This time it was en presentielle which meant a nice bike ride through parts of Lyon I didn’t know – like the 2km long Croix Rousse tunnel.
A lovely bike lane La salle de classe
La formatrice était tres gentil et on a appris beaucoup de choses sur l’histoire de la France.
Clovis I – le premier roi de la France
Francois I – le roi qui a commencé la Renaissance et a invité Leonard de Vinci en France. Il a aussi officialisé la langue francaise.
Henri IV – qui a terminé les guerres de religion avec l’Edit de Nantes. Et il s’est marié à Lyon.
On a appris aussi des choses culturelles. Qui a fait la Statue de la Liberté. Je savais deja qu’elle avait été faite par Gustav Eiffel – mais pas qu’elle avait aussi été faite par Auguste Bartholdi. Et monsieur Bartholdi a aussi fait…
La fontaine de la Place des Terreaux
Pendant le cours, j’ai reçu un courriel de la prefecture. Ils m’ont delivré mon visa – et alors la formation civique je ne doit plus la faire!
Mais il ne reste qu’un jour en Octobre. Je pense que je le ferai.
I got so many requests to live blog the delivery of the kitchen appliances and bed that I couldn’t say no (well one from a fake address but I can’t be too picky).
12h00 I have arrived with lunch from the local boulangerie. Kitchen appliances coming between 14h00-16h00 but bed anytime from now till 17h00. Now we wait.
Allons y
12h06 I realise I don’t know how to turn the electricity on. Mild panic.
Looks on but isn’t
12h15 Busy myself with some unpacking
Les manteaux
12h56 That didn’t take long.
C’est fait
12h59: First worrying moment. I get a text saying my packages have been delivered. Where? What?
What has been delivered?
I nip down to the street to check that no-one has left a bed and mattress by the door or with the boulanger- they haven’t. 🤷🏻♂️
13h01: Lunch, but it is interrupted by….
Le lit est arrivé
13h29 And when I say lunch I mean…
Tartelette aux pralines
14h00: We now enter le creneau for Darty to deliver les blancs.
14h25: Darty will be here in five minutes. I can’t turn the water on either – hoping they know the trick with these French gizmos.
Ça commence
14h52: We now have electricity and water and our first appliance is in!
Le lave linge
15h00: The fridge is in – but the door opens the wrong way from the one we ordered. Ce n’est pas grave but we need an extension lead to plug it in a bit more discreetly.
Hard at workLe frigo et le lave-vaisselle
15h20: Next is the hob and the oven and within an hour it is done.
La cuisine est fait
15h25: Of course there are a couple of issues – the hole for the hob is too big so it is not secured and the hole for the oven is too small so the door doesn’t open when it is all the way in.
Oven and hob need work
Someone is coming next Wednesday to fix them both. Now we wait for the man who is going to assemble the bed.
16h34: Where is my TaskRabbit assembly man?
17h44: He is here but yet to get on with any assembly
18h02: He is now cracking on with it.
Nearly there
18h15 And just like that he was off. Leaving me to position the bed correctly, unwrap the mattress and put it on.
Notre lit
18h25 And we are done. Hope you enjoyed this exciting afternoon. A few hiccups to correct next week and work out how to keep the electricity on. But it is coming together.
As July ends, it’s time to reflect on the biggest things I have learnt in my first six months living in France. In the best listicle practice, I’ll aim for 10.
French language: More often than not you don’t pronounce the last consonant of most words. Blanc, étang, pont etc.
Like Laurent Blanc
French language: The pronunciation of the city of Reims. I mean, wow.
Reims cathedral
Life in France: Café gourmand – always a good idea.
Café gourmand
French language: Également – a very useful reply to bonne journée, bon weekend etc
French language: Bonjour – ça marche toute la journée.
Les oiseaux: Les herons garde boeuf ne se trouvent pas toujours près des vaches. A Lyon ils se trouvent dans les arbres au Parc de la Tete d’Or.
Qu’est ce que tu fais ici?
Les oiseaux: Le coq gaulois is one of the symbols of France. But for me it should be la buse – because they are everywhere.
French language: And what is this? Le croûton or le quignon?
Croûton ou quignon?
Life in France: Lyon is a very beautiful city. From the old town to Place Bellecour to the banks of the Rhône to Fourviere it really is a très belle ville.
The view of Lyon from Fourviere
Life in France: whether you voted leave or remain, Brexit makes moving to and living in France far more difficult than it used to be. From lung x-rays to four days of formation civique training, it ain’t as straightforward as it once was.
Back at 47 Cours Franklin Rooosevelt pour faire l’état des lieux*.
Les escaliers La porte de l’appartement
I met the landlord and together we looked around and made a note of any faults.
Le salon
The white goods/les blancs arrive next Wednesday. Until then the kitchen looks like this:
La cuisineLa deuxieme chambre – les rideaux sont toujours laAnd I finally got to see la cave
The landlord was very welcoming and said he was really pleased we were moving in.
He explained how everything worked and said if I ever had a delivery, the boulanger on the ground floor would be happy to look after it for me. I explained to him that she already had!
Elle est contente de garder les colis*So I thought I’d better buy this.
Alors, on y va encore une fois. C’est parti. Formation Civique jour deux.
How to become French
My second day of Formation Civique was quite similar to the first. We learnt some numbers that we might need to memorise if we ever want to apply for French citizenship.
How big is France? 672m square kilometres How big is the population of France? 67m
How many Regions are there? 18.
How many Departments? 101.
How many Communes? 35,000
We continued to learn about health, employment, accommodation and parenting.
There were plenty of quizzes
And as ever I learnt some new words:
Laicité – securalism (one of the four values of France)
We had to pick our atelier for the fourth day. Workshop. I chose socio-culturelle.
Depistage – to detect; la soigner– treatment.
Only two days of training left – and next week’s one is in person.
Meanwhile, with the help of Evelina, Euronews’ visa expert, we have applied again for the passeport talent visa which was rejected tout de suite by the embassy in London. This time we are applying to the prefecture in Lyon. It will be too late to avoid two more days of formation civique but it should make staying in France a bit easier for me and Cath.
We saw this delivery van doing its thing near our new house. This is what we have to look forward to – the ladder-cum-lift that takes all your worldly possessions up five flights and in through the window. Exciting!
Then it was off to Darty to buy five kitchen appliances which will be delivered and fitted on 3 August.
And then buying a bed and mattress from IKEA to be delivered on the same day.
So 3 August will be a BIG DAY* We also sorted out gas and electricity and the internet so we are good to go.
I also learnt a new word – fliquer. Apparently you don’t submit meter readings in France but a surveillance van drives past your house and collects all the readings over wifi. Incroyable!
*I’m happy to live blog it if there is enough demand.
Thrown to (the) Lyon 