That sounds reasonable. I was thinking of just going with CUPA, but I wanted to hear what my f-list had to say. Of course, the other thing is, I really want to correspond with said experts, but I am intimidated and have no idea what to say. >.>;;
That pretty much matches up with what I've heard. I think as long as I don't end up in a class taught by a revisionist - which really shouldn't be too hard to avoid (although there seem to be a lot of them at the EHESS too) - I'll be fine.
You've got a point there; whatever else Lille might be, it's certainly not warm. And if I wanted to study there I'd have to do it on my own in any case.