On Monday, May 4 I had to visit the doctor to see if I would be allowed to stay in France. This was rather a disappointment because Ben and I thought it would be a useless thing to do. But we heard that if I didn't go through with it my carte de sejour could be taken away, so reluctantly we (Amy came too) all headed to the specific doctor's office that dealt with foreigner's coming to France. Once we got there, we showed the receptionist my carte de sejour and she motioned us into the waiting room, where we sat just about 10 minutes and a nurse came by to pick me up. She directed me to a little room to change for the x-ray. Once changed, she spoke to me in French and demonstrated the actions I needed to take to help her with the x-ray. That was easily done, but once done the real wait began. I looked at my watch, it wasn't nearly closing time for the office yet, but I felt like I was forgotten. Unfortunately my appointment was planned at 12 noon and we got there early so as to be seen before noon. That happened, but I had to wait for the doctor a good 15 minutes before he was ready to see me. When he did see me, he asked all the questions for the interview in French. I even told him " En Anglais, s'il vous plait" but he continued merrily in French, doing a few motions to explain what he was asking. I watched him quickly check my paper, which I figured was a good sign. Then, at the very end of my paper, he wrote a large OK. So I could only guess I was a-OK, that I was allowed to continue to live in France for the rest of the time here. He gave me another paper and I left the office, confused and relieved it was over. I told Ben all of my visit was in French. He couldn't believe it at first because he had been lucky, like so many of my friends here, and got the entire thing in English. Nevertheless I gave Ben the paper I had received and he told me he would give it to Christiane, our liaison while we are here. She would do what she needed to do with it and I could stay. I am not French, but the whole process was rather ridiculous. But such is life. Sometimes pointless things need to happen. Amy and I spent the rest of the day in Toulouse, enjoying the beautiful weather and shopping.
The next day (Tuesday, May 5) was spent on a rather different adventure, we had decided to take a train out of town. To the town of Albi. We had gotten our tickets the day before, so in the morning we arrived at Gare Matabiau early so we would be more than ready for our train. When we got there, about 20 minutes walking from the apartment, I could not see our destination on the board, the only destination that was even remotely close to our tickets was headed to a different location. It was headed to Rodez instead of Albi. That definitely got me nervous about our train, but all the other information followed our tickets. So I stuck with it, watching the Rodez stop carefully so we would catch what platform we would be headed to. It finally came up and we headed straight to it. When we reached to platform, to my dismay the tracks beside it looked to be under construction, it confused me so much that I thought we might be on the wrong platform, but everything pointed to it. After the train arrived, I knew for sure we were on the right platform. The train that appeared looked a lot like the train we took to Bayeux, so it was a smaller train, more like what you see in a metro station. There were both permanent seats and ones you could fold down. Amy and I sat across from each other on some of the permanent seats. The train was rather full going to such a small destination, but it seemed it made a few stops before Albi as well. So the train for the most part evened out, there were fewer people once we had stopped in Albi. Entering the station, I grabbed our trusty Rick Steve's guidebook which gave directions from the train station to the center of town. It was quite correct and soon we were standing under the massive St. Cecile Cathedral. We went in and Amy was amazed. We peeked around for a little bit, but I was unable to show Amy the cathedral's blind for it was closing for lunch time. So we walked out and I wondered if she was alright if we had lunch then (for it was about noon). She agreed and we walked around Albi for a bit trying to find a good deal on a meal. We found one at a petite restaurant that I unfortunately did not write down the name of. But we were able to get seats and were quickly served. Amy and I both had tarte salee or savory tarts. They were quite tasty and we savored every bite. Soon it was time for dessert and we both picked the tarte framboise or raspberry tart. It was also quite tasty, it was served with a small scoop of ice cream that just improved the taste. Our meal was soon over and we headed back to see the choir blind, which we had missed on our first visit. Once there we immediately entered the blind and I again read about the importance of the blind, that it was one of the few remaining and that each angel was holding something different. After visiting the blind, we headed to the Tresor, which I had not seen before. It held many of the cathedral's important relics, safely protected against heavy glass. When we descended the stairs, the cathedral had become busy with school children, it made it hard to get around and to talk to one another because of the noise and the amount of children. But we were able to exit by weaving in and out of the children as they stood in line. Amy thoroughly enjoyed the cathedral and I thought it was nice I had a chance to enjoy it for the second time and admire the grand artwork that adorned its walls.
The cathedral was not the only stop on the list when going to Albi. I thought Amy might like to see the Henri Toulouse-Lautrec museum as well. So we stopped by and I introduced her to his artwork. Again I enjoyed seeing the work for a second time. It was interesting to see if I caught anything different that I had not noticed before. I didn't catch much, but I realized what pieces of art I enjoyed the most. Which were his very practiced landscapes and dramatic pictures of people. Amy was quite fascinated and enjoyed his paintings more than his prints. But to each his own. Our trip to Albi was winding to a halt, for the train we were to take was to arrive in an hour. So with that hour we relaxed and sat down for a bit to enjoy the brilliantly sunny day and ponder the beauty of the cathedral and what we had seen for the day. Our rest was too quickly over and we trudged back to the station to wait patiently for the train. Many people were headed back to Toulouse, and Amy worried we might not fit. But to our happiness a larger train arrived to take us back. Without a hitch we arrived back in Toulouse to trudge back to the apartment and see what Ben was up to. I was glad Amy had enjoyed herself in Albi and what Albi had to offer. It had been a wonderfully art-filled busy day.
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