Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Liberté, Égalité, Reality
'I'm really glad you moved here, the gene pool could really do with some shaking up!'
I'm not sure what we expected when we took Samuel for his first day at the local school, but
a tacit admission from one of the other parents that perhaps some local families were a bit too
close wasn't up there.
Though I like to think that we've added a certain exoticism to the area - well I have anyway,
I'm certainly the only mod around here - we didn't move to be the 'English family in the vil-
lage'. Natalie and the boys all have French citizenship now; they are to all intents and purposes
French; but that doesn't mean that the boys don't have their English traits and sometimes they
stand out like, well, like a mod in a
boulangerie
.
That said, I love the fact that my children are part French, part English. There are things I'm
not happy with, of course: Samuel doesn't like Yorkshire pudding, and Maurice, to stress his
Frenchness, will eat baked potatoes but not the skin. But the point is that they fit in.
Samuel was a little reluctant at first. He started school very soon after we moved in, and we
went to see the headmaster - Monsieur Vernon - to ask if he could just do some mornings for
a while so that he could adjust. Monsieur Vernon was having none of it. While quite obviously
loving the children in his care, he seemed to have little or no patience with their parents. He
peered at us over his heavy-rimmed glasses; if this was the kind of weak, lily-livered attitude
that British education produces, he seemed to be thinking, no wonder they're all coming over
here.
'Non,'
he sighed, more in disappointment than anything else. '
Non.
If you start school, you
start school. It is not a hobby!'
Poor Samuel - he was only four! It was like he was being initiated into some highfalutin
Academie Française, not the local infant school. We had the option of waiting until the new
school year started in September, but that was eight months off and we felt that if we left it too
long he would find it even harder. He only had a smattering of French and for the first fort-
night or so clearly found it very difficult indeed, saying that he wanted to go 'home' and that
he didn't want to learn French anyway.
I've learned over the years that parenting, more often than not, is about knowing when to
bribe and what to bribe with; and the promise of various
Star Wars
related tat if he made more
