Merry Christmas

I decided to fly home for Christmas to see my family, eat good food, and flee from the cold weather of Illinois.  It is hard to believe, but studying abroad has also drawbacks alongside with its numerous advantages, and anybody should be aware that it involves important sacrifices.  I am not talking about "culture shock" but rather about being away from one's family.

Unless you worked hard for it - but let's be honest it's not the case of many, it is usually a heavy burden financially for your family to have you abroad.  This depends on the wealth of family and on the expatriation, of course.  Nevertheless, one thing stays equal for everyone whenever you are abroad: you are exposed to be dramatically powerless in the case something occurs to your family.  Loneliness, health problems, discords, tightened finance are some examples.  With your family, being abroad is like missing 5 episodes of Dallas in a row: when you come back, so much has changed that you don't understand anything.

I realized that I always took my decisions about expatration myself, not thinking that I could be a cog in the machine. Overconfident, probably selfish, I was looking up without knowing what was under my feet, and I let people down.  Semesters abroad sometimes make you feel like you'r in holiday and everything is "fun" or a "new discovery". Bad habit when you finally have to face the real world.

The coldest place on Earth!

Winter finally arrived in Macomb, IL! During the same day, the temperature dropped from around 6°C to -15°C!!  Today, the temperature reached -17°C and it felt like -25°C because of the wind. This is by far the coldest temperatures I have ever experienced.  Luckily, I found some warm coats and sweaters for a descent price during the Black Friday of Thanksgiving, and the cold is quite manageable as long as you walk fast to class. Despite the temperature, I managed to go to my finals and I think the results should be OK.  

The campus is now covered with snow, which is actually pretty nice!  I uploaded some pictures of the Fall and homecoming, and also some pictures I just took of the snow, check out my survival equipment!!

Recession is only about queuing

The current financial meltdown has been compared in many ways with the Great Depression of the 30s, because both crisis involved a high speculation that resulted to panic sales and made the stock exchanges plummet. In my opinion, there is a central point in which they differ: queuing. 

The most common visual representation of the Great Depression is this picture of gentlemen lining up for free soup.  How is that related to the credit crunch?  Eighty years later, there is no "physical" line, but several people are queuing for one thing: a jackpot of $700 bn (also called TARP... almost trap).  I could already picture AIG's, BoA's, Citi's, or Goldman's CEOs lining up in front of a Henry Paulson giving away billion-dollar-bags.  I read today on the Wall Street Journal that insurance companies througout the country were trying to buy small banks in order to get a ticket in this line... sounds like a pretty tasty soup.

I think you get the point, my personal opinion is that the way this huge amount of money is used is quite controversial.  No free soup for poor people nowadays, but billion dollars for greedy corporations.

It is paradoxal for me to write this because I am studying finance and might be hired by these companies once they are back on track, but it reminds me that I am a business school student and I might be queuing for a job very soon... I am glad not to be at the bottom.. may Obama do something.

President Obama

Among the several reasons why I am very grateful toward the Atlantis Program, the opportunity to be in the United States of America during the presidential campagin is definitely the most important one! Today is an historical day: Barack Obama is the 44th president of the USA.

Presidential rat race '08

One of the good things about being in the U.S. is that we have this great opportunity to be able to follow one of the most interesting presidential elections in the world.  So much money spent, so much talk, gossip, words, rumors, lies, strategies, tensions; so little content.  Pretty much the average American TV show! 

The recent trend in television is characterized by numerous successful series like 24, Lost, or Prison Break, that thrill our senses and keep us busy wondering for the rest of the week what will be happening next week.  Here, we have two superstars and an intense promotional campaign monopolizing the attention.

Analysts keep saying that people focus on personality rather than content.  Unfortunately for our two runners, there seem not to be any real answer to the current financial turmoil; this explains why both of them have been avoiding answering the questions and just repeated that greedy investors from Wall Street are evil... pretty demagogic.

As pretty much anybody from outside the U.S., I tend to support Barack Obama rather than McCain, because I think it is high time to have someone who would think twice before invading a country as leader of the most powerful country of the world.  Many comparisons with the Great Depression and the actual financial crisis have arisen; at this time, America was down on its knee, and what brought it up again was.. WWII! Hopefully, this won't be the remedye again. 

Future, uncertainties, stress

The financial markets are in bad shape nowadays, all stock exchanges plummeted and the U.S. government is about to spend the equivalent of more than Sweden and Ireland's GDPs combined.  I am glad I am not of these Wall Street brokers that we always see totally depressed, illustrating the highlights of the newspapers... wait, hold on a second... what's my major again?

Today once again, our teacher asked that question with that tone which already gives you the answer:

  -"If you graduate in May and are looking for a job, when do you think you should start applying?? Right now, of course"

Well, it seems obvious that this teacher is not the one who will waste her time sending resumes to human resources already busy with firing people.. I was thinking about applying for an internship in the U.S. after I graduate to get more experience before I want to earn a master or MBA but it seems kind of hard right now..

In addition, the Atlantis Program has been a very rich experience already for me, but we are  some students to share the same fears.  What are recruiters going to think about such a strange resume with no valuable internship and an abnormal number of bachelors for a 22 year-old kid?  Should I continue and earn a master?  Should I try to find an internship?  A job?  Where?  How am I going to argue about the strenght of my school and mention no internship?  These are tough questions and I still cannot find any answers..

always a pleasure

Yesterday, I went to the movie theater of Macomb to watch "The Last Mistress", a french movie.

Heard while leaving the room, from an old person:

"Anyway, I hate French people"

Bad guess

As a long-time basketball fan, I was very excited about going to the U.S. because I was expecting to play against very good players, and be a little behind. My second favorite sport is football, or "soccer" as they like to call it, and my guess was that americans would be quite bad at it.

Actually, the level in basketball is not very impressive. Alright, it is maybe not the most popular sport (which are probably football and baseball), but still... I have seen a few very good players, but most of the players are just bad! They are very athletic, and therefore can shoot from almost everywhere, run faster than you, jump higher but... they can't play!  Passing is the very last option, running and shooting from the 3-point line being the first, second, third and fourth option. Everytime I played, one guy was catching the ball on one side of the court, running to the other, and shooting "from downtown"... Pretty irritating when this person is on your team. Of course, there are some good players but most of the people I played with were so selfish..

Now, soccer. With some friends of my floor we decided to join in the intramural tournament and form our own team, "The Imports". The team is composed of two australians, one german, one indian, one swede, one american and one guinean. There were three levels and we chose the easiest one, called "recreation" or something. I thought than it would be a piece of cake as americans are not very big fans of soccer, but we actually lost our two first games 2-8 and then 0-10 !!! The teams we played against were pretty good, organized, they could definitely play! We could not even compete! Soccer is much bigger than I expected, with games on TV pretty often, many fields on campus and a lot of pretty good players.. I would not have guessed!

Just annoying

Six months ago, my idea of the cost of living in Macomb was very different from what it is now. Back in France, we had to decide between DePaul and Wiu, and I chose Wiu for many different reasons. Nevertheless, one of the main reason was that I was convinced that Macomb would be much less expensive than Chicago, and thus would allow me to spend allocate money toward travels rather than housing or food. At that time, the exchange rate was around 1€=$1,40, and then it went better for us every month (not for our american friends unfortunately...) up to 1,60 six months ago; precisely when we had to chose our housing options.

Problem is, we were confident, and our computations led us to conclude that we would have plenty of money in the US, and therefore could afford to apply for "super single room", and the "Dining option 1". I found that the process was very opaque, price-wise, with no clear price along. Well, it did not matter to me because I felt like it was still cheap with the exchange rate (not to mention that I kept reading article from "analysts" forecasting a low dollar for the next 5 years).

Now that we are in Macomb, everything appears much more expensive that we thought for a town of 30,000 inhabitants.  First surprise, we discovered that we had to pay everything upfront for the semester!!!  That-is-to-say $4,500 had to be paid before... the 28th of August! Wow.. and in the mean time, the exchange rate dropped to $1,40 per euro.  It means basically that we have to pay $680 a month for our rooms, and the dorms are closed for thanksgiving and winter break (--> kicked out we are).  In addition, the meal plan costs us about $1,400 for the semester, but actually we have in our dining cards only $750 of purchasing power as half goes to overhead charges... Then prices seem low, but their real price is multiplied by 2 as you paid the same amount for overheads. 

 

Only food and housing costs therefore more than $1,000 a month.

Well, there are still some products that are very cheap at the dining hall: pizzas and cheeseburgers. A slice of pizza costs $0.7 (so $1.4 actually) and is pretty big; on the contrary 50grammes of fruits cost you about $3!  I understand quite fast how is the trade-off working in people's minds.  For an european, it seems so strange than a tiny salad might cost more than 3 big slices of pizzas...

Alright, housing and food still costs much less than in Chicago, where an average student rent costs about $1,100, I heard. We still have to ride the train to travel anywhere, and the system is pretty lame... only two trains a day: one in the morning, one at night (therefore the sunday night train is always around $50 and crowded). But now, I found out that I could not waive the Wiu student insurance, which costs $300 a semester whereas I already have an international insurance that covers much more than what the Wiu's one does. Not very flexible, and these are $75  more each month.

If you had to this miscellanous expense such as move-in expenses, phone, probable cost of winter clothes, and books (around $400), it gets pretty tight... This has really taught me the relative value of money, and I thank this program for granting us with 917€ a month, as well as my family who keep supporting me.

I am not trying to blame everything (except maybe the health insurance....), just show how expenses can be much higher than expected, especially for overseas studies.  I am not planning my upcoming travels much more carefully! To summarize, what I learned from this is: do not rely too much on exchange rates, remember that you cannot think about everything expense-wise, prioritize budget allocations!

Slideshow

I have just added a slideshow on the right side with pictures of Western Illinois, my dorm Tanner Hall, the mudvolleyball and some other events like the "tailgating" and the airballoon show of Macomb!

Enjoy!!

For non-french readers, I apologize but I had to write this in french, please understand.

Une personne qui m'était très chère nous a quitté ce week end, il s'agit de ma grand-mère. Je suis profondément triste car mamie est celle a qui l'on doit presque tout, celle qui nous a éduqué tout petit et sans qui je ne serais peut être pas là où je suis à l'heure actuelle. Le bonheur que je vis actuellement, je le lui dois, et je me sens coupable de ne pas avoir pu lui faire partager cela davantage. Néanmoins, je suis soulagé que ces souffrances aient pris fin. C'est une grande perte pour la famille Daguerre tant elle avait d'amour pour chacun d'entre nous...

Mamie, repose en paix avec l'amour des tiens

Chi-town is magic

For my first time in Chicago, I must admit that I have been very impressed: Chicago is really huge, and pretty nice! I like how the Lake Michigan contrasts with the skyline of the city, it really feels like you are facing the ocean! Surburbans areas like Lincoln Park remind me of the movies I see on TV, with large streets where hundreds of SUV are parked, terraced houses with small front gardens, many joggers and a lot of trees and grass. Downtown looks definitely like New York, however the different rivers crossing the CBD gives it more charm.

We were lucky because it was very sunny (and warm) and during the entire week there was an "air and water show"; many military airplanes were flying over the city, sometimes very low which made a lot of noise, and we could assist to the exhibition alongside Lake Michigan, that was awesome!



We used our time there to visit DePaul University and it looks really nice! The campus is broad although close from downtown, very well equiped and with a lot of vegetation. The downtown campus is more serious; the entrance hall is very fancy and looks like the headquarters of a multinational company!

We also had a drink in the Hancock Tower (one of the tallest skyscrapers in Chicago) at the 92th floor! There was a great view of the region, and you could see straight lines of lights forming the city.


I would like to thank Connor and Maksim for being so available and patient during this week, the americans did their part of the welcoming job very well!



Being in America raises some worries, the most important of them being the food. So many fast foods everywhere is a big concern for us and we all weighted ourselves before leaving, officially I weigh 76kg! Let's see how its going to evolve!

Bilan à mi-chemin

I have some time to kill in my hotel room in Dublin, time for some writing! –

Now that the first year is over and the second year in the US is approaching, I would like to share some thoughts about this program, this experience so far. What an interesting experiment! This program mixed up many different profiles which makes it very interesting to compare them to each others. First, there are 3 main nationalities, Americans, Swedes, French, and some “minor” nationalities (Lina is German, Maksim is Ukrainian, Camilo is Colombian). Second, there are three different types of schools: a private university (DePaul), two public universities (LiU and WiU), and a business school (ECE). Third, whereas DePaul’s CTI is specialized in Information Systems and Technologies (with the exception of Connor, studying film), the three other universities enrolled business students to this program. Last but not least, the American students are divided between one university from a big city (DePaul) and one from the countryside (WiU). In addition to these four points, the different students show very different personalities, it goes without saying that living in this tiny Babel tower is very rich.

I don’t know what I should start with to summarize what I observed during the last 10 months. Let’s start with academic considerations. For this point, all three nationalities are VERY different. Swedes seemed to be the best students, hard workers, very serious and organized; they could travel during the week end and still be at school on Monday with their homework done. They are also much better than French for languages (I will skip the comparison with Americans for that point… J )! All Swedes have perfect oral skills in English (sometimes written was not as good), as well as a very strong third language, usually German or French. On the other side, Americans were not hard worker, but usually very smart and participating to discussions all the time. They seemed not used to spend hours and hours to study, but rather have a solid content that they understand and therefore remember easily, they have a very critical mind, asking relevant questions, and know a lot of concrete business. This is my explanation why some Americans were complaining about the academic level of the classes provided in France at first, because they are more used to teachers that make the work easy for us to remember, whereas in Europe they expect you to figure out stuff by yourself.

Although the French students are not as smart or organized than the rest of the groups, everybody did fine this year. I think that it is mostly due by the way we work, less organized but much more reactive. We don’t usually stress if we are a little late and approaching the deadline, whereas it seemed to me that Swedes had trouble working out of the organized and structured way; Americans tended to lose hope and blame the system sometimes. What surprised me is how sometimes we can be very positive toward things, probably because we are very happy of the situation; I think it helped us find the motivation to get things done when clock was running. In a whole, Americans are the faster to get the work done, the Swedes the slower, but the result is very different.

Americans are much more confident than Europeans, especially the DePaul guys because they are very skilled at what they do. If you tell one of them that he is wrong, you’d better have a solid explanation! I sometimes felt that it was a little arrogant, though they often tell you when they don’t understand something. Americans and French were better for everything that was concrete, like Management Control’s case studies, whereas the Swedes were much better for more academic work.

Concerning social behavior, there are also many interesting observations to make. It is amazing how Americans are at ease with people they barely know. Whereas Depaul students used to be more “individual”, Western Illinois’ students used to hang out together all the time! That is probably because IS or IT guys might be used to work alone rather than in a team (but I am not sure about that) compared to business students who are used to work as groups. They talk to you as if they had known you for years! They like to party, joke, ask questions about curiosities of our country. The Swedes too are very very friendly, but not as “open” as the Americans. They are extremely nice with you even when they don’t know you but without being “intimate” (not sure the word is accurate).

to be continued...

Not so close!

Well, everything did not go as fine as I was expecting... Unfortunately for my banker, I was missing a paper that was mandatory to pass the US port of entry! This I-20 form costs me about €1,000 because I am now stuck in Dublin, forced to buy a new plane ticket in the middle of august, and to settle in a €90/night hotel... Apparently, having graduated does not automatically mean that you have become smart

Getting closer

There are only a few days left before I fly to Chicago, and I am having mixed feelings right now. I was very excited about going to the US before, because it has always been a dream for me to study in this country, but I do feel that I will terribly miss home.

I am not a big fan of the so called "theories of culture shock" that I think are simple things, modelized by "experts" in search of credibility (I might be a little tough); whatever, what I want to talk about is that strange feeling of being torn between places I created an emotional link with. I started to really appreciate Sweden but had to leave it early which was quite frustrating because I was about to enjoy it a lot. Nevertheless, my return to France was incredible! After having been living in Bordeaux for the last 20 years, I never enjoyed it as much as I did during this summer!! The town has changed a lot, and is now an extraordinary (if not legen-dary) place to live in. The region offers so many different types of landscapes and summer activities, that no one day look like the previous ones; I am enjoying the presence of my family, my friends, beaches, restaurants, wine, and many exhibition like "Bordeaux fête le vin". Bordeaux is running for the "European Capital of Culture 2013" and therefore is making huge efforts to open itself more to tourism and Europe. It feels like the city is electric, more dynamic than ever!

It feels so good to be home right now that I don't want to leave the city at its best, even for the country that I have been dreaming of for years now! It just feels like its now the best time, but I have to go on. Don't think that I am complaining, my life is a dream and I am the luckiest person in the world, but traveling quite intensively made me appreciate home much better, and I am torn between so many places I love and I don't know anymore whether I am happy or sad...

On top of Bordeaux's cityhall, the French, European and American flags

Graduate!

I am sorry for not keeping this blog very active recently but I had so many things in mind and to do, like packing for example! Anyway, I am very pleased to inform you all that I officially graduated from Linköping University!

"Bachelor of Business Administration - International"

The ceremony was very pleasant as well as the lunch we had right after! I am very proud and I'd like to congratulate once again everybody from the Atlantis Program after everything we have "been through" (even if my atlantis experience was as smooth as possible personnally!).

The first phase of the Programme is now definitely over and on overall it is an incredible experience that I don't regret. It helped me become a lot more mature and I think I got a little bit americanized as well as swedishized (copyright to myself)!! Hanging out with the american a lot was very interesting and I know their culture much better now, which explains a lot of stereotypes we see negatively from our european perspective. On the other side, living in sweden helped me getting routines, and organizing my time! I had a budget to track my expenses, I used to go to the gym regularly, was preparing food for the entire week and had strict planning for the thesis work (and we always were on time so I think it worked pretty well).
Nevertheless, the contact with swedes has not been intense so these are just very simple things. I regret not to have talked much swedish even if I had 6 swede in my corridor, but they speak such a good english that you don't feel forced to speak swedish... I will definitely miss Sweden, especially now that the weather is so nice and everybody so excited about it, but I will participate to the traditional midsommer with some of the atlantis students thanks to Johanna!

Final Seminar

The long-awaited day of the final seminar is now behind me! After weeks of intense studying and stress, I feel very relieved now that it is done! First of all, I would like to congratulate all the Atlantis students for passing the thesis, and thank our teachers for the smooth running of the class. I know some students were very worried about the thesis and absolutely not confident in passing, but in the end everybody passed!!

That was a very interesting day, even if the discussion tended to go off track sometimes, but in a whole the discussion was good and pretty much everybody participated! Linnea and Connor were our opponents (or "discussants", teachers say) and they did a good job by questionning us on things we did not think about and that were very relevant. I'd like to adress special congratulations to Mr. Greenberg, whose thesis we had to review, and had an excellent defense despite some unlucky facts that made his work almost impossible to complete. This kid is brilliant.

Finally, I am very happy that Per and I passed the thesis! Per did a great job, almost keeping me on track and motivating me with some swedish organizational skills, that was a real pleasure to carry this work out with such a good student, and a good friend. We did not only passed but also had an A! That was totally unexpected and I am very proud of our work! The thesis remains a very good experience, even if sometimes it felt very very academical (way different from the way business is taught at ECE), there was a real knowledge creation process.

Westcoast week-end!

As Per and I were done in advance with the thesis, we planned a little road trip on the Westcoast of Sweden, region that is totally new to me. Indeed, Per lives a few kilometers away from Göteborg and invited some of us to his place, in order for us to discover that (important) part of Sweden. Raphael, Mario, Per, Paul and I drove there on Friday 24th.

All in all, this was a great week end! we did so many things in such a little time!! On friday, we met Per's parents who were very nice all along, his house is more on the country side, it was therefore very charming and beautiful! Whereas the Ryd is a sort of microcountry peopled by students, and therefore not really nice, Per's home felt like a peace haven! His parents cooked very good food to us.
Then, on saturday, a crazy day started. Per's family has got a motorboat, and as the weather was really nice, he invited us to sail and go fishing! On the way to the fishing stores, we drove by a field were the national soccer team was training, and we therefore decided to go have a look! I recognized some players I knew, and it was fun to see how many fans went there just to watch their team training!
The fishing-sailing time was great! It was the best way to discover the region and it was very funny (especially when the boat stopped, making a strange noise and that we started to fight for the last food left on board as the engine seemed to be broken). Unfortunately we did not manage to fish anything, but we tried hard!! It wasn't our fault, ahah...
After another great dinner cooked by Per's father, we headed downtown for a rap concert that was pretty cool (the band was called EMC and came from the USA). We then wandered in the streets and finally went back home pretty early. We ended the week end by going to the amusement park and enjoy the good weather!
Göteborg was very fun and nice, that was definitely worth visiting!

21 !

Even if I feel like I am 12, today is the day I officially turn 21! Time flies fast, especially when you are studying abroad or writing a thesis... To cope with that concern I simply decided to celebrate my birthday at the glorious Burger King Restaurant! At least nobody will complain about the price ahahah.

Ain't no good being French sometimes

It is very soon time for the first draft of the thesis work, and most of the Atlantis Students seem very worried about it. Nevertheless, through our constant research of subprime crisis and Basel II, Per and I found an interesting article that was pretty funny, a good way to relax while working! It is written by James McDonald (definitely American) for the Financial Times, read and enjoy:

• How the French invented subprime in 1719

  By James Macdonald, FT.com site
  Published: Mar 06, 2008
  

  Imagine the following: a collection of debts owed by a highly leveraged borrower with a bad credit record is magically transformed into marketable securities with triple-A yields. How is this miracle performed? It is through the power of financial innovation and free capital markets.

  It could be the story of subprime mortgages in the US; but it is not. It is, in fact, the story of government debt in France in the early 18th century. In 1719-20, a financial whirlwind even more dramatic than anything witnessed today swept through France. Shares in the Compagnie des Indes, or the Mississippi Company, rose 1,000 per cent and then fell by 90 per cent in less than two years. The story illuminates current events.

  1. The dodgy debts. The French monarchy had a history of recurrent default. By the end of the War of Spanish Succession in 1714 public debt had risen to over 100 per cent of national income and was subjected to forced reductions of interest and principal. Confidence collapsed and government paper sold for discounts of up to 75 per cent and the economy was in recession.

  2. The financial wizard. Along came one of the most remarkable people in the history of finance: John Law, a Scottish economic theorist who had never held any post related to public finance and who lived by his wits at the gambling table. This charismatic figure seduced the Regent with his blueprint for France: to exchange existing government debt for shares in the Mississippi Company, which held monopoly trading rights to the French colonies. The government would issue a new series of bonds to the company paying only 3 per cent in exchange for its old debts, which paid 4-5 per cent.

  For the government, the cost of servicing the debt would fall sharply and the budgetwould look rosier. The trading rights to the French colonies were largely worthless, for there were no profits at the time and the Mississippi Company had existed for a while without exciting public interest. By the same token there was little or no reason for the debtholders to accept this exchange. Law needed extra incentives.

  3. The power of securitisation. The market for government debts was moribund. Law's aim was to make Mississippi shares as actively traded as possible. This provided an incentive to swap - to get a more liquid security and the prospect of speculative gains. In other words, Law repackaged a collection of "subprime" debts as marketable securities under a different name and thereby increased their investor appeal.

  4. The role of easy money. Law proposed that Mississippi shares would be so actively traded that they would constitute "a new form of money". This striking idea tied into the second part of his scheme: a massive monetary stimulus provided by a newly founded central bank (do I hear Federal Reserve policy 2001-04?). This monetary boost would put some pizzazz into Mississippi shares, and their rise would encourage the public creditors to convert.

  5. Boom. Law's plan worked beautifully. The debt was exchanged and became worth many times its previous value as Mississippi shares continued their dizzying ascent. The economy recovered and everyone was happy - even though the underlying reality was an unsustainable credit-driven boom.

  6. Bust.For all Law's wizardry, the underlying assets of the Mississippi Company were still questionable royal debts that did not provide enough income to pay its promised dividends. Moreover, like many holders of collateraliseds debt obligations nowadays, speculators in Paris relied heavily on borrowed money. The rise in Mississippi shares in 1719 was reversed in 1720 and the bewildered French found themselves holding subprime paper, merely relabelled.

  The lessons seem obvious. Financial innovation can achieve much, but cannot transform sows' ears into silk purses. Moreover, there are risks that innovators do not fully understand their inventions and get carried away. The correct regulatory response to this risk is not to fuel it with easy monetary and credit conditions. The collapse of the Mississippi bubble had ruinous consequences in France. The government concluded that paper money, banks and stock markets were inherently dangerous ("financial weapons of mass destruction"). It took until the 19th century for France to recover its nerve and its rival, Great Britain, leapt ahead in the race for financial supremacy. In the rush to reregulate markets, let us hope western governments do not repeat the French mistake.

  The writer is the author of A Free Nation Deep in Debt: The Financial Roots of Democracy (Princeton University Press, 2006)

Stlm by day

Last week end was the occasion to spend more time in Stockholm, capital of Sweden, a town that I would recommend to anybody! It is one of these big towns - an urban population of around 1,200,000 - that has kept its tradition and charm while being very modern at the same time. No skyscrapers but some very high churches, the architecture is very nice! Nevertheless, I noticed this sort of American side of Sweden, that might just be the consequence of a country that lacks a strong culture in domains like gastronomy or entertainment, in the invasion of so many foreign fast foods downtown, or the fashion of girls that reminds me of New York! These are assumptions as I don't know the country enough, and the restaurant where I ate dinner was a really good quality-price ratio!

Stockholm was also for me the occasion to visit the Vasa Museum and Skansen, two great places! The Vasa Museum is in a sort of island which looks very nice and seems dedicated to entertainment. I was amused by the story of the ship and fascinated by the museum, which was much more interesting that museum I usually visit. Skansen was also amazing with so many different animals and a funny site that is convenient to visit. It has also been a while I didn't see any "exotic" animal! I recommend both of them!

It is hard to be researcher

T-H-E-S-I-S.

One word to rule them all.

One word that summarizes where 90% of my energy goes!

The thesis work is brand new for me, and I wasn't expecting such a workload! Whereas a normal course is much simplified by the teacher's explanations, here you have to build your own knowledge by collecting data in the infinitely vast universe of the web, or the more condensed world of libraries and books. In one of them, it's all about finding the few precious stones among the multitude of rocks; in the other one, it's more about being patient enough to follow the path to the goldmine.

Per and I were very motivated about writing a thesis on the financial field, but I think we might have been to ambitious from the start. Being interested in the subprime crisis led us to try to study the limits of risk management tools in monitoring and coping with the crisis. But then further research of the theoretical field of risk management in the banking system showed us how much it is developed, and therefore how hard it is to break it down. Everytime we think we are on the right tracks, then meeting with Emeric makes us understand that our research questions have purpose or constraints issues. It gets very confusing and we struggle making the trade-off between interesting thesis and manageable thesis.

It is a hard task, but it is very interesting. I really enjoy the researches, the only problem comes from the frustration of having an idea that suits your interest. Anyway it is also funny to see how one's own discipline changes from the early days to the following weeks. The first week was about enjoying more freetime or freedom of scheduling, but then one quickly realizes that in order to be research effectively one need to wake up at 7:30 and starts studying around 8:30 till the end of the evening, while averaging 10 coffees a day. We usually meet at 9 with Per and stay all day long at the university with a confortable lunch break to rest our brains, and the study rooms of the A building are just great. The only problem is that after 9AM there is no room left! In general the A building is a very good place to study, I really enjoy it.

This week end will be about releasing some pressure as I go back to Bordeaux for 3 days in order to pick up my passeport at the townhall and do some administrative tasks. A sligthly warmer weather, some good food and then seeing my family and friends (in this order of satisfaction, ahah just kidding) are the perfect recipe to come back 100% up and about! (I feel kind of sick though... that would really be too bad !!)

Please anyone interested in some french products let me know, I will unload my winter stuff there and bring back some food in my bags !! ;)

Atlantis BBQ!

What a great day! After the coldest week end of the year when the temperature reached -10°C, the weather became fine here in Linköping. Very surprising to find oneself in t shirt in the streets! The temperature was so "warm" someday that biking without mittens was possible, thing that is IMPOSSIBLE usually. The sun brings a wonderful atmosphere here, at a time when many of us felt kind of bored of the Ryd and its awful landscape, and outside activities are not possible.

We have therefore been celebrating Johan's birthday today by having an "Atlantis BBQ party" and later on go out downtown. This was a great feeling! Almost everyone was there, playing american football for the american while we french played "pétanque", and of course grilling some. The "BBQ spirit" was so nice, making us forget for an afternoon the last 4 months of freeziness that we've been experiencing in Lyon and especially in Sweden.
Even if it was still not really warm, I appreciated that day very much and found some motivation for the thesis work and the few weeks left in Sweden.

Thesis time

April just started and so did our thesis work! Even if I feel really excited about writing a thesis, this is a lot of stress. Luckily I had no trouble to find the perfect co-worker, and Mr. Hilling and myself are teamed up for this enterprise. I am very interested in research and writing, nevertheless this represents a task that is time-constrained, and totally new in a way, which makes me feel kind of lost. Defining a field of research is much harder than I expected and it is hard to think about a topic that would not be too ambitious.

Our coordinator seem involved in this work to make us organize our time, be careful and help us in the thinking process. I appreciate Mr. Solymossy's energy and think he is going to make sure we keep on track the all time. It still looks like a challenge to me, but with a good teacher and a good teammate, it should be just fine. I am confident in this work.

Visiting Tallinn

Capital of Estonia, Tallinn is now known as a sort of "Silicon Valley of the Baltic Sea" after many IT start up where born there, the most famous of them being "Skype" (!). Consequences of my limited culture, I used to think that Estonia would only a sort of small Russia, but actually this country has some historical influence of the danish, german and especially swedish cultures.

We learned that some cruises were regularly connecting Stockholm to Tallinn for a very reasonable price - unfortunately because people could buy duty-free alcohol and cigarettes, and some of us showed a strong interest in visiting one of Eastern Europe countries. And I think that none of us regreted this journey!

11 of the Atlantis students took part in this experience, and Johan drove some of us to Stockholm with his van, which reminded me the feeling of going on holidays to some summer camps, when everybody is very excited about keeps talking, joking or singing in the bus! The way to Stockholm was a lot of fun! Then after some visiting of Stockholm, let's go to the boat. The principle of the trip is this: we get into the boat at 6PM, the travel time is about 15hours so we sleep on the boat, arrive at Tallinn around 10AM, spend the day in Tallinn and then go back to the boat at 5PM the same day to go back to Stockholm. It seems like a short time period - actually it is, but Tallinn is still not a big town and it is the cheapest way to visit but still enjoy it.

The boat is a curious thing. It is nice, but ugly at the same time. The nice part was the entire sauna - steamer - jacuzzi thing for 4euros, it makes you feel like business men talking about their successful investments and a luxurious boat, some thesis proposal were born during this moment! The ugly thing is to realize that the boat is just meant to buy the all the duty-free stuff, watch some sort of shows, gamble at the slot machine or play blackjack. Moreover you are stuck on the boat so are obliged to eat at 200% retail mark-up restaurants, so let's say that this boat is for a certain kind of people. Anyway, we had a lot of fun, it was a good time to relax, think about something else that classes, get to know each other even more.... and a wonderful karaoke night!! (there are some serious compromising files in some cameras!!).

Arrived at Tallinn, I really felt that "russian" feeling. The town is really nice, it kept a very medieval style, and some building really reminds you pictures of Moscow or St Petersburg. The street covered of snow were also very nice, and I expected more snow in Sweden so it really made me feel abroad! This was the occasion to buy a really nice Chapka, and finally have my ears covered from the icy wind. All day long we have been wandering in the town, discovering some new architecture. It thought that you can still see consequences of the soviet era by the way people don't show any emotion in the street. They keep being very serious even if the people we talked to in the shops were nice! We also visited the oldest pharmacy in the world and saw the tallest building of the world... or at least it was the tallest in the 15th century I think. We decided to have lunch in a medieval restaurant where the menu looked attractive. The decoration was very funny, and the waiter very nice if we just forget that he was trying to sell us more and more drinks all the time, being not clear if it was for free or charged!! That was a nice gastronomic experience, it was good! (Despite the cockroach that wandered in the table, but my experience as waiter immunized me of these type of fear (sic)).

Finally, we had to rush to the boat after of course being some "souvenirs", and we were back for some 15hours of karaoke and shows. Even if the trip only lasted 3 days, it was really nice and I keep a good memory of Tallinn, plus that I had this "back from holiday" feeling that motivates you to get back to work (or not sometimes...). Tallinn, you and me it's just a matter of time before we see each other again!

Sverige!

It has been now a few weeks that I am in Sweden, so I think its high time to talk about this singular country. We actually live in the university housing area, the Ryd, where most people live in what is called a "corridor". Basically, this is a big flat shared by up to 8 people, where you have your personal room but share a living room and a kitchen with 7 other people. My room is very convenient, large and practical, with a decent shower. Sharing with many people has a big advantage: a huge kitchen! There is plenty of kitchen furniture and we have toasters and ovens! Unfortunately, it can become a nightmare for some corridors when people are a little dirty, I have seen some really disguting corridors!! But my roommates are very nice and clean.

There are 5 swedes and 1 german in my corridor, and the 5 swede are very close friends cooking and living together. It is sometimes annoying to feel like I am not at home as these swedes have been living there for several years and therefore make the rules, but it was fine and I have a lot of fun so far.

About the swedes, they are usually very nice even if they can seem cold. It is so surprising to see how EVERYONE speaks english... From 8 year-old kids to supermarket's cashiers! It is very frustrating to consider oneself a good english speaker and realize that you just have the average level of another country. Another interesting point is how they are super-organized, you always know how to do, or where to go, there is almost no uncertainty. It is sometimes a bad thing because when you have to take a ticket online to play basketball at the gym two days in advance, it becomes really insane! Queuing is part of the culture... you have to queue, everytime, - horrible!

Anyway, I make my way through, it is a pretty fascinating country and if you get used to the very bad weather then its perfectly fine! (but it is NOT easy). I now have a fancy bike, a swedish one that says "world-best bike" or something like this in Sweden ahah!

Livin' it up the Ryd

This is "Ryd". This strange term that I have no idea what it stands for or mean, is the name of the residential area where we all live. The least we can say about it is that it's very....... interesting!

First of all, the Ryd is not really part of the town as it is separated from it by a sort of wood, and to go to the center you will need at least a 15-minutes bikeride. The university is closer, with an average bike ride of 7 minutes and 35 seconds. The area shown in the picture is the university housing part of the Ryd, the one dedicated to LiU students, but it is surrounded by other habitations where other people live. The big red spot on the map is where I live, Rydsvagen 262 appt C30. The two red squares are pretty much the barycenters of the Ryd. The one on the left, Ryd Centrum is where Hemköp is at and the other one is the Herrgarn' a.k.a. "HG". Hemköp is the one and only supermarket in the Ryd, therefore we can use the term of monopoly situation and inexistence of competition to put pressure on prices. The HG is the student bar of the Ryd, so this is where main parties end, mainly because of the wind/cold/bike/laziness/price of drinks factors that occurs when trying to go out downtown. It is funny to notice that the entrance of the bars, where many drunk students are queuing and still drinking and being drunk, is adjacent to a kindergarten... Only in Sweden.

As I said before, the Ryd is very "interesting". The most confusing thing is that it is the antichrist of what you could think about Swedes obsession of organization. As all the building look the same, it is first very hard to find one's way, so your first reflex when you look for somewhere is to refer to the streets names and numbers. But here, there seems to be an absence or logic, or maybe a logic way too complicated for my simple french mind. It's a total MESS. You could be in a street that is called Alsättergattan, walk straight in the same street and then realized that now you are in Björnkarrsgatan... then you see a perpendicular street and go to the left, you are in Rydsvagen, and then the next street on the right is also called Björnkarrsgatan. And If you go straight you are in Alsättergattan again. It's so confusing, I'm still working on breaking down the mystery of Ryd.

Ryd is also like a "Little Amsterdam". Not talking about people using illicit drugs, even if it would be a relevant comparison, my focus is more on the use of bikes. An estimation of the number of bikes in the Ryd is 10,000 (Source: Myself newspaper) of which approximately 7,000 are broken ones. This therefore became the paradise of the of a gang of 12-year old kids that just hang out in the Ryd all day long looking for bikes they could "lend". A very common picture of the Ryd is to see tires or even entire bike stuck in some trees, roofs, or wherever it can be thrown.. consequences of the HG!

Swedish Course and first frustration

26/01/2008

The Swedish language started right after, and we all had to get back to work. I was really upset by the differences regarding the way of teaching foreign languages. During two weeks, our teacher has constantly been talking English 80% of the time! In France, we are used to have teachers that almost don’t speak French during the entire class. This is much better in a way because you understand the situation instead of just translating it. I think that this difference comes also from the fact that we were with Erasmus students coming from all horizons. But the thing that really upset me was that our teacher never asked me any question during the class because she simply could not pronounce my name!! So she kept avoiding me and when she had no choice but to ask me, she just nodded or said “Continue”… This is very frustrating coming from a language teacher! On overall, I think everybody learned a lot of Swedish in a short period of time (the class was very… intensive! Almost 40 hours a week), so this is a good thing.

Sweden !

08/01/2008

After a short week end in Stockholm, which is a wonderful city that I will certainly visit many times during the semester, I arrived in Linköping. First, I felt like the Ryd was quite depressing, even if I was very excited by the snow, which I rarely see, but afterwards I realized that the campus life would make that place look much more colorful and warmer. Then came the time of meeting the others! Everybody wasn’t arrived but it was still very nice to get together, I really missed them all!

Monday 7^th is the orientation day; back to school! I finally discovered Linköpings University and its campus! And my first impression is… it is impressive! French campuses don’t really look like that, Linköpings is pretty much Americanized: it is just BIG, very modern, it seems like all the buildings are brand new. It really seems that there are very good conditions for a study abroad semester.

The flight - time for a thought

Here I am, in the plane, not really realizing the scope of the trip. So many things in mind during these past months, I did not really think about Sweden before. I was very excited though, because Sweden is really perceived as a successful model across Europe, and that therefore going there would be only positive. Everybody makes up his mind about a university through its students, and the Swedish students from the program have shown so much discipline, been so friendly, motivated and professional concerning their study, that I could only have high expectations for Linköpings Universitet. So far, the only fear I had was about the climate. I was born and raised in Bordeaux, and never really experienced cold temperatures; my “winter jacket” would become really obsolete.

Winter break - Bye bye Lyon, Hello Linköping

As the French phase of the Atlantis program ended, I had to prepare myself for Sweden. I have to say, the semester in Lyon was like being abroad for me: another school administration, an unknown city, and 4 month in a residence with 10 American and 6 Swedes (+ Other nationalities from Erasmus). Except the cultural chock (well, maybe a little), I shared the same situations as most of the foreign students did, and without the stipend, which made it pretty tight. Anyway, this was still a very good experience and despite of the frustrations of some of the students, I had a very good time with a group of people that I now consider as very good friends.

Nevertheless, the winter break and being back home was more than welcome and extremely necessary. I had the opportunity to enjoy good food, rest and see the family before a very long trip. It seems like I spent most of my time in administrative tasks, family meeting and presents hunting. I managed to keep in touch during the break with some of the Atlantis students which proves that we really feel an unity. Finally, these two weeks seemed two minutes and I was already re-packing the bag that I hadn't really unpacked actually. On the road again!