Across the street from a Creole restaurant, I turn the key to enter and pass through the lingering sweet stale smell of an overflowing garbage can before seeing myself in the mirror ascend the marble staircase to apartment number seven on the third floor. My temporary neighbours consistently offer a polite greeting without hesitation whenever we pass in the stairwell. I feel welcomed. We all easily take care to avoid the new double-pained window frames that await installation and that are stacked against the wall on each level.

Nice

The key turns clockwise twice to unlock the door to the six-room flat where I rest. The apartment smells of smoke and lavender air spray. The rooms are decorated with African masks and amateur unframed paintings signed ‘V. Sicot’. My room is a warm yellow and my bed is a faded orange. The two fans on top of the dark wooden and locked dresser sit idle, apparently exhausted from the unpaid overtime this summer. I have a little Goldstar TV that plays six French channels that I watch in the evening after stealing the pillow from the unused second bed in my room. The bath mat in the bathroom next door is a big blue foot made of thin rippled foam.

Door, St. Paul de Vence

I am in Nice, a city burned as much by the soft Mediterranean sun as by the hard echo of dirty scooters and mini smart cars that park perpendicular to the curb. The streets are cleaned every morning before the sun rises and pool with water that waits to be soiled again by the lap dogs of the South of France and the maladroit pigeons of blunderous bipedal birth!

The mother of the household in which I am staying during my three-week French course is a fast speaking Franco-Italian with dark black hair and a discreetly pierced nose. She is well tanned with a finely wrinkled face. Married twice, Angi is kind and trustworthy and she looks after her three-month-old granddaughter while her oldest child sells homemade necklaces to the rich and wealthy in Monaco and December is a big month.

Every evening at seven, I am called to dinner with a loud casual yell indicative of familiarity despite only having known Angi for a short time. I mimic her call playfully and sincerely. I am one of the many students that pass through her home and life. At the moment, I share the residence with another student who attends another language school but never goes. Her name is Kathy and her parents think she is learning French in school. They have kindly paid for her four months here. She is a twenty-seven year old redhead with fair skin and dark eyeliner.

Nice’s old town.

Kathy is a daughter of privilege and doesn’t respect it despite being sweet-tempered and pleasant. She speaks several languages and spends most of her time being young in Nice with a misguiding boyfriend – or so Angi tells me disapprovingly. Kathy and Angi have a confidence to which I am privy, if only partially, while we dine on simple food. The meals are simple because Angi doesn’t have time for anything else: while looking after her granddaughter she lives off coffee reheated in her microwave. It is here that I first learn that the French know little of how to eat a balanced vegetarian diet! On the evenings when Kathy dines out, Angi is patient and eager to chat while I eat my dinner and baguette. I look forward to the fruit yogurt at the end of the meal.

Friday night and ‘All of Me’ resounds clumsily on an acoustic guitar through the well-lit streets of Nice. Un Homme d’Or, a man of gold, mimes a statue and only moves for money. He motionlessly competes with the Baroque Man who is dressed for a masked ball in ornate blue and white: This street performer balances two twin cats on his arms and plays catch and other games with them. If only he could train the viewers as well as he has trained the cats. I paid €3.10 for a coke in an Irish pub yesterday; I can’t remember the last time I paid $5.00 CAN for a soft drink.

The streets are noisy, busy and unspectacular as a tramway is being built and detours traffic. The same homeless man, whose skin colour, like a chameleon, matches the dirty grey of his coat, watches the same TV in the same store window before the same closing time each night.

The vieille ville, the old town, is a mass of buildings that cascade horizontally over each other. And the stores therein spill out onto the cobbled sidewalks in the same manner. I can’t walk without smelling a patisserie with its tempting sweets and pastries. A middle aged woman who works in a near by patisserie always warmly smiles when I enter to purchase my daily baguette. The French can spot a foreigner as easily as spelling the name of a well-known fast food restaurant correctly. While walking home one day I wonder if I remind her of someone. Would she smile if she saw me out of context, without the €65 in hand? I glance left and see her pass by on the street – She smiles and answers my question without knowing.

Many of my questions would be answered the same way over the next four weeks. I had a hidden guide…

Tags: travel