à Nice

This year I’m living in Nice. Why? If you had a choice between living on the French Riviera or in Sheffield, which would you choose?

Nice has its own particular characteristics, namely: dogs, terrible parking, and terrible driving. The French have a relaxed attitude towards things like smoking and personal safety. Crossing a road in France is much like dicing with death. There is a rule whereby the right of way belongs to anyone pulling out from the right. This includes zebra crossings, which drivers will happily pull halfway across whilst pedestrians scurry out of their path. Similarly, the privilege of parking in Nice is a matter worth fighting over. Drivers can often be seen (and heard) bickering, horn-honking and shunting each other up the rear over spaces.

The dogs in Nice are the same size as their owner’s handbags, and often live in them. They regularly take their owners shopping to the local SPAR where they tie up their owners outside while they buy food, have fights on the floor and sniff the vegetables. The dogs often take their owners to restaurants too, where they will sit on the carpet waiting for tidbits (lower class dogs) or have their own chair and plate (upper class dogs). The dogs often pay for their meals with platinum cards.

Monaco is only fifteen kilometres away. In Monaco, there are big boats, big millionaires, smaller dogs, and open air escalators to carry dogs and their owners up hills. I don’t know what they do when it rains.