Nantes and Mont Saint-Michel! And elephant riding! (What?)

Hey, guys! Sorry it's been so long since I've written something. Life is busy busy busy here. Work is intense and deadlines to finish things are approaching, so there's that. The weather here is also nice and hot, which with no A/C in the labs or my room means like I feel like I'm melting 75% of the time. On the plus side, that means outdoor activities are twice as fun, and with the sun not going down until around 10 pm, there's loads of time to enjoy oneself.

But I did want to share a bit from that "science week" I was talking about in my last post. I left Lyon for Nantes by plane Monday morning, and returned back to Toulouse on Friday afternoon. Nantes is a small-medium sized city in western France, not too far from the Atlantic coast and on the Loire river. So, what was the week like in a nutshell? I'll hit some of the highlights photo-reel style in a minute, but first, the science! (Because I know everyone is just so jazzed about research...sorry!)

The week was divided into scientific presentations and lectures, visits to various scientific sites, and, the most fear-inducing part of it all, our research presentations. The scientific lectures were largely very interesting...professors and researchers came just to see us three students (me and the other two Americans here) and our accompanying professors, and I was so flattered by how engaging and interesting they all were. Subjects ranged from Type 1 diabetes research to comparative work on muscular dystrophy, and there were even presentations specifically showing us how the French educational and research system works. It feels a lot more team-based than from my impressions in the U.S., with many different labs working under different agencies (often multiple ones) rendering the system hierarchical and almost labyrinthine in its complexity. On the cool side, they apparently are working quite hard to encourage North American students to come to France to pursue Ph.D's (paid for!), so if the vet thing doesn't for whatever reason work out here - thank you, crappy job market and veterinary education system compounding the problem - at least I know I'll be welcome abroad!

The scientific visits were also really cool. We got to check out the vet school's wildlife rehabilitation center, visit a cyclotron (a particle accelerator), a very spiffy research lab, among other places. The thing that had us three students incredibly nervous were our presentations in front of our professors and hosts. Asked to be approximately 25 minutes long and exclusively in French, followed by a Q&A session (and these are all Ph.D's, so they know what questions to ask!), it was certainly a challenge to prepare and perform. However, in spite of this, I was extremely proud to have done it - my presentation actually exceeded the time with no issue, and the listeners very very complimentary of my level of French - both spoken and grammatically on the slides themselves, which I painstakingly edited to be just right...took a while. They also liked the presentation itself, which they said was very clear and well-presented! Victory!

With that done, we could breathe a little easier and enjoy the rest of the week. Of course, Nantes was awesome, involving visits to castles, an island of machines (more on that in a bit), tons of awesome food all week long, and...Mont Saint-Michel! So here's the week, photo-style:

La Cigale, the fancy restaurant where we at Monday night. Right next to the opera house, and decorated accordingly. A feast for the eyes (and tummy!)

The château des ducs de Bretagne, where the rich folk stayed. (13th-16th centuries)

Very interesting looking, and slightly out of place in the city today!

Courtyard on the inside.

The crêperie where we had dinner Tuesday night. This is the second floor, with its very low ceiling! Dinner and dessert crêpes...yum!

Mont Saint-Michel from the outside. At this point in the morning, it was still surrounded by water! Legend has it that back in the 8th century, Archangel Michel appeared to the bishop of the area in a dream and said, "Hey you! Build a church on this piece of rock!" The bishop ignored the dream twice until the third time, when Michael got angry and burned a hole in the bishop's skull with his finger, which was present when he woke up. The bishop listened.

And just after lunch, water gone! If you look reeeeally closely, see those people over my shoulder? This place is known for its dramatic change in water coverage with the tides. You have to take a guide if you want to go barefoot walking out there - if you don't, you run the risk of dying one of two ways: trying to outrun the incoming tides and failing, or falling victim to the many spots of quicksand. You've been warned.

Today, this piece of rock hosts a lovely monastery, lots of tourists, and around 90 permanent inhabitants (who can't even park their cars inside!)

Inside one of the grand halls. Life even here was segregated. Wealthy pilgrims had the nice areas (with chimneys for heat! Fancy!), the monks their spaces, and the poor pilgrims the least assuming rooms.

And, if you were really naughty, you get stuck here. (Just kidding - the monastery was converted to a prison around the time of the French revolution. Only a temporary setup - but full of interesting stories. Ask me if you want to hear a few! We had a really awesome guided visit)

At the Ile des Machines (Machines of the Isle of Nantes)! Much more awesome than it looks. Basically a bunch of creative people got together and converted an old shipyard into an awesome artistic haven. They started by making awesome machines out of recycled and thrown away parts. Here's a caterpillar you can ride!

And here's a three-story elephant.

Who likes to squirt water at random unfortunate passerby who spend too much time gawking ;)

The intricacy was amazing. The eyes, ears, joints...everything moved! Here she is blinking.

It's a bird...no, it's a plane! Is it both? Two people going for a ride.

Scary looking digging insect. One day all these machines (minus the elephant) will be incorporated into one huge project - a gigantic tree, with all these insects and birds and things, which will be a massive playground...for kids and adults!

And, last but not least, the Lieu Unique - famous cookie factory (LU cookies - you may have seen them before if you like tasty French treats!). The square thing on top represents a box of cookies, and is supposed to show the "power" and grandeur of this impressive old factory (which is not a cultural site). Somehow, to me, "power" doesn't really go hand in hand with cookies...

Whoo! That was a lot! And I've still more catching up to do! I've yet to regale you on my hiking in the Pyrenees, so hopefully I'll get to that...and there are still more adventures to come. Thanks for reading!