The house that we’ve rented for our first year in France was advertised as une petite maison which can translate as a little house or even a cottage. What I have yet to discover is a French word that means “home” in the sense that we normally use it as being a warm and welcoming place. That certainly is not to say that it doesn’t exist considering how welcome we have always felt there and the fact that their culture values friendship to the point that they have divided it into seven levels. We just have to keep looking.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for us just follow the light. What? Yes, in Carcassonne the light really is different depending upon which side of the river you live. Fellow blogger and former resident there, Tracy, told us that because of the presence or absence of trees from one bank to the other you really can tell a difference. I figure that if we lived in Paris we would be saying that we live on the Left Bank or the Right Bank, so why not do the same in Carcassonne? But which is which? The Left bank (Eiffel Tower, Latin Quarter) is usually associated with intellectuals and artists while the power of the Presidency and business is centered on the Right (Louvre, Arc de Triomphe). We’ll have to figure that one out.