Mes Raisons De Ne Pas Avoir Des Enfants

I like to think of myself as someone who is good with kids (I decided to be an Au Pair for a year didn't I?!) but there are just some things that make me think/say/wish/scream 'I am never having kids. Ever.'

So, if you're feeling broody, just read my helpful top (was just 5, but quickly expanding) reasons why you may want to reconsider going down that road right now. I'm sure it's more effective than all other contraceptives combined...

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6. Your body. 
Not only does childbirth destroy the body, but the human spawn gets bigger and stronger, and proceeds to continue hurting you too. They're not even mine and I'm covered in bruises from having toy cars smashed into me or being kicked or punched for asking for something as simple as 'please put your coat on' or 'let's eat lunch'. Oh and then there's all the scratches and bruises I've received from Aurianne when she's climbing on me or when I'm trying to wrestle her into tights. Ouch.
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5. Mealtimes
Why are they so hard? Why does it take someone so small who is eating half of what an adult is eating, take 3 times as long to do it? I'm 90% sure that the average length of a mealtime is 1 hour. And that is just eating. Simple main course and fruit/yogurt for dessert. With no breaks in between. Not even intellectual conversation.

Not only that, but it looks as though everything supposedly eaten during the aforementioned meal has been splattered across the floor, table, chairs, children, clothes and me. I do so much more laundry than I ever did before for this main reason. The other reasons are slightly higher on my list because they are just a little bit more gross than regurgitated banana. Who knew.
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4. Lack of sleep. 
This could probably have come under 'my body', but it's so extreme I think it deserves its whole own heading. Why, children? Why will you no sleep at night?! This week I think I've been woken up an average of 3 times per night, every night. And I'm not even the one that has to get up and deal with it! There's mid-night toilet trips, coughing fits, earache, 'I can't/don't want to sleep', feeding time and nappy changes. Oh, and then they wanna get up at 6am?! Not cool.
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3. Creatures.
See my post about 'Worms, Headlice and other human parasites'. Need I say more. This is another reason for dramatically increased laundry...
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2. Poo and other bodily excretions.
(Here's the final laundry reason). Only three times today have I changed a pooey nappy and had it smeared across my hands. I have also endured wiping a 3 year old's poo smeared bum, and poo being picked up out of a potty and thrown on the floor (that was last week. Fingers crossed for never again). And there's wee too. Marc thought it was hilarious to stand up in the bath and wee 'at me', while Aurianne has been perfecting the skill of mid-nappy change wees lately.

There's also a crazy amount of snot and dribble that come out of those little bundles of joy. So much of it seems to end up on my jeans/jumpers etc. it's unreal.
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1. Three year olds.
To enlighten you about the joys of 3 yr olds, here are just some of the charming things Marc has said to me today....

'Why?'
'I don't want to eat dinner'
'I'm going to throw the broccoli in the bin'
'I'm going to stab you because you're naughty'
'I'm going to throw you in the bin because you're not nice'
'AHHHHHHH'
'Why?'
'Nooo, I won't'
'I think you're mean'
'I'm going to spill this yoghurt on the table'
'Bam bam. I'm bashing you with my car'
'I'm going to throw peas at you'
'WOOOOOO, I'm scaring you because I'm cross'
'I'm not hungry so I'm not eating anything for my dinner' (closely followed by...)'I want stroopwafels'
'I'm going to break you'.

We've also had several tantrums for what I can only describe as the most ridiculous of things over the past few days. One of which involved screaming and running into the middle of the road after the request that we walked a little bit faster (a 10 minute walk home from school had taken over 30 mins and we weren't even half way home yet...), another involved collapsing on the playground in a fit of rage and despair and refusing to get up for 10 mins after I told him I had Prince chocolate biscuits for an after-school snack and not the dinosaur biscuits he wanted.

I googled 'dealing with a 3 year old' and this absolute genius of an article was the first hit. I think it sums it all up pretty accurately!
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Oh, and before people start trying to tell me 'but you're just an Au Pair! Kids are great!'... Yeah, I'm sooo sure it's completely different when they're your own. It's probably 10 times worse because you're the one that actually has to deal with it all 24/7 (unless you have an au pair, that is....!)

Rant. Over.

Vers, Poux et Autres Parasites de l'Humain

Sending kids to school is just an invitation for illness to come party at your house. That plague invested centre of learning seems to harbour all that, surely in the 21st Century, we should have stamped out around the same time as Smallpox.

Ew. Yuk. Why oh why do these things exist?!

But, apparently not...

So, in the past month I've been subject to an infestation of head lice (I didn't actually get them, but the friendly warning letter that came home from Marc's school was enough to get me running through my hair with nit combs twice a day and soaking it in tea tree solution - and, no Sarah, I didn't feel the need to announce it to everyone I know).

Just the other weekend, the newest residents, namely 'worms', were casually introduced at the dinner table; 'Yeah, so Marc has worms. We've all got to take some drugs. Don't you just love kids.'

No, is the answer to that rhetorical statement. Right now, I do not. Thankfully, this common parasite has been around long enough (and in enough species) for the human race to have developed pretty effective drugs, so just one dose of it kills off any possibility of them for two weeks, when any remaining eggs apparently start hatching and it's good idea to re-dose yourself with the stuff. Just in case. I've been hoovering and washing everything in sight all week. Just found out that household detergents do nothing to the eggs though so tempted to start throwing bleach around.

Absolutely disgusting. I'm itching all over just thinking about it.

No, I'm not deluded and I knew about these before, but the reality is just something else... Working in childcare before you have your own should probably be banned as it must put so many people off! If everyone did it, I think the human race would be extinct right now.

I just can't wait to find out what's next! Fingers crossed that's not Giardia or Scabies. Half expecting him to come back with Ebola. Eurgh.

Le Bébé de Chocolat et Bonne Fête à Rayures!

Today I was really poorly. We've all been suffering with a nasty cold since last Thursday, but it's really caught up with me today. Not fun.

Fran went out to teach one of her lessons this afternoon and left me with the children. Marc is also feeling poorly and was apparently up at 6am, so he was playing up. As a bit of a bribe/calming him down after school thing, Fran let him have one of his chocolate eggs (he still has some little ones left over from Easter!) and rather than having just one, he brought his whole chocolate stash bowl into the living room.

He then had one of his eggs (after opening one other and deciding that he didn't want that one anymore - probably because it was broken but he just had a tantrum about it) and I stuck him in front of Sesame Street (I have about 75 podcast episodes of this on my laptop and he loves it!) while I went to make dinner in the next room.

Aurianne has finally learnt to crawl and is now getting into everything so I came back in every few minutes to check she hadn't found wires/got stuck under a chair. I then went out to serve up their dinner and was definitely not out of the room for more than 3-5 minutes. I walked back in to tell Marc that it was time to come and sit up to the table, and heard Aurianne scrunching some plastic. She had her back to me, but when she turned round I realised what she'd got; a plastic bag that (had) contained Marc's star chocolates and foam fish sweets. I then noticed there was no chocolate in this bag, and that, instead, it was all over her face, hands and clothes. She was really pleased with herself!

I took the remainder of the sweets away (just some of the foam fish sweets, one of which she'd clearly chewed on and decided she didn't like...) and tried to clean up the sticky baby! She'd managed to get it everywhere, including on the glass table and the carpet! I wish I'd taken a picture because it was hilarious, but I was too busy trying to sort her out.

I was mid-stripping her clothes off while trying to keep Marc, who was attempting to punch/hit his thieving little sister, at a distance, when Fran came back. Not quite the 'calm and well-organised scene with children happily eating dinner up to the table' look I was aiming for! So embarrassing!

Chocolate cake and
Chocolate/Raspberry Sauce

I decided that I would make a chocolate cake this afternoon (cravings), but didn't get a chance to thanks to the chocolate baby, but did once the children were asleep. I had planned to use the Kenwood but it seemed like more effort in the end...

I used the BBC All in One Chocolate Cake recipe to make it. When they say "the cake mixture will be very liquid" they aren't kidding! It also says 'Preparation time less than 30 mins' but I'm pretty sure it took me well over an hour - partly because I'm not feeling very well so everything is a bit all over the place, but also because I don't know where Fran keeps all her baking stuff yet. I also managed to pour boiling water, straight from the kettle, all over my finger, which obviously slowed me down even more.

Chestnut Creme
(It doesn't taste like Christmas)

"Mmmm, so moist!"

We also made a chocolate sauce which we'd intended to make into a ganache, but instead we made it with creme fraiche, dark chocolate, frozen raspberries and chestnut cream or 'Creme de Marrons de l'Ardeche' which Fran & Charly insisted I tried, telling me 'it tastes like Christmas!' (for the record, it doesn't taste like Christmas, it tastes like fig rolls).

The cake ended up being very well-timed though as it turned out that Charly actually got a promotion today! Being in the Navy, this means another stripe on the uniform (hence the 'Happy Stripe Day' blog title) so a cake was very befitting.

Fran got out candles, and then Fran and I sang 'Happy Stripe Day to youuu' to Charly and then we ate cake.

Just one last thing to add, Charly had to help a barge that had fallen over in the harbour today. Apparently, 'just like in one of Marc's Thomas the Tank engine books'. I wish I had a picture to post, ideally with the caption 'go home barge, you're drunk', but I don't. A shame really as the pictures Charly was showing me were hilarious.

Un Parc en Bord de Mer

View of the park and sea from the car park

Today was Wednesday which means no School! So, I took Marc to the Park (excellent rhyme) while Fran went to 'Boobie Group' - a kind of Breastfeeding coffee afternoon support group with like-minded mums. The group is quite far away (can't remember where) but this means Fran has to go in the car.

As it was a lovely day, I thought me and Marc could go out and so Fran suggested a park near the beach as this was on the way. The park was near to the Navy base and had two really modern play areas, one of which apparently had lots of trampolines (we didn't go up there). It was also right on the beach and had lots of stony rockpool areas too!

Marc spent over an hour playing in the park. It had loads of fun stuff in it - small climbing frame with slides etc. for smaller kids, and a bigger one on the other side, lots of spinning and wobbling equipment too.

On one of the spinning things, Marc kept wanting to go faster and faster and didn't want to get off. After 5-10 minutes on this thing, he announces that he feels a bit poorly so I got him off. He told me that he felt much better now and was going to run to the slide (the slide being straight ahead). He started running, but ended up almost doing a U-turn and then fell over as he was so dizzy! I asked him if he was ok and he said 'yes, but first the sky was there (pointed up) and then it was there (pointing down)!' Hilarious!

'Let's go see the big carrer', says Marc. (Anchor)

Plaque by the Anchor

After the park we went down to the rocks, where Marc collected lots of shells and stones. He found some 'snail' ones - tiny crab/sea snail ones and kept putting them down on the big stones so that they could 'walk away'. I had to explain that these shells were empty so there wasn't a snail or otherwise to walk away with the shell!

Lovely views across the harbour to the forts

Information board showing where we were
in relation to the rest of the harbour/beach

Beautiful views

"Ah, the Big Blue. What's it like?"
"Urm... big... and blue...?"
"I knew it."

La Plage

On the sunny afternoon of Sunday 31st August, the family decided to go on a walk at the beach and invited me to go with them. They're very kind and have told me that pretty much anything they do as a family, I'm welcome to join in with if I want.

There's about 3 beaches (that I know of) in or very close to Cherbourg, what with the town being on the coast of the Cotentin Peninsula and all. The beach we went to was called 'La Plage Urville-Nacqueville' about 20 minutes drive away from home. It's quite rare for us to drive places as school, shops etc. are within walking distance.

The beach was sandy and there were lots of campsites nearby. Lots of wind too, a bit like a nice English beach really. There were lots of people windsurfing and doing other similar water sports.

We parked on the other side of the dunes and walked along the beach. They strapped Aurianne into a front baby carrier so that she could have a sleep. Fran took off her shoes so she could paddle and Marc rolled up shorts so he could splash.

After walking for around half an hour, Marc took a big jump and slipped, falling into the sea! He was soaked. We had a spare change of shorts, but not a spare top. Charly took off his jumper and wrapped that around him so he wouldn't get cold - it was too long though so they used a hairband to tie the back and keep it up. It was hilarious. He looked just like a little rabbit!

I carried around his t-shirt and jumper, letting it flap in the wind to dry. They were so wet I had to wring them out! It was working but after another 15 mins he started getting cold so we turned around and headed back. 

We got back to the car before his clothes were dry so he just sat in a different one of Charly's fleecy jumpers for the ride home. This one was tan coloured and almost came down to his ankles. Combined with his sandals he liked like a little Arab boy. Hilarious.

Some pictures of Urville-Nacqueville beach...

Ici à Cherbourg

So I have arrived in Cherbourg! I'm loving my new family and getting to know the town.

My first day in Cherbourg was Friday 29th. Fran and Charly were really lovely and told me that because I had arrived early I didn't need to worry about waking me early and that I could just chill for a couple of days which is just what I needed.

My New Room!
(They bought me chocolates
and flowers as a welcome present!) 

Fran and Charly have two children, a boy and a girl. Marc-Alexandre (boy) is 3yrs old and then Aurianne (girl) is 8 ½ months.

Marc, being 3, tired and overexcited, gets a bit naughty and stroppy but on the whole is an interested and smiley boy. Monday will be his first day of school! They start school at 3 years old in France.

Aurianne is a very happy, smiley baby but two weeks ago hit the clingy phase and so is not very comfortable with strangers. Thankfully for all involved she took to me very quickly and is happy to be left with me for periods of time.

I'm learning how to find my way around places, and am having a lovely time settling in. It's been very relaxed which has been great after the stressful time with Helene!

Fran and Charly are on a bit of a health kick at the moment too. By this they mean eating better food, and in smaller portions; this is excellent for me, given my rocketing weight over the past year. Hopefully, with this and the walking to and from school, and up the two flights of stairs to the flat etc. I'll be back down to my happy size 8 again by Christmas! (Ideally well before that, but there's no point being unrealistic!)

In Cherbourg, they live in a large, 3 bed flat. The building used to be two, three-storey houses but the owner decided to knock through to join the two houses and make each floor into a flat instead. It's in a pretty good location with about 20 minutes walk from the town centre and harbour. It's a really good sized house but unfortunately has no storage. The kitchen has all of 2 cupboards under the sink so they've been forced to improvise with shelves. The lack of storage makes the house feel really cluttered, but there's not much that can be done about that. The other bad things about this flat is that the guy in the ground floor flat smokes, and it comes up through the air vents. Every now and then you get a big whiff of it which is not very nice. We also have other flats opposite and when they hang out of their windows to smoke we have to make sure the windows are closed else it blows right in.

Fran is taking me to find out about French classes the other day too. I think they're on Friday mornings and start next week (not 100%). I'm hoping that I can meet other au pairs/english speakers of a similar age so that I have people to hang out and do things with soon! We'll see!

Cherbourg Promenades en Mer

L'Adele Bateau
(Taken from the tour website)

French Flag flying on the Boat!

Forts around the Harbour

View of part of the forts

On my first day here (Friday 29th August), Fran took me on a boat tour with the children. It was about 20 minutes to the Harbour so we left at 3pm to get the 3:30pm boat tour.

You can embark on the boat from either the 'Pont Tournant' - the bridge at the harbour near to the shopping centre, or la Cité de la Mer. The harbour is much closer so we got it from there (the first boarding place) and then the ferry swings round to the Cité de la Mer. Fran was really glad we got it from the Harbour as to board from Cité de la Mer you had to climb down some precarious looking stone steps, and with a baby and a 3yo, not the safest!

It was very interesting and went all around the harbour, lasting around an hour. It was guided and they gave us lots of interesting information about Cherbourg and the harbour, well, at least I think they did... it was all in French! (Their website is in English though oddly enough www.hagueapart.com)

One of the forts in ruins
"Probably the Germans", says Fran.

The boat, called 'l'Adéle', went right up to the walls and forts which are all around the Cherbourg Harbour. These were built towards the end of the Napoleonic War, designed to keep the British out, but the French then ironically invited Queen Victoria to come and open them at a grand ceremony!

We saw lots of marker buoys which Marc got very excited by (probably because he could easily spot them and told us about them every time he saw one!) and also saw lots of Ferries going to and from Rosslare, Poole and Portsmouth.

We went past the Cité de la Mer (the Aquarium and Sea Museum) which apparently had/has an exhibition all about the Titanic. Cherbourg was (one of) the last places for the Titanic to stop and they're rather proud of that fact.

It was a pretty bumpy ride. Marc kept wanting to go and sit outside, but after the first 15 minutes, the seats had all been splashed and were too wet to sit outside. We had sat inside to begin with (Marc insisted) so hadn't gotten wet like a lot of other people, but this meant that we didn't really have a good view. He also wanted to run around a lot, which wasn't the best idea given how bumpy the ride was... We're lucky he didn't fall over!

Cherbourg harbour is actually quite big. There's a couple of beaches and the Ferry port, as well as the boat docking bit too.

It was quite a good boat trip all in all. Perhaps I'll do it again when it starts again in April (they're closed from October - March) and hopefully I'll be able to understand a bit more of the tour then!

View of Cherbourg from Sea!

La Dernière Ligne Droite

Thankfully, we were woken up by Helene at 8, not 6. She said ‘we are very late and have to leave immediately’. She wasn’t joking about wanting to leave immediately. I barely had time to throw clothes on before she was back to tell us that we had to go!

The journey was awful as ever, although finally someone had the idea that maybe I should sit by the door and not in the smallest seat in the entire car given that I was the 2^nd biggest person in the car… After that it was a bit more comfortable but the kids were still completely unaware of the concept of personal space.

We arrived at a Service station to pick up some breakfast at around 10am. My headphones were broken by Hermine (she yanked them out of my laptop on the ferry) so when I went in to go to the toilet I made a very speedy stop in the shop to buy some more. Helene came in to tell me that they were very late and now they were waiting for me I was wasting their time. I tried to hurry up but not much I could have done faster. I went back out to the car to find everyone sat on the grass eating, and definitely not waiting for me!

At some point we went past Avignon and the famous bridge – I meant to take a picture but I didn’t have a window seat at the time so didn’t get a chance.

Cat at the Train
station Car park

At about 1.30pm Helene told me they’d changed where Alienor would be getting the train. She was supposed to be getting a train from Bourges (I think) which was completely the wrong direction to where we were actually going, and instead she was dropped off at the train station in a town called ‘Beaune’. The family used to live there apparently so Helene was familiar with the roads – just as well as we entered Beaune with apparently just 8 minutes to go until the train, the satnav said 15 minutes, and they apparently hadn’t bought the ticket yet…

View from Beaune Train Station steps

Beaune was quite nice. Very french, naturally. Helene told me it’s a very old town with a wall going all the way around it. When we got to the train station they rushed in to get Alienor on the train, which must have left about a minute after they got there but somehow I think she managed to get on it. I was left in the car with the children – I don’t remember what they were doing exactly but they weren’t being very nice. Helene came back about 20 mins later and asked if I’d taken my medicine. Obviously I hadn’t as we’d left immediately in the morning and so I hadn’t had a chance. She started shouting at me telling me the reason she’d been gone so long was so that I would have time to take my medicine. I tried to explain that I couldn’t just take it in the car and needed to use a toilet. She then told me she would take the children away and I could go and find a restaurant and use the toilet in there and that she’d be gone for as long as I needed. When she asked how long I’d need I told her I’d need at least an hour – I only needed about 15 mins but I was pretty fed up of her and the kids and wanted a break!

More views of Beaune

I found a little pub just opposite the train station. Helene had suggested I go to some other restaurant over the road but it looked quite posh and the type of place you can’t just go in to have a drink and use the loo! The people in the pub were quite friendly. I ordered an orange juice and then sat there having a nice time for about 40 mins, and then went to take nasty medicine in the toilet. I’d taken the little plastic cups from the toilet at the hostel and had ‘borrowed’ a teaspoon from the Ferry so I could mash up tablets.

Lots of old buildings in Beaune

When I was done I texted Helene to tell her I’d wait at the train station. While I was waiting I decided to pick up my Railcard - a very good idea because I don’t know when I would have had another opportunity to get it! Helene returned at least 20 mins after that, during which time I just sat on the station steps and watched a cat wandering about in the car park.

Now that Alienor had gone I was able to sit in the front seat! Much more room so much more comfortable! I was also able to talk to Helene – the first time we actually had a proper conversation since I’d arrived in Corsica. I was very annoyed to find out then that there was no internet at the house in Vosges!

Un Voyage Difficile

This morning was awful. I didn’t sleep very well last night because I was worrying about the journey, medicine etc. (mainly just because no one actually gave me any information so I didn’t know what was going on!)

I must have only got around 4-5 hours sleep, which was interrupted by a lot of banging at 4:30am – the german uncle (finally found out his name was Albrecht) and Benoit were leaving (I think going to Ireland, but who knows).

I got up at about 7am. I had some hot chocolate and then went to take my medicine. At 7:30am I asked if it was ok to use the shower to which Helene told me ‘No no no, there is no time’ so I just had a quick wash in the sink instead and then got dressed. I helped all the children finish getting dressed and have breakfast and we were ready to leave at about 8am. I was feeling very sick and the children wanted to play in the garden so I sat with them and had a drink of water. 5 minutes later Helene started shouting at me telling me that there was so much to do because we were about to leave and to go and help in the kitchen. I went to the kitchen only to be told by Anne and Grandmaman that it would be easier for me to wait in the garden with the children because there wasn't enough space (they were just emptying the fridge, getting the food together). There really wasn’t much to do – they had paid for the cleaning service at the villa so they didn’t have to wash bedding or towels or vacuum or anything.

Helene told me to put the children in the car because we had to leave very soon so I started getting the children into the car with all their things at about 8:30 and they were all inside, ready to go by about 8:45. At 9:15 I was getting annoyed. All the children had been sat in a boiling hot car for half an hour but Helene was just talking to the other adults. At about 9:30 we FINALLY left and by 9:40 all the children were fed up with their toys and games (obviously). At 9:45 we made our first stop at the side of the road because one of the kids was feeling carsick. I kept telling them to look ahead out of the window, and to open their window and let in some fresh air but for some crazy reason Helene told them to look out of the side windows and to put a jumper on – what?! Consequently we stopped another 2 times in that first hour… We also stopped after about 40 minutes to have a coffee at a little café – something else that made no sense to me. She didn’t even ask the children to go to the toilet if they needed to when they were there and so 5 minutes later they were all crying because they needed to go.

Helene told me to order a
'small hot chocolate' at the cafe.
Tiniest hot choc I've ever seen
(this cup was barely bigger
than an espresso cup)

There was hardly any room in the car, but Helene made me sit in the smallest seat in the whole car (the middle seat) – despite being bigger than all the other children. Apparently Hillaire gets carsick – so put him in the middle so he can look out of the windscreen!? Idiot.

We arrived at Ajaccio at about 11:30am and then drived around all over the place, the wrong way down one-way streets etc. looking for a Boulangerie. Crazy. At about 12:30 (yes, almost a whole hour was spent driving around aimlessly) we stopped in the ferry carpark. The grandparents were coming on the same ferry so they found a shop and bought croissants, pain au chocolat and baguettes which we then stood in a car park and ate. I wasn’t able to put on suncream this morning either – they had made me pack it up in the car the day before so I now have slightly burnt shoulders because the only shade was one bench under a tree and there wasn’t room under it for me.

We then drove to the boarding area for the ferry. Helene told me that she didn’t have a ticket in my name so if anyone asked my name was Bethany Amis (perhaps this is an au pair that cancelled on her which would explain the late notice for hiring me!). We then had to sit in a very hot car for almost an hour while we waited to board which was very difficult with bored and uncomfortable children (and me).

Eventually we boarded the ferry where everything was a big rush to find a seat. Helene then told me that she needed to spend time with her parents away from children because her mother was ill and was very exhausted so needed quiet time. She told me that she would sit with her mother for an hour or so, and then come back to spend time with the children before dinner, after which she would go to have dinner with her parents and Alienor, and then give me some free time.

However, that, as always with Helene, wasn’t how it happened. She appeared 3 hours later, at which point the kids were all huddled around a French film and I’d stuck on a film for me on my laptop. She came up behind me saying ‘is that a film for the children?’ When I said no, they’re watching a film on their dvd player, she got really angry and started telling me that this was time for the children, not for me. Trying to explain that the children were watching their own French film right next to me didn’t make any difference – she just huffed and then shouted, ‘I am really fed up of you!’ and stomped off. Her 17yr old daughter Alienor then gave me a dirty look and followed her mother… I was pretty confused at this point, in my opinion it was pretty nice of me to look after the children at all as she’d told me that she was hiring me to be an English tutor and to edit her courses. 10 mins later she came back with 5 plates of steak hache (basically a burger that’s not in a bun) with chips, throws them all on the table and then stamps off again. I wasn’t sure if one was for me or if they were just for the children inc. Alienor, and when I asked Alienor what they wanted me to do she just said ‘eat and watch the children like you’ve been told to’.

I had just sat down to eat when Helene reappeared to tell me that she had to speak with me immediately. I got up and followed her off to some stairs somewhere (ridiculous place to decide to sit – loads of people kept trying to walk past with their bags etc.).  I don’t remember exactly what she said but the gist of it was that she wasn’t very happy with me because I hadn’t done anything at all in Corsica (oh, only look after the children, and help in the kitchen or with cleaning, washing…) I told her that she’d never actually told me that I was going to be looking after children so to now tell me that was the main reason she had hired me was pretty ridiculous. She then tried telling me that she had been very clear – I was hired to help with English, edit her courses and look after the children (she didn’t). She then told me that I had to keep the children with me until she had finished dinner with her parents because her mother wasn’t very well. I tried to explain that at any given time at least 1 of her children (usually Hermine) didn’t want to stay with me and would run off to find her. She just told me she didn’t care, that she needed to keep the children safe etc. When I asked her to tell the children that so they knew they had to stay with me as they didn’t understand/listen to me, she told me that she didn’t hire me to tell her how to be a parent… Not sure quite what that had to do with it.

Typically, she then didn’t come back. One by one the children disappeared to go and find her. I tried following and keeping track of them but once I realised their mother wasn’t actually so far away, I gave up. She was supposed to have come to take them away after she’d finished dinner anyway…

Final view of Corsica from the Ferry

We finally arrived in Toulon just after 11pm. Helene was very angry about this because she thought they’d have arrived at 10pm, allowing us to get to the hotel by around 12am. Naturally she didn’t account for the actual getting off the ferry which took around 20 mins, plus getting out of the ferry area which probably took another 20 mins. Consequently, we didn’t arrive at the ‘hostel’ until after 2am, although I’m convinced we could have arrived by half 1 if she’d started walking back to the car earlier, and then hadn’t driven around EVERY roundabout 2-3 times each, and taken about 5 wrong turns (seriously, how?! the signs were so clear and she had a map and satnav?!) When we arrived at the hotel she told me that, again, she hadn’t planned for me and had only bought 2 rooms for 6 people (there was 7 of us). She then told me I had to share with the 10 and 12 yr old boys while her, Alienor, and the two little ones shared the other room. I felt quite uncomfortable about this arrangement – and told her so, but she just told me there was no problem and that she wouldn’t change it.

The hostel was super basic – much worse than those Formula1 hotels we used to stay at. Worst part was that the bathroom was like a train toilet, except they’d squashed a shower in there too… I felt hot and sweaty and generally dirty after the travelling and ferry so had a very hot shower before I went to bed. It was a good move as I definitely wouldn’t have got one the next morning. Helene told me that we’d be leaving at 6am (to be honest I don’t know why you’d bother stopping for just 4 hours – probably would have been better to upgrade to a cabin and sleep on the ferry…). I probably asleep at around 3am in the end…