Moving to France and adapting to life in Lyon
My French teacher told me that on 2 February- La Chandeleur – Candelmas , when Jesus was presented at the temple, in France you eat crepes.
Not wanting to ignore such a tradition , we joined in.
Then we added a bit of crème anglaise and tucked in. Some were jam filled, others plain but they were all delicious.
Today there was a strike at Euronews. When I arrived at work I saw this banner on the cube.
I was then given this flyer:
And then at 10am the staff protested around the cube.
It meant I got to write a few stories like this one. I even learnt how to update the new scroll bar on TV.
Maybe things will be back to normal tomorrow.
Et maintenant ça fait un an que je travaille chez Euronews. Il n’y a pas eu un seul moment tres calme.
On a des nouveaux propriétaires, on est en train d’établir un programme de transformation dans la redaction, on a demarré un nouvel habillage à la télé:
Et le cube est à vendre. Qu’est-ce que ça va devenir dans l’avenir? Qui le sait?
Je suis en France depuis un an. Je suis arrivé le 30 janvier l’année derniere.
Ma premiere journée s’est passée comme ça.
Le temps passe vite
To celebrate Cath’s birthday we went to the Alps – to Aiguilles to be exact – for a weekend.
There was plenty of snow and the views were amazing.
Cath’s sister, nieces and great niece all arrived along with our sons from London. It was lovely seeing them all.
When we explored the village we saw some people with ice picks climbing an icy cliff face.
I, of course, brought my binoculars with me so I also looked in the numerous pine trees and the first bird I saw was a crested tit. Une mésange hupée. I knew they were in the area but couldn’t believe how easy it was to see one.
The other bird that was everywhere were les grives littornes – fieldfares. There were 15-odd in the tree next to the flat.
We also took advantage of the snow to go to an espace ludique. There was a competition of skiers being pulled along by dogs – these dogs:
There was a ski run and a luge run there. I have never really done any winter sports but agreed to have a go with the luge.
It was a fantastic weekend organised by Cath. Great fun was had by everyone.
I got my first puncture – une crevaison – on my journey to work.
It meant I had to learn some new words:
Fortunately there is a bike shop right next to work – Probikeshop so I was able to buy a new chambre à air and can say goodbye to the Velo’vs for now.
Cath booked tickets to go to see Swan Lake performed by the ballet company of Odessa.
They were in town for one night only.
It was on at La Bourse du Travail and it was clearly very popular with large queues to get in.
It was my first ever ballet so I read the story beforehand to know what was going on.
At the end there was a standing ovation and then they played the Ukrainian national anthem. It was all very moving.
Qu’est-ce que c’est ça? Un bateau plein de bois? Trop de troncs, une abondance d’arbres? Une peniche avec une profusion de planches?
Ça suffit? Oui.
Notre voisin en dessous a trois chiens. Quelque fois quand je descends un m’accompagne.
Aujourd’hui j’ai rencontré tous les trois.
It was Cath’s birthday so we left the mice and went to Brasserie Nord for a meal.
Lyon’s most famous chef is Paul Bocuse. He has four restaurants at the four compass points in the city. This was our first visit to one of them.
Each restaurant has a different theme. This one specialises in traditional Lyonnais food. L’Est has food from around the world, L’Ouest has an exotic/islands feel and Le Sud has a Mediterranean bent.
The food was lovely – although we steered clear of the tête de veau.
Thrown to (the) Lyon 