Brigitte

Sometime over last weekend I bumped into our French neighbour, Brigitte, who lives above us on the second floor. She has always been very friendly and helpful since I first came down here two years ago and she also speaks a good deal of English. We (Debrah and me) have had the occassional get-together with her but hadn't done so for quite a while - so I asked her if she would like to take an aperitif with us sometime this week. The date was set for this evening and she would come with her 'friend' Michel.

Brigitte is a divorcee who doesn't have a kind word to say about her ex-husband, who runs a pharmacy just across the river Aude at the base of the Cite. She has two children, a boy and a girl, much the same age as my own. Her friend, Michel, appears to be the new man on the scene although that is mostly supposition - he owns a couple of holiday appartments and fancies himself as something of a wine expert. The only previous time we met he was trying to blind me with the French myth about wine which he assumed I knew nothing about until I gave him a full description of the French word 'terrior' in French which not only shut him up but probably pissed him off as well.

I am obviously not the only one to piss him off because Brigitte turned up this evening without Michel - they had had a difference of opinion and he had stomped off in a strop and no doubt taken his ball with him. Brigitte didn't seem to care and in her best philosophical franglais announced that "tomorrow eeez anudder day" I get the impression that she has had more than enough of the French male attitude, and probably any male attitude.

Mind you, when I informed Debrah that I had invited them for drinks she was less than enthusiastic if not downright grumpy about the whole thing. She has been a bit grumpy this week because she has had a lot of work to do and not all of it that interesting and the date of our imminent departure is looming, despite having snatched a few extra days. So there was a lot of "you invited them, you sort some food out" followed, this evening, by "why have you done it like that?" and "the sausages aren't piled up the right shape" type comments.

As ever, in the end, all was lovely and all had a very enjoyable evening. Brigitte was on good gossippy form and her and Debrah sipped peach bellinis and smoked fags and laughed a lot while decourously adorning the sofa.

Brigitte explained, that as a Parisienne originally, she found it very difficult to understand the local accent and dialect, and sometimes found it difficult to make herself understood. Good grief! - what chance do us poor Brits have when the French can't understand each other - well, at least I can say "Desolee, je suis Anglais" and get away with it as a foreigner. Brigitte doesn't have that excuse and is probably recognised as a Parisienne divorcee of a good local pillar of the community - no chance really. In fact, nobody from anywhere north of mid-France has stood any sort of chance of being accepted down here after Simon de Montford and the Crusade army had marched all the place in the 12th century slaughtering the Cathars and anyone else who got in their way and nicking their land all in the name of God and Catholicism. There is an 800 year old grudge which shows no sign of abating - I'm convinced that I am more accepted here than anyone from the Ile de France.

So we talked about property prices and the state of the building and the lack of action from the managing agents and what we were going to do about it, and we gossipped about neighbours old and new, and we talked about the new British Prime Minister and the new French President, and our children, and the weather of course, and Carcassonne and the market and the history of the building and so on and so on.

Talking of ex-neighbours as we were - it appears that the so called very respected surgeon that sold the property to us might not have been quite as respectable after all. This appartment wasn't his main residence - oh no - it was kept for 'special' entertaining. There was so much eyebrow raising and side of the nose tapping going on from Brigitte as she explained this that you couldn't help but conclude that our esteemed former owner kept the place as a 'shag pad' - what a short balding moustachioed dark horse he turns out to be! I have seen him once or twice walking up the road casting an eye up to the windows - I always thought he was wondering what we had done to the place but he was probably just reminiscing about some prior conquest.

One great advantage of talking with Brigitte is that she helps me to speak French because she is happy to correct me and help me say what I want to say in the right way, and because she also speaks good English I find it easier to understand where I have gone wrong. At the same time we help her with her English which is very good but not perfect or fluent. 'C'est une nouvelle entente cordialle'

The other thing that Debrah and Brigitte have in common is that they are both tequila monsters. Brigitte recounted her Bastille Day experience this year which included beaucoup de tequila and not remembering anything about the fireworks at all - I think Michel had a bit of a strop that night too. He should lighten up - that's my advice - the ladies on the tequila is a special special thing to be loved and appreciated. I look forward to getting them both in the tequila mood at the same time - that will probably be an exceptional evening . Salut.