Some Interesting Stuff

Looking back on my entries, I see that I haven't written... well... ANYTHING of what we've been doing. The short version is: we went to San Remo, watched a lot of World Cup games, swam in the pool, watched Some Kind of Monster, and stayed out until 2am celebrating the Fête de la Musique. The longer version might be written by BB later; I'm just going to talk about some highlights here.

First, we went out to have pizza and enjoy the ambiance of the France-South Korea World Cup match. It was great when France scored about 10 minutes into the match. Everyone in the bars around us jumped up, screaming. We could barely give our orders to the waiter. After we finished our meal, we walked along the Cours Saleya looking for dessert, when we heard two small voices screaming. We looked over at them, and they seemed to be the only South Koreans in the area. All of their barmates looked at them a bit quizzically, but not at all aggressively. We found some crepes to eat and listened to the French fans groaning about the tie with South Korea. As we walked along the Promenade des Anglais, we heard someone shouting Allez les bleus! I thought it was kind of odd to be shouting for the team after they had effectively lost. We all looked around, and finally found the supporter neck deep in the Mediterranean, with two friends holding his clothes and laughing. When security showed up, complete with a big German shepherd, the laughing bet-loser climbed out of the water and flashed all of the spectators a quick view of his thong.

Then, on Wednesday, for the Fête de la Musique, we headed out to centre ville. It was packed with people dancing, singing, eating, and (above all) drinking. We went to an all-you-can-eat mussel restaurant where Jube and BB packed away 3 1/2 bowls of mussels (I had another 1/2) and then walked around trying to find a rock band. We listened to two or three (one of whom played Master of Puppets, which Jube and BB both sang), passed a few of Jube's students, and then saw something we had never before seen. A young boy sprinted across the road into the Jardin Albert I followed by two policemen. He circled around towards us again when a police car tore into a U-turn and blocked his escape. Finally he was led out of the garden with his hands behind his back to join a group of youngsters already being held in custody by the policemen. We don't know what they did, but they were definitely caught. In fact, the whole centre ville was full of police officers. We saw them simply patrolling, listening to the music, but also jogging in formation towards an unknown emergency. Luckily we weren't caught rocking out! Well, that's because we didn't really rock out, although Jube did dance with me twice and BB sang most of the songs he knew.

Finally, on Thursday night, we invited Jube's colleagues to come over for a barbecue at our house. We are the only members of the group with a yard, and although I sometimes wish we had a larger apartment or lived closer to town, it's nice to see our apartment through other people's eyes; I realize that our little garden is just what they want. I made big juicy hamburgers, deviled eggs, and fresh spinach salad. Jube grilled it all up and had also bought shish kebabs, but my hamburgers were so American almost no one could eat more afterwards. Some even turned down dessert! We invited four friends, and two of them really made the effort to speak English with BB, which was really nice. He basically followed along with the conversations until we started talking about politics, which I didn't bother to translate. I don't think he knows who Sarkozy or Royal or Hollande are, and since we only talked about Chirac in relation with them... well... I didn't translate.

Today I start my job in town. I'm a little bit sad, because BB doesn't leave until Tuesday and Jube doesn't really start vacation till then (he's been grading the Bac since last week). I'm going to be living with a group of high school students and arranging all of their evening programs for them. It really ought to be interesting, and it's certainly well paid and a good experience... but I can't help thinking about how little time I have left with Jube and (more generally) in France. I'm leaving on August 3rd to start grad school in Virginia, and I'll have to wait at least another month before Jube comes to join me.

That worries me too. I haven't talked about it on my blog because I've been very stressed out about it, but we applied for a visa for him, and we haven't received any news about it since mid-May. We haven't received much mail for the past two weeks, either, though... we're hoping that it's just another example of slow post office service. I'm feeling more stressed since yesterday Jube received word that he has been granted a leave of absence from his job for a year... more pressure. I'll be sure to update you when I know more.

And now I'm going to leave you. I'll try to write more while I'm at work, and I'll force BB to write a nice entry about France before he goes.