Lyon
During my last week in Annemasse I must have been a Portrait of A Disheveling Individual. I shocked every class, not just the first class of the day as usual, by fixing my hair as i entered removing my hat; when my clip broke, when my clip dissapeared, and finally suffered the consequences of not-brushing-hair interacting with the politics of no hejabs in schools-- meaning my instinct to put on my hood to hide my mass of uncombed hair was paused in mid hood-ing, forcing me to embrace my 'look' as i turned towards the board to present exactly what i had worked so akwardly to conceal just moments before. Sigh. Next term im wroking from plays and stories and the book the government of canada finally sent me that includes a fantastic introduction to contemporary Inuit culture for kids. i ll even brush my hair.
I finally made it to Lyon on the 11th of December to catch the last night of the Festival of Lights. It also meant I had to skip H's birthday party (i had prepared by cooking a homemade lunch on friday- h's reall birthday). I refuse to suffocate myself. is that selfish? We're all selfish. its called taking care of yourself. its allowed. So i went to Lyon at 4 pm after a rapid tea with the old english assistant and having finally finished my reference letter-writer packeges. I did this because i could not stand the idea of staying in, kind of like the journey to Geneva. The journey was all that much sweeter knowing that all too easily i may have trapped myself in Annemasse because of poor time planning. I went not knowing if i would only be there for 2.5 hours (the time between when my trian arrived and when the last train would leave... or if I would finally make contact with family friends and maybe stay the night. I stayed the night, releived myself of friends of famiily in Lyon-seeing guilt, and slept and ate well. In between the eating and sleeping was a walk through the historical World Heritage Site that is the city of Lyon, and a walking lesson in the history of the city, which I think i may become obsessed with. Lets begin with setpping out of the metro station into the litstreetst of down town. It was cold but the lights erase my memory of the cold. Lyon was enchanting. The streets were filled with people, in clubs on the street in restaurants. Each street in the core gave off onto another lit cobblestone street, and opened up into squares with fountains, or even a ferris wheel. Every inch of the city wafts of human history-which is partially thanks to my guides M and S. The streets gave out into darkened streets that lined the canal and its blue lighting set against the black water and grey/blue night. There was a display of floating lanters on one part of the river. I think it was the Rhone. The same Rhone that flows from Geneva down down down....to lyon past the Crox rousse, where the silk weavers used to live and weave. The only location where slikworms were allowed to be keept and silk spun was in the CR hilltop neighbourhood- now the houses have 9 foot ceilings that tell of thier looms that stretched so high in the weaving days. The city itself reflects this old industry, with over 3oo secret passages that were used to transport the slilk so that they w ould nto be damaged by rain, or snow or humidity. These same intricate passages were so well known by locals but so confusing to strangers that the French Resistance (headquartered in Lyon) used the passages to successfully out hide and escape the occupying forces when the city was captured by the Nazi's. The old city has three churches that once were the local places of worship untill each grew so large that they knit into one anohter, and finally thier commuinities spilled onto the newwer part of the city that is now mapped as Lyon. The Rhone, like the Seine is huge, wide and beautiful. The bridges are wide and new, having been blasted as the occupying forces lef the city, knowing thier defeat was iminent. The old part of Lyon which reaches back into the middle ages, is (if i remember correctly) situated on a "pres-q'ile" at the end of which the Rhone and the Saone meet -- they are said to be two converging ribbons of green and brown-- where they go and what they become once they merge, im not sure...(side note: Labrador is marked on one of my classroom maps as a Presq'ile, too). Other windeing cobble stone streets spill out onto paved road areas, where the smell of spiced wine still follows us, and there before us is a square that is only somewhat lit. During the french revolution the upper class/nobility wasw beheaded here. During the Occupation executions were also heald on the square. Across this square is a building witha black-bulbous roof- like something from teh 1800s (Im guessing) --it is similar to the appartment buidings near the Passy metro station in paris-- it was the hotel where St. Ex. wrote Le Petit Prince. beyond the quiet pine tree sellilng station and the peruvian musicians surrounded by a frosty breathed crowd and amplifiers, was, at the other end of the somwhat lit square, a fully lit chanukiah. It is the fisrt sign of channukah I have seen. I am drawn towards the crowd, but wary, and in the end skirt the edges, trying to catch a breath of channukah, warmed to see this festival of lights I was missing. The 8th, the day the fefstival started here, was also this year the first day of Channukah. There is no one here to share that with. it is the first chanukkah in years that Ihave not celebrated with you. like Rosh HaShannah and Yom Kippur, these markers that were so tentatively set as markers on my adult life are only hesitant finger-print-smudges on my callendar this year. Another little piece of myself floating in the mould.
I drank spiced wine and ate chageignes, and finally fell asleep. I felt like I was comming down with a cold. Sunday I returned to annemasse afeter a day-time trot through the old city and a brief photo session at the two roman anphi-thiatres. Lyon was an ancient Roman city. The amphi-theatres are like the ones in rome, and their acoustic engineering still works. my thoughts spill out onto the stage that feels like home. like a piece of myhistory. another piece in the mould. In evetiably our walk back down and away from these ancient stones what they represent brings me to another out-loud-pondering of my future with S, who insisted so kindly on accompanying me out around the city. I was introduced to a follow you passion arguement. what is my passion? argh. Im boared of the conversation. I am going to bore myself into a choice, just for relief from banging this proverbial skull against the proverbial wall, again, and again, and again. it is like a dull drone.
I rush back on the train to try and make it for dinner with the family I live behind. They are having a Raclette (potatoes and melted cheese, a specialty of the region hahahah.). The train is late because they are on strike, but searchign for a 'composte'' poste to bite my ticket and legitimize my birthday-escape-doing-what-I-want-on-my-time-with-my-money-yeah!- ticket, i bumped into A with a new fasion mullet haircut, heading back to annemass too, and also waiting for the delayed 3pm train. I bumped into a friend on a train platform in another city on my way home to annemasse. im still stunned. No wild dance parties out here just yet, but bumping into friends randomly will be added to my list of things to accomplish and will then satisfyingly be crossed out as a marker of home....
I finally made it to Lyon on the 11th of December to catch the last night of the Festival of Lights. It also meant I had to skip H's birthday party (i had prepared by cooking a homemade lunch on friday- h's reall birthday). I refuse to suffocate myself. is that selfish? We're all selfish. its called taking care of yourself. its allowed. So i went to Lyon at 4 pm after a rapid tea with the old english assistant and having finally finished my reference letter-writer packeges. I did this because i could not stand the idea of staying in, kind of like the journey to Geneva. The journey was all that much sweeter knowing that all too easily i may have trapped myself in Annemasse because of poor time planning. I went not knowing if i would only be there for 2.5 hours (the time between when my trian arrived and when the last train would leave... or if I would finally make contact with family friends and maybe stay the night. I stayed the night, releived myself of friends of famiily in Lyon-seeing guilt, and slept and ate well. In between the eating and sleeping was a walk through the historical World Heritage Site that is the city of Lyon, and a walking lesson in the history of the city, which I think i may become obsessed with. Lets begin with setpping out of the metro station into the litstreetst of down town. It was cold but the lights erase my memory of the cold. Lyon was enchanting. The streets were filled with people, in clubs on the street in restaurants. Each street in the core gave off onto another lit cobblestone street, and opened up into squares with fountains, or even a ferris wheel. Every inch of the city wafts of human history-which is partially thanks to my guides M and S. The streets gave out into darkened streets that lined the canal and its blue lighting set against the black water and grey/blue night. There was a display of floating lanters on one part of the river. I think it was the Rhone. The same Rhone that flows from Geneva down down down....to lyon past the Crox rousse, where the silk weavers used to live and weave. The only location where slikworms were allowed to be keept and silk spun was in the CR hilltop neighbourhood- now the houses have 9 foot ceilings that tell of thier looms that stretched so high in the weaving days. The city itself reflects this old industry, with over 3oo secret passages that were used to transport the slilk so that they w ould nto be damaged by rain, or snow or humidity. These same intricate passages were so well known by locals but so confusing to strangers that the French Resistance (headquartered in Lyon) used the passages to successfully out hide and escape the occupying forces when the city was captured by the Nazi's. The old city has three churches that once were the local places of worship untill each grew so large that they knit into one anohter, and finally thier commuinities spilled onto the newwer part of the city that is now mapped as Lyon. The Rhone, like the Seine is huge, wide and beautiful. The bridges are wide and new, having been blasted as the occupying forces lef the city, knowing thier defeat was iminent. The old part of Lyon which reaches back into the middle ages, is (if i remember correctly) situated on a "pres-q'ile" at the end of which the Rhone and the Saone meet -- they are said to be two converging ribbons of green and brown-- where they go and what they become once they merge, im not sure...(side note: Labrador is marked on one of my classroom maps as a Presq'ile, too). Other windeing cobble stone streets spill out onto paved road areas, where the smell of spiced wine still follows us, and there before us is a square that is only somewhat lit. During the french revolution the upper class/nobility wasw beheaded here. During the Occupation executions were also heald on the square. Across this square is a building witha black-bulbous roof- like something from teh 1800s (Im guessing) --it is similar to the appartment buidings near the Passy metro station in paris-- it was the hotel where St. Ex. wrote Le Petit Prince. beyond the quiet pine tree sellilng station and the peruvian musicians surrounded by a frosty breathed crowd and amplifiers, was, at the other end of the somwhat lit square, a fully lit chanukiah. It is the fisrt sign of channukah I have seen. I am drawn towards the crowd, but wary, and in the end skirt the edges, trying to catch a breath of channukah, warmed to see this festival of lights I was missing. The 8th, the day the fefstival started here, was also this year the first day of Channukah. There is no one here to share that with. it is the first chanukkah in years that Ihave not celebrated with you. like Rosh HaShannah and Yom Kippur, these markers that were so tentatively set as markers on my adult life are only hesitant finger-print-smudges on my callendar this year. Another little piece of myself floating in the mould.
I drank spiced wine and ate chageignes, and finally fell asleep. I felt like I was comming down with a cold. Sunday I returned to annemasse afeter a day-time trot through the old city and a brief photo session at the two roman anphi-thiatres. Lyon was an ancient Roman city. The amphi-theatres are like the ones in rome, and their acoustic engineering still works. my thoughts spill out onto the stage that feels like home. like a piece of myhistory. another piece in the mould. In evetiably our walk back down and away from these ancient stones what they represent brings me to another out-loud-pondering of my future with S, who insisted so kindly on accompanying me out around the city. I was introduced to a follow you passion arguement. what is my passion? argh. Im boared of the conversation. I am going to bore myself into a choice, just for relief from banging this proverbial skull against the proverbial wall, again, and again, and again. it is like a dull drone.
I rush back on the train to try and make it for dinner with the family I live behind. They are having a Raclette (potatoes and melted cheese, a specialty of the region hahahah.). The train is late because they are on strike, but searchign for a 'composte'' poste to bite my ticket and legitimize my birthday-escape-doing-what-I-want-on-my-time-with-my-money-yeah!- ticket, i bumped into A with a new fasion mullet haircut, heading back to annemass too, and also waiting for the delayed 3pm train. I bumped into a friend on a train platform in another city on my way home to annemasse. im still stunned. No wild dance parties out here just yet, but bumping into friends randomly will be added to my list of things to accomplish and will then satisfyingly be crossed out as a marker of home....
posted by blueolive at 11:01 a.m.
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