Hey All,
Today being a nice day I took a study break to go wander through a museum.
Musée d’Orsay had a line out the door so I returned to the Louvre and explored
the top floor which I had never been on. My favorite painting of the day
portrayed the Louvre when it was still a private gallery and showed dozens of
artists sketching or painting the works that hung on the walls. I thought this
funny since whenever you go into the museum there are always artists with
sketchpads or paints practicing by recreating some of the masterpieces. It
seemed to tie together the artists of today with those of the past. The train
ride there and back gave me time to finish up a post that I started writing
before the break, which follows.
Europe loves its students, France included. One would be
hard pressed to find an area where at least some of the shops, restaurants, and
travel companies did not offer some sort of student discount. In France
students also are given free admission to any historical or cultural exhibit,
meaning that my admission to The Louvre or Le Château de Versailles is free any
time. Students can likely get a 10-15% discount at movie theatres, some shops,
and cafés. The best student discount as far as I am concerned, however, is when
it comes to travel.
French students can apply for a railway discount card with
SNCF, the transit company that covers the whole country. After paying an
upfront fee the card is available for use on any train in France save the
Parisian metro at discounts of up to 60%. SNCF runs the TGV, the high-speed
train that I have mentioned before as well as the regional train system called
the TER which branches off the TGV lines and connects much of the area between
the main lines to the transit network. The combination of the two makes
destinations up to several hours away easily reachable for under 10€.
Our French professor is great, at the end of almost every
lecture she gives us a history or geography lesson (in French, of course)
detailing places that we can go to and why we should. She is insistent that
while Paris and large French cities are very cool, a lot of French culture and
way of life can be discovered by visiting less known and less populated places
around the country. Furthermore, for students looking to work on our French in
our spare time the countryside is the place to be.
One might be surprised, as I was, that for a beginner in the
language Paris is actually a pretty bad place to practice French. Many people
who live or work in the touristy areas will change to speaking English when
someone talks to them in French with an American accent. Of course, I can
hardly blame them with how many anglophones visit the city each day. Many
Parisians are well educated and have at least a basic knowledge of English
which they are happy to use rather than try to suffer through a tourist’s heavily accented speech. It is worth noting
that the longer I am here the less this happens to me, a decent amount of the
conversations I have in the city are done without the other switching to
English as was more often the case a month or more ago. In the brief time I
have spent in downtown Paris I have been asked for directions a handful of
times, including a few weekends ago rather late at night when I pointed a group
of Spanish tourists in the direction of a corner store that sold liquor. They
we elated. Though I am happy to exercise my knowledge of the city, I can suppose
just how annoying it would become to be stopped several times per day in such a
fashion. I suppose this can explain in part what some have described as
Parisians’ outwardly unfriendliness.
Outside the city is a different story. In my part of the
woods there are still English speakers, but the tend to be more random and
spread apart. Usually it will be a rather random individual who will know the
language such as a mall security guard who will respond in fluent English or a
gentleman sitting closely on the RER who will let out a small laugh at a joke
being told between ourselves behind what we thought was the privacy of a
language barrier. Though I have learned that one can never tell who speaks
English, for the most part outside of the universities Cergy is completely
francophone. As such, except for a few exceptions, most people have an
abundance of patience when being spoken to in imperfect French. In fact, today
I made a rendez-vous for a haircut at
the coiffeur by my residence. She picked
up that French wasn’t my first language pretty quickly and spoke just slightly
slower and clearer than she normally would. Though I won’t be winning any
awards for barber shop small talk in the near future, I would consider letting
a woman who didn’t speak English come near my head with sharp objects an
accomplishment.
The people in small French towns are like this as well. My
first experience as such was a few weeks ago when myself and two other FAME
students decided to make an overnight trip up north to the region of
Haut-Normandy (France is divided into 22 administrative districts called
regions roughly the size of small states, I live in the Île-de-France region).
Our destination was Rouen, about a hundred miles Northwest
of Paris but still along the banks of the River Seine. Rouen had a long history
and was at one time one of the largest cities in medieval Europe. The
population of the agglomeration (city and surrounding areas, similar to a
metropolitan region) lies at just under ½ million. After a short TGV ride (and
cheap at only 10€) we found ourselves at the main train station. Rouen has many
residential streets and a main pedestrian walking district. The city’s
frequently used symbol is Le Gros Horloge a large clock and clock tower
dating back from the 16th century likely so famous because it
survived being destroyed so many times. Rouen was on the stage for several wars
and was burned and nearly completely destroyed by German bombing during World
War II.
Perhaps the
most notable thing about the town is how many large churches it has. We visited
at least three, but there were several more on the map. They were all several
hundred years old and built in the Gothic style. Off the main roads is a small
wooden tower where Jeanne d’Arc (Joan of Arc) was imprisoned before being
burned alive in the public square where there is now a church and open-air
market.
An awesome vantage point of
the city was found at La Côte Sainte-Catherine a large hill on the side
of the village that we climbed up to gain a pretty great view. Dominating the
landscape is the curve of the River Seine and the spires of the cathedral. While Rouen was a cool city, there were also adventures to be had in the Normandy countryside. We took a quick bus trip to Les Andelys, a small town just up the river that boasts an excellent example of 12th century castle architecture, Château Gaillard. The castle was built by Richard the Lionheart at a strategic position on a cliff overlooking the river. In 1198, the castle was completed after only a year in which is coincidently how long Richard could enjoy it for, he died in 1199.
The next day, our last of the weekend, we took another day trip to the French coastline to a small town called Étretat. The town is famous for huge white sandstone cliffs gracing the picturesque coastline as well as being the childhood home of Guy de Maupassant author of many short stories including “The Necklace” which I remember reading in grade school.
Exploring the cliffs and the coastline we found many a viewpoint atop of a steep cliff, caves along the beach, and several WWII “pillbox” bunkers still built into the cliffside. After all, the beach faced the English channel and was a likely spot for invasion during the occupation of France. On top of the tallest cliff was an interesting monument to L’Oiseau Blanc (the White Bird) a plane whose disappearance in the course of trying to make the first trans-Atlantic flight from New York City to Paris is one of the greatest mysteries of aviation. Étretat was the last place where the plane was seen. Less than two weeks later The Spirit of St. Louis successfully accomplished the feat.
A few
weekends later a short train ride and a cheap ticket brought us to the town of
Reims (pronounced with great difficulty for a non-native speaker, imagine
saying “prince” without the “p” and working an “m” sound in there somewhere).
Reims is known throughout France as where French kings were traditionally crowned
and throughout the world as the major city within the Champagne region.
Obviously
our group of four guys were eager to find some bubbly, but it was hard to miss
the huge cathedral Notre-Dame de Reims just in front of our hostel. An
interesting note is that though when you mention “Notre Dame” to anyone outside
of France, they will immediately think of the one in Paris. However, since the
name Notre-Dame simply means “our lady” there are as many churches
called Notre Dame in France as there are churches in the US beginning with “Our
Lady of…” Nearly every French town has one.
This Notre
Dame was especially interesting not only for its architecture, but for its
history has having seen the coronation of every French king from 1179 to 1825. The
tradition goes back to the 5th century when the king who would unite
all of the Frankish tribes, Clovis I, decided to be baptized in the same city. Following
in the footsteps of the great ruler, the new line of French kings beginning
with Phillip II were crowned in the city. Nearby, the Palais du Tau
houses centuries of royal artifacts used during coronation ceremonies.
However, if
a visitor only saw what was above ground in Reims, they would be missing half
the story. Below the city is a vast and expansive labyrinth of champagne
caverns whose chalk walls provide the perfect levels of humidity and
temperature control for fermenting alcohol. The ground under Reims has been
used for this purpose since Roman times. Our tour guide said that in addition
to the operations of modern champagne manufacturers, the city will reluctantly
admit that there are many ancient caverns of which it has no definitive record
or map. I was reminded of the Pennsylvania ghost town of Centralia which was
abandoned in the seventies due to a fire in the numerous and unmapped mining
tunnels underneath the city. The fire has been burning for decades and will be
burning for many to come. Luckily I don’t believe Reims is built upon tons upon
tons of coal so I don’t think they are at risk of such a disaster.
Legitimate
champagne must contain one of the three grapes grown in the Champagne Region of
France: Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier, and Chardonnay (each respectively
contributing structure, sweetness, and texture to the wine). By French law, all
others must be labeled sparkling wine (the US has a more relaxed rule, so there
are some bottles labeled ‘champagnes’ that are not true by the French standard).
There are three classifications of vineyards based on a huge list of
qualifications such as soil quality, average angle of sunlight, etc. Grand Cru
is the most sought after. To begin the process, each batch of grapes is
squished and left to ferment in huge concrete casks for about a month. It is
the job of a master winemaker to take the sometimes hundreds of individual vineyard’s
wines and mixing them into a blend. Blends can be in any percentage of the
three different types of grapes and any percentage of qualities up to Grand
Cru.
From the mix
goes into bottles, is temporarily capped, and put downstairs in racks in the
huge cellars. Most cellars have main roads that extend for kilometers with
branches that extend outwards (in Mumm’s cellar the long avenue was humorously called
the Champs-Élysées). As the sugars ferment they create gas in the liquid giving
champagne its bubbles. Of course the fermentation leaves two undesired
consequences: the champagne bottle is under a rather high six atmospheres of
pressure and the excess fermented material accumulates in the bottle. To get
rid of the ferment, the bottles are stored at an angle and rotated every two
weeks at the same time increasing their incline to near vertical. Though now
done by machine, this was once the job of a “riddler” who not only worked in
near darkness all day but also had the misfortune of being occasionally shot at
by champagne cork “bullets” fired out of a mishandled bottle.
After a
period of time between one and fifty years the bottles are removed from the
cellar. A man had the job of releasing the cork, sending the ferment shooting
out of the bottle and quickly recapping it for many years. Now it is done by
flash freezing the first centimeter of the neck and removing the
sediment-containing ice by machine. It is then bottled and ready for sale. Major
companies like Mumm will only export 30% of their product outside of France,
meaning that the French get to keep a lot of the good stuff for themselves!
Last on the
agenda before heading out of town was a stop by a relatively insignificant
looking building along the river bank outside the city center. Though
nondescript from the outside the inside contains General Eisenhower’s “War
Room” for the Supreme Allied Command still decorated floor to ceiling with
troop movement maps and supply distribution charts. The museum was surprisingly
empty considering that it was here in that exact room that the Allies accepted
the unconditional surrender of the German forces in WWII. The treaty was signed
on May 7th, to go into effect the next day, May 8th,
VE-day. Ever professional, Eisenhower sent to London the extremely brief “The
mission of this Allied Force was fulfilled at 0241, local time, May 7th,
1945." after the treaty was signed by both parties.
Full of
history, agriculture, and perhaps a glass or two of champagne we headed back to
Cergy to begin classes again in the morning.
-Adam
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