Mid-January

Galette des rois

The French have a tradition with something called a ‘galette des rois’ to celebrate epiphany. It’s a round, flat-ish pie which is filled with almond paste or apple. Hidden inside the pie is a ‘fève’, a tiny porcelain figure (but I think it can be other things). Some people hold to the tradition that the youngest person present goes under the table to decide who gets which part of the pie so there’s no cheating! When the pie is eaten, someone will come across the fève and they become the king/queen and have to wear a golden paper crown and keep the fève. I’ve been able to join in 3 times with different people and it’s very enjoyable. I even got the fève once!

Emilie’s visit

Saturday morning came around, and with it the visit of my favourite French person. Emilie and I had a brilliant time together. This year we’re mainly speaking French to each other, last year we mainly spoke English. Things always seem to take longer than usual when the pair of us are together, because our talking slows us down. It’s either because of my constant French language stumbling or the fact that we frequently bounce off each other in conversation! Maybe a mixture of the two. She’s very patient with me when I start a sentence to realise that I don’t know most of the vocabulary to finish the sentence! Thankfully she’s seen an improvement in my language since October when we last saw each other.

We went for a walk and chilled out on Saturday, and on Sunday Emilie came to both my churches and we didn’t do a lot in between. After church in the evening we talked to Melanie and Emily (two university friends in Southampton) on Skype with webcams, which was lovely…as if the four of us were in one room again (almost)! Then on Monday we had a relaxed morning before I went off to work and Emilie had a very long walk around Lille, discovering the city (and the sales!). In the evening again we took things fairly easy. On Tuesday we went to the supermarket to get a few bits and bobs, I showed Emilie how to make drop scones, and later on hosted the GBU (Christian Union) at my flat. I’m sure we did other things that I can’t remember too. She left yesterday morning and is safely back in Besançon, with smelly cheese from the ‘nord’ region!! (Each region in France has its specialities so Emilie wanted to take back some cheese and stuff for her family, and at least one of the cheeses was very pungent and I teased her about it staying in my fridge for a night…still winding her up about it right now in fact, when she reads this!)

Snow

Here are some belated pictures of snowy Lille which were taken in December, except the little snowman, who sat just outside my window yesterday morning. I invited him in, but he declined for fear that his life would be shortened.


Fiona x