A Year in Villefranche sur Mer - Moving to France

Day 176 (Thursday) It was yet another gorgeous day, the hottest for a while, which I thoroughly made the most of sitting in the sun. I went up the top road to do some shopping and was amazed to see that they are already selling Christmas trees in Casino. I realise it’s December tomorrow but isn’t it a bit early to be selling real Christmas trees? There was yet another stunning pink sky at sunset, it never fails to amaze me how different the sky looks every day. Ages ago, when I started speaking to Wendy, the manager of the studio I look after who used to live here. She had to go back to the UK because her dyslexic son wasn’t getting enough attention in school. She misses it terribly and she told me that many of her UK friends used to ask her if she got bored down here because there’s little theatre and so on. We both agreed that looking at the view every day was theatre enough for anyone. I wish I’d been here when she was here because I could have helped her son through his

Day 175 (Wednesday) I forgot to say that yesterday when I was talking to Andy we chatted about how difficult it is to learn French, especially the masculine, feminine palaver and he told me that the Academie Francaise, the people who control the language are still undecided whether the word après midi (afternoon) is male or female so I looked it up and found this… Traditionally the word was classified as masculine during the last century, but it is recorded as also feminine in the current, ninth edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française (1992). In fact, only the eighth edition (1932-35) recorded it as exclusively masculine. It was recorded as only feminine in the fourth edition (1762) and as both masculine and feminine in the seventh edition (1878). In modern everyday usage it is both feminine and masculine. If they can’t decide this what chance do all us learners have of mastering this beautiful if infuriating language? It was lovely and sunny again this morni

Day 174 (Tuesday) Lovely and sunny again but a definite nip in the air today, so no summer frock for me today but still sitting outside in a T-shirt. I told you that I’ve been having rugby conversations with Guillaume well I had another email from him today ranting about if France can’t beat Japan what on earth are they going to do in the six nations. I sympathised with him and he also told me that he is going to Cardiff in March to watch Wales vs. France so I gave him some recommendations about where to stay and how to find Caroline Street, a street near the best stadium in the world which is comprised of just chip shops (how I would love a bag of chip shop chips). This is all good fun but still no mention about the job. I have received some letters in French about my new self-employed status and as much as my French is improving it certainly isn’t anywhere near good enough to read anything official so Andy has very kindly offered to help me. As I was walking down the hill I

Day 173 (Monday) Still in some pain so no walking for me again today – this is the longest we have gone without walking somewhere exciting every single week. I found this information about the walk we had meant to do this weekend so here’s hoping I’ll be able to do it next week. https://french-riviera-blog.com/2011/10/05/cap-dail-and-the-mala-beach-coastal-path/ Cap d’Ail and the Mala Beach coastal path View near the start of the Mala footpath looking back towards Monaco This is really one of my favourite walks down the coast from Monaco into the town of Cap d’Ail just west (in the direction of Nice).  This small and pleasant residential town, built in several layers between sea level and the mountainside of the Tête de Chien, is not just a dormitory town for people working in Monaco, even though it is only one station away by train: there are several noteworthy attractions, notably the nice beaches, Belle Epoque architecture and various rather luxurious villas with