This is part 3 of an ongoing series I started to explain our journey from South Africa to France, to eventual self reliance.
💥The Journey from a point A to a point B to eventually a C (Part 1) 😵
💥The Journey from a point A to a point B to eventually a C (Part 2) (WARNING: 15 min LONG READ)
The country side
After spending years in the city, you don't even realise how much space there is out there. Each inches, every corner of the city is used to its most efficient purpose, and we forget about the immensity of nature, how contrived we become parked in boxes, stacked on the top of each others.
In most cases, there isn't much that can be done about it because most jobs are situated in the city, that's where people gravitate. After the first wave of the pandemic, we thought it was time to make our move before the expected second wave (and so on...). We got lucky to find a good place to rent,that we can eventually buy and for the first time managed to dream bigger.
That is really what the space has made, since day one. It gave us the opportunity to think, to fill that gaps with thoughts.
In all honesty, we started planning our exit to the countryside from South Africa in 2017, and of course a lot of things changed on the way, and we aren't even sure that it's our final destination yet, but the dream was there.
We spent countless hours talking about how the farm we wanted looked like, how the kids would love it, how we could become self-sustainable and gain a true sense of freedom.
The trip was quite surreal, as the road was essentially going through little village, with their typical architecture. The more we left Toulouse, the houses turned from pink (typical houses in Toulouse are pink, that' why it's called "La Ville Rose" to a more rustic and rural architecture, made of old stones, and red tiles.
Compared to what we were used to live in before that, finally everyone could have a room to sleep, and we won't have to be cramed on the top of each others.
I won't get in too much details, but let's say that we were used to be uncomfortable in the recent years.
That much comfort all of a sudden felt almost weird, and a little bit overwhelming. It something that we've been dreaming of for years, and yet, once it was there, I was a little bit in schock and denial, not let it sink in too much in case it was taken away.
That cherry tree was very familiar to me for some reason, a funny morbid thought I had on arrival, is that one day , in a very long time, I would like to be buried under a tree like this one, or maybe just incinerated in case of a zombie apocalypse.
Once again it's probably a strange thought to some, but I think of time in a non linear way, and I might be attached to that tree because I've been there before. You can see in the background the mountains, quite faintly as it was foggy that day. On a good day you can see those massive chains, with snow at the tops.
First drink we had there
After a while we finally let our guard down and learn how to chill a bit, the feeling of being outside, feeling a breeze, simples things that we could not feel from our windows from that 12m2 bedroom in the centre of Toulouse,
Not hearing the train passing by, no neighbour...Especially with time, I become far less social, and probably a little bit more reserved and always on my toes. It's safe to say that this year might have had a determining effect on our lives in ways we cannot still comprehend.
The Tractor
Realistically, I wouldn't be able to give half of the things that the countryside provides if we were still in the city. Maybe I am losing some of the "comfort" (that's very relative) and fast pace of the urban life, but at the end of the day it's all worth it. Here, the kids are able to drive a tractor, do cool stuffs that I would have dreamt doing at their age.
Soon I want to start introducing fun survival activities with the kids, like making a fire, bow hunting, fishing, spotting the good berries and mushrooms. We started already, and they are really learning fast, I cannot imagine what few years of this life will do to them.
The amount of life skills accumulated in such a short amount of time, that alone is enough for us to confirm that we made the right choice.
Getting our first figs
Right on time for our arrival, the figs started ripening around July and August, with some also in September.
I remember that we eventually had that much, we decided to let them to be eaten by animals and insect, we were not full prepared yet, for this year we are making sure we will have the right amount of jars and make as much jams as possible.
There were actually two different strains of fig tree, one ripening a little bit later than the other one, the size of the fig varies. We could plan on making as much pies as possible, and barter with the neighbours.
Getting the pears
There were only one tree quite fruitful, the others were either too young to bare enough fruits, or too old and damaged. One old tree has lots of vines climbing on it, which can sometimes be a sign of decay (I was told at least), so ever since 2021, I started cutting as much vines as I could.
Neighbour got us Potatoes
We also learnt very important lessons for preserving our food, if you add a little bit of flour on potatoes it allows you to keep them a little bit longer as moisture doesn't penetrate as much.
There were a learning curve with learning how to seal jar, pickle vegetables, making the brine and quite frankly I haven't really mastered that skill yet, room for improvement. 😌
Recording again
You have to understand!
I finished my second album on the run. I never had the opportunity to have a proper studio environment in South Africa as we knew already 2 years ago that we were leaving, so I never got a heavy set up, and the same happened when we left for France, living in airbnbs for months, I ended up mixing my album in one of them.
For the first time in 10 years, I can close the door and not hearing an airplane (the air traffic in Johannesburg was hectic), a dog barking, an ambulance passing by, an alarm, a hadida...It was the source of so much frustration, so much time wasted!
Finally, I had the tranquillity and peace of mind to focus only on my craft, not too many external factors to prevent me from recording...
...Except the kids interrupting, but I can totally live with that! 😁
It was also great to have an office again after few months of transit, we also tried to always create a working environment in South Africa, it helps with our productivity. We even had a big board, where we wrote all our projects. It's funny how it works, you write something on a board, and it manifests itself like a "make-a-wish" gift.
Especially a individual like myself tends to be a little bit chaotic (what a surprise 😁), so it's always good to keep some structure, making lists, giving ourselves some side missions to accomplish.
New Neighbours
We've been told that every year, for the last decade or two, cranes from the north come and feed off the land, enjoy the warm weather, and will be gone by the beginning of spring.
For me, it was a marvel to witness. I wish I had a better camera with a good zoom, to watch them fly in V formation, as a city boy I never had the chance to watch them in action before, except on TV.
We are also not too far from hunting ground, it's very common to see a deer passing by. One morning I was doing some gym in the garden, and one of the grownup deer jumped inside my garden and was few meters away from me. He probably did not expect to see me here, we also saw traces of boars running around fields.
Right in the middle of winter, I also saw a bunch of deer crossing the neighbour field, and chilling there for a while. I approach as closed that I could, before they ran away.
Snow
The kids have been waiting for their entire life for making a snow man, we don't have snow in South Africa, and it's something I imagined for a long time. I even wrote a song about it when we were still in the motherland. It's interesting to think that my wife and kids never saw a snowflake before that day, and next year, I am planning on going skiing as we live 45 minutes from the ski resorts.
Slowly the land and the air started to warm up
I am sure 
Homeschooling
I will probably do an entire post about it, but we also made the decision to home-school the kids, even
if it was ill advised by people around us, it fits our lifestyle and the kids have caught up with their curriculum in a short amount of time, and even more. We are using (paying) apps that gives us a program for the year in Math, reading, and other activities, and we can track their record and know when and where they are making progress or slacking.
It's a great tool for them to feel autonomous, some days we go back to paper to work on motor skills, but in all honesty, the playful aspect of these applications made them progress at an outstanding rate.
Our daughter Aimée isn't 6 years old yet and can read correctly, and Neo is 7 years old, can read a book and solve complex math problems. They are also learning programming, and I give them music lessons on the side. The next step is to turn they play room in a music room, with a bass, drum, piano and guitar. All second hand of course.
There are still area that they need to improve upon, for example they have never been often on bicycles, so it will be the next step to get them a lil' bike. They also aren't learning French as fast as they were at school, but at least they are happier, the French will eventually come. We would also like to register for other activities and get a social life, as normal as it could be in these times.
Sometimes I think of how I was feeling when the idea of leaving was just an idea. I try to remember how impossible it may seem at the time, how I was trying to get inside my own head, giving myself as many counter arguments I could find for convincing not to even try, keeping my hopes as low as I could to never be disappointed. Every time there is an new obstacle in front of us, we remind ourselves what we have already accomplished, and everything feels so much easier.
We aren't supposed to stagnate, but are a by-product of constant evolutions (I am not speaking in the Darwinian sense) that will adapt to new environments, to new routines, and I can't wait to see what the future behold!
Thanks for reading the 3 parts if you did, and stay tuned for more ^^
Ed