What's so different at "la fac"?

While sitting in one of my classes last week, I started to realize just how different the classroom environment is at my school here in Paris compared to UMass. In this post, I will be talking about some of the differences that I see and how I feel about it.

Since most of my classes are in one building (Halle aux Farines), this is the only building I can write about because I haven't walked around and explored the other buildings. I'm not used to having all my classes in one building because, at UMass, it would at least take me 5 minutes to walk from one class to another. 

In this building, men and women share the same bathrooms. Yes, there are separate bathrooms but students at the school decided that there's no need for separate bathrooms so anyone can go where they like, which is pretty cool and different!

Another difference is that most professors at Diderot don't give out a syllabus, so you have to pay attention the first week of classes to know and understand how the class works. Some professors in lectures (Amphi) don't use PowerPoint, so at times, it's hard to follow. Most of them read from their notes from a laptop and if you are taking notes by hand, It will be hard to write down every single thing they say so I advise looking at recording laws and asking the professors if you could record their lectures.

The dining halls are not the same and people don't usually go to the dining hall, they mainly go to "grab and go" and the line is usually really long around 12h-13h. One time I was in line for 30 minutes but it was totally worth it because I got a huge baguette for only 3 euros.

Everything is very different since I'm coming from a huge university like UMass and it took me a while to get used to it. One thing I really like about Diderot is how diverse it is and I never really saw that with UMass. Overall, I feel like I'm learning a lot just from my environment and although it is different, I don't mind it at all.