Rodlin Fertil is the hard working student from the Andrew Grene High School who was selected by Headmaster Ricot Pierre, to visit Ultima France at the start of 2015. His visit includes work experience at the Head Office of the exhibition hardware manufacturer. He was awarded this opportunity following his hard work and great exam results in 2014.
Below are extracts from his diary about his visit:
12th January
“As you know I was the winner in the contest that was organised in Andrew Grene High School. Today I arrive in France, in fact it is for me for the first time I travel to a big country with a very big plane. The trip lasted eight hours, and I arrived at Paris about 10am. I took my suitcase then I saw Philippe who came to pick me up. We drove to Nants, had a quick sandwich on the road and I am happy to go to school tomorrow.
I thank all of the AG foundation and I will prove my love for all of you achieving a successful stay in Nantes.
Special thanks to Mr Ricot who chose me and who battled to get the visa sorted.”
15th January
“After a very good diner at Florent’s house, I woke up early at 7am and went to the St Felix La Salle school.
My first lesson was a technical lesson about raw material. We learnt how to drill, punch, draw, saw and make hole in iron with an hammer. Very interesting and maybe useful one day ! We will have next Thursday a second lesson to get better practice. It was a 4 hour lesson but it appears me very short time.
Then, we went to the ‘Cantine’ and had good food. After lunch, I played table football with my colleague and then went back to classroom.
Time for chemistry. It is a lesson I like very much. We prepared an experience with saccharose.
Philippe came to pick me up at school and we had dinner. ‘Basquaise’ chicken and ‘Galette des rois’. I got the charm. I am lucky !
Time to go to bed and rest for being ready for the 24h cycling challenge in Ultima.”
17th January
Rodlin takes part in the P3 Group 24 hour Cycle Challenge >
18th January
“Greetings – till now, i’m terrific because i had a great week at school and a great weekend with Ultima team. We were cycling for twentyfour hours in a way to do the equivalent of a tour of Haiti. 2300km normally, but we did 1745km.
Our purpose was to earn money for Haiti, and we did it collecting money for AGF. Because Haiti needs a hand, to move up, and during the challenge we were sharing one another.
On sunday morning about ten i went to catholic church, and we were worshipping god together. In the evening, Philippe’s family wished my birthday, tomorrow normally, and i’m 19 years old. We ate togerther a chocalate cake, it was perfect for the weekend, and tomorrow it’ll be school, i’m so happy to get school once more. I am going to the pension for the week with all my colleagues of the classroom.
bye all, have a wonderful week.”
24th January
“After spending my last week end in Philippe’s house, I discovered my room in the dormitory of Saint-Felix Scholl on Monday morning.
After putting my suitcase in my bedroom, I rapidly went to my Physcical Education and Sport Lesson. I discovered the badminton. At the beginning it was not easy and I missed the shuttlecock various times with my racket! After I started to be more precise even if I still have a long path to become a champion.
Then we had an English test followed by Civic Eduction dedicated to the description of the Franch Healthcare Public system.
At 12.10 it was Lunchtime in the self service restaurant of the school.
I then went to the library my roommate lent me his laptop to check my email and send some news to my Haitian friends.
At 6.30 pm they opened the dormitory and we went to our room to work our lessons. I enjoyed to discuss with my roommate, Romain VENANT, which studies Environment. He is in the dormitory because his parents live far from the school. He made me discover french humour films on his laptop and we spent a funny moment.
We then had dinner and went to sleep.
The Tuesday morning was dedicated to professional teaching. We had a test with various questions.
The afternoon, we studied Civic Education and then Mathematics.
Then In mathematics, the class was about the statistics and more particularly the different ways to analyze a serial through the statistics aspect.
Then we went to the dormitory.
On Wednesday the first class in the morning was about industrial mechanics. We learned how to design an iron piece on a computer through specialized software called Solidworks.
Then at 9 am we studied health and safety procedures. The subject was the various risks that can exist (technological, natural…), the different ways to manage these risks and the different actors in charge of managing them.
Then there was a class of English more particularly conversational English. We had to introduce ourselves to the class and speak about our identity, personality, family…
After that we went to the Nantes Congress Center to assist to a classical music concert, tied to the “Folle Journée”, an annual event in Nantes consisting in various classical music concerts of 45 minutes.
After the Lunch, Marius and Victor, Philippe’s sons came to the school and we walked to Philippe’s house together. There, Philippe’s friend called Vincent, who is a doctor, drove me to the Hôtel-Dieu hospital, that is just near the Loire River, and made me discover the hospital, the departments and the way they work and some rooms. We dressed with special clothes (photo attached) and a mask to discover a sterilization room that helps to clean all the medical tools. We even went to the mortuary but we did not see the dead people because it requires family authorization.
Another thing that impressed me is the fact that the rescue helicopters can land directly on the hospital roof to bring the patients in the hospital.
I was really very happy to do this visit because my dream is to be a doctor in the future.
I had many things to tell to my friends when I came back to the dormitory in the evening.
On Thursday morning we studied Chemicals, the elementary components and the mixes of these elementary components on a theoretical aspect. On a more practical point of view, we studied the industrial ways to mix some materials depending on its physical and chemical characteristics.
On Thursday afternoon I went in another class to study geology. It was very interesting as we talked about the seismology and the volcanos. We had a description of the mechanisms that create the eruptions of volcanos and the earthquakes. It reminded me about what happened in Haiti 5 years ago.
On Friday we have been taught the 18th Century in France which is called the Lights Century because of the French Intellectuals and philosophes that were contesting the absolute power of the king of France (Louis XV at the time).
Then I went to a primary school, with a pastor, to make a presentation about Haiti to young pupils. For the occasion, I used the banner I prepared with some people of Ultima Displays France.
I finished the week on Friday afternoon with a Desciptive Statistics Course. Florent then came to pick me up by car and we returned to his house to spend the week-end with his family.
We plan to to some sport this week-end and maybe to go to the see. I will keep you updated.”
30th January
“Greatings –Probably my last report before joining Port-au-Prince.
This week has been another great week in the College. I attended classes of Mathematics, Biology, Chemical and English lesson. On Wednesday, I went to the Congress Center in Nantes for listening classical music. Very impressive, many people and very good music.
On Thursday, we visited a factory in Nantes which produces electricity recycling the wastes from Nantes. Great interest in this environment friendly thing.
This morning, I visited some classes of young pupils and presented Haiti, the School, our way of living…they had thousands of questions. I met as well Brother Jacques from La Salle network and he spoke me about his trip to Haiti where the La Salle network has two schools (in Ile de la Tortue and in Port-la-Paix)
The College organised a meeting with all the people who took care of me during my stay and I had opportunity to thank Isabelle, the Student manager, for her kindness to me and as well to thank all my friends and mainly those with whom I shared the boarding school. We promised to keep in touch via Skype and Facebook.
This afternoon, I went back to Philippe’s home and I packed as tomorrow we go to Paris for visiting the Eiffel tower and going to the movie on Champs-Elysées.
I have plenty of nice moments spent in Nantes in my head. I phoned to my parents tonight and I am anxious to coming back to PAP for telling them and as well to the AGHS all that I lived during this three weeks.
Everything was good except the rain and the low temperature !
Rodlin”
