AU Pub Quiz

It's that time of the year again! The ever-popular AU Pub Quiz is coming to you this time from l'Apostrophe Cafe in the 10th (same place where we had it the last time for you pub quiz fans). So, start putting your teams together and thinking of some clever team names. This will also be a great time to meet the new president of AU (yours truly) as well as catch up with fellow AU members. Feel free to bring your friends along because as they say, the more the merrier!

As usual, practical info for the quiz is on the right. Look forward to see you then!!

Viva el Pub Quiz!

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Musee Carnavalet Recap

Hello AU members and fans! TGIF!!

We had a great turnout at last weekend's event, the guided tour of the Musee Carnavalet. Our tour guide, Mlle. Tram, was very friendly and very knowledgeable in all things Paris. Her excitement was so contagious we had some hanger-ons join our tour. There was much to see and 1,5 hours is simply not enough time. I will definitely go back for learn more about this wonderful city I now call home.

Oh, and one last thing, the Musee Carnavelet offers many different themed tours (ie 17th century furniture, a general history of Paris, 18th century art). Some tours are free and others paid. General admission to the museum is free and you must pay if you want to check out their latest exhibition: the French Revolution.

Go check it out...you won't regret it!

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La Rentrée

Hello and welcome back!

It has been a while since most of us have seen each other. We hope that you all enjoyed your summer and that your tan has not completely faded!


AU will kick off the fall season with it's first event of the season: a guided tour of Musee Carnavalet (see our Events box on the right for more information). What better way to learn more about this wonderful city we live in? (And we shouldn't really tell you this but there will be a General Paris History category in next month's pub quiz...shhhhh!!! it's a secret!)

Later in October, we will be hosting our most popular event - the AU Pub Quiz! More details will follow later. I don't know about you but I can't wait for this one! This will be the first one I am hosting and I hope that I can be as entertaining as the charming Miss Cooper...Wish me luck!

Keep checking back with us as we will start posting more information on AU future events. We are glad to be back in full force and look forward to a great fall season!

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Open-air Cinema @ Parc de la Villete

Hello everyone!

By now, you've hopefully received the AU email or FB invite to our next event at Parc de la Villette. This month Accents United is heading out to the Open-Air Cinema at said Parc to watch "In This World" by Michael Winterbottom.

Here are a few details on the film:
Enayat and Jamal are Afghan refugees who live in a camp in Peshawar and try to escape to Great Britain by the help of people smugglers. The journey to freedom has no borders. Their dangerous journey leads them along the "silk road" through Pakistan, Iran and Turkey towards London.

And now for the important info:
Date: Thursday 13 August
Time: From 20.00 (The films generally start around 22h but we will meet up earlier for a picnic)
Place: at entrance to La Villette, Prairie du Triangle,
Metro: Porte de Pantin (ligne 5)

This year the cinema is free of charge ;-))

I wish I could join you all but I will be on vacation! Have a wonderful August and I will see you at our next event in September!!

Melanie

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Accents United Summer Picnic - New Date

Hello again,

We're going to try this again and this time I'm doing a couple of sun dances on my end to make sure we have the same beautiful weather we've had these last few days!

We have set a new date for this picnic and we hope that more of you can join us this time around (unless of course you are jet setting around the world...). So the here is the new date: July 16. The rest of the event remains the same - time, location, and charming company. If you're a bit hazy on the logistics, just check out the AU Events section on the right-hand menu.

Let us know if you plan on joining us. Feel free to invite friends, family, colleagues etc, the more the merrier!

Hope to see you then!

PS: I (Melanie) will be at the Why Bar tomorrow (info to your right). Drink specials, cool cocktails, and great ambiance...Here's looking at you, kid (j'espère...)

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Monday Musings...

What a beautiful day! Why didn't get all this sun love last Thursday? I guess it wasn't meant to be. We will be coming back to you in the next few days with a new date for the picnic. (And let's keep our fingers crossed that there will be sun on the new date!)

In the meantime, if any of you want to catch up over a nicely mixed cocktail, I will be at the Why Bar this Thursday, July 2 (cocktails hour begins at 7pm). My friend Forest, the hostess for this event, puts together a monthly cocktail meetup with one goal - to find the best cocktails in Paris (click here for more info on her 52martinis Cocktails Meetup). I can tell you this much for sure...you will now be asking yourself "Why?" when you taste their very yummy cocktails. I wish I could remember the name of my favorite cocktail but I can't...age is getting the best of me!

Hope to see you there!
Melanie

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We've Moved!

Welcome to Accent United's new virtual home. Sit back, relax, and explore the new digs.

Now as you know, moving can be...well, ummm...challenging to say the least. While not as physically straining, virtual moves are quite a challenge. I won't bore you with the details but know that there was a bit of work involved and there is even more work that needs to be done over the next couple of weeks.

The purpose of this blog is to share Accents United related information with you, our members (and those interested in becoming members). We will post information on Accents United events, charities we work with and Accents United administrative information. Links to our Facebook profiles and our Picasa photo albums can be found right below the header. We have also added a section for member events in case you have an event that you would like to share with the other Accents United members (right menu column). And of course, if you have any ideas for the blog, feel free to let us know. This is after all, a work in progress.

One last thing...as you can well imagine, we have a lot of photos (4 years x 12 events/yr = A LOT of photos!). This is the part of the move that will take the longest. Most of the photos will be housed on our Picasa site. Photos for our most recent events will be found on our Facebook group page. We'll let you know once all the photos are posted but in the meantime, keep checking back with to see how far we've come along!

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Accents United GM Meeting, May 27, 2009

Present: Racquel Cooper (President), Aisling Mullet (Secretary), Laurent Petit (Treasurer)
Members present: Alexandre Iffrich, Leonor Rondeau, Melanie Vaz

Renewal of Committee members
Racquel explained that she would no longer have time to run Accents United considering her new role ;-) Racquel will continue to attend events when possible but put the President role up for renewal. Members were asked if they were interested in taking over the Presidency position. Melanie stated her interest and was unanimously voted in as President. Aisling and Laurent were asked if they would like to continue as Secretary and Treasurer. Both agreed to be renewed and were voted unanimously. Members were asked if they would like to participate as a committee member which would mean helping out in the organization of certain events. Leonor became a Committee member.

Therefore the current Committee includes:

Executive Committee
President : Melanie Vaz
Honorary President: Racquel Cooper
Secretary : Aisling Mullett
Treasurer : Laurent Petit

Members of the Committee
Leonor Rondeau

Financial Statement
Laurent presented Accents United’s current financial position. He explained that Accents United had a relatively good year, making money for this year’s chosen charity through 2 garage sales and two quizzes. Main outgoing costs include insurance and the cost of the website. It was suggested Accents United’s try reduce its outgoing costs in order raise more money for our chosen charity. One suggestion was to find a free website or blog. Melanie agreed to look into a new solution.

Accents United currently has 12 paying members. Please email accentsunited@yahoo.fr for a copy of the 2008-09 financial statement.

Events
Members were asked if they had enjoyed the 2008-2009 activities. It was noted that the Sports day should remain as an annual event (perhaps free of charge for everyone). Other favourites with members included the quizzes, museum visits and the guided tours in English. It was agreed that we would include all of these events in the 2009-2010 calendar. New suggestions for events included:

• Cooking class
• Bike tour or segway tour in Paris
• Ballet
• Museum visit
• Boat trip Canal Saint Martin
• Organise new photo exhibition
• Visit photography museum
• Picnic Parc Monceau
• Polyglot apéro evening
• Tickets to Roland Garros
• Day trips - St Germain en Laye, Parc des Sceaux, Vaux Le Vicomte
• Night show at Versailles
• Visit St Eustache church, Les Halles
• Outdoor Shakespeare (jardin anglais)
• See a show at Opera Bastille
• Treasure hunt
• Guided tour of la coulée verte, Paris
• Metro ghost tour
• Jardin des plantes
• Bike trip in the 93
• Forum des images

If you have any other suggestions, please feel free to let us know via email or in the comments section of this post.

Charity 2009
Accents United made 400€ for this year’s chosen charity. Aisling mentioned that originally Accents United would have liked for someone to participate as a volunteer in one of the humanitarian trips organised by Coup de Pouce. So far no member has volunteered. Aisling will send another email to members to see if there is any interest. If not, Accents United will donate the money directly to Coup de Pouce.

Next Charity
Members present were asked to make suggestions for this year’s charity. Most members were interested in a local children’s charity. Each member present will look into this further. Members who have any ideas can forward any suggestions to Aisling: accentsunited@yahoo.fr

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Charities

Accents United wants to give something back to the community in a concrete way by raising money for charity. Consequently, proceeds from our different events are put towards our charity fund and will be donated to a chosen charity for that year.

For the year 2008-2009, Accents United will help 2 associations.

The main charity is Coup de Pouce – an humanitarian association which works on specific projects (building schools, hospitals, home etc.) in different parts of the world (mainly Africa and Latin America). The idea is that people choose a project and a country that is of interest to them, then they spend two weeks working on that project and if they like, they can spend some time traveling in that country. Each person who decides to enjoy one of these working holidays has to pay their plane ticket and approximately 150€ living costs. Accents United aims to raise money for an AU member who is interested & motivated to work on one of the projects.

With this association we would really see how the money is being spent as the trip is filmed by the team and the chosen person would have lots of stories/pictures to share with us afterwards.

For more information visit the Coup de Pouce website.

The second charity is the Association Piroguiers. This association tries to help with the education of children in Africa. They raise money through the sale of artisanal products – jewellery etc. They also try to gather books, magazines etc. which they send directly to Africa. In order to help the Association Piroguiers, we will organize book collections for them and also let members know of their Arts & Crafts sales.

Last year we donated money to Vert de Ville.
For the year 2006-2007, we donated money to Premiers de Cordée.
For the year 2005-2006, we donated money to La Mie de Pain.

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Membership

All nationalities are welcome as Accents United reflects the cultural diversity of Paris. Due to our international nature, Accents United’s working language is English but French is not forbidden!

The annual membership fee is 10€.

What am I entitled to as a member ?

• Members’ rates for all events
• Voting rights at our annual general meeting
• Invitations to 'members only' functions

Join our association and connect with like-minded people from around the globe who are based in and around Paris. In order to enlarge our cultural mix, we need YOU!

If you’re interested in becoming a member, drop us a line at accentsunited@yahoo.fr or feel free to come along to our next event.

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Why Accents United?

Paris has a huge expatriate population, yet with work engagements and other such commitments the choices available to newcomers (and those already established in Paris) for making contacts are often limited. The majority of our committee members understand the unique problems faced when moving to Paris from abroad. Being alone in a big city is no fun!

In short, it can be difficult – sometimes daunting– to meet people socially.
Although many cultural associations/clubs exist, they often focus on a single area of activity such as sports, language exchanges and orientation for newcomers to Paris.

Accents United is involved in a variety of activities and welcomes everyone!

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