a la Francaise

So... have been a complete slacker and haven't blogged in ages, my apologies.

Donc, quoi de neuf? Pas grand chose....things have been going well, time is flying by very quickly and I'm pretty into the swing of life here now. 3 months has gone by in a heartbeat and unfortunately I think I've learned about 3 new French words in that time... and they're all names for cheese :)

I'm up to a full-time teaching load, so my days are spent discussing topics such as bonds, hedge-funds, inflation, global warming, politics, commodities and mergers with my students... and surprisingly that can actually be more interesting than it sounds sometimes. I've certainly learnt a lot and had some very interesting discussions. I've made a few friends and am spending time getting to know Paris, which I am loving more and more as time goes by.

I've also ventured out a couple of times (sometimes I feel the need to see the sea and breathe clean air.. Paris is gorgeous, but dense!) and had a weekend in Girona, Spain and just came back from a weekend in Brittany.

Girona was cute, it's a little medieval town with some nice buildings, so I spent most of my time wandering around the old walled city and stumbling across the odd sexual deviant in the back gardens of the cathedral... obviously the locals are lacking in alternative entertainment. Either that or he was making some kind of anti-religious protest, it was a Sunday after all.
Brittany is also beautiful, very rugged coast and dramatic landscapes. We went the whole hog with seafood platters and champagne at a coastal restaurant, unfortunately the luxury lifestyle didn't stretch as far as accommodation and after an entire night of non-stop rain we were almost able to turn our tent into a life raft. Mussels grow everywhere here and damn are they good... even though they're tiny little suckers they give the NZ ones a run for their money..mmmm. Yes, so the weekend pretty much revolved around food and several types of galette were also sampled.

So... that's about it, not very exciting, but am planning a few more trips so will hopefully post more soon. In the meantime here are a couple of cheesy shots of Paris....









PS: The froggies are holding these guys hostage... but not to fret a covert rescue operation is underway and they'll be eating Vegemite again in no time.

Oh, and the stereotypes are true...there are scary little rat like dogs everywhere and hence dog shit abounds on the pavements. Between the rat like dogs and the vast flocks of rat like pigeons the pavements can get a little hazardous at times.