Monday, January 13th | Written by Blanca
Bonjour à tous! Je m’appelle Blanca Zhang. Puis-je avoir une table pour trois s’il vous plaît?
Hello, everyone! My name is Blanca Zhang, and while I don’t actually need a table for three at the moment, I’m thrilled to be posting again! (These are the only three sentences in French that I currently know.)
This time, I’m writing to you not from my desk in the North Avenue Apartments, but from my (substantially more spacious) desk in Crous Lorraine, Campus Technopôle. Since my arrival, I’ve already seen more sights, experienced more cultural nuances, and eaten more bread than I could have hoped. But wait—*record scratch* *freeze frame*—you’re probably wondering how I ended up in this situation. For that, we’ll have to turn back the clock a week.
Sunday, January 5, 2020, 6:00AM EST: I am rudely awakened by my alarm, a cacophonous sound which evokes in me more rage than empty staplers, comma splices, and drivers-who-don’t-use-their-turn-signals-until-they’re-actually-turning combined. Cursing the past three weeks spent waking up at noon and ruining any modicum of a sleep schedule that remained after the fall semester, I blearily finish packing (yes, I am that person, and no, I don’t recommend it) and am soon on my way to Queens, New York.
Fun fact! The boroughs of New York City are where I spent the first few years of my life, but this time, instead of going home, I’m heading far, far from it.
Sunday, January 5, 2020, 3:00PM EST: Maybe my roots in Queens are stronger than I thought, because I cannot seem to leave. My flight has been delayed for the umpteenth time, and I count the flight departure update messages I have received from American Airlines since that morning; there are eleven. I am sure to miss my connection in Philadelphia. I consider my options: 1) cry, or 2) frantically message my much more knowledgeable friends in hopes that one might know what to do. I choose the latter and decide to revert to option 1 if it isn’t successful—luckily, it is, and I’m given a crash course on how to ask for a flight change. Here are the steps if you ever find yourself in such a situation:
- Find a different flight with your airline that shares your current location and intended destination.
- Explain to the airline representative at your gate that, due to the delays with your flight departure, you are going to miss your connection at a different airport.
- Request to be reassigned to a flight that will arrive at your destination. If you must arrive before a specific time to, say, catch a shuttle to campus, as I did, be sure to emphasize so.
Sunday, January 5, 2020, 5:45PM EST: I board my new plane and settle in for a six-hour flight. Already, most of the passengers around me are speaking French—this comes as little surprise, since we’re heading to Paris. I recall that I, however, do not speak French, so I try to draw upon my Duolingo French expertise but remember that I quit halfway through the first lesson. Should I reinstall the app on my phone and practice during the flight there? I try, but a flight attendant asks that I switch my phone to airplane mode, and I am left without WiFi. Such is a modern tragedy of our day.
Monday, January 6, 2020, 4:00PM CET: My flight touches down at the Paris-CDG airport at half past 7:00AM, and after boarding the GTL shuttle and falling asleep almost immediately, I wake up to foggier skies, the incandescent glow of street lamps, and yellow stone façades with wrought-iron terraces. We’ve made it to downtown Metz!
Soon, however, the neo-Romanesque structures begin to fade, and cobblestone gives way to paved roads. As the shuttle rounds the bend of a pristine lake, I’m greeted, after a long day of travelling through unfamiliar sights, by one I know very well: a glass building that reads ‘Georgia Tech.’
Monday, January 6, 2020, 6:00PM CET: A couple other GTL students and I have decided that we are not tired enough yet, so we’ve made the 15-minute trek from Crous to Cora, a walk that was well worth it. While I’d been aware that Cora is dubbed the ‘French Walmart,’ nothing could prepare me for its sheer magnitude. I’m a lover of grocery stores, bakeries, furniture/homewares stores, and garden centers, so you can imagine my awe at a single store that combines all those and more.
Armed with my list of room essentials, I wander around Cora without a single idea where anything is located but not caring one bit—this is objectively the most amazing supermarket I’ve ever visited. Not knowing French poses a slight inconvenience when you find yourself on a wild goose chase around Cora in the hopes of finding Brita pitchers and can’t read any of the aisle signs (but hey, at least you can get your steps in)! I’ve always heard that European culture involves much more bread-eating and walking than in America (among many other things, of course), and Cora is, unexpectedly, a place where you can do both!
Present Day: The past week has been exciting, exhausting, eye-opening, exhilarating, plus a bunch of other adjectives that start with ‘e’—and it’s only been a week! I’m looking forward to many more of them, and since I plan to write all about it, I hope you are, too.
in the world is in Spa, and the race happens to be at the beginning of the fall semester every year, so I wanted to go. My mom made it happen, and my dad got to come too, so that was an unforgettable experience. Lastly, Tromso—it was by far the most expensive trip that I planned, as well as the furthest distance from Metz (and therefore the most difficult to get to). After traveling for 20 hours, a couple of friends and I got to see the Northern Lights on both nights that we were there. They are absolutely stunning I could not recommend them enough if you have the ability to go see them.
I would like to think that I did quite a few things well during this semester. I managed to travel tons – almost every weekend – and got to see many things that I never would have thought I’d be able to see. I was able to take 13 credit hours (I have been taking 14-16 every semester before this one) and still be able to do this traveling and be social. Another thing I did well was being social: I’m an introvert, and therefore being social is usually a problem, but I was able to be pretty social among the group of students at Georgia Tech-Lorraine. Lastly, I don’t think I got lost at all this semester—I had limited data and though a couple of wrong turns were taken, I always made it to the end destination relatively quickly.
with Verizon and had very limited data. Second, plan your trips decently in advance. There were multiple occasions where I had to make last second plans to go to a city that wasn’t my first choice because all of the trains were sold out to get there. Another reason to plan bigger trips in advance is that planes are cheaper when tickets are bought in advance. Third, talk to people outside of the group you’re with. I struggle with this because I’m such a shy person, but I heard some really cool stories from people who talked to locals. Lastly, do focus on school some on the weekends. While I did well enough, I rarely did anything school related on the weekends, and therefore caused a bit of unnecessary stress for during the week.
Region in Northern Italy on Tuesday. After that, we have one more class on the following Tuesday. In my circuits lab, I have my final exam on Wednesday. It’s worth 35% of my grade, so I need to do well on it. In thermodynamics, we have three more classes with three more evaluation periods and then a final exam slot, which is essentially three evaluation periods put together. I was hoping to not need to come to the final to get an A, but it’s looking more and more likely that I will need to go. In my probability and statistics class, we have a couple of classes left, one homework assignment, and then the final exam, which is also 35% of my grade, so it’s a similar scenario to circuits. In French, we have a couple of review classes and then a final exam. 
as them. Today, we did the Porsche and Mercedes-Benz museums and then tomorrow morning, we will do the Porsche factory.
are like miniature exams and need to be prepared for in a similar manner. Even so, I’ve been traveling (as evidenced by my travel-related posts). Here’s how I’ve managed to travel and try my best to keep up with school and the blog.
what I’ve had each and every day that I’ve started in Metz. Jake got an electric kettle during the item swap, so that’s been extremely convenient. I just fill it with water, put a spoonful of instant coffee and a spoonful of instant cappuccino in a mug, pour the hot water in, and mix it up (and then add a little milk because I’m weak). Though I drink quite a bit of coffee, I do drink it because I enjoy the taste, and not because I need the caffeine entirely (though I definitely need some of it). Perhaps I should drink more decaf just to be safe. 
abroad were ME 3322 (Thermodynamics), MATH 3670 (Probability and Statistics with Applications), and ECE 3741 (Instrum and Electronics Lab). It worked out well that Thermodynamics meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8 am, Probability and Statistics meets on Mondays and Wednesdays at 3:30, and Instrum and Electronics Lab meets on Wednesdays at 9:30, and none of these hinder travel in any way. For Electronics Lab, it was convenient that I had taken the lecture part of the class (ECE 3710) in the spring, so I have some of what we’ll talk about in my recent memory. Since the other two classes are not required courses for my major, I had a bit more leeway with what I chose. I knew I wanted to begin getting my humanities out of the way and I was likely going to take a language, so since I am studying in France, I chose FREN 1001 (Elementary French 1). French class 
meets on Mondays and Wednesdays at 2 pm, which means I would have to be back earlier, but it’s unlikely that I would be getting back that late on a school day anyway. Lastly, I picked Science and Technology in the Modern World (HTS 2100) because it is a study of European regions and because it begins to fill up my 2000 level electives. This class meets on Tuesdays at 12:30, and therefore also doesn’t affect travel in any way due to lecture, though there are a few fieldtrips that occur on Friday throughout the semester. A normal week for me this semester starts at 2 pm on Monday and ends at 9:30 on Thursday, which technically gives me 100.5 hours per week to travel out of 168 total hours in a week. Though I won’t be using all of this time to travel, as school does come first, it is reassuring to know that if I have an easier week ahead, I can make some pretty ambitious travel plans and still make it back with plenty of time for class. 
schoolwork, and therefore I can only really do schoolwork when I’m alone. Now that I’m here in France, I have even more distractions. It seems like all anybody can think about is where they’re going to travel next, and I’m the same way. Luckily, as with any typical semester, the first couple weeks—or first full week, in this case—are usually pretty slow, with the occasional homework assignment needing to be completed. Because of this, I’ve been able to make new friends, take lots of pictures (and stay on top of editing them), get the recommended eight hours of sleep, and yes, travel in both of my first two weekends (I’m currently writing this in Belgium).
Modern World. The most worrying ones are the three that are mandatory to graduate as a mechanical engineer: Thermodynamics, Probability and Statistics, and Instrum and Electronics Lab. These classes, though fair according to past students, will be very difficult to get an A in if I don’t take them seriously and make time to review the material. Thermodynamics is a flipped classroom, so in class we’re solving problems and outside of class we’re watching lectures. There are eighteen evaluations to be completed throughout the semester, and if they all get completed successfully, we get an A. Probability and Statistics is heavily based on the midterms and the final, but if I’m able to stay on top of the homework and not miss any classes, it shouldn’t be too difficult. Instrum and Electronics Lab is based around lab quizzes and lab reports, so if Jake and I are able
racking thing that has happened so far, as we were supposed to grab stuff that we didn’t have but that we needed. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize what exactly I needed until after this event took place.