The Last Week in France Part IV

Even if I hated that time was passing by so quickly, I knew that I had to continue with my life and my studies and that my place for the moment was not Amiens anymore. I was afraid of saying goodbye, especially to my boyfriend, but I knew that it was no goodbye forever, more a "see you again". I would surely come back one day and I was happy that I had found a second home in the North of France.

Souvenirs and Presents

It was the last weekend (my departure was a Wednesday) and I hoped that my boyfriend would have some more time as usual for me. It was still difficult for me to talk with him about serious things like our future, my/our feelings, what I really wanted to do etc. Usually he decided something and I agreed, because the most important for me was to be with him, not how when or whatever. The days before the weekend I had finished the present I wanted to give him, and I had thought about souvenirs for my family. Unfortunately, I wasn't really creative and Amiens didn't offer any particular things but postcards and the usual touristic stuff next to the cathedral. As I knew that nobody would be happy about that, I decided to buy some of the Macarons of Amiens. In France each region has its own kind of Macarons, and the ones of Amiens were made with almond paste and apples - in my opinion even tastier than the "normal" Macarons everyone knows. So Friday afternoon I went to the city centre by bus and walked through the streets, still looking for something more special to buy for my family and friends. But as always when you are looking for something I didn't see anything better, so I went to "Les Halles" (a shopping centre which does also have a fresh market department) to my favorite bakery and bought some packages of the very expensive Macarons. For my Mum who doesn't like sweet stuff I walked to the Cathedral to the souvenir shop and looked for something else. At the beginning I didn't see anything interesting, they just had the touristic stuff you also find in Paris, Mallorca and London: mugs, t-shirts, pens, glasses, clocks, keyrings and plush toys. But they also had a gourmet section with homemade products from the Picardie (the region whose capital Amiens is) where I finally found a "Confiture de Macarons d'Amiens" - a (hopefully) delicious jam which tasted exactly as the Macarons of Amiens. Even if my Mum doesn't eat Sweets, she eats jam in the morning, so I hoped that she would like it, bought it, and left the store. 

Plans for the Weekend

As most of the time the days before, I walked a bit through the city centre, but soon I didn't want to do that anymore because I already knew every single shop and café in the city centre and for the moment it wasn't interesting anymore. So I took the bus back to the student's residency, where I washed my clothes for the last time and waited for my boyfriend to text me. We passed the evening together and thought about what to do during the weekend, but we didn't have so many ideas. So for the moment we just did what we always did - having dinner together, watching a movie and enjoying our last days. The whole time I thought about talking to him about our future and our feelings, but it was never the right moment, so I didn't say anything and remained without answers. The next day we stayed in bed until noon, we just talked about unimportant things and loved the time together - it was one of the moments you wish that time stands still forever and lets you enjoy that moment for the rest of your life. I knew that I would think back to these times very often during my semester in Tenerife when I would be really far away from Amiens. In the afternoon we took the car (he insisted on taking the car, because he hated going by bus) to the city centre and went for a walk. The weather was wonderful, so we went to Parc Saint-Pierre and enjoyed the sunshine. The Parc Saint-Pierre was a very large park full of variety, you could do sports there as basketball or soccer, go running quite good, sit down in the grass next to the large lake in the middle of the park or start your trip through the famous Hortillonnages. Especially when the sun was shining it was a wonderful place and I had already spent a lot of time there with my boyfriend and other friends. There were parks next to my house in Germany, too, but they weren't that beautiful, because everyone there has a own garden and you only need parks to go for a walk with your dogs or for running. Unfortunately, all the parks were full of hills, so it was quite exhausting to run there and I wasn't that successful. 

After Parc Saint-Pierre we went back to the district Saint-Leu, which was right next to it, and had a coffee. We did nothing special, but that last Saturday was one of my favourite days we had had together anyway, because we were together and had so much fun. Time with him was always passing so quick which was something I had never experienced in that dimension with somebody else during the past. For me that was a sign that our relationship was something special, but I told myself to be careful and not to hope too much - maybe my feelings about that exciting experience and that relationship with somebody from another culture talking another language were changing my point of view a bit and making me a bit naive. I didn't want to be disappointed in the end because he didn't care and I cared too much. I had experienced something like that once in my life and I didn't want to be hurt so much (partly because of myself) again, so I did what everyone else was telling me, too: enjoying the present and not thinking too much about the future. 

In the evening we went to the cinema Gaumont which was situated right next to the train station. We had dinner in the burger restaurant in the same building - they were a bit expensive, but their creations were interesting and I liked eating there. I had already had dinner there with my ex-boyfriend and my Dad & his girlfriend. After dinner we entered the cinema to buy tickets - it was a special price offer, you only pay 4 euros to see a weekly chosen movie. This time it was kind of a action film with actors I didn't know and a name I don't remember anymore. But I didn't care - as always, important was simply the fact to be there with my boyfriend. I would have gone to (almost) any place with him, just to be there together. I know, that sounds incredibly naive and as I would not have any self-consciousness, but I am a person that doesn't like stress and problems and sometimes I focus on the most important need - during my last days in France it was definitely to pass time with him. The movie was okay, but in French cinemas it was always either too hot or too cold, and I was freezing during the whole two hours - my boyfriend wasn't somebody very romantic and due to his cultural point of view he didn't accept too much body contact in public (like kissing or holding hands most of the time), so it hadn't helped that I had been there with him. After the movie he insisted on coming with me to my room in the student's residency and spend that night with me, too. I was happy about that, because I would have thought that he might prefer to sleep one night in his own bed, too. 

Sunday in the Nature - Time should stop sometimes

The next day we stayed in bed as long as possible as the day before, and I knew that it would be the last time we could do that until noon. I was sad about all the "last times" I had to experience during my last week in France, and hoped that one day I would come back and would be as happy as in that moment in the bed next to my boyfriend. We got up, everyone had a quick shower, and we thought about something to do on that sunny day. In the internet we found a nice garden/park next to Beauvais, about one hour away from Amiens. Because of the nice weather we decided to go there, took a shower, got ready and left the house. We arrived at the park after a bit more than one hour, because my GPS didn't like me from time to time, and had shown us a much too slow way. The weather was still great, so we parked and went to the entrance. It was 8 euros - a bit expensive, but we had come here one hour, so we entered. We received a plan of the park (it was huge!) and the buildings around, and started a small tour. With the sunshine everything was incredibly beautiful even if many flowers didn't bloom yet, like all the roses for example. From time to time we lay town in the grass and enjoyed the sunshine next to each other - that reminded me of our visit in the zoo in Beauvais where we did the same thing. There weren't so many people, so he didn't care about body contact, and I really really enjoyed that day. It was only a wonderful garden, wonderful weather and the two of us. Only the departure in three days was spoiling our happiness a bit.

After some hours (we really spent a lot of time in there), a million of flowers and buildings and even more unforgettable moments, we became hungry and decided to leave. We thought about going to the city centre of Beauvais, but as we had been there once and hadn't found a convincing restaurant, we prefered to return to Amiens and eat something there. I was sad that our last weekend was already over, it felt like 2 hours, not two days, but I was also happy about the many wonderful memories that nobody could take off me. Back to Amiens we got a Kebab in the city centre and went to my student's residency to have dinner there. Even if he had already passed the two nights before with me, he wanted to stay that night as well. The next day when he would go to work I had to start thinking about packing and bringing some things to the car already - I would have to clean the whole appartment and that wasn't possible with all my things in it, and I only had two days left! 

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