Mon cœur est au Japon

Though it’s not exactly related to my travels in the slightest, I’d like to talk a little about todays events.

When I got home from class today, the first thing Jon and I noticed on Facebook was something about an earthquake in Japan, accompanied by a towering 27-foot tsunami.  My heart immediately sank.

I lived in Japan for just short of five years, and know all to well the horrors of an earthquake.  Though I recall feeling small tremors almost daily, I do recall the Kobe Earthquake of 1995 and its aftershocks.  Now, I lived at Misawa Air Force Base, over 700 miles from Kobe, and was scared out of my mind about what was going to happen mid-quake, and that was only a 6.8 on the Moment Magnitude Scale.  I can’t even imagine was an 8.9 would feel like, or the damage that would ensue, or the number of deaths we should expect to see during its aftermath.  I can’t even fathom was a tsunami is like, and consider myself lucky that during my five years there I never experienced one.  Another sobering though, as awful as this may sound, I am beyond relieved that Jon and I opted to come to France, rather than go to Japan.

I have faith in Japan, and its ability to pull through this.  The Japanese are strong- hardened by their experiences, and armed with the best earthquake science to date.  They will rebuild, better than before.  They will prevail, they always do.

I did do a little bit of searching and found that all US Military bases in Japan (including Misawa AB near Misawa City, Yokota AB just outside of Tokyo, and Kadena AB of Okinawa) are okay, and are on stand-by, ready to provide relief to the Japanese government, Hawaii and the Pacific coastal areas of the US, as well as our Pacific territories.

If you would like to donate to the relief efforts in Japan, I found this list of ways you can help.

 

On a lighter note, here in France things have been fairly laid back.  The closing ceremony for Carnival proved to be a royal waste of our time, and caused us to miss out on a good view of the burning of the King.  Had I known the ceremony wasn’t anything entertaining, we would have just camped out by the beach for a few hours so we can see it.  Jon was bummed, he really wanted pictures.  We saw the top of the flames from several yards away, and with in two minutes the fire was out.  They did make up for their lame ceremony with a wonderful fireworks show, complete with music and all.  It was really very nice.  My camera died again, but that proved to be okay after looking at my pictures, because not a single one of them were even close to salvageable.  Oh well.

Today we finally went shopping.  I went out searching for a new pair of shoes, a scarf and mascara, and came home with a scarf, mascara and lip gloss.  I consider it a semi-successful day.  Plus that means I just get to go shopping for shoes again!

Until next time, bonne nuit!

La Bataille de Fleurs a été super!

The sun was warm today, the air was crisp, and there was a slight breeze in the air.  Today was simply beautiful.  I could not have asked for a better day for the Battle of the Flowers parade.

The morning started well, with a nice hot cup of tea.  I prefer to start my mornings like this, but during the week, I never allow myself the time, sleep is far more important.  I actually got in the shower at a reasonable hour so I could straighten my hair for the first time in weeks (when it rains, there’s no point in trying).  I took my time getting ready, and didn’t feel the slightest bit rushed.  I like mornings like these.  Then we were off to buy our tickets to the parade!

We met Khalid, bought our tickets, and then decided that we needed to get something to eat.  Unfortunately, we forgot to share this with him, and he wasn’t really hungry, but we enjoyed some nice conversation at a bistro across the street from Nice’s city hall, where we got to see a few weddings.  In France, you first get married at city hall, where its made legally official.  Then, should you desire a religious wedding ceremony, you proceed to the church afterward.  Made for some interesting people watching.  Jon ordered raviolis aux artichauts, and I ordered salade de chef, keeping my fingers crossed that it wouldn’t have a whole bunch of crazy things in it.  It definitely didn’t, and it was delicious.  It had little pieces of pan fried chicken in it, fresh sweet corn, tomatoes and feta, all on top of mixed greens and drizzled with a balsamic dressing.  I was in salad heaven.

After our lunch, we proceeded right to the parade location, where we met up with Fabiola and Niko.  Now, the Bataille de Fleurs is best described as a more family appropriate version of New Orleans’ Mardi Gras (meaning, everyone is sober and keeps their clothes on) only instead of throwing beads they throw flowers.  Beautiful flowers.  And, they run the parade circuit twice.  The first time, they throw the most prevalent flower, the yellow mimosa.  Niko told me that these flowers are usually the first to bloom after the winter, and traditionally announce the coming of spring.  I thought they were adorable and fun- but thank goodness I don’t have flower allergies! I had little yellow pollen dust all over me!  The second time around the circuit, they throw the… more beautiful flowers, for lack of a better way of describing it.  These included roses, orchids, lilies, daisies of all sorts, tulips, and a number of other flowers I can’t describe or name.  It was great competitive fun, and with a little help in catching them from Jon, I came home with a huge bouquet of flowers for our host family’s table.  I am incredibly thankful that the sun decided to stick around today.  I don’t think it would have been as enjoyable in the rain!

So, here you are! Some pictures!

ALSO- If you’ll take a moment and look at the top menu bar on my blog, you’ll notice that I added two new tabs.  Travel Tips- where you can find all my tips on packing and my favorite resources, and Contact Me- where you can send me an email and find links to my Facebook page, Twitter feed, and Flickr photostream.  The Travel Tips menu will continue to change as I add more and discover more, so check back regularly.  I’ll do my best to announce when I add things!  Enjoy!

Notre famille est de retour

Well, our family got back a little over an hour ago, and I’m already tired of French Dora’s voice.  You really appreciate the silence when its gone.

It was yet another gloomy day in Nice, despite weather predictions all week claiming the sun would come up.  To make matters worse, before deciding not to go to the Bataille des Fleurs on Wednesday because of the relentless wind, we checked to make sure the weather for Saturday was supposed to be good.  It promised bright sun, with a 10% chance of rain.  Well, now its promising rain.  I guess we’ll be going to the parade in the rain, because its our last chance.

Class today wasn’t bad though.  I received a zillion compliments saying I looked nice today, even though I’ve worn that outfit at least five times since we got here.  Only difference was I actually got up in time to kind of fix my hair, play around with some make up, and put my contacts on.  I think its the contacts that did it.  I usually hide my make up behind my big nerdy glasses, but the room is small enough that I can read the board with my contacts, so I thought I’d give it a try.  More importantly, I was still expecting the sun to come up, and wanted to wear my sunglasses.  C’est la vie.

This week has proven best to serve as a catch up week.  On anything and everything.  Talking to friends, online course work, and several hours spent in my Kindle, getting to know Julia Child more and more each day.  If only I could do that on the beach!

Le Défilé des Lumières

Yesterday was another parade day for Carnival, and Jon and I had every intention of attending both the Bataille de Fleurs (Battle of the Flowers) and Le Défilé des Lumières (The Parade of Lights).  At €10 a piece, mind you.

However, we learned something critically important for our future parade plans:  tickets are on sale only two hours before the start of the event.  So when we arrived at the day parade location at 3:00 pm (30 minutes after it started) we were greeted by closed ticket booths.  Now, I’m already frustrated enough that we have to pay to see a parade.  In the US, the most you have to pay for are premium viewing seats, which for those willing to pay for them, more power to you!  But all of the Carnival parades are paid events with the exception of the opening ceremony, and Mardi Gras.  But to show up and find out that we couldn’t even pay to see it because the ticket booths were closed was frustrating enough to make me want to boycott the whole thing.  Okay, not really.  My mood was helped significantly after finding a gummy candy stand full of my childhood favorites, and a stand selling Venetian style masks.  Jon suggested we buy ourselves one and dress up for the night parade.  This came as a bit of a surprise to me, I can’t even get him to partake in Halloween parties, but you don’t have to ask me twice to dress up.  Jon also enjoyed a beignet filled with warm apple sauce that was simply amazing.

After walking around a few more carnival stands, we headed home, mouths watering, and exciting plans for the night to come.  After a good two hour nap, and thirty minutes of primping and layering as much as possible while wearing tights and a dress (and of course, a coat) we were off.  We got a lot of looks walking down the street, and I couldn’t help but wonder if they were good.  But when we got to the parade location, I totally didn’t feel silly anymore.  We got there pretty early, to ensure we’d be able to get tickets, and enjoyed a good hour or so of people watching before the parade actually began.  I saw a lot of glittery wigs and funny hats and face paint.

Once the parade began, it was just like the first night.  Silly string and confetti everywhere.  Jon and I were pretty fortunate not to get plastered with silly string, and I welcomed the confetti.  I thought it was fun.  The parade itself was incredible, and incredibly long.  But not the long you feel when you’re performing in a dreadfully long and boring  parade.  This was the sort of long that, once you finally feel your toes start to become numb with cold, you look at your watch and say “Oh my goodness, its already been over an hour!”  I think I had better luck taking pictures for this one, given that the Parade of Lights would probably be fairly well lit, however, my battery did die probably 3/4 of the way through the parade.  Which worked out to Jon’s benefit because he filled up his memory card, and had to use mine.

After the parade, I finally tried the churros I had been boycotting since we arrived.  I felt pretty strongly that €4 for a small thing of churros was pretty outrageous… until I got close enough to read the rest of the sign.  A small comes with ten churros!  I did skip the chocolate (even though it was temping, since they dip theirs in Nutella) and went with the classic churros, covered in sugar.  And, lucky me, they were fresh out of the fryer.  So. Delicious.

So, here are some of the pictures I managed to snap before my camera died.  Amusez-vous bien!

Carnaval de Nice: Roi de la Méditerranée

So last night was the start of Carnival, and the one in Nice happens to be one of the largest in the world.  You know, up there in ranks with the ones held in Venice and Rio de Janeiro.  Needless to say, it was quite the spectacle.

We went together with our host family, but they left within maybe ten minutes of getting there.  It was 8:30 in the evening, and Nicolas would normally be getting a little cranky anyway, but the whole thing scared him.  Poor thing.

The theme this year was “Roi de la Méditerranée” or King of the Mediterranean.  They had these huge balloons shaped like various sea creatures, a dragon of some sort, and some crazy mermaid thing that had cat heads for boobs.  I really wish I could have understood what they were saying, because if they described that I would have liked to know.  Oh well.  The crew was a lot of fun to watch, the people pulling the balloons had some crazy make up, and the spectators were throwing confetti everywhere and hitting people with silly string.  I must say, I’ve spent many hours watching the Travel Channel, and of all the things I’ve seen people throw in a celebration, these two are preferable, by a long shot.

Now, I don’t really know how to describe the rest of what I saw.  It seemed to require the same amount of acid to create this event as Beatles used while creating the Magical Mystery Tour album.  So I’ll have to once again let the pictures do the talking.

BUT: My camera is poorly suited for night photography.  I have not had the funds available to purchase a proper DSLR, so I’ve been working with a Canon PowerShot SD1000.  That being said, its definitely the best point-and-shoot I’ve ever had, and Jon had the same one, but I acquired it used from a pawn shop and its a little dated now, since they don’t even make it anymore.  Needless to say, my first big purchase (aside from a Vespa, scooter or small car of some sort) once I get back to the states will be a proper Nikon DSLR.  Its hard to make photography a real hobby, or even more, with a point-and-shoot.

So, long explanation aside, the pictures are blurry.  I couldn’t let that keep me from showing you guys just how crazy and huge this event it.  So here are my pictures.  Jon is still going through all of his (which turned out much better), but he will be posting them in a blog post soon, so keep checking in on his blog here for his pictures.

Balloons!

The octopus balloons were my favorite

Aren’t they cute!

Jon and I… amongst a few thousand people

More balloons

Even more balloons

Crew member gettin’ his groove on.

And even more balloons.

Can you tell they were my favorite?

They were moving pretty quickly, so I barely caught him. This is what the people pulling the balloons looked like.

TROIS, DEUX, UN… CONFETTI!

Confetti over a few thousand people

King of the Mediterranean float

The Carnival Queen

Some weird lady float

The seahorses with the King

Seahorses again, I thought they were awesome

And again, seahorses.

The crowd

Crew members standing on crew members. You know, nothing out of the ordinary.

Crazy lady float

The Carnival food stand. Its just as big of a rip off here as it is in the US

The Ferris Wheel

Definitely the biggest one I’ve ever seen in person

Also, here’s a short video clip that Jon took!