06.17.06
Daewoo Espero
Yesterday I bought the car, so now I’m the happiest car-owner in the world! I could drive it home from Amadeus on the old owners’ insurance, but thereafter I needed to get a car insurance of my own. This might seem just as a phone call and a little bit of paper work, but in reality it was much worse than that.
First of all we have a different car insurance system in Sweden where you insure your car and anyone can drive it, but here the car insurance is for yourself. The cheapest place I found was direct assurance, an online insurance company. Since they didn’t speak French I got help from a college at work who phoned them for me. The answer was that since they had no office I could walk in to they only accepted French speaking people. The second place I tried was at Carrefour, the big supermarket between Sophia and Antibes. There I got the answer that they only would give me an insurance if I could show that I had had a previous car insurance for three years with no accidents. I can understand that they are careful here with beginners since they drive like crazy but they could at least propose a more expensive alternative.
Well, I asked around at work and they were really helpful and I got some car insurances that I could try to visit. Nicolas, who helped me call direct assurance, called GMF which was his company and also the one that Amadeus employees get discount at. They had an office in Antibes which was closed on Saturdays but one in Cannes that was open. So, today me and Magnus took the bus to Antibes, and then the train to Cannes. It was surprisingly quick to get there, and we were lucky with the busses.
After a little bit of walking around in Cannes we found GMF and went in to speak to them. And no, no English at all. We spoke a few words in bad French with him and then we gave him the phone number of Linda (in my team), and she spoke French with him for a while and then English to me. She didn’t have time to come and help me but instead we called Nicolas, who actually lives in Cannes. He and his girlfriend (or wife or fiancé) came down to help me. Really kind of them! It took us about an hour to talk through all things and fill in all papers. At one point we thought it wouldn’t work since the man wanted to check with the police that my drivers license were valid, but then I think he realized it was valid any way and we came out from there with an insurance J
Magnus is really happy because now I can drive him to the airport tomorrow. One thing that is less good is that it is only me who can drive the car, or a person with an at least two years old French car insurance. Luckily my family will be able to drive when here, since they can get a proof from their Swedish car insurance company and a temporary deal can be made with GMF.
After this adventure we lifted with Nicolas down to central Cannes where they showed us a market with vegetables and fruit. Great place, I will definitely go there again. We had lunch at a grill kind of place and then walked up to the castle where it was a great view over Cannes.
Up at the highest part we stood watching the view when suddenly both of us felt a bird was dropping something on our heads. I saw a light at the same time and shortly after thunder. The thunder was a bit away so I don’t think we were really hit by the lightening but what else can it have been? Anyone who can explain this phenomenon?
Two weeks are already gone and I’m learning new French words every day. Tomorrow Magnus will go home and then I can really try and find someone who can give me private French lessons. I will also start with a new hobby next week: climbing. Never tried before but it’s supposed to be really good to clime here with lots of good sites and nice weather. I bought climbing shoes a couple of days before, really uncomfortable, but that’s how they’re supposed to be.
I just finished cleaning up my new apartment, so now I think we will go over and se if Johan and Anna is home and socialize for a while.