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Published: January 19th 2008
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My view
From my attic hideaway I love France!
Well... that might be an inaccurate statement. It's like saying that I like my hometown in Innisfail, when really I love our old home - a farm 5 minutes from Innisfail (in my memory - and heartwarmingly also in Raphael's - one of the best places that ever was and ever will be), do I love the main street filled with people who live in Innisfail? ugh - not so much.
So to be more accurate. I love Raphael's farmhouse, situated about 10km from a small town Miribel-les-Eschelles! The beautiful view, the warm rooms, the lovely inhabitants who come home from work and school and smile when they see this odd relative stranger greeting them.
My week in France was great! Well, 9 days really. Raphael and Claire both worked through the week, which they kept apologising for - but I wouldn't hear of that... I think they thought that I expected to be entertained, but after a few days I got it through to Raphael that as much as I like traveling around, I also really (and at that stage really really) loved not doing much... just relaxing and not having to see new
attractions everyday.
Not that this trip has been about that up to this point. And THAT is why this trip has rocked quite so much.
So my days in France were spent waking up with Mathilde's alarm... oh wait.
Introductions
Raphael - Came and lived with us on our farm for about 10 months when I was about 15 or so. My french brother. He is a mountaineering god - totally into hiking, climbing, canyoning, ice-climbing, skiing - everything. He works for a sports-goods store in the mountains department. Says that he's lost most of his English, but he still speaks a crap load more English than I do French (which would be absolutely none FYI)
Claire - Raphael's partner, supernice. She travels for her job, which is selling pharmaceuticals or something like that... pretty fancy though. She learnt English at school, so we can communicate pretty well.
Mathilde - Claire's daughter who is about 11 and learns English at school. SOOOO cute - beautiful little kid. she'd get into fights with her mum and Raphael and sit sulking at the table and then look up at me and give me a big smile
View
From the front door - just awesome - I love her.
Justine - Raphael and Claire's daughter who is about 3 and a half. she is very cute, but I think I absolutely annoyed her by not understanding what she was saying... she would try and kick me out of rooms but like every kid, even her annoyance could be beaten by the power of a Gummi bear!
Leonie - Raphael and Claire's baby! Well, she's like a day older than Lucas - so she's about 20 months old. she has a head of hair, babbles away in total sentences, runs around all over the place. So very gorgeous. I love her, and it's so easy to communicate with foreign babies! quack quack is still quack quack - no matter what language you speak.
Yeah, so I would wake up with Mathilde's alarm and then have breakfast with the munchkins during the morning madness before everyone would run off to school, work, daycare... then I would have a nap, write, go for a walk through the farmland or one day I walked into town... I was freaking buggered - then I had to walk back 😊 One day I borrowed Raphael's spare car and
Handy map
Raphael left me with his keys and a map. was brave enough to go for a drive... all the time thinking 'keep right, keep right' only drifted once or twice, and the people coming the other way were very nice about it :P
On the Thursday, Claire drove me into Chambery, a city down in the valley that is really old - like super old, and really gorgeous. She dropped me off in the town centre and headed to work. I walked around looking for either of a) a McDonalds (and yes I know how pathetic that is... but they take away the question of 'is it table service or not?' and they don't mind if I stay and scribble in my journal all day long) or b) the courage to enter a french coffee shop (it's not like I can't speak enough french to order a cup of coffee - I can do that... but what if the guy then asks 'do you want foam or no foam?' or 'you help yourself to sugar at the table up the end' or 'would you be interested in joining our regular customer rewards program?' then I would be sca-rood!)... in the end I found a really nice tree filled
Raph's house
Me, heading off on an adventure (and bench filled) park to sit in.
The sun was getting warmer and warmer as it rose, so it was really nice sitting and writing. There were lots of dogs around, and being french dogs, one has to assume that they were out to shit and not much else... First rule about France - look where you are walking - people do not pick up after their dogs... and there are a lot of dogs. The dogs are always really well trained though... of course they tend to get ruled with the fist. From what I saw, the typical French dog owner is a demin-clad 20-something guy, who is a big enough man to give his dog (or teeny tiny puppy) a whallop whenever it does the slightest thing wrong... like lag 2 metres behind or something equally atrocious... Oh well... at least they don't have to wear leads.
January in France is soldes season - SALES!! It was possibly a bad move being left in a city for a day. Unfortunately language is no barrier between me and a cheap shirt. After leaving one shop with like 4 shirts I made the decision that I would be
Hello... are you down there?
Looking for moles in the garden... checking my bag in on Ryanair.
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Brendan
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Still Jealous of You! Their daughters are so gorgeous! The younger one looks like a mini replica of the elder one! Heheh, cuuuuuute.