Katerina Dedkova

Long-term mobility

• Lycee Frederic Mistral • Avignon • France •

At the end of February I flew to France for a three-month stay in Avignon, Provence, where I attended Lycee Frederic Mistral as part of a long-term Erasmus+ mobility. I flew from Prague to Marseille and then took a train for an hour and a half from the small airport station to the centre of Avignon, where my host family picked me up.

During the week I slept in the boarding house, which was directly connected to my school. I shared a room with three other girls who were very kind, and we quickly became friends. Every Friday I left the boarding house to spend the weekend with my host family, who lived in the wider city centre. My host family had a son a year younger than me, so we played games together a few times. On weekends we went on trips or I often went for a walk into the centre.

My stay flew by incredibly fast and I quickly got used to French life. In my free time I walked around the city a lot, wandering through the streets of Avignon and Villeneuve. At the end of May, unfortunately, the time came to say goodbye. I travelled back by coach, which went straight from the outskirts of Avignon to Hradec. Even though it took 22.5 hours, the journey passed relatively quickly and was comfortable.

Although I was confused at the start, I quickly got used to French and improved my language skills. I learned a lot of new things about other cultures and customs.

We asked...

Why would you recommend your classmates to participate in the Erasmus+ programme and what advice would you have for them?

I think that besides the language, my stay taught me to communicate with people, which used to be a big problem for me. I am also now far more efficient with my time, and I think it helped me get rid of my phone dependency too, since there was no Wi-Fi at the boarding house. I can definitely handle complicated situations now and I am more independent because of it. I think I finally realised that I am capable of a lot of things and do not need to be afraid of the unknown.

What experiences and highlights from your stay are worth mentioning?

For me, the best experiences were probably the trips with the family. Looking back, there were quite a lot of them, mainly with my host mum. We visited many natural sights and towns. The best was probably the trip to Marseille in mid-May, when I got a great chance to talk with them and it felt really nice. At school we had a culture week full of activities for students - theatre, film, music, and dance performances. I was especially struck by the Carnaval, when almost the whole school dressed up in costumes and held a parade that was often very funny.

How would you describe your typical day?

When I was at the boarding house, my alarm was set for 6:45, I got up and prepared my things for school. Breakfast was at 7:15, and I had the same thing every day - fruit with yoghurt and cereal. Then I went to lessons, which on most days lasted until 15:00 and were divided into three two-hour blocks with a lunch break. After lessons I usually went into town and came back to the boarding house at 17:30, where I studied until dinner. Dinner lasted from 18:45 to 19:55. I then went back to my room, where I had free time until ten, when it was official lights-out.