Finding our feet

9 – 15 September 2019

The alarm buzzed at 645 and we went to wake the kids. No clothes laid out this week, but still no protest votes at the idea of heading out to school. Excitement about the bus, about seeing their friends, even about their classes. Excitement in the house too for the rentrée for Liz and Anthony – the start of formal Alliance Francais classes this week. Before that, Anthony’s first ride with the Cyclo Club d’Aix (local bike club).

This felt like it was going to be the first ‘full week’ – at least almost (gymnastics doesn’t kick off until next week). School, homework (Yay!), French lessons, some sport. Normal life. We had loved our travels but part of us really craved the normality and opportunity that our prospective routine offered. We were excited.

Monday morning. Kids deposited at the bus stop without incident, Liz deposited at Alliance class. Anthony headed off for a bike ride with the new club. He had been warned in advance that this was a ‘slower group’ ride and that it was a good initiation into the club. Having not ridden for a long while, this sounded perfect. On arrival, the ‘slower group’ turned out to be (literally) a group of retirees ranging from 50s to 70+ (they assured me that there were other members of the club too!). The fact that some could even get on bikes was impressive (some, but by no means all, were riding electric bikes). We headed out south of the city and meandered our way sedately through old country lanes and back roads of the towns of Les Milles, Bouc-Bel-Air and Luynes. Absolutely beautiful. Stopped for the all important coffee break and a good chat at a cafe overlooking the countryside. Talked about grandkids and life in Provence. This is what they mean when they talk about growing old ‘well’ here (it’s a real topic of conversation). Some 2.5 hours later we had covered all of 25kms but had had a fantastic morning. It was a lovely way to meet some new people outside the school environment and (safely) see some new areas of the region.

Back in town and back to Alliance Francais for the start of group lessons. Alliance had changed schedules at the last minute and Liz was in the morning, Anthony in the afternoon, giving us all of 15 minutes to cross over during the day. Far from the visions of long, rosé filled lunches and not ideal.

We had never done classes like this and were excited. Liz, having survived last week’s boot camp, was in upper beginner, Anthony in upper intermediate (the entrance exam having exposed his basic inability to write in French). We piled in, new books, new stationary. Keen as hell. We were soon to discover, however, that the nature of group classes is that they tend to operate to the lowest common denominator. Materials (whilst interesting and, in our opinion, well taught) can only be covered at the rate of the slowest student – and, coming to French from English, you get an awful lot for free, relative to Arabic or Asian languages. This means that classes move….. very …… slowly. And you tend to spend a lot of time talking and listening to people who don’t speak French trying to speak french. It can be a little time consuming.

This, coupled with the fact that the afternoon schedule clashes with homework time and kids drop offs/pick ups left Anthony bowing gracefully out of group classes after a week and shifting to privates; Liz will continue for the next month and then look to do something similar.

So whilst we were settling into our french classes, the girls were back at school for their second week. The school effectively teaches two parallel syllabuses with two separate teachers – one french (aligned to the french school system) and one English (aligned to the Cambridge system). In addition to this, they also have French as a second language class to help them pick up french. This sounds, and is, quite confusing. We had asked them to bring home their books this week so we could see what they were up to. (We’ve got one eye on the syllabus here, but are particularly keen to understand what they cover relative to Australia, so that we can ‘top up’ where necessary so they don’t fall behind in Australia). We were also interested to see their homework too. After the first week or so, it’s interesting to see the different levels. We expected the level of maths to be strong here, for the girls to be inundated with French and for the English to be relatively easy. Initial observations are that the maths is significantly behind what they have covered in Australia, the ‘french as a second language’ course they are doing is off to a very slow start and the English (aside from some spelling) is also pretty limited. But of course, there’s also a real risk that we simply have no idea what is going on (and neither do the girls). Being the needy, control freak kind of people we are, we have immediately made appointments to go and see teachers next week so we understand what they’re doing and how we can help them with it. We can already hear the cries of ‘here come those bloody Australian’s again’ from the teachers when we walk into the school!

We hosted our first gathering this week… 3 families braving the 4 flights our stairs to eat pizza on our terrace. The girls were very excited to be hosting their first playdate (as were we).We were joined by a 2 french families (Marion, Julien and Sophie) and an American one (Otis and Elizabeth) – all with kids in the same or similar years to our girls. Pizza and wine were consumed, along with amazing apple tart from the famous Patisserie Béchard down the street

(Side note: on eating this, Sena immediately asked for more (no), whether she could have it for breakfast (no) and whether she could have it for her birthday (yes)).

It’s interesting to see what French people bring to these events – one of our friends brought with her homemade aubergine and olive tapenade and pickled capsicum (where she found the time for this around moving recently back from the US, setting up a new house and getting 2 small kids settled we have no idea). Anyway, our first attempt at hosting was successful, and we established that we could get 8 adults and 10 kids in here at a time for dinner. A promising sign for things to come (except maybe not mid-week next time, as the 9.30pm finish ensured that the kids were hammered for the rest of the week).

On Friday we had the much heralded ‘wine and cheese’ night at the school – their first parents mixer of the year. We had found a babysitter which we hoped would be our ticket to future child-free evenings throughout the year. At the fairly-last-minute, we also arranged for 2 of Jessie and Sena’s friends (and Julien and Sophie’s kids), Victoria-Louise and Aleanore to sleep over (note: our girls don’t speak French yet, these girls don’t speak English yet, but that doesn’t seem to worry anyone). What better way to test our new Brazilian babysitter than to load her up with 5 children who speak different languages and then disappear for 8 hours. She seemed to be up for the challenge, we didn’t ask twice and quickly bailed out the door.

The event, held on the rooftop terrace at the school, was really good fun. We got to see a bunch of people we had met before and meet a whole bunch of new and interesting people as well. It’s really interesting what brings people here – to a place that’s very focused on lifestyle but not a natural location (with some exceptions) for work. There are some that commute to Paris every week (big business in France seems very centralised out of Paris), some that run their own (generally SME but often global) businesses, some local manufacturers and some who have already made their money and are just looking for a change of pace. Lots of entrepreneurs. Lots of people creatively looking for ways to stay here (and afford the school fees). It feels a bit like exchange/Erasmus for 40 somethings. And incredibly social – both into the expat and also the French community here.

Inevitably, after the main event, we ended up at a nearby after-party with a bunch of new and different people, a combination of European expats and French people. These were not conversations we were having in Australia, and we were loving it.

We arrived home late, half expecting our Brazilian babysitter to be either tied up and gagged in a corner or already on a plane back to Brazil. Neither was the case, and she actually seemed quite relaxed and keen to return. Bonus.

The following morning (inevitably a little painful after the night before) we were awoken by the sound of laughter coming from the girls room. We got to spend the morning with our two french guests, who were excited at the fact that they had just experienced their first sleepover. We went foraging for croissants for breakfast, and after eating explored the markets and did our weekly shop. Having had the opportunity to spend some one-on-one time with these girls (aged 7 and 5) we can attest to the fact that french kids do not, in fact, throw food. In fact (these ones at least) were incredibly confident, well mannered and fun. Pretty impressive considering they don’t know us very well and much of the conversation was happening around them in English. The morning was so successful that we ended up rolling around to their place (at beautiful 16th cottage in a village north of Aix, for a swim that afternoon).

Saturday night, Ellie went to the social event of the month (if you’re 9) – her best friend’s birthday sleepover, complete with hair dying and make-you-own penguins out of mozzarella cheese. Wildly successful by all accounts.

On Sunday, Anthony had signed up for a bike ride with his new club, a 75km Tour de Sainte Victoire (the mountain outside of Aix made famous by Cezzanne’s studies of light). The ride was a ‘special event’ put on the club, meaning that, at the 40kms mark, there was a rest stop complete with salami sandwiches, fruit and, of course, a selection of rose and red wine available (as you do when riding up and down fairly steep provencale hills!). The ride went through incredible scenery east of Aix, passing through beautiful old villages, vineyards, forests and, of course, the incredible Sainte Victoire. It was a fairly feisty first proper ride back for Anthony – 1.2 kms of hills across the distance, some steep and some long, followed by some fairly steep and scary downhill runs. Overall great fun and incredibly beautiful, and with any luck he will have feeling back in his rear end by Wednesday or Thursday this week!

Sunday lunchtime was spent exploring ‘Assagora’ the cultural and hobby club based equivalent of the sports fair from the previous week. If you want to do painting, photography, calligraphy, human rights or join the France-Chinese appreciation society, this was the place for you. Hundreds of clubs and associations spruiking their wares and looking to recruit more members. More flyers gathered and conversations had.

Sunday afternoon was another pool party, this time with a lovely American couple, Caroline and Scott who have been in and out of Aix over the past several years and their group of friends from all over the place. Food, rosé, swimming and interesting conversation. We could definitely get used to this.

One final thing that is probably worth mentioning… whilst we feel incredibly fortunate to have met so many interesting and welcoming people and have already had some great experiences here, the transition into this lifestyle has not been all plain-sailing. The girls have had their moments (from Sena sitting in the corner screaming every Thursday night for no reason she can articulate (simply exhaustion) and Jessie not being able to sleep because her mind won’t stop whirring) and at times we have struggled with our new family dynamic and role clarity (when no one is working and we’re around more, who does what, how do we divide stuff up, who helps who with homework etc) and ongoing questions around purpose and maximising opportunity whilst we’re here.