From Linn

All right… I’ve promised to fill everyone on what I’ve been up to with my class, classmates and general geeky wine stuff.

First the school: The school is terrific. The campus is small as is the student body- I think 1200 students from what I read in a document that was written entirely in French… so my translation certainly wasn’t checked with anyone. This would make Montpellier SupAgro the smallest school that I’ve attend since Sacajawea elementary school. The campus is beautiful, there is a large bamboo grove, a two or three acre vineyard, and is about a mile from the center of town. The school was moved from far further north in the late 1800’s in order to do research on how to combat phylloxera when it was wreaking havoc. Marcia- the woman who was so much help prior to arriving is terrific- whirling around and fixing things within and without the school as she sees fit- if a student needs an official looking document helping to get a bank account or needs information on finding an apartment she is the person that can help. Alain Carbonneau is the director of education for this program as well as being the director for the IHEV.

 The classes started off with a general introduction, a lecture on the state of viticulture worldwide, and 15 hours of intensive French for the “debutante” level of French language students, also called “patates” which is the less romantic way to say potato and is also a way to call someone dumb.

The first week we made it out on one winery visit to Domaine l’Horteus in the Pic Saint Loup appellation in the Languedoc. We toured the vineyard with the owner/winemaker and then tasted through the wines. It was a nice introduction to the region and great to get out into the country and see something other than Montpellier for a change.

This week and last we have been working on an intensive economics of the global wine industry segment. Last week we had the top economist in EU wine markets. We had a refresher in general economics- it was nice to have the econ brush up but I felt pretty good about how familiar it seemed. We’re having lectures and tastings with Dieter Hoffmann from the University of Geisenheim in Germany who is also quite a well known wine industry economist who has spoken at length about the ins and outs of the bulk market, and the international exchange in imports, exports and consumption. There are lots of graphs involved, it’s interesting but 90 graphs a day and I start to think I’ve seen all the information in one of the other graphs.

 There is some degree of debate in the EMAVE consortium over what mobility consists of. The original idea was that there we would have to spend the whole second year in another country at one of the consortium schools in Italy, Spain, Germany, or Portugal. The French feel that there is quite a bit of mobility involved in the program as it is and if some people want to stay in France the should be able to. They have agreed that the second year can be divided… if a person stays in France for the first half of the year then they have to go abroad and work on their thesis in another country. Hypothetically I could study between the University at Bordeaux and Montpellier for the first semester next year and then work overseas (even back in the states) for the thesis. My thinking is that I’d like to do my thesis in France in which case I’ll have to spend a semester somewhere else… which is fine on face value but for maximum value it would be nice to be able to not have to learn German/ Portuguese/ Italian etc…  in one year while learning French in order to take masters level classes in enology or viticulture in that different language. There are some rumors that there will be some effort to teach classes in English... which I also feel somewhat guilty about. We don’t officially have to chose which country we have to go to until the end of the first semester, however we have to decide right now which language we want to take… which pretty much means that we all have to decide now where we want to go.  I chose Giesenheim (provisionally) which is very strong in viticulture and economics but also has a good enology program and also has an expert in sulfides in wine. There is a joint program between our sister school in Bordeaux and Geisenheim studying these compounds (both positive and negative) in wines. Since I’d probably be spending time between Montpellier and Bordeaux in the second half of the year I’d do well to get involved in studies while I was at Geisenheim. Also Giesenheim has several programs in alternative vineyard practices- organics, biodynamics and the like.

Also I’m curious about the beer in Germany since it really has a greatly different market for styles that France does… and I think that would be very interesting to see and to consume.

The people in the program are great. There are three other Americans: Trent from California (worked at Chateau St.Jean) Robert from Texas (who worked at a winery in Texas) and Rachel who worked at a winery in upstate New York. There are three Greeks- Nikos, Costas and Dimitrious all great guys all with a different link to the wine industry in Greece. There are Three Germans Matthias, Andreas and Simon all good, all Geisenheim graduates and all quite fun. The French contingent has four people and since they can speak French they have made a bit of money translating for people… Marie, Cyril, Xavier, and Pierre… they are all from different parts of France so it is fun to see the differences and hear about all the different parts of the country. There is only one Italian Paolo, and only one Spaniard Javier, both seems to be good representatives of their country- friendly and patient with the English only crew. There is a singe New Zealander- Carolyn- who is very nice- here with her boyfriend who is going to have to head out and see if he can find a job probably which will be interesting to see what happens since many of us may have to head  out and try and do the same. Driekus is the South- African, he is terrific, funny and quite business-like (similar to Jesus in the tuxedo tee shirt from taledega nights- may anyone who ever had respect for me pardon the reference.) There is also Agatha who is polish, she seems to have quite a good feel for French and is smart enough to not hang out with all of us all of the time. And last but not least is Bisso, he speaks something like 5 or 6 languages, is very smart and is an expert in the Russian wine market. He is content editor for one of Russia’s premier wine publication, organizes travel for staff for the distribution company he works for to travel to see special producers in Europe and abroad. Currently, I suppose, he is an import specialist for the growing Russian marker. He lives part time in Russia and part time in Rome and is generally speaking awesome.  He saved our bacon at the bank too since he and Allison and I all went to get our accounts at the same time and he speaks fluent French and English and the banker and Allison and I could only really manage one out of two successfully.

That’s all for now!