hannah dee

There are a few things on the to-do list still left over from France – I’ve not got the deposit back from the flat, and I’ve not managed to get a refund on the rental insurance (because I need a document from the landlord that says that the contract has been properly terminated and I think that’ll come when the deposit does). I’ve not yet closed my French bank account, either, for the reasons outlined above.

When I was living in Grenoble I’d send emails in French all the time, but for some reason now I’m back I find it really hard to get motivated to write stuff in French. Actually, I’m finding it hard to get motivated to write stuff in any language (English, c++, matlab…) but that might just be a function of unemployment. Hey ho. Maybe writing a blog post mentioning a lack of motivation will give me the kick up the arse I need. Or maybe I’ll just go to my 12.30 appointment at the job-centre then pop for a pub lunch to recover.

Anyway, here’s a guided tour of the flat that I recorded just before leaving – as you can see, it wasn’t a bad little flat.

Now I’m back in the UK, I thought I’d do a quick write up off things I wish I’d known upon arrival in Grenoble, just in case anyone else finds it useful. So here goes:

• France is rubbish on Sundays. The only places that open properly are bakeries and florists. Supermarkets and shopping centres generally don’t open. But there are a handful of smaller supermarkets which are exceptions to this rule – Simply Market (one on Boulevard Maréchal Foch near where it crosses the train tracks, one on Avenue Jean Perrot up by Malherbe) and Monoprix (in town by Hubert Duberdout tram stop) open in the mornings, with the last shoppers allowed in at about 11.30.
• Get a bike, because Grenoble is great for cycling. But if you’re only going to be there for a year, don’t bother buying one. Instead, rent a bike from Metrovelo who do a 100€/year contract where they repair the bike too. If you’re a student, it’s only 85€. My 2ndhand one cost me 89€ and it was great, but I also had to buy lock, pump, replacement pedals, new saddle, basic tools etc. which took the total cost to well over a hundred.
• Markets are by far the best place to buy veggies. There’s a big one in town under the train tracks pretty much every day (including Sundays).
• For exotic or out of season vegetables, either go to one of the international supermarkets or to Carrefour at Grand’Place. But be warned, Grand’Place is hell on earth on a Saturday.
• If you like fancy beer, go to Les Frères Berthom at 1 Rue St Hughes. If you like pints of Guinness and sport on the telly, go to O’Callaghan’s on the south bank of the Isère. If you like pints of Guinness and good atmosphere, go to The Druids. If you like loud and soulless student bars, go to The London Pub or Couche-Tard.
• There’s a Brocante (flea market/junk sale) on Sunday mornings out by the Porte de France (in the Intermarché carpark by Boulevard de l’Esplanade). And there’s an Ikea out towards Gières. The Brocante really does sell some junk, but I wish I’d found it before I found the Ikea.
• The Bookworm Cafe has english-language 2ndhand books, and also sells tea. I think they might even have free wifi.

Any other suggestions?

My current parallel text is “L’homme à l’enverse“, a Fred Vargas novel translated into english with the title “Seeking whom he may devour“. I guess the title translation should have tipped me off to the fact that this was likely to be a clunky read. There’s one translation detail that’s really beginning to wind me up though, and that’s the name of the dog.

The old shepherd, called “Le Veillard” in the french and “Watchee” in the English, has a faithful sheepdog. This dog, in the french, is called “Interlock“. When asked about the name by the protagonist, Camille, the shepherd explains that this is a weaving term, and that he picked it by chance from the dictionary. For the rest of the book, there is a kind of running joke as Camille has difficulty remembering the name and calls the dog related terms (or “whatsitsname”).

In the English version, the translator has chosen to call the dog “Woof“. This is, indeed, a weaving term. But it’s also the noise that a dog makes. And so the running joke now has the effect of making Camille look utterly stupid every 20 pages or so, when she forgets that the dog is called woof. Way to go, translator.

In an effort to improve my French, I’ve been reading a few of my favourite books in translation alongside the original. It saves me from having to pick up a dictionary every time I come across a word I don’t know, and it also encourages me to try and work out what words mean myself (it’s a bit of a pain stopping and starting and switching between languages, so I try to do a paragraph or a page at a time). I’ve just finished L’appel des morts, by Ian Rankin (also known as “The Naming of the Dead”; one of my favourite Rebus novels). This was a challenge, but fun, and made all the more so by the entertaining footnotes. Yes, Rankin with footnotes. And entertaining, because they’re frequently wrong.

The footnotes are usually explanations of cultural references (this Who song, that Rolling Stones number). However, when the translator isn’t sure what the reference is to, sometimes he just pulls something out of his arse. For example:

• When Rebus passes Big Top, just around the corner from Canning Street, the footnote explains that this is a reference to the film Pee-Wee Herman’s Big Top. I’m not an Edinburgh expert, but… I don’t think Ian Rankin is likely to slot a reference to a US film into a geographical context, and I expect there’s actually a venue called Big Top there.
• Rebus and Siobhan have just arrived at Gleneagles and it’s all rather intense. Rebus says to Siobhan “… we’re not in Kansas any more… “, to which Siobhan replies “Does that make me Toto?”. The footnote explains that Toto is a reference to the 1970s american pop-rock band. Seriously.

I’m slightly surprised that there’s so much variation in translation quality. The Harry Potter books are cleverly done (Oliver Wood becomes Olivier DuBois for example), but the Fred Vargas novel I’m currently reading has been translated from French to English by someone who clearly owns The Bumber Book of British Clichés. It makes me think about all of those other books I’ve read in translation – and to wonder what I’m missing out on by not tackling the original. But let’s be honest, I’m not going to bother to learn Russian.

Number 10 in a series of N…

Back in June, when I was getting started in France, one of my major headaches was the form-filling. The French excel at bureaucracy – the number of times I’ve had to show my birth certificate/marriage certificate/degrees/passport is just amazing for me as a brit. Why do the bank need to see my wedding cert? Why do the uni need to see all my qualifications, three times?

But the real problem for me is the proliferation of impossible questions. The first question on the form I had to fill in to get a social security number asked for my numéro INSEE, and after asking about four people I found out that this was asking for my social security number. Er, hello, I don’t have one. That’s why I’m filling in this damn form.

So here I am in my last month in France getting geared up for a new bout of form filling – I expect to have to do it for gas, electric, internet, income tax, health insurance, etc. etc. The latest form to arrive is for the Taxe D’Habitation (kind of a council tax). They didn’t just send me a bill – no, that would be too easy. They’ve sent me a form with 14 questions. The first of which asks for my numéro FIP, which apparently I can find on the first page of my tax return, which I haven’t received. They also want to know all sorts of other stuff, which I can probably work out, but I can see this particular bit of bureaucracy dragging on a bit. Which is a shame, as I’m leaving the flat at the start of June and would have liked to get this out of the way. I hope they’re not as bad as MGEN, the mutuelle I have to use for health insurance – they sent me a letter two weeks ago about the final piece of documentation they needed to set up my account, 10 months after I started the process.

There’s an interview with the captain of Grenoble foot 38 in this week’s GRE News, and it’s got a cracking opening question:

Rough translation… “Shit season, don’t you think?”

I’ve been getting quite into the rugby lately. It’s the wrong kind of rugby, obviously, and the whole “line up and throw the ball in” thing still confuses me a bit, but it’s good fun to watch down the pub and there’s a good chance that France might win the tournament. I got chatting to a woman during the France v. Ireland match who mentioned that there was going to be a live match between the Italian and French under-20s teams in Grenoble, and that it was free for women (!), so of course I said yes when she offered to get me a ticket.

Fast-forward a few weeks and I’d assumed that the opportunity had evaporated, like so many pub-based opportunities, but two days ago I got an email saying if I wanted my ticket for the Friday night match I should be in a particular square at 1915. So of course I said “Oui merci!”. But… upon arriving at the square, I discovered that it was full of people, many of whom were under 10. I hovered on the fringes of the crowd for a bit, straining to see if there was anyone I recognised (I had, of course, forgotten the woman’s name by now…) and generally played the lost English person. Eventually she spotted me and handed over the ticket, and we all moved off in convoy towards the ground. It turns out that all the local Rugby clubs had also been given free tickets and that’s who I was with – a junior rugby club. Oh my god can those children make a lot of noise. Good fun though. Here’s a video of some of the march to the stade des alpes – warning, you probably want to turn the sound down:

The pre-match entertainment included Les Pompom Girls du Stade des Alpes, a hugely irritating DJ bloke, and a brass band. DJ bloke came on to annoy us all at half time too. The match itself was a bit scrappy – lots of silly mistakes – but that’s to be expected from the under-20s teams I guess.

Number 9 in a series of N…

This photo was taken by my mum in Galleries Lafayette in Paris. Apparently “Acne” is upscale designer clothes, and you can find it between Stella McCartney and Vivienne Westwood. Heh.

Number 2 in a series of N…

I love the graphics here.