Aurevoir ma chère France, ma Buongiorno Italia!

So it happened.  I left.  And it was horrendous.  Many tearful goodbyes were had and I thoroughly embarrassed myself as usual.  Fantastique.  The last couple of weeks were gorgeous though.  The weather was beautiful so I could be all voyeuristic in the park by spying on all the topless blokes doing yoga and the topless bloke walking on the tightrope.  There's no theme I promise.

I had a wonderful surprise visit from the lovely Verity in the last week.  We had a lovely time at Niolon which is just across the bay from Marseille.  It's such a beautiful spot which clearly needed some silly stunts.

The beautiful Verity:

And true to form and my word, on our last Friday night I did something rather silly that may or may not have involved swimming in the Rotonde, you know that massive fountain in the middle of the roundabout in Aix, at 5am.  Great idea, particularly when the police showed up.  (Interestingly instead of making a beeline for the dripping wet half naked girls they went to speak to the weird pervy men watching us)  Once again, video available on request, featuring commentary from the hilarious Jimmie Russell.  And so I finished the year as I started it, in a fountain for no real reason.  Typical.
Sadly I cannot describe how much I miss France.  I had such amazing friends there, as well as family, and even though Italy is lovely, I do want to go back to this bunch.

Sad times.

But onwards and upwards!  After a lovely few days at home where I got my puppy and pony fix it was time for Italia!  I will admit that I had a little wobble before coming.  I was missing France a lot and didn't feel I had the energy to move again, particularly to a country where I don't know anyone.  Luckily Mumma Coleman gave me a kick up the ass and I managed to haul my stupidly heavy suitcase to Florence.  It's rather beautiful in case you didn't know.

I have been living with a lovely Italian couple called Andrea and Fiamma and their two cats which is great fun.  Andrea and Fiamma are basically overgrown students so our lifestyles seem to fit quite well.  Every time I crawl out of bed hungover they are there telling me how proud they are of me while also being just as hungover as me.  We work well together.
Aside from writing a monster essay on Dante (apparently the physical and moral structure of the Divine Comedy is important or something) I have been studying at the Istituto Italiano to bring my Italian up to scratch.  After the first week where I kept speaking French it has been going quite well.  My class are a lovely bunch too which helps, particularly on trips to beautiful Ligurian coastlines.  We visited a gorgeous place called Le Cinque Terre which are five tiny villages inaccessible by roads.  You take a little train and see views like these.

I seem to have gone from one beautiful place to another, how tragic.

Apart from taking trips to picturesque villages I have mostly been doing what I do best - going to bars and drinking a bit too much wine.  I managed to excel myself in the self-injury stakes this week by trying to kick up my heels Irish style barefoot on cobbled streets and consequently rupturing a vein in my ankle.  It has gone an interesting colour to say the least.  I also had a visit from the nutty Raph who gave me a brilliant tour of Florentine gelaterie.  I'm hooked, they are just so nommy and my beach diet has gone completely out the window in a haze of pistacchio and frutti di bosco.  As usual we took some silly photos in the giardino delle rose which thankfully in May is blooming.

Soon I will be moving yet again, God help me.  But I'm moving to the seaside so I suppose I'll live.  Ciao for now!