Feb 08

So, to get an income we have to finish the gite and to do that, we must apply to our Marie (the local major),  to get 

permission for the work.  In most areas this takes a month, but this is the Canal du Midi - basically  one long conservation 

area, so here it'sa minimum of three. Having no idea how to apply, I go to the local tourist office for advice. There the M & Ms, 

the bilingual and mutli lingual tourist  officers advise me. 'You must first go and see the architects, Batiment de France 

in Carcasonne', they tell me, 'Discuss with  him your plans, and then put in your preable (permission document)". That way I   

will know what I can do straightaway and won’t waste precious months asking for something I can't do, and then having to 

start  all over again . 

You need an appointment with the architect, says one M, (five and a half fluent languages), 

and rings the chief architect for me. Ah, but you can’t see him for six months she says, when she comes off the phone. She 

shrugs,   then seeing my look of dismay says 'I’ll try someone else'. This time at the end of her call she's got an 

appointment for me to  see an architect in Carcasonne next week. 'He' s used to dealing with foreigners', she says, 'and he’ll 

speak English'.

All week I write down everything we want to ask the architect, and learn it  In French, just in case, practising my spiel to 

anyone who will listen, including the dog, and collect  photographs and pictures of what we want to do, so we can do a show 

and tell. The following week, on the day of our appointment, which happens to be my Birthday, and a no-school Wednesday, 

BF, Little  Daughter and I head to Carcasonne,  driving past the fairytale castle and getting hopelessly lost before

finally trudging the last bit in the cold wind until we find the modern, not very architectally stunning offices on the side

of a grey river. 

What we most want  is permission for a pretty balcony, and to leave our little gite unrendered, to show off it’s 

pretty stone walls. If he won’t let us have a balcony, says BF, I’ll just haul him over the desk. I can’t be doing with all this 

permissions nonsense.

We are shown through to a tiny office, where a small elegantly neat man with a  pointy grey beard, our architect de Batiment, 

joins  us. As I try to stop LD  grabbing the hole punch and the stapler I ask the architect if he speaks English? Anglais? he 

answers,  Non. Great, I think. Taking a deep breath, and trying not to look panicked, I take the stapler away from LD  and go

through what we want, starting with the balcony on the first floor, so that our guests can sit and watch the canal. 

A pretty one, like this, we say, showing him the pictures we have collected of typical French local balconies. Un Balcon? Says 

the architect, looking at us, not even glancing at the photos,  'Oui', we answer, hopefully smiling. 'Non', he says. 'Ce n’est pas 

possible'. We pause. I don't look at BF, who is busy relieving Little Daughter of more stationary. Ah, Ok. We would like to 

finish the outside in its original stone rather than render.  Is this possible? 'Non', he says.' Ce n’est pas possible'. It crosses my 

mind that he is having a joke on us, forgetting that the French don’t really do jokes, but he looks very serious, and when I ask 

him again, just to check,  he says non again, just the same, no smile, no joke. 

Finally we have a breakthrough. Can we put in some windows? 'Its possible', he says, like this, and expertly draws

windows, one above the other, the top ones smaller than the bottom. We can have more windows as long as they were 

‘equilibre’ – bigger on the lower floors, smaller as they go up, with their centre lines running the same from top to

bottom. How long will it take for permission to come through, we ask. 'Troi mois', he answers. Can we speed it up at all I say? 

'non', he says, 'trois mois'.

We haven't got much that we wanted, but it's still my birthday when we leave so we go to the fairytale castle and sit in a chintzy 

restaurant full of Americans and Germans where we have a very bad cassoulet and a very good glass of rose, and

then walk about a bit in the howling chill wind under the grey sky, looking a the batiments until finally we get too cold and 

head for home.

Now we can get on and write our preable, a detailed document with photographs and and drawings and plans in a special 

format. Once we've done that we only have to copy all of it seven times in colour, and hand it to the marie and hope that we 

can start building in three months. We try to be cheerful. But as we drive back through bleak windswept vineyards I'm thinking 

oh my god, we can’t do what we want to do, what have we done? Then I think I’ve left England, I’ve spent all this money and 

got this huge mortgage, and I still haven’t got a horse, which is all I really want in the first place.

When we get back, wheezy Jean from next door has left a plant  on our doorstep, and the light has started to shimmer 

on the canal as a watery sun makes it’s way through the opening clouds, and the geese are honking. And suddenly the 

sense of possibility returns, the hope that we can create a good life here, that the children will get an education away from the 

endless celebrity culture swamping Britain, and as the wind finally drops and the evening sun comes

through a bit more there is the thought of the days of sunshine, even in January when the air is warm, and everyone lunches 

outside and SD  bombs off round the village on her bike in a way she never could in England in our busy

town, and suddenly, shivering, on our step overlooking one of the best views on the Midi, I know why we are here.