Saturday 17 March 2012

Local and Increasingly Vocal

It's the small things that connect you to a place, I think, and make you realise with a giddy jolt - I live here.

  • Collecting an Ebay parcel from a sort of sub-post office where the lady did not look up from her phone conversation while serving me.  I could hear a baby crying down the phone as if strained through something.

  • Making my first hair appointment in French.  Slightly terrifying but my feet were in the salon before I realised what was happening.

  • Small exchanges and mishaps - letting a lady know she's left a bag on the pharmacy counter; dropping a €2 piece under the counter in the wholefood shop and explaining it to the cashier.  There's always a slight time delay in my language, as the brain engages its (almost) second tongue. 

These tiny increments of existence bed me further into life here.  That and the PUB QUIZ of course.  I live here.  My magnolia tree is nearly out. 




7 comments:

  1. I think you are bloody marvelous Jane. You currently rate amongst the bravest people I know, I could no more up sticks and move to a completely different country than fly to the moon!

    Just thought you should know that.

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  2. Thank you but I'm not brave; not at all. I cannot explain what made me give up everything to come here, but it was mainly an overwhelming desire for adventure and new experience. If I can do it, ANYONE can.

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  3. You're FAB - and totally right, of course, about all of it. Keep blogging on!

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  4. aw thanks. And I will keep blogging - as long as there is something I want to say. Which is usually all the time...

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  5. People used to say I was brave when I emigrated. It's not that though is it? For me, it was that real need to change the course of my life before it was too late.

    You're doing brilliantly Jane...keep it up.

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  6. Ditto ditto ditto, you are doing an amazing thing Jane, and I'm particularly envious of your ability to make the hair appointment...thats one of things I'm worried about. J.

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  7. Ayak - that's it exactly. Not bravery, just a need for change.

    And Janice - the hair thing was governed by my feet. I didn't want to go in but they kept walking!

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