Waking up in the morning was really great. When I opened the window, the sun was shining through the window and it was really beautiful. I felt that French windows are really stylish because they have double doors, one made of wood and the other of glass. Anyway, everything was wonderful. I thought that if I could spend every day in a place like this, I would definitely be happy and healthy.

The light from the window that I open when I wake up in the morning cheers me up.

As usual, I took a shower and got dressed. I heard Jelena and her mom’s voices, so I figured they were already awake. So after I showered, I went downstairs and was greeted by Jelena and her mother saying good morning.

We decided to go to a nearby bakery to buy a baguette for breakfast.

Going to buy a French baguette! Excited!

Up to the nearby bakery we talked about college and how she is researching the master’s college she wants to go to. She said that she is now wondering whether she should go to Bordeaux, Lille, or somewhere else. She said something like that. I sometimes think that I would like to study at a graduate school abroad too, but at this point I am more interested in business than in graduate school, and I actually want to retain money in business first. I think once I build a system with that, then it will be easier and easier to go to grad school or pilot school.

Plus, I feel like I really enjoy building a business. So I want to build a creative company that involves many different people from overseas. That’s what I’m thinking.

Stylish appearance

The real baguette is long!

The bakery was really stylish. It was my first time in a French bakery. It was really great. There were baguettes for sale and other delicious looking breads. I bought some bread that was absolutely delicious. I don’t know the name, but Jelena bought it for me.

Take the train to Toulouse

After that, after eating that bread at home, we headed to the train station where the train was. Her mom gave me a ride in her car and we arrived at the train station.

The mask that Jelena gave me. It looks French and cute.

While waiting for the train, I was so surprised to see a train coming through at a very high speed, probably the TGV. But it was really great.

The next train was to Toulouse, so we took that train to Toulouse. There were many people on the train. Since Jelena was carrying a suitcase, many people gave up their seats, or rather, moved their bags away and opened their seats for us.

Train. Interesting.

I thought they were very kind. I didn’t have a good impression of France, but I found it to be very kind in general. I thought again that stereotypes are not good.

After a 20-minute train ride, We arrived at Toulouse.

Toulouse Station

I envy Jelena’s college apartment, French style.

Leaving the station, we began to explore the town. First we went to a room near Jelena’s university to drop off her luggage. The place was really stylish, the room was not big, but it was really French style and nice.

Is there such a beautiful place?

Is it more like a dormitory where each person lives individually? No, it was more like a student apartment. And it was in a really beautiful place, right in the center of town.

This is the place. Very stylish.

It was a really nice place. The architectural style is really great and very nice. The streets narrowed down and many of the buildings looked like they were really Toulouse. I was always amazed at what a wonderful town it is.

Very stylish plaza

For Jelena, Toulouse is a town where she has lived for 20 years, so of course she is used to it, but for me, it was really too nice a town and a really great place.

Talk to the French about pain au chocolat or chocolatine and they get loud.

Once we dropped her bags at Jelena’s apartment, we decided to have a light meal. Choosing a restaurant is always really difficult, and I have no idea where to go. So we finally decided to buy a SIM card first, which was 40GB and could be used in the Czech Republic, which was nice! I thought. With Jelena’s help, I was able to buy it. I am very grateful to her, because I really don’t think I would be able to live without her.

Then we went out to a nearby cafe for a quick snack. At the cafe I ordered a cappuccino and a pain au chocolat. Elena said too much about a chocolatine, not a pain au chocolat! She was really fussing lol.

Chocolatine lol

I heard that in Toulouse, pain au chocolat is called chocolatine. I thought it was a cute name. Then we went upstairs and sat down in one place to talk.

Once again, I talked to Jelena.

I talked about my personality, how I came to France to meet her, and how I had a hard time making friends in Latvia and Georgia. I told her that I had used Tinder to make friends, and that it is possible to make friendships even with Tinder!

She said, “Tinder is an app for one-night stands and dating, right?” So I told her that yes, of course it is possible, but you can also make friendships. So we talked there for about an hour.

Going to a hair salon in France! I’m so excited. I wonder what it will be like.

My appointment with the hairdresser was at 4:30 p.m., so I moved to the place where the hairdresser was located. Getting my hair cut at a hair salon in France is very nerve-wracking. So I told Jelena that I always get nervous before getting my hair cut. I didn’t know what to say or how to act. That’s what I told her.

French hairdressers are super friendly and loud!

When I walked into the hair salon, it was a really small hair salon but it felt like it was in the center of a shopping district, a very stylish place. Everyone greeted me with a loud “Bonjour!” the moment I entered, and it was a very positive hair salon with crazy smiles on their faces. Too loud.

So the guy made me curly hair. Jelena was supposed to be somewhere else while I was getting my hair cut, but when the hairdresser found out I only spoke English, she asked Jelena to sit with me and she was learning something on the computer. And so it began.

Ask for a haircut like Timothée Chalamet’s, please.

I wanted my hair to look like Timothée Chalamet’s, and when I showed it to the hairdresser, he said, “I see! It’s a normal perm! He understood immediately. He said that he couldn’t do a perm because there was not enough hair in the back, so it would be a mixture! He was a really energetic hairdresser. He even gave me a massage while he was washing my hair. Very handsome the way he put the perm tool on.

In Japan, they usually put it on, but it is the French way to put it on smartly. It was really cool. The place where they put the perm liquid on was where they wash your hair, so they fixed my neck there and put perm liquid to my hair. So I had to wait 20 minutes. At that time, it was really hard, I was almost hysterical. The hairdresser was talking to another customer over the wall while he was setting up the perm equipment for me, and I thought, “That’s really freeing. Everyone could hear him, so everyone was joining in the conversation. I thought, “France is really a friendly country. I thought to myself, “That kind of thing doesn’t happen at beauty salons in Japan. Then, they took off the permanent wave tool and fixed it for 5 minutes. After that, they washed my hair. Apparently, the perm was finished. I wonder what it really looks like. I can’t tell how it’s going to look without my glasses. So I didn’t get my hopes up until the end. Another woman cut my hair. At that time, Jelena sometimes looked at my face, but I was too embarrassed to make eye contact with her.
Then she asked me to put on my glasses, so I finally put them on. After I put on my glasses, I saw that my hair was more permed than I had expected, and it was a really chilly perm. It wasn’t amazingly chili, but it really looked like Timothy’s, so I was really happy.

Finally, I got my dream perm, like Timothy’s! I was so happy. The bill was 95 euros, which was not expensive at all, about 12,000 Japanese yen. It was really cheap. And yet, they gave me the best finish, and it was really the best hair salon. I really wanted to go to a hair salon in Toulouse next time I have a permanent wave.

After I paid, they gave me a dog strap as a Christmas present. And Jelena got a sample of something. It was really great to get a Christmas present.

Walking along the river in Toulouse

Then we went to the riverside. There seemed to be a lot of tourists there, and I didn’t hear much French around us. When we walked along the river, Jelena was really tired and didn’t talk much. The riverside was really romantic and beautiful. It was amazingly beautiful. At sunset, the buildings would look like they were turned upside down in the river. This view was really great.

At sunset, this place is really romantic!

I thought, “This is my favorite place in Toulouse. It definitely was. We sat there and enjoyed the view. I didn’t say anything to her. I didn’t know what to say to Jelena, because I knew a lot of things from our online conversations, so I didn’t know what else to say lol. It was a little awkward, but it was very important as a buffer time. I think it’s good to be close to each other to not talk, because it’s a very important time to get closer to each other.

While talking about where to eat for dinner

After that, we decided to look for a restaurant for dinner, because time was time and we were going to see Don Quixote at 8:00 p.m. today, so we wanted to go to dinner before then. But we had a very hard time finding a restaurant for dinner. In Toulouse, there are so many different kinds of stores, including record stores, and I went to bookstores and many other places because there were so many stores I wanted to visit. But I couldn’t find a good restaurant.

Mural above the gastronomic restaurant. Beautiful.

So we finally arrive at a restaurant that looks like a gastronomic place. That place is across the street from the government building in the center of Toulouse, so it is crazy expensive. But we decided to go there because we could eat outside there.

Toulouse at night

There were so many people that I was able to find a seat and was able to sit down, but the waiter did not come and when I called him, he just said, “If he just came, wait a minute. So, with only an hour left before Don Quijote started, we decided to stop this time and go back tomorrow.

Finally, we decided to have a hamburger.

Finally, Jelena and I decided to go into a hamburger place. I ordered a hamburger. And fries and water. My mom was going to come there too. The burger was so much bigger than I expected and I was so surprised.

Insanely huge hamburger

The size of the fries was several times the size of those in Japan. We shared the fries. They were burnt, which I thought was definitely bad for my health. Then her mother came over and asked me if I liked Toulouse. Of course I love it. It’s only my second day of communication and meeting Jelena, so I’m still getting used to it, but the city was really the most beautiful. Her mom bought cookies and water and shared half with me. Jelena’s mother was very friendly and seemed to resemble my grandma in some way.

Finally, we get to see the musical Don Quixote.

After that, I finished my burger and fries and decided to see Don Quixote! We went inside the theater on the right shoulder of the government building. It was really beautifully built, and now we were going to see Don Quixote!

Lots of people waiting at the entrance.

I felt very incredulous. In the first place, I could only thank to them for buying the tickets for me. We were on the top floor, so we had a panoramic view. It was really great to see my favorite orchestra.

Don Quixote!

Don Quixote is a Spanish story, all dancing, something I don’t really like the atmosphere of. I love The Nutcracker, Sleeping Beauty, and Swan Lake. I think they are mainly Russian stories.

The three of us commemorate the event!

But it was such a wonderful experience to see Don Quixote. And since it was only the second day we had met, we were really amazed that we could go to such a theater together and watch the show together. There were two intermissions, and during the first one, we decided to drink champagne. So Jelena’s mom bought me a bottle of champagne and Jelena had a glass of juice.

Drinking champagne. It’s good!

The bar with champagne was so crowded that it took me a very long time to buy it. But I managed to get it and drink the champagne. It was really great. The champagne was good, not too dry. I got really hot from it. I get drunk so easily.

So I was really drunk when I was in the theater watching the second part. And it was so hot. It was really too hot in the hall. But I was dancing to the music of Don Quixote. Thank you so much for giving me such a wonderful opportunity.

Don Quixote Finale

The third part of the Don Quijote event was over, and we left the venue. I was hoping they wouldn’t ask me what I thought of the show, because I didn’t know what to say, so I was glad they didn’t lol. But the music was great, really great. So I thanked them.
After that, we walked down the street, passed through the shopping district, and arrived at the parking lot where Jelena’s car was. Then we went home.