Falling into winter, describes the weather this month. We saw the daytime temperatures move to the mid-50’s and the overnight temperatures dip into the 40’s. Students of all ages, beginning the semester, were evident in the enthusiastic tours for small children, and the chanting and singing rallies, by the older students, held in the squares. They were easy to spot in the team building exercises which occasionally required them to dress and carry props in particular themes. Also prevalent were the late night serenades of the same, in various stages of inebriation. Ahh, youth!
Early on, we took another visit to Lille’s art museum, Palais des Beaux Arts, to tackle the next floor, which holds the masterpieces of Rubens and others of the mid 1500’s. There were lots of students, older and younger, with their teachers. Unfortunately, the sad fact of this floor is that the rooms are too narrow to properly show such large, great pieces. One cannot stand at the proper distance to truly view and appreciate the works and the lighting is such poor quality as to hamper proper viewing as well.
The rooms are lit by skylight in some areas with no other augmenting lighting, which is the worst we’ve ever seen in such a prestigious museum. It is wonderful to have access to the works, although a tragedy and utter disappointment in its presentation.
The weekend-visiting shoppers seemed to increase and the streets took on a winter holiday feel. We also looked out on our street, Rue Faidherbe, and talked about the wonderful street sculptures that have been delighting young and old who pass through, and how much we’ll miss them when they’re gone.
As a university city, we hear so many different languages here and are usually able to, at the very least, identify what is being spoken. But we had come to notice a language unfamiliar to our ears, which we asked our landlord about. He identified what we were hearing as Belgian Flemish. To our surprise, he explained that Belgians speak three languages in three different areas; French, Flemish and German. The Belgian-Flemish was confusing in that it sometimes sounded French and sometimes sounded Russian, to our ears.
As we mentioned last month, the protests have started up again, as well as strikes by firefighters and the train unions (which has made us very alert to our train schedules and arrangements). The latest protest here in Lille was a group calling on the US tech companies (Facebook, Apple, Google, etc.) to pony-up and pay their fair share of taxes in France and the EU. Across the street from us is the Apple Store, and they regularly attract the protesters as an example of big business that does not sufficiently support its employees and its communities.
It was time for flu shots, which we were quick to get, on a trip to our Paris doctor. As a reminder, here in France, the patient picks up the flu prescription at the pharmacy and schedules their shot with their doctor, taking the refrigerated prescription with them. We had received a special packet from our Lille pharmacy to keep our prescriptions cold on our one-hour train trip to Paris.
On the Paris trip, we also saw the orthotic specialist who quickly identified the issue with my problem foot. Our orthotics were extremely old and no longer servicing our needs. He was able to measure for new ones, promising that it would mend all issues we were experiencing due to our increased walking (G’s back pains and my tendon problems). When he told us to call in to schedule our return trip, we carefully explained the problem we’d encountered with the telephone receptionist (which we wrote about last month). He was not pleased to hear of the issues we’d had, stated that he would address it and also walked us over to the reception desk to insure our appointment was made with success. Thank goodness for that sorely needed intervention. On the same trip we were able to have dinner with our immigration attorney friend, alway a lively and entertaining time.
We got to see our first Opera performance of the season which was a rarely performed unfinished play by Henry Purcell, called The Indian Queen. We had read the story, looking forward to seeing the Peruvian costumes and sets. The story was great, along with the performers, but to our surprise, the production was ultra-modern. It had stark black and white background photos and all black modern clothes, which was a great surprise.
The most jarring part of the production was the use of a running film of the play, projected in the background, with actors different from the stage actors doing the same scenes but slightly out of sync. Even though it was in English, with French subtitles, it proved too difficult to watch and we left at the break. That said, we’ve found a wonderful, little local bar that serves a terrific gin and tonic, to discuss anything we see, afterwards.
Next on our calendar was the big Mexican-style dinner which we had promised Flo and his family as a thank you for all of his help in our transition to Lille. It has been a year ago this month that we moved into this apartment, on the 28th, no small thanks to Flo. We had been preparing for some time by amassing all of the proper ingredients by way of the El Dorado markets that had come to town, during a trip into London, online orders and the April trip to California where we packed our return luggage with needed items as well. The last piece that fell into place was made possible by our California visitors, who brought (as we requested) Monterey Jack cheese. Such a variety of dishes and beverages took a bit of strategic planning, taking into account our small counter top oven and two nob stove. It was great to smell all of those food dishes again. As an aside, we’d come across large carving pumpkins at the local Marks & Spencer market, which we had not been able to find last year. I actually squeaked with delight when we saw them and carted one home immediately. When it came to carving it, G resoundingly wanted a ‘traditional’ face of triangle eyes, nose and a sparse, toothy smile. Being halloween lovers, it was terrific to have one again.
What a night! They all loved the margaritas, the simple classic tequila, lime and triple sec variety. We explained each dish on the buffet and the main differences between traditional Mexican cooking which we had prepared, versus California, New Mexico or Texas Tex-Mex cooking. They tried the chips, salsa and guacamole to start with, as well as all of the following dishes, clearly enjoying them. Flo loved the Horchata. Sofie loved the Capirotada. No one wanted a coffee with dessert but when Flo saw G come out with an espresso, his eyes lit up and asked for a coffee after all. He thought G was going to serve American style coffee, not a proper French coffee. Curious, he investigated G’s coffee machine and gave it his full approval !
It was outstanding – many times it was almost like New York, with everyone talking at the same time. I had a tough time following conversations in the clashing of fast talking. Flo definitely was the story teller and was just hilarious. Such great fun to see that they were completely comfortable, all clearly enjoying themselves and I was so, SO relieved. My biggest fear was polite, uncomfortable, small conversation. But it was a wild fast conversation ranging over a wide variety of topics. Then to top it all off, they would jump up to add new words on our living room poster of vocabulary. So utterly delightful ! A solid success – AND HEY – We hosted our very first party and parted as friends. 😀
We now have a huge box of Leonidas chocolates (thank you Frederic and Sofie) and a plant (thank you Flo) that I will try to keep alive. OH- BEST OF ALL – Sofie can’t wait to have us over for her famous holiday meal with Foie Gras. She showed pictures of her cooking, which looked professional. I know we can’t compare. Our meals are not at all like this Mexican one (a year to gather and a week to put together) and from now on, they will be underwhelmed. Yep, LOL.
We delivered some leftovers to Fabrice, to try, as well as to our upstairs quartet of roommates. In discussions over food and cooking Cyril, who is the main cook of the four, admired our “American Style” refrigerator. We explained that for us, it was too large. We would prefer the size of the one that they had, which was better suited for two and ours was better for the four of them. Our old:
They admitted that theirs was on the edge of quitting, as it had begun to leak. We’d been looking at replacing ours (reportedly 12 years old and left by previous tenants), so we offered it to them. Their eyes lit up with utter joy over the prospect and Cyril, clapping his hands, exclaimed that it was “just like Christmas!” The only stipulation was that they had to remove it. Plans began immediately, as we measured the unit with and without the doors. The end result was that they could indeed get it up the stairs and get it into the kitchen, after removing the doors. We ordered a new one for us, still tall yet a bit smaller in size and then completely scrubbed the old one in preparation. The new one arrived by A lift through the balcony door. The old, leaky one from our upstairs’ neighbors, which they had brought down to our place, was taken away through the balcony.
They are now the pleased owners of the “American Style” refrigerator and we are extremely happy too, with the new one sitting in our kitchen.
We had another evening at the Opera House, for the next performance in the season. It was the Quatuor Hagen, a quartet formed in 1981 with four siblings. One of the four retired three years after their formation and that spot was filled with a fellow, who has stayed on with them since. We had excellent seats and it all was extremely enjoyable as we listened to Beethoven, played in two 40 minute sets. It is such a pleasure to be able to walk across the street for such excellent performances in that beautiful setting.
We spent a good part of the month watching the news regarding the wildfires in California. Many friends are without power, having had it cut by the utility company to try to prevent the start of new fires. Some have been evacuated from their homes but thankfully they all are safe according to last reports as they continue to keep us posted on that horrible situation.
In our little safe haven, Annabelle, our new French language tutor, met with us for the first time. It was a good fit as she has an easy sense of humor and adaptable to our preferred approach. Having spotted our biggest weakness, she is pushing us to speak more rather than using a traditional book approach. We met again the following week and are now on a weekly schedule for what promises to be a long venture. I have to say that I think the French “U” is out to get me.
October closes with the dipping temperatures and with children on school holiday, the feel of holidays and Halloween is in the air. The decorations are small and subdued compared to the states but we still manage to get our little Whoo Hoo’s ! And we indulged in the pass-time of making chocolate spider bugs for our new friends here.
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