Vive la France

Okay, so we took a BA flight from LHR to Toulouse.

The first thing you might notice about France is that they speak French. Even when you clearly have Ignorant Tourist emblazoned on your forehead. They just roll their eyes at you, managing to convey a French accent without uttering a word, and re-phrase in French.

The second thing you might notice is that it’s not England. Funny how you just cross an itsy-bitsy [unless you are swimming it] channel, et voila! Tout le monde parle Francais, et, autour de toi, tout semble different.

Once you’re away from Paris – the average tourist’s comfort zone – the names of the towns and villages become unpronounceable. Especially when the signs whizz by as you’re driving. Which reminds me. The car Avis gave us is an Opel Meriva, which I’d never heard of, mainly because it isn’t imported to Israel. Over to you, Hebrew speakers: Can you imagine an importer promoting a car model called Meriva?*

We took the A61 going south.

You know you’re in a European-Mediterranean region when…

-        The farm houses have solid wood, low-tech shutters; none of your flimsy white (lace optional) things and/or heavy drapes of British homes.

-        Some of said shutters are painted warm brown hues; others in a wide range of blues, greens and violet.

-        The public toilets are – unless you’re very lucky – squat toilets, which I strongly feel should have been phased out at the turn of the century. That’s the 20^th, not the 21^st, century.

-        The distances are in km, not miles (when they are displayed at all); fruit and veg are sold by the kilo, not the pound.

-        Pizza rules. McDonald, though present, is way behind.

Shutters on the houses in Foix

And so we reached the godforsaken little village of Belesta en Lauragais. Which doesn't even appear on most maps. And this is where the story of our south-of-France vacation begins. Stay tuned!

* “meriva” in Hebrew means a quarrel, a row.

Your Basic London Shopping Rules

(Substitute name of other major city as applicable)

-        You will always find the perfect T-shirt/leggings/ODIC (Other Desirable item of Clothing) in the last shop you go into, after you’ve already bought the okay-but-not-quite-what-you-wanted one in the previous shop.

-        You will always find your favorite perfume/moisturizer/ODIS (Other Desirable Item of Skincare) for a better price after you’ve already bought it elsewhere for what seemed, but no longer seems, like a reasonable price.

-        However, if you refrain from buying that item of clothing or skincare, on the assumption that it’s bound to be cheaper at the airport Duty Free shop, the airport shop will surely be out of it. Better luck next time, honey.

-        If you buy that expensive glossy mag, you’ll be seated on the plane next to the most amusing and friendly traveler you’ve ever met, and time will simply fly. Need I spell out what happens if you don’t buy the mag and have mistakenly packed your book in with the checked-in luggage?...     

It's the little differences - Take 2

Take 1 was in May 2010 – see http://nina-makes-tracks.blogspot.com/2010/05/its-little-differences.html. But each time I go to the UK, other things catch my eye.

You don’t have to be told that English homes are different than, say, Israeli ones. It’s obvious. One thing that always strikes me is the doors. All rooms have doors, and these doors are actually put to use! On a regular basis! You go into the lounge and shut the door behind you. You move to the dining room, and – unless you’re in and out setting the table or bringing in food – you shut the door. In Israel, only bedrooms and bathrooms have doors. And possibly the door leading to the small porch you use for storage, where  you keep that old gizmo that you can’t quite bring yourself to throw out. I assume all this door-shutting is very logical – to keep the warmth from escaping. But it‘s part of a different life style. Also, many doors still have knobs rather than handles. I’m sure handles are easier to handle than round, slippery knobs. But there you have it. Tradition.

Bedroom door with knob. Ignore mess inside :-)

 Dryers

You’d think, with English weather being so predictably unpredictable though strongly leaning towards the wet side, that dryers would be a staple. But not so. Apparently, dryers are a relatively modern invention; more modern than the washing machine, to be sure. And it hasn’t quite been accepted as the norm. I bet more families have dryers in sun-drenched Israel and Nevada than in Britain. Here, you hang up the laundry outside, weather and blackbirds permitting (you know, like the maid in Sing a Song of Sixpence), or else you drape it over anything drapable like the laundry horse and the radiators.  Then there’s always the hand-held hair-dryer to finish of the job, if push comes to shove. Which it often does.

Laundry drying on the radiator

The Voyage Aboard the One Seven Four

So you think only an ocean-crossing trip qualifies as a voyage? You think a mere Rishon LeZion>Tel Aviv>Rishon LeZion bus-ride does not merit the name?

I beg to differ.

I reached my conclusions the hard way, i.e., cold and bitter experience. Cold, because the a/c on the bus is enough to make an Eskimo reach for his fur coat; and bitter because I forgot to replenish my emergency stock of fruit Mentos, for which I have no one to blame but myself, and the fact that I didn’t think a mere Rishon-TA bus ride required such meticulous preparation.

Women’s fashion this summer dictates large bags, the kind that can comfortably hold a basketball and still have room for the average female city-traipser’s paraphernalia. No, I’m not referring to the rare woman who leaves the house with a tiny clutch that can barely hold a single tissue, house-key, and credit card.

Luckily for me, I have this Lee Cooper shoulder bag that I fell in love with way back in 2008, that has lots of pockets.

On any given day, the bag inventory is as follows: Really Fat wallet (let’s not go there); make-up bag (ditto; the term “makeup” is used here very loosely);checkbook; business cards; Parker ball point, Pilot V5 Hi-Techpoint; mini Sharpie marker; mechanical pencil; assorted keys; tissues; lip balm; notebook/writing pad; Palm PDA (yes, I know they’re nearly obsolete, but it contains so much valuable data that I never look at!!!); diary/datebook (in case PDA lets me down); earphones for Palm; cellphone; mints/cough drops/chewing gum; various flyers and/or vouchers for coffee-and-croissant (possibly out of date); spare panties (old habit from my early twenties when I wasn’t sure where I’d end up spending the night; also accounts for the toothbrush in the makeup bag).

Now, consider all the extra stuff that went into said bag for the purpose of the arduous, demanding voyage aboard the One Seven Four, and the demanding 5 hour stay in an apartment at the Far End of Civilization, namely a central Tel Aviv boulevard, which you must admit is still the far end of civilization from some perspectives; or for a given value of Far, or End, or Civilization:

• Hat
• Scarf/gloves/long sleeved shirt (see Eskimo above)
• Spare T-shirt in case Baby Momo spits up or pees on me, which he has been known to do
• Apple, granola bar – in case my daughter’s [kitchen] cupboard is bare and it’s too darn hot to pop out to Tiv Taam or AM PM along Ibn Gvirol
• Laptop, wireless mouse, charger, computer glasses – in case Momo sleeps like a baby (ha!) and I can work, or blog, or email, or Chat, or…
• Bottle of water, in case we’re stranded at the bus stop (has been known to happen)
• Thingy I promised Daria (there’s always a thingy. Dr. Spock’s Baby & Child Care – yes, there was Help before The Baby Whisperer -- , that comfy tunic, a photo of Daria, 6 wks old, to compare to Momo; magic potion to put Baby to sleep)
• Camera (in case Momo does something really cute, which he invariably does and my cellphone camera sucks, and I’m the last of my generation to not switch to a smartphone, yet)

Total weight: 57.3 kg. Or thereabouts.

I’d better get out my ocean-crossing backpack and start transferring everything to it…

On the bright side, since the reform in public transportation in Gush Dan, a one-way ticket costs me only NIS 3.20 – just under one dollar. Can you beat that?