Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Thursday 17 November 2005
Yesterday was a very Cambridge day. In the post I received my copy of CAM, the Cambridge University Alumni magazine, and enjoyed reading just what the university had meant to recent and not so recent alumni. It occurred to me that for the first time I was reading it outside Cambridge, as the majority of alumni must do. In the evening N passed me a new and fascinating book on Corpus Christi College, taken down from the shelf as part of his current project to dust, label and re-shelve all of the 3000 odd books in his library. This has been going on for a week or so, a block of shelves at a time, some of which are very high.
In the afternoon we went out together, as N wanted to visit his généraliste (GP) to tell him about the drug that had had such an adverse effect yesterday, and I wanted to see where this was. I sat outside the surgery, and was amused to note that everyone who came in to the waiting room said "Bonjour, m'sieurs, dames" to everyone else already there. I couldn't imagine this happening at the surgery in Cambridge. We took more prescriptions to the pharmacie, and N explained the process of the Carte Vital and the Mutuelle to me for future reference. He said I must think he was really old and decrepit with all these medicines, and I said no I just thought he had been drawn into the French addiction to médicaments; apparently their bathroom cabinets are four times as full as those of the British!
We then did a little food shopping together – I have been doing it own my own recently – and the lady at the boulangerie observed that we had come in together, which I thought was a significant step!
The other main event was that the boiler serviced the day before began leaking, and so another phone call was made, and we were told to expect a visit today. This happened at 8 this morning! and N dealt with him this time, and then I decided to do my Pilates exercises before breakfast, which I had done in Italy, and this is a much better idea.
N's other main preoccupation at the moment is the planning of a musical party which will take place in the new house (and garden) at La Neuve-Lyre next August; partly to celebrate his birthday but mainly to celebrate the 50th birthday of his viola. Guests will include members of his family - almost all string players - and French musical friends, some of whom will be put up in the house and all of whom will be fed. Apart from the musical items, there are various garden buffets, teas and dinners on the programme.
Part of the reason for having a large country house was to be able to hold such musical weekends, but I am finding it a little difficult at present to decide exactly who can sleep where, when we have not moved in yet and only have a hazy idea of the sizes of some of the rooms, and can't see exactly how the Cambridge furniture will fit in, let alone the Italian pieces. I must admit I am looking forward to the challenge though, both the accommodation and gastronomically! And feeling glad that there is an excellent charcutier/traiteur a few metres down the road….. And glad that both here in Saint-Denis and in the house at Soliera there are large trunks full of bedcovers of all descriptions, old and new, plus curtains, which may or may not fit the many naked windows.
We are still in rapid and useful e-mail communication with Mme V, concerning the heating system, chimney sweeps, phone points, TV aerials and the electricity supply. It looks as though sorting out the phone will require a visit to Verneuil-sur-Avre, a place we both liked very much, so no problem there. Abels the removers say they will be in contact soon regarding the proposed time of day for the furniture delivery on 22 December; I am very conscious that it will be the darkest week of the year.
Saturday 19 November 2005
Yesterday we went into Paris to see an exhibition of photographs by a 95-year old photographer called Willy Ronis, mainly of ordinary working people in Paris between the 1920's and 1950's. I found them fascinating, but N thought the life of the photographer far more interesting. The exhibition was held at the Hôtel de Ville, so afterwards we went to the BHV store just opposite, with the main aim of looking at bathroom suites, to give us an idea of what we could get for La Neuve-Lyre. We ended up spending hours in there; having lunch, looking at lighting, buying a new towel rail (for here) and renewing N's BHV card which had expired; this took ages, but fortunately there were deep red sofas to sit on and wait. On the way home we called in at FNAC at Châtelet, with three main aims: buying more labels for N to print and put in his books, for me to buy a small photo album for the La Neuve-Lyre house photos, and to collect the phone/fax which should have been repaired. After even more hanging round, they maintained there was nothing wrong with the phone; very frustrating. N has since written them a long and detailed letter.
Sunday 20 November 2005
More disasters – yesterday a leak was found inside the door of the kitchen cupboard, and in the afternoon a plumber was summoned at short notice and great expense. He is coming back on Tuesday to remove the old copper piping, and fortunately N has agreed to be here to deal with him. Coming so soon after the boiler, the phone and N's malaise, this means it has not been a very good week. Tuesday was chosen rather than Monday as tomorrow N has a dentist appointment east of Paris, and I'm going along for the ride, as there are apparently some good shops nearby.
This afternoon we went to the prize giving of the Rostropovich competition for young cellists, at the Theâtre du Châtelet. The prize-winners had been selected yesterday, and today we saw the prizes presented and heard three of the winners play a variety of pieces; all were in their teens or twenties and very talented. The theatre is a sumptuous building with a lot of history, and I am pleased that we are going again twice in the next few weeks. It was wonderful to come out into the centre of Paris afterwards, in the dark and cold with all the lights twinkling.
Tuesday 22 November 2005
The visit to Nogent-sur-Marne – where the dentist is - was very interesting. The shops were very varied and quite unlike Saint-Denis; lots of beauty parlours and dog grooming, but as it was Monday very few of them were open, so it was mostly window shopping, which was unfortunate as it was very, very cold; a digital thermometer in the main street showed the temperature as 2 degrees! Fortunately for me (but not for N) he has to go back to the dentist on Thursday, so I can go again for the ride; there is a large bookshop and a very full antique shop to explore. N has to have a very expensive crown fitted; not good especially after the expenses involving the boiler and the plumber. Since Saturday we have been dealing with leak in the cupboard by having the water turned off when not absolutely necessary, i.e. when out or asleep, but I am looking forward to all bring back to normal again, and being able to have a bath or wash hair at will, not to mention using the loo. This morning I made tea and coffee using bottled water from the fridge.
After leaving Nogent-sur-Marne we visited an IKEA which was usefully very near, looking mainly at kitchen tables and computer desks, and buying a few little things, especially in the food shop.
Today I have been into Paris and N has waited in for the plumber, who was still here when I got back, filling the apartment with smells of soldering (not the rather disagreeable one from last Saturday, but an Israeli youth of 18 who seems to have told N his life story.) I have been to a free lunchtime concert at the Eglise Saint-Roch – solo classical guitar, another talented youth – and shopping in the Rue de Rivoli and the Grands Magasins in the Boulevard Haussmann. Lovely and sunny and much warmer than Nogent-sur-Marne yesterday. I have also done some research at the Gare du Nord ready for what N calls the visit of the offspring; daughters Madeleine and Caroline are coming to visit this weekend, so I checked left luggage lockers and suitable restaurants for lunch. I found some Christmas cards and even some Christmas presents!
Wednesday 23 November 2005
The plumber left very late yesterday evening, after going away for an hour or two and returning with a senior colleague. All of this time the kitchen and bathroom were more or less out of bounds, and very messy, and the air was thick with the smell and smoke of the soldering. Fortunately we managed to heat something from the freezer and eat it in front of the television. Once they had gone we at last cleared up, and each had a welcome bath! This morning however, N has found another little leak further up, which he is keeping an eye on, while re-plastering and painting the damage done during the mending of the pipes, and being horrified at the cost of it all.
Yesterday was a very Cambridge day. In the post I received my copy of CAM, the Cambridge University Alumni magazine, and enjoyed reading just what the university had meant to recent and not so recent alumni. It occurred to me that for the first time I was reading it outside Cambridge, as the majority of alumni must do. In the evening N passed me a new and fascinating book on Corpus Christi College, taken down from the shelf as part of his current project to dust, label and re-shelve all of the 3000 odd books in his library. This has been going on for a week or so, a block of shelves at a time, some of which are very high.
In the afternoon we went out together, as N wanted to visit his généraliste (GP) to tell him about the drug that had had such an adverse effect yesterday, and I wanted to see where this was. I sat outside the surgery, and was amused to note that everyone who came in to the waiting room said "Bonjour, m'sieurs, dames" to everyone else already there. I couldn't imagine this happening at the surgery in Cambridge. We took more prescriptions to the pharmacie, and N explained the process of the Carte Vital and the Mutuelle to me for future reference. He said I must think he was really old and decrepit with all these medicines, and I said no I just thought he had been drawn into the French addiction to médicaments; apparently their bathroom cabinets are four times as full as those of the British!
We then did a little food shopping together – I have been doing it own my own recently – and the lady at the boulangerie observed that we had come in together, which I thought was a significant step!
The other main event was that the boiler serviced the day before began leaking, and so another phone call was made, and we were told to expect a visit today. This happened at 8 this morning! and N dealt with him this time, and then I decided to do my Pilates exercises before breakfast, which I had done in Italy, and this is a much better idea.
N's other main preoccupation at the moment is the planning of a musical party which will take place in the new house (and garden) at La Neuve-Lyre next August; partly to celebrate his birthday but mainly to celebrate the 50th birthday of his viola. Guests will include members of his family - almost all string players - and French musical friends, some of whom will be put up in the house and all of whom will be fed. Apart from the musical items, there are various garden buffets, teas and dinners on the programme.
Part of the reason for having a large country house was to be able to hold such musical weekends, but I am finding it a little difficult at present to decide exactly who can sleep where, when we have not moved in yet and only have a hazy idea of the sizes of some of the rooms, and can't see exactly how the Cambridge furniture will fit in, let alone the Italian pieces. I must admit I am looking forward to the challenge though, both the accommodation and gastronomically! And feeling glad that there is an excellent charcutier/traiteur a few metres down the road….. And glad that both here in Saint-Denis and in the house at Soliera there are large trunks full of bedcovers of all descriptions, old and new, plus curtains, which may or may not fit the many naked windows.
We are still in rapid and useful e-mail communication with Mme V, concerning the heating system, chimney sweeps, phone points, TV aerials and the electricity supply. It looks as though sorting out the phone will require a visit to Verneuil-sur-Avre, a place we both liked very much, so no problem there. Abels the removers say they will be in contact soon regarding the proposed time of day for the furniture delivery on 22 December; I am very conscious that it will be the darkest week of the year.
Saturday 19 November 2005
Yesterday we went into Paris to see an exhibition of photographs by a 95-year old photographer called Willy Ronis, mainly of ordinary working people in Paris between the 1920's and 1950's. I found them fascinating, but N thought the life of the photographer far more interesting. The exhibition was held at the Hôtel de Ville, so afterwards we went to the BHV store just opposite, with the main aim of looking at bathroom suites, to give us an idea of what we could get for La Neuve-Lyre. We ended up spending hours in there; having lunch, looking at lighting, buying a new towel rail (for here) and renewing N's BHV card which had expired; this took ages, but fortunately there were deep red sofas to sit on and wait. On the way home we called in at FNAC at Châtelet, with three main aims: buying more labels for N to print and put in his books, for me to buy a small photo album for the La Neuve-Lyre house photos, and to collect the phone/fax which should have been repaired. After even more hanging round, they maintained there was nothing wrong with the phone; very frustrating. N has since written them a long and detailed letter.
Sunday 20 November 2005
More disasters – yesterday a leak was found inside the door of the kitchen cupboard, and in the afternoon a plumber was summoned at short notice and great expense. He is coming back on Tuesday to remove the old copper piping, and fortunately N has agreed to be here to deal with him. Coming so soon after the boiler, the phone and N's malaise, this means it has not been a very good week. Tuesday was chosen rather than Monday as tomorrow N has a dentist appointment east of Paris, and I'm going along for the ride, as there are apparently some good shops nearby.
This afternoon we went to the prize giving of the Rostropovich competition for young cellists, at the Theâtre du Châtelet. The prize-winners had been selected yesterday, and today we saw the prizes presented and heard three of the winners play a variety of pieces; all were in their teens or twenties and very talented. The theatre is a sumptuous building with a lot of history, and I am pleased that we are going again twice in the next few weeks. It was wonderful to come out into the centre of Paris afterwards, in the dark and cold with all the lights twinkling.
Tuesday 22 November 2005
The visit to Nogent-sur-Marne – where the dentist is - was very interesting. The shops were very varied and quite unlike Saint-Denis; lots of beauty parlours and dog grooming, but as it was Monday very few of them were open, so it was mostly window shopping, which was unfortunate as it was very, very cold; a digital thermometer in the main street showed the temperature as 2 degrees! Fortunately for me (but not for N) he has to go back to the dentist on Thursday, so I can go again for the ride; there is a large bookshop and a very full antique shop to explore. N has to have a very expensive crown fitted; not good especially after the expenses involving the boiler and the plumber. Since Saturday we have been dealing with leak in the cupboard by having the water turned off when not absolutely necessary, i.e. when out or asleep, but I am looking forward to all bring back to normal again, and being able to have a bath or wash hair at will, not to mention using the loo. This morning I made tea and coffee using bottled water from the fridge.
After leaving Nogent-sur-Marne we visited an IKEA which was usefully very near, looking mainly at kitchen tables and computer desks, and buying a few little things, especially in the food shop.
Today I have been into Paris and N has waited in for the plumber, who was still here when I got back, filling the apartment with smells of soldering (not the rather disagreeable one from last Saturday, but an Israeli youth of 18 who seems to have told N his life story.) I have been to a free lunchtime concert at the Eglise Saint-Roch – solo classical guitar, another talented youth – and shopping in the Rue de Rivoli and the Grands Magasins in the Boulevard Haussmann. Lovely and sunny and much warmer than Nogent-sur-Marne yesterday. I have also done some research at the Gare du Nord ready for what N calls the visit of the offspring; daughters Madeleine and Caroline are coming to visit this weekend, so I checked left luggage lockers and suitable restaurants for lunch. I found some Christmas cards and even some Christmas presents!
Wednesday 23 November 2005
The plumber left very late yesterday evening, after going away for an hour or two and returning with a senior colleague. All of this time the kitchen and bathroom were more or less out of bounds, and very messy, and the air was thick with the smell and smoke of the soldering. Fortunately we managed to heat something from the freezer and eat it in front of the television. Once they had gone we at last cleared up, and each had a welcome bath! This morning however, N has found another little leak further up, which he is keeping an eye on, while re-plastering and painting the damage done during the mending of the pipes, and being horrified at the cost of it all.
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Friday 11 November 2005
On arriving back in France, in fact on first seeing the hotel TV at Nice, we became aware of rioting going on in Paris suburbs, and as the days wore on, in the suburbs of many large French cities. Although these seemed to have started in the department of Seine Saint-Denis, they were not in Saint-Denis itself, and we personally have not seen anything of them, as they are mostly in housing estates with large tower blocks. But we have received several e-mails from friends and family asking if we are all right! And we have watched much TV news coverage, and televised messages by Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin. I was interested to know whether the chorale concert scheduled for last Saturday 5 November in a church in Stains had taken place, as it is an area only a short bus ride from here, and one of the places the rioting started. We were due to go in cars, those with them giving lifts to those without, and I couldn’t have imagined people would have been happy to leave parked cars there for several hours during an afternoon and evening. When I went to the rehearsal yesterday evening, it certainly seemed that the concert had been cancelled – which from my point of view was good, as I hadn't missed it! Whether or not it will be rescheduled apparently depends on the priest. Anyway, we are rehearsing now for the "Téléthon", a fund-raising event on 3 December which I shall miss as it is the date we go to see Casse Noisette (Nutcracker) and last night sang the same popular song as before; and a new negro spiritual. I still haven't filled in any kind of official fiche, or been asked to pay anything. There is talk of learning some choruses from West Side Story, which will tax their English pronunciation a little more than the spirituals, but this may not be until the spring, by which time I shall unfortunately probably not be with them, but spending more time in La Neuve-Lyre.
Talking of which: I have received a message from Abels saying they can deliver my furniture on 22 December, as a part-load as agreed. We have been in e-mail contact with Mme V and the agent at Conches, to try and agree that the date for the signature will be the 20th; Mme V is in agreement and M Urset the agent says that should be fine, but that it may not be able to be confirmed until 8 or 9 December.
Otherwise, since coming back we have been doing all the usual coming back things: catching up with correspondence, washing, cleaning, food shopping, and just pottering, of which we seem to do a lot. Last Sunday lunchtime we attended the Fête de Vins here in Les Ursulines (the former convent in which the apartment is situated).This event was formerly La Fête du Beaujolais Nouveau, but has been brought forward a few weeks because the weather was usually very cold. It takes place outdoors in the courtyard; there is a large quantity of barbecued meat and other things to eat apart from the wine, and traditional music in the shape of a street entertainer complete with barrel organ, complete with books of words for those who didn't know all the songs. Participants were asked to bring other dishes, and I made an Italian pepper salad which I was told had been "beaucoup apprecié", gratifying, even though it turned out I was one of the few who had brought anything. There was a good sized crowd, including a neighbourhood cat and dog who were especially interested in the meat, cooked and uncooked. I had hoped to get to know a few neighbours during the course of this event, but don't seem to have made much progress.
On Tuesday a man came to service the boiler (and will return next week with an expensive spare part) and on Wednesday we went into Paris for the first time since coming back, to see an exhibition called Vienna 1900, of paintings by Klimt and three others, at the Grand Palais. It involved a lot of standing around, queuing for almost an hour to get in, queuing for tickets, and then afterwards queuing for lunch, in the Ladies and at the cash desk in the gift shop. The part in the middle was well worth it though; many unusual and beautiful paintings, most of which we did not know. Afterwards we walked all down the Champs Elysées towards the Place de le Concorde, along the Rue de Rivoli, past Palais Royal to the Grande Poste by the Louvre, which is where N always stocks up on stamps. He then went home, and I went back towards the Avénue de l'Opéra, where I spent a long time in Monoprix, one of my favourite shops, which I have not visited since arriving in September, buying a very attractive casual black jacket. Feet needed resting a long time after all this walking.
Today is a jour de fête (public holiday) as it is Armistice Day. I remember from living here before that November is a good time of year with two days' holiday (1st and 11th) which if you are lucky means two holiday weekends. A bit better than in Britain, where apart from school half term, there are no holidays between August Bank Holiday and Christmas. There are only the first signs of Christmas now, one or two shops in Nice, and the odd advert on TV; much later than in Britain.
Saturday 12 November 2005
This morning the piano tuner came, and the piano now sounds much better. N had been playing in the evenings while I got dinner ready, very enjoyable but now even more so.
Mme V has sent us some useful reading material on La Neuve-Lyre, including practical addresses for shops and services, and details of local things to visit.
I have found a second hand clothes shop here in Saint-Denis, which I have visited for the first time. I was able to have a good look round without needing to speak to the proprietress who was engaged in an argument with a young African woman over the price of a Moschino handbag, all the time I was there.
I have also been making cakes using cake mixes as at the moment I don't have my cake recipes or cake tins here with me. I am limited to those needing a cake tin the size of the only one N has: 24 cms diameter. The first one was a complicated lemon/pine nut custard cake, bought it Italy, complicated linguistically and in method, but very good. I have just made a simpler French chocolate one.
This evening we are going to the opera at Bastille, to hear Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. I think it was last June when the date was fixed, it seemed such a long time away, but 12 November has finally arrived. When N sent the confirmation by e-mail, I was amazed at how much it had cost, and e-mailed back "Quel prix!" His message came back: "Quel opéra!"
Sunday 13 November 2005
The opera was wonderful. Very long; it started at 6.30 so we left the house at 4.45 after a large lunch and early afternoon tea. It was in three acts, with two intervals, the first one of 45 minutes to allow time for a little supper. It was a fairly controversial production including a background video, which we had originally wanted to see on my birthday last May but was sold out, and on Radio 3 last summer and here on Radio Classique recently I have heard interviews with the producer of the video. The costumes and the set were very simple and black, and the video was like a cinema screen behind, showing sometimes sea or forest, and sometimes alter egos of Tristan and Isolde. This meant there was a good deal to look at; switching constantly between the screen, the singers and the surtitles above, not to mention the orchestra, superbly conducted by Valery Gergiev. As always, the audience are as interesting as the performance, if not more so, and kept us interested during the intervals. It was due to end at 11.15 but overran, and we got home at about 12.30. It always amazes me that the metro is full of people at that hour.
Tuesday 15 November 2005
N has not been at all well today, having taken a (prescribed) drug to see its effect, and one which he won't be taking again in a hurry. He has been very dizzy and mostly asleep. This means that I have had a quiet day, apart from dealing with the man coming to mend the boiler, and taking a phone call from my notaire's secretary to confirm my address; but it seems all is going smoothly, and the signature for the house sale will be on 20 December at the very latest. It also means that I have been able to do a lot more reading than usual; I am still very much enjoying Il Disprezzo by Alberto Moravia, which wasn't the film I thought it was, but have recently realised is the source of the Jean-Luc Godard film Le Mépris, also seen at the Arts in Cambridge (not surprising as it's the same word; scorn) but with quite a different slant. Even more exciting was the fact that I found that Le Mépris is showing in an obscure little cinema in Paris; if that's still the case when I've finished the book, I shall go and see it again. I think this is the first Italian novel I have been unable to put down, and look forward to reading more Moravia, when I can unpack my books. (Also can't help wondering how many other students in my Italian university class are still reading in Italian…..) Then I must get back to reading War and Peace, (in English!) which was going very well before I started on Il Disprezzo. I thought there was going to be a lot more time for reading once I got here, but we seem to spend so much time talking, and watching interesting videos. The latest one is all about Brussels and the history of the Belgian royal family, but must we confess to having watched several Inspector Barnaby episodes in French, aka Midsummer Murders. N's theory is that once having left England, it's necessary to see English villages. I prefer Morse and Oxford, though.
On arriving back in France, in fact on first seeing the hotel TV at Nice, we became aware of rioting going on in Paris suburbs, and as the days wore on, in the suburbs of many large French cities. Although these seemed to have started in the department of Seine Saint-Denis, they were not in Saint-Denis itself, and we personally have not seen anything of them, as they are mostly in housing estates with large tower blocks. But we have received several e-mails from friends and family asking if we are all right! And we have watched much TV news coverage, and televised messages by Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin. I was interested to know whether the chorale concert scheduled for last Saturday 5 November in a church in Stains had taken place, as it is an area only a short bus ride from here, and one of the places the rioting started. We were due to go in cars, those with them giving lifts to those without, and I couldn’t have imagined people would have been happy to leave parked cars there for several hours during an afternoon and evening. When I went to the rehearsal yesterday evening, it certainly seemed that the concert had been cancelled – which from my point of view was good, as I hadn't missed it! Whether or not it will be rescheduled apparently depends on the priest. Anyway, we are rehearsing now for the "Téléthon", a fund-raising event on 3 December which I shall miss as it is the date we go to see Casse Noisette (Nutcracker) and last night sang the same popular song as before; and a new negro spiritual. I still haven't filled in any kind of official fiche, or been asked to pay anything. There is talk of learning some choruses from West Side Story, which will tax their English pronunciation a little more than the spirituals, but this may not be until the spring, by which time I shall unfortunately probably not be with them, but spending more time in La Neuve-Lyre.
Talking of which: I have received a message from Abels saying they can deliver my furniture on 22 December, as a part-load as agreed. We have been in e-mail contact with Mme V and the agent at Conches, to try and agree that the date for the signature will be the 20th; Mme V is in agreement and M Urset the agent says that should be fine, but that it may not be able to be confirmed until 8 or 9 December.
Otherwise, since coming back we have been doing all the usual coming back things: catching up with correspondence, washing, cleaning, food shopping, and just pottering, of which we seem to do a lot. Last Sunday lunchtime we attended the Fête de Vins here in Les Ursulines (the former convent in which the apartment is situated).This event was formerly La Fête du Beaujolais Nouveau, but has been brought forward a few weeks because the weather was usually very cold. It takes place outdoors in the courtyard; there is a large quantity of barbecued meat and other things to eat apart from the wine, and traditional music in the shape of a street entertainer complete with barrel organ, complete with books of words for those who didn't know all the songs. Participants were asked to bring other dishes, and I made an Italian pepper salad which I was told had been "beaucoup apprecié", gratifying, even though it turned out I was one of the few who had brought anything. There was a good sized crowd, including a neighbourhood cat and dog who were especially interested in the meat, cooked and uncooked. I had hoped to get to know a few neighbours during the course of this event, but don't seem to have made much progress.
On Tuesday a man came to service the boiler (and will return next week with an expensive spare part) and on Wednesday we went into Paris for the first time since coming back, to see an exhibition called Vienna 1900, of paintings by Klimt and three others, at the Grand Palais. It involved a lot of standing around, queuing for almost an hour to get in, queuing for tickets, and then afterwards queuing for lunch, in the Ladies and at the cash desk in the gift shop. The part in the middle was well worth it though; many unusual and beautiful paintings, most of which we did not know. Afterwards we walked all down the Champs Elysées towards the Place de le Concorde, along the Rue de Rivoli, past Palais Royal to the Grande Poste by the Louvre, which is where N always stocks up on stamps. He then went home, and I went back towards the Avénue de l'Opéra, where I spent a long time in Monoprix, one of my favourite shops, which I have not visited since arriving in September, buying a very attractive casual black jacket. Feet needed resting a long time after all this walking.
Today is a jour de fête (public holiday) as it is Armistice Day. I remember from living here before that November is a good time of year with two days' holiday (1st and 11th) which if you are lucky means two holiday weekends. A bit better than in Britain, where apart from school half term, there are no holidays between August Bank Holiday and Christmas. There are only the first signs of Christmas now, one or two shops in Nice, and the odd advert on TV; much later than in Britain.
Saturday 12 November 2005
This morning the piano tuner came, and the piano now sounds much better. N had been playing in the evenings while I got dinner ready, very enjoyable but now even more so.
Mme V has sent us some useful reading material on La Neuve-Lyre, including practical addresses for shops and services, and details of local things to visit.
I have found a second hand clothes shop here in Saint-Denis, which I have visited for the first time. I was able to have a good look round without needing to speak to the proprietress who was engaged in an argument with a young African woman over the price of a Moschino handbag, all the time I was there.
I have also been making cakes using cake mixes as at the moment I don't have my cake recipes or cake tins here with me. I am limited to those needing a cake tin the size of the only one N has: 24 cms diameter. The first one was a complicated lemon/pine nut custard cake, bought it Italy, complicated linguistically and in method, but very good. I have just made a simpler French chocolate one.
This evening we are going to the opera at Bastille, to hear Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. I think it was last June when the date was fixed, it seemed such a long time away, but 12 November has finally arrived. When N sent the confirmation by e-mail, I was amazed at how much it had cost, and e-mailed back "Quel prix!" His message came back: "Quel opéra!"
Sunday 13 November 2005
The opera was wonderful. Very long; it started at 6.30 so we left the house at 4.45 after a large lunch and early afternoon tea. It was in three acts, with two intervals, the first one of 45 minutes to allow time for a little supper. It was a fairly controversial production including a background video, which we had originally wanted to see on my birthday last May but was sold out, and on Radio 3 last summer and here on Radio Classique recently I have heard interviews with the producer of the video. The costumes and the set were very simple and black, and the video was like a cinema screen behind, showing sometimes sea or forest, and sometimes alter egos of Tristan and Isolde. This meant there was a good deal to look at; switching constantly between the screen, the singers and the surtitles above, not to mention the orchestra, superbly conducted by Valery Gergiev. As always, the audience are as interesting as the performance, if not more so, and kept us interested during the intervals. It was due to end at 11.15 but overran, and we got home at about 12.30. It always amazes me that the metro is full of people at that hour.
Tuesday 15 November 2005
N has not been at all well today, having taken a (prescribed) drug to see its effect, and one which he won't be taking again in a hurry. He has been very dizzy and mostly asleep. This means that I have had a quiet day, apart from dealing with the man coming to mend the boiler, and taking a phone call from my notaire's secretary to confirm my address; but it seems all is going smoothly, and the signature for the house sale will be on 20 December at the very latest. It also means that I have been able to do a lot more reading than usual; I am still very much enjoying Il Disprezzo by Alberto Moravia, which wasn't the film I thought it was, but have recently realised is the source of the Jean-Luc Godard film Le Mépris, also seen at the Arts in Cambridge (not surprising as it's the same word; scorn) but with quite a different slant. Even more exciting was the fact that I found that Le Mépris is showing in an obscure little cinema in Paris; if that's still the case when I've finished the book, I shall go and see it again. I think this is the first Italian novel I have been unable to put down, and look forward to reading more Moravia, when I can unpack my books. (Also can't help wondering how many other students in my Italian university class are still reading in Italian…..) Then I must get back to reading War and Peace, (in English!) which was going very well before I started on Il Disprezzo. I thought there was going to be a lot more time for reading once I got here, but we seem to spend so much time talking, and watching interesting videos. The latest one is all about Brussels and the history of the Belgian royal family, but must we confess to having watched several Inspector Barnaby episodes in French, aka Midsummer Murders. N's theory is that once having left England, it's necessary to see English villages. I prefer Morse and Oxford, though.
Thursday, November 10, 2005
Saturday 5 November 2005
Back from Italy! We went by metro to La Gare d'Austerlitz last Wednesday week in time for the departure of Le Train Bleu at 9.15 pm. I had never been to the main line station, only the suburban lines, and a very odd mismatched untidy station it was too; I don't think Napoleon would have approved at all, especially in its bi-centenary year. The wagon lit was rather cramped, with a bunk on each side high up under the roof with a ladder (made up with clean sheets and pillows and tartan rugs), a coat rack, a seat by the window, a table which became a washbasin, towels, mirrors and a cupboard, free magazines, bottles of water, soap, toothbrushes, and the famous chamber pot in its cupboard under the window. (And yes, we did use it - very useful but rather small. And, disappointingly not blue, nor inscribed SNCF)
Going out of Paris we passed through several stations I knew well from when I lived in the southern suburbs in the early 1970's; Juvisy-sur-Orge, Viry-Châtillon, Choisy le Roi, Ris Orangis. Once we were past Melun there was little to see so we pulled down the blind and got ready for bed, one at a time as there was only room for one person upright in the middle of the cabin and the other up on their bunk. Once "in bed" it was fairly comfortable, apart from a strange sensation once the train gathered speed of one's head then toes being pulled in opposite directions. I abandoned my Don Camillo book in favour of the free magazines in French. In the middle of the night we came to halt, so I climbed down the ladder to see where we were : Lyon. I watched for a few minutes as we went through the city, much the same view I had seen as the last time I passed through it, during the night by bus on my way to Florence in 1994. It was difficult to get back to sleep; but necessary to wake early so as not to miss the sunrise as we went along the Côte d'Azur. Once again many familiar stations, this time from holidays in the 1970's and 1980's: Cannes, Juan les Pins, Antibes. We were not due to have breakfast until we arrived at Nice, so much to N's surprise and astonishment I had equipped myself with a croissant the day before, which was very welcome. My overnight bag was now quite heavy with the remains of the bottles of water, the magazines and the free toiletries, but we made our way to the Buffet de la Gare at Nice for breakfast, along with others from the train, some of whom had spent the night in couchettes, and as N said, looked it. (He was feeling superior having successfully managed to shave in the train)
We then embarked on a very long wait for the car. N had done this many times before, and had explained that although we finished breakfast at about 8.45 the cars would not probably arrive before 10.00, and we might not be able to get away before 10.30. In the event we did not leave until 12.00, so it was just as well that Nice station is a very elegant place, with palm trees both inside and out, with well-maintained toilets, newspaper stall and beautiful flowers, and as the morning wore on the weather became very warm and we abandoned our coats. We caught up with Italian newspapers, one of which had a beautiful cartoon of Saint Francis of Assisi in bed with 'flu, and another monk saying to him "I told you not to go talking to the birds"! Fortunately, unlike some of our fellow travellers who were getting increasingly impatient, we were not in a hurry, and it just meant starting the journey to Italy a little later.
Much of the journey was on the coastal motorway, and through wonderfully constructed tunnels. France gradually blended into Italy; and there was just a little notice to tell us when we crossed the border. We stopped for a late lunch at a very superior Italian motorway restaurant; they were cooking risotto at the self service counter, gradually ladling in the stock before our very eyes, but it was not ready yet! So we ate some beautiful roast vegetables instead, N's with chicken.
After lunch and the interrupted night's sleep, I kept dozing off and being reprimanded by N for missing the spectacular scenery, so we stopped at another motorway café and did something I have never done before in Italy or anywhere – drank an espresso coffee standing up at the bar. Very strong, very bitter and very small, it did the trick and I was much more alert for the rest of the journey. On arriving at Aulla, our nearest small town, we stopped at our favourite supermarket Conad, and stocked up. It seemed so familiar and normal, just as though we had never been away, so full of good things and we hadn't even needed to change the money in our purses!
The apartment which N has owned for nearly four years now is on the first floor of a sixteenth-century palazzo in a small village called Soliera. I have been several times in all sorts of different seasons and weather, including at the end of October two years ago when it rained non stop for three days, so I was prepared for the worst. This time we were lucky: apart from the last day the mornings started foggy and the days were dry and very sunny, about 24 degrees. In the past there have sometimes been young goats on the piece of land outside the bathroom window, but not this time; as N said, it had become a no-goat area.
We started by doing a lot of cleaning, airing and removing cobwebs as the place had not been visited since July, and N did "gardening" on the terrace, tidying the terra cotta pots full of oleanders, geraniums and magnificent herbs, which I used several times during the week for cooking. There is a lovely large partly new kitchen in which I love cooking, using all the good ingredients from Conad. We caught up with Italian TV news again too, watching it on two different channels one after the other, so as not to miss anything. There is the same collection of politicians looking much the same although slightly older (they might well think the same about me) all still reciting the relevant merits of Centro sinistro and Centro destra.
I discovered the book by Moravia in my bedside cupboard was not the one made into the film seen recently, but one called Il Disprezzo; very enjoyable and well-written, with the result that Don Camillo did not get opened during the entire visit.
We visited Fivizzano - the nearest small town in the other direction - better known to us than Aulla as N's first Italian house, Il Prato, was a few kilometres away up in the mountains. As we arrived at siesta time nearly everything was closed, but N managed to buy some wonderful packets of vegetable seeds – including green, yellow and red beans - ready for the garden in Normandy. We fared better at Aulla, arriving on market day, and I bought myself some slippers for 6 euros. Our favourite place of all though is Lerici, on the coast, where usually we lunch in an excellent fish restaurant perched on the cliff, but on this occasion we arrived in the afternoon, and a very warm afternoon it was too. Two years ago at the end of October there had been many people walking up and down in the sunshine warmly wrapped up in their coats; this time they were in t-shirts and shirt-sleeves. There were even a few bathing in the sea, even though the last sun beds and parasols had long since been removed. Even the TV news regarded the weather as eccezionale, and commented on the numbers of cars on the road; because All Saints Day Tuesday 1 November is a public holiday many were " making the bridge" as they say in French and Italian and taking the Monday as holiday too, thereby making a four-day weekend. At Lerici I bought an exercise mat at a beach shop; this made exercises with the Pilates video much more comfortable on the stone floor of the apartment.
1 November is traditionally the day on which to lay chrysanthemums on family graves, so there were many on sale in markets and by the roadside, even before we left Saint-Denis. The other seasonal commodity much in evidence was chestnuts; we stopped by the side of a mountain road where the ground was thick with them and gathered some to take home; sometimes just picking them up and at others carefully prising them out of their prickly cases, and roasted them on the stove to eat after dinner. On Saturday evening there was a Castagnata, a kind of chestnut celebration up in the old part of Soliera; the outsides of many houses were decorated with twigs, leaves and chestnut cases; there was seasonal produce and crafts, and we bought local wine and chestnut honey. Hot chestnuts were on sale in cornets of paper, and the ground was thick with their skins.
On Sunday afternoon we went to an antiques fair at Filetto, a medieval walled town which we had visited once before for an evening medieval market with music and flag throwing. This time it was a little less formal, but there was still entertainment in the form of yet more chestnuts roasted in huge holed pans suspended over large fires, and shaken from time to time by the men in charge, with smoke and sparks flying in the wind, and more chestnuts in paper cornets. Apart from our purchases – N bought a book of old postcards of the area, and I bought an oil/vinegar/salt/pepper/olive set in coarse yellow pottery – we were extremely interested to see many things on sale very like those in the apartment in Soliera, all included when N bought it. These ranged from large items of furniture like chests of drawers, often with marble tops because of the local proximity to Carrara, to linens and china, and small things like tin trays, bottles and baskets which would never have occurred to us to try and sell to anybody, but were all on sale on various stalls. The journey back to Soliera was long and dark, because of the holiday traffic and because the clocks had changed the night before and this was the first dark afternoon. Having seen the prices of some things similar to those in the apartment, we began to discuss the possibility of keeping some of the furniture and taking it to the house in Normandy, a discussion which continued on and off until the end of our stay. The Soliera apartment has been on sale for some time, offered completely furnished, but N now began to come round to the idea of offering it partly furnished, and to take the more interesting items to Normandy. If not required immediately they could be housed in the many outbuildings, and we had noted an antique shop a few doors way from the house which could prove useful.
Monday was the last day of October; rain was finally forecast for Tuesday, and in the event Monday was the last day of autumn sunshine. We started off for Aulla in the morning merely for a few things from the post office and supermarket, intending to have lunch in the only good restaurant, but it was closed on Mondays. Still enthused from the day before by the apparent desirability and value of our possessions, we set off on a whim for Sarzana, a town well-known for the large number of its antique dealers. In the event most were closed, but we looked through many shop windows and admired the pretty town in the emptiness of an out-of-season Monday. We found the last free table in a very good little restaurant, just before 1.30, and enjoyed excellent pesto, salmon, pork à l'orange and moist granary bread, which N said was like chocolate cake, together with interesting décor and fellow guests. At the end of our meal, when only we and one other couple were left at table, we were given their bill in error, much to the confusion of the proprietress and the amusement of everybody else. The pleasure of the lunch and visit to Sarzana was all the more because we had no plan whatsoever to go there when we had set out that morning. In the evening we visited N's local contact Lindsay and her mother for apéritifs; they had been unable to come for lunch on Sunday as planned as they were too busy.
We hadn't planned to go out on Tuesday as it was a public holiday and heavy rain was forecast. N was still spending a lot of time measuring pieces of furniture due to go to Normandy, and making an inventory for Traslochi, the local moving and storage company he had dealt with before, when he sold Il Prato and had furniture moved to Paris, some of which is still in the cellar and already promised for the house in Normandy. We also sorted and looked at a large trunk full of bed covers, and numerous baskets, tools, pans and other oddments in a large glory-hole near the entrance of the apartment, and packed some to go to Normandy with the furniture, and put others in the car to take with us, in particular a large iron fire grate, chimney plate and fire irons. During the morning there was a violent thunderstorm as promised, with lightning and such strong winds that a sheet drying on the terrace pulled the washing line right out of the wall, and ended up in a sad wet pile on top of the watering can and the pot of herbs. It needed much untangling, and re-washing, and only dried just in time before we left the next morning.
After leaving the place very clean and tidy on Wednesday morning, hoping that many potential purchasers would come and view (something of which I have had much experience of late) we left at about 10.00 am and with plenty of time took the road back towards Nice, having lunch at the same motorway restaurant, risotto still not ready, nor the pasta. We also bought local delicacies to eat at the shop, then came off the motorway, rejoining the coast road at San Remo. This time the border crossing was at Ventimiglia, where there was an abandoned redundant customs house. We got out of the car for a short break at Menton which as N said was a clean, expensive place, and where the men putting up Christmas lights were working in their shirtsleeves; After sitting for a while on the sea front we set off again, arriving in Nice at about 4.30 and giving us plenty of time to put the car on the train, eat, and possibly fill in some time at the cinema before the train left at 8.45 pm.
N said to the man at the station gate as he drove in "C'est pour Paris ce soir", and the man replied "Il n'y a pas de Paris ce soir", and after much checking of tickets and dates it transpired that we had come a day early! On taking stock of the situation, we decided things could have been a lot worse; we would just have to spend an extra 24 hours in Nice. The only disadvantage was that I had been hoping to be back on Thursday evening for a chorale rehearsal leading to a concert on Saturday, and that we had a bag of left-over food in the back of the car containing ham, salami and cheese, which might have lasted one day out of the refrigerator but not two.
Fortunately right next to the station there was a multi-storey car park and an Ibis Hotel, so we checked the car into the one and ourselves into the other, and looked forward to a less rushed evening and a better night's sleep than originally planned.
The main street between the station and the sea was being remade, and was difficult to navigate. We looked at the cinema and discovered that the new version of Oliver Twist was showing the next day, and eventually found a suitable restaurant for dinner. It was named L'Angleterre, and had thus attracted various American and Irish clients. The portions were enormous, and we felt we wouldn't need to eat again all week.
The next morning we managed some breakfast however, checked out of the hotel, put our overnight bags into the left luggage office at the station, and set out for our day in Nice. Having read some helpful literature at the hotel, we visited the Chagall Museum, along with many Japanese tourists, then took the open-air bus, stopped at the Matisse Museum, decided that was enough museums for one day, and stayed on the bus all round the city centre and along the Promenade des Anglais. It was very cold and windy on the bus but, as N said, very warm when it stopped, and there were wonderful views of ornate white villas, hotels, casinos and palm trees. After a few showers earlier the sun came out just as we reached the sea, and we made our way into the old town, originally looking for sandwiches but ending up having a delightful lunch outside a little café opposite the flower market. It was a wonderful feeling to be eating outside in the sunshine in November. We each had salad and a glass of rosé; I watched a woman at the market make up a bouquet of pink flowers, and finished my meal with a thé gourmand; tea with two tiny biscuits and a minute square of cake, just enough. We spent the afternoon looking round tourist shops in le vieux Nice, and then realised it was nearly time to be putting the car on the train. After we had walked a very long way in the wrong direction, N went to deliver the car and we eventually met at the cinema just in time to see Oliver Twist, very relieved to sit down after all the walking. It was very well made, not entirely true to Dickens, but very enjoyable. Afterwards there was just enough time to eat at the Buffet de la Gare where we had had breakfast the week before, get our bags from Left Luggage, buy my croissant for the morning - again with much adverse comment from N - and wait a few minutes for the train.
The carriage and compartment were the same as before and once again I felt that perhaps we should see James Bond or Hercule Poirot, but no. This time we saw the beaches of Cannes and Juan les Pins in the dusk, and then pulled down the blind and got ready for bed, a little more practised this time. In the middle of the night there was a screech of brakes and we stopped suddenly, seemingly in a tunnel, but we never knew why: N favoured the theory of a cow on the line. On opening the blind in the morning a very different sight met our eyes; Paris suburbs with grey skies, rain and commuters running for a bus wrapped up in their winter coats. We got off the train and walked along to the Buffet de la Gare at Austerlitz for breakfast, and I noticed that several dogs had been with us in the train overnight; unfortunately they were not entitled to breakfast and eyed each other warily from under their owners' tables. On the wall of the Buffet was a large mural depicting the Battle of Austerlitz, and we tried to guess the identities of the principal protagonists.
The arrangements for fetching the car were the complete opposite of those at Nice; instead of waiting hours in warm sunshine we collected it very promptly in the rain. We reached the Gare de Bercy in a little shuttle bus – a little like an airport bus – dogs included, and then walked up to a roof-top car park where all the cars were waiting.
The journey back to Saint-Denis took us through central Paris the morning rush hour in mist and rain, but in spite of thinking that from now on this was winter, I was pleased to feel that I had come "home".
Back from Italy! We went by metro to La Gare d'Austerlitz last Wednesday week in time for the departure of Le Train Bleu at 9.15 pm. I had never been to the main line station, only the suburban lines, and a very odd mismatched untidy station it was too; I don't think Napoleon would have approved at all, especially in its bi-centenary year. The wagon lit was rather cramped, with a bunk on each side high up under the roof with a ladder (made up with clean sheets and pillows and tartan rugs), a coat rack, a seat by the window, a table which became a washbasin, towels, mirrors and a cupboard, free magazines, bottles of water, soap, toothbrushes, and the famous chamber pot in its cupboard under the window. (And yes, we did use it - very useful but rather small. And, disappointingly not blue, nor inscribed SNCF)
Going out of Paris we passed through several stations I knew well from when I lived in the southern suburbs in the early 1970's; Juvisy-sur-Orge, Viry-Châtillon, Choisy le Roi, Ris Orangis. Once we were past Melun there was little to see so we pulled down the blind and got ready for bed, one at a time as there was only room for one person upright in the middle of the cabin and the other up on their bunk. Once "in bed" it was fairly comfortable, apart from a strange sensation once the train gathered speed of one's head then toes being pulled in opposite directions. I abandoned my Don Camillo book in favour of the free magazines in French. In the middle of the night we came to halt, so I climbed down the ladder to see where we were : Lyon. I watched for a few minutes as we went through the city, much the same view I had seen as the last time I passed through it, during the night by bus on my way to Florence in 1994. It was difficult to get back to sleep; but necessary to wake early so as not to miss the sunrise as we went along the Côte d'Azur. Once again many familiar stations, this time from holidays in the 1970's and 1980's: Cannes, Juan les Pins, Antibes. We were not due to have breakfast until we arrived at Nice, so much to N's surprise and astonishment I had equipped myself with a croissant the day before, which was very welcome. My overnight bag was now quite heavy with the remains of the bottles of water, the magazines and the free toiletries, but we made our way to the Buffet de la Gare at Nice for breakfast, along with others from the train, some of whom had spent the night in couchettes, and as N said, looked it. (He was feeling superior having successfully managed to shave in the train)
We then embarked on a very long wait for the car. N had done this many times before, and had explained that although we finished breakfast at about 8.45 the cars would not probably arrive before 10.00, and we might not be able to get away before 10.30. In the event we did not leave until 12.00, so it was just as well that Nice station is a very elegant place, with palm trees both inside and out, with well-maintained toilets, newspaper stall and beautiful flowers, and as the morning wore on the weather became very warm and we abandoned our coats. We caught up with Italian newspapers, one of which had a beautiful cartoon of Saint Francis of Assisi in bed with 'flu, and another monk saying to him "I told you not to go talking to the birds"! Fortunately, unlike some of our fellow travellers who were getting increasingly impatient, we were not in a hurry, and it just meant starting the journey to Italy a little later.
Much of the journey was on the coastal motorway, and through wonderfully constructed tunnels. France gradually blended into Italy; and there was just a little notice to tell us when we crossed the border. We stopped for a late lunch at a very superior Italian motorway restaurant; they were cooking risotto at the self service counter, gradually ladling in the stock before our very eyes, but it was not ready yet! So we ate some beautiful roast vegetables instead, N's with chicken.
After lunch and the interrupted night's sleep, I kept dozing off and being reprimanded by N for missing the spectacular scenery, so we stopped at another motorway café and did something I have never done before in Italy or anywhere – drank an espresso coffee standing up at the bar. Very strong, very bitter and very small, it did the trick and I was much more alert for the rest of the journey. On arriving at Aulla, our nearest small town, we stopped at our favourite supermarket Conad, and stocked up. It seemed so familiar and normal, just as though we had never been away, so full of good things and we hadn't even needed to change the money in our purses!
The apartment which N has owned for nearly four years now is on the first floor of a sixteenth-century palazzo in a small village called Soliera. I have been several times in all sorts of different seasons and weather, including at the end of October two years ago when it rained non stop for three days, so I was prepared for the worst. This time we were lucky: apart from the last day the mornings started foggy and the days were dry and very sunny, about 24 degrees. In the past there have sometimes been young goats on the piece of land outside the bathroom window, but not this time; as N said, it had become a no-goat area.
We started by doing a lot of cleaning, airing and removing cobwebs as the place had not been visited since July, and N did "gardening" on the terrace, tidying the terra cotta pots full of oleanders, geraniums and magnificent herbs, which I used several times during the week for cooking. There is a lovely large partly new kitchen in which I love cooking, using all the good ingredients from Conad. We caught up with Italian TV news again too, watching it on two different channels one after the other, so as not to miss anything. There is the same collection of politicians looking much the same although slightly older (they might well think the same about me) all still reciting the relevant merits of Centro sinistro and Centro destra.
I discovered the book by Moravia in my bedside cupboard was not the one made into the film seen recently, but one called Il Disprezzo; very enjoyable and well-written, with the result that Don Camillo did not get opened during the entire visit.
We visited Fivizzano - the nearest small town in the other direction - better known to us than Aulla as N's first Italian house, Il Prato, was a few kilometres away up in the mountains. As we arrived at siesta time nearly everything was closed, but N managed to buy some wonderful packets of vegetable seeds – including green, yellow and red beans - ready for the garden in Normandy. We fared better at Aulla, arriving on market day, and I bought myself some slippers for 6 euros. Our favourite place of all though is Lerici, on the coast, where usually we lunch in an excellent fish restaurant perched on the cliff, but on this occasion we arrived in the afternoon, and a very warm afternoon it was too. Two years ago at the end of October there had been many people walking up and down in the sunshine warmly wrapped up in their coats; this time they were in t-shirts and shirt-sleeves. There were even a few bathing in the sea, even though the last sun beds and parasols had long since been removed. Even the TV news regarded the weather as eccezionale, and commented on the numbers of cars on the road; because All Saints Day Tuesday 1 November is a public holiday many were " making the bridge" as they say in French and Italian and taking the Monday as holiday too, thereby making a four-day weekend. At Lerici I bought an exercise mat at a beach shop; this made exercises with the Pilates video much more comfortable on the stone floor of the apartment.
1 November is traditionally the day on which to lay chrysanthemums on family graves, so there were many on sale in markets and by the roadside, even before we left Saint-Denis. The other seasonal commodity much in evidence was chestnuts; we stopped by the side of a mountain road where the ground was thick with them and gathered some to take home; sometimes just picking them up and at others carefully prising them out of their prickly cases, and roasted them on the stove to eat after dinner. On Saturday evening there was a Castagnata, a kind of chestnut celebration up in the old part of Soliera; the outsides of many houses were decorated with twigs, leaves and chestnut cases; there was seasonal produce and crafts, and we bought local wine and chestnut honey. Hot chestnuts were on sale in cornets of paper, and the ground was thick with their skins.
On Sunday afternoon we went to an antiques fair at Filetto, a medieval walled town which we had visited once before for an evening medieval market with music and flag throwing. This time it was a little less formal, but there was still entertainment in the form of yet more chestnuts roasted in huge holed pans suspended over large fires, and shaken from time to time by the men in charge, with smoke and sparks flying in the wind, and more chestnuts in paper cornets. Apart from our purchases – N bought a book of old postcards of the area, and I bought an oil/vinegar/salt/pepper/olive set in coarse yellow pottery – we were extremely interested to see many things on sale very like those in the apartment in Soliera, all included when N bought it. These ranged from large items of furniture like chests of drawers, often with marble tops because of the local proximity to Carrara, to linens and china, and small things like tin trays, bottles and baskets which would never have occurred to us to try and sell to anybody, but were all on sale on various stalls. The journey back to Soliera was long and dark, because of the holiday traffic and because the clocks had changed the night before and this was the first dark afternoon. Having seen the prices of some things similar to those in the apartment, we began to discuss the possibility of keeping some of the furniture and taking it to the house in Normandy, a discussion which continued on and off until the end of our stay. The Soliera apartment has been on sale for some time, offered completely furnished, but N now began to come round to the idea of offering it partly furnished, and to take the more interesting items to Normandy. If not required immediately they could be housed in the many outbuildings, and we had noted an antique shop a few doors way from the house which could prove useful.
Monday was the last day of October; rain was finally forecast for Tuesday, and in the event Monday was the last day of autumn sunshine. We started off for Aulla in the morning merely for a few things from the post office and supermarket, intending to have lunch in the only good restaurant, but it was closed on Mondays. Still enthused from the day before by the apparent desirability and value of our possessions, we set off on a whim for Sarzana, a town well-known for the large number of its antique dealers. In the event most were closed, but we looked through many shop windows and admired the pretty town in the emptiness of an out-of-season Monday. We found the last free table in a very good little restaurant, just before 1.30, and enjoyed excellent pesto, salmon, pork à l'orange and moist granary bread, which N said was like chocolate cake, together with interesting décor and fellow guests. At the end of our meal, when only we and one other couple were left at table, we were given their bill in error, much to the confusion of the proprietress and the amusement of everybody else. The pleasure of the lunch and visit to Sarzana was all the more because we had no plan whatsoever to go there when we had set out that morning. In the evening we visited N's local contact Lindsay and her mother for apéritifs; they had been unable to come for lunch on Sunday as planned as they were too busy.
We hadn't planned to go out on Tuesday as it was a public holiday and heavy rain was forecast. N was still spending a lot of time measuring pieces of furniture due to go to Normandy, and making an inventory for Traslochi, the local moving and storage company he had dealt with before, when he sold Il Prato and had furniture moved to Paris, some of which is still in the cellar and already promised for the house in Normandy. We also sorted and looked at a large trunk full of bed covers, and numerous baskets, tools, pans and other oddments in a large glory-hole near the entrance of the apartment, and packed some to go to Normandy with the furniture, and put others in the car to take with us, in particular a large iron fire grate, chimney plate and fire irons. During the morning there was a violent thunderstorm as promised, with lightning and such strong winds that a sheet drying on the terrace pulled the washing line right out of the wall, and ended up in a sad wet pile on top of the watering can and the pot of herbs. It needed much untangling, and re-washing, and only dried just in time before we left the next morning.
After leaving the place very clean and tidy on Wednesday morning, hoping that many potential purchasers would come and view (something of which I have had much experience of late) we left at about 10.00 am and with plenty of time took the road back towards Nice, having lunch at the same motorway restaurant, risotto still not ready, nor the pasta. We also bought local delicacies to eat at the shop, then came off the motorway, rejoining the coast road at San Remo. This time the border crossing was at Ventimiglia, where there was an abandoned redundant customs house. We got out of the car for a short break at Menton which as N said was a clean, expensive place, and where the men putting up Christmas lights were working in their shirtsleeves; After sitting for a while on the sea front we set off again, arriving in Nice at about 4.30 and giving us plenty of time to put the car on the train, eat, and possibly fill in some time at the cinema before the train left at 8.45 pm.
N said to the man at the station gate as he drove in "C'est pour Paris ce soir", and the man replied "Il n'y a pas de Paris ce soir", and after much checking of tickets and dates it transpired that we had come a day early! On taking stock of the situation, we decided things could have been a lot worse; we would just have to spend an extra 24 hours in Nice. The only disadvantage was that I had been hoping to be back on Thursday evening for a chorale rehearsal leading to a concert on Saturday, and that we had a bag of left-over food in the back of the car containing ham, salami and cheese, which might have lasted one day out of the refrigerator but not two.
Fortunately right next to the station there was a multi-storey car park and an Ibis Hotel, so we checked the car into the one and ourselves into the other, and looked forward to a less rushed evening and a better night's sleep than originally planned.
The main street between the station and the sea was being remade, and was difficult to navigate. We looked at the cinema and discovered that the new version of Oliver Twist was showing the next day, and eventually found a suitable restaurant for dinner. It was named L'Angleterre, and had thus attracted various American and Irish clients. The portions were enormous, and we felt we wouldn't need to eat again all week.
The next morning we managed some breakfast however, checked out of the hotel, put our overnight bags into the left luggage office at the station, and set out for our day in Nice. Having read some helpful literature at the hotel, we visited the Chagall Museum, along with many Japanese tourists, then took the open-air bus, stopped at the Matisse Museum, decided that was enough museums for one day, and stayed on the bus all round the city centre and along the Promenade des Anglais. It was very cold and windy on the bus but, as N said, very warm when it stopped, and there were wonderful views of ornate white villas, hotels, casinos and palm trees. After a few showers earlier the sun came out just as we reached the sea, and we made our way into the old town, originally looking for sandwiches but ending up having a delightful lunch outside a little café opposite the flower market. It was a wonderful feeling to be eating outside in the sunshine in November. We each had salad and a glass of rosé; I watched a woman at the market make up a bouquet of pink flowers, and finished my meal with a thé gourmand; tea with two tiny biscuits and a minute square of cake, just enough. We spent the afternoon looking round tourist shops in le vieux Nice, and then realised it was nearly time to be putting the car on the train. After we had walked a very long way in the wrong direction, N went to deliver the car and we eventually met at the cinema just in time to see Oliver Twist, very relieved to sit down after all the walking. It was very well made, not entirely true to Dickens, but very enjoyable. Afterwards there was just enough time to eat at the Buffet de la Gare where we had had breakfast the week before, get our bags from Left Luggage, buy my croissant for the morning - again with much adverse comment from N - and wait a few minutes for the train.
The carriage and compartment were the same as before and once again I felt that perhaps we should see James Bond or Hercule Poirot, but no. This time we saw the beaches of Cannes and Juan les Pins in the dusk, and then pulled down the blind and got ready for bed, a little more practised this time. In the middle of the night there was a screech of brakes and we stopped suddenly, seemingly in a tunnel, but we never knew why: N favoured the theory of a cow on the line. On opening the blind in the morning a very different sight met our eyes; Paris suburbs with grey skies, rain and commuters running for a bus wrapped up in their winter coats. We got off the train and walked along to the Buffet de la Gare at Austerlitz for breakfast, and I noticed that several dogs had been with us in the train overnight; unfortunately they were not entitled to breakfast and eyed each other warily from under their owners' tables. On the wall of the Buffet was a large mural depicting the Battle of Austerlitz, and we tried to guess the identities of the principal protagonists.
The arrangements for fetching the car were the complete opposite of those at Nice; instead of waiting hours in warm sunshine we collected it very promptly in the rain. We reached the Gare de Bercy in a little shuttle bus – a little like an airport bus – dogs included, and then walked up to a roof-top car park where all the cars were waiting.
The journey back to Saint-Denis took us through central Paris the morning rush hour in mist and rain, but in spite of thinking that from now on this was winter, I was pleased to feel that I had come "home".
