A writer in Scotland

“Oh, good luck with ye book! Mari, was it?” I smiled at the old lady from Glasgow that I had been talking to half the tour.

We got an early start for once as we had to check out from our hotel, but then the Elephant House was just around the corner and I was ready for my morning tea. I’m not sure if I love the place because Rowling is said to have been writing at the café, or because of the amazing view of the castle. Okay, definitely the castle. We headed for the castle after tea and shortbread, but were kept by souvenir shops – we had to find a birthday gift for my dad – and in the end The Writers Museum. 
       

    “That tour departs in just 15 minutes,” I said to my mom and pointed at a sign outside the door. “Book Lovers tour”, Sir Walter Scott, J. M. Barrie, Arthur Connan Doyle, J.K. Rowling and so on. In the end I ran to get some money and paid the tour to Allan, a wonderful guide/writer that took us (a group of what? 8?) around Edinburgh talking literature for more than the 90 minutes we were promised.

   Among our fellow tourists was an old pair from Glasgow, an Australian couple, I think the woman was an editor, and to other women, one of them from Brazil. And that is what you’ll know her as: Miss Brazil.  

   

    “I find it easier. Italian.”
“The Italians pronounce the word, just like she said” said Miss Brazil. It was by coincidence we had ended up eating lunch together. She was going to the castle, we were going to the castle, none of us ever got there, all three were hungry so we invited the nice lady to eat lunch with us at some Italian place our guide recommended us.

     “I’m a pizza person,” I said and looked down on what looked like bread with tomatosauce on it. “In Brazil they make real pizza. If you ever come to Sao Paolo you must tell me and I will show you were to go!” I smiled as we exchanged contact information. New country, new people, new destinations.

Mari Clémentine

Sunflowers

Ah, the train. The air-condition. Love. We even had our compartment for ourselves most of the way. It was two years earlier, on a 7-hour long trip from Rome to Milan, I first saw the sunflower fields. I don’t think I’ve passed anything more beautiful during a train ride. So ever since that day I’ve had a thing for the sunflowers.

   As many of you may know I’m a writer. I write. I’ve written four books and writing in general is a great part of my life. It was only months after my trip to Italy I wrote a chapter called Grand Soleil (which means sunflower in French) where one of my characters gives a sunflower to my main person. It was set in the city of Paris.

 Sunflower fields of Tuscany

    Paris is one of my favorite places. I’ve visited the city several times and the autumn of 2011 we went there again. The first thing I see when we arrive in the city: A market where they sell flowers. Sunflowers.

    It wasn’t until this summer my passion for the flower started blooming again as I was walking the streets of Oslo with my boyfriend. We went cross a square where they always sell flowers out in the open, and there they were. Pretty, yellow sunflowers in a pot. And now not my home nor my hotels rooms are complete without a bouquet of sunflowers. So if anyone wonders where I am headed tomorrow, you’ll find me at the flower shop.

   Being back in Italy, on the very same track (from Rome to Milan) is kinda wonderful, kinda weird, but when it comes to seeing the sunflower fields again, I do not regret taking the train this time either. Florence, here I come.

Like a 14-year old in Paris

Mari Clémentine