Today's aim was to have a wander , go to the tourist bureau, finish the ends of yesterday and vaguely outline my weeks) About half achieved. The great thing is that I have had a smile on my face and the right attitude, well most of the day , right up to a few hours or so ago when for some reason I could not post the blog entry about the rest of Tuesday properly. I had to type it on my tablet, emai it to myself, published it on my phone, where it appears to have worked, but it doesnot appear on my tablet as being published, so who knows.
There is a bar/Cafe about 5 doors away from me. It supposedly opens at 7.0 each day. Not this morning. There is no thing else obvious near me. I looked at Google maps and decided I could not be bothered and just walked in the general direction of some shops along a mainish, but not too big, road. This is unusual for me. I don't do ' random' very well. I past several butchers, quite a few pastry shops selling delicious looking croissants but not the corner local French bar style. Quite a few fruit and veg shops. Finally I found a bar, with some tables inide and out and 2 men talking to the barman. I went in but saw no sign of croissants. I asked and then followed a lovely conversation that started with the fact that my eyes were watering from the cold, I was not crying ( they were lovely and quickly got the hang of talking slowly to me.) . They said I should go to a pastry shop, I said i wanted a coffee with my croissant. After a quick interchange between the 3 of them which I could not follow, the barman told me to go and buy a croissant and bring it back and eat it there with my coffee. Which I did. I watched the news ( I can usually get the gist of the subtitles. I have no TV) replied bonjour to several locals who came in and greeted me. Then I can back here. I got almost back to my apartment door and I stopped to say goodmorning to a guy who was opening the door to a restaurant 2 doors away from my apartment. I had looked at the menu while I was waiting for the guy who met me yesterday afternoon to let me into the apartment. The guy was quite chatty and I asked him some questions about some of the food.
Soon after, i set off after to walk through the old town ( the usual narrow, twisty cobbled streets, but not as high a proportion aimed at tourists as is often the case). In I the direction of the tourist bureau. I stopped to look at a lovely display of little sweet cakes and was just taking a photo of an inscription in the window. It said " le gout du sucre sans les inconvenients" ( I cannot be bothered with accents) . The taste of sugar without the inconvenience . As I was taking the photo a lady came up and started opening the door. She was the owner. We had a lovely chat about sugar for 5 minutes or so. Again, I found enough words in my brain to communicate. . I pottered on, got to the tourist bureau and spent a while getting information about all sorts of things from a lovely Japonese lady. At the end of the conversation we did talk about where I ahd been in Japan. I ambled back here, again going through the middle of the old town. I stopped and looked at a beautifully scuptured chocolate koala in a chocolate shops window. I was surrounded by Easter rabbits. Why a koala? Along came a similar aged to me local and saw the koala and smiled. We were still talking 15 or 20 minutes later.She ahd been to Australia but never seen a real kangaroo or koala. My level of French was fairly equal to her English I think so we got on quite OK. Like the men in the bar and the koala lady, she said complementary things to me about me trying to speak and practising French. So, without trying, that was the forth time I 'talked' to someone ., excluding Tamiko. By the time I got home it was time for me to go to the restaurant 2 doors away. I was only going to have 2 courses, but I ended up having 4 courses of delicious food. When I went in I was ushered to a table by a pleasant young man. I talked briefly to him and the other wait staff and they asked fairly early where I was from . Apparently the guy I spoke to in the morning was the chef and he had said I might come in ( I don't actually remember saying that I would today but I certainly said I wanted to try there one day). But they all wanted to know where I came from. I asked all sorts of questions during and after my meal.
I have been in my apartment since, pottering.
Some notes to self based on events of this morning:
Walk on the right side of the footpath, not the left as is my custom.
When crossing a road look left,right, left , not right,left, right.
When walking down a one way street, do not assume cyclists follow the one way directive.
If a cyclist is approaching on a footpath, do not instinctively move left, move right, otherwise cyclist may get very wobbly trying to avoid a head on collision.
Beware trams, they are almost silent as they slow down and easily blend in with the background.
When walking along cobbled streets, if I need to look at phone directions stop, don't try cobblestones without looking.
Take more careful note of the morning temperatures not just the maximum. Look at the morning temps and decide if thermals are required ( they certainly would have helped this morning.
It is now 6.45 and I havenot started my planning . Too bad.
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