Return home

Good things usually have to come to an end. Today is the day of my flight back home. After a month of productive fieldwork, fruitful social interactions, good eating and sightseeing, and shopping, I am looking forward to going back to my loved one and my dogs. I know it's going to be a long day of traveling, but I know that the upcoming hugs and kisses are well worth it.

Monday at the Louvre

The first time I came to Paris, I was 17 years old, touring France with a group of high school senior girls. Back then, the trip was intended as a cultural historical and spiritual trip, which took us to places like Tours, Lourdes, Lisieux, Thésée, and other religious or historical sites related to the foundation of Montreal in 1642. By the time we got back to Paris, I was rather fed up with highly cultural activities. So when we were given the choice between an afternoon at the Louvre or shopping at Les Galeries Lafayette, I chose the latter. Needless to say that I had lots of fun shopping with the girls, but today, more than 14 years later, I figure that it would be a sin to be in Paris a second time without seeing the Louvre. So I woke up early yesterday morning to be at the entrance at the opening (9am). I went in by one of the alternate entrances to avoid waiting in line -- the main entrance at the Pyramid is always way too crowded -- and spend the morning at the museum. This was a very pleasant way to spend time alone in Paris yesterday. Seeing so many masterpieces gathered in one single place was quite impressive and inspiring. Then, when I left the museum around 1pm, I walked down the rue de Rivoli to Le Marais (gay area) and the Place de la Bastille. In case anyone is wondering, I did do some shopping, after visiting the Louvre this time...

Rough morning...

Rough morning this morning. France was defeated in the World Cup; the mood is down. Italy won the World Cup; the night was noisy, sleepless. I'm heading out to the Louvre and more sightseeing early this morning...

Fun times in Paris

I got to Paris yesterday afternoon, and hooked up with Claire, her cousins and two of her friends from Bloomington -- Alexa and Ira -- to go to a movie near the Opera Garnier. We saw a comedy, "Nos jours heureux" and it felt really good to laugh out loud and unwind from the last few weeks of fieldwork and academic conferences. After the evening, we decided to meet again today to walk through Montmartre. I met Alexa and Ira in the 5e arrondissement this morning and they showed me around the neighborhood a bit. We had mint tea and pastries on a terrace right by the Mosquée de Paris, walked around and took the Métro to join the others by Montmartre.


The city is filled up with excitement in preparation for tonight's final game of the soccer tournament in Germany. People are wearing the #10 t-shirt for Zidane, cars are drving by honking and cheering "allez les Bleus!", there are signs everywhere. It's crazy! I decided to stay in tonight to avoid fire crackers and drunk crowds; I'll watch the whole thing on TV and will undoubtedly stay up first because of the game, then because of the noise outside. Today was a great day: Allez les Bleus!

Conferences in Belgium

I attended two conferences in Belgium this week. I got to Mons on Tuesday afternoon for the first one, "la Journée de la Nasalité", which was quite technical, but very interesting. It focused mostly on acoustic issues related to nasality. When I first got my hotel (Hotel Etna), I realized that I should have asked around before booking my room right by the train station... It felt like a dump where people go to get some, if you know what I mean. My view: a shut-down sex show viewing place. No wonder they had me pay for the room upon arrival. I will spare you the details (noise, shower, phone, service problems) but I will say that it was less than an ideal place to spend the night before a conference, especially on the night that the Italian soccer teams won their semi-final game against Germany. After Mons, I went to Louvain-la-Neuve for a second conference on prosodic aspects to sociolinguistic variation in French. It was great! I learned quite a bit about the sociophonetics, and about various research projects related to prosody and the perception of phonological fearures that are tied to social or geographic differenes. Although I got to Louvain-la-Neuve quite late on Wednesday night (long story!), I was able to walk around this brand-new university town in the following days. Everything there was designed to cater to the university, which was founded in 1425 in Louvain (Leuven) and got kicked out from Flemish territory in the late 60s, hence the creation of Louvain-la-Neuve. The town didn't feel like Europe at all. In fact, it felt like an unban laboratory where we live under the supervision of some crazy scientist, à la 1984. You should check it out sometime.

http://www.olln.be/ (website of the city of Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve) http://www.ucl.ac.be/en/intro.html (website of the Université catholique de Louvain)



A sign by my room door in Louvain-la-Neuve. It reads "Walen go hom", which was displayed at a demonstration for the departure of Walloons (Walloon students and their university) from Leuven, in the mid-60s.

Train ride to Belgium

The train ride to Mons (Belgium) -- my first train ride ever, except for the commuter train in Chicago -- was great. When I got to the train station in Amiens, with all my stuff, I asked a man for information, making sure to look helpless enough that he would offer to help me with my heavy suitcase, which he did. Turns out he was the train operator, and after noticing my Canadian accent and finding out this was my first ride ever, offered me to ride in the driver's cabin to Lille. It was AWESOME!

Goodbye Picardy

My time in Picardy is almost over. I met plenty of great people who welcomed me with open arms, and I hope that I can come back next year for more firldwork. I am leaving for Belgium tomorrow for 5 days of conferences -- I'm not presenting, just attending!-- and then a few days of tourism in Paris before heading back home to Milwaukee. The weather is finally warm, pretty hot in fact. I hope I can write more when I get to the city. :)

Trip to Amiens

The trip to Amiens was great! I met Laurent Devime at his house in St-Gratien (a few miles North of Amiens) and we drove to a talk he was giving in Chauny (Aisne). The talk was extremely lively, with traditional Picard tales and legends told by a professional story-teller. I really enjoyed it. I also met a friend of his, a comedian from Aisne. I had a great time! Then, on Saturday June 24th – St-Jean-Baptiste Day, the national holiday in Québec – Laurent took me to Amiens so that I could see a few of the tourist attractions. We went to the Cathedral, which I learned is home to the relic of no other than St-Jean-Baptiste. I though it was a great coincidence that I found myself in the Cathedral of Amiens on that day. Then, while we were having lunch in the Quartier St-Leu, a hip and young neighborhood in Amiens, we saw Jean-Pierre Facquier, a friend of Laurent who is a wood sculptor and makes traditional Picard wooden puppets like Lafleur. He joined us for a beer, and then walked us to his shop, where he builds all his string puppets. I then spent some time touring by myself a bit, and then we went for a tour of the Grottes de Naours that Laurent was leading in Picard. I must admit that I got slightly claustrophobic when we first walked down (33 meters deep), but I felt fine soon thereafter and enjoyed my visit a lot. I got back to St-Valery in the evening for a well-deserved good night’s sleep. I photographed the cows that greet me as I make my turn on the Rue de Neuville in St-Valery; she (or maybe he) looked intrigued by my pulling over to take her (his?) picture by the barbed wire. I though this would give you an idea of where I am spending my time these days…

Not much time this Friday

I don’t have much time to write today: I’ve had two interviews a day for the past few days. I’m a bit tired, and hungry this morning… Perhaps I should go out and get breakfast and a coffee. There were concerts on the 21st (two days ago) all over France for "la Journée de la Musique": choirs, marching bands, bossa nova, big band... I thought the little girl with the cymbals was adorable.

I’m going to Amiens today, and will be there until Saturday. I’m planning a visit under the Earth on Saturday night: there is a grotto in Naours, close to Amiens. I’ll dress so that I don’t get cold. It’s the recurrent theme for this trip!

One week update

One week in France. Only two more to go until I go to Belgium, and my agenda is filling up. I managed to schedule interviews almost every day until July 4th. I have five so far, and the transcription process is underway. I doubt I’ll transcribe much while in France, but it’s a start. I met really interesting people so far, took a few pictures, and got a nice tan on my shoulders. Internet access is really sparse here, the cyber-site – where I can access the Net for free – is open two mornings and two afternoons a week, with intermittent closings due to storms damaging the network or due to days of training for the one employee. I drove down to Abbeville this morning and was able to find a few things I needed (among which a power adapter to replace the one that broke when I dropped it yesterday, a hairdryer to replace the one I can’t use because of a bad power conversion, and writable DVDs to replace the writable CDs that my interviews cannot fit on!). I’m loving it here, despite a few logistical irritants: the people a very warm and welcoming, the food is excellent, the landscape is colorful and quite pretty, and the air is fresh and crisp. I went to the public market here in St-Valery Sunday morning, spent Sunday afternoon at the Herbarium, a few blocks from my place, and learned about a vegetable dye called “la waide”, which is how indigo is called in Picard. It was really hot and sunny; I barely avoided getting sun-burned on my shoulders. Then, I went to the beach in Cayeux-sur-Mer, where the Defente (the people renting me the room) have a cabin by the shore. I met some of their friends, all very friendly, drank a drop of white rum and ate the best blood sausage ever. Things are going well so far. I’m eating well, staying on budget. I have a space heater now; I won’t be cold in the room again.

My contact information in France

Just in case some of you need to reach me, here is my cell phone number in France:

06.62.94.83.07

You need to dial the international code and then the country code (011.33), and then the number, so:
011.33.06.62.94.83.07
I'm not sure if you need the first zero of the cell number. If that doesn't work, try:
011.33.6.62.94.83.07

Just remember the time difference (7h for Central, 6h for Eastern), so make sure you call no later than 5:30pm Easter (11:30pm in France).

First few days in France

I got to Paris at 11:30am on the 13th, and drove up to Picardy straight from the airport. After getting chatting with the owners of the B&B a bit and getting settled in my room, I walked down my street to the local bakery to buy a baguette and the across the street to the “charcuterie” for pâté, ham and cheese. Although the weather was very warm and sunny when I got here yesterday afternoon, by dinner time, the rain had started and the temperature had dropped quite a bit. I had no trouble getting to sleep around 9pm, but found myself wide awake by 2am – probably the effect of jetlag – and decided to get some work done and watch some TV. I was eventually able to sleep again around 4am. Yesterday was my first full day in Picardy, and I am happy about the way it turned out. Woke up at 8am, and got some more groceries, and the breakfast at home (trying to save $$!). Later drove to Abbeville (the closest medium-sized “city”) for a meeting with the “Picardisants”, an association of speakers and writers of the local variety of Picard. I was pleased to finally put a face to names of people I had been told I should meet. I was given permission to record the readings (Julie, more data for you!), and I was then invited for coffee at the Vasseur’s after the meeting. Met really interesting people and started making appointments, starting tomorrow night. All is fine so far. One thing though: I wish the weather was nicer… I’m freezing in my room and can’t seem to get the heat to work, except in the bathroom.