L'Avare à la Comedie Française

(I started this post a few weeks ago but never put it up. Sorry, Momma.)

Last weekend Educo took a group of us to La Comedie Française, which is housed in the Palais Royal, a smaller complex across the street from the Louvre. It's where Louis XIV grew up and later where Molière put on most of his plays. For that reason, the house troupe continues to specialize in Molière.

L'Avare tells a story about a miser who manages to ruin the love lives of his two children in the space of about five minutes. The lovers then spend the rest of the play scheming to get their father to change his mind. They fail, but, like most (all?) Molière plays, there's a happy ending anyway -- call it Louis ex machina.

Educo gave us all copies of the play to read our first week in France but not many people got through it. It wasn't a problem though because swooning translates pretty well.

Spooky Paris

Last week, Le Chef and our new friend, Pomegrenade, and I had picnic, and since it was a beautiful day and we had nowhere to be, (Class was cancelled due to the grèves, it's getting to be a Thursday routine.) we decided to head over to the Catacombs. Apparently, in peak tourist season and on the weekends, the line to get in is epouvantable (horrific), but we got there right before it closed and I guess everyone else was at the manifestation. We paid our student price of 4euro and waltzed right in. We were just about the only ones down there, and it might have been the first time I missed the tourist hoard.

After paying, you are directed to a staircase. Imagine how spacious it would be if someone decided to put a spiral staircase in a manhole. Now imagine that said manhole goes at least five stories down. Now imagine that you and your two friends are the only ones down there. Once you reach the bottom of the staircase and recover from the vertigo, there are a couple kilometers (yeah, I just went metric) of chalky, strangely lit, unmarked corridors. My friends took this opportunity to make up tag lines for the horror movie that would be made of our story: "In October 2010, three exchange students in Paris went sightseeing...their bodies will remain in the tunnels forever," etc.

Finally, we arrived at the entrance:

(STOP! THIS IS THE EMPIRE OF DEATH)

The French government has always had a flair for the dramatic, no? The Catacombs were created in the 1750's (I believe) to ameliorate the public health problems caused by overcrowded cemeteries in Paris. Ew. Thousands of disgusting old corpses were dug up as part of what has to be the worst temp job ever. The last bodies were moved in around 1820. The bones are stacked in extremely compact, orderly rows that give the distinct impression that when French people die, they disintegrate until nothing remains but skulls and femurs.



The most interesting part of the visit to me was the signage. Apart from lots of Latin and crosses and signs indicating where particular femurs had first been laid to rest, there was a lot of poetry:


(Come people of the world, come into these silent dwellings and you soul, now tranquil, will be struck by the voice that rises from their interior. "It is here that the greatest of teachers, the tomb, holds his school of truth.")

Happy Halloween!

Le Pique-nique :)

One of the best ways to save some money and generate some extra melatonin before the sun goes on vacation for the winter is picnics. We had a perfect one, and discovered a beautiful park right by my house last month!



Here we have Pont-l'Eveque cheese (similar to brie) and another soft cow's milk cheese, figs, Louis Bouillot rosé champagne (4,60euros at Monoprix) and bread made from organic flour and a selection of patisseries by celebrated baker Dominique Saibron!

The best part? All of it came from shops on my block! The park where we sat down with our spread, Parc Montsouris, is also no more than a 5 minute walk. It has great walking paths, a lake, and pony rides complete with adorable French toddlers. And of course, it was only fun because I was there with some lovely people. C'est belle la vie. :)


(Photos stolen from Le Chef's facebook page)

Allons enfants de la Patrie...

So, Sarkozy, who is about as popular as Bush was at the end of his second term, is pushing to move the national retirement age back (from 60 to 62) and the Frenchies are freaking out. To be fair, everyone understands that people are living longer and something's gotta give, but the proposed reform is very biased. Since people with cushy desk jobs stay in school longer, they might work (if they finish grad school at 28) 32 years while an ouvrier, a laborer, who starts working at 16 has 44 years of hard labor. The proposed reform does not account for this. It also gives less to women who take time off to raise their children, but I am unclear on the details there. Young people are also up in arms because it's already extremely difficult to get hired in France. They're counting on the geezers to move into maisons de retrait (retirement homes)and clear a space.

Anyway, this all means ongoing grèves(strikes)and lots of lots of manifestations (demonstrations). Le Chef and I headed over to one last week.



If only New Orleanians had turned out in such force for the oil spill protests!

The way the manif works is basically just a big marching parade with lots of red balloons (Glenn Beck would have a field day with that!), stickers, and bullhorns. Of course, the parade starts at - where else? - Place de la Bastille, the granddaddy of all sights of civil disobedience. When we were there, it was chalked up with slogans and anarchy symbols.Each syndicat, or labor union, has a truck, usually with a woman sitting on top shouting slogans and then going "Tous ensemble! Tous ensemble!" (Basically, "All together now!") The union members marching behind the truck, being French and very dignified, do not holla back.





The grèves only really effect study-abroaders when the workers at national monuments and the transit workers go on strike. When this happens, put on your walking shoes...

Winey Weekend

Last weekend, I was invited on a day trip to the Champagne region! We started the day in Epernay at the Moet and Chandon caves where we learned about the three kinds of grapes that are harvested for champagne (Chardonnay, Pinot Meunier, and Pinot Noir) the Grands vintages (really good years) and Dom Perignon (really good grapes from really good years). We also got to do a tasting!

In the afternoon, we headed to Reims, where we saw the cathedral where Joan of Arc lead Charles VII to be coronated. It was stunning. Of all the cathedrals I've seen in the last month, this one has the most exciting history and the prettiest chapels.




After that we headed to the Martel champagne caves. This one was way less corporate than the Moet & Chandon tour - They keep a lot of bottles for smaller producers, most of which never get exported from France. Our guide at this one looked like he spent a lot of time underground. He was very knowledgeable and showed off the ancient equipment dating back to when women weren't allowed in the caves. This tour was cheaper and came with a tasting of 3 different champagnes! a brut (not too sweet), a rosé, and a demi sec (sweet champagne)




Last week also happened to be the Fete des vendanges a wine and food festival held annually to celebrate the bottling of the Clos du Montmartre, wine that comes from a vineyard within Paris. There are foods from every region of France, traditional performers (clowns, chanteurs, etc) and free wine tastings and cooking demonstrations! Some friends and I spent Sunday afternoon wandering around tasting and enjoying the weather :)

Mont Saint Michel

Our second day in Normandy started off with a beautiful sunrise over our questionable hotel:

The it was back in the bus for another hour. We stopped to take pictures once the church came into view, and while we were off the bus we ran into some hunters who had bought some ducks to train their new spaniels and a shepherd:




Finally, we arrived at the immense fortress/monastery and our tour guide, Gilles, took pains to describe every last type of arch and differentiate the various centuries' architecture.


Back in the day, Louis IX called it a merveille, but I think that had more to do with getting the building to stay put on top of the rock. The edifice is immense and pretty austere (as is befitting a monastery, I guess) but there were some very nice touches in the garden and windows of the refectory.


The view was beautiful, but I couldn't capture it through the fog. Besides being very Wuthering Heights, the vast panorama and shifting tides definitely give the rock strategic value, which is why everyone from William the Conqueror and to Patton has used to defend their hold on the mainland.

Storming the Beaches

My computer seems to be going through culture shock and has stopped recognizing my apartment's wifi network. This is both a blessing (less time frittered away on Facebook) and extremely annoying (when it leads to long-overdue blog posts).

Anyway, two weekends ago, Educo took us to Normandy to see the Bayeux tapestry, the D-Day Beaches, and Mont Saint Michel!

We had a rendez-vous with the bus at 7:45 (which is dawn here). After four hours on the bus and one traumatizing "pipi stop," we arrived at Bayeux, a little bitty town in Normandy that houses an excellent cathedral and the Tapisserie de Bayeux, 70 meters of embroidery from the 11th century that recounts the victory of William the Conquerer (Guillaume) over somebody named Harold (the audio guide was in French). They won't let you take pictures of the tapestry, but here's one of the boat outside the museum:

After that we headed to the American Cemetary and D-Day Memorial at Omaha Beach and Pont du Hoc, which was also stormed by American Rangers on June 6. The weather was nasty and the path from the beach inland was long and steep, even without a heavy pack and being wet from jumping out of a Higgins boat. The memorial featured maps of the allied movements and a military cemetery, while Point du Hoc has preserved the bomb craters (more than 600 were detonated there on D-Day) and the skeletons of axis fortifications.