5/20/2010
Today was my first day waking up a wee bit too late, but we managed to have a very quick breakfast and made it to school in plenty of time. Dr. Sullivan gave a passionate lecture on the European Monetary Union. He started with some historical information back to the gold standard and how that was essentially abolished and why. We talked at very macro levels of currency exchange, but it was very interesting to think about governmental institutions essentially instituting depressions to shrink a country’s money supply to pay off deficits. It put into context the thought that the economic power of the world really is only held by a very few people in our world and especially how quickly decisions made can effect world wide finances.
A professor from Audencia came in to talk about Germany and it reinforced a few lectures my architecture professor gave a few weeks ago. We spoke a lot about Berlin, but I never realized that the Berlin Wall fell as a result of peaceful demonstrations by the people and I also learned that it was largely built almost overnight on August 12, 1961. I learned a lot more about the division from the west and the east and the results that has caused today. The western portion of the country (Germany has 16 states – federal system like the US) is much more economically prosperous than the eastern portion of the country in which Berlin sits. Berlin is broke, but used to be a major industrial center. However, once communist Russia took control of that portion of the country, businesses moved away from Berlin into the west. Today Berlin is very cultured, diverse and artsy. Germany is also one of the richest nations in Europe and has the third highest average income (41,000€). Also I learned that about half of German women work, but mostly only as part time. This is because of the issue of childcare which is usually ran by churches (church and state is not separated in Germany), but care ends at 2:00 p.m. and that obviously does not work well for a career. Additionally the birth rate is low in Germany (1.3) and this is a problem very much like the United States and several other European countries when it comes to funding pension programs and healthcare as there will soon be a big boom of retirees just like in the US. The government is currently trying new programs (like 1 year parental leave with 80% of your salary) to boost the birth rate and one year after this was implemented (2007) there was an increase in the birth rate.
Class was out at 1:00 today and we went downtown to have lunch. I had an amazing turkey sandwich with a great mayonnaise from a little restaurant in the street. The streets are so narrow here and one area is just filled with restaurants. My friend Ashley and I walked around and also stopped for a super delicious chocolate éclair. We walked a few blocks further to the castle and met in the center courtyard.
We had a tour of this castle even though we did walk through it and get a brief history on Monday. In 2007 the castle opened after a nearly 17 year restoration to turn the castle into a museum of the history of Nantes. Our tour guide gave us all headsets to listen to him as he spoke. It ended up being a great 90 minute tour. I learned that Nantes, even though that it is many miles from the sea, it still has been the most important port in France because the river flows into the city. It became part of the slave trade in Europe (abolished in 1848, ’84 or ’98) in which sugar from Haiti was traded to France and then slaves came from Africa to Nantes and African goods were traded to Haiti. This became an important trading triangle in the history of France.
Nantes became a highly industrialized city include shipbuilding and also Lu or Lou biscuits which is a type of cookie/graham cracker that we have actually had while here at dinner. They also grow a lot of small beans and a very world famous small leafed lettuce. The castle is what you might picture and the inside was all white from the limestone. It was very nice and the modern elements of the building tied in nicely.
I’m sitting in the back porch and formal garden of my host mom’s house right now. There are some unusual sounding birds here that I have never heard before. We will have dinner soon and tonight will be a mini pub crawl with the French students from Audencia. We’ll meet at 21:00 and go from there.
I likely won’t post for several days as I’m leaving Friday night via an Air France flight to Paris and then off to Geneva, Switzerland by 22:00 Friday night. We’re staying in a hostel and then catching a train to Interlaken on Saturday morning and meeting up with another smaller group from Miami. We are perhaps thinking of going ATVing through part of the Alps and for sure some hiking. Saturday night at a hostel then more time on Sunday in Interlaken before taking a train back to Geneva Sunday night and a flight back to Nantes earlier Monday morning. All 9/13 of us are excited to go see the Swiss Alps!!
