Fourth Day

This first entry might be a little long, as I feel like I've a few things to put. This is our fourth day here. We're in a lovely flat, in the 14th arrondisement, which is quite far out in Paris terms although already Paris doesn't feel too big. We've done a lot of walking since getting here, trying to find our bearings which thanks to the blissful weather has been lovely. Our flat is much bigger than we'd expected; a separate kitchen and bathroom, with decent sized living room and bedroom, both of which have almost floor to ceiling windows which let in very little light as we are surrounded by taller buildings. I think I remember reading this about Paris, and perhaps the way forward is a higher floor flat. It's hard to tell what the weather is like from inside, and with the shutters on the windows there is a strange half light in the mornings which is disorientating. Although suddenly living together in Paris is also disorientating!

By lovely coincidence last weekend was a festival of children's books in France. We passed by a poster in a children's bookshop and looking it up online discovered an exhibition of the work of one of my absolute faves, Kitty Crowther. We went along to a small bookshop near the Pompidou centre and looked through a large selection of her books and at some really lovely drawings on the wall. She works in coloured pencils mostly, and her work is strange and funny. The books that were new to me included one about spouses torturing each other (one page said something like excuse my French "vous jamais aimez pas mes cadeaux" and had a woman shrinking away from the giant stag beetle crawling out of a pressie from her husband) and a book which I bought later called "Dans Moi" which seems to be a kind of psychological story about our inner demons. In one picture the inner demon ogre swallows the protagonist. The former perhaps wasn't for kids, but the latter I'm sure is.

The man in the bookshop said Kitty herself would be there at 6.30 to sign books! So we returned, drank wine and queued. There were two other illustrators there, and they sat in a row with pencil cases out and handmade books, and drew intricate things on the endpapers of each person's book. No plain autographs here! They all wore ankle boots and long skirts (they were all women) and when it was our turn happily Kitty Crowther could speak English, so we chatted for quite a bit. I brought four kid's books for inspiration with me to France, and when I say one of those is by Kitty Crowther, you will understand how keen I am! She was very friendly and told us a bit about the market here, which is more diverse and interesting in many ways, but less well paid and distributed. It was a super evening!

In other news... we have eaten out a bit, which seems pretty expensive although perhaps we've not found the right places yet. A Diet Coke costs 4 euros in one of our local cafes!! Wine and cheese seem cheaper, but not much else. We've been getting to grips with our local food shops, and there seems to be a boulangerie on every corner. We did a croissant taste test on Saturday - Richard liked the fat buttery ones and I preferred the flat more buttery ones. Language wise I think we are doing okay. Richard is more intrepid than me I think. We can both stutter out sentences, but he looks less terrified than I do when people reply. Yesterday I walked to Barclays on St Germain and had to go through two electric doors which they buzz you through in order to get inside. I felt appalled to be so trapped in a place with my poor French. But they were very nice and were able to tell me that they have absolutely no relation at all to Barclays in the UK, so that was helpful.

Richard began his course yesterday. It's out in Sceaux, which is the suburbs of Paris, about 10 minutes on the RER. I went to find him after walking around yesterday. It seems a pretty town, and Richard's course sounds like it's going to be great. I'll write more about it once I've checked with him that that's okay. We said maybe I should refer to him as "R" as people seem to do on blogs, but that feels kind of weird. R left today for college. R likes the fatter croissants. Etc.

Sorry this is so long. Thanks if you've managed to last this long, won't go on so much in future. Love Tor x