I am back and I don't hate France!

 

Having turned a bit sour on my Belle Epoque City as a home, we went off to Montpellier for a week to visit our cousin and kick that city's wheels, so to speak. While we were gone I had loaded up clerkmanifesto with snacks for you, which I hope you enjoyed. Sometimes snacks are better than meals! But we are back now to some good, solid home cookin'!

Honestly, I have no idea why I'm talking like this.

But the truth is, we adored Montpellier, not just for its gloriously pedestrianized medeival center, but for its truly kind people and chill atmosphere. Where we live now pretends to be chill more than it actually is chill. Also Montpellier felt like France in a way that the places we've lived in and visited this first half year here didn't entirely. And oh how we liked it.

We liked it so much we might move there.

I will report on developments in the weeks to come.

Also, I have a substantial amount of pictures and a few written things from the time of this trip, so I'll be bringing these to you in the days to come. I took pictures in Montpellier and also experimented with some new and favorite stylistic reinterpretations of them, so hopefully I will be able to convey some of the charms of this stony city, with its little charming squares, festive student population, and wildly adorable sculptures. To give you a taste of our journey today I will give a little sampling of this variety of images of Montpellier. In the days to come I will no doubt present more coherent collections of my souvenir photos.

Across the street from a Thai Restaurant we became fond of:

A section of the enormous cathedral that is connected to one of the oldest medical schools in Europe:

A staircase in the more than 500 year old botanical gardens:

A not Roman, but rather 18th Century Aqueduct, quite grand, that used to supply water to the city. It is a purpose, as you can see with the rising sea levels, that is no longer relevent:

Just a quiet street in the center, which can open up at times, but usually remains peaceful from the lack of cars:

A grand old tree near the Arceaux neighborhood that had students picnicing under it. You will see more tarot cards like this tomorrow:

The small square next to where we stayed in the second half of our visit:

The interior of a Japanese Restaurant we liked, and it definitely looked it: