Let's see..Friday night, I went to see Cedric Andrieux at the Cite Universitaire Theater which was for my theater class. It was actually really interesting -- it was this dancer (Cedric Andrieux) who told the story of his life and career, in particular when he was working with choreographer Merce Cunningham in New York City. Throughout, he did little demonstrations and solos so that we could see what he had been doing when in NYC, and then what he's been doing after his return to France.
Yesterday, we left to go to Lyon for the Fete des Lumieres last night -- let's just say that it was an interesting experience....The train got there around 3pm, and we took the metro into the old part of the city -- the entire place was completely mobbed the entire time. From the metro stop, we took the tram up the side of the hill Fourviere so that we could see some of the Gallo-Romain ruins and then go to the Notre Dame de Fourviere cathedral, which is really incredible. It was finished at the end of the 19th century, and then inside in entirely covered with mosaics. It's really beautiful.
From there, we descended into the old part of town and walked through the streets while listening to our history lesson. Lyon really was just incredibly crowded the entire time. Martine had told us that we probably wouldn't be able to find a place for us all to eat dinner together, but we actually did! We asked at this one little restaurant which was advertising that they had 50 seats downstairs if they could take us...at first they said no, but when we offered to eat right away (at about 6pm), they showed us downstairs. We all got the entree-plat-dessert option which was quite lovely. I chose the onion soup to start which was very good -- the only negative was that we all had to share this one small bowl of cheese to put on top....For my second course, I got the sausage which was fairly large, and came sliced on my plate in a red wine sauce and some potatoes gratin on the side. All very delicious! Even though the specialty dessert of Lyon is a praline tart, I decided to go for the gooey chocolate cake which came sitting in a little puddle of cream sauce -- yum!
From dinner, we all split up and walked all over the city to look at the displays of lights. There were bridges that were decorated, buildings that were all lit up, lots of displays in front of restaurants -- who were all serving cups of hot wine, which smelled heavenly. We wove our way through the streets and finally arrived at this adorable Christmas market which was near where we were supposed to meet the bus. We spent a while there -- lots of different things to buy -- everything from crepes to roasted chestnuts to santa hats to you name it!
This is when things started to get interesting. We all arrived in front of the Brasserie Georges to get on the bus, and amazingly were all there EARLY, and so we left around 10:45. Martine had warned us that our "hotel" would be a bit different than our other excursions, but I don't think we really knew what to expect. We pulled into the "F1" about 20 minutes later and went in to check into our rooms. F1 is the lowest level hotel in the Accor family of hotels - apparently you can come at any time of day and give them your credit card and they'll give you a room.
Well, first of all, the lobby was more like the lobby of a rental car place. The guy behind the counter was actually incapable of using the computer and had NO idea what he was doing. Martine and Madame Stevens went back and forth with him for quite some time -- lots of "there's no problem here" and "yes, there's a big problem", and the like...we were all pretty tired, and as frustrating as it was, most of us couldn't help but find it a bit entertaining.
Finally, we got little slips of paper with our room number and code (yes, code, not key), and went up to find our room. Well it didn't take us long to realize that yes, he had given us 11 slips of paper with codes on them, but about 4 of those slips were duplicates of other slips...so I found myself sharing two twin beds (small beds) with 3 other girls....wasn't going to work. So it took us about another 15 minutes to get new rooms assigned and figure all that out....finally, my roommate, Cynthia, and I got a room to ourselves -- no bathroom in the room, just a bed, sink, and a tiny little tv.
I don't think anyone slept particularly well, but we got up and went to the "breakfast" they were serving in the lobby. Again, an interesting experience. You truly do get what you pay for....
The bus picked us up at 9:30, and we took a little driving tour around Lyon before going to the train station -- where we almost got stuck in some major traffic and missed our train -- but luckily, we made it. The train ride back to Paris was fairly uneventful - I worked on my expose on Cedric Andrieux which I have to present tomorrow. And then there's this 15 page report on the economy of Nigeria which is due on Thursday.....which is SLOWLY coming along. Emphasis on the slowly. It's hard to focus when it's Christmas, and lights, and PARIS.
Here are some pictures from Lyon and then one of Pastel who was hiding in a bag last week, and I just find it too funny to not post....
Above -- they were playing pinball in lights on the side of this building which was very cool...
One of the main plazas in Lyon.
A bientot!
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