Habituer [abitчe] vt: s’~ à to get used to.

Having had much difficulty in stringing a sentence together due to a mix of English-French confusion, extreme fatigue (grace à Ryanair) and general ignorance, I suddenly cannot stop thinking about the verb habituer. I originally intended to start this post by saying, “It is astonishing how easily on s’habitue aux environs changeant” – but I keep forgetting that franglais is most definitely not a valid mode of expression; at least, in normal life as opposed to the incoherent garble that flits around my head. I have had some difficulty in finding an equivalent expression in English; not a literal equivalent as such, but more along the lines of something that had the same connotations. Essentially, what I mean to say is that in the past couple of weeks I have had to become accustomed to/m’habitue à such different circumstances and ways of life that I have become increasingly interested in the process of how one actually becomes accustomed to different situations. Despite the seeming ease with which the act of ‘accustoming’ is carried out; such as children going to school or university for the first time and instantly settling in, finding their soul mates and having ‘the.best.time.EVER’; or starting at a new job and having only a few days of ‘newbie shame’ before falling comfortably into a routine, circle of friends, and ‘water-cooler crew’, I am ashamed to say that I have found the immediate effects of the transition kind of difficult.

Basically, leaving quiet village life in rural France just before Christmas and flying straight into a manically busy three-week festive season, has proven to be a little bumpier ride than expected.   For example, on arrival in the UK I found myself constantly around people as I hopped from Manchester to Cardiff to Chepstow to Portskewett to Bristol to Edinburgh...you get the picture. I’m not going to lie, it was absolutely great, and I was ecstatic to be able to see all my friends and my family and also to catch up on so much missed time with Celyn. Yet, at the beginning, I just felt completely exhausted nearly the whole time, and also became paranoid that I ‘had no chat’ as it was so bizarre to actually be speaking to people for more than half the day! On the converse, arriving back in the ‘ghost town’ of post-Christmas Sarlat and suddenly finding myself with empty hours and afternoons to fill, a skeletal timetable, and a lack of friends and family at hand, it was a pretty rough return to say the least. Perhaps I am exaggerating. In fact, I am almost certainly exaggerating. And no doubt reading in to it far too much. In both cases, I was absolutely knackered – especially after the horrendous all-night and all-day journey back to Sarlat, and also again I have to point out that I am a hormonal female who has wasted hours reading trashy romance novels so feels the need to incessantly speak about feelings. But, honestly, I just wanted some sort of explanation for that uncomfortable sensation of not really fitting in... for the first few days at least.

Anyway, now, as per, life is looking up. After two afternoons and a very long night catching up on sleep, I am finally starting to feel like a human being again. Thanks to Celyn and the Welsh boys I have jumped on the bandwagon and joined them in their ‘No-Alcohol-January’ tradition. Or, at least, am trying to. Not really sure why, (and extremely doubtful as to whether it will work) but it’s a good start to try and get a bit healthier after the Caligulan indulgence of the Christmas season. It was back to school on Thursday, starting with my Occitan class, otherwise known as les enfants terrible, who were actually surprisingly studious and well behaved for the first time in known history. They were followed by the CLIS class (Classe d’Inclusion Scolaire – essentially equivalent to UK special needs) which didn’t go quite as smoothly but they are unbelievably sweet and always up for a great laugh. My favourite was Charles who, when asked what his favourite colour was, just kept bursting into the ‘Rainbow’ song sans cesse, much to the amusement of everyone else. When prompted to actually answer the question, he stated, as if blatantly obvious, that he liked all the colours. Duh!

With only half a day’s work followed by a cancelled violin accompaniment lesson (poor Sophie is unwell and Ludovic is proudly sporting a massive bandage on his finger so is unable to play), it has been a fairly gentle retour au travail, unlike mes pauvres parents who spoke of their rather more stressful return to work.  

Strangely enough, Epiphany, which usually goes completely unnoticed at home apart from the dolefully symbolic taking down of the tree, is actually quite a big deal in France. People make these round brioche cakes called Galette du Rois (King’s Cake) with sugar on the top, and apaz they put a little trinket of a king or a crown inside and the person who gets the piece of cake with the figure inside essentially becomes ‘king’ for a day. It’s a bit strange but kind of a nice idea, especially as January is such a depressing month. I only know this because my landlord’s wife gave me a massive slice of theirs to taste. It lasted about five minutes before it was completely devoured... seriously nice. Ironically, that is one of the first times they have actually been really quite pleasant to me, and I only went up to tell them that I was planning on moving out. Whoops.

Anyway, the damage has been done and, yeah, that’s my big news – I’m moving house. Having spent so much time thinking about ‘getting used’ to situations, I’m changing again. More on this to follow but bare bones for now – playground assistant who works with me at Temniac, plays rugby for Sarlat, became friends, nice family, big family, rent rooms, live on farm outside Sarlat, cheap rent, relatives all nearby, will be living with French family, have dinner each night with said family, practice French, learn French, not so lonely.

I cannot wait.

Reading: 

Just finished Stephen Fry’s The Liar. It was one of those books that you cannot put down but then again you don’t want to finish it because then it will be ‘all over’, so about ten pages before the end you start reading really really slowly and re-reading passages to prolong the denouement. Actually, I'm still re-reading the last page because I still don't want it to end...I really am in great need of a life here. Great book though. Standard Stephen Fry – public schools, irritatingly perfect Queen’s English, closet homosexuality, insane intellectual conversation throughout, ridiculous facts, strange, hard to believe and often unnecessary plot twists... definitely recommend it though. Perfect Christmas present, cheers again Cel.