playing tag

It's all P's fault for sending me an invite to her BBQ on facebook! I went looking for some of the Givaudan crew and managed to find my archetypal Frenchman, Olivier, whose first words to me when I got back from hols to discover I was his new boss were a surly (imagine ze french accEnt) "I don' work for no woo-man'. He just sent me a message on FB "I remember you were the voodoo card player. And you gave me english SF books!"

Ahhh, nostalgia. From that unpromising start, by the time he left he would greet me each morning with "Salut, chef", and choose to reply in english (so I would understand) anything controversial our UK system designer said in French (so I wouldn't understand). Highly amusing since J didn't realise that my french listening skills were much better than the speaking skills. We also pulled the longest shift on the project one time, working till about 1am, by which time the hotel kitchens were closed, and both back in the office at 8:30 as usual the same morning.

Having found the link for La Reserve, where we mostly stayed, habitués enough to be leaving luggage there over the weekends if we didn't stay over, buying bicycles and tennis racquets, I went looking for the other places we stayed in Coppet, and Morges,. Corporate heaven indeed but the working day was 8-6 to make up for getting up at 4am on Mondays to be able to get the 8:30 flight from Heathrow.