October 25, 2009
Well, it is about two weeks since the last blog, so it is time to get another one off.
Our French classes are Tuesday and Thursday, so Wednesday we surprised ourselves by taking a break and biking to the Mediterranean for a sandwich and the smell of salt water.
Montpellier is full of vitality. All you have to do is walk out the door and something is happening. Saturday we happened upon our French landlady (last on the left) singing Portuguese with her Bossa Nova chorus as her Argentine husband took pictures.
In order to have this kind of public space, lots of room for community events, the community has to place a premium on public space over private profit. This space was developed following the departure of a military base and the city had control of how it would be used. Where on Bainbridge Island is there such a readily accessible venue?
Also, on our walk we happened upon 300 or so who were watching a demonstrations by the Red Cross, firefighters and police. We stopped for a moment as the firefighters actually cut the roof off the top of this Subaru in order to show how they would evacuate an injured accident victim.
We walked over the Rive du Lez and its waterfall to a boules tournament with well over 100 men. As far as I can tell, boules is an excuse for groups of three men to hang around talking for a half day, to build community but not muscles and cardiac capacity. Boules is available to anyone can wants to play on any empty area of dirt with only a minimum of equipment. In towns of 200, it provides a way for the men of the village to hang out on some regular basis. In towns of 250,000 like Montpellier, it accomplishes exactly the same thing.
About an hour later, grateful for this hour of three kinds of spontaneous entertainment, we joined another 300 folks for “8h Pour La Palestine, Contre Agrexco et Pour l’Emploi,” We heard the leader of the Solidarity effort in Italy, the leader of the French farmers’ union, the leader of a major labor union in Scotland, and most impressive, the young leader from Palestine of the five year old Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions initiative in Palestine.
The purpose of this 8-hour conference was to develop support for an initiative to stop the Israeli firm Agrexco from opening a port in Sete, about 15 minutes from here. They want to compete with French farmers by selling vegetables and fruits grown on 95% occupied Palestinian soil watered by water that is 98% available to Israelis. 10 Jewish women's peace groups located in Israel including Women in Black have joined hands to support this boycott. (Have you seen the pictures of the French watering their fields with milk? Holding up traffic with tractors? There is vast discontent now in the French farming community which is a separate subject.)
Two spoke English and then were translated into French. Great way to learn the language as well as to admire a well-designed meeting.
Artisans for Fair Trade sold hand-crafted pieces made by Hebron Ceramics and Glass. Hebron Ceramics was 45 workers before the First Intifada, went down to 2 workers, and is now 40 again. I couldn’t resist adding a second piece to the “collection” started with a gift from a French friend
The next day the 14th annual Day of the Bikes provided visibility to the biking community of Montpellier that enjoys 158 km of bike routes and is looking forward to 100 more, funded by a 1 million euro allocation of funds by the City Council. 2000 bikes can be rented for 2 E for half a day at one of 50 publicly owned bike stations dotted around the city. The bikes are made of solid material and are not light but they are regularly used through the city by students and other residents.
Did the 800 participants come for the drawing of the 4 free bikes, for a family outing, for the free T-shirts, the free breakfast, or free lunch and drinks at the end? I went because one of our French biking/walking friends, Marie-Laure had never attended. At the end, she and Bob shared a hug in front of a photo exhibition seen by 10,000,000. The pictures are by Yann Arthus-Bernard now available through Netflicks in a film called “Home.” The pictures have a distinct ecologic message.
The French are slow to change. In fact they hate change, but once they adopt something as their own, they are on it. They are now very clear about the danger of the warming of the planet. (It is no wonder since this area lost 78% of its wine crop this year.) The Montpellier City Council has now dedicated a whole building to exhibits on how to save energy. The building is right on prime downtown property next to the Pavilion Populaire with the free exhibition of 160 of Yann’s photos, the photographer included in the picture of Bob and Marie-Laure above.
We saw a French producer’s breathtaking film (Le Syndrome du Titanic by Nicolas Hulot) which tells the part of the story that Al Gore’s film, « An Inconvenient Truth » did not address. I will leave it to you to figure out what truth even Al Gore finds inconvenient. (Thank you Mussa)
While Marie-Laure and I biked slowly 14 km around the outskirts of Montpellier with 800 men, women and children, Bob had to suffer through the scenery around Mt. Pic St Loup as he biked
90 km with 7 rabbits disguised as 45-year-old bikers who kept dropping back to help the old guy stay up with the rest. It was at a rapid pace (average speed was 26 km/hr with several pace lines at about 50 km/hr) and there were plenty of hills to climb.
We got back to our apartment to find that our landlord and his son had further improved our furniture They had already added this leather sofa.
by adding a lovely black buffet to match our table
Wednesday an On va sortir friend and I walked around a small artificial lake in one of the suburbs of Montpellier.
Friday a full house watched a dance choreographed by Mathilde Monnier entitled “Palova 3’23”. She is the most well known of the Montpellier choreographers. I found the dance boring and intellectual. I guess that there are others who feel the same way as the web panned her by its silence. Bob liked it more than I.
Thursday night we joined 20 other On va sortir folks, including two we already knew, Jacques and Sophie, to go to a book reading by a Sorbonne professor of sociology. Michel Maffesoli talked about his new book “Apocalypse.” I was so proud to think I understood 80% of it, sitting in a red plush chair in a comfortable auditorium. Bob and I wondered why the professor who introduced him seemed so distant. Well, I just looked up the speaker on Wickipedia and found out that 3,000 people signed a petition against his appointment to CNRS, the most prestigious of the national research institutes because he had approved for a doctorate a woman who wrote her thesis on astrology. I think he is an embarrassment to these scientists and that is why his colleague looked like he would like to be many miles away.
There are free scientific lectures weekly. So only a few days later we attended another free lecture on food and nutrition by a scientist here for a one day conference with hundreds of other scientists on food. The universities really extend themselves to include the public. Because the universities depend on the city for rooms and food for their students as well as about 70,000 trips a day on the tram, perhaps they like to woo the tax paying general public by these special events.
Tomorrow, we don’t have the time or energy to attend a day-long conference, also for free, held at the School of Pharmacy on mushrooms. I wish Will and Marta were here. Do you know that in France you can take your mushrooms into a pharmacy to make sure none are poisonous?
Yesterday, Saturday October 24th we compared photo expositions in four venues including the 15th edition Corum des Photographes of pictures taken of Montpellier as well as an exhibition of pictures taken by the press like this one entitled “Just Like Daddy.”
Another photographer/producer Guillaume Martial created a whole experience at A La Babak, Atelier de Photographie et Espace d’Exposition, 10 Rue de La Petite Loge. He was so attached to his subjects he wrote a little story about each one next to the pictures. At first I was bored, but he drew me in until I wanted to know the story about each garage mechanic he had photographed.
Exhausted after three hours of photography exhibits, we happened upon a small little restaurant with a Routard sticker, a sure hint for value for French restaurants. (I don’t know why Routard is not available in the US.)
Each table at the Au Bonheur des Tartes, 4 Rue Tresoireres de la Bourse, was full of smiling folks eating tartes with melt-in-your-mouth crusts. Today’s 11 E special included slices of three different tartes: onion, tomato, and cheese. The chef came out and wanted to know if we were British and had come because of a recent article in a British newspaper. He also ask where we were from and noted that Seattle is the home of Jimmy Hendrix and Narvana. A patron stopped Bob on the way out wanting him to know that Joan Baez was in town for a free performance.
We had heard a rumor that she was giving a press conference today in the Rockstore, 20 Rue de Verdun, a much beloved musical site now owned by the city, (like at least 80 other historical medieval houses in the city) before her free performance tonight, (the city paid her 60,000 E so it wasn’t really free of course) as the grand finale of Montpellier’s three week international guitar festival. When we walked by the red car which is the sign for the Rockstore, she was, of course, no where in sight.
Then home, to rest our feet and give thanks for the blue skies and the creativity in this city of artists.