Most people planning a year abroad in France picture the flight. I picture the train pulling into Lille Flandres, two hours out of London, watching the flat northern French countryside blur past the window, already feeling like someone who made the right choice before the year even started.
I am Serina, a second year Computer Science with Games Technology student at Nottingham Trent University, heading to JUNIA ISEN in Lille for my sandwich year. I want to spend my career building creative digital experiences. But the world those experiences will live in needs protecting and I carry that with me in every decision I make, including this one.
A return flight from London to Lille produces roughly 100kg of CO₂ per passenger. The same journey by Eurostar produces around 6kg. Over two return trips home that is nearly 188kg of emissions saved. That number matters. But what matters just as much is the mindset behind it, because sustainable travel is not one dramatic gesture. It is a hundred quiet daily choices that add up to something real.
France has one of the lowest carbon electricity grids in Europe and Lille is a city that takes this seriously, with green urban investment, an excellent tram and metro network, and a city wide bike sharing scheme called V’Lille that I plan to use every single day. No taxis, no ride hailing apps. Just a bike, a city, and enough French to ask for directions when I inevitably get lost.
The UN Sustainable Development Goals I return to most are SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) and SDG 13 (Climate Action). In Lille these will not be goals I read about, they will be goals I live. I will shop at local markets instead of supermarkets. I will use Too Good To Go to rescue surplus food from local cafes and restaurants, an app that is enormous in France. I will buy secondhand before I buy new. I already cook most of my meals, bring reusable everything, and have calculated my travel footprint using My Climate before I have even packed a bag.
I am also learning French through NTU’s University Language Programme at Stage 3. Speaking someone’s language is its own form of respect, for their culture, their community, and the place you are asking to belong to for a year.
I moved from a small town in Essex to Nottingham on my own at eighteen. That taught me that the things worth doing usually cost you something first. Lille is the next version of that. I want to arrive as someone who thought carefully about what it means to show up somewhere as a guest, and chose to do it well.
The Eurostar, the V’Lille bike, a baguette from the boulangerie on the way to class. Honestly that is exactly the year I want.
