23rd March onwards
Sunday
I’m ashamed to say I did not leave the house. I was looking through my diary and only realised it was Easter half way through the day. There’s not really much publicity in the way of Easter eggs here…not that I should need that as a reminder. Anyway it snowed and I was freezing. I put two pairs of socks on and read my book. Aww Bridget Jones moment all by my self!
Monday
We thought the art school wouldn’t be open and so for some strange reason we decided to meet to go to the internet café at 8.30. I can’t sleep in any more. I’ve tried but I just lie there thinking get up and do something. Stop being Lazy! It’s made me more productive at least. So we turned up to the internet café put just as I suspected, it wasn’t open. We went to our trusty alternative Flunch. We are regulars now. When ever we profess our love for flunch people make fun of us as it’s really cheap and just full with old people. After lunch at flunch, Liz and I went back to Grace’s and she made us some hot chocolate in which she managed to use up a whole can of cream! I think we watched a bit of mtv. Oh also Grace painting a kind of manifesto over my back and chest and face, which took about 5 hours and then another 5 hours for her to take photos. It was a long evening. She then cooked us a meal. Riz et legumes!

Tuesday
Presentations! Ahhh the day had finally come. Well Grace was first and it went wondrously well. She didn’t look at her bit of paper once and was engaging with everyone the whole time. Liz was next and she was reading off the paper and kept looking up and seemed astonished that people knew what she was talking about. Then came moi….i starred down at my paper for the majority of it, recited my speech and tried to get it over as soon as possible. It went well though. People recommended Artists and asked questions. Hannah went next and she too read off a prepared speech. It went well.

Apres I think we all just went home. I can’t remember. That evening I went to bed at a ridiculously early time. 9.30! I woke up at 1.00 and thought it was morning. I also had a really bad dream where these toyu jelly babies came to life and started undoing the strings of my guitar. I don’t know what that means. I think in the dream they were warning me that the guitar was cursed. Scary stuff!
Wednesay
I finished off my painting. Here it is.

Thursday
Well we’d been told it would be a good idea to arrange a tutorial with Philip Richard, who’s the painting lecturer here and apparently he’s really hard to get hold off. I’d heard he was in on Thursdays and you have to catch him early. So Liz and I arranged to meet at the fountain at 8.30 and try and chase him down. We turned up waited around where a few lecturers were standing and eventually I went up to one of them and said, ‘Ou est Philip Richard?’ to which he said ‘C’est moi’ and we arranged to meet that day at 11. We decided to go on a search for staples. My next painting’s pretty big and I needed to staple it to the wall. Philip Richard is actually Patricia’s husband. We’d been told by her that he speaks no English which is an absolute lie! He spoke brilliant English. The tutorial went really well. He was recommending Renaissance artists for me to look up as they are all interested in the theme of someone carelessly being watched at mundane activities like I am. After this, I stapled my canvas to the wall, put Primer on it, Liz did the same and we sat and watched paint dry. It didn’t dry that day so we went home.

That evening we’d arranged to go out to a Japanese restaurant with one of the guys from the other night called Quintin but we call him Mika because he has curly hair like the singer. He brought a few friends called Charlie and rhhh I can’t remember the other name. Anyway I found out Charlie spent a year in London last year and lived in Wood Green! Very close to where I live. We met them outside of O’kalloghans and incidentally decided to go in for a drink before the meal. The Grace and I ate the only thing we could on the menu, rice and avocado thing. After getting used to Grace’s amazing stir fry’s, this was quite boring. Some how during the night the waiter got it into his head that it was Grace’s birthday and we didn’t chose to correct him so he gave us free shots which were actually disgusting. There was a naked man that appeared at the bottom of the glass when the class was filled with liquid and disappeared when you drank though so that was cool.

After the meal we went back to O’kalloghans for a few more drinks. Good fun. We then went on to Emporiam Galloriam which wasn’t so fun. It’s too dark in there. We decided to call it a night. It was nice to see Mika again as we hate the idea that our friends here are disposable. After a few discussions about music we discovered that Mika plays the Ukulele and the guitar and he some how managed to arrange that we all have a music session at Liz’s the next night. Well we’re always keen to show off our wagon wheel rendition so we obliged. Liz stayed with me that night as it was too late or early to walk home.

Friday
Despite having a late night i wanted to get an early start on the finally dry canvas on my wall so I set my alarm for 7.30 and went in for about 9. I painted most of the day away. There’s starting to be loads of tourists here because of the Easter holidays and they all come in to look at the art school gounds. It’s strange the transformation from tourist to inhabitant. I mean I still think it’s beautiful here but I don’t look at in the same way I used to. The toursist, taking photos of every old looking building side of me went away after a few days and as I said I just wanted to fit in as a resident. Hmm also there was a parade through town and directly behind police cars and cars that collect rubbish wre directly behind. They’re so on the ball here. They go to great effort to keep Rouen the beautiful place that it is. I do have one complaint though there is so much dog crap every where. Amazingly I haven’t stepped in any yet.

I headed over to Liz’s at about 6. I was the last to arrive. Grace was already cooking away over the stove. She cooked meat for the boys too which was very nice of her. Hannah was chopping vegetables, Liz was in the living starring lovingly at the electric guitar that Mika had brought. He was amazing at the guitar and was playing old classic roch songs like Johnny be good. It was great. Charlie wasn’t musical at all so he just sat there all night I’m afraid. Yeah so grace served up her feast of a stir fry and rice this time adding cashew nuts and ginger to the mix. Unfortunatly and also quite hilariously Mika and Charlie could not stand the ginger and apologised that they couldn’t finished they’re meal. ‘In France we eat only meat!’
Later on Grace tried to teach me some salsa but fayed profusely. She kept saying ‘Look at your arms! They’re all floppy. Hold them firm!’ She spent a good 20 minutes trying to teach me and then gave up. I warned her I can’t dance. The night came to an end at about 10.30. We were all knackered. I sneakily asked if we could have a lift off of Mika.

Saturday
Strangely every single Saturday without fail, It’s always sunny. So it always puts me in a good mood for the weekend. I woke up pretty early and cleaned my apartment form top to bottom and then met Liz and Hannah in the laundrette…..to do laundry. I finished atonement. We then went on to Café cheri, which was absolutely packed with students. This may be the reason why my lap top wasn’t connecting but I just wanted to throw it across the room.
Hannah invited us over to hers for a meal and a film. She made us delicious quiche thing and salad. We watched little miss sunshine which I love.