For FLE (French as a foreign language) last Friday a few of us had the wonderful opportunity to go to the theater in Albi and get a private tour by the director. For starters, we had to wait out in the cold while he smoked his cigarette and blew the smoke in our faces. Everyone in France smokes! I'll likely have black lungs by the time I go back to the US. Now, it was truly interesting for about the first 45 minutes, but after 2 hours, I was bored to tears! The theater has been renovated several times. Originally it was the gymnasium for the prison, but when they built a larger prison farther outside of town, it became a public gymnasium and has recently been renovated for use as a theater. It really is cool though! They were setting up the lighting for a set while we were there. It was pretty cool to see all the behind-the-scene places. We even got to see the air filtration/ conditioning system, and holy heck- it's huge!!! That sent the director into a tangent about how it has to be that big to filter out possible pathogens terrorists can unleash in theaters, just in case. Then he showed us the dressing rooms, toilets and showers (as if we really needed to see those), and we had an awfully long chat about photons and electrons. By this time, he had already been talking for an hour and a half, and then asked if we had any questions. Did I mention that we watched a 40 minute film in class the previous week about everything he didn't cover? I had heard more than I ever wanted to about the behind-the-scenes of the theater. But, he wasn't shy to tell us that we must be half-dead if we're not curious about anything. So, he talked for another 15 minutes during which he kept making long dramatic pauses in the middle of his sentences in which he was completely still. It was really quite strange. By then, it was way past time that he had another cigarette, so we went back outside and froze while he took another smoke. Finally, we thought we were done, but then we got a quick 10 minute tour of the cinema.
| photo credits: http://ballsontheline.wordpress.com/2011/02/25/saving-face/ |
Saturday we went to "Anglo-phones Anonymous" at a cafe for lunch. This crazy old man is really quite interesting. Him and his wife come every week and when we arrive, he always takes our hands, strokes and kisses them, pulls our chairs out for us, etc. in the name of French gallantry. There seem to be a number of rumors about the reason he and his wife move so often, why he can't have an email address, and what his real job is. Anyway, on the 26th of March at "11 o'clock 15" he's planned a "surprise" for everyone. I can't even imagine what it could be. Whenever he leaves he always insists on getting his goodbye kisses one way or another, and he can be quite assertive about it. France is funny like that. You kiss total strangers, just because they know one of your friends, even though you'll probably never see them again! Then, that night was the rugby match between England and France, so Caitlin, Laura, and I went to O'Sullivans to watch the game on the big screens and around halftime I finally decided that I was officially cheering for England. (England had two hot players, and France only had one cute one) Rugby is so much more violent that American football, but it's also more fast-paced and more entertaining. And because they don't wear pads or helmets you can see their faces, although very few of them are really worth looking at haha. Sébastien Chabal is certainly interesting... I could never play rugby against him. He's a beast! It was a good match though! England won!
I'm being quite spoiled here as far as school goes. We have a two week break right now, and another at the end of April! There's a carnival in Albi right now, and it's all over town. It's pretty cool! I'll take my camera with me next time I go! So Tuesday we ventured into Toulouse! Unfortunately the weather has been dreadfully gloomy lately, and so I didn't get any great photos. Laura nearly got beat up by some girl on the metro though! This girl got on, and just gave Laura a nasty look. I just assumed she was having a bad morning, and ignored her. Several stops later she started yelling at her like crazy! Unfortunately, my vocabulary is quite lacking in French profanity, so I don't know what she was saying, but she shut up after a few minutes. Finally, she got off the train, only to turn around and start yelling again nearly about to drag Laura off the metro. Thankfully, a man shoved her off just as the doors were closing. We got to the university library with no problem, but it probably took us a good ten minutes to figure out how to get inside lol. But, we were finally successful and headed back into town, and after finding one of Caitlin's buddies we got lunch at a Lebanese restaurant! It was really quite good. It reminded me of a chicken burrito from Chipotle with french fries inside. From there, we went shopping and headed back to Albi! I had started a load of laundry before we left and two of my once white shirts and several socks were then pink, as well as one of Richard's towels I thought I'd be nice and wash for him... Woops! And, I finally got a postcard from Paraguay and a letter from OFII! So, hopefully I'll be able to go see some more of Europe soon enough. It finally cleared up for a while today so I got to catch some sun at the park. Hopefully we have another gorgeous day tomorrow! To be honest though, overcast skies and rain are so much better than feet of snow, ice, and sludge. I'm definitely not missing the winter weather of Flagstaff!
 |
| Capitolium |
 |
| Bookshop- "White Shadows" |
 |
| Restaurant Libanais on the left! |
No comments:
Post a Comment