I’m going to be going there next year from January to March for studying abroad. I’ve talked to some other people who have been in the program, but I was wondering if any Dopers knew the area and could tell me a bit about it.
I’m a bit nervous. I didn’t expect to get in- one of the application questions was “What would you do if your family served cow brains regularly?” and I wrote a rant about Mad Cow Disease and consumerism. Perhaps they appreciated my reference letters.
At any rate, aidez-moi?
I think it’s called ‘Lyons’.
Lyons in English, that is.
My spelling’s hopeless today.
Bugger all this for a lark, I wasn’t chosen for my spelling ability.
Or for your sense of humour.
Two peanuts were walking down the street and one was a-salted. Happy now?
So… France? Anyone?
Enough. Any spelling jibes were aimed at myself. I apologise and suggest a cease fire.
andygirl, I’ve passed through there twice, but not stayed on. It seems a place like many in the French country - nice people, not at all rude or stuck with a superiority complex like Parisians. Yes, it’s a decent-sized place, but still it doens’t have that “big city feel” to it. It’s quick to get to Paris and elsewhere via TGV from there, and you also aren’t terribly far from Provence, and Monaco, and the Riviera.
This is a good site for finding more info:
Official Site of Lyon
Dr. Schadenfreude? Please don’t harass my daughter andygirl. 
Okay, andygirl – next time I try to help out with a link, I’ll do it when you and Dr Schadenfreude aren’t having words. I tried to help, I really did!
[sub]Ice Wolf walks off mumbling, and kicking a can down the road.[/sub]
Andygirl, I have only been there very briefy, for a World Cup soccer match, which is not any indication of a place. But, I recall that the people I worked with in Geneva were fairly concerned about my car being stolen while I was there. I don’t know if its a general Swiss anti-French thing, but they seem to think that the large cities in France are dangerous places full of thieves. This could be an indication of a bit of racism/xenophobia since France has a lot of immigrants from North Africa, etc.
My car was fine, but we did get fairly lost. Its almost a full two hours from Geneva, BTW, not as close as it seems on the map. And in the getting lost, driving around bit, it didn’t seem very interesting, but most towns/cities in France have a small, interesting city centre somewhere, if you can find it, and the rest of the place tends to be just normal (albeit different) town where people live.