One year

I've been back from Montreal since 365 and few hours. It's been already a year. Can you believe it? I don't. It seems I left yesterday but at the same time, everything related to Montreal seem so far away. Well, it helped me a lot to go back there in February, to spend time with people I didn't think I would see so soon.
So, what did I learn this year? What did life teach me?
The feeling of missing Montreal never left me. Don't tell me it's just because of Jonathan, I miss all of you guys in Montreal and I miss the city, I miss the life style, I miss the atmosphere. I miss the 10 things I listed earlier in this blog.
But I appreciated being back in Geneva: seeing the beautidful lanscape, watching the moutains everyday, the warmth of my home, being back with my family. I love that!!! I love spending time with my friends, it's great to laugh with them and to share a bit of their life. Spending time with my grandparents is such a gift!
I learned a lot during this year: I had success, I made mistakes, I learned things about myslef, I developped new strategies to face the struggles in life. I realized that being sad and sitting there missing Montreal was not a solution. Living in my memories would be a really sad way to avoid reality. So I decided I would try to make my best out of this new year. And I'm pretty happy of the result: of course, I did some mistakes this year and I would do certain things differently if I could do it over again. But overall, I'm really happy. I learned a lot about myself: I discover with Jonathan that I could be really selfish and that I'm not the perfect girlfriend I thought I would be. Jonathan taught me a lot: he helped me to manage my stress, he helped me to love people more. I learned a lot at school even with the courses that I didn't like the most. I learned how to avoid the solution of facility and to take challengs because it's worth working hard on something to have a good result.
I learned to trust into God more: I realized once again that He was always there for me and that He would give me the best in every situation. It's just up to me to decide if I want to be happy or not. He showed that He had good things for me in Geneva, while I'm waiting to go back to Montreal.
I'm learning how to be an adult I guess.
Now, school and exams are over. I'm working on my BA dissertation for the whole summer and work a bit to make some money. I'm planning to be done with my BA dissertation in september. And then, I'm gonna find a job to work full time to make money. Meanwhile, I'm gonna apply to become a Quebec permanent resident. Jonathan is coming in Geneva for a bit more than 2 weeks at Christmas and if my immigration process is done, I will go back to Montreal with him in January. And this time, not just for a year. For a long time...
So here I am: a lot of dreams in my heads, a lot of hope, a lot of love. Let's continue!

sleeping

Photographer David Ichioka did an awesome project!!! He wanted to see how people sleep. So I putted a camera on the ceiling and programmed it to take pictures every 20-30min. You can see the results here

I love the idea!!!! If someone can help me to set the camera on my ceiling, tell me!!!

And you, how do u sleep?

Radio

My career of international journalist begins. Well, it's only the really early beginnings but it should starts somewhere, right.
I'm in the team of a radio show with the university of Geneva called "the unusuals" and we try to make discovers some unusuals aspects of Geneva.
If you want to listen to it (it's in French as you guessed), we go to : http://www.unige.ch/acultu/index.php. Then click on the top on "rendez-vous AC",then "les insolites" and the first show is there.

Enjoy!

Relationships are hard!!

Relationships are hard. Yeah, I'm aware that you all know that, I didn't make the discovery of the century and I won't receive the Nobel prize of relationships ( I know it doesn't exist but we could create one...) for this.
But still, relationships are hard. Maybe I watched too many romantic Hollywood movies with romantic, easy-going, I-love-you-you-love-me-everything-is-perfect scenario. Or I could blame society and its princesse waiting for the prince on his white horse thing. In fact, it's like Santa: there's no white horse (i wouldn't know how to ride it anyway), no princesse in a castle. There's just 2 people, different from each other, working hard to be happy together. Well, sometimes you have to work harder. And usually, we don't like to work harder: we want everything to go well with the minimal efforts. But it doesn't work like this: if we really want something, we have to put a lot of energy and efforts. But I'm actually enjoying it: I like to see the outcomes at the end. And even if I don't see them right away, I know they are somewhere around the corner.
Difficulties are pretty good actually because it shows us what we are really willing to put our efforts in, what's worth it. It helps us to sort things. But when we know what's worth it, we have a whole new passion and energy to put in it. I realize that it's in moments of doubts, questionning that I sorted things out and made the priority in my life.

So relationships are hard but we know they are worth spending time and energy. And your efforts won't lead you to a castle with your man on a white horse (well, except if you're going out with a prince who has a castle and white horses...) but to a beautiful place that will be unique, that no one else in the world can be and that will be better than a castle. So let's keep working hard for the people we love because that's the joy of our live.
And don't stop reading the princesse story but imagine that there's something even better for you.

10 things I like about Montreal

So, I'm gonna try to put some posts about my stay in Montreal as a lot of things happened.

Here is a list I did last week: I wanted to find 10 things I like about Montreal, to prove to myself maybe that moving back there is something I really want... I don't know what I really mean by that, I guess it's a bit scary to think of moving there and here is one result of my deep thinking. Anyway, stop thinking and talking Marion, just give us this list!!!

1.Switching between English and French all the time
2.General Tao chicken and, most generally, cheap chinese food
3.The diversity of culture, food and languages
4.Saint Denis street
5.The sound of the metro pass when you enter the metro station
6.Shopping underground in winter
7.Being able to buy a muffin at every corner for a reasonable price
8.Dolarama
9.The Québécquois accent
10.The fact that every corner remind me a great memory

Looking far ahead

The pastor's wife of the church I used to go in Montreal has an amazing blog: she has the gift to analyze everyday life situations and to discover great life lessons. I've been beginning to do that in order to hear from God in a different way.

I had my first driving lesson today: the instructor was explaining to me that, in a turn, it's important to look far ahead in order to have a good vision of the turn and to stay on the road.
I think that it works like this with God as well: if we just focus on our present situation, on the current problems or sufferings, we're not gonna be able to continue on the road, we'll be stucked. But if we look far ahead, if we keep our eyes on the big picture, if we remind ourselves that God is at the end of the road and that He has an exit for us, we're gonna keep our car on the good road and it's gonna be easier the drive. And the road is not only made of tightened turns, we eventually gonna find a nice road.

Valentine's day

roses
Originally uploaded by Marionetblablabla.

Ok, I know I'm always the first one to say that Valentine's day is just something commercial, just about money, that you don't love someone more that day, that guy shouldn't think that they can give flowers only on that date, and blablabla.

But I have to admit that receiving beautiful roses from my love... Well, yeah, that's pretty nice