Dreaming of a French Christmas

Decided to start our Xmas celebrations with Christmas Eve dinner at... a Chinese resto. It was tasty! To continue the culture mix, I decided to have profiteroles. Yum...

Next morning, had a sleep in (as per usual! Lol), then set off to the zoo, munching on waffles for breakfast! It was a fairly chilly day, so was quite pleased to head into the rainforest part of the zoo. A little bit more like NZ Xmas weather.

Saw lots of different animals, including kangaroos.

I promise there were real ones as well, but here's Kingi trying to make peace (I smuggled him in).

Christmas lunch was looking like it was going to be a non-event for a bit. Nowhere seemed to be open, since we were out of the town centre. Wandered past a few places - all closed - and, just as we were giving up, found a dairy that was open.

So, a well-appreciated lunch of sandwiches, chips and waffles!

Next on the list was a Walk around a nearby park. Nice to spend Xmas arvo close to nature. There was also a fitness trail in the park.

Sabrina was hard at work doing the exercises. She also did sit-ups for about 5 minutes! Although, I can tell you that she regretted this the next day, lol. Anyway, this nice family came along while she was in the middle of this, and one guy's comment was: Ca fait digérer la foie gras! (More or less "that'll work off the foie gras!")

When we did return to the hotel, we ended up accidentally gate-crashing the hotel owners' Xmas dinner to eat our couscous in the corner of the dining room! Once again, we hadn't trusted any restaurants to be open, so had gone to another trusty dairy. :)

Legal Formalities and Pink Brick

... aka A Day In Toulouse.

After an epic fail in which I missed my first appointment to get my visa validated (because I got the mail telling me about it after the appointment), I was determined to get there this time. Sadly, I had a 9am appointment so had to catch a 7.05am train. Yep, I've got soft since leaving AXA.

Had been a tad worried about finding the place, but it turned out to be a case of a metro ride and a short walk. Still, am pretty glad I left myself an hour to get from the Toulouse station to the office, because I needed most of the time!

Arrived, and was directed to a waiting room... waited... got asked a few questions by a nurse... back to waiting room... chest x-ray... back to waiting room... doctor looks at chest xray and asks me a couple more questions... back to waiting room... lady puts 'viginette' (ie extra stickery thing confirming that I've completed the formalities) in my passport. Done. I swear that the Army wants to know more about you than France does. Although Mum did remind me that I had a semi-medical before leaving home. Anyhow, in sum, I think I probably spent more time waiting than actually with a medical professional. But I don't care, cos now I'm fully legally in France AND to come and go as I want (while my visa is valid!).

That done, my day in Toulouse commenced. Train ticket costs equivalent of about NZ$20 and I had no classes on Weds, so I was determined to spend the day in Toulouse and make the most of being there! Il faut en profiter! Lol, I like this phrase more in French... Also, it was a freakishly warm day (for winter): 19C. So it felt like summer. I was clearly meant to enjoy this day.

Profit, I did. Including in terms of my metro day pass. Why walk when you can metro? Well, actually it's way better to walk, because you see what you're passing AND you're not limited to going where the metro lines go, but I was still trying to get rid of a cold so therefore was avoiding long walks.

Went for a random walk in the direction of a church spire that I'd seen from the visa place, just because I could. Was trying not to make too many turns though, as my map of Toulouse didn't extend to this area, and didn't want to get hopelessly lost. Glad I did walk to it though, 'cos it had this awesome sculpturey thing on the side.



On the metro again, and went to the Canal du Midi and walked along the banks. Rather nice.



Walked right into town, and wandered a bit, looking for somewhere to sit and eat some lunch. Clearly was looking in all the wrong places, as I couldn't find any parks (and later, there seemed to be heaps around). I suppose the smart person would have looked at their map but, well, I wasn't the smart person that day.




Did see this awesome Basilisque though (Saint-Sernin). Love the way it's just kinda at the end of a street... Nothing major.

Eventually decided that there must be somewhere in the main square. Glad I headed there, as the Christmas market was in full swing. The whole place was filled with little chalets with all kinds of food (tartiflette, hot chocolate, mulled wine, savoury dishes, cheese, pastries, almond paste decorationy things...) and all kinds of goods (funny t-shirts, hanging decorations, saints etc for nativity scenes, clothes, violet products...). So, after my brief lunch, I had a wander.



Also found an advent display, where there were present-shaped boxes for each day of the advent, so checked out the ones which were open.

Next stop was the tourist office, of which the gift shop was very tempting. Bought a reduction card for Toulouse (some shops, hotels, tourist attractions) and found a brochure for a Resistance walking trail.

While I fully intended to do the Resistance trail, I was distracted after about 2 stops... by a Quick. Which seems to be the French version of McDonalds (even though they have McDonalds). It wasn't so much the food as the free wifi that I wanted, though. So, one strawberry lolly milkshake and 3 'extra cheesy' (yes, that is what they are called in French - they're bite-sized fried cheese thingees) later, I was settled in with my laptop and had a reasonably lengthy internet session. Which was nice.

By the time I finished, I had lost all motivation for the Resistance trail... however, I do intend to do this properly on a future trip, when I'm not carting my laptop and a heavy document holder in my backpack!
So, instead, I decided to go on the Metro again, and find this bridge which appears in all the photos of Toulouse. Very glad that I did this, and am sure you will understand why after seeing the following pix.





Back on the Metro and into central Toulouse to have a quick squiz in the shops. Kinda a nice change to have so many people around, and things going on in the streets (random fire-stick-twirler dude in a park, for example, or the following...).



By this stage, the thought of tomorrow's 8am class, and a good sleep to get rid of this cold, were starting to play on my mind, so it was time for a final metro trip to the station. While I was waiting for the platform number for my train to come up, a couple of policemen leading 4 or 5 armed, camo-clad soldiers came past. Just casually. Also ran into an assistante who works with Kate, the other Kiwi, so was nice to actually see someone I knew!

Oh yeah... got to love the way rugby is so engrained in the consciousness that it's used to show people how to behave on the metro.



Then had a chat with a nice girl on the train home. Happy times... even though my French is far from perfect, it is getting easier and less worrisome to talk to people. :) I'm more likely these days to just talk than to spend time before thinking about what I need to say and how to say it!

Sens-ational

Can't get these pix to move where I want, so will have to be pix first and text later. Too annoying!

Me with my 'French name': ie the French word for Libya.

Majorettes at the Sens Xmas market

Sens Xmas market

Sens Cathedral, where I finally lit a candle for the miners.

Sabrina being proud of her new town!

Sorry, couldn't resist a cheesy pun since I couldn't come up with anything original!

Day 2 in Sens started with a big sleep-in I had been pretty exhausted after the big journey, and was trying to fight off signs of a cold, so it probably did me good!

Next mission was to look at another apartment for Sabrina (which she ended up taking). A wander in town.

And then... off to the Christmas market! This turned out to be a fairly small affair, but had a look around the stalls at the products on offer. There were some rather tasty-looking foods, especially at an ethnic stall from I'm not really sure where, but possibly somewhere MIddle-Eastern?!, but we had already bought our lunch from La Mie Caline.

After checking out the market, we decided to go and eat aforementioned lunch, but didn't really know where would be a good place. Ended up sitting in a bus stop in amongst lots of HLM (more or less equivalent to state housing). I very much enjoyed my beignet gout chocolat: kinda doughnut-like thing, but without the hole in the middle. Instead, there was chocolate!!

Headed back to the Xmas market to see the marionette display (accompanied by some dude that Sabrina had asked for directions, and who seemed to want to befriend us. This was the first time we were asked if we were speaking German).. Don't know if it's just me who hadn't heard of this before but, if you're the same, it was basically young girls dancing with batons. The youngest ones were especially cute! One of the tracks was a sped-up version of La Vie En Rose, so will have to search that one out. Quite liked it!

Didn't really know what to do with ourselves after this, so ended up going to a museum. Aside from anything else, a good way to escape the cold (or so we thought, until we got down into the basement). The lady on reception asked if we were speaking German (twice in a day! Is it the NZ accent throwing them off?!) I found the museum pretty interesting, as it had all kinds of info on the area... going right back to time periods that I don't know the name of in English and have forgotten the word for in French. Go me. Anyway, iron age and before. There were old arrow-heads, and mosaics, pieces of stone facades, tombstone enscriptions, paintings... There was even a hat worn by Napoleon at Waterloo. Well, provided I understood that sign correctly. This was the one downside of the museum. Museums are tiring in another language! Took me rather a long time if I wanted to read the notices telling me what the display was all about.

Went back to the hotel to be lazy for a while, then re-emerged to get a kebab and a crepe for dinner, before calling it a day.

Day 3... well, we did a quick walk in the am. Found the pools and a game of handball (don't quite understand how it works, but it seems pretty popular over here). Also found a sign with the French word for Libya on it... this is what my name sounds like with a French accent. So much so that, when people have trouble with my name, I pronounce it the French way and say "like the country."

Then it was time to get back on the train... 1 hour to Paris, approx 2 hours break in Paris, 6 hours to Toulouse, 30 min break, 1 hour to Saint Go!

Tried to make use of my time in Paris... went between the train stations on foot at a relaxed pace, so saw a nice park, walked over the Seine, past one entrance of the national library (wow, it is massive!), then carried on past the station a bit to get some food. After Kate mentioned that she missed Indian food when we were in Luchon, I was sold on a take-away Indian sandwich. Which I ate in a nearby park, while dripping sauce on myself. Must stop doing that every time I travel.

Then back into the train... this trip was a bit of a trial as I didn't quite manage to doze but was too lazy to read AND was trying to ration my tissues to last the trip! But I survived. :)

Actually saw someone I knew at the Toulouse station (amazing!)... the Bolivian assistant who works at the same school as Kate. So that was pretty nice.

Got back to Saint Go pretty late, so shoved down some food and then went to bed... back to reality!