3rd night.

I am about to spend my third night in Bastia, Corisca. I arrived on 1st March at 21.30 on a plane transfer from Nice. (where I watched two massive arguments break out in the space of 20 minutes) Marcel Fortini, the director of the CMP (Centre Mediterraneen de la Photographie), the organization I am working with, met me at the airport. He was friendly, easy-going and quickly began explaining how I need to speak French. I did my best but my best is relatively crap, he was encouraging nonetheless, and so I tried some more. 

After 25Km we were at the apartment I now live in. It is probably the polar opposite of the barge I live on in London. It is situated on the second floor of a building inside the Citadel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citadel It is huge and bright, with big windows and a balcony. It has an amazing shower built into the corner of the bathroom with a white mosaic floor and wall. There is a huge oven, a washing machine, a dishwasher and chandeliers. There are very interesting works of art and artefacts on the walls and good books on the shelf. It also has wifi - hence the blog. (OK enough rambling on about my temporary accomodation - I just can't believe my luck!)

So after the do's and don'ts were said and the plans for the following day announced, I went to sleep in my new four-poster.

Yesterday - day two in the big Bastia house - Marcel picked me up at 11.30 and drove me around the city. It is one of those cities where its actually quicker to walk as driving takes you round the one way streets in the opposite direction of where you want to go. There was plenty of time to get my bearings and its basically left or right along the coast depending on where you want to go. We went for lunch at a cosy wooden restaurant where my first drink of the day was a glass of "Table wine" which tasted like normal wine to me because I am from the UK. The pizza was mouth-watering and the coffee to follow was pokey and short - just the way I like it. Then I met Valerie, Marcel's assistant whom I would be having the most contact with. She is also very nice and speaks good English. By now I get a sense that Marcel is concerned that I am going to struggle with this project. I am however, determined not to. I keep telling myself that if I can manage to make a book about Mongolian women in 2 months then a book about Corsican ones shouldn't be too hard...but maybe its harder!

An afternoon with Valerie was spent visiting the office, the south of the city (the "disadvantaged" part where a massive regeneration is taking place) and the centre of the town. I then went on an adventure to buy a sim card a dictionary and some vegetables. Apart from not realising that in order to get any attention in the Orange phone shop, you needed a ticket, (I eventually sussed that out) I was successful. I had a nice lentil stew and ebly for dinner. 

Today I went with Valerie to meet the head of the south "Quartier" she explained my project and that I wanted to photograph women in their apartments but he was also a little pessimistic about my ability to communicate. Then we met a lady who was the head of an organisation who defend the rights of women who are victims of domestic violence. She was introduced to me and then introduced herself in perfect English and told me on Friday there is a celebration for international women's day and an exhibition of work by women who had been attending art classes. I could feel the others breathe a sigh of relief and my hope in the project was restored. 

She gave me her number and I will meet her on Friday. I was also introduced to the head of the central "Quartier" and despite his pigeon English and my pigeon French we are meeting next to Napoleon on Thursday morning at 9am. 

After this cluster of rendevous I went into town to check out the art centre. It wasn't that interesting as the exhibitions and cafe were closed but I did meet a lady and I asked her if she knew of any french teachers, she did and said she would call me. After that I wandered into Le Ronde Pain for some lunch and a hot chocolate and had a Coriscan cheesy bread thing which I have forgotten the name of. It was very tasty! The two bored looking assistants giggled a lot - probably at me - and when I went to pay, the cockier one asked for my number for the other one. I told them after an awkward silence that I would return and give him my card at some point. He may be useful at some point. To finish the day off I popped into the little shop I spotted yesterday with heaps of lenses in the window and pictures everywhere. The lively oldish man who owned it came to life and he has a lens for the Nikon I have which I am tempted to buy. He also had just about every possible image of Corsica old and new you could ever wish for. I spent an hour in their looking at everything from Mick Jagger being papped by him whilst on holiday (shouting fuck off) to images of maps from 1600's. He had some great pictures of Jim Morrison (some looking pretty terrible) and thousands of images of every aspect of Corsican life. We had a great conversation with a complete hotch-potch of Corsican, French English and Italian. A fruitful day.

Maintenent, je vais me couche.