Caffiend.

In Tours, there were no Starbucks or Second Cups. I didn't see a single person walking around with a to-go cup. And I didn't go a day without un café. Usually with a macaron to nibble on. Once with a cigarette. Always on the patio. Never for an all-nighter.

Ordering a dainty but potent shot of espresso was the best (and cheapest) way to justify sitting at a sunny table for 3 to 4 hours reading, writing and -my personal favourite -people watching. What we call coffee shops they call salons de thé. Sounds way classier and reminds me of the literary and art salons of 1930s Paris, but really they were pretty small and normal looking with the bonus of outdoor seating and good pastries.

Funny thing about Tours and coffee though -and I wonder if this is true of other areas in France -is that, at least in Place Plumereau (which is a local and tourist hot-spot), hot beverages are not served after a certain time at night. So quite literally, you cannot order a coffee, decaf or tea after 9 or 10pm even though the creperies and little restaurants stay open until well after midnight. We kept forgetting this fact when we were out late, and finally after being embarrassingly reminded yet again by a friendly waiter one night, we asked (out of curiosity, not indignation) why this rule existed. He gave us this very amused grin before giving his best shot at an unconvincing answer.

"That's a very good question. I've lived here all my life and I'm not sure why it's this way. But hot beverages take a longer time to prepare, so maybe that's why."

A longer time to prepare, really? Compared to a crepe or one of your mega-gelato-fruit-chocolate-everything dessert creations? Personally, I think it has more to do with money and turnover of tables since coffees are the least expensive item on the menu for the most disproportionate amount of acceptable "sitting-time." Or maybe French people just don't drink coffee and other hot things at night. Maybe that's considered totally plebeian. Maybe the French way of night dining is to inadvertently get drunk off an opaque glass of heavily concentrated sangria. Not that I did. (I totally did.)

Weird rules aside, the best espresso I had was actually in Langeais, a tiny town 30km west of Tours with a castle smack bang in the middle, hanging out with the other buildings like it was the most normal thing in the world.

I wasn't exaggerating about the castle thing.

It was the morning after I'd arrived here on my weekend biking trip with Christie that we sat down for a breakfast coffee at this place next to our hotel (which deserves a post in itself). There are several reasons why this particular instance of caffeine consumption stands out in my memory.

1) It was genuinely an amazing coffee, the kind where the bitterness isn't acidic and leaves a natural sweetness behind in the back of your throat.

2) I stupidly spilled 1/3 of it, being the klutz I am.

3) Everyone else around us was drinking alcohol. At 10 in the morning. There was a table of around 8 old, gruff men who looked like they could have been war veterans, and they were leaving when we ordered. Leaving behind empty bottles of wine and champagne.

I bet they had an amazing Sunday.

Salle V12

A month is somewhat a weird length of time to spend in a small class -in the case of Tours, 18 students. Sure, you come to know everyone's names and faces, work with some more than others, chat in the hallway while waiting for class to start, give each other the side-eye when the Madame seems particularly on edge. But for the most part you're stuck in a limbo between knowing each other enough that you would make eye contact, smile, say hi if you saw one another in the street, and not knowing each other half as well enough that you would actually hang out as buddies. It's probably only in the last week, even last few days that you begin to feel more comfortable as an entire group (or maybe this is a sentiment that accelerates with the knowledge of a fast approaching departure) and by the time that familiarity starts to set in it's time to bid adieu.

Maybe that's why I hold onto the nicknames that quite naturally slipped into my head during those lazy afternoons when I tuned out of class and discreetly stared at people (in a non-creepy manner). I can't be the only person who has secret monikers for people I am acquainted but not familiar with. It's never done in a nasty spirit (unless if they're nasty people), but more so due to the fact that they often possess or exhibit something in particular that I come to remember them for. They're not distilled descriptions based off of first impressions either, though I admit I can be quick to judge sometimes. Anyway, in this case it was a cumulation of mini-observations that led to quiet "I dub thee" moments. And so in the spirit of nomenclature, I would like to fondly introduce just a few.

1) The pair of Spanish lads -Lisp Boy and Jesus -who sat next to each other and shared some bizarre, unconscious need to constantly open and close their thighs. I'm not kidding. Some people jiggle their leg, some click their pens. These guys...opened and closed their thighs. Every day. Not only that but they would often be synchronised; Jesus would be doing double time of Lisp Boy. And in case you have me down as a total perv, know that they sat right opposite me, facing me, so it was really hard not to notice.

2) "Cherie" -a guy, whose real name sounds like the French word -who really was a sweetheart, from Pakistan, had been learning French for 10 years, spoke it practically flawlessly but also ridiculously quickly. Had an amazing shriek of a laugh that would just come out when the teacher supposedly said something amusing. He was a total keener as well and described our first French Lit class as "orgasmic."

3) Brit Girl from Nottingham who over-pronounced her rs but had such an adorable accent I probably spoke to her in English just so I could hear it more.

4) Rapunzel who was Columbian and had amazing, frizz-free ebony hair that looked like it came out of a Pixar movie.

5) Spanish Grace who reminded me so much of my high school best friend Grace from the way she sat to the way she gave presentations. Sometimes her accent was so strong I didn't know which language she was speaking. Incidentally, high school Grace is also a language wiz at both French and Spanish, and one of the nicknames we had for her was Senorita Shrimp. COINCIDENCE? I would like to meet my own European doppelganger some day.

Maybe the only thing I really regret about my time in Tours is that I didn't pull out my harmonica by the Loire.

here on the third floor level with the rooftops

i could be hemingway with a harmonica

all i need's a typewriter cigarette and

i'd be set

i'd be in sync with

the screeching sparrows screeching fugues and symphonies

one frenzied flock per seven words

it'd be like clockwork

it'd be like eureka

it'd be like finally outrunning my better half

Je suis à Tours! Donc je dois parler et ecrire en français.

Je l'adore ici beaucoup beaucoup.

Je prends des cigarettes aux matins, des macarons aux midis, et des décafeinés aux soirs. Alors j'exagère un peu, mais c'est plus ou moins comme ça.

C'est plus ou moins comme un rêve.