Book Review: A Year in Provence

A Year in Provence

Well I'd put off reading this as I thought, travelling to Provence, and reading A Year in Provence? What a cliche! 

But, I loved it - it was a lot of fun, and extremely useful, prior to travelling... For example, there's a phrase 'payments noir'.  We bought some sandwiches at a small cafe on Sunday. And we paid in cash for them, they were excellent (half a baguette, split lengthwise) - jambon avec crudites (ham with vegetables) - the kids had just jambon sans crudites (the thought of vegetables on a Sunday was a bit too much).  The woman wanted to be paid in cash (pas de Visa, Madame) because it was 'dans la noir'. We had an interesting discussion of 'under the table' which means,  I think, roughly the same: a way to evade the tax man.

The only problem with this book is that it leaves you feeling immensely hungry. So don't read it with an empty stomach!