE the bag drop desks so people can sort their bags out beforehand.

-Don’t bring a guitar on Ryanair unless you are prepared to shell out £35

- Edinburgh airport is much nicer than Prestick and takes the same amount of time to get to from Glasgow

-Always expect Ryanair to try and charge you extra for anything they can!

Travel

Brussels Charleroi Airport (Ryanair); flying in over a cemetery?

Well as we all know I am not the biggest Ryanair fan.  I am however compelled to fly with them due to their ridiculously low prices, and well who can deny the cheeriness of the ever welcoming cabin crew and airport staff! ;)

I noticed something peculiar during my penultimate arrival into “Brussels” Charleroi Airport (Not Brussels at all actually; it is Charleroi, the 4th biggest city in Belgium and the largest in French Speaking Wallonia an hour drive from Brussels). After enduring a flight of verbal abuse via the tannoy about the “amazing” array of deals on offer EVERY 5 minutes, and a usual near crash landing, I caught sight of a small cemetery right next to the runway.

For a fleeting second I wondered if that was where all the people who had died of shock from the combination of a near crash landing, the intoxicating bright yellow colour of the cabin, and the ridiculously loud trumpet arrival sounds (if you have ever flown Ryanair, you know the ones I’m talking about).

Having conducted some research, the cemetery appears to be the Ransart cemetery. The local community stopped burying people there a number of years ago, before the construction of the new terminal completed in 2008, which is now a matter of meters from the cemetery.

They say rest in peace, but however could they be resting peacefully with some 4million passengers a year, that’s somewhere around 120 flights thundering overhead everyday!?! Who knows!

(Photo by askthepixel (Flicr) )

Travel

Ryanair introduces scales at gate for hand luggage

I have regrettably been flying with Ryanair regularly for the past 5 years, and it has progressively become an ever more loathsome experience.

The whole ordeal starts when you book your flight, you are fooled into believing that the flight is insanely cheap, but, by the time you get past the taxes and charges, and lord forbid if you want to take luggage the price is generally about 3 times the original one. You then have to pay the extortionate £10 credit card charge to pay for the damn thing!

At this stage you are however still quite pleased, as you have managed to bag a bargain flight.

It then comes to the day of departure and this is when the aggravation sets in. If you haven’t checked-in online you face paying a staggering £40 for your ticket at the airport. (Even if you attempted to check-in online and it did not work!!!)

You then have to trek your way to the airport which in most UK cities is not too expensive. Most European Ryanair airports on the other hand are located around an hour outside the city, which incurs yet more expenses. This usually cost around £20-30 for a return on the shuttle bus.

Right you’ve made it to the airport you’ve paid your forty pounds for the boarding card, and now you’re checking your luggage which you have already paid 15 or more pounds for. “I’m sorry Madame your case is 2Kg overweight that will be  £15”. So you then decide to ram as much stuff into your hand luggage as possible, so as not to have to pay the excess. You’ve got your suitcase open on the floor of the airport, undies in full view of all the other passengers! But it’s OK your bag now weighs that little bit less. No extra charge, you win! (But not for long.)

You then head through security where they make you shove you bag into the tiny carry on luggage measure. (Note at this moment everything has to fit; handbag, laptop, suit bag.. into the 1 piece of hand luggage.) The whole process so far has been quite stressful, and you think you’ll need a strong drink once you get to your destination. You therefore buy a bottle of alcohol in the duty free and sit and read the paper.

If you didn’t already know, EVERYTHING has to fit into this 1 piece of hand luggage. That ridiculously means your duty free as well, unknown to any other reasonable airline! It’s OK though you manage to squeeze it in.

They’ve called the flight to board 4 or 5 times even though there is still no plane in sight, it hasn’t even landed or disembarked the previous passengers. Everyone is queued up waiting for 30 minutes worried they won’t get a seat, because for no logical reason Ryanair still have DO NOT do allocated seating.

You finally get to the gate and this is when the NEW CATCH comes in. They have procured scales at the gates to weigh your hand luggage! They don’t even have a table or anywhere to sort your bags out, so when you find that your bag is over 10Kg you have to scrabble about on the floor trying to find a way to make it weigh less!! You’re also being rushed by the personnel because the flight is boarding! If you’re lucky your friend has space in their bag but otherwise you have to pay excess or check it!!

You may well have had extra space in your checked bag but now it’s too late for that and you are forced to pay up!! (Or abandon said bought bottle of alcohol!)

You are now fuming and f-ing and blinding the airport staff and you haven’t even reached the plane. When you then finally get on after standing on the windswept runway in rain, sleet or snow, and are bombarded with adverts for fast food, cigarettes and scratch cards over the intercom at 5 minute intervals! This means it is humanly impossible to get a moments rest.

You get to your destination exhausted, angry and ranting to anyone who will listen. Was it really worth it? At least it was cheap. It’s like something you buy in the sale and then hate!

Next thing you know they’ll be weighing passengers and charging extra if you’re not the right dimensions!

Updates on scales for hand luggage at gates: (Let me know if you have had your hand luggage weighed at a Ryanair airport!)

-Charleroi-Brussels (Belgium) – did not have scales at gate

-Edinburgh (Scotland)- did not have scales at the gate BUT the hand luggage police DO go around with a cardboard sizer that you have to try and fit your bag into!

-Belfast City (Northern Ireland)-did not have scales at the gate

- Krakow (Poland) – DID have scales at gate

-Prestwick-Glasgow (Scotland)- DID have scales

And according to Bernard Beige on About.com “carry-on luggage was not weighed at all at Dublin Airport, while the return flight from Frankfurt-Hahn had electronic scales”

In addition to the updates I have just made on 10 June 2010 I would like to say that Ryanair at Prestick have now installed tables on which to sort your luggage! How very humane of them!

(I did also head a silly girl telling her friends how she had to pay extra because she had 10.2 Kg !!! PUT the extra weight in your friends bag! You can put it straight back into your own once you’ve passed the hand luggage croons!!!)

Art, Fashion

Contemporary Pop-Art Gallery Paris

The hat shop Sandrine Bourg on Rue des Tournelles which I mentioned in my previous blog post is neighboured on both sides by a contemporary art gallery called Art Jingle. Part of their collection is dedicated to blues and the 60’s jazz movement and the other studio when I visited was hosting a Marvel Comics exhibition which was particularly eye catching.

Both galleries were filled with exciting and interesting art work which would make brilliant centre pieces in any young professionals home.

It had a kitschy cool pop-art feel and also retained an unpretentious character.

On their website you can check out other pieces they have which also look ultra trendy http://ajc.artjingle.com/artiste

Fashion

Hat shop in Paris: Sandrine Bourg

If you are looking to buy an extremely special and haute fashion chapeau in Paris I think I might have stumbled on just the place while visiting the fashion capital of the world.

Down a hidden street called Rue des Tournelles near the Bastille at number 31 is Sandrine Bourg’s little hat and accessorise boutique. Her shop evokes an epitome of rustic chic and showcases some irresistibly beautiful handcrafted hats.

The designer worked as an assistant to world renowned British designer Philip Treacey. Her hats have been used in catwalks by Ioannis Guia, Carven, Katherine Pradeau, and Hermès among others.

http://sandrinebourgparis.free.fr/

Tech

Women and tech

When considering women and technology the first things that might come to mind are pink laptops and cute girly gadgets but with closer inspection the Concept of women and tech becomes a hot issue for debate, why are there so few women in tech?

It is important to consider the increasing changes in the tech world not only with regard to the consideration of a female customer and marketing strategies for products for women, but also with regard to the women who are behind the emerging technology around us.

It is a common fact that men dominate the technology scene with a mere 1/5th of the industry jobs being occupied by women, but now more and more women are getting involved in tech and they are also letting companies know what women want from tech.

Not every woman is interested in being a .com guru and becoming the next CEO of Microsoft but what the tech industries have clocked onto is that women will buy technology and lots of it, especially if it’s sleek, functional and fashionable.

Nearly every mobile phone, mp3, camera and computer manufacturer has now brought out a “girl friendly” version of their product from multicoloured ipods to the pink Sony Vaios. The only disadvantage is that these products are often not designed to the same standard as the more “male” black versions. Thus preying on the technologically undereducated female shopper whose main concern is purchasing a product that will look good.

Nonetheless it could be said to have made tech more female friendly and to have at least aroused the curiosity of girls and women who otherwise may not have become as interested in technology and gadgets.

Some women however do not appreciate the niche market which seems to be creating a sting of products for women which could be seen as sexist and acting as segregators between men and women, men being taken seriously in the tech world and women being seen as silly and sexy. One such woman is Jolie O’Dell writer and journalist who wrote on ReadWriteWeb on Friday that “I’m a woman, and I’m in technology, and I demand here and now that you stop catering to me. That’s right, I’m talking to YOU: brands, marketers, PR flaks, hardware manufacturers, advocacy groups and the women and men in my industry…”

This point of view is exemplified perfectly by the cloud of controversy that was created last year when Dell created a new site especially designed for women called Della. The Register one of the world’s largest online tech publications was one of the first to come down on the site an accuse it of being ridiculously demeaning. The site was taken down less than 10 days after its big launch after complaints from women world wide.

The reason for all the complaints was that the website which was mainly promoting their latest laptop for women; was very pink and fluffy looking, and had a host of wonderful tips for women, including information on understanding the baffling world of technology as well “unexpected” ways your Dell could change your life as a woman some of these tips were “help in finding recipes online, storing them and organising them, as well as how to watch cooking videos online” in addition to info  on apps which would help with calorie counting and dieting.

So we know that girls are buying the gadgets BUT are there any women working within tech?

According to research done by Research in Motion 73% of girls in the UK aged 11 to 16 “believe there is a gap between school interest in technology and a career in the industry because of a lack of UK female role models” this might be changing however as more and more women become top dog at major tech companies or create their own multi-national companies.

Some such women are Meg Whitman who was CEO of eBay for 10 years, Marrissa Mayer Vice President of Search Products and User Experience at Google, Caterina Fake cofounder of flicr, Dina Kaplan co-founder and COO of blip.tv, and the list goes on! Not many of these women however are British. It could also be said that the UK is lagging behind in the blogging and video blogging departments as youtube and other media sites are dominated by American users.

One point which has been made by many bloggers and online journalists however is that many of the female tech success stories have been categorised as “geek girls”. Far from the imagined stereotype of a spotty girl who sits in front of her computer all day, these women are more akin to the “geek chic” than the “geek freak”.

Aforementioned Marissa Mayer and Jodie O’Dell have in fact been named as two of the “12 Hottest Geek Girls” (Manolith). Tech therefore seems to have become another aesthetically judged job sphere for women, but it could also be said that this can be used to a woman’s advantage.  Perhaps these beautiful women have mastered the woman’s recipe for success in an industry dominated by men who spent most of their adolescence in front of a computer screen with more virtual women than real ones.

So here are a few points to ponder the answers to which I as yet do not know; are women really still not as interested in tech as men OR is it that the opportunities for women are not as open and advertised as they are for men? Is there perhaps a social or psychological explanation for this lack of interest IF it does indeed exist? Are women encouraged to get involved in tech or do girls and their teachers think that tech is a boy’s game AND the industry a man’s world? And finally how should we start teaching women about the endless creative avenues for making money in the tech world?

(It must be noted that I am far from being a professional in these matters so any comments and debate is highly welcomed!)

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