What were they thinking??

What's with the website you need to go to in order to rent boats around here??? And the starting age is 16??? Crazy French!

Pictures of the Apartment

Well, I promised pictures and here they are. This is the inside of our new apartment. It is pretty nice, but super small. You can't tell by the pictures. but it is smaller than it looks. As you can see we got cupboards, a sink and a stove top (stupid electric!), but nothing else in the kitchen. To the right of the sink goes a dryer (have to by that still), to the left of the stove goes the clothes washer (it is coming on Friday) and I forgot to take a picture of the tiniest spot possible for the fridge (that is also coming on Friday). Under the stove, where there is a curtain is suppose to be an oven, but actually it is a vacant hole (we bought the oven and that is coming on Friday, as well). We also bought a microwave, coffee maker and blender.
The bathroom doesn't come with an enclosure around the tub or curtain so we have to buy that, as well so we can actually take a shower. I am so tired of spending money I could puke!!!! As soon as all of our appliances come, I will post some more pictures.

Shopping Spree in Stormy Weather

So it took another 3 days, but we finally got the keys to our apartment. It rained the entire weekend and it was also a holiday, but we managed on Monday to get some appliances. So we went to this store called Boulanger (it is sort of like Circuit City) and spent 2/3 hours there buying a fridge, washer, oven, microwave and iron. They didn't have the fridge, washer or oven in stock. What a big surprise that was! So we now have to wait and have them deliver everything on Friday. I had to order a coffee maker (good grief) and it will be here on Wednesday. The other totally crazy thing is that we wanted a toaster and they didn't have that in stock, either. They said it was going to take 4 weeks! For a friggin toaster???? So after that we went to Decathalon. (Pics above) Boy do I like this store! It is like Sports Chalet, but wayyyy better. The last picture is little Presley exhausted from the day and it was only half over at that point! So we got some mats and sleeping bags because we have to camp out on the floor of our apartment for the next month until our stuff from the states arrives. Lord help us!!!

Then we went to some random store that wants to be Ikea and got mentally exhausted by all the crap you can buy. We only came out of there with some hangers and a shower curtain! Michael absolutely hated that place so I venture to guess that we will never go back there.

Then we decided to go to the sea for a quick view. It was really stormy that night. What a bunch of crazies we were!

Next up~pictures of the new apartment

Official Provencial Renter

So I just signed the lease for my south of France apartment. It took more than 3 hours to do the friggin' paperwork! Can you believe it! It is also a totally empty apartment, and by that I mean, no fridge, no washer, no dryer, no oven, no stove! You get nothin' here when you rent and when you leave, you take your stuff with you! Whatever. So now we have to go and by all that junk. Hopefully we will move in on Monday or Tuesday. I am so ready to be done with hotel-camping. Pictures to come!!!

Picnic at the Calanaques

Today was better than most of the days have been around here. I actually got some work done and was invited on a hike and picnic,by the two girls I work with, in the Calanaques. When at the top, you can see the cove of Cassis on one side and the cove of La Ciotat on the other. The weather was great! Warm and sunny, but a bit windy at the top.

Work, as usually, has not gone too well. The internet here is just crap and we can't seem to get any speed. I called Orange France Telecom, that's the company we use (and every body raves about here) and they said we have crappy internet and phones for the business. Duh! So the guy told me about Orange Business Services which is suppose to give you better service. Why didn't they just give us that in the first place instead of stupid residential lines?? We are in a business park! So they gave us there little blah blah blah and told us it would take 1 month to run the lines. In the meantime, I gotta have some decent speed to work an ERP system. Let's hope that they can hurry this up. I hate inefficiency:(

Luckily some time away for lunch today was a much need break. Oh, and say hello to the two girls I work with, Marie and Severine. They are awesome!

 Tomorrow is sign the lease agreement for an over priced apartment day. Wish me luck! I don't have any more time to shop around ;D

Poster Child of France

First weekend in Provence

Well, we made it through the weekend. I can’t actually say it was all good, but Sunday evening was nice. Michael and I took a walk near a lovely golf course which had a hiking trail nearby. Definitely want to do that again. The hotel is called Dolce Hotel and Resorts Fregate Provence. Apparently a fregate is a golf course around here. Whatever?  Here is their site.

http://www.dolce-fregate-hotel.com/

So on Saturday I had to go to work. The internet at our hotel stopped working on Friday night so the only way to conduct business was to go to my office. That worked out fine since Michael is still trying to figure out what to do with the internet connection at my office. While he was messing around with that (he calls the wiring here a “clusterfuck” by the way), I was still trying to fool around with my work email. I still can’t get Outlook here, and I hate webmail. Anyway, I found out that the lady who we want to rent an apartment from is being a really big pain. She keeps thinking that we are going to skip out on her and not pay the rent or something. I have given her so much paperwork it is ridiculous. So she tells me I need to have some sort of guarantee from my boss that I am a good person. So my boss writes this letter and I send it to her. Now she says she needs a copy of my work visa. I wish she would just get her act together and tell me everything she needs all at once. So I emailed her my visa and a copy of my lease agreement in the USA showing that I lived in the same place for 2 years and they loved me soooo much after the first year that they allowed me to stay a second. Then I sent her the phone numbers of the 2 people I rented from when I was here (after I got their ok) and told her to call them for a character reference. I also sent her the immigration lawyer’s info so he could tell her “yes- she is all good and legal”. If that much info doesn’t convince her then I don’t know what will and I don’t want to even rent from her. I will be truly pissed, though, because she originally told us “yes” and we could move in this past weekend so we stopped looking for apartments and concentrated on other things. 

So after working at the office for a few hours, Michael and I went off to a town called Aubagne, just up the road, but it cost you 2. 40 euros round trip. Well, guess what. We got stuck in the toll booth because all I had was paper money and the toll booth only takes coins. So we had to push the attendant button and wait for some French guy to slow-as-molasses walk over and give us some change while the cars behind us started lining up and honking like crazy. Eventually, we got through and now we keep change with us at all times.

 In Aubagne, we went to a store called Darty to do some research on what to do with the clusterfuck at the office and also price out appliances. When you rent an apartment in France you have to have your own appliances, and then when you move out, you take them with you. Weird. So we stayed at Darty for while and then we had to go to the car rental place to show them the damage on our car. It is kind of messed up with a big scrap down the driver’s side where the kid’s scooter hit and along the window where his helmet hit. Needless to say, the car company wasn’t thrilled. The lady took pictures and told us to come back on Monday with the police report.  So we took off for Carrefour (which is a super cool market here  sort of like Costco) and made sure we did some grocery shopping because nothing is open in France on Sundays except for the police stations, hospitals and churches. So we loaded up on food (so far shopping for groceries has been the only successful thing we’ve been able to do here). Then we headed back to my office to do some more work. We ended up staying there until 10:30pm. After that, we went home and made tacos (yes –you read right) good old fashion Mexican food with rice and chips. It was great. Then went to bed at midnight!

On Sunday, we went back to the office to use the internet to print out some Google maps. The internet is still not working at the hotel.  We needed maps to get to Marseilles because today was the day that we had to go to the police station to pick up Michael’s accident report.  I tried to get some more work done with my folders, but was not too successful. It is really too time consuming using webmail.  So off we went at 12:30pm to Marseilles. Needless to say the street signs here don’t match what Google says at all, but we found our way. Once in the station, and letting the officer at the front desk know who we were, all the officers came around to us (about 10 of them) and they all had to say “Oh the American from California-hello!!” in a real jolly sort of way. We sort of became celebrities to them and they were all smiles and nice to us. I sure as heck don’t get treated like that in the states! So they gave us the report and the officer said she thought it was the kid’s fault and not Micheal’s, so let’s hope that holds up. They all said “good-bye” to us (really!-in English) and we headed back towards the office. We arrived back around 1:30pm so Michael could continue fooling around doing research for this place. I swear it takes forever to get NOTHING done around here! While at the office Michael was using Marie’s computer and the little ball fell out of the mouse. How does she work like that! We left the office around 4:30pm to go home to eat and then headed off for our walk. I guess that 2 hours of peace and quiet during the whole weekend is going to have to be good enough. I still can’t get a damn thing done here, though. I don’t know how these French do it.

By the way, there are 3 things that piss me off more than anything:

1.When people cost me money.

2. When people waste my time.

3. When people are not helpful. 

So far this week, all three have happened. I am not in a good mood!  The only people who have been helpful are Marie and Severine. Thank God or I would have been stranded more than once!

Well, tomorrow is the start of a new work week. I am trying to keep the faith +

I Have Arrived

Hi All,

I actually made here! The trip was awful and I am not even going to sugar coat it. We got up at 5:30am on Sunday to leave by 7:30am to get to LAX. It rained on the way (but that was nothing compared to the rest of our trip). Everything went great at the airport, no issues there. The flight was really great. I recommend Air Tahiti Nui anytime! You should have seen the food they gave us (chicken and rice with veggies, bread, chocolate mousse, cheese, crackers, coffee) and for breakfast (waffles with raspberries on top, fruit, yogurt etc). I think it was the best airline food I have ever had! I should have know that our bliss would not last. Once arriving in Paris, it was all over. We arrived at 9am at Charles De Gualle airport. We were suppose to catch the TGV at 11:50 to be in Marseille and pick up our rental car at 3:30pm and make it to the hotel by 4pm. That never happened. Instead, we were told that our train had been canceled due to the strike and we would not be able to take another train until 2:30pm. So we parked ourselves and all of our luggage (6 very large suitcases 30" and 3 carry-ons 20" my computer and my daughters backpack)in the train station for 5 and 1/2 hours. Mind you, it was freezing in there. They do not heat the train station. Once on the train (it was a little late) we had to make every stop imaginable because not enough trains were running. It took 4 and 1/2 hours to get to Marseilles. By the time we got in, the car rental place was closed. It was now 7pm at night. I went to the ticket both to find a train to La Ciotat and was told that we would have to wait until 9:40pm ( 2 hours and 40 minutes in the station) before we could leave and it would be on a bus, not a train because they weren't running any more that night, that dropped us off, God knows where, some place in La Ciotat. So we went to find a ATM machine (which was outside in a shady area, and I don't mean under a tree, in Marseilles)and got some money to find a taxi to take us to La Ciotat. Well, the cars here are very small so picture Ross or Jacob's car but maybe a foot longer and that is what we got. Do you remember how much luggage I told you we had? So we didn't fit too well and in the tax station there were 5 guys trying to literally tie our luggage on to a Ross/Jacob sized car. The taxi driver left the back hatch open and tied the door down over our luggage. We also had luggage in the passenger's side of the car from floor to ceiling and Michael, my daughter and I each had a piece of luggage on our laps in the back seat. We did finally made it to our hotel, but it was 10:30pm (we were suppose to be there at 4pm). We did not have internet or a phone in the room and the heat and television didn't work. We also didn't have any food.(We decided before getting a taxi that we should eat something in the Marseilles station so we did that. I can't believe my first meal in France was stupid McDonalds!! That was the only thing open, but at lease we got dinner)

The next day I went to the hotel office to get the password for the internet and new batteries for the remote so we had heat and TV. I wanted to also tell them that a rental car was going to come and pick us up at 9am. I went to the office at 8:30 and was told by some guy outside the office, that it was closed until 10:30am that day (office hours are suppose to be 8:00am to noon and then 2pm until 7pm). Mind you, in the time I have been there no person has ever been in the office before 10am! Anyway, the guy gave me the batteries so that I could have TV and heat, but said that the secretary was the only one who could give me the password so that I could get on line. (I also did not have a phone at this time). The guy told me he would watch for the car rental. Well time passed and no car showed up. It was now 11am and I went back to the office. The lady was not there even though she was suppose to be there at 10:30am. There was another guy there who said he never saw a car. I asked if I could use the office phone. Well guess what! The office phone didn't work. Apparently France Telecom went on strike as well and they decided to shut down lines in certain areas and my hotel was in the unlucky area. So still no phone. The nice man let me use his cell phone to call Marie. I let her know what happened with the car so she called the car rental place and then called me back on the nice man's phone. They argued for a while (that was hilarious) and then I talked to Maire and she said the car rental people were coming back to get us.  They showed up about 15 minutes later and the guy in the car (I will call him Benoit) started to argue with the nice man at the hotel whose phone I had borrowed. Apparently the car rental did show up at 9am like they were suppose to, but no one told them to go to my room since the office was closed when it should have been opened! So we leave with Benoit in our microscopic car and go to the rental agency. Since this agency is small and in La Ciotat and not Marseille, we now have to pay more for the car rental than we would have if our train was on time! Nice. At the car rental agency Michael's credit card wouldn't work because Chase thought that his card had been stolen. That was fixed pretty quickly and we were on a way. WOW, we got 1 thing accomplished!

When getting to the office I learned from Marie that she was at a meeting that morning and guess who was there with her?? The secretary of the hotel office. That is why she wasn't at the hotel office and instead of some one there to take her place they just closed the office and no one told me my car was there! Beautiful... That night we found out that we still didn't have any heat in the hotel.

On Wednesday, we tried to get phones ( that still hasn't worked out for us) and look at some apartments (I didn't like them). Then we went to the office and stayed until 9pm. Apparently my Microsoft Outlook Email doesn't like my computer being in France. I can't get my email. So while I was on the phone for 2 hours with Jason, Michael was busy trying to see what he was going to do to get the internet speed faster. At 9pm we left, my email still not doing exactly what it is suppose to do and Michael having some ideas of what he would like to try to improve the internet speed. When we got home, Michael broke the hotel coffee maker and then blew up his drill charger plugging it into the wall thinking it was a 110/220. I guess not. Boy was the sound loud. Good thing the hotel doesn't have smoke alarms or they would have all gone off and we would have had to evacuate. Needless to say, our very cold room stunk that night.

On Thursday, we saw 2 apartments in the morning and 1 in the afternoon. We liked the one in the afternoon and went back with the owner to give her all my paperwork (boy-it was a ton! They want everything around here except your first born!) Now they know everything about me. They lady said that the owner was actually her son who lives in Paris and she would give him the info and get back to us. We are still waiting, but are hopeful that we will get the place. It is right around the corner from the office and it has a garage which Michael wanted for all of his tools. It is also close to shopping and the beach so I am keeping my fingers crossed that we get it. We would like to move in this weekend and get out of the hotel. It is too expensive and I don't want to keep paying for the room. We have suitcases every where and want to get settled. We again stayed at the office until 9pm talking to Jason about fixing my computer mail. It sill doesn't like me being here. But I have to give Jason a big "shout out" for all the patience and hard work he is doing to try to get me up and running. At the moment, I have to use webmail which seems to be working okay, I just don't have my signature and it is not as user friendly, but it works for now. Since we stayed at the office until 9pm, all the markets were closed and we couldn't by any groceries. We had McDonald's for dinner again. Can you believe it?? I didn't come to France to eat stupid McDonald's! I hate that place, but when you are hungry, I guess you will eat anything!

Today is Friday, guess what?? I have to call Jason again. Still need help with the email. I am at the office and Michael went off to the store to see about getting some wires and plugs for the internet at the office. He just called and some motorcycle passed him on the left while he was making a left hand turn. The motor cycle hit him and now he is in the police station. What the hell!! This is not my week. I have no idea what is going on since, of course, I am not there. He doesn't really have the capability to defend himself so I am worried that they will say it is his fault. So today is in the wash. By the time he is done fooling around with these yahoos at the station the store will be closed and he won't be able to get what he needs. Then he is going to come back super pissed and I will have to live with him being like that for the next couple of days. Great, that's all I need! I still don't have word about the apartment and really want to get in there by the weekend. It will be much easier to move then than during the week. Pray for us, we really need it!

Until later...........

Ashley