How We Welcome Summer Here

I can't believe that we passed Spring in a jiffy! I had wanted the Student to take the 1st signs of Spring in the valley, where the trees were so covered with little pink flowers, and the walkway lined with wild flowers of so many different vibrant colours...but it seems that we have to do that next Spring after we got used to the seasonal changes.

Now, the neighbourhood is filled with roses, lavender and cherries for us to pick, our neighbour just picked 2kg worth of cherries 2 weeks ago, I tried them and they are pretty sweet for something in the wild...

So this is a list of what we did and will do in summer:

1) On a fine sunny Sunday afternoon, open the windows and enjoy the breeze with a pot of fine tea and cake.

2) Before time stands still in August, settle all outstanding administrative matters, like exchanging your driver's license for this piece of paper (the locals also hold the same paper, since eons ago). This process is the most straight forward of all the French administration, whereby everything can be settled within an hour or so at the Prefecture (after getting your CDS of course). Documents required: True copy of translated driver's licence, original licence, 2 photos (same size as for CDS), true copy of CDS, and fill in forms given by the Prefecture on the day of exchange. Exchange is immediate, since it doesn't take much effort to laminate this piece of junk...which we cannot live without...

3) Go for a concert and summer sale in Paris. In the first week of summer, there were a number of free concerts to go to...but unfortunately, the weather was not very agreeable.

4) Go for a hair cut. I had mine done at a local hairdresser's, and had a great time speaking in French to her! She was really nice and patient to have understood my half-past-six French. Now that we are spending in Euros, I'm a little more thrifty when it comes to a haircut...so we save some Euros by cutting the Student's hair at home instead. Easy peasy...a full set of clippers just cost 10 Euros from Carrefour. But the Student's head is getting bigger, so I'm taking a little more time to get it in shape. I'm taking an average of 2 hrs to cut a  "hawk" style.

5) And of course....go for a vacation since there is NOBODY working...:)

Footprints on Alluvial Plains

The same image of Mont Saint Michel on the front cover of my guide book in France, this is like a floating village with an Abbaye at the tip.

This post is rather belated since we went for a short vacation (after a long vacation) during the Ascension long weekend. After Tour La France, we thought we could have another small roadtrip to St. Malo, with Mont Saint Michel as a highlight. This is about 4 hours drive from GIF, and so, we stayed 1 night at Angers, which is on the way and 2 nights at St. Malo.

Our 1st stop was at the Cathedrale of Chartres. This is another UNESCO monument of Gothic architecture.  My bad for going to the Cathedrale on Ascension Day, bad bad choice...this is a religious holiday, and the Cathedrale is practically closed for anything touristy. We could neither enter the crypt or get the audios, the labyrinth was also blocked by chairs placed for people attending the service. Maybe, we are just not fated to walk the labyrinth.

Nonetheless, this highly religious monument has already invoked lots of curious cells in me to find out about the rose windows, what the labyrinth contain and what lies underneath this majestic and sacred structure. And so we made another bad choice to buy a guide book on the Cathedrale, which we could not understand nuts! The English is so badly translated from French, that we might be better off getting a French version instead.

We ended the 1st day at Angers, and spent half a day in Chateau d'Angers. This is a very lasting structure of wood, which was reinforced by stones in the later years. The Apocalypse Tapestries are also housed in the building.

The cones are removed for the use of canons

This set of tapestries measures 100m long and 4.5m high, illustrates the biblical text between the good and evil, with Saint John as the "narrator".

Princess Daisy: Here comes Mario again!

It was a stressful day arriving at St. Malo, since our schedule has to be governed by the tides. Seriously, the most important thing to carry around here is not the map, but the tide table. Everyone seems to be here, and the nearest parking spaces nearest the old town were all snapped up by 2pm. After 1 hr of frantic search before the tide comes up, we settled with a space at the passenger terminal, which is a little distance away.

I had initially planned to visit Grand Be and Fort National on the same day, while the tide is still low. However, I realised that Grand Be is situated at a spot where the tide rises faster. So if we really want to go, we can only do that +/- 1.5 hrs of the LOWEST tide. On the other hand, Fort National is much more flexible with a wider window to walk over the beach.

Fort National, accessible by foot during low tide only. Guided tour in French only, with an English leaflet.

This fort held an important role in defending the city during the war. Besides Fort Nationale, there are also a few more offshore forts serving the same purpose.

St. Malo city, view from Fort National.

Something we tell each other regularly....

Grand Be with it's access submerged.

This wall is not friendly with short people. If not, the walk by the ramparts would be perfect!

We got some Bordier butter from here, I'll never spread my bread with any other butter again...

These butter are all handmade in Bretagne, and is a speciality of the region. Various flavours too...we tried doux (unsalted) and sel fumé (salted, smoked). The latter was brilliant for making mash potatoes, and I heard that it is great for grilled fish too. 

We happened to catch some action from the art forum too...great music and fun!

I think the Student was more startled then they are when he took this picture.

We hopped over to the neighbouring town, Dinard on our 2nd evening in St Malo. The route from St Malo to Dinard is subjected to frequent jams, and is not for one with a tight schedule. The jams are almost certain, as the boats and the cars share the same path. When the boats need to exit into the sea, the road will be raised to let the boats pass. Everytime this happens, it will take at least 15 mins...so, just pull up the handbrake, enjoy the breeze, check FB and blog. Here, we stopped by the barrage and loaded some information on their electricity source.

In Dinard, take a walk along the coast...there are luxurious mansions lining the coast, most belonging to rich Englishmen who were once shipowners here.

A statue of Alfred Hitchcock in Dinard.

This is the restaurant that I missed having dinner at....we reached the restaurant too late without any reservations. In St. Malo, forget all other things, except seafood and galette.

Mont Saint Michel is about an hour drive away from St Malo. A UNESCO site, and a major focus of pilgrimage (we are really making sure our roadtrip is in-line with the religious holiday). In the 10th century, the Benedictines settled in the abbey on the mont, with a village below. This image is what the people in the middle ages regards as paradise, a representation of the heavenly Jerusalem on earth.

The mont is connected to the mainland via a tarmac causeway now, historically via a tidal causeway. On google maps, the mont looks like a floating village on the alluvial plains. The carpark used to be just below the mont, but it was very venerable to the tides. They have since constructed another carpark at the mainland, and provide shuttle buses across the causeway to access the mont.

Legend has it that the archangel Saint Michel, who defeated a dragon (symbol of the devil) instructed Saint Aubert, the bishop of Avranches to construct a church on Mont Tombe, which is Mont Saint Michel of today.

A statue of the archangel slaying a dragon in the church.

It was low tide in the morning, and saw streams of "ant like" people walking on the alluvial plains. We were just not equipped and dressed to join the crowd...slippers, bermudas and raincoat needed. There is quicksand in the area, so it is advisable to follow the crowd and not wander on your own.

Those specks are people, not dirt on the lens. These guys actually walked all the way to the coast at the end side, past that rock you see. To do that, I suppose we have to spend the entire day here.

The Abbaye on the tip of the mont.

The grass land here is apparently very good for sheep grazing. So try the lamb on the menu here.

These monks and nuns live, pray and work here in the Abbaye, prayer starting soon, so this is our last shot here.

The Cloister of the abbaye. Admire the architecture and art sculpture on the pillars here, I notice that there is not a single repetition in the design.

Capturing a shot that we can't get on our own.

The Weekend that We Went Back In Time

Had a very eventful weekend last week, with a hike at Saint-Remy with our classmates from ALFAP on Saturday, and a visit to Musee d'Orsay on free Sunday. We are never the arty-farty type, so France has really taught us well in this aspect. I'm not a connoisseur of paintings, but I left Musee d'Orsay with only images of impressionists and post-impressionists paintings. 

The 2 artists etched in my mind are Edgar Degas and Vincent van Gogh, the former with a negative impression, and the later with curiosity. There was a temporary exhibition on the theme of "nudity" by Degas, all was good until the explicit paintings of prostitutes. If my understanding of "impressionism" is right, then I would think that Degas must have visited lots of brothels for his project.  

Van Gogh's works are so distinctive, that I think the non-arty me could probably sniff out his works in future.  The child-like style of his is so unmistakable that I can't help wonder what was going on in his head when he painted those crooked images. Were these the images he saw during the years when he suffered from his mental illness? I'm curious...

Oh well...we ended the day very well at Coutume cafe, based on David Lebovit's  recommendation. Haven't had such a good cup of latte ever since I arrived in France! But I guess this place is really just good for coffee, as their meals are rather sub-standard. Great place to get all kinds of coffee gadgets here, they even have a coffee mill so that you can grind your own coffee beans....cool!

It was pure coincidence that our paths just crossed with these "18th century" beings. I would probably have freaked out if I'm alone in the forest, with these ladies standing in the middle of the woods like that. Turns out that an association is having a party at the château, commemorating French history. They saw us walking past, and wanted to invite us to join in the party...can't believe that something like this can really happen out of the blue, this is my neighbourhood and I'm LOVING IT!!!

The Alien in France - Conjoint of a Scientist Visa

Finally, I've received that piece of paper that weighs a tonne after 5 months of patience. A tonne of French labour and administration to make my long stay possible in France. Seriously, I've always thought that my treatment would be the same as the Student, but apparently not. In my case, I'm the conjoint (or spouse) of a Scientist visa. Below is what just happened to both of us to get that golden paper.

Both the Student and the Wife:

Got a 3 months visitors' visa from the French Embassy in Singapore. Free for the Student, but I have to pay about SGD 150 ( EURO 99). This has to be done in our home country, and just the beginning of the visa saga.

After we arrived in France, we have to make an appointment with our prefecture to submit our documents to apply for the Carte de Sejour (CDS in short) to enable us to stay for 1 year. The appointment was made by the school, Supelec. Since we are not in centre Paris, there is not too much crowd and hiccups here. After all the documents are in, we received the recepisse (read 25 Feb 12 entry), a temporary paper, valid for 3 months until we get our CDS. I waited for about 4 months, and so the recepisse expires, making me an illegal alien for a while. But ah...this is very normal, I'll just have to make sure that I stay in France and not wander around the EU region.

Between the recepisse and the CDS, the visa saga starts to brew...

The Student: 

Received 2 parallel letters to go for a medical appointment at OFII at Creteil (1.5 mths after the recepisse), and that he can collect his CDS, with EURO 368 timbres* from the prefecture at Palaisseau any date in the morning. Bravo! This is so efficient...1.5 mths...wee!!! But this means that the medical certificate is not crucial to him getting the 1st CDS, probably for subsequent renewal only.

The medical appointment was smooth and easy, he just answered some questions on vaccinations and illnesses by the doctor. Took his eyesight test, weight and height. Proceed for chest X-ray, final review by doctor, and all done within 2 hours.

The Wife:

Received an SMS to meet at OFII, and prepare EURO 368 worth of timbres* (4 mths after the recepisse). The process for me is so very different...but why? I'm the Student's wife, shouldn't the treatment be the same?

[*Timbres = stamps purchased from either the treasury or the prefecture. I got mine from Tressorerie de Palaiseau. These are NOT postage stamps.]

I went for the appointment at 1pm as stated, and did not leave until 5pm. I was 1st asked to wait in a waiting room with many others. After 45 mins of waiting, a stylish dude ushered us to a TV room to watch a 15 mins film of Life in France. Then, he came in and blabber in French a lot of words that I cannot catch. Some contract....blah blah...EURO 368....blah blah...whether we need to attend French lessons...blah again...and he left with some people he called out. After 5 mins, a very friendly lady came to get me into her room, and I finally have a clear picture of what was expected of me. Not that she can speak English, but as least there is Google translator to bridge my minimal French, and her minimal English.

1) I am supposed to go for "Formation Civique", it is a 1 day event at Evry to talk about integration into the French culture. She arranged for a day whereby the event is held in English...sweet!

2) She gave me a date to go to a place (slightly further than Palaisseau) to evaluate my level of French, and to allocate me into the right class near to where I stay thereafter. At the same time, I did a mini test in front of her. The French class is free!!!

3) She asked me to sign a contract, which I still do not know the content. But what are my odds? If I don't sign, I have no CDS. Therefore, it is no longer important whether I understand the content.

After this "interview", she ushered me to the 1st doctor. Here, I took my height, weight and eyesight test (short and long sight). Then I take my slips and go downstairs, the multi-function security guard took my slips  and asked me to wait aside for a chest X-ray.

Before this, I already have a preview of the X-ray room during the Student's medical examination. And so, I came prepared with a front clip bra and buttoned shirt. Attention ladies! There are no robes for you to change into...With what I was wearing, I can just flash my body in front of the radio panel, without the nurse (male or female) seeing anything.

There are 2 doors in each changing room, 1 door leads you to the radiography room, and the other enables you to enter the changing room from the common corridor.

Go into the changing room, lock the door you entered by. When the spotlight shines onto your door leading to the radio room: Put your hands on your waist, walk out half naked, look confident, chin up, chest up and shashay your way to the radio panel. Press your chest against the panel, deep breathe in. When you are done, turn around, strike a pose and strut your thing back to the changing room. Voila! That's it...

Then I waited for a while to collect my print, and go up to wait for another doctor to evaluate the print and answer questions on the vaccinations (specifically BCG, Hepatities and Tetanus) that I've done. No proof required, just a Q&A. 

After all's well, I waited again for the 1st friendly lady to get me back into her room, whereby I give her my timbres and received my laminated piece of Card! On general, this is a pleasant experience, the staff in OFII are very professional and nice too. I guess the only fault of this is the 4 months' wait...

3200 km of Michelin Tire Prints

With this post, I can finally draw the curtains on Tour La France...Thanks to our new travel mate Serena, all our destinations were found without much difficulties. In case you don't know her, Serena works for Garmin, and pronounces French street names with an American accent. On hind sight, I think we should have opted for Kate instead, who can't be bothered with reading street names. Reason being, street signs in France are inconsistent in names and numbers, they are either placed inconspicuously, or does not even exist in sight. Most of the time, I struggle to find the name of the street AFTER we made the turn. So a precise GPS to show the distance to turn is very important, the roads in France can be very close to each other too.

Before we embarked on the road-trip, the Cols were the roads that scared us the most. The thought of those small winding roads, with the cliff on the right, and a truck on the left, just sent us hallucinating with "Final Destination" scenes. Lucky or not, our planned route through the Cols were closed, and in view of bad weather, we ended up with a half scenic route from Nice to Digne. 150km of hair-pin curves was scenic enough. Cols are in fact mountain passes, the highest being Col de la Bonette. Those at higher altitudes are closed in the winter-spring season, except for a few such as Col de Vars which might be open in Spring. These routes are bikers' heaven! Plenty of youtube videos of the Cols if you are interested. Useful information pertaining to the Cols:

http://www.bison-fute.equipement.gouv.fr/acces-aux-cols/listecols.do?nom=&codeDpt=0&massif=ALPES&typeCol=X

http://www.inforoute05.fr/wir3/cameras.html

http://www.infotrafic.com/route.php?region=FRANC&link=cols.php?Ouverts&761765025

After the trip, we realised that we had probably taken the most dangerous routes while we were in Dordogne, right from the start of our trip. There were endless small hairpins, which was even more difficult to manoeuvre than larger ones seen at the Cols. Worse still, these small hairpins were accompanied by 13% slopes, some unpaved (mixture of rocks and grass). I would have thought that these routes are meant for ATVs only. Didn't take any videos as I was too busy looking out for on-coming cars for the driver, these hairpins turn 300 degrees, without any mirrors at the curve. Just when we thought the 1 car-width roads are too small for a 2 way traffic, the roads can still get smaller. 1 bad judgement at the edge can send us down the cliff!


Our favourite leg: Nice to Annecy through Digne and Grenoble
The roads here are acceptable enough for me to take videos. Never knew how a snow shower is like (at 5:30 in the video), but now we do. This route has surprises at every turn, from towering mountains, gorges, lakes to a troglodyte village, Entrevaux. This video is not for one with motion sickness.

Red Red Wine - Bourgogne (better known as Burgundy)

Needless to say, this leg is a gastronomy stop.

I've read about French wine and their wine regions, but that pea brain of mine just could not register that Bourgogne's speciality is Pinot and Chardonnay. Since I'm not a fan of Pinot, this fact is now etched in my cerebral hemispheres.

We set base in Beaune, where we could savour both the bourgogne cuisine and their distinct architecture.

Hotel Dieu - Hospices de Beaune

This used to be a hospital for the public, and was built by Nicolas Rolin (Chancellor of the Duke of Burgundy) and his wife. The multi-coloured roof is very typical of Burgundian architecture.

The Hospice married both Burgundian and Flemish architecture beautifully.

The sick and poor used to be housed in this room, males on 1 side and females on the other. There was a purpose for the decorations on the ceiling to bring comfort for the sick, which I think that it was really thoughtful of the founders then.  The Chapel at the end of the room was for nuns to pray for the sick.

To raise money for free/subsidised medication for the poor, the Hospices also provided a private room for patients who can afford to pay.

The kitchen. Interesting to know that the patients each have a carafe of red wine by their bed. Water on the other hand, was considered to be more harmful due to possibilities of water pollution. The patients' meals were also planned according to the individual's constitution. Poultry are reserved for patients with weaker digestion, while red meat such as beef are for patients with better constitution.

The dispensary. Herbs such as dill, menthe and thyme etc were used as medicine for various ailments.

The stained glass here have a very different genre as those seen in most churches. The colour theme is just shades of grey and yellow. 

1.5 Days of Wine Tasting

For this 1.5 days, we can hardly remember doing anything except an information overload on wine making, and an endless list of Pinot, Chardonnay and Crémant.

Beaune is a town that is rather developed on the surface, little would I expect that there are actually cellars  running everywhere underground! 

Our 1st wine tasting stop was at Marché aux Vin. I came to know of this place through travel reviews, and was even more intrigue by it during our visit to the Hospices. This company bought over the vineyards that were once owned by the Hospices, and is still holding on to some really aged bottles in their cellar now. Entrance is 10 Euro/pax, and you get to keep the taste vin (a shallow metal dish) that they give out for tasting.

After we woke up from 1.5 days of intoxication, we kinda regretted spending that 20 euros on Marché aux Vin. If we will do this again, we'll probably dedicate the time for an oenology session (1 to 1.5 Hrs) instead.

Marché aux Vin

Old bottles from the Hospices

We didn't suspect anything running underground with this amount of buildings in the surroundings.

We went direct to a wine maker, Chateau de Meursault to check it out. 15 Euros/pax, wine glass to keep. You can also make reservations for lunch and other tours with the Chateau. Details: www.chateau-meursault.com

Wine pairing information with cheese, and other food.

It is very old world to put their emphasis on terroir, which I personally agree very much with. Here, the maker believes that the plants around the vines are also very important to harmonize with the grapes. As we are not in the season, we couldn't really see what's growing in this garden.

The Chateau has its history since the 11th century, and this cave has been intact since the 13th century.

Bottles left for ageing since years ago. I've been restraining to clean off that thick layer of dust on the bottles.... 

This cave is humongous! It is a maze of red wine bottles in here.

This room is 800 sq m,with more than 800 barrels of alcohol. To be matured 15 months for red wine, and 1 year for white. They make Marc here as well, which is similar to Cognac. These are aged for 12 years in the barrels to reduce the alcohol level from >70% to 40%. 

Look at that layer of dust since 2001!!!!! This is what ageing is all about...

The distinct coloured roof of Burgundy, in the town of Meursault.

Our last tasting was at Veuve Ambal, a maker of sparkling wine (Crémant). This is one of those times when we felt really fortunate to be visiting in the non-peak season. Through the tourism brochure, it stated that the guided tour starts at 2pm. We went a little earlier after lunch, and was surprised that we could start whenever we want, as it is off-peak, and they are not expecting a big crowd. The staff who attended to us is very knowledgeable, he studied wine for 2 years in school, and can be a qualified sommelier. We chatted for the entire afternoon, and clarified everything about wine. What we wanted to know, and what we do not know that we do not know...it was an amazing afternoon for us!

I've always wondered why Pinot fetches a premium over other grapes. It seems that the main reason lies in the difficulty of harvesting the vines. It is a more delicate species than the rest, needs to be hand-picked and requires more attention during loading. In Burgundy, the best plots of vines are usually found in the mid-slope  facing East and SE (Grand Crus). But of course, grapes from the same Grand Crus could still taste different between different makers, so the best is to taste and find one maker to your preference.

We've thought of growing vines as a retirement hobby, but it seems more difficult than we thought. First, we need a sizeable plot at a good location with good terroir. Then, we need to go through the entire farming to harvesting process which is not that easy at all. Vines need pruning to concentrate their juices, then it is the picking and sorting of the grapes (which can't be squashed during loading, otherwise oxidization will occur) and the pressing (1st press is the best)...blah blah and blah...so I guess we'll stick to growing vegetables instead.

After this trip, I suppose we will not spend that premium on Moët when we are back in Singapore. What's it with Champagne? It's only a region isn't it, so why should I pay a premium for crémant made in Champagne?  Not that Moët is not good, but there are other makers with pretty good recipes on crémant too.

The mix of grapes that they use in making the various crémant recipes.

Food and accommodation

We stayed in Beaune hotel. Good location, but not very value for money. Very bad sound proofing too, we could hear our neighbours putting the key into the keyhole, turning the key, opening the door to pulling the key out. No joke, it is true!!! Private garage is 5 Euros/day. We checked out other Logis along the same stretch, and found that there are cheaper and better options.

Food specialities:
Appetizers: Escargots, Jambon Persillé (looks like 猪脚冻, but with ham instead).
Mains: Bouguignon beef stew, Coq au Vin (cock stewed in burgundy wine), veau or lapin (rabbits) with Mustard sauce (Dijon, the father of mustard makers is only a stone throw away).
Dessert: Pain d'epices (ginger cake).

Lunch at Meursault is pretty good. I promised that we will not take any more pictures on food, so here is the ambience...This is a hotel-restaurant, very cosy setting and traditional home-cooked burgundian meals... brilliant!