Mont St Michel

Salut,

Last week was a busy one and I was glad when the weekend rolled around as I needed a break. My week consited of School, a French test and grumpy/tired children, which also made for a grumpy/tired Au Pair.
For the weekend I participated in an APITU weekend away for Au Paris around France. On Saturday afternoon I met about 15 other Au Pairs and from there we were split into groups and sent on a sort of treasure hunt around St Malo. St Malo is a very cute little walled city on the North East Coast of France. While we wandered around half heartedly trying to answer the questions we got to know each other, how many children and the ages of the children we all looked after as well as where bouts in France we were from and where in the world we had come from. I’m constantly amazed at how many nationalities there can be doing a job like this, there were girls from South America, South Africa and all parts of Europe and Australia. When our time for the treasure hunt was up we met up again and split into cars to go to Pontorson where our Auburge Jeunesse (youth hostel) was for the night. I sat in the front seat of the car which still made me cringe a little each time we went around a corner or through a round about as I continuously felt like I was on the wrong side of the road. After a few u turns and phone calls to see if we were going in the right direction we made it.

Too many people on the dance floor

It felt a bit like school camp as groups of 3 and 4 shared rooms. Pontorson seemed like a tiny town, but I suppose compared to Paris every town is small, it was strange that nothing was open and I couldn’t hear any sirens or see apartment buildings, but it was nice to be out of Paris and finally seeing some other part of France. For dinner that night we went to a local creperie which is the specialty of Normadie as well as Apple cider. After the lovely meal I managed to convince the majority of the tired Au Pairs that we should go to the local Discothèque. We decided to head back to the Auburge for a little siester before being picked up by the free shuttle service at 1am, that’s the thing here in France most night club don’t open until midnight and don’t usually get busy until 2am. So when you have a night out you really have a night out! This was one of the weirdest t experiences though. As we all squished into the dodgy old mini van we were taken to a club litterly in the middle of nowhere, it was about 10mins out of town in a paddock surrounded by cows! It was quite a nice club though and for 10 Euros we got entry and a free drink of our choice. When we got in, at 1:30, there was no one but a couple of middle aged women and men who had a bit too much to drink. It was so strange seeing just one person on the dance floor, and there wasn’t even many people at the bar –VERY DIFFERENT! We hung around for a couple of hours dancing to every second song that wasn't doof doof, then got the free shuttle back to the auburge.

Mont St Michel

Sunday we headed off to Mont St Michel, basically a huge old church on an island. Again this was another old walled city which had plenty of tourist shops and lots of beautiful views of the countryside and the beach. We toured the church – for free because  we lived in France and are under the age of 26, I love this about France! We also walked up and down the many steps and hills of the island before feeling like we’d covered every inch of it after about 3 hours. After that I had some afternoon tea with two of the girls in what seemed like a nice little café/restaurant but you had to buy something to sit and eat on their chairs. As the other two had already bought something to eat from there I thought I would just buy a glass of orange juice so that I could sit with them, but this orange juice was 3 Euros – nearly $5AUD! Defiantly not going back to that café!

We then caught the bus back to Pontorson where we got our various trains to our various parts of France. I had to change train in a little town call Folligny which I thought wouldn't be too bad and I could get some dinner there, but when I got there I went outside the train station and didn’t see anything went back inside the station asked the long haired almost toothless man in the station box where the centre of the town was and he just laughed at me and said I was in it, so much for dinner!

I really enjoyed my weekend and would recommend visiting St Malo and Mont St Michel if you have time in the North East of France. St Michel is quite touristy but once you get over that you can enjoy the beautiful views of the north coast and countryside, and wonder howsomething so huge could have been built so long ago, even on a cloudy and windy day like it was for us. I made some good friends but unfortunately most of them will be heading back to their respective countries in about a month as a typical Au Pair year goes from September to July.

 This week has started off pretty well and last night I was taking the two eldest children to meet with their grandmother to see a theatre production when I was invited to see it with them. So I got to see Peter Pan by Irina Brook, my seat was separate from the others but probably the best in the house, 5 rows from the font in the dead middle! The show was all in French of course – except for the songs. I tried my best and felt like I understood most of it but I think I was just interpreting most of it like a ballet. It was still a brilliant show and would love to see more!

I usually dread Wednesdays but again the kids have gone with their grandmother for the majority of the day so I’m currently sitting in the beautiful Parisienne springtime sunshine in Parc Monceau feeling pretty damn lucky to be living the life I live! Might just have a snooze now to energise for when the little kiddies return.

A bientot!