November 4, my friend Sally's birthday... Tomorrow, Guy Fawkes Day -- celebrated here in France by little clutches of English expatriate residents in various ways -- and, weather permitting, there'll be a bonfire or two and maybe some smallish fireworks displays in back gardens. There are a surprising number of English residents around Tornac and Anduze -- hence the popularity of the tea shop I've already mentioned earlier, TEAPOTES. Of course, success depends on adaptability, and TEAPOTES has made itself a fixture in Anduze by also providing excellent coffee as well as buttery teacakes and scones. It has also become a favorite meeting spot for French locals, and afternoon classes in French & English are well attended. I've made an arrangement with a retired French teacher (Marie-Ange) to meet once a week over afternoon tea or coffee at TEAPOTES, where we spend an hour chatting... She speaks English and I correct her, and I speak French and she corrects me... It's a pretty good system so far, although I think she finds herself busier correcting me than I do her.
Still, I have to declare with some pride a kind of linguistic breakthrough experienced this past week when I went to the cinema with my English pal Joanna, she who is married to a Frenchman and thus is really completely bilingual. We went to see AMOUR, the Michel Haneke film about the elderly couple facing illness and death together, that won the Palme D'Or at Cannes this past May -- and well might it have won, for it is a film I can't recommend highly enough. Tough to watch, but worth every minute. Brilliant, intelligent, important. And what was really important for ME, watching the film --in French without subtitles -- is that I understood at least 80%, perhaps even more... Now, it does not escape me that the dialogue was extremely simple, infrequent, and delivered in a slow fashion as befits the elderly.... Nevertheless, I have gained some courage and confidence and may continue now to hie off to French films without subtitles...
Living in two languages is, they tell us, good for the brain. I hope so... But even if it's not good for me in some avoiding-Alzheimer's-kind-of-way, it does provide more scope, more enjoyment, more delight in the sound of words themselves...
I mentioned Kerry Clare's site www.picklemethis.com a few days ago, and must draw your attention to it again as she has added to her initial comments about THE ELIZABETH STORIES now that she has read the whole book. It's wonderful to feel so warmed by her appreciation for the stories, especially on this chilly, dark, rainy November evening...Indeed, I have to nick back downstairs to add some logs to the fire.
