Du the avec du lait and milk



Front yard.



Time: 10:51pm ohhh its late..

Location : on my bed again

 

Weather : well, its night. but not too bad. Need a light sweater I suppose

  

Most of the back yard



On to today. Seeing as it was Remembrance Day today, once again Lou did not have school. Which is turning out to be great for my jet lag. I don’t believe that they call it Remembrance Day, but it is the same idea. Same holiday.





Niolon.



After a simple breakfast of bread and nutella. Yes, Nutella. It is a world wide thing. Actually, probably more European than North American. I will not get into that.. I went grocery shopping with Marie-Anne. Something odd about the super market; it was small. Superstore back at home still has France beat, for now. Also, everything came in packages. Like the butter: in a cardboard box. And the milk, well, you can buy it refrigerated and fresh, like most of us do back home, but I guess it really isn’t that popular. People like their milk off the shelf. And a contributing factor is probably the lack of milk drinkers in the family here. Also, some items, I found to be oddly pricey, while others were quite cheap. Maybe there was a sale on, or maybe it’s just different. I will have to keep an inquiry.



On the way home we stopped by a REAL BAKERY. Here it is an art. I would no longer call the Extra Foods bakery a real bakery.

Post grocery shopping, Allisa and I played allot of Post Office with Lou. It seems to be her favourite.

Very neat bridge.

Marseille

Niolon

A lovely lunch was prepared since Alex and her boyfriend are home for the weekend. We began with aperitifs outside on the patio, and then moved inside for the main meal. I quite enjoyed the little appetizers of anchovie stuffed olives, little crackers, picked garlic and nuts. The main course was some kind of meat dish with a tomato based sauce that we had on top of rice. Quite delicious. We followed with a vinaigrette salad and cheese on baguette. I have no idea what kind the first kind of cheese was that I tried, kind of tasted like Swiss, but it was much more firm and a little nuttier. The second was obviously Camembert. Which I am already developing quite a taste for.

After lunch Marie-Anne took Allisa, Lou and I to see the Mediterranean Sea. It was gorgeous. Where we went for a hike along was the Blue Coast; named after its blue waters. Very beautiful. And across the bay, a very large bay I will add, was Marseille. It is the second biggest city in all of France. It stretches all along the coast from the main sea all the way into the bay. Very beautiful area. We wandered back into the small fishing village of Niolon. Once again, a simply beautiful area. Houses of vary heights and levels due to the ragged terrain of the sea cliffs and rocks. Not a very wealthy town because of the fishermen’s trade, but to purchase a home here is very very expensive. Marie-Anne explained that in order to have a home here it is next to impossible. The properties are very much sought after and are only obtained through the family. Another interesting fact is how in the summer, it is not permitted to visit the village. The prime location for tourists to come and swim is the exact reason; they do not want the villagers to be disturbed by the huge crowds of people that come to refresh on the easy +40 degrees C days.

I will add that it was a quick 20-30 minute car ride to return home. This was even in the 17H00 traffic.

Once again us girls played, being world famous DJs and Superstars where Lou had no problem in all of a sudden turning the area into a mini Bistro. I quickly ordered `the usual` which was a tea with honey and milk. Lou can not get over the fact that I like milk and honey in my tea.

Supper was quite delicious; we melted some other kind of cheese and spread it over our potatoes and deli cuts. Very fine meal, and nicely finished with some yogurt.

Easily being 21H00, Lou retired to her room, as did us others. And here I am.

Quite a bit later, being drawn out by my extensive Facebook life.

I must sleep.

Good night!

11:10 pm



On the way to the Sea, you spy Marseille



We play house.



Looking out of a top story window



Location : on the couch, watching TV

Time : 10:52pm

Weather : well, it's night time. And a bit humid because itrained this morning and is yet to warm up..



Luckily today Lou didn't have school. I slept for almost 12 hours. And until 10am. Nobody wanted to wake me. I don't know why..

Anyways, we drove around a little, showing me the vilalge, which really isn't all that big, and before I knew it we were in Aix. I honestly didn't know we had left Luynes.



We just chilled around the house for the rest of the day.

Played ALOT of Post Office with Lou. Like ALOT. And some Laundromat. And some House. And Room mates. She is really imaginative, which makes it very fun.



Down the street. Notice the walls.



The town is really quite beautiful. I'll hopefully have the patience to upload some photos. I tried before, but it was taking wayyyy too long.



There's more people around now. Marie-Anne just got back with Lou's older sister; Alexandra along with Jean-..(I forget, aiya), her boyfriend.



I'm still getting used to this double cheek kiss thing. I constantly forget that its customary. haha, oh well.

Anyways, peopleare here, I gotta fly. I'll try the photos later...maybe

TaTa

11:04pm



The front of the house.



Toilet Room.

Time : 9:19pm


Date : 9th November 2010

Location : Sitting on my temporary bed in my temporary room in my semi temporary home.

Weather : Its nice inside, outside its dark. And a tad chilly. Around 8 degrees I think.

Today I landed in Paris. The flight was ok. Watched some movies, slept a bit. The guy beside me really wasn’t all too interesting. Apart from our brief “Hello, I see that I’m sitting next to you”s all he did was read the New York Times, and sit. I don’t believe he slept. And yes. There was a crying baby right near me. Again.

Paris airport reminded me of a space ship. I felt like I was inside one, it’s very domed and has a lot of glass. How descriptive.

Oh, also, I love airplane food. I had the most delicious chicken and penne in tomato sauce with the moistest brownie ever. I couldn’t even lick it off my spoon it was so moist and sticky. Something weird though; cubed carrots, possibly turnip, I am unsure, definitely peas and some red pepper, all in a kind of coleslaw vinaigrette. Those of you who know my Grandma Dawson’s coleslaw, yeah, thats what it was like. Right sauce, wrong veggies.

Speaking of peculiar food, so in the Paris airport, I wasn’t hungry until 10 minutes before my plane was to board (and they boarded 5 minutes early!!) I began to starve. I had had about three hours to get food, but I just wasn’t feelin’ it. Until then that is. So I chugged ‘er to the nearest lil fresh & natural food deli/café and grabbed a Monaco timbouli(?) Salad with some yogurt dressing on the side. It looked promising. So I try it without the dressing, and it tastes alright. Something was a little off though. I put on the dressing and keep eating. Still, something is off. I think to myself “This really tastes like smoked salmon.”. I decide to read the label to see what is actually in it, and I kid you not, right beside tomatoes : Smoked Salmon. Yummoh.

First View of the Mediterranean

I’d love to tell you all about the short flight from Paris to Marseille, and how wonderful it was. But I was asleep before we took off and woke up well into the descent only because my clogged sinuses were not allowing my ears to pop and I was in pain. Not to help the situation, the screaming toddler in front of me, who upon boarding the plane threw a fit that I can only assume went well into my nap over not getting to sit beside the window, was screaming again. I’m pretty sure children sound a lot meaner when they’re screaming in French.

But I did see the Mediterranean for the first time. It was reflecting the sun very well and blinded my freshly awoken eyes a teensy bit.

I finally met Marie-Anne. She gave me one of those Kiss-Kisses. One for each cheek. I felt so French. Then we drove back home, here.

Marseille is so beautiful. Well, the little that I saw. The trees here are SO GREEN and to contrast the color wheel there is red rock and cliffs. Luynes, the town that we live in, is pretty much still in Marseille. Comparable to Saskatoon and Martensville, only way more beautiful and lacking semi trucks.

I don’t even know how to describe the town, but I’ll give it a shot. Ok, I’m trying to think, but my descriptive gland seems to be not working. All I can think of is everything is orangey pink. And the houses kind of look like town houses, but they’re all separate. Ours is nice, cozy. Well actually, there are 4 bedrooms, an open living room – dining room – kitchen, 1 bathroom, 1 toilet room, and 1 bath and toilet room. The backyard has nice trees, there are a couple olive trees and I believe I saw some bamboo. Oh, and a pool.

Toilet room. Yes, I can sense curiosity a couple thousand miles away. Toilet room. That pretty much explains it. Just a little room and all it has is a toilet. I got up to make sure I didn’t miss anything and I didn’t. Pretty awesome eh?

Marie-Anne is very nice. She took a lot of care to make sure I knew where everything was and gave me a very good tour of the home before she left for work again. It sounds as of she’s done a bit of travelling, which I will be sure to ask her about soon.

Lou is well, she’s pretty awesome. She is 9 years old, and very much alive. Her, Alissa and I played a board game, and it ended up being quite interesting even though the game itself is ridiculously simple. And she likes Grey’s Anatomy, so we watched an episode of that then ran upstairs to play Post Office for about an hour.

Alissa is the other girl au-pair that came when I was unable to back in September. We haven’t talked much yet, but she gets along with Lou very well and is very pleasant. She’s from Germany.

Marie-Anne has two older children, Alexandra and Pierre, but they’re away at school. I do believe that they will be back for the weekend to meet me.

As you can tell, this wasn’t posted on the 9th. Marie-Anne showed me how to get the WIFI working here, but somehow I couldn’t get it. Oh well. I also couldn’t get the phone to work. I hope this trend isn’t all the rage.

Anyways, the three went out to the theatre tonight. They had offered to get me a ticket too, but I declined. If I sat down in a dark room I will konk right out.

Speaking of which, I’ve had minimal collective sleep in the last two days, so I think I am going to call it a night.



9:49 pm. There are 2 turtles in my room. And they are alive.



PS. An airbus has two rows of three seats. Whereas the plane from Saskatoon to Toronto had only 2. And the Toronto – Paris plane was 2 on each side then 4 in the middle.

Still balmy. No breeze.

Location : Toronto Airport, right by my terminal, which is wonderfully close to a Tim’s. I can smell the caffeine.

Time: 5:05pm.

Date : 8^th November 2010

Weather : a balmy room temperature with a slight breeze from an air vent. Perfect for typing if I do say so myself.

Greetings Blog readers! Guess who finally made a start to their journey! Right now I am sitting in the Toronto Airport, not a bad location. Except I can not for the life of me connect to the internet. And my backpack is wayyyyy too heavy for me to be getting up to ask someone for assistance any time soon. So here it is; one of the first of many to come, blog entries, written on Microsoft Word and saved for later. Just like the Boston Cream donut’s cream on my lovely scarf…

Thus far into this adventure today there isn’t much to recount. All I’ve really done is fly to Toronto. Which really wasn’t all that exciting.

Some of you who came to the airport this morning to wish me off and catch one last real life glimpse of me may be wondering about the crying baby I had to sit beside. As soon as we levelled out some thousand (maybe only hundreds?) feet in the air, we were both relatively quiet.. fast asleep.

Y’all may have heard a lil bit about my troubles and the French Consulate. Since I have nothing better to do right now, I’ll lay it down for ya;

            Way back in August when I first applied for my visa I was thinking it would come in the mail a short week or two after. That was not so. Not at all. I waited for three weeks until heading off to Toronto to visit them in person to fully submit my application. And do a little sight seeing with my Dad.

            Then the wait began.

            To be fair, I was missing some documents. Some had to be sent back to France to be signed, which took nearly a month to be returned to me, but I promptly had them sent away to Toronto in with double express envelopes (one to get my stuff to Toronto, and another within to get my Visa and passport back ASAP).

            I was expecting, again, too much of either the French Consulate or Canada Post, or both, or probably just the Consulate, and I started to worry. The total days of worry lasted from a Tuesday until Monday, when I got The E-Mail.

            Oh The E-Mail. When I saw that the Consulate had made an appearance in my inbox I was thrilled. One click later my world came crashing down and days of going in and out of my Stress Comas ensued.  What The E-Mail said that my visa had been approved, but the French language course I had to take (which is scheduled to begin in January 2011) was problematic since the date did not coincide with my November arrival in France. Please note that before slipping into a Stress Coma I fired off an email expressing my frustrations.

            See, nowhere on the French Embassy site does it specify that the dates have to coincide. Their defence was that they do state that they may need “any other additional documents” aka they just made themselves a HUGE loop hole that I can in no way argue.

            I began planning my life out for another couple months in Saskatoon. Started looking into getting more shifts for the next week at my two jobs, took a Food Safety course so I could get a better job.

            For some reason, on Thursday, I decided to check out the status of the Express envelope I had sent to the Consulate. The weirdest thing I discovered; the envelope had been processed the previous day in a Toronto post office.

            Becoming guarded for a hard let down, they had either sent my passport back, my visa (with my passport) or neither of the two.

            Waiting merely a day  with antici..     …pation, sure enough my visa came in the mail on Friday.

            And now, here I am. On my way.

            The only thing stressing my mind is the fact that I gotta hoist my backpack on again soon.

            For some reason I always remind myself of a pack mule…

            I mean.. a graceful and beautiful cat. Like Sheba. So majestic. 

            Tim Horton’s is calling me for one last coffee.

            Peace out Canada,

            Stay Classy.

5:35 pm. Still balmy. No breeze.

Toronto Airport at Sunset

Connecting..

Today was a fairly simple day, yet it is getting long. Main reason being; the travel home.
But before I get into that, I will quickly recount the remaining hours spent in Toronto;
Not much happenned. Dad and I divided to each finish our own shopping trips. I completed the Eaton Center in the hour and a half I had until we regrouped and headed to the airport.
Fairly uneventful, we subwayed and bussed to the airport, where we did the usual until our plane departed. On the plane, instead of sleeping the whole 4 or so hours to Edmonton, I watched 2 movies; Paper Boy (starring Emma Stone, pretty good flick, I'd reccommend it) and American Beauty (fairly dark drama, kept me watching until the end, regardless of the flight attendant telling me to turn it off >:] )
The most exciting part of Edmonton, was us spotting some fellow Saskatonians, who were catching the same homeward flight as us.
The 40 minutes between Edmonton and Saskatoon were filled by a chess game between Dad and I on my laptop. Neither of us are overly skilled players, the game really wasn't much and was never finished. We'll say that I was winning hahah
Going from a high of 26 in the T to 5C here, Saskatoon is a lvoely place to come home to.

Short n a lil sweet for once,
A/L

"the beauty of soup." - Paper Boy movie.

Inches of Pastrami

First stop this lovely morning was the French Embassy. Got into my interview early, and all went well. The road to France now has one less obstacle.
Jumping on the subway, Dad and I headed to the Hockey Hall of Fame. We toured around the displays, taking in all of the legends; Bobby Orr, Mario Lemieux, Gordie Howe, and of course, The Great One; Wayne Gretzkey. The Stanley Cup itself was in the Grand Hall. The one you take a photo with was of course one of 2 replicas, the other one was travelling around the world. The REAL cup was encased in the vault. I bet you never knew that there have been numerous designs of the Cup. Ever since the mid 60s, the Stanley Cup has looked the way it does today.
Grabbing a nice veggie dog from a vendor, and dropping a mix of sauerkraut and mustard down my white shirt, we headed back underground to get to the ROM.
Now, you ask, "What is the ROM?".  Well.... Royal Ontario Museum. How's that? Not too bad.
The ROM is interesting right from its exterior. Obviously an old building, the museum recently went through an exterior addition of some very artistic architecture. Theres no way to describe it other than, Modern?
Once inside we tour through a couple exhibits of Egyptians, Greeks, Asia and the Middfle East. All fairly interesting, but if you've ever been to the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, the Asian Artifact exhibit they had was far better. Moving on to another floor, we explore European Style. Learning all about the how architecture, furniture and art are all inter-realated and can be disguinshed from one era to another. Medival, Gothic, Classical, Baroque, Renaissance, Neo-Classical and Modern were most of the eras. Finish up our tour, we spent some time in the natural history section. Originally looking for the Bat Cave, we came across a room full of birds. Birds galore, so many birds all I could think of was Teri Clark and how she'd be in heaven. Oh, and by the way, an Albatrosse is absolutely gigantic; minimum 8 foot wingspan. We some how went through the dino section and some fishes along the way, but in the end, the Bat Cave was incredibly... poorly done. Not impressed.
Walking being our transportation of choice, we walked back along Bloor Street to Yonge where we made it back to our hotel to rest our feet for about 10 minutes. We stopped in many shops along the way, but had no success.
Once we headed out for good this evening, we hit up every shoe store that we saw, which is about every third shop, and then most of the clothing stores on Yonge Street from Charles to the Eaton Center. Our purchases were minimal, but we enjoyed the walk. Pretty much the same walk as we did yesterday.
Around 9:30pm we stopped for a late supper at the Pickel Barrel. Walking in we were expecting a bar & grill setting, but continuing down their stairs, we soon did not know if we were indeed in a restaurant or in a small delicastisserie. The menu was absoltely HUGE, gigantic, monsterous. But we eventually enjoyed some Spanish Paella and some Kung Pao Stir Fry. 
Walking back we finally stopped in at the ice creame place we had seen yesterday. This place was similar to Jerry's, only they didn't have any "food" on their menu, just desserts involving ice cream and the like. I hadn't had a "smash in" in my icecream or a waffle cone in I don't know how long. I think this place may have topped Jerry's, although the fact that they did not have any gelato kind of makes them incomparable.
Its getting late, and that is all.
A/L

" You just wasted three minutes of my life!!!!" - Scalper.

One Step Closer

SO, its mid september and im still not in france. Why? WELL, getting a visa takes a bit longer than i thought; theres no filling out a form n sending it off, hoping to get a reply in 2 weeks or so. No, i had to wait for a month to get an interview, fly out to toronto for the interview, and wait up to 6 weeks for the processing time.
Right now, im sitting in my hotel room, with Dad, in Toronto.

Quick recap of today;
Fly out here on a 6am flight. Needless to say I slept the 3 hours.
Upon our arrival we bussed n subwayed our way to our hotel, the Comfort Inn, right off of Yonge Street.
Torontos pretty cool. Lotsa cars, lotsa people, ALOT of restaurants. We saw a walk for AIDS and all kindsa people. Very cool.
Ginger was the name of the restaurant we had our late lunch at. Dad had the Spicy Chicken on Rice and I have Fried Tofu on some kinda noodle. Very tasty. I'd give the restaurant a good rating for lunch. Not only was it very quick with getting us our food, waited 5 minutes for our food to be brought to us and it was alot of food. None of this half a plate fancy stuff, this was a full nearly overflowing large plate of food. Very impressive, and all for a price of 6 - 8$ a plate
Next stop was the CN Tower. I had no idea how tall it is. Tallest building in the world. Im skeptical of that one, but I guess they cant put something thats not true. Anyways, we went to all the levels; the observation deck, glass floor and the Sky Pod. Each level you could see farther and farther out. One a clear day you can see Niagra Falls and Rochester, NY. I THINK we saw those two, but i really didnt know what to look for. Something neat was that the SkyDome was open and we saw the Argos playing.
While trekking bac kto the hotel, we saw some attractions;
   - Hockey Hall of Fame. It was closed for a private event, so hopefully we'll make it back tomorrow.
   - Yonge Street in general. Walked all the way from the CN tower to our hotel. Quite a trek, but hey, what else are we gonna do?
   - Break dancers, they were ok. Ill upload vids on to either here or my facebook once I get home. I forgot my camera cord so yeah..patience my friends.
   - Hard Rock Cafe. I was excited when I found it. I had never been before, so we stopped in for a late supper. Saw a Bob Dylan display and some John Lennon stuff. Don't forget the Jim Morrison boots. Our waiter was super nice and was fairly interested in me going to France. (Although almost everyone that hears about it gets intruiged).
  - 1.52$ a slice pizza. Needless to say, we've got our lunch planned out for tomorrow.

Well, I've been up for a pretty long time now, so its time to call it a night. Hope yall enjoyed my first actual blog entry.
Please leave comments and questions about the trip; I lvoe to share, and dont really know what kinda things people like to hear about.