Author: Pat

Visa appointment

Today was the long-awaited day for our appointment to apply for work visas for France. We needed to take a lot of paperwork with us and I had a last-minute wobble when I realised I hadn’t printed out Cath’s form properly.

We made our 1030 appointment on time – on the site of the old Young’s brewery (where I once went for a job interview).

The visa application centre is on the site of the old Young’s brewery

My experience of applying for visas in the past meant I was a bit apprehensive that things wouldn’t go smoothly, I would have forgotten some key document, we would be here for many hours.

But actually the process was very smooth. There was a bit of waiting but when it was our turn we had brought all the key documents and, although I was told off for missing a comma which meant the form had to printed again, it was all ok.

When they relieved me of more than £200, I was reminded of when I worked in Paris in 1990 how I just turned up and got a job in Monoprix without any need for documents. But I guess that’s Brexit for you.

A final biotmetrics appointment and we were done. It took 90 mins in all which is far faster than I had expected.

They suggested it might only take five working days before we get our passports back which means I should make my departure date of 30 January. Fingers crossed.

Celebrated the smooth process with a croissant. Felt fitting.

The first of many

An adieu to British birds with a bang

I went on my last birding trip with my friend and former colleague Jim Todd before I head out to Lyon.

We have been to Norfolk and the south coast and this time we headed to the Somerset Levels.

In the first hide we popped into on the off-chance we chanced upon the rarest bird I have ever seen – a baikal teal.

The trip was also a chance for me to try out my leaving present to myself after 23 years at the BBC – a spotting scope.

A baikal teal at the front of many other sleeping teal

It enabled me to get this photo of the teal – at the front of this photo with his head tucked in.

I added two more birds to my life list – a cetti’s warbler and cattle egret. It was a great send off.

Next stop French birds.

Leaving the BBC

Today marked my last day at the BBC after 23 years. Head of Digital Naja Nielsen rang me to wish me well and then sent a lovely email to the staff.

Slightly annoying not to get top-billing in my own leaving email

I then received lots of lovely messages which made me laugh and smile. As I said in my email to colleagues I will always look back very fondly on my years at the BBC where I had an amazing time and made some lifelong friends.

But now on to the next chapter.

Ripping up the rulebook on swear words?

French President Emmanuel Macron has had strong words to say about France’s unvaccinated this morning.

In an interview with Le Parisien the president said:

So, there’s a new word for my French vocab – emmerder – to piss off.

J’ai très envie de les emmerder! I like that sentence.

The story is leading Euronews this morning with that translation IN THE INTRO!

Now, during my BBC career I became the go-to person to ask about the use of swear words in stories. This happened so often that I had a list of the most offensive swear words laminated on my desk. Our general rule of thumb was if it was absolutely essential to the telling of the story then it should be used but not in the intro or the top four paragraphs. This is because there is no watershed on the internet and a lot of children read the news site.

But France clearly has different rules and is comfortable putting strong language right there in the intro. Obviously more Guardian than BBC.

Only Lyon

I asked Euronews if they had any pictures of the flat we are moving to. Here they are:

The living room
A kitchen
The master bedroom

It’s in the 6th arrondisement.

They also sent me this publicity video for the city of Lyon. Not too shabby.

Regardez ce que j’ai trouvé

OMG! Cath reminded me that we do have a book about birds in French that we bought in Hay-on-Wye (in all probability) and then surprised me even more by finding it on our bookshelf.

So I was wrong about roi pecheur. A kingfisher’s name is martin-pecheur d’europe. There are so many other names I need to learn. Tits are called mésange. A long-tailed tit? Un mésange a longue queue. Sittelle torchepot? A nuthatch. I knew learning French was going to be hard but learning French bird names looks like a whole new ball game.