Galette des Rois

I woke up this morning thinking it seemed like a great day to have an epiphany. I ate bacon for the first time in four months. It smelled like home and it fuelled my melancholy. I’ve been feeling desperately lonely and sad, that my French isn’t improving and that the only people who want to talk to me here are disgusting sleazy men, and that more than anything I want to give up and go home. So I tried and tried to come up with a plan... and eventually it happened. It came to me in a flash. I realised I just needed to swallow my pride and beg someone to be my friend.

So I sent a text to Nelta from taekwondo, who had seemed concerned when I was looking wistful a few nights earlier, saying I felt sad and lonely and I was finding it hard to meet anyone and that I was basically having a terrible time here. AND IT WORKED! She invited me to her Aunt’s house this evening to share the galette des rois with them. And I had the most fantastic time! It was a huge family gathering with loads of kids running around and homemade kumquat punch, peanut punch, coconut punch, cider, champagne and guava juice. The Aunt was big and friendly and welcoming and kept us all amused by trying to speak English (but mostly speaking some strange hybrid Spanish) for most of the evening and I had the best night ever. Isn’t it funny how a bit of human contact and kindness can completely change a person’s world around?

Back to school tomorrow. I prepared the first four lessons for my CM1 classes and then decided to just do the same lessons with CM2 as well. I’d made a million fruit and foods flashcards by then and just couldn’t face opening another felt tip. I don’t think anyone really cares what I do as long as I keep them entertained. So as long as I can prance around pretending to be a very hungry caterpillar for all my classes I do believe all will be well.