I went to spain for the day, but the weather was awful. I was surprised at my ability to use the few words of spanish I know. I've realised that my awkwardness of speaking french comes from caring too much, and feeling like I should be able to speak it well.

I'm going to miss Rodolphe, he's fun and nice, and he has no friends! But he said that's OK, he doesn't need friends... why do I always go for the loners? He packed me a lunch bag with a sandwich, cherry tomatos, a peach, chocolate cake and some sour lollies. He calls lollies 'sweeties' because he got mixed up when I explained about lollies/candy/sweets. I didn't correct him.

Today someone asked me, after talking for a little bit (OK, they were one word answers) if I were Belgique and someone even said 'oh finally, a French person!' (after I said one word)

I sat next to a poodle on the train. It was well behaved, it barked a few times when people unexpectedly walked past, but that's to be expected, right?

I'm in Nice now. My room is tiny, the food is awful, but I like it anyway. I've had some successful smiles, but so far no friends. Tomorrow I will make many.

The south is so much better than Paris. Not just the sunshine, but the people are aren't so uptight, EVERYONE wants to chat, and they have funny accents.

I'm quite nervous about tomorrow, I just hope there are some really crap violinists.

In two weeks I have a week off, the first half is as yet unplanned, the second half I am going back to the west to go to the wedding of Jan (older son of the family I stayed with) and Chi. There will be 180 peopleish. I will sleep in a field, or a barn, or something equally exciting. Perhaps I will meet a cute boy.