#the only place i escaped it was a study abroad program which was intensive and over quickly

[telluricdog]

i get it i know higher education is plagued from mostly a single point (the increase of HR and their practices) that bloat what could be taught in a semester and a few thousand dollars into years and years of mandatory courses to even chance it at seeing a degree and it absolutely is ridiculous- but trashing on the idea that going in to study just one thing and not needing any supplemental information isn't exactly helpful either.

the "might need this in their career" is a careful line to walk but seeing say, meteorology students chase a tornado into a town and not have any first aid knowledge or USAR procedures is painful. having very obvious pointers from the start of the semester like "the nearby Y hosts first aid training. you should look into it because not only is a understated and important skill but if you turn to full time storm chasing you'll be much more well off if you find injured people during a chase."

not a perfect example but i think it highlights my point.

i think the approach should we have if an actual national conversation about university reform is elective, again, most of it is bloat but there is a reason for it- most of it can't be taught in the same classroom by the same professor. regardless of that, it still could be unspeakably important to one or two students, they should always be gently shepherded to things that actually relate to even a small part of the field. not everybody's leaving into the exact same job.

[blackscarabfilmz]

Date Night by Michael Gleason

There’s this prompts website that does a weekly contest with several prompts and I decided to take a crack at one of them, the prompt for this story was:

Start your story with a character saying, “Are you coming tonight?”

“Are you coming tonight?”

I looked up from my computer to see the smiling face of my coworker, Erin, looking down at me.

“Coming to what?” I asked.

“We're all going out to karaoke tonight, me, Carlos from accounting, Andrea from reception, Steve from marketing, you know, the Gang!” Erin replied.

“The Gang” was the nickname that Erin had given the group of single work-friends from our office that occasionally go out to bars together and try to pick up dates. The group used to be much larger, but it dwindled the more success the individual members had romantically. There's a metaphor for something in there, but I can't think of one at the moment. Erin had been championing my inclusion in the group for months now, and sometimes I went out with them and had fun, but I knew what tonight was, and it meant I had to turn her down.

“Sorry, I'd love to go, but I've got plans tonight.” I smiled.

“Romantic plans?” Erin questioned.

“A gentleman never tells,” I chuckled. “Maybe next time.”

“I'll hold you to that,” Erin said as she started to walk back to her desk, but she stopped. “You know, it's funny. You always turn me down whenever there's a full moon, makes me wonder...”

After a few moments of an intense staring contest, Erin broke out into a fit of giggles and continued back to her desk. Now, I know what you're thinking, the full moon thing, I get what's going on, I'm a werewolf and that's why I can't go out during full moons. And you're wrong, although my real reason does have something to do with the supernatural. The night of the full moon is when the barrier between the natural world and the spirit world is at its weakest. And for me, that meant it was date night.

About a year and a half ago, my fiancee, Christina, died in a tragic car accident, but I couldn't let go of her. We were high school sweethearts, we were gonna get married one day and have kids and a whole life together... and it was snuffed out in an instant because of one faulty stoplight. I fell into a dark pit after that, I started drinking heavily, went on autopilot for months, I was weeks away from being fired, from losing my apartment, and one night, months after Christina's death, in a drunken fit of grief, I used a Ouija Board to try and contact her spirit. I don't know what I expected to happen, to be honest, so imagine my surprise when I found it that it actually worked!

There Christina was, back in my living room, sure, she was a little more translucent than usual, and wearing all-white, but I had her back! We were both ecstatic to see each other, and I resolved to never lose her again. But, obviously, I had to keep my renewed relationship a secret, for one thing, I doubted anyone would believe me, and if they did, I get the feeling that dating a ghost is probably taboo. Unfortunately, the drawback is that we can only see each other once a month when the full moon is in the sky, but for me, that's a small price to pay to have Christina back in my life. Just talking to her and knowing that she was okay in the spirit world made me feel better. Everyone around me noticed how I'd changed, although they thought I'd finally gotten through the grieving process, they were none the wiser to the fact that I'd lost the need to grieve at all.

“Erin's still trying to get me to put myself back out there, but don't worry, I'd never stray from you.” I raised a wine glass and took a sip.

Christina sat across from me, sitting cross-legged, although sitting is the wrong term as she always levitated slightly above the ground. She couldn't partake in drinking or eating for that matter, but Chrissie didn't mind that I did during our date nights. I think she enjoyed the normalcy it created.

“That's nice...” Christina seemed distracted tonight. I hoped it wasn't something I'd said.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

“Robert... How long can we keep this up?” Christina replied with a question of her own.

“What do you mean? Keep what up?”

“This! Our date nights! Our relationship! It was great at first, it can get lonely on the other side, but... this isn't healthy for you...”

“This isn't healthy? You saw what I looked like the first night! I'm a lot healthier than I was before that! Before... I got you back...” tears started to well in my eyes and I took a shuddering breath.

“I know that my love, but... You need to move on.” Christina looked away the moment the words left her lips. She knew how I felt about that particular phrase.

“Move on? Why would I move on when I have everything I've ever wanted right here?” I reached out and tried to grab her hand, which failed for obvious reasons.

Christina just shook her head and sighed.

“You see me once a month, but you have a whole life you live every day that I can't be a part of anymore! And I've tried to make this work, for both of us, but it's getting harder every month.”

“So what? It's long-distance, like when you did that study abroad program in college!”

“This isn't the same and you know that! Besides, whatever we might have done together can't happen now! We can't get married, I can't give you children...”

“Marriage is a piece of paper, Chrissie, what we have goes deeper than that! Who cares if we don't have a ceremony or exchange vows? And we can adopt!”

“Adopt? Sure, and our kids will have a ghost for a mother? Do you realize how ridiculous that sounds? You won't even tell my parents about this, but you'll tell our children?”

“Babe, that's years away, we don't need to think about that now! We have time!”

Christina stood up suddenly and soundlessly stomped her foot on the ground, her foot slightly sinking through the hardwood floor.

“We don't have time! Our time ended the moment that car slammed into mine and killed me! And I can't let you keep your life on hold for a future that can never happen!”

“We'll make it work! I know we can!” I was on my knees begging by this point, tears flowing from my eyes. “I can't lose you again!”

“Robert, you never had me back to begin with, this was never supposed to be a permanent solution. I'm dead! And nothing can ever change that! When I came back, it was because I saw how you were and I couldn't leave you in that state. But it can't be forever. There's a place beyond where I've been, where souls at rest go, and I can't leave unless you realize that! We both have somewhere else we should be right now. Erin's a nice girl, from what you've told me, I think she likes you, and you should be with living people who care about you right now, not a ghost.”

“Please, don't leave!” I begged.

“I have to... and I can't come back,” Christina sniffled through her tears.

Christina started to sob and I saw her form slowly fading away. I rushed towards her and tried futilely to grab at her.

“Robert... Always remember that I loved you.” Christina said quietly as she vanished into the ether.

I silently mouthed “I love you” back to her, before breaking into the most anguished cry that I'd had since the night I'd gotten the news about Chrissie's death.

True to her word, she never returned, not even on the next full moon. I'd lost my fiancee again, but somehow it didn't hurt as badly as the first time, maybe because I'd already grieved her loss. I took to heart what she told me, and I stopped trying to live the life I'd had planned out, and started living the life that was unfolding in front of me.

“Are you coming tonight? Oh wait, it's a full moon, right? I guess I already know your answer...”

I looked up from my computer to see Erin, already starting to walk away.

“What is it this week? Karaoke? Bowling?” I asked.

“Escape room, actually,” Erin replied. “Does that mean you're in?”

“It does,” I smiled.

“What happened to those 'other plans' you usually have?” Erin questioned.

“They fell through, so whose idea was the escape room?” I answered.

I was still going to take it slow, but Christina was right, Erin liked me, and while she could never replace Chrissie, I knew that wherever she was, she was smiling down on me and happy that I was moving on with my life.

[conceptualliteratureblog]

Language Profiles: student agency & multilingualism

This post is relevant either to language A/B teachers or to educators looking at whole school literacy implementation ideas.  

Thank you, Yi Shen (Sandy) for showing me the power of a language profile in our workshop in Hong Kong (Sha Tin College, September 2017)!  This is something any of you can try with your teaching staff or your classrooms to make language a truly dynamic part of the learning process at your school and help people become aware of the power and challenges that come with personal language knowledge.  

Some schools will already have a language profile for each student.  Often, this only lists the home language(s) and level of English (or language of instruction) of the student.  We can do more!  Also, sometimes the level of English listed is from an application filled out by parents trying to impress the school.  Find out where the information comes from to really understand what it means.  Essentially, there are many ways to get more information that can help gain knowledge for the student’s personalised learning strategies, but likely the best person to create this portfolio is the student, at least in secondary schools.

In order to understand how this works for students, try to do it yourself:

Think back to your infant development and schooling: what is your language story?  Where and when did you learn language(s)? What dialects do you speak?  What slang do you know?  Especially if you live away from where you grew up, this dynamic has probably changed over the years.  Even if you only speak English, you have probably had exposure to different kinds of English and use a certain type with friends, family, and students.  You probably also at one point learned a second language in school.  What was this experience of language learning like for you?  What excites you about (other) languages?  What scares you?  How does language give you power?  How does it make you powerless?

There will probably be a wide range of responses to these questions from colleagues and students alike.  Sharing your language story with a colleague or two can help you to express what language is for you and to have empathy for others who may find difficulty with language.

Try drawing a map of the language(s) you use today.  With whom and for what purposes do you speak different languages, dialects, or slang?  Maybe your register simply shifts; that is ok as well. Maybe you speak some languages for fun and others out of a need.  

I was raised an anglophone.  Hailing from Boston, I avoided the accent and local dialect due to the nature of the transplant and immigrant town of Lexington that I grew up in.  My parents came from Minnesota and Texas, and each had lived in Boston since just after their university years.  We had a blended American English at home.

My mom also studied French extensively at school, so when I started lessons at age 7 in our school system, the fit felt natural.  Half of my mom’s family is French and with Québec not that far away, schools in the area at that time all taught French to students as a ‘second’ language.  I took French all through grade school until the AP exam when I feel out of love with the language.  Suddenly, I had teachers who just cared about correctness and memorisation rather than taking us to see the Impressionist exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts or teaching us how to make crepes.  The joy was killed.

So at university, I took Spanish for a year.  It was fun, but I wasn’t quite in love with it the same way.  And then there were all those other courses on the syllabus and I wanted to double major…so…no language B study for a couple of years.  But then, Latin the last year.  I had wanted to take Latin as a first-year but my advisor said it was a dead language.  What was the point?  I found the grammatical structures a fun puzzle and our tiny class of five a fun classical oasis.  

After college, I went straight into my MAT to earn a teaching degree.  I hadn’t studied abroad like so many US students mostly because of sport with the plan to somehow do it later.  My MAT programme allowed you to do your student teaching abroad, but you had to find the school.  It was much of the reason I had chosen the program.  

I had decided I wanted to give French a go again.  After writing to many schools in Switzerland and France, I finally got a positive response from the Lycée International American Section director, just outside of Paris.  Paris!  What a dream.  They wouldn’t pay me, of course, but I could work with several of their teachers and live with one of the school’s families in exchange for some babysitting and tutoring.  

That year was bliss.  But I could digress for ages about my love affair with Paris…back to the language!  I had to take intensive French courses again as part of my visa.  It was also a great way to meet people from other places.  I had very good, slow, correct French, I was told time and again.  But it was slow.  Part of culture is how you speak, and the French, at least the Parisians, don’t like to speak slowly.  I was given the advice to just spit it out and not worry about my mistakes.  So I did that, time and again, until I felt comfortable in French.  I felt like a different part of my personality came out in French.  

Fast forward three years: I had moved back to the states and then to Italy.  My French proved very useful in learning Italian and the locals were even more encouraging about just trying the language out.  Within a few months, I was comfortably having conversations.  Sadly, a lot of that is lost now after more than a decade without much exposure, but I think I could reclaim it in a month or so if given the opportunity.  

Similarly, when I moved to Hong Kong, I took Mandarin Chinese lessons.  But though I loved it, I found it difficult to practice the language in a place that is mostly Cantonese and English.  Cantonese was trickier to learn and ‘not as useful’ once you move away.  I never knew how long I would stay…if I had known it would be eight years, I probably would have learned right away.  In any case, learning some Chinese helped me to at least understand what it’s about and is something I would go back to as well with a longer stay in the mainland or again in Hong Kong.  

I kept up the French, though, with long, frequent stays in France, lots of films, and a long-term French beau along the way.  Now, I have friends with whom I speak French in Vienna, I read in French when I can, and I have that dream of living there….

But most of my life is still lived in English.  I’ve learned some German living in Vienna.  I took a class and did some self study.  But there’s always that time factor, and I decided to have a baby and do some writing instead.  Maybe I’ll go back to it.  Let’s see how things shape up in a year or two.  The little I’ve learned is certainly helpful and shows a sort of respect in trying, I think.  When I travel I also like to learn a few phrases for this reason.  We who speak English are privileged to have the ‘international language’ at our fingertips.  But we are only denying ourselves if we limit the other languages we can learn.  

Now I also have a baby boy who is learning language every day.  We speak American and British English at home.  We try not to swear around him.  I sometimes speak with him in French.  He will attend a mostly German speaking nursery school soon.  It makes more me aware of how and why we learn these languages.

That’s my language story in brief.  I’m sure you can find links with geography, emotions, work, and more to understand even more where it all comes from.  I have students with much more dynamic backgrounds.  Some speak three languages at home with their parents, a different one at school (English), take a foreign language, and speak in some kind of multilingual slang with their friends. When students go through their language journeys, their stories, they find ways to use language for learning.  They acquire agency.  In asking teachers to also go through the process, they can connect with the student’s learning as they make reflections on their own journeys, connected also to emotion, place, people…the list goes on. These associations help us understand the way we use languages as well as our motivations or fears connected to language.  

One of my students studying three language A at school (English, German, Italian) for a trilingual diploma (wow!) conducted her Extended Essay research on the topic of multilingualism and cognition.  She narrowed it to bilingualism since little research has been done beyond this, even though, as she noted, many people speak more than two languages.  She always felt her languages were a hindrance, which really shocked me.  Most of the recent research I had read showed the cognitive power of having more than one language.  This is why so many people try to get their kids in immersion programs if there is only one language at home.  She was aware of this, but sometimes felt like words escaped her or she couldn’t understand something she read.  She realised that even though she reads a lot, the time is divided among these three languages. Her vocabulary development could be limited in that way.  Research supported this, but this was the only area she found to be a hindrance.  The way she uses language can be more creative and the development of her brain allows for code switching that goes beyond language and into experiences.

Are any of you doing research in this area?  I would be interested to hear about any current work with multilingual speakers and happy to post a link to your published work on my blog.  

[phanfic]

Apple

Summary: Dan eats an apple. Phil can’t help himself. (loosely based off of that one really old Daniel Howell video, Cringe Attack, except here, they’re high schoolers.)

Warnings: making out

Word Count: 1670

It’s the first day of school, and Dan was lost. You’d think that having been at the high school for three years now, Dan should know his way around. But no.

Not his fault their high school was huge. Nor was it his fault his map was gone; he’d tripped on another student’s shoelace and dropped his map while trying to break his fall. Nor was hit his fault that the lady at the front door was too scary-looking for him to ask for another copy.

So instead of getting even more winded looking for room 231, he took a left turn, headed into an all-too-familiar hallway, which was empty, per usual, and he waited.

He waited for Phil.

Phil Lester was his boyfriend, and goodness, the thought of him brings out such an intense, mixed reaction within Dan. Obviously, the thought of his precious, beautiful boyfriend made him feel happy, feel lighter than air, but it also made him frustrated, too, because of how long they’ve been apart. They hadn’t seen each other all summer because Phil had been in France doing a study abroad program, and Dan, curse him, Dan didn’t do anything the entire summer other than feel sorry for himself and miss him. It didn’t help that Phil’s parents wouldn’t let him splurge on a better phone plan and forced him and Dan to limit their phone calls to a minute or two a day. It didn’t help that the family Phil stayed with had the worse WiFi service ever; more often than not it was down, and on the off chance that it wasn’t down, their Skype calls would be such low resolution that Phil would barely be recognizable and the call would rarely last over ten minutes before the signal would die. And it certainly didn’t help that Phil’s study abroad program lasted the entire summer vacation: the last time they were together, Dan had been pinned against the lockers of this very hall, and they were passionately licking into each other’s mouths before Phil had abruptly broken away and left to go catch his shuttle to the airport.

Point is, Dan missed his boyfriend.

And the thing is, Phil was perfect. Phil was everything Dan aspired to be and failed miserably at. Yes, Phil was tall, and so was Dan, but Phil was attractive, with his broad shoulders and toned muscles and sparkling blue eyes, and Dan wasn’t. Yes, Phil was nerdy, and so was Dan, but Phil was nerdy in a charming way, and Dan’s strange interests just made him less approachable. Perhaps Phil was clumsy and geeky and admittedly quite childish sometimes, but that just made him more adorable, and you should see how sexy Phil can be when he tries. And yes, Phil had a boyfriend, and so did Dan, but Phil made his boyfriend feel like he was the most important thing in the world. Dan, on the other hand, only felt like his boyfriend was the most important thing in the world; he couldn’t convey it, not in the same way Phil could.

But in this moment, Dan’s more concerned about how Phil knew the location of every single room in the entire school building, and Dan most certainly did not. But he knew where to find Phil: they’d met in this hallway every day before and after school for as long as they’d been together, and Dan knew that Phil will arrive eventually.

Suddenly, Dan was yanked from his thoughts by a pang in his stomach. In an effort to arrive at school earlier to be with his boyfriend, Dan had skipped breakfast, and now he was regretting it. However, he didn’t want to go buy food from the school cafeteria: he might miss Phil’s arrival and the school food tasted like crap anyways. So he searched through his bag for the apple he had packed to eat alongside his lunch, took it out, and took a bite, moaning slightly at the sweet flavor.

And this was when his boyfriend Phil, who had just finished scouting out the location of every class on his schedule, decided to arrive.

After spending the entire summer in France, Phil was eager to return; he’d missed Dan as much as Dan missed him, even though he doesn’t really show it. But not that eager, not to the point where he had no self-control. He could keep from running at his boyfriend as soon as he saw him, and that’s exactly what he was doing. He saw that Dan was distracted so he decided to approach slowly, quietly, to give him a surprise.

But he did NOT expect to hear Dan moan. At an apple, of all things.

It caused him to trip over his own feet, remembering all the other times that beautiful sound had escaped Dan’s lips.

As he hoisted himself back up he hoped that Dan didn’t notice, and proceeded to continue creeping towards him, pressing himself against the wall to the best of his ability. He thought he saw Dan sneak a glance at him from the corner of his eye but decided that he imagined it when Dan just continued to chew at the apple like nothing had happened. He stopped again as Dan let out another deep, sultry moan.

Dan saw, of course; Phil wasn’t exactly small-framed and he did wear bright, colorful clothing. But Dan didn’t react. Instead, he decided to put on a show, wrapping his lips around the apple and letting out another noise.

And as Phil approached Dan’s eating of the apple became less and less appropriate and more and more pornographic: before long, he’s stopped biting at the apple altogether and instead focused completely on running his tongue along the teeth marks, mouth open and panting, hunger be damned. And yes, perhaps it was strange to pretend to intensely make out with an apple, but Dan couldn’t be bothered to care at that point; Phil’s reaction made it all worth it.

And Phil, oh Phil’s self-control was definitely beginning to falter. He still wanted to surprise Dan, but the desire to ear him squeal in joy and excitement was quickly being overpowered by the need for him to be groaning into Phil’s mouth.

Phil made it to about two yards away before he snapped. He stood up to his full height and pinned Dan to the lockers, using one hand to hold Dan’s arms above his head. Dan dropped the apple in shock but he couldn’t give a damn; he was trapped between Phil’s lean body and the cold metal of the locker, Phil licking into his mouth relentlessly. He could do little more than try to kiss back and moan uncontrollably, but that’s fine; he’d missed the blissfulness of losing control, missed the taste of Phil on his tongue, missed Phil’s hooded blue eyes and how the way Phil looked at him in a way like he wanted to devour him whole.

His knees shook and his head spun and they separated for a moment to gasp for air, but then their lips were meeting again, and Dan could never get enough. It was too much and he swore he’d pass out but he still couldn’t get enough. Phil’s tongue licked into his mouth again, and again, and again—

The bell rang. Their mouths separated Phil let go of his arms in shock, having not realized so much time had passed, and now both of them were tardy for first period on the first day of school and both of them were a little bit horrified, the silence of the hallways ringing in their ears. Dan the first to return to his senses and remembered suddenly why he had come here in the first place, while Phil was still frozen in shock, still keeping Dan pressed to the locker with his torso. Dan stood on his toes and gave Phil a quick peck on the lips, and Phil pushed his surprise from his mind and took a few steps back, freeing Dan from his position against the locker.

“Phil, there was actually something I was going to ask you before…this happened,” Dan murmured softly, embarrassed by how loud he was earlier.

“What is it, babe?”

“…I need to get to room 231, and…” he shrugged, raising his hands to show Phil that they were empty, “I may or may not have lost my map.”

“Oh,” Phil grinned slightly, “It’s right here.” He pointed behind him, and Dan realized in shocked that they’d been snogging in front of the window of a classroom and that the entire class, plus the teacher, could have seen them. His face flushed in embarrassment.

“ONLY JOKING!!” Phil said with a laugh, and Dan was greatly comforted by the fact that he doesn’t need to enter that classroom after the fiasco that had just occurred, but still uncomfortable about how many people could have seen. “That’s room 193,” Phil continued, chuckling, “231 is on the second floor.”

“193 is my English class!” Dan realized, horrified again.

But Phil apparently didn’t hear his exclamation, or was purposefully ignoring it, because now he was dutifully telling Dan the exact route to room 231. “Once you get up the stairs, take a right, and at the end of that hallway take another right. It should be the fourth door on your left. Anything else you need, or should I head to class?”

Dan shook his head. “I’m good,” he smiled softly, feeling extremely fortunate to have such a caring boyfriend. He picked the apple he had dropped back off of the floor and looked for a wastebin, but didn’t find one. He shrugged.

“Guess I’ll just keep this as a memento.”

Phil laughed again, sticking his tongue between his teeth. “I’ll never be able to look at apples the same way.”

“And I’ll never have the courage to set foot into English class!”

“So what?” Phil grinned, “Wasn’t it worth it?

“After such a long wait?” Dan smiled, “Definitely.”

[internet----girlfriend-blog]

On Saying Goodbye, or Making Meaning Out of Nothing

   I’ve never been great at saying goodbyes. Generally, I will stand around uncomfortably and shift myself closer and closer to the door until I can escape. With phone conversations, it’s even worse. It’s not that I don’t want to talk, it’s just that I can’t deal with the silence that comes before saying goodbye.  Most people who know me understand by now that they can expect an abrupt hang-up instead of a goodbye. I think this is mostly because I have an irrational fear of permanence and would rather leave abruptly than face the absoluteness that comes with a goodbye. This is probably because I am mostly a very overdramatic Sagittarius and I watch too many movies.

   I moved out of my parents’ house for the first time when I was eighteen. Within a week of graduating high school I was in the next state over. I didn’t have a hard time saying goodbye to my family but I cried like a baby when I hugged our dog for the last time before leaving. At least my mom could text; the dog didn’t have thumbs. I had expectations that this move would be much more emotional and dramatic, maybe even grandiose, but it was quiet and calm and unassuming. Again, I watch too many movies. I backed out of the driveway in my Kia and tried not to think about our dog. This was my first goodbye that ever really mattered; if you ask my Aquarius mother, it is the only goodbye that’s mattered so far.   

   While trying to escape the small town I grew up in, I ended up in an even smaller town. The name of this town is irrelevant because it’s so small that Google Maps won’t even recognize it as a real place. The deluxe Sheetz gas station was the main attraction, and the closest grocery store was a forty-five minute drive away.  I lived with my first serious boyfriend in this town. He was the first Aries I dated. We stayed in a large apartment over a lawyer’s office and in the summer I sat in front of the windows and listened to people shout and argue with each other about things that I didn’t understand at the time. Our neighbors were visited by the cops almost weekly because their fights got so bad that someone always ended up getting hit. I spent a lot of nights in my room with my ear pressed to the wall, listening to their fighting and learning all of their intimate secrets.  I didn’t think this was weird at the time. Our lease ended the following summer and, no longer fueled by the intensity of the honeymoon phase of our relationship, we decided to part ways. I didn’t cry once but he did keep my record collection, which hurt more than anything else.  I drove back to Ohio in the same Kia and tried not to think about my limited-press editions that I would never see again. This was my second goodbye that ever really seemed to matter.

   I moved back into my parents’ house when I was nineteen. I stayed in their attic and drove twenty-five minutes to work in Cleveland every day. I worked in a tiny restaurant that made most of its money from breakfast rushes and overpriced alcohol. It sat on the corner of Detroit Ave and bragged about the “friendly neighborhood atmosphere” more than embodied it.  I wasn’t allowed to park in the parking lot of this tiny restaurant and I acquired more parking tickets in that time than tip money. The men who worked in the kitchen would crudely talk about my haircut and my facial piercings and the way my ass looked in skinny jeans. The turnover rate was incredibly high, mostly due to the fact that the woman who owned the restaurant was batshit fucking insane and known to be violent.  I quit my job at this tiny restaurant when I was twenty and still living at home. I quit in the middle of a particularly hectic morning shift when I dropped a Bloody Mary on the floor and the owner called me an idiot in front of customers. The Bloody Mary shattered on the floor and stained my white Vans with tomato juice. I walked out, collected the parking ticket from my windshield, and drove home. I was never able to get the stains out of my shoes; it almost felt like one final “fuck you” from the tiny restaurant. This goodbye doesn’t really matter that much now but it felt like it mattered at the time.

   I moved out of my parents’ house for the second time when I was twenty. I lived in an apartment in Cleveland Heights with three other people that I didn’t really know. The apartment was overpriced with high ceilings and narrow hallways. There was always trash everywhere and the kitchen smelled like rotting food. A rice cooker sat in the corner, generally filled with molding rice. The bathroom had a standing shower with a perpetually clogged drain and dirty clothes covered the floor. I was a freshman in college and I spent most of my time at the school to avoid being in the gross apartment. I stayed over at friend’s places and only came home when absolutely necessary. I smoked a lot of weed and did a lot of acid and didn’t sleep and lived off of Clif bars and sugar-free Redbull. I broke up with my then-boyfriend because he was cheating on me with a woman twentyish years older than me. She was a sexually robust woman in her forties who went by the name Bunny and she had a daughter who was also older than me at the time. We met at a mutual friend’s party and she introduced herself by telling me that my boyfriend was good with his tongue. This initially confused me because mostly, I just thought he tasted like Marlboro Reds. I smoke American Spirits. He was the second Aries I dated, coincidentally with the same first name as the first Aries. I never spoke to him again. This goodbye mattered because I no longer had anybody to bring me free weed and help me build IKEA furniture in my shitty apartment.

   I turned twenty-one over the winter break of my freshman year of college. I was living with my parents again, after leaving the shitty apartment during Thanksgiving break. All of my friends were out of state so I bought myself a cheap bottle of gas station wine and invited a boy from Tinder over to my house. We made out on the couch and I knew he was going to hurt me. He did. He was a poet and a playwright with a big ego and a vaguely Italian-sounding name. He lived with his mom and did stand-up comedy on the weekends. I will never trust a stand-up comedian. He was a Capricorn, which also cannot be trusted.  He made fun of me for listening to emo music and I made fun of him for liking musical theater. We went on for months, sleeping together and refusing to acknowledge the fact that we were sleeping together. I moved into an apartment on Coventry while I was still seeing him and he would come over to drink and argue with my Pisces friends. He had a girlfriend almost the entirety of the time I was seeing him. We didn’t know about each other. She was a Gemini. I found out he had graciously given me an STD months after we had already stopped talking. He still follows me on Instagram. This goodbye was extremely prolonged and painful and overdramatic. This was the kind of goodbye I had been expecting when I left home for the first time, but instead it was with a dumb boy. It still mattered, probably.

   I moved out of Cleveland Heights the week before the end of my sophomore year of college. I left behind an apartment that never really felt like home and moved into another apartment that sometimes feels like home. I left behind my bitterness and anger but managed to pick up uncertainty and consistent self-doubt along the way. I moved into a big, old apartment building in Shaker Heights with my (very recently) ex-boyfriend. The first night in our new place we got a pizza and tried to coax my cat out from hiding in the furniture. I cried because I knew I was going to feel trapped, not unlike my cat, probably. I cried because I thought about my mom and how sad I make her. I cried because I knew nothing was ever going to be enough for me. I chalked it up to the fact that I am an overdramatic Sagittarius and ignored those feelings for five more months. I felt like this was a goodbye that mattered, but I’m not exactly sure what I said goodbye to. I’m still trying to figure it out, but I probably never will.

   I spent the summer in this apartment in Shaker Heights doing nothing and taking care of plants and my cat, who’s a Gemini. I drank a lot of wine in the evenings and stopped eating and started sleeping too much. I ignored my friends and didn’t pick up the phone or text anyone back. I only left the house to go to work and came back immediately after my shifts, feeling too anxious to be outside or in public alone. I laid in bed at night, sweating because we don’t have air conditioning, thinking about dying and what my parents would say at my funeral. This time, those thoughts didn’t feel so overdramatic, which was scary. As the summer went on, I thought less about dying and more about escaping, leaving school, leaving my job, leaving my relationship. I applied for study-abroad programs and ignored their acceptance emails. My boyfriend was working full-time, usually over-time, and so I spent most of my days completely isolated, planning my escape. I looked at apartments for rent in cities I’ve never been to, or even considered going to. I spent a weekend in Columbus and then another weekend in Detroit, always dreading coming back to Cleveland. I felt like I had been living as a ghost for the last six months of my life and I was desperately trying to figure out how to become human again. I feel like I’ve said goodbye to this image I’ve curated so carefully for myself, completely disregarding everything I thought I knew about myself and now I’m scrambling around, trying to understand what happened. This is it, this is the big one, the most melodramatic, the most important goodbye.

   I left my first serious, adult relationship last week. We were only together for a little over a year, but it felt like a lot longer. We still live together, so that’s been awkward. When the conversation actually happened, I felt less sad and more relieved. I didn’t even cry. I sat on the chair in our living room and he sat on the couch, asking me what happened. I don’t know what happened. Falling out of love is weird. Realizing that you have a better time hanging out with your friends than spending time with your partner is weird. Understanding that it’s not anyone’s fault and that two people can still care about each other very much but not be in love anymore is weird. We are both fire signs and we are both very overdramatic. And we watch too many movies. He doesn’t believe in astrology, but he’s the stereotype of a Leo. I’ve been listening to a lot of Sufjan Stevens and the National, thinking really hard about what went wrong, and where, and what we could have done to change it, or prolong it even more, or ignore it completely. This goodbye feels like a death. This goodbye will leave a lasting imprint, on both people involved. This goodbye matters.

   I’ll be turning twenty-three in a couple months. I’ve said countless goodbyes, see-yous and catch-you-laters in my life so far. I’ll say a billion more. This isn’t meant to be some deep, soul-searching essay or even a reflection. More an examination. No matter how many goodbyes I say, I know they’ll all matter, even if they become arbitrary later. I’m still not any better at saying it. I will probably never be comfortable saying it. I know I’m always going to be a melodramatic Sagittarius. Maybe someday I won’t define myself that way, but today is not that day.

[yuniesan]

Girl Meets Season 5 - Episode 17 – Girl Meets Abroad

Synopsis: What can you expect when you’re finishing high school? For Riley her entire world will turn upside down and picking up the pieces will bring her and her friends closer together.

[Previous Episodes]

A/N: Ducks under the table

Episode 17 – Girl Meets Abroad

Josh saw the paper and couldn’t feel anything but shock, he had applied the year before, this was before he and Maya started dating, it was on a whim. He had been pushing himself away from Maya at the time and was trying to give her the chance at having her life. Riley found out and told him he was being an idiot, but at the time he had applied for the program. It was only for a few months but it was supposed to give him the chance to find his footing in his life.

“Crap,” he said out loud, while staring at the acceptance letter. Two-month semester abroad, an intensive course study with little to no breaks, an escape from reality. The program was supposed to be held half in Europe and the other half at the NYU campus. Four classes in total, but how had he forgotten about the application at all.

Of course, the answer to all of his questions was Maya, she had made him forget about everything. They studied together, he sometimes sat in her room while she drew something and he read a book. Sometimes he would read to her while she painted, and although she would deny it to everyone in the world, he knew she liked it. He picked stories that he knew she would enjoy, they had gone through all kinds of novels throughout their relationship and it had been weird at first but after a while she would just lay down next to him on the floor as he read to her.

That’s why this was going to be the hardest decision he would have to make at the moment, because this relationship was still new. Their one-year anniversary was still a month away, and he would be in Europe the day it happened. He sighed as he sat on his bed in his dorm room. He had a single, which was rare as it was, but he had gotten lucky when they had given it to him, even though he rarely spent any time in the room. He worked at Topanga’s, he ate dinner with Maya and her parents, or at his brother’s house.

Not knowing what to do he leaves his room and starts walking towards the park, but he doesn’t stay there, he keeps going watching the lights of the city around him. It was home because he lived there, it was home because his family was near-by, it was home because he had found someone he loved there. He found himself in a park close to his brother’s place, it was almost dark but the park was still open to the public. He always found it weird that the parks were closed after a certain time, but he knew it was because it was New York and all kinds of things happened in the big city.

“You know you could just come upstairs,” Riley said sitting down next to him. Her foot encased in a boot from the skiing trip.

“Why are you out here?” he asked her looking pointedly at her foot.

“Well the snow is gone, and I just wanted to take a walk, the park is close so I wouldn’t have to go very far,” she said smiling at him. “What’s wrong?”

Josh sighed knowing that he couldn’t really keep anything from Riley, “Last year, before Maya and I started dating, during that awkward time before you forced us into admitting our feelings, I applied to this program, it’s competitive, but half of the year is spent in Europe, I think it’s Germany this time, anyway they accepted me.”

“That’s great Josh,” she said to him smiling. “You’re worried aren’t you, about how Maya would react.”

“Among other things,” he said looking at his niece with sadness in his heart. “Is it bad that I still want to go?”

“No, it’s not bad Josh, it’s something good and although I know Maya would be happy for you, she would also be sad. She does care about you very much.”

“I need to talk to her about it,” he said watching the streetlights turn on as the darkness slowly engulfed the street.

“She’ll freak out for like a minute,” Riley says watching kids run home as the lights turned on. “The question is do you think this would change your relationship?”

“Doubtful,” he sighed. “We’re stronger together but it’s still two months apart.”

“But it’s an opportunity you can’t pass up because it will be something that taints your relationship.”

“Why do I have a feeling that this isn’t just about me?”

“It’s not, but in the end, we both have decisions to make about the future, and if our relationships survive after all of that then maybe it will be something special.”

Josh looked at his niece’s face and realized that as much as she loved Lucas there was something under it all that held onto her insecurities. Before it was about whether they were good enough for one another, Maya was a part of that as well as the bullies she had to face the year before. Now it was their future. Riley held onto everything in regards to her own struggles until it all exploded, but when it came to everyone else she fought tooth and nail for them.

“I’m going to go talk to Maya, but Riley whatever you’re thinking stop,” he said looking at her as he got up. “Trust your heart.”

She smiled at him and nodded, “I will as long as you trust yours.”

“Promise.”

He walked her home and then made the short trip to Maya’s apartment. He knew that this was one of a million tests that he had to go through because of his relationship with Maya, if they survived one test they would be stronger together.

Maya was standing in her room thinking about what it would be like to lose her childhood home, if they moved what would it mean especially when she got into college. Or at least if she went to college, she was never sure if she could get into any school but with Riley on the case, not only for her but for all of them, Maya was a little more optimistic. She might never go to a big school like NYU but she had some kind of future ahead of her.

“Hey,” Shawn said as he walked into her room. “So I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Sure,” she said before sitting on her bed, before patting the mattress for him to sit down next to her. “Talk away.”

Shawn always made her nervous, not in a weird way, just in the he’s now my father please don’t leave us kind of way. She didn’t want to lose her family.

“Well your mom and I’ve been looking at apartments big enough for all of us, but your grandma wants to move to Florida, she keeps saying that she’s retired and we should let her live a little.”

“Yeah well, she’s feisty, and I think she wants to live somewhere that won’t make her arthritis act up,” Maya loved her grandmother and knew that the old woman wanted to really run around causing hell in a warm place.

“Well, we’re letting her go, she’s going to use her social security to go live in Florida, and we’ll send her things if she needs them.”

“Does that mean we’re not moving?” Maya asked hopeful but Shawn looked at her and shook his head.

“We’re still moving, I don’t want you or your mom walking home so late and something were to happen because we live so far from her job. But we did find a place you’d approve of.”

Maya gave him a questioning look, “I don’t know I’m pretty picky.”

“Well it’s in the building next to Riley’s so I think it would be perfect,” he said smiling. “There’s an apartment there, it’s as big as the Matthew’s apartment and we can afford it so we signed the papers today… but if you don’t want to move there we’ll find somewhere else.”

She couldn’t help the smile on her face, she had dreamed of living in a place like Riley’s all of her life. “The baby gets the bay window,” she said automatically.

“Why?” Shawn said.

“Well I’m going to college soon but I want the baby to have a room like Riley’s.”

“What if we have a boy? Would it still be the same kind of place?”

“Please you know mom is going to have a girl,” she said smiling, they weren’t sure. “It doesn’t matter either way as long as they have a safe place.”

“That’s fine with me,” he said hugging her. “Okay, your mom and I are going to plan, and I’ll call when dinner’s ready.”

He left her to her own thoughts, which were only filled with happiness, her family was alright, they were going to grow. She had her friends, her life, and most of all she had Josh. She went back to thinking, not about this room but her new room, the baby’s room, how their furniture would fit in a bigger place. There was an image in her mind for the walls of the nursery, something adorable, because she wanted to leave a present for her sibling.

A knock on the door broke her thought process as the door swung open revealing Josh, standing tall in front of her.

“Hey Maya,” he said as he walked in and she knew automatically that something was on his mind because usually he just walked in and sat down without saying a word especially when she was drawing or painting.

“What’s wrong?” she asked automatically.

“We need to talk about something,” he said and she never realized how much she hated the words we need to talk before. That’s what people said before they broke up with their significant other. “It’s a good thing in a way,” he kept talking even though her mind was going through a million thoughts at once.

“If you’re going to break up with me just get it over with,” she said trying to be the strong fearless person she knew she was even though she could feel her heart breaking.

“Maya,” he said kneeling in front of her. “I’m not breaking up with you.”

“Then why do you want to talk,” she said as her traitorous voice broke.

“I have a school thing,” he started but stopped before he pulled her into a hug. “You have to listen to everything I have to say before you say anything.”

“Okay,” she said wiping a stray tear from her face.

“Okay,” he said before sitting on his feet and looking at her. “Before we started going out I applied to this prestigious program, it’s very competitive but it’s a good experience for a student. I found out this morning that I was accepted into the program.”

“Josh that’s great,” she said but he held up his hand.

“I’m not finished,” he said and she could see a flash of sadness in his eyes. “The program sends students overseas for the first two months of the semester.”

“Oh,” she said looking at him for the first time. He was leaving for two months, which meant he was going to miss their anniversary, his own birthday, which she had been planning a surprise party for. “You want to go,” she whispered.

“Yes,” he said. “We could write to each other every day, we can skype too.”

She thought about it for a moment, she wanted to scream about how unfair it was, but she also knew that he deserved the chance that he was being given.

“As long as you take me to prom,” she said knowing that she needed to let him go but it still hurt just a little bit to let go. “And we go on a trip to see my grandmother in Florida this summer.”

There were tears in his face as he nodded, “We can visit my parents too… are you really okay with this?”

“Not really, but I know that our relationship can only get stronger if we trust each other enough to let the other person do something they really want to do.”

“I trust you more than anything,” he said to her.

“You have to send me post cards every week,” she demanded. “One email a day with a picture of something interesting that you saw,” she tried to keep the tears back because Maya didn’t cry. “And we can skype twice a week.”

“That’s fine with me, but you have to send me updates on which schools you get accepted to,” he said smiling at her. “And pictures of anything you draw when I’m not here.”

“I want you to record a book for me,” she said taking his hand. “Just so it can feel like you’re here reading to me like you normally do.”

“Okay,” he said pulling her close to him. She could feel his heartbeat against her ear.

“Bring me back something they only sell wherever you’re going.”

“I will, and you should learn to make that banana bread from the bakery and send it to me,” he said breathing her in.

“Okay,” she said as she ran her fingers through his hair.

They stayed there holding onto each other until Shawn came in to tell her dinner was ready, Josh stayed for dinner explaining to Shawn what was happening. Shawn in turn gave him a guide book on Germany that he had, with tabs on all kinds of places Josh should check out.

He left two weeks later, Maya waving him off at the airport while Riley held her hand. Josh sent his first email the minute he landed, a picture of himself at the airport and the words I miss you already written on the image. The Hunter family moved into their new apartment the week after, and Maya sent Josh the sketch of what she wanted to paint in the nursery.

[sheporbust]

A Summation of Experiences

     My school requires students who study abroad to write a final report, collecting all their experiences and advice into one handy little package. I’ve been thinking of a good way to sum up my time in Bordeaux, and I think this is a good way to do it. It’s fairly long, so please read at your leisure, and if you have any questions feel free to ask them. This is just my experience and thoughts, it won’t be the same for everyone so please take it with a grain of salt. Some of the questions may format or look weird, partly because I’m taking it straight from the document.

1.      Describe the city you lived in.

     Bordeaux is a city that exhumes the idea of European culture. Statues, monuments, buildings hand crafted in stone decades ago, everywhere you turn is a new piece of art that is passed by as everyday life. While the city maintains much of it’s heritage, newer sections reflect a contemporary minimalist look, and art is spray painted across large stretches of walls. There are three things you will never be able to escape when you go to Bordeaux; cafés, hair-cutters (coiffures), and restaurants. The latter are filled almost every night, with Thursdays seen there as Fridays are seen here.

2.      Describe the school and its surroundings.

     INSEEC has 2 main campuses in Bordeaux, one that sits directly across from the Garonne River (Rive de Garonne) near the bridge Pont Jacques Chaban-Delmas, and another school nestled in a narrow alley way called Rue Raze (Raze Street) that is located further up the river in the south. Between the two campuses, they are about a 20-minute walk along the river, which lends itself to tourists and residents alike. The Rue Raze campus was where most classes took place for the Erasmus students, and it was a mix between the stone archways and rooms of the original building, and the updates and drywall needed to make it modern. Unfortunately, windows were not common in many classrooms, and their size was restricted, with small desks and poor ventilation making some class sessions a matter of comfort rather than learning. The other campus (called the Hanger, as it was part of a large outlet chain of connected stores) was a modern building that lost the charm of the stone work but gained larger class room size, windows, and a more comfortable atmosphere overall. Interestingly, still small desks.

3.      Compare the student population with Camosun’s, e.g. number of students, student attitude, dress code, etc.

     INSEEC is a private school, and while that usually lends a negative connotation in North American terms, in France it is a more open and common term. For France, Universities are paid for by the government either in full or a large part. This creates a large demand, especially with the French population having one of the highest birth rates in Europe (if not the highest) paired with a lack of current jobs. This is caused by 2 main factors; the first being that households more children pay less income tax, with 4 children meaning no income tax. The income tax itself is high, at about 45%. The second is that any employee hired will receive 2 years of full paid salary and benefits if they are terminated or the business goes bankrupt, by the employer. This makes turnaround for jobs very low, as well as lends itself to more strict hiring policies. This is all important because education there plays a larger roll for obtaining employment than it does here. Post-secondary education is looked at less as a learning environment as it is a networking opportunity, and this is where private institutions have focused their efforts. While there is still a learning requirement, with private schools you are paying for the network more than you are the degree. This is shown with the students, many of whom were no doubt from wealthier families as indicated by their clothing choices and emphasis on parties and events. During my 4 months at the school, there was no less than 12 events and parties that were advertised, with a table and cash box set up at the front of the school almost every week. Although I did not work directly with any French students, I was informed by many instructors that many students will write down what is written on power point slides and will not ask questions or dive deeper into a topic. This could be reinforced by the idea that in the classroom the teacher is a deity and that students are merely mortals lucky (and in this case wealthy) enough to be in their presence. A good example of this is the marking scale, which is from zero to twenty. Students will never get a 20, or a 19, and rarely an 18. In fact, 10 is a good grade, while 14-15 is outstanding. This is echoed all through all years of schooling, and the saying goes, “Twenty for God, 19 for the teacher, and the rest is for you”. While this took me a long time to wrap my head around, once an instructor had informed me that it is because no one is perfect things started to become clearer. The French do not look at their grading system as how well you performed for the specific course or class you are taking, but rather at the entirety of the subject. I am still unsure of how French students can cope with this, and perhaps it will elude me for eternity.

4.      What on-campus resources are available to students e.g. library, gym, counselling services?

     There is no on campus resources available. I did not see a library, there was no gym, counselling services were more offered by specific staff, but that was if they were not busy with their primary job (which they usually were), and the computer room offered small computers that, while loaded with Adobe Premiere and other intensive computer programs, where more for typing and browsing the web. In fact, many students used the computer room for their own computer use, which no doubt overpowered the mini-ATX desktops. The only resource I can think of apart from the computer room was the student lounge, which has table, chairs, a couch, a few microwaves, and a sink.

1.      Did you have any difficulties during the application process?  Please explain.

     The application process was straightforward. The only concern was that it was “mandatory” to take all the classes, except for the 2 labelled optional, as well as it was “mandatory” to attend every class. I put mandatory in quotation marks because throughout the semester there were many students who did not attend every class, and some who even dropped a class altogether, with no notable repercussions seen or heard of. The biggest downside to making something mandatory and not having people attend was that group projects, which comprised for about 95% of all work, meant doing so with one or more less people.

2.      When did you register for your classes?              ☒ Prior to arrival                                   ☐ Upon arrival

3.      Describe the registration process:

     Much of the registration process is done at Camosun, with several forms being completed in a slightly different way and submitted to INSEEC. At INSEEC, there was an emphasis that non-European students needed to get the mandatory EU health insurance and incidental insurance for the school. While the first is part of the student VISA requirements and easy to obtain, the second seemed almost impossible, unless you could open a bank account, which was a feat unto itself. Thankfully, both these things were, “mandatory”.

4.      Were you required to get a visa?            ☒ Yes   ☐ No

a.      If yes, what type of visa did you apply for?  Describe the process, including time and cost.

     I applied for a student VISA (3B), which allowed me to forego the cost of processing. The process was straightforward, with all the forms and directions set out on the French Embassy’s website. VISA are required to be submitted no more than 3 months in advance, and any errors will cost about 2 weeks time (1 week to get there, 1 week to get back), so my recommendation is to have the forms in order before the 3 months as processing can take a month or so.

1.      Describe what classes and instructors were like and how it compares to Camosun, e.g. teaching style, workload, difficulty, teacher-student relationship, classroom dynamics, etc.

     The French education system is famous for being poor. These aren’t my words, they are the words of several of the teachers there, and I think I can see why they would say that. Many of the courses had no structure; no syllabus, grading rubric, consistent or understandable time table (one class had a 5 week break in-between the next class, with 2 classes remaining). Structure was so bad that there was a teacher who did not know he had to prepare a final exam for us (much to our dismay as we then didn’t have any more classes with him, so we did not know what to study for), and one teacher was told there was a class of 20 students that would be attending and they needed a special topic on one expert in the field for the requirement of their home institution. What she got was 7 of us that didn’t need her to change her teaching material. The school even marked the seven of us who attended as being the ones who missed the class, as they didn’t think only seven students would show, not the other way around. The work load is laughable, with many “projects” not even being graded by the teacher. The hardest part comes near the end of the semester as many group projects come all due, and with several different groups of all the same students it becomes logistically troublesome. One of the most frustrating parts is that the instructors will not let you know what is graded, what is not graded, what they are looking for, or give you any feed back once an assignment has been submitted. All my projects, save about a handful, were given a grade and shown to me, with feedback non-existent. When asked how to improve without feedback, one instructor said that we would pick up the positive and negative points about what other students did and use that. I pointed out that if we didn’t know what was good or bad about our own, there was an unlikely chance that we would be able to figure that out about other students. This is a fundamental teaching style of INSEEC, which I described as digging a hole. The course is a small square of grass, what they teach you is all the top of that grass, but then they expect you to dig down on your own to gather more information and to learn more. In theory, this is good, but they will literally let you dig as much as you want, either in the confines of the original square plot or not. Where this runs into problems is that you can go into such depth and work extremely hard on something, and get a mediocre grade (even in French standards) and not know why. Some teachers even told me not to work so hard on it, in which I was awarded a 2/5 (one of the few grades I got back). The teacher-student relationship is hardly there, mostly due to the sporadic class schedule which has little rhyme or reason. Many times, I ran into teachers shocked that we were still at school, and many new teachers thought we were their first class, when we had been at school for months. Teachers at private schools tend to be almost on-call, with many of them working at several different schools. The best teachers I had were much more structured and presented their material extremely well. Unfortunately, these teachers were from North America, and the classes, save one, were mostly about culture and attitudes/belief systems, not marketing/business.

2.      What advice do you have to help future students succeed academically at the host institution?

     This is hard for me to answer, as I myself do not know if I have succeeded or not. If you have a year of Camosun under your belt then you need not worry. Show up to class, or don’t. Do a project, or not. Little seems to matter there, and some French students even said that Erasmus students are an instant pass. While I’m sceptical of this, I can say that the class projects cannot be worth more than the final exam.

1.      Were there any additional fees you had to pay to the host institution? ☐ Yes            ☒ No

a.      If yes, please describe:

2.      What was your average monthly budget?  

Rent: €450.00 Food: €200.00

3.      What budgeting advice do you have for future study abroad students, specifically ones that are going to this host institution?

     Groceries are very cheap, the French believe that living should be a priority in terms of food, healthcare, housing, etc. Having said that, eating out and partying can be quite expensive. The average beer is about 5-6 Euros, so learn to drink wine with goes at around 3-4 Euros. Travel is also cheap, and much of Europe depends on apps to find cheap trains, flights, lodging, and cars to help keep costs down. For housing, ensure that you either have a contract (which can increase your rent by quite a bit, but helps you get deposits back and make sure everything is up to liveable standard) or use AirBnB. Ideally, you want to see the place before hand, but even if you use the unit for a month then move out or ask to stay longer, that’s the safest option. Rent will, most likely, be the largest of your budgeting portion, as there are no requirements for books or any real school supplies.

1.      What transportation assistance, if any, did you receive when you arrived?

     None. The school does not provide any tram pass, although there are usually student discounts for transportation services, however, they require a student card from INSEEC, which you may not get for some time.

1.      Was there an orientation?         ☒ Yes   ☐ No

a.      If yes, describe what it was like.  Include activities, tips, and opinions.  

     The orientation was brief, going over who we were and where we were from, the school’s policies, and then a “mandatory” project due at the end of the week. My advice would be to not listen to anything they say that they say is mandatory, required, etc. INSEEC requires all students be part of a school club, which is good in theory, but results in many not caring. The student club that was supposed to be working with us was seemed more for their own gain, with trips planned and discussed among themselves and us being more asked if we wanted to tag along. In my opinion, anytime the school asks you for money for some event, no matter how fun it sounds, do not go. It rarely, if ever, goes as planned, assuming it is planned at all. There are no teacher oversight or involvement in clubs, they are, to the best of my knowledge, self-regulated.

2.      Is there an international office?              ☒ Yes   ☐ No

3.      Did you use any of the services offered by the international office?      ☒ Yes   ☐ No

a.      If yes, please describe:

     I tried discussing some problems that I was having with instructors, however, the office is more for putting people through the system than rectifying any problems or concerns. When there was a verbal confrontation between a teacher and myself, while they agreed it was more of a miscommunication, they said they would not be able to overrule the teacher’s actions (automatic failure of the course). If you have problems, the international office cannot and/or will not help.

1.      What type of accommodation did you choose to live in?  

a.      ☒ Homestay                   ☐ Dormitory                  ☐ Off-campus

 2.      Describe the process of finding accommodation. Did you receive assistance?  How much did you pay?  What were important things that were included/excluded?

     Other than scholarships, grants, and personal donations (please see my Tumblr blog for a list of the generous donors https://sheporbust.tumblr.com/, I did not receive any assistance. The school did provide some websites to help find accommodation, but the process is difficult and requires paperwork. In the end, I took a gamble and just paid cash to stay at a room with no questions (or deposit) asked. I lucked out, it was cheap (€450.00/mth) and nice enough for my purposes. Usually rent includes internet and all utilities, but sometimes internet is not included. Be sure to ask lots of questions.

3.      What accommodation advice do you have for future exchange students planning on studying at this host institution?

     Try to book with AirBnB or get a contract of some sort to help guarantee your deposit. If they are asking for more than a full month of deposit, it is probably a scam and they will not return it when you leave (citing that you broke something or caused damage). The French tend to communicate very directly (low context) so if you say something to upset them, they may have misunderstood that you did not mean it literally. Sometimes they can use this as an excuse to not return a deposit, saying that you refused to talk to them. Culturally, it is acceptable to lie about something just to get someone off your back. Don’t be offended if this happens, just keep talking to them and eventually they will fold.

1.      How did you get around the city?

     I walked mostly. Sometimes took the tram, and occasionally the bus.

2.      Did you visit any other cities/countries during your exchange?         ☐ Yes   ☐ No

a.      If yes, please describe where:

     I visited Biarritz (South of Bordeaux on the Basque coast, near San Sebastián in Spain), Arcachon (a 30min train, 1 hour drive from Bordeaux to the West, South-West), and Lisbon, Portugal.

3.      Do you have any recommendations and/or advice about travelling in the host country?

     Travelling is very cheap in Europe, with many airlines providing round trips to other countries for around €100. I strongly suggest taking advantage of this and travelling to other countries, using AirBnB to find cheap accommodations.

1.      Were there any health concerns in your host country that you think future students should be aware of?

     If you have allergies/sensitivity/dietary restrictions to dairy, meat, and/or gluten, you may have some difficulty finding places to eat. Otherwise, nothing I can think of.

2.      Did you feel safe in your host city/country?  What are some safety concerns that you think future students should be aware of?

     I personally felt safe. I have worked in some dangerous occupations in the past, and I didn’t think where I stayed was very dangerous. Some people had commented that I lived in the more dangerous part of Bordeaux, but I think that may just be a misconception because it was in government funded housing. Female students, however, did say that strangers would sometimes come up and try to pick them up. This never happened when I was around, probably for obvious reasons.

1.      What were some cultural differences that you feel are important to know about?

     There are some extreme cultural differences, ones that I did not expect to encounter and not ready for. There’s almost too many to list here, but I recommend considering Edward T. Hall, Fons Trompenaars, and Geert Hofstede to get a rough idea about French culture. Students worried about cultural differences and are wanting to know more are welcome to contact me and I can provide more information, but again, it is quite a bit.

a.      Do you have recommendations on how to navigate these differences?

     Patience is key, which is hard to have when so much effort needs to be put forward for something so small (not all the time, but sometimes). My best recommendation is honestly just to contact me, a lot of my difficulties were situations that needed to be pointed out by a professor, and I couldn’t make the connection until she told me it. Otherwise, Cross Culture Communication and Sociology were two key courses I took at INSEEC to help me with cultural differences, it was just a shame these were offered near the end of the semester, and one was optional.

2.      How do you feel you were treated as a foreigner?

     By the French population, very well. Most shop keeps and people were kind enough to not grimace as I butchered their language, and many were happy to speak English after I told them I know little French. Social and Extra-Curricular 

1.      What types of activities did you participate in outside of school?  How did you get involved in this?

     One of the students was an avid runner back in Belgium, and had started a running club while he was there. I was involved in this, as well as running on my own. The Erasmus students were always together, so if there was an event of some sort you would most likely hear about it.

1.      Provide some advice to future exchange students.  What did you learn?  What did you wish you knew before you arrived? 

     I’ve learned some incredible things about Europe. Not just France, but a lot about Lithuania, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Poland, and probably a host of other countries I’m forgetting. Unfortunately, I did not learn about international marketing as much as I had hoped, but I think this is because marketing, for the most part, if fairly the same in all countries, just with some tweaks, and I think Camosun does an excellent job as seeing international marketing as the future requirement and tailoring their classes accordingly. If you are going expecting to learn something, I doubt it will be in a classroom at INSEEC, but if you are open and ask lots of questions and listen to the other students, you will learn a plethora of knowledge about Europe. Hopefully, you will be able to use this to improve your own educational practices and future work experience.

2.      Did the experience meet your expectations? Please describe.

      In some ways yes, in others no. I was thinking that INSEEC would be more aligned with how Camosun operates and is structured. I was mistaken. But my goal was to learn about Europe, not about the classes offered, to which this was a resounding success. Unfortunately, INSEEC was not required to me for this, but the opportunity helped make this process easier. 

     If you would like to provide a testimonial about your exchange, please write 2-3 sentences here.  Your testimonial may be used in publications, websites, blogs, etc.

     If you are looking to learn about marketing or International marketing, INSEEC is not the school for you. If you are wanting to experience French culture, learn more about Europe, or just enjoy warm weather, this program is it. �Y���'Patience is key, which is hard to have when so much effort needs to be put forward for something so small (not all the time, but sometimes). My best recommendation is honestly just to contact me, a lot of my difficulties were situations that needed to be pointed out by a professor, and I couldn’t make the connection until she told me it. Otherwise, Cross Culture Communication and Sociology were two key courses I took at INSEEC to help me with cultural differences, it was just a shame these were offered near the end of the semester, and one was optional.

[philo-in-ise-blog]

22/2/2017 blog

For everyone that didn't notice yet (you can almost not escape it...) i'm in Ise! I am participating three weeks in a study program, with only one rule: post something on social media or your blog every day. i'm trying to do it in such a way I can interest as many people as possible for Ise, because it is a very interesting place in Japan. Maybe not as famous as Kyoto or Tokyo, but of great cultural significance as well. The holiest and most important shinto shrine is located in this city, and it also has one of only two universities in Japan where you can study shinto (that is right, the university I study at you can graduate studying shinto! It's name is Kogakkan university) .

Another nice thing about the program is that we are not only learning a LOT (LOT LOT LOT!) about Ise and about shinto, but are also learning a lot about other facets of Japanese culture. Today for example was a lecture about samurai, and their connection to shinto . And also about the difference between a samurai and a knight for example.

The program has been very intense, and I noticed my Japanese level quickly decreased since I came back from my study abroad in Kyoto. Reason is simple: I haven't been using it.

This makes the lectures kind of tough; there is a lot of specialistic vocabulary (think of words such as 'rebuilding the shrine and removing the objects of worship) ... . Sometimes my brain feels like it is overheating! Aside from the language part, it is A LOT of information at once. But it has been amazing so far. I am trying my best, want to learn as much as possible because it is such an amazing opportunity.

Another thing is that when you study Japan, you almost can not escape it's ''religious'' aspect. However, it is also something that tends to not come up as much as you expect when studying Japanology (at least, that is my experience...). I managed to only follow a few courses on this at my university ''Japanese religion'', ''Buddhist art'' ''Introduction to Buddhism''.

Even though I have not been exposed to that much information, I have been interested in Japanese spirituality for a long time. Sometimes fellow classmates would tell me (when living in Kyoto) 'do you want to go to a shrine/temple again?' . And I would be one of the few actually trying my hand on some simple rituals or prayers.

It is amazing how much I can learn here. I want to write a good blog soon with all the information I have been learning, however it has just been so busy and tiring!! There was no time or energy. Hopefully I will find it soon. I finally had a good nights rest, but tomorrow we are going to ISE JINGU!!! so I want to be fully rested for that. We have been having lectures for 2 days in a row now about this shrine, which is considered the holiest and most important one of Japan. So now we are finally going to see it!

I hope my blogs will entertain and inform you!!

Yoroshiku again !

PS: Another thing: My tumblr is fighting with my photos... so I am writing on tumblr and posting pictures on fb ... DOU SURU?? What shall I do. I think it's better to have everything on one place. Maybe I should make a wordpress tomorrow? Is that easy ? Or any other tips for building your own blog with text and pictures (easy ones to use please!)

Mata ne

[vienneseabenteuer-blog]

Finals and Family

Hey y’all! Finals week was where I left you so I’ll be brief. I had three final papers and five final exams. Not exactly the intensity one often expects on study abroad, and I was not exactly in the mindset I would usually be in at finals time. I got through though, grades still to come. Then after the program ended on the last exam day we had some celebrations: BBQ in the Vienna Woods, reminiscing in the park with my roommates, und so weiter. Then the day after my last exam, my family came to visit, and we’re still traveling together as of today! I have never been so excited to see my parents and my siblings. Five months was definitely way too long. With a backpack on either side of me and a 68 pound suitcase dragging behind me, I ran hard for that first hug. We then stayed in Vienna for a couple of days, and it was really exciting to show them where I’ve been living for the last few months. Hopefully, they thought it was as cool as I did. We walked the 300 and 30-something steps up the big St. Stephan’s church tower, we ate cheese filled sausages, walked too much (apparently), enjoyed live music in one of my favorite restaurants, and got an unexpected, private tour of the palace that my school was in. It was very surreal to place my family in this foreign and far away part of my life, but also really nice. Then we headed to Paris! Paris is one of my biggest, most romanticized travel dreams so I was really excited to go (especially to go not on my own dollar). The first day we did the Louvre. The art and exhibitions were amazing, but also very overwhelming. It is very interesting to see things that are so built up over time and in the media. Like the Mona Lisa. There she was smiling, not doing much else. It was neat though to look in the face of history and fame. I was also very excited to see the Venus de Milo. She is a statue from the BC period, from Greece. She is famous for her detail and preservation, and her lack of arms. Overall, the Louvre was really cool. So the next day…… Hey! Have you ever wanted to be around more people than you ever thought humanly possible? Well then, I have a place for you. Visit Versailles, France and go to the palace. Even though you may have bought a ticket ahead of time and arrived early, you will still have to wait in an hour plus line outside to get into the palace, and once inside you will never escape the hoards. This made it hard to appreciate the royal residency, which is too bad because it really is the most impressive palace I’ve seen in Europe thus far. Overall though, it is really beautiful and hosts so much of French history, and the grounds alone are immensely impressive. The third and last day we saw the Arc de Triomphe, the Champs d’Elysees, and sat in front of the Eiffel Tower at night. It was incredibly beautiful, and we had perfect weather to top it off. As I’m writing this we are on our way to Venice!

Forgot to post this after I wrote it so now I am no longer on the way to Venice, Venice is over. We spent only one full day in this beautiful, floating city and now we’re waiting for our flight to Greece. Venice was definitely as beautiful as it is hyped up to be. It is truly a bizzare place as the ocean surrounds the entire city up to door frames and sidewalks but there are no beaches. The city really seems to just float. We did the gondola tour of the “side street” canals, ate amazing seafood pastas, ate gelato, ate pizza, ate more, then walked the narrow corridors of the city, visited one of the most amazing churches I’ve seen in Europe, and got up in a tower for an incredible view of Venice and the surrounding islands. The weather was oppressively hot, but the gorgeous old buildings and cute canals and waterways made up for it. I would definitely recommend Venice to anyone. Also, by happenstance, we got to meet up with Will in Venice for a bit. It was a nice chance for us to catch up in the middle of his journeys. Now we’re going to Athens for a night before flying to Santorini for a relaxing end to my family’s Europe trip. I’ll write to you again soon.

PS: the blog posts won’t be every two weeks on Sunday anymore probably (as you can tell). They’re going to be much more sporadic as I’ll be traveling around.

PSS: Photos to come.

[thecoroutfitters]

Mankind is at greater risk from both natural hazards and many manmade hazards than at any other time in history. Think about that statement for a moment. I know I do. This is why I try to write about what I am working on in my personal emergency preparedness and survival efforts, or to work on my preparedness related to topics, to kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.

One of my long-term projects is my own personal Modular Survival Kit which is one of the primary frameworks for my personal emergency preparedness efforts. From that framework hangs a smaller project which is called the Digital Survival Library and my personal digital map collection is part of that project.

I have been working on it and thought I’d document some bits and pieces to share with my friends who read Surviopedia. Make a list and check them one by one as you get them, you will later make good use of these survival resources!

12 Strategic Planning Maps Sources for Location Selection

I have listed some resources for the USA and a few for maps abroad, but if you live or own property outside the US, you may need to look up the equivalent entity in that country. I wouldn’t buy paper copies of the maps here unless they are in books since you only need them to plan.

1. USGS Natural Hazards Maps

This is probably most all-encompassing natural hazards map site I know of and includes tsunami, earthquake, geomagnetism, landslide, volcano, astrogeology, flood, drought and wildfire hazards. It even includes quite a bit of information for foreign nations.

2. FEMA Earthquake Hazard Maps 

This one will show you  how earthquake hazards vary across the United States.

3. FEMA Flood Map Service Center – gov

They can help you understand flood insurance rate maps.

4. National Geospatial Intelligence Maps

They are good for studying all kinds of things from nuclear power plants to polar ice and climate change.

5. US Nuclear Reactors, Nuclear Power Plants & Seismic Hazard

It wouldn’t take a tsunami to cause a severe nuclear accident in the US. Note where the nation’s 104 nuclear reactors are and note 10 & 50 mile zones around plant and take prevailing winds into consideration.

6. Nuclear Target Maps

You won’t find any current nuclear target maps on-line, as any current information is going to be secret compartmented. That said, there is plenty of outdated, declassified material available in on-line archives.

One of the greatest nuclear risks today is that a single nuclear weapon or small number of them will be detonated in major cities. New York and Washington DC are major targets as are many significant and/or populous cities, but it’s largely speculation so I won’t include nuclear target maps on this topic for planning purposes, but do observe likely fallout patterns from major cities.

7. Nukemap

In case you want to simulate weapons effects in nearby cities. Helpful for creating realistic training scenarios and choosing locations of fixed sites.

8. EarthExplorer

Think of it as the USGS version of Google Earth … only you can go back in time. Some of the first generation of US satellite imagery taken between 1960 & 1972 has been declassified, so it you want imagery of areas unlikely to change since then you have a free resource now.

9. Google Earth

As every criminal casing your home and retreat knows, Google has invested crazy resources to make Google Earth a fairly-up-to-date tool for ever-increasing swaths of the planet … especially most places most folks reading this live, own property or plan to hole up. If that’s not OK with you, get your place blacked out by telling them you run a child day care, but save some images before you do for your own use.

For survival use, I recommend the Offline Installer for Google Earth. Zoom in areas of interest and snap and print what you need, mark them with the scale, indicate magnetic declination, label and print them and you have useful maps.

10. Books

There are many fine books on the subject containing a number of maps and guidelines – Rawles on Retreats by JW Rawles and Strategic Relocation by Joel Skousen are a couple of good ones.

11. Threat-specific Online Searches

Search for hazard maps for threats you are concerned about, they will help you a lot.

12. Digital Survival Library

Use technology, but don’t become dependent on it. To this end, I curate a very useful collection of data that is my personal Digital Survival Library and as you probably guessed, it contains a ton of maps. I store it on pairs of volumes on ruggedized media.

  The first volume is not encrypted and contains information necessary to treat me in an emergency and some selections from my library that I would like anyone who happens up on to have access to.

The other volume is encrypted and contains a vast library of books, maps, emergency communications plan, emergency plans, insurance information, medical records, photos, genealogy, music, scans of documents, software, driver and a backup of all my important data that I never want to be without. I scan and shred anything that can be, so it’s a lot of data.

It also includes all the software necessary to make any phone of computer I come across read every file type of maps and other files in the library, drivers to print, program amateur radios and everything else I could anticipate that a survivalist would need.

It is comforting to know that if my plane drops out of the sky and I find myself on some island in the Caribbean or in South America I have a map and access to my library … maybe I won’t have a map in the level of detail I would like, but chances are good that it would be useful.

13 Essential survival items are included inside this kit. Grab this offer now!

How to Make Your Own Digital Survival Library

If you make one for yourself, here are a few things to keep in mind.

Stash portions of your DSL on an encrypted server outside the US to make sure you can hop on line an access it from anywhere … as long as the internet is still up.

Cache copies in separate sites. Info caches can be very small so it’s no big deal to stash encrypted copies in places you could find yourself stranded.

It you have need, you can stash a copy on a rugged MicroSD card concealed in a hollowed-out coin, under a band-aid or any imaginable object of sufficient dimensions.

Carry a copy on your keychain in a flash drive or adapter that can connect to both cell phones and computers.

Be careful about using cellphones. Most people carry a powerful computer in their pocket, but haven’t configured it for use as a standalone computer, they are very portable and common. Sufficiently small cell phones are likely to survive EMP as a standalone tool even though they contain a lot of vulnerable circuitry because they lack the conductor length to pick up sufficient charge from an incident of typical (50kVA/m) field strength at a distance.

Their small size and low cost make it a simple matter to shield them against more intense super-EMP field strengths and to cache backup phones in Faraday cages. Make sure your phones have the all the software and drivers to get the most of out of your phone in an emergency. If you root a phone and remove all the balloon-ware and tracking software cell providers pre-load phones with, even old phones are plenty powerful to be very useful.

As with all digital maps, GPS’s make it possible to carry more maps, greater detail and more current information as long as you are willing to shell out the dough. They are great tools. Use them, but don’t become dependent on GPS’s, cellphones, PLB’s or anything else that runs on batteries.

Get proficient in orienteering with map and compass first and then add GPS’s and a DSL on top of a strong foundation of map and compass land navigation. Every year, I read about hikers dying from injuries and/or exposure when gizmo’s fail, leaving them stranded.

SERE Maps

Keep copies of a couple small maps in your PSSRK (Pocket Survival and Self-recovery Kit) so you will always have a map on your person. Update them as you move around. Even if you know the area like the back of your hand, not everyone will and maps have a number of other uses besides finding your way.

Phone Book Maps

If you find yourself without a map in a populated area, a decent map for Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape (aka SERE) purpose can be had for free from any phonebook. You can often find old phonebooks in or near dumpsters or at recycling centers.

Make sure you have the social engineering skills to get your hands on one from any business or residence without putting yourself at risk stealing. Hotels and churches often print small maps on fliers and the latter have aided in prison escapes.

Tyvek

Tyvek is a waterproof, tear-resistant ultralight material that can aid in the construction of a shelter in a pinch … great for SERE maps. The Federal Publications Inc website in Canada prints maps of Canada on Tyvek as do US companies that change so frequently I won’t waste your time with a link … or you can DIY.

Fabric

There is a storied history of blood chits and E&E maps silkscreened or traced onto fabric and sewn into the lining of jackets.

Silk is durable and fire resistant. Polyester taffeta burns thoroughly and quickly without producing hardly any smoke upon exposure to a lighter or other flame. Choose material based on need. Both fabrics pack great in pocket kits.

Light Source

Make sure you can read your maps in the dark. Less-overt colors of low brightness are more covert and preserve night vision, also tend to make ink of the same wavelength disappear, making them less-effective for use with maps that use those colors.

Because of this, I use the Petzl STRIX IR a lot which is a headlamp that can produce red, green, blue white or IR light of low intensity or more intense white light depending on the situation.

UV Light & Marker

A small UV LED can be used to read notes written with UV ink that are normally invisible to the naked eye. UV LEDs and pens can also useful for marking and signaling dead drops, for visual communications and the LEDs for finding biomatter, and scorpions.

General Direction SERE Compass

If you do manage to survive with only the contents of your pockets in unfamiliar terrain, your map won’t be effective unless you orient it.

Maps for Travel, Recreation and Emergency Preparedness

You will want paper copies of these where possible. Digital copies can often be had for free, so get those either way. Store digital copies of your paper maps for use on your cell phones and computers. Scan maps that you only have on paper.

Neighborhood Maps for Emergency Response

I keep these in an emergency-response binder.

By collecting and updating maps, I have accurate maps showing every home and who lives in it, not only my neighborhood but also in surrounding neighborhoods. This information greatly simplifies the process of Block Captains and Co-Captains should keep maps of the neighborhood to mark off which homes need assistance in the event of a disaster incident.

Each neighborhood gets checked off house by house in each block with blocks reporting to neighborhood EOC’s (Emergency Operations Centers) and Neighborhood EOC’s reporting to Area or Municipality EOC’s. You can find out more about how the program works from your local CERT Program. Find a CERT Program Near You

US Geological Survey

You can download all the maps you want for free or order printed maps at reasonable cost.

Another option with the USGS is that you can send them media and they will send you the maps you request or even a copy of the entire inventory, but you had better send a big drive since that would be several TB of data at this writing. That would take quite a while to download over most connections, so perhaps that’s why they provide the service.

1:24K Topo Maps – High level of detail when on foot.

1:100K Topo Maps – A little larger scale for traveling by vehicle.

USDA Forest Service Maps

They typically cost $12-$14 for printed copies.

US National Park Maps

Download for free or buy paper copies for typically $9-$12ea. Set the page to the maximum number of products per page so you don’t have to scroll through as many pages.

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Map

Similar to EarthExplorer. Save digital copies and print paper ones.

Maps for Your Vehicle

City Maps

City maps are a must. I make it a point to pick them up wherever I travel, in advance when possible.

Topo Maps of the Entire State

These atlases and gazetteers by DeLorme and possibly competitive products are useful for traveling back roads and forest service roads by vehicle. This is important because you never know when an unforeseen emergency may force you to flee in an unplanned direction over back roads.

The scale isn’t large enough to be of much use on foot unless you have a lot of ground to cover, but pages or parts of pages could serve as E&E maps while traveling and is great for long drives. Invest in plastic covers and cases for these if you want them to last banging around in a vehicle.

Cost is about $15-$20 for most states and a little more for larger states or states with a lot of detail. I make sure I carry atlases for all of the states I am traveling and the adjacent states out West. Back in the Northeast where sizes of states are smaller I would make sure I had atlases for 2-4 states away from planned routes.

US Road Atlas

They are long distance backup to the above atlases.

Compact Phone Book

Maps and direction finding are more effective with a destination in mind. As soon as your cell tower, the grid or the internet go down, google and online maps will no longer work and you will find yourself reaching for something your probably don’t use much any more … a phone book … provided you are old enough to know what they are and how to use one, that is.

Custom Maps

Custom Maps Printed by University Libraries

Cheapest source of custom maps I have found. I had a university library print some color topographical maps on water-resistant paper in the same detail a the USGS topo maps. They are very large, about the size of 2 USGS topo maps high x 3 wide centered on areas of my choice.

They cost about $6 each which is an outstanding value! USGS topos would have cost me 6x as much, not come on water-resistant paper and aren’t centered where you like so you always seem to end up hiking through 2-4 maps per day, which means you have to line up the edges multiple maps.

DIY

Print maps at home. Depending on how many maps you print, what software you use and what you print them on, this can range from very inexpensive to expensive.

In addition to the USGS, there are several private websites which also offer free, printable maps online. I have printed some useful ones using Google Earth.

Custom Maps

mytopo and a few other companies have websites with easy to use interfaces that enable you to order custom maps of every sort imaginable. They have useful hunting products as they can display public vs private land, land owners and hunting areas. They are more expensive, but not ridiculously, so. Price varies by size and type.

Also check out their Backpacker Magazine Pro Maps if you are a backpacker.

This article has been written by Cache Valley Prepper for Survivopedia.

from Survivopedia Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. How prepared are you for emergencies? #SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

[newstfionline]

Kim Jong-nam, the Hunted Heir to a Dictator Who Met Death in Exile

By Choe Sang-Hun and Richard C. Paddock, NY Times, Feb. 15, 2017

SEOUL, South Korea--When North Korea held a state funeral for its leader, Kim Jong-il, in 2011, one son was conspicuously absent.

The absence of Kim Jong-nam--the eldest son of the family, who was bound by Korean tradition to preside over the funeral--was all the evidence outside analysts needed to see how isolated he had become from the center of power in North Korea, the world’s most secretive regime.

Never fully accepted into his family, sidelined by his powerful stepmother and haunted by fears of assassins, Mr. Kim lived much of his life wandering abroad from Moscow to Geneva, Beijing, Paris and Macau, the Chinese gambling enclave.

On Monday, Mr. Kim, 45, met his end at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia. According to the National Intelligence Service of South Korea, he was poisoned by two women who appeared to be carrying out an assassination order from Pyongyang, the North Korean capital. Mr. Kim died on his way to the hospital. A woman was arrested in the killing on Wednesday.

It remained uncertain whether Mr. Kim was traveling alone and whether any bodyguards were present. It was also unclear how many people were involved in the attack and whether airport cameras captured the episode on camera.

Grainy footage released on Wednesday showed a woman suspected of being one of the assassins, who appeared to be of Asian descent and wore a shirt emblazoned with “LOL” in large letters, before she fled the airport.

South Korea’s acting president, Hwang Kyo-ahn, said Wednesday that his government was working with the Malaysian authorities to find the killers. But officials here quickly pointed fingers at Mr. Kim’s half brother, the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who has executed a number of senior officials, including his own uncle, who have been deemed a potential challenge to his authority.

Ever since Kim Jong-un succeeded his father in 2011, “there has been a standing order” to assassinate his half brother, Lee Byung-ho, the director of the South’s National Intelligence Service, said during a closed-door briefing at the National Assembly, according to lawmakers who attended it.

“This is not a calculated action to remove Kim Jong-nam because he was a challenge to power per se, but rather reflected Kim Jong-un’s paranoia,” Mr. Lee was quoted as saying.

Kim Jong-un wanted his half brother killed, Mr. Lee said, and there was an assassination attempt against him in 2012. Mr. Kim was so afraid of assassins that he even begged for his life in a letter to his half brother in 2012.

“Please withdraw the order to punish me and my family,” Mr. Kim was quoted as saying in the letter. “We have nowhere to hide. The only way to escape is to choose suicide.”

Mr. Lee said Kim Jong-nam had no power base inside North Korea, where Kim Jong-un had swiftly established his monolithic rule with what the South called a reign of terror.

If North Korea’s involvement is proved, the United States could face intense international pressure to put the country back on its list of terrorism-sponsoring countries, said Cheong Seong-chang, an analyst at the Sejong Institute, a think tank in South Korea.

North Korea was first put on the terrorism list after the South caught a woman from the North who confessed to planting a bomb on a South Korean airliner that exploded over the Indian Ocean near Myanmar in 1987. The North was taken off the list in 2007 as part of a deal aimed at ending its nuclear program.

South Korea’s military plans to use loudspeakers along the shared Korean border to inform North Koreans of Mr. Kim’s killing and their government’s brutality, a South Korean news agency, Yonhap, reported on Wednesday.

“By assassinating Kim Jong-nam, Kim Jong-un may have removed a thorn in the side, but it will further isolate his country,” Mr. Cheong said. “It is also expected to worsen his country’s relations with China, which has been protecting his brother.”

Kim Jong-nam’s life illuminates the hidden intrigue inside the Kim family, which has ruled North Korea for almost seven decades.

While the lives of the rest of his family remained shrouded in mystery, Mr. Kim, the oldest of three known sons of Kim Jong-il, has been the closest thing the isolated Stalinist state has had to an international playboy.

He was often seen with fashionably dressed women in international airports and spent much of his time in Las Vegas-style casinos in Macau, where he also kept an expensive house.

Outside analysts often saw him as a possible candidate to replace Kim Jong-un if his half brother’s leadership imploded and China, North Korea’s traditional ally, sought a replacement head in its client state.

Chinese experts on North Korea said they doubted that Mr. Kim had special security protection from Beijing.

“Chinese elites had no expectation this guy could play an important political role,” said Cheng Xiaohe, an associate professor of international relations at Renmin University. “If China wanted to use him as an alternative leader, China would have offered good protection, but this assassination shows he had no security protection.”

In Macau, where Mr. Kim was headed, he was safe just by being there, said Zhang Baohui, director of the Center for Asian Pacific Studies at Lingnan University in Hong Kong.

“Macau is part of China and is a safe haven in itself,” he said.

Mr. Kim was a prince in exile with little chance of returning home, analysts and officials in South Korea said.

Mr. Kim’s wife and a daughter and son are in Macau under Chinese protection, Mr. Lee said.

The South Korean intelligence agency did not disclose how it acquired the letter from Mr. Kim begging his half brother to spare his life. But government sources said that emails Mr. Kim sent home through North Korean embassies had been obtained in a hacking operation. In one of the emails, they said, Mr. Kim bitterly complained that the North Korean government stopped sending him cash after his father died and Kim Jong-un took over. In 2012, a news report said Mr. Kim was thrown out of a luxury Macau hotel, unable to pay a $15,000 bill.

The Kim family has never been known for its togetherness.

Kim Jong-nam’s mother, Sung Hae-rim, a decorated “people’s actress,” was already married with a child when Kim Jong-il forced her to divorce her novelist husband and marry him. Kim Jong-il adored his first son, Kim Jong-nam. He once seated his young son at his office desk and told him, “This is the place where you will one day give orders,” according to Lee Han-young, a relative who defected to the South in 1982.

But Kim Jong-nam’s grandfather, the North’s founding president, Kim Il-sung, never approved of the marriage.

“My father was keeping highly secret the fact that he was living with my mother, who was married, a famous movie actress, so I couldn’t get out of the house or make friends,” Mr. Kim was quoted as saying in a 2012 book by a Japanese journalist. “That solitude from childhood may have made me what I am now, preferring freedom.”

Mr. Kim was born in secret, and when his mother fell out of favor with Kim Jong-il and was forced to live in Moscow, he was left in the care of her sister. He was later sent to Geneva, where he learned English and French. (His mother was alone in Moscow when she died in 2002.)

Kim Jong-il would later begin a relationship with Ko Young-hee, a star of Pyongyang’s premier opera, who gave birth to Kim Jong-chol and then Kim Jong-un. According to a Japanese sushi chef who in 2003 published a memoir about his experience working for the Kim family, Kim Jong-un was by that time the father’s favorite.

Kim Jong-nam squandered what little chance he may have had to succeed his father when he embarrassed Pyongyang in 2001; he was caught trying to enter Japan on a fake Dominican Republic passport. He told Japanese investigators that he wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland.

But rumors of intrigue never left Mr. Kim, as analysts speculated that should the young, inexperienced Kim Jong-un fail to meet the expectations of hard-line generals in Pyongyang, they might summon home the eldest brother.