It used to be called the Crystal. Not to be confused with the Diamond on the east side of the city. A motel on the way to the Sunset Strip and certainly not a signpost of great significance. Just something a boy passes on the way out of town. Onto Derby township, past the Burger King and Woolco before heading up the hill to Springmount and onward to the farm.
But in a way.
It was the first place he saw weekly and monthly rates available, on the sign out front. Motels and hotels up to that point had been places for nights and holidays, not long term stays. Not everyone takes holidays he found out later, and those that do generally don’t stay at the Crystal.
Later, the name stayed but the sign changed. It lost its plastic gem approximation and gained the brand. The beer. Crystal. A beer he later discovered to be an Owen Sound, Grey and Bruce County favourite. Labatt would have ended the line years ago if it didn’t have this pocket of Ontario thirsty, or so the story goes and grows.
An older boy smiled at this development now knowing, according to provincial surveys, the regional reputation for drinking. A sign like a beer’s label. Monthly rates. He catches the drift and feels clever for it.
Today it’s the Knights Inn, part of a chain, freshly painted and looking spiffy. A new reputation to uphold.
The boy now knows what hourly rates mean, something he saw in a movie, but hasn’t seen any signs.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Friday, April 03, 2009
Back in OS CAN again
I really need to make sure I don't let time drift by without writing. There are many things of interest around regular life that I'm sure I can write about. So far all I have is the people I saw out the bus window at the Barrie bus station.
I'll work on something a bit more clever than that.
I'll work on something a bit more clever than that.
Monday, March 23, 2009
my own personal st jacques de compostella
Santiago de Compostella. That’s the big one. The famous one. The pilgrimage route largely ignored since its heights of popularity centuries ago, now becoming THE vacation route for those looking for exhaustion, blisters and a big ol’ dollop of god cream. Or perhaps spirituality cream, it’s really a diversity of taste.
What a lot of people don’t think, or perhaps care, about is that pilgrims looking to scoot and skedaddle themselves to the north-west corner of Spain need a starting point and landing elsewhere in Spain was something not available to most European peasants of the middle ages. Most.
The reality of Europe at the time was multiple pilgrimage routes, some on their way to Santiago de Compostella, others to Rome or Jerusalem. The SdC route in fact had at least three paths through France that pull together towards Spain before joining the pilgrim highway, straight to eternal salvation. One of these happens to pass through the north of Aveyron, named St. Jacques de Compostella and easily traced by the seashell carvings and paintings that mark the way. Although it inevitably passes through many important sites on its way south the most important for local flavour is undeniably Conques, a tiny village buried in the valleys of north Aveyron that found its spot on the pilgrim trail by stealing relics from another church. Classic. Steal the relics, more pilgrims, more fame, more wealthy benefactors and the land holdings grow allowing the local Church and monks to produce increasing amounts of wine, for which even most of the labour is free because apparently even viticulture kills sins.
All this is to say I didn’t walk any of that. Instead I caught a bus to Villefranche de Rouergue and started hiking back along Grande Randonée 62B to Rodez, approximately parallel to St. Jacques but a few degrees south. The GR trails being a system of routes, signed with red-and-white-stripe trail markers, that sprawl across France like some spider web intending to catch people in the outdoors and sell them products from what must be the most well-developed commercial topographical map industry in the world. They lead you through forests, along riverbanks, down country lanes, across farm right of ways, and where necessary along the edges of small roads.
To give you an idea of the distance involved in this undertaking look at google maps, or whatever, just taking directions from one city to the other. It’s a fair distance but I figured what the heck, and I stepped off at 9:20am. I walked and walked and walked, meeting many fine dogs, one of whom enjoyed placing a stick in front of me, then when I picked it up he would pounce, necessitating a brief tug of war before he released and let me throw the stick, inevitably behind me in an attempt to send him home. He persisted until I actually pointed that way and he slouched his shoulders and watched sadly from a distance, thinking this happens with every hiker that passes through. My best guess is I stopped for a grand total of just over thirty minutes for snacks and water and a few photos. I knew I had until around 7:30 light wise and was therefore moving at a steady clip. Even with these efforts I still figured I would be making my final push, two hours or so, in the dark.
So I walked and walked and thought I should have reached Belcastel by now, a pretty village with a pretty castle of all things that marks roughly the halfway point. I thought I saw it twice, once it was a tower on a hill and once it was another village entirely, things you only figure out when you’re up close.
At a certain point I had decided I was mistaken, misremembering a map I had looked at in a bookstore and Belcastel was not actually on this route. Just after 5 when I walked up to a sign saying Belcastel 2.5km that way I discovered I was wrong.
So there I stood, around 6pm in Belcastel, knowing this was approximately the halfway mark and I’d used just under 9 hours to get that far. Yes, I knew the GR would be windier and longer than the roads but this really hit home after seeing the Belcastel highway sign at 2.5 km out, then following the GR trail markers away from the road, up, up and away onto the steep slope of the river valley, before coming back down closer to town, having added both a climb and undeniable distance.
I considered getting a room as I was starting to flag, running a bit low on water, but seeing 88 euros for a single and realizing I had set a goal of Villefranche to Rodez in one day I decided to struggle on, but along the roads rather than the hiking trail. I was not in the mood, even if I was able to follow the trail all the way in the dark, add another 9 hours to the journey and arrive home at 3 in the morning. Although for that authentic pilgrim feel maybe I was letting myself down there?
My one regret is not changing my socks at this point as they were a bit damp and that one moment’s pause would have undoubtedly saved me a bit of rubbing on the tips of toes that I am still feeling today. Thankfully I’ve never had a problem with blisters that saw the bottom of my foot leave me, but baby toes in damp socks can only survive unscathed for so long.
What became an increasingly hobbled and pathetic voyage along darkened highways where I was shuffling forwards with two walking sticks, relying on them more and more as the night deepened, pulling off to the side when a car’s headlights alerted me to an impending approach, took me around 5.5 hours (615 to 1140) and was about 27km in distance depending on where they measure town to town distances from and which signs you trust.
Based on ratios and figuring a slightly better pace previous to the evening’s blistered limping, my estimation of the morning’s walk is approximately 45km. And 72km in 14 hours are numbers that both seem reasonable and I can be happy with.
Distance (as the drunken, wobbly crow flies): 72 km in just over 14 hours
Injuries: sunburn on back of calves (yes, I wore shorts and it was glorious!), tight left calf for a few days, achy feet, blister on end of right baby toe, rub wound in centre of left foot, long blister along outside of ball of right foot (almost said along outside of right ball), other small rubs on both feet, various rubbing/chafage in the usual spots but nothing drastic
Enjoyment: through the roof
Smug self-satisfaction: of course
Disappointment I couldn’t make my way along the GR path the whole distance and emerge upon Rodez out of the forest like a legitimate pilgrim or perhaps a farmer who has taken longer than expected to move the herd of goats to market and return: mild but admittedly present
Werewolves spotted or attacked by on the desolate, star swept patches of emptiness that is the D994: secrets
What a lot of people don’t think, or perhaps care, about is that pilgrims looking to scoot and skedaddle themselves to the north-west corner of Spain need a starting point and landing elsewhere in Spain was something not available to most European peasants of the middle ages. Most.
The reality of Europe at the time was multiple pilgrimage routes, some on their way to Santiago de Compostella, others to Rome or Jerusalem. The SdC route in fact had at least three paths through France that pull together towards Spain before joining the pilgrim highway, straight to eternal salvation. One of these happens to pass through the north of Aveyron, named St. Jacques de Compostella and easily traced by the seashell carvings and paintings that mark the way. Although it inevitably passes through many important sites on its way south the most important for local flavour is undeniably Conques, a tiny village buried in the valleys of north Aveyron that found its spot on the pilgrim trail by stealing relics from another church. Classic. Steal the relics, more pilgrims, more fame, more wealthy benefactors and the land holdings grow allowing the local Church and monks to produce increasing amounts of wine, for which even most of the labour is free because apparently even viticulture kills sins.
All this is to say I didn’t walk any of that. Instead I caught a bus to Villefranche de Rouergue and started hiking back along Grande Randonée 62B to Rodez, approximately parallel to St. Jacques but a few degrees south. The GR trails being a system of routes, signed with red-and-white-stripe trail markers, that sprawl across France like some spider web intending to catch people in the outdoors and sell them products from what must be the most well-developed commercial topographical map industry in the world. They lead you through forests, along riverbanks, down country lanes, across farm right of ways, and where necessary along the edges of small roads.
To give you an idea of the distance involved in this undertaking look at google maps, or whatever, just taking directions from one city to the other. It’s a fair distance but I figured what the heck, and I stepped off at 9:20am. I walked and walked and walked, meeting many fine dogs, one of whom enjoyed placing a stick in front of me, then when I picked it up he would pounce, necessitating a brief tug of war before he released and let me throw the stick, inevitably behind me in an attempt to send him home. He persisted until I actually pointed that way and he slouched his shoulders and watched sadly from a distance, thinking this happens with every hiker that passes through. My best guess is I stopped for a grand total of just over thirty minutes for snacks and water and a few photos. I knew I had until around 7:30 light wise and was therefore moving at a steady clip. Even with these efforts I still figured I would be making my final push, two hours or so, in the dark.
So I walked and walked and thought I should have reached Belcastel by now, a pretty village with a pretty castle of all things that marks roughly the halfway point. I thought I saw it twice, once it was a tower on a hill and once it was another village entirely, things you only figure out when you’re up close.
At a certain point I had decided I was mistaken, misremembering a map I had looked at in a bookstore and Belcastel was not actually on this route. Just after 5 when I walked up to a sign saying Belcastel 2.5km that way I discovered I was wrong.
So there I stood, around 6pm in Belcastel, knowing this was approximately the halfway mark and I’d used just under 9 hours to get that far. Yes, I knew the GR would be windier and longer than the roads but this really hit home after seeing the Belcastel highway sign at 2.5 km out, then following the GR trail markers away from the road, up, up and away onto the steep slope of the river valley, before coming back down closer to town, having added both a climb and undeniable distance.
I considered getting a room as I was starting to flag, running a bit low on water, but seeing 88 euros for a single and realizing I had set a goal of Villefranche to Rodez in one day I decided to struggle on, but along the roads rather than the hiking trail. I was not in the mood, even if I was able to follow the trail all the way in the dark, add another 9 hours to the journey and arrive home at 3 in the morning. Although for that authentic pilgrim feel maybe I was letting myself down there?
My one regret is not changing my socks at this point as they were a bit damp and that one moment’s pause would have undoubtedly saved me a bit of rubbing on the tips of toes that I am still feeling today. Thankfully I’ve never had a problem with blisters that saw the bottom of my foot leave me, but baby toes in damp socks can only survive unscathed for so long.
What became an increasingly hobbled and pathetic voyage along darkened highways where I was shuffling forwards with two walking sticks, relying on them more and more as the night deepened, pulling off to the side when a car’s headlights alerted me to an impending approach, took me around 5.5 hours (615 to 1140) and was about 27km in distance depending on where they measure town to town distances from and which signs you trust.
Based on ratios and figuring a slightly better pace previous to the evening’s blistered limping, my estimation of the morning’s walk is approximately 45km. And 72km in 14 hours are numbers that both seem reasonable and I can be happy with.
Distance (as the drunken, wobbly crow flies): 72 km in just over 14 hours
Injuries: sunburn on back of calves (yes, I wore shorts and it was glorious!), tight left calf for a few days, achy feet, blister on end of right baby toe, rub wound in centre of left foot, long blister along outside of ball of right foot (almost said along outside of right ball), other small rubs on both feet, various rubbing/chafage in the usual spots but nothing drastic
Enjoyment: through the roof
Smug self-satisfaction: of course
Disappointment I couldn’t make my way along the GR path the whole distance and emerge upon Rodez out of the forest like a legitimate pilgrim or perhaps a farmer who has taken longer than expected to move the herd of goats to market and return: mild but admittedly present
Werewolves spotted or attacked by on the desolate, star swept patches of emptiness that is the D994: secrets
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
elevator
Rolling into town the other day on my pod train of Bombardier extraction I was struck by an opportunity Rodez seems to have missed. The gare, or train station as the kids are calling it these days, is at the bottom of the hill on which Rodez perches. To get to it from Toulouse, one goes around almost half the circumference of the hill.
That part of the trip is actually quite nice. If you’re on correct side of the train you get a pleasant view of the city. Of course the cathedral predominates, but there are a few other churches to see and the longer I’ve stayed and returned here, the more I have to pick out from the cityscape. The IUFM where I work, complete with its dining hall in front, Lycée Monteil where I sleep, a white monstrosity that lords over that side of the hill, threatening to devour even the near-by Sacre-Coeur, and if I’m on the other side of the train and very lucky the Géant Casino, which is actually a grocery store, where I go to buy delicious muesli to sprinkle on my weetabix and bigger jugs of milk and orange juice than I can find anywhere else.
This is all pleasant enough, but I would be willing to give it up if Rodez was willing to realize the value of its geography. What better way to take advantage of a city on a hill than to build a train station at its very core?
A train station connected to the hilltop by elevator, one that spits people out in the centre of the city. In my ideal conception the exit, which could be the entrance too but here we are only concerned about people being amazed and dazzled as they arrive, would face the cathedral from the Place d’Armes. In a perfect world the elevator doors swing open, and there in all its majesty is the cathedral. That which is on all Ruthenois postcards, that which is in the centre of town, that which contains the history and future of the city in one fell swoop.
Maybe the train station’s current location is better suited to housing the train yard or servicing the vast majority of the population who drive and don’t live in the middle of the city. And to them I say BAH! Call up Sarkozy, get the cash and start digging.
Dig Rodez, DIG! Dig for your future!
That part of the trip is actually quite nice. If you’re on correct side of the train you get a pleasant view of the city. Of course the cathedral predominates, but there are a few other churches to see and the longer I’ve stayed and returned here, the more I have to pick out from the cityscape. The IUFM where I work, complete with its dining hall in front, Lycée Monteil where I sleep, a white monstrosity that lords over that side of the hill, threatening to devour even the near-by Sacre-Coeur, and if I’m on the other side of the train and very lucky the Géant Casino, which is actually a grocery store, where I go to buy delicious muesli to sprinkle on my weetabix and bigger jugs of milk and orange juice than I can find anywhere else.
This is all pleasant enough, but I would be willing to give it up if Rodez was willing to realize the value of its geography. What better way to take advantage of a city on a hill than to build a train station at its very core?
A train station connected to the hilltop by elevator, one that spits people out in the centre of the city. In my ideal conception the exit, which could be the entrance too but here we are only concerned about people being amazed and dazzled as they arrive, would face the cathedral from the Place d’Armes. In a perfect world the elevator doors swing open, and there in all its majesty is the cathedral. That which is on all Ruthenois postcards, that which is in the centre of town, that which contains the history and future of the city in one fell swoop.
Maybe the train station’s current location is better suited to housing the train yard or servicing the vast majority of the population who drive and don’t live in the middle of the city. And to them I say BAH! Call up Sarkozy, get the cash and start digging.
Dig Rodez, DIG! Dig for your future!
Monday, March 09, 2009
sensations of the end
Having a life compartmentalized means I experience many beginnings and ends. Periods of adjustment and anticipation.
Before I left for Morocco I began to experience my first sensations of another end drawing nigh. I had decided not to renew my contract, and knew when I returned from the trip there would only be a month left in France. Immediately my brain began spinning, considering the loose ends that would need to be tied up; sorting through papers, mailing things home that were too bulky to carry, considering the process of shutting down a bank account and transferring funds.
Now that I am into the final month in Rodez, less than a month left on the continent even, the anticipation has given way to procrastination. Piles of paper sit on my floor, most of which I know will be tossed. Couldn’t tell you exactly why I kept them in the first place. Maybe some notion of saving teaching resources, ready to be used again.
Sort, box, deposit at the post office. Won’t take too long, and I really can’t do a proper job until the end of things, so they can sit for now.
Every day I consider going to the bank and figuring out just how easy or hard it will be to sort out my accounts, but there’s always too much of a line for me to bother. Then last night I realized the bank has restricted hours on Mondays, if it’s not closed entirely, meaning I may need to push back my departure by another day just to make sure I can get my last paycheque on the Friday and then make sure all loose ends are tied off before I leave.
Thus is life.
As usual the end is accompanied by a beginning, but this go round the beginning remains indeterminate. There are choices and options before me, outside influences more or less within my control that are slowly emerging from the ether. Eventually they will concretize and the choice will be left to me. Up, down, left, right, or around and around?
And the great voyage rumbles on.
Before I left for Morocco I began to experience my first sensations of another end drawing nigh. I had decided not to renew my contract, and knew when I returned from the trip there would only be a month left in France. Immediately my brain began spinning, considering the loose ends that would need to be tied up; sorting through papers, mailing things home that were too bulky to carry, considering the process of shutting down a bank account and transferring funds.
Now that I am into the final month in Rodez, less than a month left on the continent even, the anticipation has given way to procrastination. Piles of paper sit on my floor, most of which I know will be tossed. Couldn’t tell you exactly why I kept them in the first place. Maybe some notion of saving teaching resources, ready to be used again.
Sort, box, deposit at the post office. Won’t take too long, and I really can’t do a proper job until the end of things, so they can sit for now.
Every day I consider going to the bank and figuring out just how easy or hard it will be to sort out my accounts, but there’s always too much of a line for me to bother. Then last night I realized the bank has restricted hours on Mondays, if it’s not closed entirely, meaning I may need to push back my departure by another day just to make sure I can get my last paycheque on the Friday and then make sure all loose ends are tied off before I leave.
Thus is life.
As usual the end is accompanied by a beginning, but this go round the beginning remains indeterminate. There are choices and options before me, outside influences more or less within my control that are slowly emerging from the ether. Eventually they will concretize and the choice will be left to me. Up, down, left, right, or around and around?
And the great voyage rumbles on.
Greeting guests
Rodez, the centre of the universe that it is, tends to pull all sorts into its orbit.
Hmmm. Perhaps a better space analogy.
Rodez is a black hole. People that arrive here are never clear on how it happened, and generally find a blank spot in their memory when they try to recall their specific experience crossing the event horizon. Having one’s molecular being simultaneously torn apart and compressed into an infinitesimally small area can play tricks with memory.
But black holes hold such negative connotations, something about their unknown nature and how people feel about the concept of no escape.
Rodez is a lovely place a satisfactory distance from the sun. A bit out of the way geographically and under-serviced from a public transport point of view, but isn’t all of France?
In my time here I have been asked why Rodez, so I explain. I filled in my application form, putting the Toulouse region (Midi-Pyrenees by name) as my number one geographic choice. It was awarded to me, just a part of it that I had never heard of. The questioner smiles, shakes their head and apologizes for my misfortune. They tend to be under 30, the night tends to be Saturday and the atmosphere tends to be Rodez on the weekend, quiet.
Writing this I have just returned from a Sunday afternoon stroll in the countryside, satisfying both physically and sensorially. Lovely part of the world as they say. If there had been a Rodez rugby game this afternoon I would have been at the stadium. Saturdays I visit the well-stocked market and often sip a beer while watching televised rugby at my local pub. The week leaves me time for the gym, for runs, and visits to the local mediatheque for writing, reading and smiling at pretty girls. I’m content with my lot, and try to say as much to anyone who feels the need to rest a hand on my shoulder, look into my eyes and empathize.
But when others come to visit, or simply threaten to do as much, there is a peculiar embarrassment that emerges in my response, and in those expressed by the other assistants. We don’t want to stop people from coming, the more the merrier, but we are compelled to reveal the truth, to be honest about what the visitor should expect. As hosts we fear someone arriving, not knowing the nature of this ancient land, and becoming, gasp!, bored.
A Ruthenois (someone from Rodez) wall of shame emerges as we awkwardly explain.
“Ya...it’s...ummm...kind of slow here sometimes. This is pretty much it actually. Thursday’s a big night, if you’re ever here on a Thursday...” Distant wolf howl. Tumbling tumbleweed. Scene closes.
This is not a complaint of a slow life, one that has engendered a walking and book trading culture amongst the assistants, but an interested observation on human reaction to being a 21st century youth living a quiet, semi-rural life in a, shall we say, less-trafficked part of France.
Us young’ns are meant to be out caterwauling, drinking and carousing, causing mischief and avoiding pregnancy, something I am pleased to say I have avoided both absolutely and completely. Surely from time to time a hint of debauchery does insert itself into our lives, but nothing compared to the ‘assistant life’ that exists in larger urban centres. Bunch of drunks and sluts don’cha know?
Let’s just say the Ruthenois assistants have adopted a geared down way of being.
Other assistants here have the additional distractions of television and the internet and still crave a bit more action than a periodic perambulation provides, so I can’t claim a universal monkish community has sprung up. By this point, however, we are all at least familiar with life here, if not totally at peace with it.
It is this familiarity we feel the need to impart when the outlander arrives.
We’re in a really nice place, so there’s no need for pity, but you should prepare yourself. Take a deep breath and, well, keep on breathing until you find something else to do.
Hmmm. Perhaps a better space analogy.
Rodez is a black hole. People that arrive here are never clear on how it happened, and generally find a blank spot in their memory when they try to recall their specific experience crossing the event horizon. Having one’s molecular being simultaneously torn apart and compressed into an infinitesimally small area can play tricks with memory.
But black holes hold such negative connotations, something about their unknown nature and how people feel about the concept of no escape.
Rodez is a lovely place a satisfactory distance from the sun. A bit out of the way geographically and under-serviced from a public transport point of view, but isn’t all of France?
In my time here I have been asked why Rodez, so I explain. I filled in my application form, putting the Toulouse region (Midi-Pyrenees by name) as my number one geographic choice. It was awarded to me, just a part of it that I had never heard of. The questioner smiles, shakes their head and apologizes for my misfortune. They tend to be under 30, the night tends to be Saturday and the atmosphere tends to be Rodez on the weekend, quiet.
Writing this I have just returned from a Sunday afternoon stroll in the countryside, satisfying both physically and sensorially. Lovely part of the world as they say. If there had been a Rodez rugby game this afternoon I would have been at the stadium. Saturdays I visit the well-stocked market and often sip a beer while watching televised rugby at my local pub. The week leaves me time for the gym, for runs, and visits to the local mediatheque for writing, reading and smiling at pretty girls. I’m content with my lot, and try to say as much to anyone who feels the need to rest a hand on my shoulder, look into my eyes and empathize.
But when others come to visit, or simply threaten to do as much, there is a peculiar embarrassment that emerges in my response, and in those expressed by the other assistants. We don’t want to stop people from coming, the more the merrier, but we are compelled to reveal the truth, to be honest about what the visitor should expect. As hosts we fear someone arriving, not knowing the nature of this ancient land, and becoming, gasp!, bored.
A Ruthenois (someone from Rodez) wall of shame emerges as we awkwardly explain.
“Ya...it’s...ummm...kind of slow here sometimes. This is pretty much it actually. Thursday’s a big night, if you’re ever here on a Thursday...” Distant wolf howl. Tumbling tumbleweed. Scene closes.
This is not a complaint of a slow life, one that has engendered a walking and book trading culture amongst the assistants, but an interested observation on human reaction to being a 21st century youth living a quiet, semi-rural life in a, shall we say, less-trafficked part of France.
Us young’ns are meant to be out caterwauling, drinking and carousing, causing mischief and avoiding pregnancy, something I am pleased to say I have avoided both absolutely and completely. Surely from time to time a hint of debauchery does insert itself into our lives, but nothing compared to the ‘assistant life’ that exists in larger urban centres. Bunch of drunks and sluts don’cha know?
Let’s just say the Ruthenois assistants have adopted a geared down way of being.
Other assistants here have the additional distractions of television and the internet and still crave a bit more action than a periodic perambulation provides, so I can’t claim a universal monkish community has sprung up. By this point, however, we are all at least familiar with life here, if not totally at peace with it.
It is this familiarity we feel the need to impart when the outlander arrives.
We’re in a really nice place, so there’s no need for pity, but you should prepare yourself. Take a deep breath and, well, keep on breathing until you find something else to do.
Allez le R.A.F.
I also was remiss in not mentioning the most recent sporting news to emerge from Rodez.
The local football club, le R.A.F., is involved in the French equivalent of the FA Cup, the competition where all the club teams in the country are eligible to compete and where one finds lower tier teams playing against the big money with famous players.
First off, R.A.F. stands for Rodez Aveyron Football, Aveyron being the department in which I am in. Our logo is some sort of red bull's head. Very aggressive.
We had managed to get ourselves into the round of 16 in the tournament, despite sitting 12th in the third division of French football, and for an opponent had drawn Paris St. Germain, currently second in the top tier and one of last year's finalist. For anyone who knows French society it is perhaps the most centralized in Europe when one considers the history and current role of Paris in the affairs of the rest of the country, so there were all sorts of themes beyond the sport tied up in the match as well.
To make a long story short the town was into it from the time the match up was announced, so last Wednesday, March 4th everyone was either at the game or in bars watching. Paris scored early, but Rodez was playing well, we equalized in the 60th minute or so on an excellent shot, survived a few scares at the end of regulation and had some solid play from our keeper. The first 15 minutes of extra time yielded nothing, but in the second block of extra time a ripping shot from 30 yards out took a deflection off a PSG defender and in it went. We added a third right at the end and the town went crazy.
Honking and flag waving and flares and beers until the wee hours of the morn. Jolly times all round.
Allez Rodez! Next up Rennes in the quarters.
The local football club, le R.A.F., is involved in the French equivalent of the FA Cup, the competition where all the club teams in the country are eligible to compete and where one finds lower tier teams playing against the big money with famous players.
First off, R.A.F. stands for Rodez Aveyron Football, Aveyron being the department in which I am in. Our logo is some sort of red bull's head. Very aggressive.
We had managed to get ourselves into the round of 16 in the tournament, despite sitting 12th in the third division of French football, and for an opponent had drawn Paris St. Germain, currently second in the top tier and one of last year's finalist. For anyone who knows French society it is perhaps the most centralized in Europe when one considers the history and current role of Paris in the affairs of the rest of the country, so there were all sorts of themes beyond the sport tied up in the match as well.
To make a long story short the town was into it from the time the match up was announced, so last Wednesday, March 4th everyone was either at the game or in bars watching. Paris scored early, but Rodez was playing well, we equalized in the 60th minute or so on an excellent shot, survived a few scares at the end of regulation and had some solid play from our keeper. The first 15 minutes of extra time yielded nothing, but in the second block of extra time a ripping shot from 30 yards out took a deflection off a PSG defender and in it went. We added a third right at the end and the town went crazy.
Honking and flag waving and flares and beers until the wee hours of the morn. Jolly times all round.
Allez Rodez! Next up Rennes in the quarters.
Jamie Oliver
Looking through my Morocco photos I forgot to mention that Jamie Oliver (yes that one, the famous chef) appeared in Marrakech while I was eating supper. And of all the foodstalls arrayed around the square he decided to stop at mine and start cooking.
Humourous times as I explained to a Swiss couple who he was.
Apparently he is shooting some show where he drops into various cities around the world to get a feel for their food culture. Interesting to watch both him and those following him, and some of the local waiters working who refused to listen to the producers pleas. "Hey Jamie Oliver! Hey Jamie!"
I had ordered before he arrived so he didn't actually cook any of my food but I heard he did up an order of meat skewers that were subsequently sent back because they were underdone. Silly Jamie. You cook the meet right through because it's been sitting around unrefridgerated all day. They have a chunk of fat on the skewer for flavour.
Humourous times as I explained to a Swiss couple who he was.
Apparently he is shooting some show where he drops into various cities around the world to get a feel for their food culture. Interesting to watch both him and those following him, and some of the local waiters working who refused to listen to the producers pleas. "Hey Jamie Oliver! Hey Jamie!"
I had ordered before he arrived so he didn't actually cook any of my food but I heard he did up an order of meat skewers that were subsequently sent back because they were underdone. Silly Jamie. You cook the meet right through because it's been sitting around unrefridgerated all day. They have a chunk of fat on the skewer for flavour.
Thursday, March 05, 2009
clarification
Apparently there was some confusion, so I will clarify. I bought NO carpets and witnessed no hash being created. I was teasing a Moroccan man.
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
and so...
I think that’s all the specific, factual reporting you’re going to get from me on this trip. Anything else you’ll see will emerge in a more creative form, as part of my unceasing and ongoing efforts to give my writing purpose.
I suppose there is no qualitative difference between out of context creative entries to a blog versus more factual travelogue type attempts, but there is a difference somewhere in my mind.
So ‘creative’ it is! And besides, all these blog entries take time away from the novel.
I suppose there is no qualitative difference between out of context creative entries to a blog versus more factual travelogue type attempts, but there is a difference somewhere in my mind.
So ‘creative’ it is! And besides, all these blog entries take time away from the novel.
touts
Everything I read on Morocco warned me against the various dangers of fake tour guides and ne’er do wells who wanted to drag me to their or a friend’s store. According to reputation they are aggressive and swarming, not giving a person a moment’s peace.
Perhaps because the mental world one builds after reading such warnings is often more vicious than the real one I was not as horribly harassed as I might have thought. Apparently there have also been recent efforts to crack down on those ruining the tourist experience too forcefully. Still, I met many fine people wanting to sell me things. The sheer volume that I could write on this is already tiring me so I’ve been quite savage in trying to keep it short and even a little subdivided and organized.
Shopkeepers who said hello were stuck to their shops and could be walked by easily, despite offers of a free look around. “Why the rush?” Sometimes if the shop were off a main thoroughfare people with limited English would just point at a sign and say ‘Berber carpets’ making the ignoring process even simpler.
When arriving in a town people would offer cheap hotels, sometimes jumping to your side three steps before your chosen door, then acting like they had some role in your arrival.
Walking around you were likely to be asked what you were looking for, or simply be told X tourist site was the other way, that gate is locked, or whatever. I liked the fellow in Tanger who started telling me a gate was locked he was the gatekeeper and I should turn around. I told him I’d risk it and he started yelling that I didn’t believe him. By that point I was already at the unlockable gate, and he had never broken his pace in an attempt to convince me so I think he was a friendly insane person more than anything else.
The most irritating aspect of these people is when you are simply wandering and a road you are about to go up suddenly becomes no go because some guy has just pointed up it and said ‘synagogue’ or ‘garden’ or whatever. To go up it then would lead to some argument over payment that I would rather just avoid. I assume someone must tip these people, or why else would they bother.
While I feel the situation is not as horrible as some books make it out to be, it can wear on you after a while. You treat a person with a bit of abruptness because you’re being harassed for the 8th time in 10 minutes and they get all huffy and angry because you’re rude. The fear of being bothered also affects how long you’re willing to stop and look at something. And talking to the locals in an honest and open manner is simply impossible when you have to assume everyone who talks to you is about to move onto something of a commercial nature.
All you can do is try to have some fun, as I did near the end of my stay in Chefchouan where they took me to be a new arrival (I’d actually just been checking the next day’s bus schedule) and began telling me how I could witness hashish manufacturing at a real Berber house. I had to explain to the poor guy before he even got started in his broken English that I’d already been to no less than 6 Berber houses, seen truckloads of hashish made and had also spent over 600 euros on carpets. Too bad he hadn’t caught me earlier in the week.
Perhaps because the mental world one builds after reading such warnings is often more vicious than the real one I was not as horribly harassed as I might have thought. Apparently there have also been recent efforts to crack down on those ruining the tourist experience too forcefully. Still, I met many fine people wanting to sell me things. The sheer volume that I could write on this is already tiring me so I’ve been quite savage in trying to keep it short and even a little subdivided and organized.
Shopkeepers who said hello were stuck to their shops and could be walked by easily, despite offers of a free look around. “Why the rush?” Sometimes if the shop were off a main thoroughfare people with limited English would just point at a sign and say ‘Berber carpets’ making the ignoring process even simpler.
When arriving in a town people would offer cheap hotels, sometimes jumping to your side three steps before your chosen door, then acting like they had some role in your arrival.
Walking around you were likely to be asked what you were looking for, or simply be told X tourist site was the other way, that gate is locked, or whatever. I liked the fellow in Tanger who started telling me a gate was locked he was the gatekeeper and I should turn around. I told him I’d risk it and he started yelling that I didn’t believe him. By that point I was already at the unlockable gate, and he had never broken his pace in an attempt to convince me so I think he was a friendly insane person more than anything else.
The most irritating aspect of these people is when you are simply wandering and a road you are about to go up suddenly becomes no go because some guy has just pointed up it and said ‘synagogue’ or ‘garden’ or whatever. To go up it then would lead to some argument over payment that I would rather just avoid. I assume someone must tip these people, or why else would they bother.
While I feel the situation is not as horrible as some books make it out to be, it can wear on you after a while. You treat a person with a bit of abruptness because you’re being harassed for the 8th time in 10 minutes and they get all huffy and angry because you’re rude. The fear of being bothered also affects how long you’re willing to stop and look at something. And talking to the locals in an honest and open manner is simply impossible when you have to assume everyone who talks to you is about to move onto something of a commercial nature.
All you can do is try to have some fun, as I did near the end of my stay in Chefchouan where they took me to be a new arrival (I’d actually just been checking the next day’s bus schedule) and began telling me how I could witness hashish manufacturing at a real Berber house. I had to explain to the poor guy before he even got started in his broken English that I’d already been to no less than 6 Berber houses, seen truckloads of hashish made and had also spent over 600 euros on carpets. Too bad he hadn’t caught me earlier in the week.
physical geography corner
Although I was in Morocco, I was there in February and this provided me with realities I might not have expected.
The weather, for instance, was generally cool. The sun made things hot during the day, but even then if you paid attention a winter chill lay beneath, heightened whenever a cloud got in the way. The Atlantic coast had sea breezes and mist making things a bit colder still while the mountains were mountains, although even up there the sun did a bang up job of warming the day when one was out of the breeze.
Nights were cool to cold no matter where I was. Buildings constructed of stone and designed to minimize heat accentuated this and encouraged a dampness to emerge in most of the rooms I slept in. Not the most pleasant but not a great disaster. Blankets were available and I had my sleeping bag as well.
The landscape I found shockingly green and verdant. Admittedly I never went south past Marrakech or east over the mountains, both routes leading to the Sahara, which I understand has a reputation for being dry and beige. But the parts I did see were in spring bloom (I was told I arrived in Marrakech after a week of rains) and it was very nice. The green was that rich new growth that springs forth suddenly and uniformly from worked fields, rather than the patchy green that struggles from beneath a previous year’s dead browns when fallow land is awakening in the spring. On the train ride north from Marrakech there were also wonderful carpets of tiny purple and orange flowers.
I had always pictured a bit more of a brown deserty place, but Morocco is actually quite fertile. Something I should have guessed giving all those ‘maroc’ marked tangerines one sees on the shelves in Canadian grocery stores, the country’s reputation for wood products, and all the olive oil the Romans managed to milk from the place.
The weather, for instance, was generally cool. The sun made things hot during the day, but even then if you paid attention a winter chill lay beneath, heightened whenever a cloud got in the way. The Atlantic coast had sea breezes and mist making things a bit colder still while the mountains were mountains, although even up there the sun did a bang up job of warming the day when one was out of the breeze.
Nights were cool to cold no matter where I was. Buildings constructed of stone and designed to minimize heat accentuated this and encouraged a dampness to emerge in most of the rooms I slept in. Not the most pleasant but not a great disaster. Blankets were available and I had my sleeping bag as well.
The landscape I found shockingly green and verdant. Admittedly I never went south past Marrakech or east over the mountains, both routes leading to the Sahara, which I understand has a reputation for being dry and beige. But the parts I did see were in spring bloom (I was told I arrived in Marrakech after a week of rains) and it was very nice. The green was that rich new growth that springs forth suddenly and uniformly from worked fields, rather than the patchy green that struggles from beneath a previous year’s dead browns when fallow land is awakening in the spring. On the train ride north from Marrakech there were also wonderful carpets of tiny purple and orange flowers.
I had always pictured a bit more of a brown deserty place, but Morocco is actually quite fertile. Something I should have guessed giving all those ‘maroc’ marked tangerines one sees on the shelves in Canadian grocery stores, the country’s reputation for wood products, and all the olive oil the Romans managed to milk from the place.
synopsis (as I saw it)...hopefully you find the same points interesting
For those interested or considering a trip to the place, Morocco is pretty alright.
It is less conservative in an Islamic sense from the countries I visited last summer. Whether this is a question of proximity to the Islamic core, history of European tourists, a Berber mindset that remains powerfully distinct and individual, or something else I do not know.
What I do know is people (women...western women?) can wear bikinis, at the beaches, and not be ridiculously harassed (it wasn’t the right season but from what I saw and understand this is the case). More tamely, more local women choose to go bare-headed and a significant number (especially in new towns) are interested in following the fashion trends one finds in Europe or North America. I’m not saying there were Playboys in every newsstand and a certain conservatism remains, especially in rural areas, but the ladies working in the post office for instance were happily shaking men’s hands, a small but HUGE difference for me.
Day-to-day life is not as structured by religion. People attend mosque and pray, but not in the numbers of countries further east. Sunday tends to be the day off in Morocco and while Friday prayer is significant, it happens without quashing the rest of life. Generally things seem to tick over 7 days out of 7.
Perhaps because of the longer history of tourism I did not have the same kindness without reserve that I experienced in Jordan and Syria. While I was in Tanger there were two fellows, within 5 minutes of each other, who seemed to be in it to help, not sell, but aside from that my interactions with Moroccans had commercial threads worked throughout. (As a side note one of those two told me I looked strong in the head and I would do just fine in life.)
I did, however, tend to stick to a main tourist route, and my English friends who did some hiking in the countryside said they found at least one village, never before visited by tourists, to be extremely kind and hospitable without thinking of asking for money
The money side of things seems to be an inevitable reality when it comes to tourism and cultural transformation.
I should specify that I met many friendly people in Morocco (hostels, restaurants, shops etc.) and while some wore on me, the vast majority were kind and understanding, happy to sell but equally happy to smile and chat when a purchase was not forthcoming.
And in conclusion, a lot of people smoke hash there. I mean the locals are lighting up in their shops when business is slow, and in Chefchouan let’s just say there were a lot of glassy eyed Moroccans who aren’t planning on doing anything but being stoned and selling a little to tourists if the opportunity presents itself. If that’s your bag, go for it.
It is less conservative in an Islamic sense from the countries I visited last summer. Whether this is a question of proximity to the Islamic core, history of European tourists, a Berber mindset that remains powerfully distinct and individual, or something else I do not know.
What I do know is people (women...western women?) can wear bikinis, at the beaches, and not be ridiculously harassed (it wasn’t the right season but from what I saw and understand this is the case). More tamely, more local women choose to go bare-headed and a significant number (especially in new towns) are interested in following the fashion trends one finds in Europe or North America. I’m not saying there were Playboys in every newsstand and a certain conservatism remains, especially in rural areas, but the ladies working in the post office for instance were happily shaking men’s hands, a small but HUGE difference for me.
Day-to-day life is not as structured by religion. People attend mosque and pray, but not in the numbers of countries further east. Sunday tends to be the day off in Morocco and while Friday prayer is significant, it happens without quashing the rest of life. Generally things seem to tick over 7 days out of 7.
Perhaps because of the longer history of tourism I did not have the same kindness without reserve that I experienced in Jordan and Syria. While I was in Tanger there were two fellows, within 5 minutes of each other, who seemed to be in it to help, not sell, but aside from that my interactions with Moroccans had commercial threads worked throughout. (As a side note one of those two told me I looked strong in the head and I would do just fine in life.)
I did, however, tend to stick to a main tourist route, and my English friends who did some hiking in the countryside said they found at least one village, never before visited by tourists, to be extremely kind and hospitable without thinking of asking for money
The money side of things seems to be an inevitable reality when it comes to tourism and cultural transformation.
I should specify that I met many friendly people in Morocco (hostels, restaurants, shops etc.) and while some wore on me, the vast majority were kind and understanding, happy to sell but equally happy to smile and chat when a purchase was not forthcoming.
And in conclusion, a lot of people smoke hash there. I mean the locals are lighting up in their shops when business is slow, and in Chefchouan let’s just say there were a lot of glassy eyed Moroccans who aren’t planning on doing anything but being stoned and selling a little to tourists if the opportunity presents itself. If that’s your bag, go for it.
Morocco
Before I even consider starting in with various bits of creative genius, methinks it behooves the kind reader to get at least something resembling a summation of my most recent ramblings.
I began my journey in Marrakech where I had accepted a ride from the airport for the first time in my life. The ride was late so I didn’t have the joy of a funny man with a sign waiting for me. I’ll just have to become extremely wealthy so I can pay people to hold signs with my name on them in the future.
Marrakech was interesting and I found the souks much more meandering and confusing than anything I encountered in Syria or Turkey. In those situations I didn’t necessarily know where I was, but the lanes tended to be in straight lines and it was never too hard to sort oneself out. In Marrakech, I walked out the door on the first morning, hung one too many lefts and was bletheringly lost in moments. Fortunately, I discovered a proclivity for using the little slivers of sun I could spy high up on certain walls to orient myself (I’m not sure if one can actually discover a proclivity but I think so).
After finding myself, I was lost again but not yet aware of it, when I stumbled upon a museum. Not realizing my situation I decided the museum couldn’t be the same one as marked on my map because that would mean I was elsewhere than I thought I was and it was therefore most likely a scam I was too clever by ten to fall for. I subsequently strolled boldly off, eventually realizing I was south of the city, south of the royal palace, and wandering in the gardens, way off course. I eventually set myself right and because I had started so early and one can cover an amazing amount of ground when walking at an unceasing and steady rate I had plenty of time to visit the new town as well. French boulevards, etc etc.
From Marrakech I also went on an excessively expensive day trip to an ‘authentic Berber house’ where I had ‘an authentic Berber breakfast’ before climbing to an ‘authentic waterfall’ and then eating an ‘authentic Moroccan meal’ of tagine and couscous. Nice day, it just cost too much. I went wading under the waterfall. Everyone thought me crazy and all were impressed.
Next up was Essaouira, a former Portuguese port, currently a fishing and tourist town. Lovely place, under a gently cool sea mist the whole time I was there. A former hangout of Bob Marley, home to an annual world music festival and a place where caveat emptor is a good rule of thumb, especially when buying things from random men on the beach. I did some walking, saw the fortifications and whatnot, but the main draw was undeniably the evenings at the hostel. I was only there for a few days, but had some very nice hang outs around the fireplace, playing cards or chatting until the wee hours.
Next to Fez; 3 hours to Marrakech on a bus, then 8 by train. Fez is the former and present heart of Moroccan education. The place of Moroccan university students and foreigners giving the local Arabic a run for its money. It is also home to many a fine tout. Everyone wants to point you to the tannery (which I found by myself and really enjoyed) or whatever other random crap is on the list. Again I spent a lot of time walking, through the city and around the city, up onto local hills to get a better view of things. There are all sorts of signs and marked paths so it’s hard to get permanently lost. Again here I spent a lot of time in the old city, but did a run down to the new one as well, just to see the place.
I also did a one day trip out to Voloubulis (an old Roman city) via Meknes and Moullay Idriss. The latter being the location of a sainted former ruler’s tomb and closed to the infidels until this century. The kind of place where if a European did find their way in they were likely to get poisoned by the locals. Good times.
After Fez, where the accommodations were spartan and sufficient but not suited to befriending other travellers, it was off to Chefchouan, where the accommodations were chilled and more than suited to make friends. Cc, like the aforementioned Mly Idriss, is a place that was shut off from non Muslims until recently but is now a popular place for all sorts of weirdos. Here I sat about for a good number of days, wondering where it all went, not really in the mood to abuse my feet and generally enjoying life and chatting. Beautiful scenery etc.
Then down to Tanger for a night, which as the main port of entry for ferries from Europe is a bit silly for touristy responses from the locals. I was only there for one night, but my wanderings were solid; the American Legation Museum was excellent, having an extensive map collection AND dioramas of historic battles recreated using hundreds of toy soldiers. Amazing.
I also managed to finally find a hole in the wall selling crap old maps and books and then subsequently paid far too much for a bunch of old highway maps when the clever bastard running the place knew a sucker when he saw one. Very valuable he told me. I know for a fact torn and stained Michelin maps of Morocco from the 1970s are not valuable at all. But by valuable I think he meant you have a strange connection to these things that I intend to milk for all it’s worth. It wasn’t too bad, I just bought in excess, and when I compare it to the cost of a heavy night’s drinking at a bar I think I did myself proud.
A brief ferry ride to Spain and bus to Gibraltar and KAPOW! The end of my trip after a day wandering about and enjoying the intricacies and oddities of British overseas possessions. Flew to London, spent the night in Gatwick, flew to Toulouse and trained to Rodez. Sleep at last.
Wooosh.
Heh, now maybe I’ll give you something with a bit more depth or I’ll save it for the book.
I began my journey in Marrakech where I had accepted a ride from the airport for the first time in my life. The ride was late so I didn’t have the joy of a funny man with a sign waiting for me. I’ll just have to become extremely wealthy so I can pay people to hold signs with my name on them in the future.
Marrakech was interesting and I found the souks much more meandering and confusing than anything I encountered in Syria or Turkey. In those situations I didn’t necessarily know where I was, but the lanes tended to be in straight lines and it was never too hard to sort oneself out. In Marrakech, I walked out the door on the first morning, hung one too many lefts and was bletheringly lost in moments. Fortunately, I discovered a proclivity for using the little slivers of sun I could spy high up on certain walls to orient myself (I’m not sure if one can actually discover a proclivity but I think so).
After finding myself, I was lost again but not yet aware of it, when I stumbled upon a museum. Not realizing my situation I decided the museum couldn’t be the same one as marked on my map because that would mean I was elsewhere than I thought I was and it was therefore most likely a scam I was too clever by ten to fall for. I subsequently strolled boldly off, eventually realizing I was south of the city, south of the royal palace, and wandering in the gardens, way off course. I eventually set myself right and because I had started so early and one can cover an amazing amount of ground when walking at an unceasing and steady rate I had plenty of time to visit the new town as well. French boulevards, etc etc.
From Marrakech I also went on an excessively expensive day trip to an ‘authentic Berber house’ where I had ‘an authentic Berber breakfast’ before climbing to an ‘authentic waterfall’ and then eating an ‘authentic Moroccan meal’ of tagine and couscous. Nice day, it just cost too much. I went wading under the waterfall. Everyone thought me crazy and all were impressed.
Next up was Essaouira, a former Portuguese port, currently a fishing and tourist town. Lovely place, under a gently cool sea mist the whole time I was there. A former hangout of Bob Marley, home to an annual world music festival and a place where caveat emptor is a good rule of thumb, especially when buying things from random men on the beach. I did some walking, saw the fortifications and whatnot, but the main draw was undeniably the evenings at the hostel. I was only there for a few days, but had some very nice hang outs around the fireplace, playing cards or chatting until the wee hours.
Next to Fez; 3 hours to Marrakech on a bus, then 8 by train. Fez is the former and present heart of Moroccan education. The place of Moroccan university students and foreigners giving the local Arabic a run for its money. It is also home to many a fine tout. Everyone wants to point you to the tannery (which I found by myself and really enjoyed) or whatever other random crap is on the list. Again I spent a lot of time walking, through the city and around the city, up onto local hills to get a better view of things. There are all sorts of signs and marked paths so it’s hard to get permanently lost. Again here I spent a lot of time in the old city, but did a run down to the new one as well, just to see the place.
I also did a one day trip out to Voloubulis (an old Roman city) via Meknes and Moullay Idriss. The latter being the location of a sainted former ruler’s tomb and closed to the infidels until this century. The kind of place where if a European did find their way in they were likely to get poisoned by the locals. Good times.
After Fez, where the accommodations were spartan and sufficient but not suited to befriending other travellers, it was off to Chefchouan, where the accommodations were chilled and more than suited to make friends. Cc, like the aforementioned Mly Idriss, is a place that was shut off from non Muslims until recently but is now a popular place for all sorts of weirdos. Here I sat about for a good number of days, wondering where it all went, not really in the mood to abuse my feet and generally enjoying life and chatting. Beautiful scenery etc.
Then down to Tanger for a night, which as the main port of entry for ferries from Europe is a bit silly for touristy responses from the locals. I was only there for one night, but my wanderings were solid; the American Legation Museum was excellent, having an extensive map collection AND dioramas of historic battles recreated using hundreds of toy soldiers. Amazing.
I also managed to finally find a hole in the wall selling crap old maps and books and then subsequently paid far too much for a bunch of old highway maps when the clever bastard running the place knew a sucker when he saw one. Very valuable he told me. I know for a fact torn and stained Michelin maps of Morocco from the 1970s are not valuable at all. But by valuable I think he meant you have a strange connection to these things that I intend to milk for all it’s worth. It wasn’t too bad, I just bought in excess, and when I compare it to the cost of a heavy night’s drinking at a bar I think I did myself proud.
A brief ferry ride to Spain and bus to Gibraltar and KAPOW! The end of my trip after a day wandering about and enjoying the intricacies and oddities of British overseas possessions. Flew to London, spent the night in Gatwick, flew to Toulouse and trained to Rodez. Sleep at last.
Wooosh.
Heh, now maybe I’ll give you something with a bit more depth or I’ll save it for the book.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
back in France
It's true. After a flight to London for Gibraltar and a night in Gatwick, a flight to Toulouse and a train to Rodez I am back home.
Home being here for one more month at least.
Morocco was splendid and I'll be posting some bon mots about my experiences here in the next wee while, unless I don't. In which case you'll have to talk to my face about it.
Home being here for one more month at least.
Morocco was splendid and I'll be posting some bon mots about my experiences here in the next wee while, unless I don't. In which case you'll have to talk to my face about it.
Saturday, February 07, 2009
Morocco
Off to Morocco on Monday, unsure how much internet I'll be in the mood for. I'll likely be checking email from time to time but don't know if I'll feel like doing a whole whack of blog entries.
We will just have to see won't we.
Due back in France on the 26th.
We will just have to see won't we.
Due back in France on the 26th.
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
snowballs
“Damn right Canada is better than France.”
“Mon ami, pourquoi?”
pourBANG! Mon ami, pourBANG.
The trouble started when some snow fell on the ground from the sky, and a bunch of students couldn’t resist the novelty of a snowball fight, something that has been interdit (France talk for forbidden) on playgrounds at home as far back as I can remember. Just to show them some tricks I sculpted a few white spheres of geometric precision and went to work.
Why everytime I try to do something nice does it inevitably end with me pegging a kid in the head and running away while his nose starts to bleed? Is it really my fault that children have such soft noses and cartilage?
I mean, I’m not Darwin or God or L. Ron Hubbard or whoever was responsible for this bullshit. If I was in charge we would all have metal plates on our faces from the start.
Egg + sperm = zygote with a teensy metal plate. And so goes the miracle of life.
In my world that clumsy kid who bounced his face off a sidewalk in grade 5 would never have been teased for a month because he was wearing a basketball face mask. Pretty much shutting down the whole “If God exists why is there evil in the world?” argument, thank you very much.
But I’m not God. I’m just a man, like spiderman or batman. A man trying to do good in the world with the superpowers I was born with.
Because I’m Canadian my particular superpowers happen to include an ability to hurl snowballs with a velocity and accuracy that scared and intimidated the French into having a series of massive, nation-wide protests demanding my ouster a few days back.
It’s a national genetic predisposition France! Stop being so racist!
All the placards people carried referred to me as ‘Darko’ and I don’t understand why the Communists were so uppity as I’m not alienated from my means of production. Unless it’s warm out and I make a snowball with scrapings from the freezer, in that case they may have a point. Whatever their problem, it snowed again and everyone was smart enough to calm down, leave me be, and return to their breads and cheeses.
Through the uproar I have been fortunate to learn a few things though. A well placed stone can do the work of ten snowballs, and although the flag is the tricolour, and their sports teams are Les Bleus, the French bleed red just like everyone else. Especially the small ones I call ‘les enfants’.
“Mon ami, pourquoi?”
pourBANG! Mon ami, pourBANG.
The trouble started when some snow fell on the ground from the sky, and a bunch of students couldn’t resist the novelty of a snowball fight, something that has been interdit (France talk for forbidden) on playgrounds at home as far back as I can remember. Just to show them some tricks I sculpted a few white spheres of geometric precision and went to work.
Why everytime I try to do something nice does it inevitably end with me pegging a kid in the head and running away while his nose starts to bleed? Is it really my fault that children have such soft noses and cartilage?
I mean, I’m not Darwin or God or L. Ron Hubbard or whoever was responsible for this bullshit. If I was in charge we would all have metal plates on our faces from the start.
Egg + sperm = zygote with a teensy metal plate. And so goes the miracle of life.
In my world that clumsy kid who bounced his face off a sidewalk in grade 5 would never have been teased for a month because he was wearing a basketball face mask. Pretty much shutting down the whole “If God exists why is there evil in the world?” argument, thank you very much.
But I’m not God. I’m just a man, like spiderman or batman. A man trying to do good in the world with the superpowers I was born with.
Because I’m Canadian my particular superpowers happen to include an ability to hurl snowballs with a velocity and accuracy that scared and intimidated the French into having a series of massive, nation-wide protests demanding my ouster a few days back.
It’s a national genetic predisposition France! Stop being so racist!
All the placards people carried referred to me as ‘Darko’ and I don’t understand why the Communists were so uppity as I’m not alienated from my means of production. Unless it’s warm out and I make a snowball with scrapings from the freezer, in that case they may have a point. Whatever their problem, it snowed again and everyone was smart enough to calm down, leave me be, and return to their breads and cheeses.
Through the uproar I have been fortunate to learn a few things though. A well placed stone can do the work of ten snowballs, and although the flag is the tricolour, and their sports teams are Les Bleus, the French bleed red just like everyone else. Especially the small ones I call ‘les enfants’.
Friday, January 30, 2009
And so it ends?
The news of the past few days leaves me interested and excited. The French have had a massive strike aimed at stopping “Darko’s” efforts at streamlining the French economy. There are strikes at a British an oil refinery that have spread to other parts of the country over the issue a foreign contractor winning a bid and intending to use Portuguese workers. Meanwhile in America the stimulus package has suddenly found itself attached to protectionist measure, aimed at slowing imports. Depending on who you talk to it could be as simple as foreign steel being stopped, or as dastardly as blocking all manufactured goods.
What fun what fun what fun.
This is not the end of globalisation, the word never meant anything coherent in the first place, but it should represent an end to a certain way of thinking about globalisation.
People are now more fully aware than ever about how in the past few decades money has found unobstructed paths throughout globe. They are suddenly conscious that money is after profit and unconcerned with such niceties as national interest or quaint ideas of obligation.
With this awareness comes wariness and at times anger when they see foreign companies impinging on their space. Now that everyone is a little bit scared about the big bad world, they are falling, ever so slightly, into themselves and the collective bosom of the nation state once again.
Save us! Oh save us!
I am not clever enough to predict where this is heading. Mr. Obama made protectionist noises during his battle with Mrs. Clinton, and now house Democrats have attached the ideas to said stimulus package. Will he follow through and throw up tariff barriers? I doubt it on a universal scale, but wouldn’t be terribly shocked if we saw gates and obstructions thrown up in certain sectors. Canada the most likely to benefit.
Gordon Brown’s words from Davos don’t seem to indicate any massive change of tactics from where he has been over the past decade and a half. He seemed quite pleased to claim an end to the cyclical nature of the economy, and now that it apparently continues he seems incapable of finding new directions and strategies.
Those on strike are more clear in their ideas, plainly horrified by foreign workers taking British jobs, and are advocating a new, British first direction. Interestingly one union leader felt the need to clarify that it wasn’t about racism, just jobs. Whether this is criticism being levelled at the strikers in Britain I don’t know, being in France as I am, but I think it reveals eerie possibilities.
Are we about to see a shift to the right? Not in terms of economy, as I have no idea how classically right-wing economic positions could be supported given all the things we have recently seen, but in terms of society, culture and what those terms mean, especially as it pertains to the exclusion of others.
I’m going to be optimistic and say racism will not flourish; Obama was just elected president wasn’t he? But people are scared as they see terrorists at the gate, and maybe inside the house, and now foreign masses looking to steal jobs. Globalisation isn’t what it was cracked up to be, and there could be a series of very negative responses to ideas of foreign capital flows, cross-border jobs, and even foreign aid if things get too harsh and difficult. Or, people might look up and realize there is an elite who haven’t been leading for the people’s interests as previously advertised. On the other hand there’s a chance that this recession could simply be deep but very short, not allowing any time for concerns to fester.
I’m generally a pessimist when it comes to any notion of people (Canadians being my main frame of reference) overcoming sedentary and distracted lives to mount any change to the system (whether revolutionary or something more relaxed). If things drag on, however, with people losing jobs and money, they won’t be able to afford previous distractions, and who knows what they’ll do with their new found time or who they’ll blame for the problems.
But what the hell do I know? It’s more likely that hyper-intelligent cats will become the overlords of humanity, than I am going to accurately predict anything.
Who could have guessed that a skinny cat with big ears and a funny name could one day become the first feline Emperor of Earth? All hail Emperor Barack Hussein Tufty!!!
What fun what fun what fun.
This is not the end of globalisation, the word never meant anything coherent in the first place, but it should represent an end to a certain way of thinking about globalisation.
People are now more fully aware than ever about how in the past few decades money has found unobstructed paths throughout globe. They are suddenly conscious that money is after profit and unconcerned with such niceties as national interest or quaint ideas of obligation.
With this awareness comes wariness and at times anger when they see foreign companies impinging on their space. Now that everyone is a little bit scared about the big bad world, they are falling, ever so slightly, into themselves and the collective bosom of the nation state once again.
Save us! Oh save us!
I am not clever enough to predict where this is heading. Mr. Obama made protectionist noises during his battle with Mrs. Clinton, and now house Democrats have attached the ideas to said stimulus package. Will he follow through and throw up tariff barriers? I doubt it on a universal scale, but wouldn’t be terribly shocked if we saw gates and obstructions thrown up in certain sectors. Canada the most likely to benefit.
Gordon Brown’s words from Davos don’t seem to indicate any massive change of tactics from where he has been over the past decade and a half. He seemed quite pleased to claim an end to the cyclical nature of the economy, and now that it apparently continues he seems incapable of finding new directions and strategies.
Those on strike are more clear in their ideas, plainly horrified by foreign workers taking British jobs, and are advocating a new, British first direction. Interestingly one union leader felt the need to clarify that it wasn’t about racism, just jobs. Whether this is criticism being levelled at the strikers in Britain I don’t know, being in France as I am, but I think it reveals eerie possibilities.
Are we about to see a shift to the right? Not in terms of economy, as I have no idea how classically right-wing economic positions could be supported given all the things we have recently seen, but in terms of society, culture and what those terms mean, especially as it pertains to the exclusion of others.
I’m going to be optimistic and say racism will not flourish; Obama was just elected president wasn’t he? But people are scared as they see terrorists at the gate, and maybe inside the house, and now foreign masses looking to steal jobs. Globalisation isn’t what it was cracked up to be, and there could be a series of very negative responses to ideas of foreign capital flows, cross-border jobs, and even foreign aid if things get too harsh and difficult. Or, people might look up and realize there is an elite who haven’t been leading for the people’s interests as previously advertised. On the other hand there’s a chance that this recession could simply be deep but very short, not allowing any time for concerns to fester.
I’m generally a pessimist when it comes to any notion of people (Canadians being my main frame of reference) overcoming sedentary and distracted lives to mount any change to the system (whether revolutionary or something more relaxed). If things drag on, however, with people losing jobs and money, they won’t be able to afford previous distractions, and who knows what they’ll do with their new found time or who they’ll blame for the problems.
But what the hell do I know? It’s more likely that hyper-intelligent cats will become the overlords of humanity, than I am going to accurately predict anything.
Who could have guessed that a skinny cat with big ears and a funny name could one day become the first feline Emperor of Earth? All hail Emperor Barack Hussein Tufty!!!
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Struggles with francophilia
Before we even begin this one, I warn you, you’re about to enter a realm of perhaps and maybes. An analysis that begins somewhere in the middle of something and ends not far away. Good luck.
***
As much as I would like to deny it, I can’t help but feel an affinity to the French lifestyle.
The slowly enjoyed meals, once, twice, three times a market on a regular basis. A satisfaction with buying locally that comes from a perspective of how-it-has-always-been rather than a ‘new’ idea someone in North America has recently chanced upon. Even grocery stores are likely to carry locally produced goods, although these tend to come from the slightly larger and more commercialized local farmer, rather than the lady who pulled a few carrots out of the garden this week. (On this topic I know there is something to be said about subsidies the agricultural community is provided, but for now I will leave that alone.)
And this ability to buy locally works hand-in-hand with an abundance of personal gardens I see spread out, both in backyards and in larger communal spaces where many families work cheek by jowl. Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité et Rutabagas!
Economically, as I walk the streets of Rodez the stores are varied. There is a jewellery maker displaying his certification from some Parisian school, and a, well I don’t know the appropriate term, but he reupholsters furniture and makes drapes. Fine cloths and quality workmanship no doubt. And now that I think of it, I have been struck before by the number of chair repair technicians I have seen, vending their most recent efforts at the market.
A gajillion little coiffures, boulangeries and boucheries line the streets. The hairdressers in particular seem to spend most of their days relaxed and reading the paper, waiting for a periodic entry on whom they can wield their scissors. One fellow I pass daily I saw sitting for the first time yesterday, up until then he has always been cheerfully working one person’s hair, never anyone waiting, never anyone just having stood up.
I had never even seen the lady who I chose for a trim earlier this week, until I entered after reading the posted price. Suddenly she was upon me, catching me unawares. I later saw where she sat, on a plush chair in a darkened sitting area. Reading the paper of course.
(Strangely, given how quiet these places all seem to be, she had me into the chair, trimmed and out in about 4 minutes. When she drew down the mirror to show me the back I was more than a little shocked to know we were finished, but aside from a little mis-trim with the clippers above one ear the result was satisfactory. Her newspaper must have been dynamite because she couldn’t have been expecting another customer.)
But the point of this; there are many little jobs where no one is becoming super rich but fewer people go wanting. People can put decent, local food on the table, traipse around the market and generally lead a satisfied, French life. I like this outlook and way of being, or at least how I perceive it up to this point.
---
Admittedly a brief list, and not sufficient to even consider defining a ‘French way’, but the examples do represent things I appreciate and in some cases have attempted to work into my own life. They are ideas about living for life rather than money.
Why then do I hesitate to embrace Francophilia, starting this piece with ‘as much as I would like to deny it’?
Perhaps the most obvious culprit is language. Without a solid grasp of that I have a hard time accessing all the relaxed meandering and banter that I see around me. One can only meander alone for so long. To have the language is to have the ability to communicate, make friends, deal with the bureaucracy and be generally comfortable within a country, so I will stake a large part of my hesitancy here.
Interestingly, negative concerns also arise from the relaxed mode of life that I presented positively above. This way of living is not just about the people on the streets, also spilling into France’s bureaucracy and technological systems.
As with the storefronts, one finds a plethora of minute jobs within the bureaucratic structures, whether health, school administration or local government, and I can only assume the same is true farther up the ladder. The stamp lady position may keep more people employed, allowing everyone to work fewer hours - more time for meandering - but it also means my life is slowed down.
I am happy moving at a slow pace, but when I do get it inside me to do something I want it to happen smoothly, quickly and with minimal re-requests for copies of my birth certificate. (They have a copy and they have photocopiers but somehow need me to send it again, this time with notes in the margin. Perhaps it’s an elaborate scheme to maintain levels of employment in the postal service but more likely the idea that different nations might have different document formats hasn’t struck them.)
Similarly, sometimes I just want to be able to use the internet. Whether it is my laptop on a wireless network or a desktop in a computer lab I want the connection to be reasonable, and the computer to have all the basic programs one needs to surf in this day and age. As for having a computer that doesn’t explode when I open more than two programs, I can grant some leeway here on the grounds that to update at the rate of technology is to bankrupt both one’s accounts and the environment, but running Windows 98 is a bit obscene.
But internet technology here is behind the times, at least in terms of hyper-wired Canada. Or - knowing as I do the significantly different reality in the North, on reserves, and even in the rural south – at least the parts of Canada I am familiar with. Website design, function and reliability are also problematic, but I won’t speak to that here.
---
So after this brief self-reflection where do I find myself? I am undeniably appreciative of a place where people take the time to live and provide themselves with nourishment, whether from the garden or more ephemerally. But I also find myself wishing, every once in a while, things worked more quickly and efficiently. That the trains didn’t strike so often, computers didn’t sound like TB patients, etc.
And what is the answer to this internal division? Language, again, is a huge part. The time and patience to allow for adaptation and the discovery of a new normal are also vital.
Maybe it is also about me wanting to be unique. It’s all well and good to be the relaxed no-getter in a culture where it is the norm, but when everyone is doing it I feel out of place.
I don’t think I have actually solved anything in this spiel and although I have edited a fair amount the whole thing feels a bit confused and rambly. I actually started writing this in an attempt to determine whether I had a right to be peeved at a bunch of young French guys who had just come into the library being very loud. With that in mind this makes even less sense.
I suppose to not post it at all might have been an option.
I will end by saying I am pleased to be trying to sort through some of this muck; in an attempt to decide if I want to stay here longer, surely, but also to better understand myself and another culture’s ways of thinking and being.
And I’m sure I get some smug Canadian, post-modern, former grad student satisfaction from emphasizing the realities of difference between peoples, places and times, rather than a superior-inferior, binary mindset, which would make things a whole hell of a lot easier.
Or maybe nothing can be absolute or perfect, this all just silly navel-gazing, and I should get on with something more productive...BLAH.
***
As much as I would like to deny it, I can’t help but feel an affinity to the French lifestyle.
The slowly enjoyed meals, once, twice, three times a market on a regular basis. A satisfaction with buying locally that comes from a perspective of how-it-has-always-been rather than a ‘new’ idea someone in North America has recently chanced upon. Even grocery stores are likely to carry locally produced goods, although these tend to come from the slightly larger and more commercialized local farmer, rather than the lady who pulled a few carrots out of the garden this week. (On this topic I know there is something to be said about subsidies the agricultural community is provided, but for now I will leave that alone.)
And this ability to buy locally works hand-in-hand with an abundance of personal gardens I see spread out, both in backyards and in larger communal spaces where many families work cheek by jowl. Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité et Rutabagas!
Economically, as I walk the streets of Rodez the stores are varied. There is a jewellery maker displaying his certification from some Parisian school, and a, well I don’t know the appropriate term, but he reupholsters furniture and makes drapes. Fine cloths and quality workmanship no doubt. And now that I think of it, I have been struck before by the number of chair repair technicians I have seen, vending their most recent efforts at the market.
A gajillion little coiffures, boulangeries and boucheries line the streets. The hairdressers in particular seem to spend most of their days relaxed and reading the paper, waiting for a periodic entry on whom they can wield their scissors. One fellow I pass daily I saw sitting for the first time yesterday, up until then he has always been cheerfully working one person’s hair, never anyone waiting, never anyone just having stood up.
I had never even seen the lady who I chose for a trim earlier this week, until I entered after reading the posted price. Suddenly she was upon me, catching me unawares. I later saw where she sat, on a plush chair in a darkened sitting area. Reading the paper of course.
(Strangely, given how quiet these places all seem to be, she had me into the chair, trimmed and out in about 4 minutes. When she drew down the mirror to show me the back I was more than a little shocked to know we were finished, but aside from a little mis-trim with the clippers above one ear the result was satisfactory. Her newspaper must have been dynamite because she couldn’t have been expecting another customer.)
But the point of this; there are many little jobs where no one is becoming super rich but fewer people go wanting. People can put decent, local food on the table, traipse around the market and generally lead a satisfied, French life. I like this outlook and way of being, or at least how I perceive it up to this point.
---
Admittedly a brief list, and not sufficient to even consider defining a ‘French way’, but the examples do represent things I appreciate and in some cases have attempted to work into my own life. They are ideas about living for life rather than money.
Why then do I hesitate to embrace Francophilia, starting this piece with ‘as much as I would like to deny it’?
Perhaps the most obvious culprit is language. Without a solid grasp of that I have a hard time accessing all the relaxed meandering and banter that I see around me. One can only meander alone for so long. To have the language is to have the ability to communicate, make friends, deal with the bureaucracy and be generally comfortable within a country, so I will stake a large part of my hesitancy here.
Interestingly, negative concerns also arise from the relaxed mode of life that I presented positively above. This way of living is not just about the people on the streets, also spilling into France’s bureaucracy and technological systems.
As with the storefronts, one finds a plethora of minute jobs within the bureaucratic structures, whether health, school administration or local government, and I can only assume the same is true farther up the ladder. The stamp lady position may keep more people employed, allowing everyone to work fewer hours - more time for meandering - but it also means my life is slowed down.
I am happy moving at a slow pace, but when I do get it inside me to do something I want it to happen smoothly, quickly and with minimal re-requests for copies of my birth certificate. (They have a copy and they have photocopiers but somehow need me to send it again, this time with notes in the margin. Perhaps it’s an elaborate scheme to maintain levels of employment in the postal service but more likely the idea that different nations might have different document formats hasn’t struck them.)
Similarly, sometimes I just want to be able to use the internet. Whether it is my laptop on a wireless network or a desktop in a computer lab I want the connection to be reasonable, and the computer to have all the basic programs one needs to surf in this day and age. As for having a computer that doesn’t explode when I open more than two programs, I can grant some leeway here on the grounds that to update at the rate of technology is to bankrupt both one’s accounts and the environment, but running Windows 98 is a bit obscene.
But internet technology here is behind the times, at least in terms of hyper-wired Canada. Or - knowing as I do the significantly different reality in the North, on reserves, and even in the rural south – at least the parts of Canada I am familiar with. Website design, function and reliability are also problematic, but I won’t speak to that here.
---
So after this brief self-reflection where do I find myself? I am undeniably appreciative of a place where people take the time to live and provide themselves with nourishment, whether from the garden or more ephemerally. But I also find myself wishing, every once in a while, things worked more quickly and efficiently. That the trains didn’t strike so often, computers didn’t sound like TB patients, etc.
And what is the answer to this internal division? Language, again, is a huge part. The time and patience to allow for adaptation and the discovery of a new normal are also vital.
Maybe it is also about me wanting to be unique. It’s all well and good to be the relaxed no-getter in a culture where it is the norm, but when everyone is doing it I feel out of place.
I don’t think I have actually solved anything in this spiel and although I have edited a fair amount the whole thing feels a bit confused and rambly. I actually started writing this in an attempt to determine whether I had a right to be peeved at a bunch of young French guys who had just come into the library being very loud. With that in mind this makes even less sense.
I suppose to not post it at all might have been an option.
I will end by saying I am pleased to be trying to sort through some of this muck; in an attempt to decide if I want to stay here longer, surely, but also to better understand myself and another culture’s ways of thinking and being.
And I’m sure I get some smug Canadian, post-modern, former grad student satisfaction from emphasizing the realities of difference between peoples, places and times, rather than a superior-inferior, binary mindset, which would make things a whole hell of a lot easier.
Or maybe nothing can be absolute or perfect, this all just silly navel-gazing, and I should get on with something more productive...BLAH.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Art
Sitting in the médiathèque’s reading room in Rodez I can’t help but notice the walls are lined with books.
Yes. Well said.
Deep, knowledgeable commentary there genius.
But before the attacks become too personal, let me continue. First of all, it is no longer bibliothèque. In a surprising twist, the place where books continue to be loaned out is one of the more technologically forward places in Rodez, perhaps France. There are DVDs and CDs to borrow and computers to use. I know this is common practice in North America but given the general technological infrastructure of France it comes as a mild shock. The biblio is dead, long live the média. What does library mean anyway?
(Maybe they connected the public institutions to the new technology first, thereby tying people more fully into the bosom of the state, and only later did technology spread into public use, the opposite of NA. This notion that the French state is under perpetual construction from the centre is not an original idea of mine, but is something I am considering and will likely give further depth to elsewhere.)
I really must try to remain focused, the title of this piece, is ‘Art’ not ‘A short treatise on the vagaries of book storage in the early 21st century’ (really more of a movie than a blog entry).
So, the walls are lined with books. But these books aren’t novels, those are elsewhere, along with all the other books one finds in a city’s library. These books are the fat, juicy art, cinema and technical folios - I think folio is the right word but perhaps describing them as encyclopaedic in nature would be accurate as well - that cost a fortune and to my experience are a more common sight in university libraries. Or I suppose the one university library I am most familiar with.
From where I sit, the wall of art books deal with topics such as the Baroque era of French art, the 19th century, Australian art, COBRA’s work in the first half of the 20th century, and Istanbul. And that is the tiniest sample of the spines I can read, there are many more.
Without getting too carried away by the other sections - science, cinema, history, geography, politics, economics, etc. - the thought that a city library of this size has this type of collection for art books intrigues me. Along the lines of my earlier commentary on urban space designed for living rather than purely economic exchange, I think this inclusion of art in the zeitgeist of the country is simply tremendous.
(On the topic of urban space, very briefly and simplistically, the idea of art in said space is good, largely regardless of one’s taste. Looking out the window here I am certainly not overly enthused with the French modernist (post?) style I can see. But within the art and architecture lies the basis for public discourse, so the end result is positive in my eyes.)
Do people use the books? That I don’t know, but the point is they are here. A person can stumble across them or search them out specifically and access them for free. Even if rarely touched, they still hold within their covers potential. Potential for an artist to realize himself or herself, someone else to realize their iconoclasm, or, indeed, the potential for someone stumbling in on a cold, wet day, to have light brought to their face with the realization that humanity can, has and will continue to create amazing things.
Yes. Well said.
Deep, knowledgeable commentary there genius.
But before the attacks become too personal, let me continue. First of all, it is no longer bibliothèque. In a surprising twist, the place where books continue to be loaned out is one of the more technologically forward places in Rodez, perhaps France. There are DVDs and CDs to borrow and computers to use. I know this is common practice in North America but given the general technological infrastructure of France it comes as a mild shock. The biblio is dead, long live the média. What does library mean anyway?
(Maybe they connected the public institutions to the new technology first, thereby tying people more fully into the bosom of the state, and only later did technology spread into public use, the opposite of NA. This notion that the French state is under perpetual construction from the centre is not an original idea of mine, but is something I am considering and will likely give further depth to elsewhere.)
I really must try to remain focused, the title of this piece, is ‘Art’ not ‘A short treatise on the vagaries of book storage in the early 21st century’ (really more of a movie than a blog entry).
So, the walls are lined with books. But these books aren’t novels, those are elsewhere, along with all the other books one finds in a city’s library. These books are the fat, juicy art, cinema and technical folios - I think folio is the right word but perhaps describing them as encyclopaedic in nature would be accurate as well - that cost a fortune and to my experience are a more common sight in university libraries. Or I suppose the one university library I am most familiar with.
From where I sit, the wall of art books deal with topics such as the Baroque era of French art, the 19th century, Australian art, COBRA’s work in the first half of the 20th century, and Istanbul. And that is the tiniest sample of the spines I can read, there are many more.
Without getting too carried away by the other sections - science, cinema, history, geography, politics, economics, etc. - the thought that a city library of this size has this type of collection for art books intrigues me. Along the lines of my earlier commentary on urban space designed for living rather than purely economic exchange, I think this inclusion of art in the zeitgeist of the country is simply tremendous.
(On the topic of urban space, very briefly and simplistically, the idea of art in said space is good, largely regardless of one’s taste. Looking out the window here I am certainly not overly enthused with the French modernist (post?) style I can see. But within the art and architecture lies the basis for public discourse, so the end result is positive in my eyes.)
Do people use the books? That I don’t know, but the point is they are here. A person can stumble across them or search them out specifically and access them for free. Even if rarely touched, they still hold within their covers potential. Potential for an artist to realize himself or herself, someone else to realize their iconoclasm, or, indeed, the potential for someone stumbling in on a cold, wet day, to have light brought to their face with the realization that humanity can, has and will continue to create amazing things.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
the new way
A bothersome thing about trying to write nice entries is sometimes they take a long time to produce. So when I'm trying to write something deep, lyrical and full of introspection I find that by the time everything is edited up and ready to go my mood has shifted.
Also, I'm still not totally comfortable with posting things that become too personal. Although no one sees it here, the point is they COULD, so I hesitate sometimes.
With all this in mind, if anyone wants to read some of my thoughts immediately after the holidays on France, language and future plans feel free to request and I shall do my best to send.
And as a special reminder I don't really ever look at the comments, so to ask there will do no good.
Also, I'm still not totally comfortable with posting things that become too personal. Although no one sees it here, the point is they COULD, so I hesitate sometimes.
With all this in mind, if anyone wants to read some of my thoughts immediately after the holidays on France, language and future plans feel free to request and I shall do my best to send.
And as a special reminder I don't really ever look at the comments, so to ask there will do no good.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Carcassonne Church
Sound’s surface was smooth, unpocked by the evening’s cold drizzle now rendered dry and silent and far from those sheltering below. The cold remained. Stonewalled and tall, the church was a space of echoes and dusk, lacking the electric intensity buzzing outside its doors. Creaking floorboards of the devout and merely interested expanded, reveling in their rare ascendance. A sole elderly woman, head bowed, kneeling, kept up a constant, inaudible supplication – willingly taking-on physical strain in the hopes of something greater. Sharp pecked whispers, loud voices floating disembodied from the street, the thunderclap of failure as a padded door, let down by a hinge, announced each new entry. Rarely. Silence had brought majesty to the empty pews.
In writing the above I tried to mimic some Tolstoy style, most directly the piece below, taken from The Cossacks.
'Along the surface of the water floated black shadows, in which the experienced eyes of the Cossack detected trees carried down by the current. Only very rarely sheet-lightning, mirrored in the water as in a black glass, disclosed the sloping bank opposite. The rhythmic sounds of night — the rustling of the reeds, the snoring of the Cossacks, the hum of mosquitoes, and the rushing water, were every now and then broken by a shot fired in the distance, or by the gurgling of water when a piece of bank slipped down, the splash of a big fish, or the crashing of an animal breaking through the thick undergrowth in the wood. Once an owl flew past along the Terek, flapping one wing against the other rhythmically at every second beat.'
And here are my actual notes that I quickly jotted into my notebook while trying to keep my rain jacket from rustling too much.
Prayer that lasts, drone front left, sharp pecked whisper behind, cars, loud voices on the street, creaks, floors, pews and bodies. I’m out of place. Everything echoes. Silence brings majesty. Time for supper
Finally, here is the first thing I started writing based on the experience in the church. Very brief and unedited.
A Catholic church, when not in the throes of mass, is a place of sanctity and silence. Calm and calming. Despite this, it is part of the real world; to claim otherwise renders a church useless in the search for salvation.
At the highest moments of sanctity, the moments when Jesus is really laying it on thick, that’s inevitably when the baby cries, because the baby doesn’t give a flying flip about Jesus. The baby wants fed or the baby wants the shit removed from its pants. Little things, which in their own ways are far more important than eternal salvation.
In writing the above I tried to mimic some Tolstoy style, most directly the piece below, taken from The Cossacks.
'Along the surface of the water floated black shadows, in which the experienced eyes of the Cossack detected trees carried down by the current. Only very rarely sheet-lightning, mirrored in the water as in a black glass, disclosed the sloping bank opposite. The rhythmic sounds of night — the rustling of the reeds, the snoring of the Cossacks, the hum of mosquitoes, and the rushing water, were every now and then broken by a shot fired in the distance, or by the gurgling of water when a piece of bank slipped down, the splash of a big fish, or the crashing of an animal breaking through the thick undergrowth in the wood. Once an owl flew past along the Terek, flapping one wing against the other rhythmically at every second beat.'
And here are my actual notes that I quickly jotted into my notebook while trying to keep my rain jacket from rustling too much.
Prayer that lasts, drone front left, sharp pecked whisper behind, cars, loud voices on the street, creaks, floors, pews and bodies. I’m out of place. Everything echoes. Silence brings majesty. Time for supper
Finally, here is the first thing I started writing based on the experience in the church. Very brief and unedited.
A Catholic church, when not in the throes of mass, is a place of sanctity and silence. Calm and calming. Despite this, it is part of the real world; to claim otherwise renders a church useless in the search for salvation.
At the highest moments of sanctity, the moments when Jesus is really laying it on thick, that’s inevitably when the baby cries, because the baby doesn’t give a flying flip about Jesus. The baby wants fed or the baby wants the shit removed from its pants. Little things, which in their own ways are far more important than eternal salvation.
Monday, January 19, 2009
self evident
I’m walking away now, following the lead of the lady carrying bread. And before her, the younger one. The latter saw it all from the start, made the call to the police, actually runs away and is probably late.
The police aren’t interested in asking me, or anyone, questions. I’m not in the mood to talk or explain my role. To try to talk and attempt to explain my role.
I suppose it is all rather self-evident. One man sitting on the ground, a pool of blood continues to grow in front of him, his glasses twisted and missing a lens beside him. He is leaking from his forehead and the bridge of his nose. Trying to pull his identification from a jacket pocket his hand shakes. And is spackled as he breaks the vertical plane of his blood’s downward trajectory.
The younger of the two women I am with is non-plussed about the blood. I catch her saying something about not wanting to, or perhaps she can’t stomach, looking at the wound. I feel a bit guilty; the gash is my fault.
Finally the police pull up to take charge of the scene, carefully unnecessarily blocking a road. She’s around twenty-four, five months and seventeen days old, and is explaining she saw him fall three times: there, there and finally here.
Before, she is telling a man rushing up, late to the party, with a cell phone, that she has already called the police. I realize I don’t know what one dials here, certainly not 9-1-1. Something to look up, or maybe I should just be extra careful. For life.
A new woman appears beside me, says something, waves her hand in exasperation at the nerve of some people. I think she just got out of a car that is parked nearby. I take her to say, “The nerve of some people. Falling on their faces, stumbling in the roads, causing traffic congestion...” I respond with, “Je suis un assistant de langue...” and let her fill in for herself that I have no clue what she’s talking about.
I should try to converse more fully I suppose, but I decide when something important might need to be communicated it’s better she knows I’m a git.
The two ladies and myself are just standing around, watching our friend slowly dripping-out onto the sidewalk. He moans a bit. Inspects his shattered glasses. Stares, watching as the drips trace a degreeless arc, straight down. The cement is still plenty grey.
I help him lift his face from where he had embedded on the cement, hooking him under the arms and dragging him a few feet to a cement pole he can lean on. My decision to help him into a sitting position came a few moments too late. Might have been better if I had done that in the first place. I didn’t.
Instead I leave him leaning on a car thinking that should do the trick. Off the road and safe. Gravity has other ideas. He goes forward. His arms don’t.
It’s funny how I have read the phrase “a sickening thud” or others of its like dozens of times. But each time I hear a sickening thud all I can think is, ‘Oh right. A sickening thud.’ It’s one of those noises. You’ll know it when you hear it.
Sometimes language makes me pause for the briefest instant. A helping hand doesn’t need words but sometimes words let you grab someone more fully. The struggling trio apparently needs my help. It’s nice to feel strong as I hoist the man. I catch a whiff. Not like any seizure I’ve ever smelled.
Just coming up the stairs from the IUFM where I work and there’s a lady carrying une baguette, moving to aid another, younger woman. Across the road she is trying to help a man slouched on the road rise. There are cars waiting for a clear path. Some sort of seizure I figure.
The police aren’t interested in asking me, or anyone, questions. I’m not in the mood to talk or explain my role. To try to talk and attempt to explain my role.
I suppose it is all rather self-evident. One man sitting on the ground, a pool of blood continues to grow in front of him, his glasses twisted and missing a lens beside him. He is leaking from his forehead and the bridge of his nose. Trying to pull his identification from a jacket pocket his hand shakes. And is spackled as he breaks the vertical plane of his blood’s downward trajectory.
The younger of the two women I am with is non-plussed about the blood. I catch her saying something about not wanting to, or perhaps she can’t stomach, looking at the wound. I feel a bit guilty; the gash is my fault.
Finally the police pull up to take charge of the scene, carefully unnecessarily blocking a road. She’s around twenty-four, five months and seventeen days old, and is explaining she saw him fall three times: there, there and finally here.
Before, she is telling a man rushing up, late to the party, with a cell phone, that she has already called the police. I realize I don’t know what one dials here, certainly not 9-1-1. Something to look up, or maybe I should just be extra careful. For life.
A new woman appears beside me, says something, waves her hand in exasperation at the nerve of some people. I think she just got out of a car that is parked nearby. I take her to say, “The nerve of some people. Falling on their faces, stumbling in the roads, causing traffic congestion...” I respond with, “Je suis un assistant de langue...” and let her fill in for herself that I have no clue what she’s talking about.
I should try to converse more fully I suppose, but I decide when something important might need to be communicated it’s better she knows I’m a git.
The two ladies and myself are just standing around, watching our friend slowly dripping-out onto the sidewalk. He moans a bit. Inspects his shattered glasses. Stares, watching as the drips trace a degreeless arc, straight down. The cement is still plenty grey.
I help him lift his face from where he had embedded on the cement, hooking him under the arms and dragging him a few feet to a cement pole he can lean on. My decision to help him into a sitting position came a few moments too late. Might have been better if I had done that in the first place. I didn’t.
Instead I leave him leaning on a car thinking that should do the trick. Off the road and safe. Gravity has other ideas. He goes forward. His arms don’t.
It’s funny how I have read the phrase “a sickening thud” or others of its like dozens of times. But each time I hear a sickening thud all I can think is, ‘Oh right. A sickening thud.’ It’s one of those noises. You’ll know it when you hear it.
Sometimes language makes me pause for the briefest instant. A helping hand doesn’t need words but sometimes words let you grab someone more fully. The struggling trio apparently needs my help. It’s nice to feel strong as I hoist the man. I catch a whiff. Not like any seizure I’ve ever smelled.
Just coming up the stairs from the IUFM where I work and there’s a lady carrying une baguette, moving to aid another, younger woman. Across the road she is trying to help a man slouched on the road rise. There are cars waiting for a clear path. Some sort of seizure I figure.
France makes me lie
It isn’t my fault. Honestly. All my ‘bonjours’, ‘bon soirées’ and ‘grand plaisirs’ are filled with nothing but the most genuine of whatever it is that particular combination of letters is meant to intone.
But, sometimes, it’s just easier, and necessary, to lie. The other day a student teacher who is doing her teaching placement (stage) here asked me a question. She is training to be a Spanish teacher, and as such spent much of the last term hanging out with the two Spanish assistants, Juan Carlos and Lucilla.
I was cruising through the salle des profs last Friday and was intercepted by this stagiare.
Est-ce que tu sais si Lucille a retourné?
Well, in fact I had just seen Lucille at the IUFM (the teachers college across town where I work), she was leaving her class just ended, as I was mine, and was holding a train schedule. I assumed she was returning to the family she lives with in a neighbouring town and because of this explained to the stagiare that I hadn’t seen her Spanish friend, only having just returned a few days before myself. The lie seemed to make more sense than trying to explain the whole train-schedule-in-hand scene and my assumptions. (I should be writing my response as dialogue but it was very much deer in headlights French that wasn’t and wouldn’t be of much help to anyone.)
These language lies occur because I don’t know what to say, or don’t want to try (assuming I won’t know), and getting out of the conversation seems the better alternative.
The other type of lie I find myself engaging with revolves around silly French rules. In particular the salle de musculation (love that word) I use at the local fac (university) has a rule that requires a minimum of 2 people to be in the room at any time. Posted right on the door and everything.
One of the first times I went to fetch the key from the secretary (they tend to vary day-to-day) she asked if I was alone, and pretending not to understand her question I mumbled
Je suis un assistant de langue. Pierre Zoopas a parlé avec quelqu’un… (Pierre being the prof I work with). With a sigh and a look of rule-breaking-concern she told me to be very careful and gave me the key anyway. I don’t think she was that concerned.
Pourquoi? the rule, I asked.
Pour la securité, she said.
Well, we do live in dangerous times.
But that’s not much of a lie. This week, however, a new lady was at the desk looking a bit more officious and serious.
Êtes-vous seule?
Non. Il y a des autres, I said gesturing vaguely down the stairs. Key! Victory! Although I was pretty sure she was onto my ruse right from the start.
When I went in today her eyes told me all I needed to know before she even asked me if I was alone. “Les autres arriverai dans quelques minutes…”
Having none of it she spun off her chair and went to ask her supervisor. When it was established I was a language assistant and not a student, the key was handed over. I’m not sure if that means they trust me because I’m not French, pity me because I have no friends to life weights with, or don’t care if I get damaged.
So what have we learned? I’m awesome. But we always learn that. We have also learned that lies grease the wheels of life. We all lie a gajillion times a day (I think the actual number is lower than that but surprisingly high…read some science) to grease the wheels of human interaction, and I would suggest while there is nothing wrong with this, butter works just as well.
But, sometimes, it’s just easier, and necessary, to lie. The other day a student teacher who is doing her teaching placement (stage) here asked me a question. She is training to be a Spanish teacher, and as such spent much of the last term hanging out with the two Spanish assistants, Juan Carlos and Lucilla.
I was cruising through the salle des profs last Friday and was intercepted by this stagiare.
Est-ce que tu sais si Lucille a retourné?
Well, in fact I had just seen Lucille at the IUFM (the teachers college across town where I work), she was leaving her class just ended, as I was mine, and was holding a train schedule. I assumed she was returning to the family she lives with in a neighbouring town and because of this explained to the stagiare that I hadn’t seen her Spanish friend, only having just returned a few days before myself. The lie seemed to make more sense than trying to explain the whole train-schedule-in-hand scene and my assumptions. (I should be writing my response as dialogue but it was very much deer in headlights French that wasn’t and wouldn’t be of much help to anyone.)
These language lies occur because I don’t know what to say, or don’t want to try (assuming I won’t know), and getting out of the conversation seems the better alternative.
The other type of lie I find myself engaging with revolves around silly French rules. In particular the salle de musculation (love that word) I use at the local fac (university) has a rule that requires a minimum of 2 people to be in the room at any time. Posted right on the door and everything.
One of the first times I went to fetch the key from the secretary (they tend to vary day-to-day) she asked if I was alone, and pretending not to understand her question I mumbled
Je suis un assistant de langue. Pierre Zoopas a parlé avec quelqu’un… (Pierre being the prof I work with). With a sigh and a look of rule-breaking-concern she told me to be very careful and gave me the key anyway. I don’t think she was that concerned.
Pourquoi? the rule, I asked.
Pour la securité, she said.
Well, we do live in dangerous times.
But that’s not much of a lie. This week, however, a new lady was at the desk looking a bit more officious and serious.
Êtes-vous seule?
Non. Il y a des autres, I said gesturing vaguely down the stairs. Key! Victory! Although I was pretty sure she was onto my ruse right from the start.
When I went in today her eyes told me all I needed to know before she even asked me if I was alone. “Les autres arriverai dans quelques minutes…”
Having none of it she spun off her chair and went to ask her supervisor. When it was established I was a language assistant and not a student, the key was handed over. I’m not sure if that means they trust me because I’m not French, pity me because I have no friends to life weights with, or don’t care if I get damaged.
So what have we learned? I’m awesome. But we always learn that. We have also learned that lies grease the wheels of life. We all lie a gajillion times a day (I think the actual number is lower than that but surprisingly high…read some science) to grease the wheels of human interaction, and I would suggest while there is nothing wrong with this, butter works just as well.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Hogmanay
Hello dears. This is just a quick note to say hello and ask how things are in these early stages of the new year.
Cecil and I have been tremendously busy since returning from Scotland. The snow that has fallen is simply astonishing and clearing the drive is more than enough to keep us in constant motion. Not that either of us enjoys driving in such weather, but one never knows when a clear route to the road will become a necessity.
If only it were our sole trial. Our beloved Mr. Tufts has taken ill and I fear he is not long for this world. He’s a fine old cat and whatever his fate I’m grateful to have known him for these past 15 years.
Enough of bad news though, one needs to start a year on a fresh and positive note. And in that vein I simply must recommend Edinburgh both as a city and a place to ring in the new year, or Hogmanay as they call it over there.
Our room was in the Scotsman Hotel and gave us a fine view over Princes Street and the adjoining gardens. In addition to the city’s regular trappings we could also see many of the garish contraptions and bright lights set up by the carnival folk for the season. Some of the lights, particularly those on the big wheel, are reasonable and nice, but any joy tends to be undone by the never-ending loud songs that I can barely bring myself to call music. I’m sure Suzanne might consider them fine dance numbers but they are beyond my appreciation.
There were an abundance of rides and games sheds but my attention was most thoroughly held by some sort of over-sized slingshot. A ghastly contrivance that had people sit in a metal framed orb attached to two large elastic bands, slowly stretched before the orb was released, sending it and its human cargo skywards. I must admit I watched the process six or seven times despite feeling quite ill when thinking of the poor souls inside.
We had been to Edinburgh’s famous castle on a previous visit and decided to give it a miss this go round. Instead we took a short train journey out to Stirling to look at its castle, a former capital and home to many Scottish kings and royal courts. A lovely place with glorious views on what was a crisp, frost-covered day. My lunch was a touch underdone but Cecil quite enjoyed his steak and beer. A lovely time all-in-all.
But the true excitement of the visit was undeniably the Hogmanay celebrations. Aside from the aforementioned fair there were a number of events put on in the evenings. The first was a torch parade where everyone could buy a torch, what was essentially a large candle wrapped in a wick. It was led by a phalanx of Vikings carrying professional torches and so many pipers and drummers it made one’s head spin. Cecil said there were 50 pipers in all but the din was such I lost count after the first few rows. Simply glorious.
At a point along the parade route there were other pipers, these ones on the side of the road facing one another in a circle. There were even 5 or 6 little ones in the centre of the ring, playing their tiny instruments and looking adorable. The scene reminded me of one of those nature shows where the big arctic musk ox gather in a great defensive circle with the babies in the middle when a predator approaches too closely. Except those beasts face out of course, to keep an eye on whatever Mr. Fox, or whomever, is up to.
The fantastic end to this procession of fire, after quite a walk let me tell you, is atop Calton Hill where they put on a stunning fireshow. Fireworks aplenty and at the very end a famous bonfire, the reason we were all willing to stand in the cold for so long.
A gigantic pile of wood topped by a fearsome lion, assembled from what I presumed to be wicker boughs, made for a truly grand spectacle. Our Viking vanguard had the honour of tossing their torches in to ignite the pile, and while the wind kept the flames from burning straight up, they were so big it did little to dampen the spectacle.
I only felt sorry for the poor lion, who through no fault of his own failed to have an absolute, fiery death and was instead relegated to losing only one paw and part of his lower jaw. He ended up a trifle rat like by the end, but I suspect they did the honourable thing after we had departed and ensured he was completely incinerated, wind be darned!
The next day was meant to have been a large street ceilidh, a wonderful celtic dance with much music and spinning, but the cold of the previous night got the better of me and I spent most of the day in the room, or in a steaming tub. Fortunately Cecil was able to find a nearby pub with men of similar passions, darts and beer, to while away the day.
As for New Year’s Eve itself, there was an official Hogmanay party that took up most of the downtown area. Centred on Princes Street and promising live music it held great potential.
Instead I decided to get shittered and danced my face off with a bunch London hotties.
Edinburgh and Hogmanay, a fine start to 2009 and highly recommended.
Love to you all and best wishes for the year ahead!
Lucille and Cecil
Cecil and I have been tremendously busy since returning from Scotland. The snow that has fallen is simply astonishing and clearing the drive is more than enough to keep us in constant motion. Not that either of us enjoys driving in such weather, but one never knows when a clear route to the road will become a necessity.
If only it were our sole trial. Our beloved Mr. Tufts has taken ill and I fear he is not long for this world. He’s a fine old cat and whatever his fate I’m grateful to have known him for these past 15 years.
Enough of bad news though, one needs to start a year on a fresh and positive note. And in that vein I simply must recommend Edinburgh both as a city and a place to ring in the new year, or Hogmanay as they call it over there.
Our room was in the Scotsman Hotel and gave us a fine view over Princes Street and the adjoining gardens. In addition to the city’s regular trappings we could also see many of the garish contraptions and bright lights set up by the carnival folk for the season. Some of the lights, particularly those on the big wheel, are reasonable and nice, but any joy tends to be undone by the never-ending loud songs that I can barely bring myself to call music. I’m sure Suzanne might consider them fine dance numbers but they are beyond my appreciation.
There were an abundance of rides and games sheds but my attention was most thoroughly held by some sort of over-sized slingshot. A ghastly contrivance that had people sit in a metal framed orb attached to two large elastic bands, slowly stretched before the orb was released, sending it and its human cargo skywards. I must admit I watched the process six or seven times despite feeling quite ill when thinking of the poor souls inside.
We had been to Edinburgh’s famous castle on a previous visit and decided to give it a miss this go round. Instead we took a short train journey out to Stirling to look at its castle, a former capital and home to many Scottish kings and royal courts. A lovely place with glorious views on what was a crisp, frost-covered day. My lunch was a touch underdone but Cecil quite enjoyed his steak and beer. A lovely time all-in-all.
But the true excitement of the visit was undeniably the Hogmanay celebrations. Aside from the aforementioned fair there were a number of events put on in the evenings. The first was a torch parade where everyone could buy a torch, what was essentially a large candle wrapped in a wick. It was led by a phalanx of Vikings carrying professional torches and so many pipers and drummers it made one’s head spin. Cecil said there were 50 pipers in all but the din was such I lost count after the first few rows. Simply glorious.
At a point along the parade route there were other pipers, these ones on the side of the road facing one another in a circle. There were even 5 or 6 little ones in the centre of the ring, playing their tiny instruments and looking adorable. The scene reminded me of one of those nature shows where the big arctic musk ox gather in a great defensive circle with the babies in the middle when a predator approaches too closely. Except those beasts face out of course, to keep an eye on whatever Mr. Fox, or whomever, is up to.
The fantastic end to this procession of fire, after quite a walk let me tell you, is atop Calton Hill where they put on a stunning fireshow. Fireworks aplenty and at the very end a famous bonfire, the reason we were all willing to stand in the cold for so long.
A gigantic pile of wood topped by a fearsome lion, assembled from what I presumed to be wicker boughs, made for a truly grand spectacle. Our Viking vanguard had the honour of tossing their torches in to ignite the pile, and while the wind kept the flames from burning straight up, they were so big it did little to dampen the spectacle.
I only felt sorry for the poor lion, who through no fault of his own failed to have an absolute, fiery death and was instead relegated to losing only one paw and part of his lower jaw. He ended up a trifle rat like by the end, but I suspect they did the honourable thing after we had departed and ensured he was completely incinerated, wind be darned!
The next day was meant to have been a large street ceilidh, a wonderful celtic dance with much music and spinning, but the cold of the previous night got the better of me and I spent most of the day in the room, or in a steaming tub. Fortunately Cecil was able to find a nearby pub with men of similar passions, darts and beer, to while away the day.
As for New Year’s Eve itself, there was an official Hogmanay party that took up most of the downtown area. Centred on Princes Street and promising live music it held great potential.
Instead I decided to get shittered and danced my face off with a bunch London hotties.
Edinburgh and Hogmanay, a fine start to 2009 and highly recommended.
Love to you all and best wishes for the year ahead!
Lucille and Cecil
snack time
and now as a poem!
Drunk hands. But steady. And sure.
The knowledge of a thousand campfires rolled through them
Slicing the butter and smearing it in
To spread would be to savage and tear
No good for an artist.
Drunk hands. But steady. And sure.
The knowledge of a thousand campfires rolled through them
Slicing the butter and smearing it in
To spread would be to savage and tear
No good for an artist.
buttering
Drunk hands.
Steady.
Sure.
They had been drinking for a while and their eyes showed it. A rising interest in food was another clue; although the French was too thick for my ears, communication is rarely about language alone. The heavier one, thick in ankle wrist and eyebrow, seemed most committed to the prospect as he slowly sawed a baguette in half. A length-wise and labourious process, using only a pocketknife. Knowing his own limitations, buttering was left to his friend.
Tall and slender to the point of being long, the other Quebecois sat on the stairs that formed a miniature amphitheatre around the corner-mounted fireplace, reveling in the dual glows from without and within. His hands revealed no tremors as he took bread, butter and knife in hand, not interested in the toast himself but seemingly pleased to be involved in the process.
Not a spreading blade in a classic sense, the knife peeled the butter back one thin layer at a time, before being used to gently smear it into the crenellations and holes of the bread.
Slow. Deliberate. Safe thumbs and fingers.
A small ritual, executed this time at a hostel in France.
Before?
Perhaps around a campfire in the forests of Quebec, with a different flame holding back cold. Also the darkness. Made solid by the trees that melt into the night beyond the fire’s glow. Maybe just a fire pit. In a backyard. Or around a kitchen’s wood-stove?
The ease of the act spoke of habituity, habitual action, pleasant memory. Wherever it had happened before, the twin glows had been there. A slight grin on Long’s face hinted at times before, irretrievable if he had been asked to tell.
Drunk hands. Happy. Steady. Sure.
Finished and placed on a metal grate, the bread was quickly seared and flipped for all around toasting. The meal was complete and shared around. Long decided to have some after all.
The quiet confidence and pleasure spoke about more than a man getting a snack. A small ritual had been conducted, bread to toast and butter to spread. It wasn’t religious, but maybe just the slightest bit spiritual. Order had been brought forth out of madness, bread rendered tastier, actions and patterns from different times and places brought to bear in an ancient French city. And of course, one should never discount the silent rapture of a drunk man munching a snack before bed.
Steady.
Sure.
They had been drinking for a while and their eyes showed it. A rising interest in food was another clue; although the French was too thick for my ears, communication is rarely about language alone. The heavier one, thick in ankle wrist and eyebrow, seemed most committed to the prospect as he slowly sawed a baguette in half. A length-wise and labourious process, using only a pocketknife. Knowing his own limitations, buttering was left to his friend.
Tall and slender to the point of being long, the other Quebecois sat on the stairs that formed a miniature amphitheatre around the corner-mounted fireplace, reveling in the dual glows from without and within. His hands revealed no tremors as he took bread, butter and knife in hand, not interested in the toast himself but seemingly pleased to be involved in the process.
Not a spreading blade in a classic sense, the knife peeled the butter back one thin layer at a time, before being used to gently smear it into the crenellations and holes of the bread.
Slow. Deliberate. Safe thumbs and fingers.
A small ritual, executed this time at a hostel in France.
Before?
Perhaps around a campfire in the forests of Quebec, with a different flame holding back cold. Also the darkness. Made solid by the trees that melt into the night beyond the fire’s glow. Maybe just a fire pit. In a backyard. Or around a kitchen’s wood-stove?
The ease of the act spoke of habituity, habitual action, pleasant memory. Wherever it had happened before, the twin glows had been there. A slight grin on Long’s face hinted at times before, irretrievable if he had been asked to tell.
Drunk hands. Happy. Steady. Sure.
Finished and placed on a metal grate, the bread was quickly seared and flipped for all around toasting. The meal was complete and shared around. Long decided to have some after all.
The quiet confidence and pleasure spoke about more than a man getting a snack. A small ritual had been conducted, bread to toast and butter to spread. It wasn’t religious, but maybe just the slightest bit spiritual. Order had been brought forth out of madness, bread rendered tastier, actions and patterns from different times and places brought to bear in an ancient French city. And of course, one should never discount the silent rapture of a drunk man munching a snack before bed.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
new things
In BIG news I have new plans for the blog. Rather than treat it as a throw away thing I'm going to take the entries seriously, put some actual effort into them. They will still be about my travels (in that they're inspired by things I see while I'm not at home) but it will be different.
So if things are a bit confusing, no worries. I'm experimenting and junk.
Huzzah!
So if things are a bit confusing, no worries. I'm experimenting and junk.
Huzzah!
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