Oh Philippe!

Jesus! Jesus Christ! Philippe said I was "not so bad." I couldn't believe it, I almost wet my pants.

It was Friday afternoon and I was just having my first negative spell - could I really put up with the insults for a whole year? had I been fooling myself thinking I could cope? Was this really the right place for me? Philippe had been in characteristicaly vitriolic mood, although he declared at the beginning of Friday's session that he is not so mean to people on Fridays - it makes for a bad weekend. I didn't see any evidence of this leniancy - but maybe I will only get, (I hasten to say 'compliments', so rather) non-insults from Philippe on Fridays.

I jumped up to demonstrate the new exercise with a girl from Hong Kong. This girl is ethereally beautiful, she has one of those oriental faces that seem to radiate thousands of years of wisdom and peace. "So..." says Philippe, and I'm just thinking, come on you bastard - do your worst, "here we have two women who are both very...very..." he hesitates looking around the room "both very charming" ('fucking hell' I think, 'that's a compliment. Where's the joke?') One of them is slightly more charming than the other. I won't give a name, but so." Ha Ha Ha. We did the exercise (which was about using your voice in major, whilst playing a game) and he says "but you, you were not so bad. Quite surprising eh? Well done Madame" and I did a fucking curtsey. That's right.

We had a party on friday night for all the first years. We gathered in a bar near Gar de L'est - not one of the most picturesque areas of Paris - and we drank and talked and people danced. This is a boring account and I only record the event because I so impressed myself by managing to find a nightbus home on my own! I had to walk to Chatelet (30 mins south of gare de l'est) and find bus number N21 - I still can't believe I managed it. So I sat listening to Bob Dylan at 3.30 in the morning on le noctambus N21.