6 Feet (Down) Under

Petite photo de notre immeuble sur Alma Road publiée pour la postérité…

Il fait très beau en ce moment et dès qu’on a une heure de libre, on fonce à la plage histoire de décompresser.

J’ai un cours de Pilates ce matin (comme tous les samedis) et je n’ai pas assez de temps pour une diarrhée verbale !

Bon week-end, fidèles amis lecteurs !

This year Melbourne is hosting the XVIII Commonwealth Games, which have just started. We are not following very much, but are enjoying everything around the games, like free concerts (we love those, don’t we) and activities all over the city. Tomorrow we are going to see a French Canadian band called La Bottine Souriante at Alexandra Gardens with a few friends. The “Festival Melbourne 2006″ consists of “twelve days of non-stop music, dance, circus, street theatre and visual arts from all the corners of the Commonwealth that will add an extra sparkle to your whole Games experience. Best of all, everything’s free during the Games!”… What else do you want!

We are not going to watch any sporting event though, we are just too busy. I am just waiting to get some free tickets (I wish!)…

I am starting to resurface after a few weeks of Pilates bootcamp! I know for sure it is going to get even worse during the next few months, so I had better write a few posts before I collapse for good…

I am currently training with Pilates International, represented in Melbourne by the National Pilates Centre. Hopefully by the end of September I will be fully certified and allowed to teach low risk clients. So far, it has been really challenging, both physically and mentally, as we do practice almost every day and have to be very knowledgeable in anatomy, and learn all the repertoire (both mat and studio), as well as program classes from beginner to intermediate level.

For those of you who haven’t heard before or the Pilates Method, you can go to my first and foremost instructor’s website: Infinity Pilates in East St Kilda. Kerrie explains really well what it is, and where Pilates originates from. I will probably post some explanations in French later on, as many people in France have never heard of it.

I also take an “Anatomy and Movement” class at the Shiatsu Institute every Sunday for 10 weeks. Let me tell you that after 5 and a half hours of that, I am BRAINDEAD.

That’s all for now. I would like to write more about the Commonwealth Games, which started on the 15th of March and will end on the 26th. C YA

Well, well… I could not summon the courage to translate my first and inaugural post on this weblog, so I will just write additional posts in English for the miserable creatures out there who don’t know French… that is, until I have time and energy for a translation.

For those of you who are around Melbourne and wish to improve your French conversation skills, Alliance Française (St Kilda) hosts a weekly Wine & Cheese every Tuesday from 6:30pm to 8pm… I personally know the organiser and can vouch for her, although she is a little full of… beans! You will have a great time there!

It so happens that Pascal and I celebrated our first Aussie anniversary last week, as we arrived in Melbourne on 22 February 2005… time really does fly. We adopted a kitten from RSPCA on Easter Monday, a week after we moved in to our home sweet home on Alma Rd, and in December could not help ourselves and got a second kitten (whose arrival corresponded pretty much with my birthday, but shhh… no one needs to realise this odd coincidence). Please meet Joli Coeur aka Kiki “le gros cheeky” and Titou “les mauvais coups”, our darling cats.

We are quite pleased with our move Down Under, and do not have any regrets so far, even though we realise that we can’t see our friends and family as often as we’d like. The great advantage to living in the 21st century is being able to communicate via email and get to chat live on Skype (may I add that we are the proud owners of a webcam, so you can admire our tanned, athletic bodies… kidding!). OK, so Melbourne is quite far from the tropical kind of postcard you would get on the Gold Coast, but it is a really nice, cosmopolitan� place to live with lots of parklands and sandy beaches… I will not talk again about the little penguins, but be aware that they are pretty much the only ones that feel comfortable in our cold Tasmania/Antarctica waters… I am exaggerating a bit, but hey, I come from the deep South

Before I forget, you may leave comments at the end of each post. I welcome your feedback!
That’s it for tonight… Cheers and good night!