We moved into La Condamine on Saturday January 24th, 2015. By happy chance, there was a party in the Mairie the next day to mark Epiphany by drinking fizzy wine and eating Galette des Rois – which contains little figurines known as ‘fèves’ (beans). These confer good fortune on their finders. By some extraordinary chance, Esme and Saleem both had fèves in their slices.
And we have needed luck! No fuel in the central heating system; when filled, it turned out not to work, and it took another two/three weeks to find someone who could mend it (M. Odou: a genius from Serres, who collects old boilers to cannibalise in situations like this).
In the interim we had snow.
This is what the table outside our door looked like the afternoon before (as grumpy removal men shifted our stuff into the house, up ice-covered steps) …
… …
… and the same table the following morning.
And this is what our local mountain, Risou, looked like that afternoon:
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