[tramvai of dreams] the french motif

Foggy day

Wish I'd had a camera today. About half the snow has gone and it was foggy, not unlike in this photo from Flickr.

Crossing the bridge to town, the river still frozen and snowladen and with the fog patchy in places, it was other-worldly, atmospheric and I was hurtling to my Day of Women.

Officially this Saturday is International Day of Women [March 8th] but I have two days of women each week - Wednesday and Friday and it can get crazy. My Day of Men is always Thursday and it's a nice relief.

I was supposed to deliver my first lecture on Australia early afternoon to the 5th Course and when I got there, there were no girls anywhere. Now this was weird because I was expecting around 90 to 100 of them and it's a bit hard to hide that number away in a corner.

Turns out they had me down for the following "pair" [time period] and so it was a waste of time - couldn't go anywhere as I was being picked up by a French woman in her SUV at 14:00 so the only thing was to go down to the stolovaya for a coffee but as I hate sitting on my own, I took a girl I knew down with me and the woman who runs the place was highly amused - you don't take girls to stolovii - it's a little lower than a cafeteria.

This is the one I mentioned some time back is always passing me on the stairs or happens to be where I am or vice versa - it's become a bit of a joke and really is coincidental.

Trouble is, she's French-English and I'm English-French, which means we had to speak in a combination of French, Russian and Pidgin-English. She was telling me about going to Paris to the Sorbonne and so we discussed Paris.

Then a whole load of French-Englishers came in and that was worse. Eventually they all disappeared and the 5th Course rocked in, ready for my lecture but I had to tell them I wouldn't be there.

'But you are here.'

'Da but I shan't be in five minutes.'

'Why not?'

'Because I'm being collected.'

'But you have a lecture with us.'

'No, I have a lecture with you now, in this pair.'

'But you're in the stolovaya with us instead.'

This was clearly going nowhere so I tried to explain but they still felt I was pulling a swifty on them or didn't want to give them their lecture or whatever. I had to say, 'It's not my fault,' and then blamed the administration and they understood that one well - everyone does that. Well, that was all right then.

So I left and was collected and she looked amazing. Mistake was to take her to the Pyramid because there was a girl there I'd given to understand I was keen on two Fridays ago [tramvai of dreams post] and I understood she'd not be working today. This was tricky and then my French friend said about her that she looked uncannily like my ex-girlfriend and I'm wondering how she knew that.

Then the penny drops. This is where I'd brought the French lady some months back when my ex-girlfriend had come into the cafe and we'd made an appropriate reconciliation in the middle of the floor. This thing was now turning into a French farce.

Back to the uni and just as I'm about to have my last pair, a French festival starts up and kills that idea - the topic I was planning to do was The Art of French Dressing - you've seen it on this blog. We eventually managed and a photo will be forthcoming hopefully this evening, maybe tomorrow.

I'm getting very nervous now about this Saturday. There are about twelve women and a whole load of girls expecting some little prezzie from me and I'm thinking out how to be ill or out of town but even if I do, they'll get me the following week. So nothing for it but to open the wallet but what to buy them? Chocolates?

The driver on the way home muttered, "I hate this time,' meaning March 8th. Some years back the police pulled me over for some infraction on this day and I reminded them that it was The Day of Women - a day of peace, love and reconciliation.

The head honcho, I remember, retorted, 'Woman's Holiday', meaning he was still going to give me the full fine. What a bstd.

So - are all you boys gearing up to buy your women something super-duper? The ladies are waiting in anticipation. Or shall we declare it International Day of Men and retire to the bar?