FRENCH CONNECTIONS

Two sisters from different parts parts of the world reunite on a trip to the South of France and revel in the aesthetic pleasures of its countryside.

- Shunali Khullar

My week on the Cote D'Azur in the autumn of 2019 was my last holiday before the pandemic. The world at the time was innocent to the blow it was about to be dealt in the form of the COVID-19 virus merely two months later. I wrote this piece soon after my return from France. I was on a high, the smell of lavender still lingered in the clothes that had just been pulled out of my suitcase. Little did I realise that it would be a long time before my story would appear and that when it did, it would end up reading like a fable from a long, long time ago. So here it is, a memory made even more precious because I have not seen my sister now in over a year.. While most of the restaurants and vineyards mentioned in this piece are open, some of the places mentioned here are temporarily closed until the next season.

She emerges from a makeshift changing room in a gorgeous yellow, flirty and flowy chiffon dress. I tell her it looks splendid, but she asks a middle-aged chap shopping at the stall if it suits her. “I need a man’s perspective,” she tells me. “Très beau,” he tells her awkwardly, and she buys the dress.