tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-49267414990622850392024-02-08T06:20:51.368+01:00The storytellerI'm French/citizen of the world. I'm a free-lance photographer. And I love to tell stories.
Ⓒmammodouyblogspot2009
ⒸThestoryteller2009Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.comBlogger251125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-84615606913358557442022-06-08T16:54:00.002+02:002022-06-08T17:05:50.824+02:00Snowed in or Living it Up<p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmq_9KtvxGPNwKg_PjJHXlV_5NbAX80RgSJC-jmYW6hNminjaSbcQHkZm7glq1D1XvQLh49VaNVdp72B5jWxqZuhXSELUca84Ewr02SraliN2FV-ZI3sUhF15jEco7lhosCdugEkbM88DXTIDAhjZjW_8_0cha-zeQpMg3_8SeeZdj4BOYJiKVy7ZM/s4032/Titre.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmq_9KtvxGPNwKg_PjJHXlV_5NbAX80RgSJC-jmYW6hNminjaSbcQHkZm7glq1D1XvQLh49VaNVdp72B5jWxqZuhXSELUca84Ewr02SraliN2FV-ZI3sUhF15jEco7lhosCdugEkbM88DXTIDAhjZjW_8_0cha-zeQpMg3_8SeeZdj4BOYJiKVy7ZM/w640-h480/Titre.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><p><br /> </p><p> </p><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Waking up the next morning was a delight. Completely f</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">orgotten was last night uncomfortable feeling of being snowed in. </span></span>We truly were lost in wonder. A largely unusual, dazzling and rather exotic landscape was stretching out before our bewitched eyes. <br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-bSegucGxZw7v684oS-jevmywZT3Y0nDam_8VkvmoQ7maWQ6HoD8LKW2ScAbVYZWqLMNEP28Ky9npewKABbQp1ZTT01iMrqrL2RWuaJCJBGf7mmXQMTGQ4QgRzPiGKWkEbUWzQj4rxFefY1dbMW0HpcfPLX5E3d8DJZqpkqzKwINSBj2RoUBWKVMJ/s4032/1.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-bSegucGxZw7v684oS-jevmywZT3Y0nDam_8VkvmoQ7maWQ6HoD8LKW2ScAbVYZWqLMNEP28Ky9npewKABbQp1ZTT01iMrqrL2RWuaJCJBGf7mmXQMTGQ4QgRzPiGKWkEbUWzQj4rxFefY1dbMW0HpcfPLX5E3d8DJZqpkqzKwINSBj2RoUBWKVMJ/w640-h480/1.jpeg" width="640" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizzo7e3rrGG9xmhcLpcCC-wAtxhmD1GqPU8QgPBxvAwbhiCLlKm5JGuU-QZBywMVLhoTlg2uhuXlum11l7FEXS0bA4G5CuOf9KlgGjTWLOkxYuPw8e2Ck_wRhmRt4EGBl9rnt4eQMSmDuxlZm8v8spti29pv5-9o3A1lgRKV_3XRum8IronalKM5uu/s4032/2.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizzo7e3rrGG9xmhcLpcCC-wAtxhmD1GqPU8QgPBxvAwbhiCLlKm5JGuU-QZBywMVLhoTlg2uhuXlum11l7FEXS0bA4G5CuOf9KlgGjTWLOkxYuPw8e2Ck_wRhmRt4EGBl9rnt4eQMSmDuxlZm8v8spti29pv5-9o3A1lgRKV_3XRum8IronalKM5uu/w640-h480/2.jpeg" width="640" /></a></span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP8H_8VB4C2jqtb2-rIzExFBo011FIAUOCJM8gOSvv9VxGZZt1NSBY8NLFIuHM5r_46LMcrA8EBvDO9U8ohD5CMGfzHvyAuR18Nnt73zMGHN5CkAiDzStzerDuYxEb_6H68uPksm2gnxAgUH8l-DM6KqffFVhWugOr5oefkeDEAwZQ9666W9sLvXqV/s4032/3.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; 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margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOlaeDOo1L3prxOcooweRjxyFEstKOC4yQR9NN3Qn8NCJkrnLI4E0hNdsKPzV2buh1OzL4mMSMnTSIJ6Pl2Q-F-3p8RAX39z_tmUW2fC0g0umbTx0NzpFChtqxUp2BpSC6zAt5cFH7Sxww3RcsrlQbhfmtyzfoGuAXAMmS7UfYd4sX3zLBeuk-ocHp/w480-h640/5.jpeg" width="480" /></a></span></div><p><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKT5l9vBH0G6GJoH5IAilc0H3XPkhgdVXmv3S8D4smG1E5s2lFlyNHnsV4dA8TWTzZjfxxp1n1XjWB4s8tXGuIwDiYmtgvpC-lFynDRTod6SBNeSIlAWbOmf8hVTpRhEwIlmiE9KSM-keSdXcBEi6jDzT0y_oZ7tGk0opGTKpuAH7nXniDPSxIUFDp/s4032/6.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKT5l9vBH0G6GJoH5IAilc0H3XPkhgdVXmv3S8D4smG1E5s2lFlyNHnsV4dA8TWTzZjfxxp1n1XjWB4s8tXGuIwDiYmtgvpC-lFynDRTod6SBNeSIlAWbOmf8hVTpRhEwIlmiE9KSM-keSdXcBEi6jDzT0y_oZ7tGk0opGTKpuAH7nXniDPSxIUFDp/w640-h480/6.jpeg" width="640" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; 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margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhx_F62PjEC6OeHCcqaXXevIq_kOzGLHhQ2xmYFaqAUxDLK66U6U8A6MbjoBp1M83PXp9gyHWJfY0nKs98Grju9OlRnWSFvwvVQVBts1pblgBl7PcfvFnUkEUvLNNOuedzPP18lzrbkWsydyTJeqX7JEf2OJ3zonSX4g4PmwlXMQ7u0gHb2fcpF5aPQ/w640-h480/11.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicqM2FSUK0Pjt1At-k9cOv6YASijDk2nJzlu_RtBimbvPtN8Pq_5H-dFAjIvvMvbdvvghgxU1LpuFOU3KvKrKThJ8B94klcL3mzGI2aIPSJMKOeQ3O4j8EWHkH9PnHhhDfUIwOxKNihSeNjxWgRrN3XPKkSSZJKPyxmrsGbNYGJmbsjUm826eSC594/s4032/12.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicqM2FSUK0Pjt1At-k9cOv6YASijDk2nJzlu_RtBimbvPtN8Pq_5H-dFAjIvvMvbdvvghgxU1LpuFOU3KvKrKThJ8B94klcL3mzGI2aIPSJMKOeQ3O4j8EWHkH9PnHhhDfUIwOxKNihSeNjxWgRrN3XPKkSSZJKPyxmrsGbNYGJmbsjUm826eSC594/w640-h480/12.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">S.P.’s phone rang. It was V., his childhood friend, who had settled down in Brittany a couple of years before. V. is a very experienced snowboarder whose only regret after moving definitely to Brittany is being so far away from the Alps.<br /><br />“We all are very busy”, he said. “But this is something so unusual that I vote for a snowboarding session at Les Tertres. I brought my snowboard over when I moved from Paris." <br /><br />Where then? Well, in the meadow that slopes down along the garden and ends on the edge of the cliff, overlooking the beach. <br /><br />Why not?<br /><br />In brief, we’d have only one snowboard handy but we could convert one of our many wakeboards into a sled… This is called being resourceful. Now the only problem we had was finding the right and very warm clothes to have fun in the deep snow for a few hours! <br /><br />It was sunny and yet much colder than the night before. We have no mountain/snow gear in Brittany for a very good reason. We had to be inventive, adding up layers of sweaters, slipping on waterproof boating pants over our regular pants and for lack of anything better, we put on very old pairs of snowboarding socks (meant to end as polishing stuff for ages). The brilliant finishing touches were rubber boots for some of us… <br /><br />V. arrived without further delay, on foot and carrying his snowboard. He doesn’t live very far away but the narrow road was blocked by snowdrifts. Snowdrifts 800 meters from the beach!<br /><br />He insisted on wearing a mask since he is a very active sea rescuer and does a lot of training in teams even in wintertime. Remember, those were harsh Covid times. <br /> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Our first move was to pack down the powder snow and make a couple of ski runs of sorts. Snowboarding is a very serious undertaking. No ski-lifts though, which is something that our V. remarked upon when tasked with the chore of preparing the grounds. There were several tries. And then we all had a field day that lasted for a few hours!</span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKhVMU68GPTwB7SnEEEjNfKd4CfjFONBFyAqC4qjbiX6c-gCkY40ULQCfDcGKbCRGW68BqxF3sMZXYAF8JpajEx5IWBl8jQYnVo4WYoa3imDFrl2aG4-MyaMdu8iPdmvhcX36AjOl4luj2gWCVoW09BMguSKOBQ6szhvLaMdiWMqZ1A6abucQQAlzN/s4032/13.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKhVMU68GPTwB7SnEEEjNfKd4CfjFONBFyAqC4qjbiX6c-gCkY40ULQCfDcGKbCRGW68BqxF3sMZXYAF8JpajEx5IWBl8jQYnVo4WYoa3imDFrl2aG4-MyaMdu8iPdmvhcX36AjOl4luj2gWCVoW09BMguSKOBQ6szhvLaMdiWMqZ1A6abucQQAlzN/w300-h400/13.jpeg" width="300" /></a></span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTEXvD2XFNLuFr5pZkWPfgBFPZnyOXI_6UnZXQrXfBpfhUTJcduAnzzI7PY9dBewh-CVZozJw9COcc2EqRO0NhPnx4F4pImvjqn8fyM0fRNgvwb3FMpkrZYcNglOQPBRy7a7DiCjIMUM52QXU0mQ21_wwe8JDPD5ke1kr76AR2gri8zj_RsHyh5BjC/s4032/13b.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTEXvD2XFNLuFr5pZkWPfgBFPZnyOXI_6UnZXQrXfBpfhUTJcduAnzzI7PY9dBewh-CVZozJw9COcc2EqRO0NhPnx4F4pImvjqn8fyM0fRNgvwb3FMpkrZYcNglOQPBRy7a7DiCjIMUM52QXU0mQ21_wwe8JDPD5ke1kr76AR2gri8zj_RsHyh5BjC/w400-h300/13b.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='414' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxG_fbfPPEEWTRP3754nISJd10FnpInkVoyRt7N04Xi83T05sP_pxbBdCzu_pFRtQa9qI-hTYnHqi4VfiQbKg' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='407' height='269' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dx4uOnx4J1ujuo1Bq41HkXad9fhryMjPVrplK6DHRcprFrJMtbN2sx5eOZzhMZggL0Xi2evewKnSa0_0Vf8eQ' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='402' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dzLtVviFR2igGf3jfTvzRPvs8KagqMonmub7eKM28lM7eTdkdPVb9Gv0eFJt40dRxSY3vwIxXbQDleTSaNg7A' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='396' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxPRGds7rkyY6n4rcvZeU2Ye1ZAviVyejXPfYBWsYxHyBVFWeCHDIEhrjR77k7xY9eMha54S3AMbNbIz9cifA' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='389' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dz5snXoYyAGZpvFif1sQe_Vo85RhHryzAMyhaQNKLuiy_u5Mc9BlN7Atp-LMjB5CYB9PulN3-TxKOIwW44zew' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">We weren't snowed in for too long. Within three days, roads were cleared, naturally of course. The coastal part of Brittany is not really well-equipped with snowploughs, etc. Which is not hard to understand with one snowstorm every fifty years or more. But with such a drastic climate change though, snowstorms may become more and more common - routine maybe. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">This snowy episode which really took us off guard will be one of our best memories from Les Tertres, especially in Covid times. We were very close to a third national lockdown and we had no idea of what life would be like for months to come. </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Carpe diem!</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">*Good Night and Good Luck* </span></span><br /></div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /> <br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></p><p></p>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-61063957876693965512022-05-27T18:47:00.002+02:002022-05-28T10:54:25.940+02:00Didn't it Snow , Children... Didn't it, Didn't it, Didn't it... Didn't it Snow?<p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAD82hJS_J5bHWkSqpjvt2j3DU0SpgD5wEOBbxa5Rj6AIQIDnA2FSEbbkX-vOKoqPSB4qB9b_NaBidhjvr-d3AMRDjyX5QxPwMyozm_Ll3HB2XqsKcHgrtuCql6NQ0MqNCIK9xReuudkYgpiUk5yAvm4TXtMB5nzrNBD-bO_uJKaU-shrs1c6R7VwM/s4032/IMG_1570.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAD82hJS_J5bHWkSqpjvt2j3DU0SpgD5wEOBbxa5Rj6AIQIDnA2FSEbbkX-vOKoqPSB4qB9b_NaBidhjvr-d3AMRDjyX5QxPwMyozm_Ll3HB2XqsKcHgrtuCql6NQ0MqNCIK9xReuudkYgpiUk5yAvm4TXtMB5nzrNBD-bO_uJKaU-shrs1c6R7VwM/w640-h480/IMG_1570.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><br /> <p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;">“She” sent a message from faraway lands. “I am packing for good. Will I need my snow boots?” He had a good chuckle over it. She had never enjoyed the snowy winters in Boston. Wasn’t she lucky to spend her first European winter in Brittany where it never snows, at least where we are living - by the sea and with the Gulf Stream floating around our coast!<br /><br />So the answer was no. No need to bring her snow boots. Those would wait until the following winter in London… maybe… <br /><br />New Year’s Eve surprised us with a flurry of snowflakes which vanished within the next hour… </span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd9JhRSWk3xMvWlmequnD0cEltOZ6qU34pnHZ99DaZy8JI4Ny718G9K5i02rjyeSmG1ixNayPo8vhhy8umRwNOp-lpvHy4dj1cpkAxIHLgcH_M4wfbWqi9l5IV07SBsS_kqGylZVnWp4M91SRPkAL1t0Zog69VjwUO51u6RHPinINjoSW0aPtE0P6i/s4032/IMG_2218.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd9JhRSWk3xMvWlmequnD0cEltOZ6qU34pnHZ99DaZy8JI4Ny718G9K5i02rjyeSmG1ixNayPo8vhhy8umRwNOp-lpvHy4dj1cpkAxIHLgcH_M4wfbWqi9l5IV07SBsS_kqGylZVnWp4M91SRPkAL1t0Zog69VjwUO51u6RHPinINjoSW0aPtE0P6i/s320/IMG_2218.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><br /><span>Fall and early winter had been exceptionally warm and wet. So wet that torrents of rainwater flowing from the fields had dug deep canyons on the beach below our house, something that was hard to believe and even harder to cross during our daily walks.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkGV8PBe8_yb2Thero9MxFqsg7dzVtAUnWzPix0HJdQ7UjLrsLsO-2AFi_pw8dCiKmIlMHLMGJgazNCN8YcqBpuyRkljCCsc88Z33c1vtjPhrLFPos0thoABrCr0fel1vEAKUphec5qK5ZPt0crPmrDrZgtzSCKlkSyxdtXFdH7cWkMgcQtfyG1mql/s4032/IMG_2853.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkGV8PBe8_yb2Thero9MxFqsg7dzVtAUnWzPix0HJdQ7UjLrsLsO-2AFi_pw8dCiKmIlMHLMGJgazNCN8YcqBpuyRkljCCsc88Z33c1vtjPhrLFPos0thoABrCr0fel1vEAKUphec5qK5ZPt0crPmrDrZgtzSCKlkSyxdtXFdH7cWkMgcQtfyG1mql/w300-h400/IMG_2853.jpeg" width="300" /></a></div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><br /></span><p></p><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span>Then it became sunnier and much colder. "She" was a brave soldier but one could easily see that she was missing the Indian scorching heat.<br /><br />On the 8th of February, our national weather forecast sent out a heavy snow warning for our coastal area… which it kept repeating every hour. Strange! We usually shrug off most of those warnings. Météo France has lost its credibility ever since 1999 when our meteorologists didn’t even realise that France was going to be hit by a serious hurricane. Plus heavy snow on a coastal area, who could believe it?<br /><br />On the 9th, it started snowing in the early morning hours. A few snowflakes here and there… By noon, the skies were darkening and we were heading right into a real snowstorm, the kind of which most Britons had probably never seen in Brittany. On the ground, the dusting had turned into a thin blanket of snow. A few hours later, it was metamorphosing into a rather thick comforter everywhere.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span><br />We kept shrugging it off. By the end of the day, it was bound to stop and melt at least in our area. We live right above the beach for goodness sake and this is Brittany, not New England!<br /><br />Guess what? The snowstorm did not abate. Not at all and a strong northern wind started to blow. The sea could hardly be seen but it was rumbling at the bottom of the cliff.<br /><br />Around 5 pm, we couldn’t resist to brave the snowstorm (even though we were so ill-equipped). The wind was biting and temperatures were falling and heading below freezing point. But out we went. </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzTijN5pBk_Yg7h7XDZVyYx3fR9E0-diUXR_jAQRwAEeA5h4f61qwdSlnhv2aYx5OSVkguldIzPefgEMQUrXRo05Yrmnc0QsQ3GmYwXnVF6kHRa7LvwLk_EN1oL81ZcdlcZXxQffEQjAFF_JpV2xmntrS42pkzA799Ed_lSzGyA4kyKIT9qGoz-4J4/s3592/2.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2694" data-original-width="3592" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzTijN5pBk_Yg7h7XDZVyYx3fR9E0-diUXR_jAQRwAEeA5h4f61qwdSlnhv2aYx5OSVkguldIzPefgEMQUrXRo05Yrmnc0QsQ3GmYwXnVF6kHRa7LvwLk_EN1oL81ZcdlcZXxQffEQjAFF_JpV2xmntrS42pkzA799Ed_lSzGyA4kyKIT9qGoz-4J4/w400-h300/2.jpeg" width="400" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /> </span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span>We wanted to take a short walk around the garden, which was very daring! We start swimming quite early in the season and our natural pond is not heated of course but taking a walk during a snowstorm fueled by a nasty northern wind, this was eccentric and maybe raving madness!</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIgWtbMjZc9bIhoJuF8XJvNSCcDgnj48bXbiO18_wa2vNpkoP2Ja3B8nB8wb64kCAmbFFAjpdxDWIAECLl6oo4Kd-F7O2pnBy_J8DFfBEfKJPzsQJWvJgNPlMy5IOvsIh1RQpcvBPrVAx16x8nBrBPPG7lpLNbnZ19HywQD0f-NSD1Aku0AhU9pAKg/s4032/6.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIgWtbMjZc9bIhoJuF8XJvNSCcDgnj48bXbiO18_wa2vNpkoP2Ja3B8nB8wb64kCAmbFFAjpdxDWIAECLl6oo4Kd-F7O2pnBy_J8DFfBEfKJPzsQJWvJgNPlMy5IOvsIh1RQpcvBPrVAx16x8nBrBPPG7lpLNbnZ19HywQD0f-NSD1Aku0AhU9pAKg/w640-h480/6.jpeg" width="640" /></a></span></span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span>We ended up being very surprised by the thickness of the blanket of snow stepped up by the wind in some areas. The snow was already sticking to the plants which were bending beneath its weight. It was an amazing sight. Beautiful but worrisome. Plants, bushes and trees, they all looked so pitiful... and cold!</span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNgi2FvdP0XdJoCsq-Bfx2LY7sDrAgAzDFGfIsgSncUiF11KiHTg4rBThZEtendT7bWjTaNyUFmdVQQM2DeAdiWNKd6h4kOi1qJktUO-h3ONjzLQSOx_lcA9Iagf-3wdJWZriyeVJs7sa6WGuGSF9vSQdcnMV2YUBN91DPU3PoqKaBHiRh6dF_eKiM/s4032/3.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNgi2FvdP0XdJoCsq-Bfx2LY7sDrAgAzDFGfIsgSncUiF11KiHTg4rBThZEtendT7bWjTaNyUFmdVQQM2DeAdiWNKd6h4kOi1qJktUO-h3ONjzLQSOx_lcA9Iagf-3wdJWZriyeVJs7sa6WGuGSF9vSQdcnMV2YUBN91DPU3PoqKaBHiRh6dF_eKiM/w300-h400/3.jpeg" width="300" /></a></span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsrf3w4TBa9lDmEFs2XyExjg-fxiHizCrtbzZy8sBnz3SGuxRnf8os2jGdMc2SSeyU9hNTCAOu6LQZf5LcUrqdZJrunavRRdxffHOk_LEVK1bQ7llSZ97NjKvv6sG4zCJ4_5jDXyf_efzwZ9fcPunILZM5RFmAWhUYKtCmyu9NLaugNKOIHE4gjhia/s4032/4.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsrf3w4TBa9lDmEFs2XyExjg-fxiHizCrtbzZy8sBnz3SGuxRnf8os2jGdMc2SSeyU9hNTCAOu6LQZf5LcUrqdZJrunavRRdxffHOk_LEVK1bQ7llSZ97NjKvv6sG4zCJ4_5jDXyf_efzwZ9fcPunILZM5RFmAWhUYKtCmyu9NLaugNKOIHE4gjhia/w400-h300/4.jpeg" width="400" /> </a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC5pkKiEs2KOYsaagEL2Lx4LOnAUpXo81Gu-bfh9LCIxbPDADgKhcS1WReAa4LY7f4tJUD-hywLlNBBnZfbjr31hph5MgStoNO9lYavYm3LDv1KiSE0xoEj_1-m3SFHYjCKIfB41Zegk5li7SSXBEuUuj7TvgeP79pIWDvdk6Z5mkCOqU6dAfed1Pm/s4032/5.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjC5pkKiEs2KOYsaagEL2Lx4LOnAUpXo81Gu-bfh9LCIxbPDADgKhcS1WReAa4LY7f4tJUD-hywLlNBBnZfbjr31hph5MgStoNO9lYavYm3LDv1KiSE0xoEj_1-m3SFHYjCKIfB41Zegk5li7SSXBEuUuj7TvgeP79pIWDvdk6Z5mkCOqU6dAfed1Pm/w400-h300/5.jpeg" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: small;">Because we had never done such a crazy thing in such a long time, we started building a snowman. We enjoyed every minute of it of course, feeling so young again… and wondering how many snowmen we had ever built considering the places where we had been spending most winters in our life! </span><br /></span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHhhfb9E4ekNy3nkvRJMnvgUlk3EXokXiiYzkCMaSPl_bvxB0L_CGF1HCnMYRUDhFhFJh0gEGUBB16EGXKvFu3kfPC9zsyqeb0m4yoZNSIC8Pe0aPNaYqoDD9g7hDkTlmsVaUvrxdILn43jk-KWC_YC2vGkH8UR4I9LAcZyl6EOSQZJJCXxts7spm6/s4032/7.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHhhfb9E4ekNy3nkvRJMnvgUlk3EXokXiiYzkCMaSPl_bvxB0L_CGF1HCnMYRUDhFhFJh0gEGUBB16EGXKvFu3kfPC9zsyqeb0m4yoZNSIC8Pe0aPNaYqoDD9g7hDkTlmsVaUvrxdILn43jk-KWC_YC2vGkH8UR4I9LAcZyl6EOSQZJJCXxts7spm6/w480-h640/7.jpeg" width="480" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span>Our snowman was great! Tall and fat. I have to admit it lacked decorations - no carrot-nose, no scarf, no real smile. A victim to a dire lack of time. It was getting dark and honestly, did we, being grown-ups after all, did we really need a fancy snowman? Plus we were convinced that it would collapse pretty soon over the lawn which was already breaking out wherever we had used the blanket of snow to handcraft the three balls… It might even disappear during the night, not running away of course but melting exactly the way its fellow creatures depart every winter. No exception granted to a snowman from Les Tertres…<br /><br />And then we went back in. We took off most of our layers. A nice fire was roaring in the fireplace but no chestnuts roasting there. (Not really Breton!) <br /><br />I remember we settled down on the couch to sip a nice cup of Rooibos. It was completely dark outside and we had no idea nor any desire to open the door nor a window to check if it was still snowing. <br /><br />“Mañana será otro día”, said Popeye, reminiscing about some very cold winters of his youth in Madrid and acknowledging he never had as much fun in his youth as during this weird snowy episode in Brittany, by the sea. <br /> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: small;"><span>And someone was really feeling sorry she had listened to her husband and left her snow boots at her parents’ place where the temperature was currently 35°C at night!</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-size: small;">And this someone got even sorrier when we turned the garden lights on just before going to bed, precisely to check on the thawing process. The joke was on us! Thank you, Météo France! We were snowed in and it was still snowing...</span><br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5sipn5rO0QKnXDk7ZIwa5xZ73f3tUHeTV_Oq2Kcy0n-_rFsXYkQuudRD-88DO7hxTPXXk2VZKH825Y26siYVjewl-41T7jFu5coegIqGrX-5bkpJidPlFBl91zGb9pOqxuYHj3z4Ru_jfANiny8XX3fhXAkqs5dFoqprF0WamjwnJbp7NcR0D-K3X/s4032/8.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5sipn5rO0QKnXDk7ZIwa5xZ73f3tUHeTV_Oq2Kcy0n-_rFsXYkQuudRD-88DO7hxTPXXk2VZKH825Y26siYVjewl-41T7jFu5coegIqGrX-5bkpJidPlFBl91zGb9pOqxuYHj3z4Ru_jfANiny8XX3fhXAkqs5dFoqprF0WamjwnJbp7NcR0D-K3X/w640-h480/8.jpeg" width="640" /></a></span></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /> </span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: medium;">*Good Night, and Good Luck* </span></span><br /></p><br />Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-45478359903900897522022-05-26T15:57:00.002+02:002022-05-26T16:07:28.224+02:00INTERLUDE - Frozen Frame <p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><div style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBsuHxPYJTTg0nndZv15BKiLkYBlwwIGKXZgYj3DYk4WBVPfEvygxpg4Ie40flyeFL8h5BpJfqONtLp5Y_S5IMz-iOElLOVC4RfNYlOA-3k_ipRO-Wns-5xFvmM4Vim1kEzcdxasXG7YDEeqex-WgmAkfZjMJ7ROWOvN2F9PGkxWMKHYJuSoF-YF6K/w640-h427/DSC_3138.jpg" /><br /></div> <p></p><p><br /></p><p style="margin-left: 40px; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Unruffled by our presence, she kept watching for her next meal and then she jumped down and vanished from sight. To this day I am still filled with wonder and very frustrated to live so far away from Kruger Park, South Africa.</span></p><p style="margin-left: 40px; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></p><p style="margin-left: 40px; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></p><p style="margin-left: 40px; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">“If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.”<br />(Robert Capa)<br /> </span></p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><p></p>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-50420056267863079752022-05-24T14:25:00.002+02:002022-05-28T10:56:13.203+02:00Well, to recap... Whatever Part It Is... Trying to Achieve Closure<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYLcti26lqLNSGBdLG3xvBrOuy2RemVApc3cYb7B30ZlkaCEi4S5--iHtVtmYuJL_qH6QrJisVNScewJC_2t3dtsmb0sTTJus4Ve5f3sfCmHYbavSEUk8sQX86MmM7Nl_jHGAv4dnHGQlFNjuu28-G4P9PMK4J2ZXHN62RV2hbwHdXIxVxS0yzp5fs/s720/e767751e-7c46-48a2-863e-faa69492e7cb.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="703" data-original-width="720" height="312" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYLcti26lqLNSGBdLG3xvBrOuy2RemVApc3cYb7B30ZlkaCEi4S5--iHtVtmYuJL_qH6QrJisVNScewJC_2t3dtsmb0sTTJus4Ve5f3sfCmHYbavSEUk8sQX86MmM7Nl_jHGAv4dnHGQlFNjuu28-G4P9PMK4J2ZXHN62RV2hbwHdXIxVxS0yzp5fs/s320/e767751e-7c46-48a2-863e-faa69492e7cb.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span><b>END OF MAY 2022</b></span></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><br /><br /><span><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span>I am “home” in Paris, a living environment that is still rather new for me but not for Popeye. Some days it is hard to reappropriate my space because it is so unfamiliar. But it gets better and better every time I am back from Brittany where I have felt so safe for much too long. Nowadays there isn’t one single cardboard box lying around anymore. Unopened, I mean… My study is looking great with all my books finally on shelves all around me… Thank you, children! And the whole house is very comfy and welcoming… Thank you, all of us!</span></span></span><br /><br /><span><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span>Now that everything has been sorted, I feel freer to go outside. Stepping out in Paris is still very stressing. Most people don’t wear masks and mingle freely in stores and venues. I have this feeling (fear actually) that my life will never be the same again no matter what. I just feel so distressed and that’s the unadorned truth, I actually feel scared, really scared from time to time. Those two years spent mainly in voluntary confinement in a very safe and isolated place have changed me so deeply that I feel almost unfit to resume life in society.</span></span></span><br /><br /><span><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><span>I know I am still in danger because nobody knows what Covid-19 can do to me with my medical history. I am not sure I would really like to go through another bad experience like my friend C. (who caught Covid during chemo a few weeks ago). People around me have been vaccinated and “boosterized” just like me but they get sick nevertheless, some very badly and others with a couple of very light symptoms, all of them different. So all I hear while trying to come back into real life is : “Be very careful!”. I am careful and I really would like to resume a normal life and then I hear it again and again : “Be very, very, very careful!”<br /><br />A few months ago, we decided to move forward a little bit. We took a couple of trips. They were very enjoyable but not as enjoyable as they might have been. I saw so many people looking and acting very comfortable while I was shrinking back from time to time… <br /></span><br /><span>It didn’t help talking with one of my doctors who has been one of the first cases of Covid-19 in France, in April 2020. The experience scared (scarred?) him so much that he still has problems relaxing and having a normal social life.</span></span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">I was looking through pictures from 2020 the other day since I’d really like to resume blogging again, probably my way to achieve closure. It really bothers me that my last post ends with “To be continued…” and dates from the end of March 2021.<br /><br />I was rather hit again by the fact that we did live for so long in complete isolation. I knew this of course but it did not help to look at those three sad people walking on deserted beaches or in the garden… Waiting desperately for the missing one so far away… And very unhappy...<br /></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">There was a very happy wedding in February but our children ended up living apart for ten long months because of lockdowns and tightly closed borders.<br /><br />I found again the “picture of our daughter's picture” I had printed on a transparency and glued on the plate glass that’s between our kitchen and the living room so that our girl would be there closer to us than in a frame! But honestly this really didn’t work much to alleviate the pain of separation, especially for her husband even though her steadfast smile was most of the time very helpful through our personal lockdown tensions.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span></span><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBRQc36_p_Wwwh9ToKopJ1U3Iy85ysSg6cRc4l8jtuczlfz-HBeb_IJ7L04sGu7aIDzqRtbzYJzp1k5q9Ox5blgsG1xxJhiJ48Q257NX0IhYnFQCy5NDYR3ZUI4EO_N50wtJ3y58Pnh23QT7JStN357oRRYVRY7KmmiVYS0YsvROiOz-eY6d_jnj6M/s4032/IMG_1247.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="355" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBRQc36_p_Wwwh9ToKopJ1U3Iy85ysSg6cRc4l8jtuczlfz-HBeb_IJ7L04sGu7aIDzqRtbzYJzp1k5q9Ox5blgsG1xxJhiJ48Q257NX0IhYnFQCy5NDYR3ZUI4EO_N50wtJ3y58Pnh23QT7JStN357oRRYVRY7KmmiVYS0YsvROiOz-eY6d_jnj6M/w279-h355/IMG_1247.jpg" width="279" /></a></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><span>And then early December, one phone call… R. had been contacted by the French embassy… She was allowed to fly back to France on the 11th of December… There were so many practical problems to be solved that we decided to really rejoice only when R. would be with us in Brittany for Christmas. <br /><br />France was again in lockdown since the end of October. SP had to fill forms and prepare several written proofs to be able to drive back to Paris, meet his wife at the airport and drive back with her to Brittany where they were supposed to stay until… until we had no idea when…<br /><br />R. would also have to quarantine for ten days and take a new Covid test before being allowed to move from Paris. <br /><br />So yes, there was rejoicing in Brittany but after ten long months and so many uncertainties, we could only hope that things would go well. We also worried about her parents. India was still in a very strict lockdown. R.’s mom had lost her younger brother to Covid a few months before without being able to grieve properly with her family. There would never be a traditional wedding, such an important event for Indian families. Their daughter was flying away to a faraway country to live with a family (including their son-in-law) they barely knew. They knew we loved her very much but remember, those were Covid times filled with so much anguish…<br /><br />Since no trains were running, SP drove away a couple of days before R. was supposed to fly back to Paris on the first French flight allowed to repatriate French nationals and Indian spouses… We waited and waited until we heard that R. was on board. The plane did take off almost on time because due to lockdown, there was almost no smog above Delhi. <br /><br />And yes, R. landed in Roissy. They were wearing masks for their long awaited reunion… and R. started her ten days long quarantine in our new home. <br /><br />Eleven days later, the young couple drove back to Brittany, right on time for R.’s first Christmas in France with her husband and her in-laws. </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8edMecoVBAKfIKpTp_oGcVoaTk-HLQQOrnl13fx9Vh2qgh-2h7wYJNL2C4gP_M2xbzdNeCx2yzNY5OHIwAJ3G6xSiZVfMqBm0PO0kyFibvEz_a-bzGGDNiQklUTCOoKunZ8nQdJNNk-Yi4n2o-bK39aaP8hNcoIAkItDlGPEkRX4P9E7sx1T-wddL/s4032/IMG_3592.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8edMecoVBAKfIKpTp_oGcVoaTk-HLQQOrnl13fx9Vh2qgh-2h7wYJNL2C4gP_M2xbzdNeCx2yzNY5OHIwAJ3G6xSiZVfMqBm0PO0kyFibvEz_a-bzGGDNiQklUTCOoKunZ8nQdJNNk-Yi4n2o-bK39aaP8hNcoIAkItDlGPEkRX4P9E7sx1T-wddL/w300-h400/IMG_3592.jpeg" width="300" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><span>At long last, there were four plates again on the table… A few months later, there would be only two plates left on our table in Brittany but this would be perfectly alright since there would also be two plates on their own table in London! </span></span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span><span style="font-family: verdana;">*Good Night, and Good Luck* </span></span><br /><br /></span><br /></p>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-80795919111936224502021-03-23T17:37:00.001+01:002021-03-23T20:04:25.545+01:00Well, to recap... Part II<p><br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1eV6Pnp6GBk/YFoPFPlJvLI/AAAAAAAAFB0/hPJsC2MjXm4t_0UchL5zPOcZ7QYIAy7UgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1920/b03b2084-ef52-45ae-b392-8400f6845e07.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="1920" height="445" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1eV6Pnp6GBk/YFoPFPlJvLI/AAAAAAAAFB0/hPJsC2MjXm4t_0UchL5zPOcZ7QYIAy7UgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h445/b03b2084-ef52-45ae-b392-8400f6845e07.JPG" width="640" /><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;">Going through so many memories, trying to sort them out one year later is a painful process. I have done this several times in my life so why is it so distressing now? Is it because one whole year went by and yet we see no end to it all? Is it because I went into such a strict personal reclusion that it ends up feeling like life imprisonment? Or is it just proof that I am terribly scarred by the experience?<br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>April 2020</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">This is not a joke. I wish it were. One thing that really struck me during the string of lockdowns and restrictions and mainly after the first official lockdown was that I was seriously loosing points of reference. SP was teaching (remote) so it helped a little bit but otherwise I would wake up in the morning wondering which day it was and the day would sometimes end without any reassurance. I am still working on the issue, one year later.<br /><br />I should have started to write about our (rather boring) daily life but I was feeling so terribly exhausted all the time. Sometimes quite unable to get up from the warm embrace of my favorite armchair. It made sense though since my nights were filled with anxiety and nightmares. And anger too, not knowing what was really going on and who/what was managing our daily life. In retrospect, it really felt somehow easier to fight a recurring cancer and its many side effects. At least I was somehow in charge and fighting. Well, yes, I am going mental.<br /><br />So April was “Waiting for Godot”… (You probably have heard this expression from Samuel Beckett’s eponymous play which describes people waiting for something to happen, which never happens.) </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">Days went by. The end of lockdown kept being postponed. We kept Skyping with Rasima. The weather kept being extremely warm and sunny. Our garden kept getting dazzlingly coloured. Birds kept singing, louder and louder because it was nesting time. Our friends kept sending pictures from a very empty Paris. And we were still kept in.</span></p><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yMZibekBEYo/YFoQyEw3rsI/AAAAAAAAFB8/bVgI_LnoT8I9rZC9-mzvYpQoZe19U8nZACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/1.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yMZibekBEYo/YFoQyEw3rsI/AAAAAAAAFB8/bVgI_LnoT8I9rZC9-mzvYpQoZe19U8nZACLcBGAsYHQ/w480-h640/1.HEIC" width="480" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-O7ykhWEL1Fs/YFoQ3Vucn8I/AAAAAAAAFCA/bHb4pIguAHI-0zI8knyzJ7AqVpv8CtxaACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/2.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-O7ykhWEL1Fs/YFoQ3Vucn8I/AAAAAAAAFCA/bHb4pIguAHI-0zI8knyzJ7AqVpv8CtxaACLcBGAsYHQ/w480-h640/2.HEIC" width="480" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rKYPDFKpFa0/YFoRUgkSemI/AAAAAAAAFCI/86eLH311JxgcIqwmJm8JVnEKcOrpVsgLwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/4.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rKYPDFKpFa0/YFoRUgkSemI/AAAAAAAAFCI/86eLH311JxgcIqwmJm8JVnEKcOrpVsgLwCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/4.JPG" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Our gardeners called us one morning. They had bought the small company from Yves in January and not being able to work was a disaster for them. They were allowed to work outside though but nobody was willing to let them into their garden.<br /><br />Lucky them! In January, a family of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coypu">coypus</a> had invaded our pond and our garden. Heartless as we were, they had been (lawfully) trapped and disposed of, because of the very real threat of leptospirosis (which at the time sounded like the most dreadful disease ever). The pond needed to be emptied, cleaned up thoroughly, boulder after boulder, and damages fixed up. Coypus saved a business and it was so nice to wave to human beings whenever we’d catch sight of one of them.<br /></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>May 2020</b></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">The fruit trees were rapidly way past their flowering time and had turned leafy. We felt a flutter of excitement when the first butterfly landed on a "paper plant". Our eldest Wollemi pine went through a sudden reproductive boost, a first for us. Lockdown was not totally negative after all. But its efforts were rather unproductive. It did try though and we were fascinated by the cones, female and male.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bSYmURdUPf4/YFoS2xr9AYI/AAAAAAAAFCg/76Pk-Jg05Q0YZyqXPsHGDND2K4F68x9rgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/5.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bSYmURdUPf4/YFoS2xr9AYI/AAAAAAAAFCg/76Pk-Jg05Q0YZyqXPsHGDND2K4F68x9rgCLcBGAsYHQ/w480-h640/5.HEIC" width="480" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-I4WjUfXOthw/YFoTGYYNTgI/AAAAAAAAFCk/f_Slsk_-GUoh70D-cJeaQ1Rynxq4cugzQCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/6.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-I4WjUfXOthw/YFoTGYYNTgI/AAAAAAAAFCk/f_Slsk_-GUoh70D-cJeaQ1Rynxq4cugzQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/6.HEIC" width="640" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KB4RcrvIWMQ/YFoTQdKC7oI/AAAAAAAAFCs/7ImNgLU5fvYcsU6ZUTkH3eYF2dtxIVnXQCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/7.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-KB4RcrvIWMQ/YFoTQdKC7oI/AAAAAAAAFCs/7ImNgLU5fvYcsU6ZUTkH3eYF2dtxIVnXQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/7.HEIC" width="640" /></a></div><br /></span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Day after day, the sea below was a dream for seafaring men and women like me. Not a single wavelet from morning till dusk. Clear blue skies. Warm weather. I, Olive, declare I could have sailed around the world and loved every minute of it.<br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lEeKNSTvShc/YFoTrcPYgNI/AAAAAAAAFC4/ZZzpvPxX-W0_Ll2P92Sr9lLwdEzEQXNdQCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/9.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-lEeKNSTvShc/YFoTrcPYgNI/AAAAAAAAFC4/ZZzpvPxX-W0_Ll2P92Sr9lLwdEzEQXNdQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/9.HEIC" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Our hair was growing so fast and so long… and so unruly.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VKTDSrQ8TRM/YFoUInnCq6I/AAAAAAAAFDA/hlK1-XvtjwABgSL0z7RdC4ryI95nLVoFwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1920/10.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1440" data-original-width="1920" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VKTDSrQ8TRM/YFoUInnCq6I/AAAAAAAAFDA/hlK1-XvtjwABgSL0z7RdC4ryI95nLVoFwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/10.JPG" width="640" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Early May, a huge military plane flew right by our house, so low that we worried it’d end up crashing on the beach. The next day, we learnt it was coming back from Brest. They had flown intubated Covid patients from Paris because there was still room for them there and none in the Paris area. Impressive and very frightening.<br /><br />So we were still waiting for the presidential speech that would somehow free us. We had been told to make masks that would be compulsory at the end of lockdown, following official guidelines. One question? How do you make masks when it is quite impossible to buy elastics or fabric even on Amazon… Ordering on line should not have been a problem. We had become used to ordering food and almost everything online. Delivery was efficient and fast. <br /><br />I started making masks using whatever I could find in what used to be our holiday home… I became a crack seamstress, recycling T-shirts and summer skirts elastics! We needed to be ready!</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PfX9r-cZ_Zg/YFoUpa05NlI/AAAAAAAAFDI/UrrihEiZJscMEUme0BGe0XdW-NulQieVACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/11.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PfX9r-cZ_Zg/YFoUpa05NlI/AAAAAAAAFDI/UrrihEiZJscMEUme0BGe0XdW-NulQieVACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/11.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">And then one day, it did happen… May 11th - we were free but not all of France and our activities were still quite restricted. Some beaches opened up on the 16th but only to go on walks. We were getting less confined but still "at war". Our first walk on our beloved beach was very scary… We would have walked extra miles to avoid getting close to other people.<br /><br />I mean I would have walked miles to avoid people but I couldn’t. Walking again on a regular basis proved rather hard and painful after missing out so many months of physiotherapy. Thank goodness for crutches… But actually it didn’t take too long before the crutches were simply carried around for safety reasons and my leg got stronger and stronger.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6eXzUAKtsGk/YFoVCHuw7hI/AAAAAAAAFDQ/TKvIX_owOj0XXBTEpcmJhCKH4pl24lKaACLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/12.HEIC" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1536" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6eXzUAKtsGk/YFoVCHuw7hI/AAAAAAAAFDQ/TKvIX_owOj0XXBTEpcmJhCKH4pl24lKaACLcBGAsYHQ/w480-h640/12.HEIC" width="480" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> Very soon we started feeling less threatened on the beach. Strong and coldish winds started to blow at the right time, deterring crowds from invading our beach!</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dzTMuK1tl3yZ-cFBrLOu02SGu_JA6jJo2gTcAl-CPmU6wenADWAJ1ZgVqkl4qaPZjcrvyKBwmFTZzkimcXQ1Q' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">And then what? <br /><br />...To be continued…</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">Good Night, and Good Luck<b> </b><br /></span></p>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-61867083505882520852021-02-26T18:42:00.002+01:002021-02-26T19:07:08.137+01:00Well, to recap... Part I<p> </p><p> </p><p><span> </span><span> </span> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1Gr3fP81i94/YDkcPsBjuwI/AAAAAAAAFAU/dljAawZe0IMP4MIec4xiex20ETYRHC7vgCLcBGAsYHQ/s960/305_ex_ch_bruegelviennaexhibition_dullegriet_presse.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="694" data-original-width="960" height="290" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1Gr3fP81i94/YDkcPsBjuwI/AAAAAAAAFAU/dljAawZe0IMP4MIec4xiex20ETYRHC7vgCLcBGAsYHQ/w403-h290/305_ex_ch_bruegelviennaexhibition_dullegriet_presse.jpg" width="403" /></a></div><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span class="caption-credit-cont">
<span class="credit ">© Museum Mayer van den Bergh, Antwerp, Belgium</span></span><p></p><p><span class="caption-credit-cont"><span class="credit "> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"> The way I see it now, 2020 is at first glance our top “annus horribilis”. Then with hindsight it turns out to be the year we will remember with bewilderment and sideration even (mentally speaking) but also with some kind of fascination. Some of us almost didn’t make it and some of us did not survive. It was a year of discovering our friends and fellow human beings the way they really were. Some very generous. Some extremely egocentric. Some very wise and others so wildly insane. It was like being thrown back to very olden times so well depicted by masters like Pieter Bruegel the Elder or El Bosco… in plague times or war.<br /><br />The previous year - 2019 - had not been a very easy year. I had spent most of it trying to learn to survive (or not) with a very “exhausted” heart and mending broken bones (without surgery nor cast). But on the positive side, this was also the year when our son got engaged to the most delightful young woman ever with a wedding planned for 2020. Actually two weddings - one in February in France and one in India in April. It had also been the year he chose to leave the US to become a happy and proud academic in a country probably bound to leave Europe pretty soon (but there was still hope then). On our side, we were planning to leave Brussels behind forever and get settled in a house we had fallen in love with and bought in Paris.<br /><br />So yes 2020 was going to be a very happy and fulfilling year.<br /> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"><b>January 2020</b><br /><br />The first day of the year was a very cloudy and cold day in Brittany but I didn’t care because I knew that within four days I’d be in London with my son and I’d spend one great week in museums, the Barbican Centre (“As You Like It”) and one night at the opera (“The Traviata”) with P. who would join us to help me choose my dresses for the Indian wedding. <br /><br />Once there, I stayed in my beloved hotel in London (after one whole year away for the first time in six years due to my health problems). And once there, they did spoil me, upgrading me to the grandest suite they have, befittingly called the Opera Suite!<br /><br />Then back to Paris for one day and back to Brittany to welcome our couple in love. They spent a few days at Les Tertres to get all the paperwork done for their French wedding in the lovely city hall of our village, mid-February. And then they went back to London where R. had to attend a workshop and discover her future home.<br /><br />P. and I went back to Brussels. We had officially denounced our lease and we needed to hire movers, a very easy thing ever after all. The worst part being all we needed to sort after spending 22 years in the same place, amassing so much stuff! <br /><br />We already knew a weird and possibly deadly virus was going around but we did not feel too worried. We had been through so many bad “bugs” throughout all these years and all of them had been stopped short.<br /><br /><b>February 2020</b><br /><br />We were still in Brussels when on the 4th, we learned that people had been hospitalised with Covid-19 in Belgium, just like in France and Italy. Our Chinese friends in Brussels sounded very worried about it, though, because of a city called Wuhan. Well, Wuhan was in China and a long way away.<br /><br />We worked hard and we did a lot of worthwhile sorting out and by the 11th of February, we were ready to go back to Brittany. Exhausted but rather satisfied. One or two more weeks in March and we’d be ready to let professionals do their job!<br /><br />The civil wedding was programmed on the 15th. It would be a very simple thing since it was to be followed by a very traditional 3-days Indian wedding in Delhi. <br /><br />Attending in Brittany would be the parents (us!) and two witnesses for the groom, and the bride's parents, her brother, sister-in-law and young niece.<br /><br />We went to pick them up at the Lamballe train station on the 14th. Valentine’s day.<br /><br />That very day, the first Covid-19 patient died in France.<br /><br />The bride was arriving directly from Delhi, India, along with her parents. Her brother and family had been flying from Melbourne, Australia. The groom was coming from London and we had been travelling from Brussels to Brittany via Paris. But all this took some time to sink in.<br /><br />The wedding was perfect, so different from a regular civil wedding in India where you just pop into an office, sign papers and that’s it.<br /><br />The mayor wearing his impressive official sash officiated at the wedding (we were told it was a great honour). I stood by him to translate the whole ceremony in English. It was quite an experience to stand opposite the bride and groom, witnesses and family members. Watching feelings and emotions on their faces while trying not to get too emotional to deliver a good translation.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uUgXCJ5pYwA/YDkiVnJzaeI/AAAAAAAAFA0/gz__as6ZC3kPQ31j6rp2LP6KYtQP8dZ1wCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/IMG_3836.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1365" height="348" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uUgXCJ5pYwA/YDkiVnJzaeI/AAAAAAAAFA0/gz__as6ZC3kPQ31j6rp2LP6KYtQP8dZ1wCLcBGAsYHQ/w244-h348/IMG_3836.JPG" width="244" /></a></div><br /><span class="caption-credit-cont">(<i>The happy lawfully wedded couple holding their "livret de famille" - the official family record book containing registration of the wedding, births and deaths</i>)</span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont">They all left the following day, back to their own homes and work places. The bride needed to get her French papers processed in India and we were all to meet again in less than two months for the Indian wedding. The married couple would then fly back to London to start their lawful wedded life! <br /><br />We stayed a few more days in Brittany. I needed to rest. Happiness can be very exhausting sometimes.<br /><br />Back in Brussels, we finalized our move. It would last one whole week and would start on the 23rd of March. <br /><br />Then back to Paris driving across a very snowy Northern France. <br /> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"><b>March 2020<br /></b><br />SP was waiting for us in Paris. He had meetings at the UNESCO but he found time to go buy his suits for the wedding. He was very worried about weird happenings in his department. Colleagues getting very sick with extremely strange symptoms, a few leading to some kind of pneumonia.<br /><br />Some parts of France and Belgium (and other European countries) were already hit hard by this new plague. ICUs were filling up but what can you tell people when there were no masks and no disinfectant available other than soap? So life was going on in a superb lack of concern. Hard to fear what you don’t really know…<br /><br />We went back to Belgium to get some more work done to prepare the move. An old woman died in the hospital close to our house. The first Covid-19 death in Belgium. “People die from the flu every winter”, said the government. <br /><br />We started being more careful, trying to avoid close contact with people. We were rather ready to move and we went back to Paris where on the 10th, our Indian family wished us a “Happy Holi” via WhatsApp. We made our flight reservations and got all the papers ready for our visa. <br /><br />On the 11th, late at night, we got a phone call from friends who would be attending the Indian wedding celebration. They just couldn’t finalize their visa applications on the Indian government website. They kept getting a message: “Please get in touch with the nearest Indian Embassy”. India had suddenly gone into lockdown. <br /><br />On the 13th, SP came back from London because he had meetings scheduled in Paris. We went to pick him up at the station. There only were a handful of travellers in the Eurostar. <br /><br />The following day, British universities closed down. Online teaching would be the trend unless…<br /><br />I had a cancer and a cardio check-up scheduled at the hospital. It was very creepy. Empty waiting rooms. Doctors wearing masks. No handshakes. Social distancing. They all told me: “Go away. Go to Brittany and stay there. Be very careful. “This” one is a real killer.”<br /><br />So off we went. The three of us. After packing the car with whatever we thought would be needed for a few weeks. While on our way, we got a phone call from our daughter-in-law. The Indian wedding was postponed sine die. She would stay in lockdown with her parents in their apartment up in the sky close to Delhi, working remote.<br /><br />On the 17th of March, France entered a lockdown that was supposed to last two weeks, said President Macron. Everything came to a standstill. All stores (except foodstores) and every venue dealing with customers closed. Beaches and parks and forests were out of reach. We were allowed to take a "one hour walk outside" per day - individually or only members of the household - and no further than 2 kms away from home (round trip) after filling a very precise form. And there were forms to be filled every time we’d go get food or medicine, etc. No form and you'd get a fine. In a eco-friendly system, those forms could be filled using an app which most people refused to use anyway since most felt they would be spied upon by the government. But the birth of those conspiracy theories didn’t prevent them to vent their feelings on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram using the said phones.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"><br /> </span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3-kx7kPqmjI/YDkooZTzsOI/AAAAAAAAFBA/4npgr07f5GY8lWQjInJ-rIeB-uquJ4hwgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/IMG_8195.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="274" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3-kx7kPqmjI/YDkooZTzsOI/AAAAAAAAFBA/4npgr07f5GY8lWQjInJ-rIeB-uquJ4hwgCLcBGAsYHQ/w368-h274/IMG_8195.jpg" width="368" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span class="caption-credit-cont"><br /><br /><span class="credit "></span></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u0yipvftHqI/YDko_V6rMyI/AAAAAAAAFBI/xCK7Js25Go8Fs05NiCc1OpFNcFYDp9zsgCLcBGAsYHQ/s2048/IMG_8280.HEIC" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-u0yipvftHqI/YDko_V6rMyI/AAAAAAAAFBI/xCK7Js25Go8Fs05NiCc1OpFNcFYDp9zsgCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/IMG_8280.HEIC" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">We felt very lucky to be at Les Tertres. It was not very warm but extremely sunny. The orchard was blooming. Due to lockdown, there were no other sounds than the songs of the birds, the wind in the trees and the sound of the waves crashing on the beach down below. Not one single sound of so-called civilization. No planes in the sky. No boats on the sea. No cars on the roads. A perfect time to meditate, to calm down and to start planning our new life. <br /><br />Planning. Who was even trying to start planning whatever would become our life once lockdown would be over? We were in the harshest lockdown, not knowing much about the new plague and not at all equipped to face it. And even more, not even knowing if or when the lockdown would end. Dreary news from all over the world. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">But we had the will to survive. So we followed the rules very strictly. Our friends sent us pictures of Paris, so eerily empty and silent. We sent them pictures of the empty beach below and of empty skies with no white trails of planes. We also sent them recordings of bird songs and pictures of wild animals (hares and deers) that took to roaming around the house.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RhazmS6S_Ow/YDkrAf0MOSI/AAAAAAAAFBQ/RVGPfIMzm6QdbWbSBijLjZkToyj2O9GfgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1024/09efc27b-16f1-4a41-b70f-ba5b184ba740.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="354" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RhazmS6S_Ow/YDkrAf0MOSI/AAAAAAAAFBQ/RVGPfIMzm6QdbWbSBijLjZkToyj2O9GfgCLcBGAsYHQ/w240-h354/09efc27b-16f1-4a41-b70f-ba5b184ba740.JPG" width="240" /></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /> </span><p></p><br /><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dzaQGirkL0Nh6OnagVuZ5gaVQbM5v9lP2YlXL5HNOPm0gKJXNRb3UAydZzNLfdOEnO0PlraFw0-UPPu8xF9Sg' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />And we started waiting, our lives brought to a standstill. Hearing about friends getting sick. Hearing about friends just barely surviving and friends dying alone in places that used to be so close but which were now out of reach. Waiting for news. One day at a time. One day at a time.<p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">(You have probably guessed by now that we did not move from Brussels to Paris in March. The flu that was definitely not the flu closed borders and started series of lockdowns that by the way are not over yet... but this is to be continued...) </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"> <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"> </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"> Good Night, and Good Luck </span><br /><span></span></p>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-26922467550775567992018-11-28T14:09:00.000+01:002019-05-07T12:46:48.350+02:00My Travel Book - Shortcuts - Part II<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Early June 2017, Swee’Pea flew from Boston to San Francisco to meet us there. We were to spend the next two weeks together in California.<br /><br />You see, I always had this dream of driving from San Francisco to Los Angeles along the famous Route 1. SP had done it several times while he was living in California. I remember experiencing a disagreeable feeling of jealousy (to call things by their rightful name) while he was showing me his pictures. He wanted to share moments of beauty and happiness with me. But still it was hard on me. At the time, I did feel like I’d never be traveling again and all I was wishing for was to be able to move further and further away from the hospital.<br /><br />Sometimes dreams come true. We did drive down Route 1, at least down the part that was still open because a few areas had been closed due to landslides. Which meant that we had to alter a few plans, all for the best.<br /><br />Instead of driving down directly to L.A., we went to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tahoe">Lake Tahoe</a>, another of my dreams. I had spent long evenings watching famous wakeboarders on Lake Tahoe when SP and his friends were trying to master the art of wakeboarding in Brittany. So, yes. Lake Tahoe was a great idea.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />By the way, we spent two days there without even seeing one single wakeboarder on the lake. Spring had been very snowy. The lake was way too freezing cold and wakeboarders were still snowboarding on the mountains slopes above Lake Tahoe. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />From Lake Tahoe, we drove down to Yosemite National Park along Highway 88, most of the time that is, because the scenery was breathtaking. So many lakes and so much snow along the road. So many stops and so many pictures.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Highway 88 was splendid. Perfectly dry under the sun. And cars were very scarce. Oohs and ahs of happpiness. We’d stop every few miles. The ice was breaking up over the lakes (Caples Lake, Silver Lake, Red Lake, I can’t name them all). And there was still tons of snow along the road.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Actually we were getting very close to the gateway to California Gold Fields which is called the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Trail">Mormon-Carson Pass Emigrant Trail</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I don’t know why but I had the feeling that Swee’Pea was getting fidgety, sort of. He was the main driver and he had been driving for a long time… Oh oh, should we get ready for a shortcut? A road that would break the monotonousness… Some trail maybe…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />There was a road on the right that would supposedly spare us at least two or three miles of that boring highway, he said. And off we turned to the right. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Popeye and I were so shell-shocked that we kept silent. Silent? Speechless is the right term. That’s it. We totally lost the power of speech. I guess that even though SP was probably enjoying himself tremendously, he did not dare utter one single word. You see, there was this set of parents in the car and this road (was it a road?) was awfully narrow and cramped and endless and, and, and… </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Well, the road was not endless after all. In a way it could be, if you felt like walking to Route 88 on a snowy trail. Because the snowplow had obviously given up in the middle of nowhere. There was no network available but it was obvious that we were still quite far away from the exit on Highway 88.<br /><br />"Shortcut", he said... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I bet you have no idea how they called this road or this whatsoever… <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_Spring,_California">“Tragedy Sorings Road”</a> is its name and I am not even kidding. “Springs” because there is a spring somewhere deep below that thick layer of snow and “Tragedy” because three members of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Battalion">Mormon Bataillon</a> were found killed there in 1848. <br /><br />We told Swee’Pea that he’d better get us out of there or… Or what? Sometimes one ends up feeling very dumb. So we found a way. The snowplow men had made sure there would be enough room for a car to turn around. There must be quite a few people like Swee'Pea after all! We did not have to push the car because it did not get stuck which did worry us for a while (the getting stuck, of course!). Trust a Kia! It took a few long minutes but the car ended up facing the right way to go back to civilization and to freedom and away from Tragedy Springs!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Swee’Pea was outrageously jubilant! “I knew it’d be fun!” So annoying not to be able to tell him curtly to get back in the car, “you stupid kid”! Because he’s not at all stupid and he’s no longer a kid either. Maybe mad as a hatter from time to time but also a lot of fun. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I decided to walk for a while because you seldom get to walk between two high walls of snow, especially not in Brittany! And especially not on such a sunny and warm day!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And my preferred "shortcutter" kept on having fun until we got back onto Highway 88. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Once there, he finally set his mind on getting as soon
as possible to this very improbable place called Ahwhanee, our door to
Yosemite National Park.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There were no more shortcuts during this trip but a lot of driving around the landslides which probably made up for missed opportunities to drive off the beaten track.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Night, and Good Luck*</span></div>
Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-71058025556927284132018-11-26T21:33:00.000+01:002018-11-26T21:33:48.167+01:00My Travel Book - Shortcuts - Part I<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Swee’Pea, you remember Swee’Pea? My son Swee’Pea? It’s been a while since I have written about him. Ahem. Quite a while since I have written at all.<br /><br />Well, Swee’Pea is a wonderful travelling companion. Even-tempered, patient, uncomplaining and (almost) always in a smiling mood. Filled with enthusiasm and endless curiosity about everything. Talkative and yet a good listener. And the icing on the cake, willing to embark on long road trips with me…<br /><br />But… (because there is always a but, isn’t there?) Swee’Pea loves shortcuts. And thank you "Google Maps”! The only time I never heard him mention the word “shortcut” was in South Africa, because of safety reasons, of course. <br /><br />The interesting point though is that his shortcuts always end up being fun and hilarious… if you like adventure that is and being on the wild side of the road(trip)!<br /><br />Our road trip from London to London (almost 4.000 kms in three weeks) was filled with shortcuts. Most of them while we were travelling through Brecon Beacons Park, Snowdonia and the Lake District. Most of the time we ended up driving through fields (yes, Google maps trails and tracks and paths of all sorts) and finding ourselves hopelessly stuck in the middle of nowhere in front of a cattle gate. Which entailed backing up for at least a couple of miles on very winding and hilly pathways. And then learning from locals much later on that unless strictly forbidden, one opens the gate and then drives away after carefully closing the gate until the next one. <br /><br />(Do you read Welsh? We don’t! And so we kept backing up. Until the next shortcut.)<br /><br />One of my best memories, shortcut wise, happened on our way back to London. Driving from Edinburgh to Durham. From the very beginning of the trip, we had agreed upon travelling through the countryside as much as possible, thus avoiding big cities and congested road networks. Thus probably getting to know Great Britain better.<br /><br />We decided to avoid driving through Berwick-upon-Tweed, quite a huge town - population : 13.000 people! Google indicated that there would be a shortcut that would take us right to the coast and <a href="https://www.bamburghcastle.com/">Bamburgh Castle</a> with its Armstrong and Aviation Artefacts Museum.<br /><br />Google Maps also indicated that we had to turn right away and drive across a golf course…<br /><br />I was truly shocked when Swee’Pea, laughing his heart out, took the weediest and narrowest lane on the left or was it the right… and there we were… going through a golf course where actual people were playing and you could hear golf balls whizzing by.<br /><br />I was so shocked that I probably closed my eyes for a few minutes or maybe a century. I never took any pictures of the going through! But I found a very explicit picture on the web.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> The crossing was short. Thank you. But the shortcut kept getting worse. You see, it had been raining a lot in the area and the lane that was supposed to get us safely to the seaside look more like a shelled battle area than a leisure countryside whatever. The water holes were very, very deep and even wider. The few hikers on the way looked rather amazed that a car would make it through.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Well, we did. The mood in the car was not at its best. Mine at least. Swee’Pea was thoroughly enjoying himself and the car was obviously built to last. (I got my fun a few hours later watching SP getting rid of the caked mud in a very ancient carwash while I was munching away at a bag of M&M’s!)</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And there again - a gate! I knew it! Except that this one would be a little bit more dangerous to handle than the cattle gates. My mood was getting from bad to worse. I had to manoeuvre the gates, of course since I don’t drive. It all was a matter of being cautious and fast at the same time.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />Take a big breath! <br />Open both gates. Check! Breathe!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Cross the double-track line with the car. Check! Breathe!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Walk back to the first gate to close it. Check! Breathe!<br />Walk back across the railway line. Check! Breathe!<br />Close the second gate. Check! Breathe!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We had done it. Safely. (I didn’t trust much the green light in such a forlorn place! This was the railway track from London to Edinburgh after all. Fast trains!)<br /><br />I hopped back in the car. We were not very far from the small road to Bamburgh. And the countryside was pastoral and colourful. And peaceful. My mood went up to feeling good. This had been quite an experience after all. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A few minutes later, some Northumberland witches decided to use every trick in their power to kill the fun. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There we were with no way to do a U-turn. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One weak bridge… mentioning “road vehicles” and not “trucks”. We had driven over quite a few “weak” bridges in Wales because they were prohibited to lorries but not cars. But this one in the middle of nowhere was clearly stating that no vehicles were allowed on it, not even cars. <br /><br />We decided that being stuck there wouldn’t help and that it would be better to go check the bridge before making any impulsive decision.<br /><br />While we were pondering the pros and cons, a train whizzed past us on its way to Edinburgh. At top speed. We had the same question: “Was the “green light"</span></span>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">still on or had it turned “red” a few minutes ago? We’ll never know because we definitely decided to drive forward and check the bridge.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All those fields around would need to be harvested. And harvest means harvester and tractors and trucks… Maybe the bridge was not this weak after all. Except that all those vehicles and contraptions could be driven through the fields and never use the bridge because it really was “weak”.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We breathed in and out. At least I did. And we drove forward. We had set one rule while being on this road trip : let’s not vent our feelings (the negative ones, of course) while in the car. Not enough space for a fight. So I probably kept quiet, trying not to fly off the handle.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once close to the bridge, it was time to play it like in South Africa. Rangers in Kruger Park are always checking animal tracks on the trails. Very useful. And there they were. Tractor tracks all over the bridge. We could not be heavier than a tractor, could we? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hopefully we wouldn’t be the last straw that would break the camel’s back. And we were not. Or I wouldn’t be telling the story, would I?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For those who are still looking for thrills, we had to drive quite a few miles off the beaten track. On a very grassy path that took us straight to a very small asphalted road.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To Bamburgh Castle, at last!</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span></div>
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Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-79406682037144639252018-01-04T13:37:00.001+01:002018-05-19T16:44:11.301+02:00My Travel Book - New York 2017 - They Were Smiling. I Was Crying.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Last time I was in New York goes back a very long time. March 2001 actually.<br /><br />In March 2001, we had done hundreds of things in New York and spent most nights at the Metropolitan Opera which meant not doing what we had enjoyed doing before - having a cocktail at “The Greatest Bar on Earth” at Windows on the World. <br /><br />I remember boarding the plane that would fly us back home and telling Popeye that I felt bad we had not had enough time to go up there. He answered: “Oh well, next time. We’ll be back next March anyway.”<br /><br />And then the unthinkable happened… and we never made it back to New York until many, many years later. Not because of 9/11 but because my life took new turns that kept me away from the States for a long time.<br /><br />We landed in New York on May 13. We were to spend a few days there since I wanted to get over jet lag before attending our son’s graduation in Boston. I had planned a few activities. Not a lot. One night at the Met. A few museums. And that was about it. I was very reluctant to go to the World Trade Center site. We made the decision on the spur of the moment. It was sunny and I probably imagined it would be much easier to go back there on a sunny day. Don’t ask me why. Would a sunny day alleviate the pain I knew would be intense?<br /><br />The sun was shining but I hadn’t realised that entering the site would be unbearable. The emptiness overwhelmed me. I literally doubled up with grief. I was shedding bitter tears without even being conscious I was sobbing. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I went to Auschwitz II Birkenau a few years ago. The skies were overcast and slate gray. The extermination camp was empty save for us and our guide. There was not a sound to be heard. It was eerie. What do you expect to find at an extermination camp? We were in mourning of the untold numbers of victims who were murdered there. I remember shedding silent tears but I did not sob. And I came out of hell without one single picture. Wilfully.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />The 9/11 Memorial was different. There were thousands of people there from all over the world (and from the US too) milling round the pools and queuing to enter the museum. Cars were rumbling past. For those of you who’ve been to New York, we know the city never rests. <br /><br />However I was not there as a witness like in Auschwitz in order to testify in person about the Holocaust for fear of oblivion or even worse, denial. <br /><br />I went to the 9/11 Memorial to remember. Remembering the inconceivable abomination that happened <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/search?q=+9%2F11">right before my very eyes in 200</a>1, on the eleventh day of September. Remembering the towers the way they were and how much they were part of our lives and the skyline. And above all, remembering the people who lived through this ordeal and died there too on such a perfect sunny day.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">There was a world before 9/11, a world that totally disappeared that day, not only for New Yorkers and Americans but for all mankind. People died on 9/11 and keep dying because of 9/11 all over the world. None of us escaped nor will escape somehow unharmed after all. I was grieving for this lost world, far from perfect but such a “wonderful world” after all.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">So I wished I had been on my own that day, far from the maddening crowd… It was so hard to rub shoulders with people who looked happy, happy to be there in New York, on a visit they would talk about just as much as getting on top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. “I went to New York and went to the Memorial with my friends or family. What a great place… It was so interesting…”<br /> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I froze to the spot. There they were, delighted and smiling. I did not see any victory of the living over death. I saw “selfitis” at its worst… while I was still battling somber memories. </span></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />And there they were, taking selfies all over the place… Couples, single men and women, families with children. “I am in New York… What a beautiful day… Hello, my Facebook friends!” Like or Love would be the answer… Or more probably “Such a great couple/family. You look so adorable…” and the icing on the cake: “You look like you are having fun. Enjoy your trip.” All the while the water in the pools was endlessly flowing down. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I took a deep breath, entered my own sanctuary bubble and managed to walk calmly around the pools. I felt awed by the everlasting waterfalls and the bottomless emptiness of the core. I read names, too many names and I touched lightly some of them. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I spent a long time there. The waterfalls had a soothing effect on me. I stopped crying.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I finally noticed the pigeon which had been sitting in the pool all along. When it decided to make good use of all this water, I smiled. Life was going on. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">*Good Luck, and Good Night* </span></span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-49228375680761539462018-01-02T23:02:00.000+01:002018-01-02T23:02:21.988+01:00My Travel Book - So Much Planning... And Then We Finally Flew Away...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes it is hard to remember when an idea first pops into your mind and then becomes a project that will evolve into a real adventure. Hard to remember how plans were drawn up and steps taken to turn dreams into reality. How and when? When and how?<br /><br />Another question. Why? Oh this is usually so easy that there is almost no need to mention why. Of course, why always comes before when and how.<br /><br />During those past three years, our family has undergone many changes, most of them really huge. As you probably know, we are a very small family of three. When one of us is confronted with change, it usually ends up having an enormous impact on the whole family.<br /><br />When Swee’Pea moved from South Africa back to Europe and decided to take one year off, the change was seismic! We had to learn to spend more time together which ended up being a lovely experience actually! We had been living apart in different countries and most of the time, in different continents for more than 15 years.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />And it so happened that two years ago, Swee’Pea decided to go back to school in Boston to get a new degree in a totally different field. He has a PhD in astrophysics but this time it was to be a Masters of Arts in Law and Diplomacy. (The Fletcher School’s MALD). We were very supportive. But honestly, it was hard to face again distance, time difference and change… quite simply change. <br /><br />The first year flew away so quickly that it was amazing. A new school year began in August 2016 but we spent a few long weeks together in Brittany in December 2016. One more term and graduation would happen in May 2017. We wanted very much to be there, all together. <br /><br />Graduation with great pump is uncharted territory for French people studying in France. I still remember the day Swee’Pea received his PhD in astrophysics. One big lecture theater at the Paris Institute of Astrophysics filled with his friends, colleagues, professors (and the jury, of course). He defended his doctoral dissertation. The jury left to confer - not for long and our son became Dr SP, PhD in astrophysics. In a corner of the Institute entrance hall, we had arranged a small buffet with champagne to celebrate. And that was it. Three days later SP left for his first job as a fully-fledged astronomer at the Nice Observatory. <br /><br />Graduating from the Fletcher School’s MALD had to be a great moment in our family life. And I guess I am finished with answering the “Why” question.<br /><br />Now to when and how?<br /><br />So “when” was definitely at Christmas time, in Brittany. I probably initiated a discussion about plans to be made be in Boston as a family, considering a new important turn in our life. Popeye would be retiring by the end of January, which would give us more freedom to travel.<br /><br />Now to “how” did we ever plan a trip that started with a graduation in Boston and ended up with a 6 weeks road trip from the East Coast to California and back to New York. How did we go from reasonable to somehow loosing our minds?<br /><br />At first, we decided that we’d stop in New York for a few days to get over jet lag before graduation. We’d drive to Boston from there. We’d attend graduation and fly back to Brussels from Boston. We soon all agreed on this plan.<br /><br />How did we end up taking this crazy trip through the States? A trip that did involve two transatlantic flights, two domestic flights across the US, four flights in private rented planes, staying in 11 hotels (*12* except that we stayed twice in the same hotel in NY), renting six different cars plus riding in countless numbers of cabs and Uber cars and hiking a lot too.<br /><br />Very simple, my friends. Some of you may remember a post I wrote in 2015 - <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2015/07/my-travel-book-road-trip-where-to.html">“My Travel Book - A Road Trip - Where To?</a>”… <br /><br />There was my chance! A chance of a lifetime! <br /><br />New York and Boston were requisite. <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/09/perfect-wedding-so-much-love-and.html">We added Montreal to visit our dear friends and their growing family. </a>And then our plans went definitely wild. What about Los Angeles where Swee’Pea had spent three years at a time when I was not feeling good enough to travel? If we decided to go to LA, why not fly to San Francisco from Montreal and drive down to Pasadena, his "hometown" in one day on Route 1. “Let’s not drive down so fast”, said Swee’Pea. What about Lake Tahoe and Yosemite Park and then taking several days driving down to Pasadena? And while we were in Pasadena, what about flying to The Grand Canyon and spending two days there? And it went on and on.<br /><br />The plans, at least hotel and commercial airlines wise, had to be set well in advance. So we went to work… <br /><br />So just the way we had done it in our British road trip, we planned our main stops and we left a lot of opportunities open along the way. Trips planned to the letter do not agree with me. If I miss one single planned thing, I feel a painful loss since I have been somewhat deprived of the most important thing ever. While travelling, I like to have as much time as I can to improvise. Lingering in some places and skipping others. You know, the “Um” stuff! “Um, perfect weather today. Let’s go “there”, whatever “there” is!” Or the “Did you notice the sign on the right? Let’s go there!”<br /><br />I guess it’s because I’ve spent so much time in Brittany where it is quite hard to plan activities and where one has to live essentially according to the weather! It is definitely never much fun to go sailing on Monday as planned because the sea turned suddenly very rough while it was just perfect on Sunday but...<br /><br />I am very happy our light planning worked out well again this time. Of course, there are regrets about things and places missed but mainly because there was not enough time. But there were no frustrations. Almost none. Those six weeks were fraught with incredible encounters and adventures which may never have happened if planned carefully.<br /><br />We would not have taken an impromptu drive around Newport with SP’s wonderful roommate after flying there for lunch. We would never have ended up at Folsom prison. We would not have gotten stuck between two snowdrifts in the middle of nowhere on our way to Lake Tahoe or was it on our way to Yosemite. We would not have followed the steps of Edwin Hubble from his house in Pasadena up to Mount Wilson Observatory where he discovered that the universe is expanding… on a rather foggy day. We would never have enjoyed one last minute delightful lunch at John Steinbeck’s childhood home in Salinas, nor enjoyed a private and totally unexpected visit of the said house. We would not have landed in some improbable place called Marble Canyon… Six weeks filled with so many strange happenings, so many incredibly happy times. <br /><br />Thousands of pictures to look at on wintery days.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so many stories to be told… </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span></span><br />Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-91459087099862377642016-10-15T15:42:00.001+02:002016-10-15T15:42:07.313+02:00On Being a Photographer - Part Four - About South African Colors<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A couple of years ago, I shared a few thoughts on being a photographer. Some still ring true. Others have evolved. I tend to take pictures more often with my iPhone while I am travelling so that I can share them more easily with friends and family. Which doesn’t mean I am feeling like the careless tourists I described in one of my posts. Even when using my phone as a camera, I keep trying to take pictures I’ll be happy and sometimes even proud to share.<br /><br />I still use my professional cameras and lenses. Of course. Much better definition and bigger files. This is very important if I ever decide to get some of the pictures exhibited in a gallery or published. Foresight, let’s say.<br /><br />Taking pictures can still be a long process for me though.<br /><br />I still remember the moment when leaving the MOMA in New York, I noticed reflections of Saint Thomas Church on a building across the street. I can’t remember why I did not take any pictures at the time. Probably because I had run out of film for my camera. I really felt frustrated for a while and I remember thinking: “I’ll be back. I have to come back!” One year later, I was back. First thing I did, I went to the MOMA. The reflections were still there of course, even better than the first time because the light was sharper. I took the pictures I had been turning over in my mind for twelve long months. I was very happy… and even happier when I was asked to exhibit three of them at the “Maison de la Radio” in Paris.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes my projects are best left in the pipeline because I honestly have no idea how they will evolve. Then I meet people, not necessarily other photographers and artists and we start talking about a thousand different ideas and there it happens. I suddenly know what I’ll be doing for a while.<br /> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'll never forget the time when I got on a plane bound to Cape Town. I was carrying my cameras and lenses along. I kept thinking how silly this was. One small camera would have done the trick because I knew that this time, I would not be travelling essentially for pleasure. A huge part of this trip promised to be rather ghastly. At least that’s what I was thinking and believing while boarding.<br /><br />And then… a miracle happened. And once again my life took another bend, maybe not the best one but one that should be very positive and get me places I felt I had to go back to without knowing how to reach them after such a long time.<br /><br />Actually I was on my way to mend my life as a photographer. And I had no idea this would or could happen.<br /><br />South Africa has sparked off an new awareness of color as such in me. Color had always played an important part in my earlier pictures of course but mainly as a medium to enhance or to emphasize what I was trying to express.<br /><br />Thanks to the magnificent sceneries and the amazing light in South Africa, from the Western Cape to the Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces, color became vital, truly essential and even crucial in my work. I became aware of this profound change in my assessment of my surroundings after spending one week in Kruger Park. We had decided to go to Kruger mainly to fulfill a dream. I also wanted to try my hand at wildlife photography, a real challenge for me.<br /><br />We had wonderful field guides and trackers and we did have incredible and very close encounters with lots of beautiful and impressive wild beasts . I took (a few) great pictures I am very proud of. But what really amazed me was that whenever I climbed aboard our safari car for a game drive, in the morning and in the afternoon, I never felt under stress about sighting the big five or not. I had fallen so much in love with the Kruger scenery and its infinite range of tones that I left the park with countless pictures of the bush and the trails illuminated by the morning or the evening sun rays or shrouded in mystery by cloudy skies. <br /><br />In South Africa, it was a lot about getting the right settings to bring out the right hues and making the most of the magnificent light.<br /><br />Now to make this story a little bit shorter… I have to tell you I have been an associate member of the “Société des Artistes Français” (The Academy of French Artists) ever since January 2004. Long story. I entered their yearly show at the Grand Palais in Paris for the first time in 2000 until 2012 when for personal reasons, I decided to stop exhibiting pictures for a while either at the Grand Palais or in galleries.<br /><br />This year, on my way back from South Africa, at the end of my second trip there, I decided to present a new project to the jury (this is mandatory for “new” artists and associate members as well). I was determined to start exhibiting again in art galleries if my project was accepted in its entirety or even only partially. Time had come for action, I thought.<br /><br />I did not procrastinate as usual. I sent a file to the jury. Four pictures which I arbitrarily called “South African Colors” and which were characteristic of my awakening to color as such. Choosing them was difficult because I tend to be very emotional about pictures I like. And there were so many pictures I loved from my two trips to South Africa.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There were the white sand dunes. Such a luminous whiteness highlighted by light green succulents below clear deep blue skies.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There was this early morning picture in Kruger Park. A long forgotten mossy-like water hole. Lifeless water. A very strange and forsaken place. A symphony of many green shades. A study in green, brown, blue and grey.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And the mountains close to Franschhoek. The ardent rusty-red laterite, the rugged greyish mountains, the intense blue cloudy skies and the vegetation, once again all shades of green.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Several weeks ago, I got a mail from the president of the photography department. The members of the jury have chosen one picture, the fourth one. At their request, it will be printed in a very large size. It then deserved a new title. I called it: “Vertigo, South Africa”. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not only because the conditions in which I took the picture were rather extreme. But mainly because South Africa does make me feel dizzy in many ways.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Almost at the center of the picture, one dark cormorant is flying very low over some dazzling white eddies. Exactly what I was hoping for, a cormorant with spread out wings and straight neck above the foam. The perfect shape and the most incredible contrast - black over white. The second cormorant on the right was a complete surprise. I discovered it after downloading the pictures on my computer. It is still diving below the emerald water and trailing behind him a thin streak of bubbles. The kind of picture you take without even realizing it can turn out this beautiful. Lucky day! <br /><br />Showing “Vertigo, South Africa” in the Grand Palais in Paris, in February 2017, may well lead me to a new beginning as a photographer.<br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span></div>
Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-88715659272715360522016-10-14T22:40:00.000+02:002016-10-14T22:50:52.091+02:00My Travel Book - Bull's Eye! (Kruger Park, South Africa)<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Early November 2014, we met Popeye in Johannesburg and the three of us went off into the unknown… <a href="https://www.sanparks.org/parks/kruger/">Kruger National Park</a>. Not quite though. It had taken a lot of planning with a very nice woman from <a href="http://www.siyabona.com/">Siyabona Africa</a> to make reservations almost at the last minute (end of August 201<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">4</span> for the first week of November 2014!). We were to spend one whole week in Kruger Park and we’d be staying in three different private lodges, in three different areas of the park which would be a perfect dream come true!<br /><br />The first lodge, <a href="http://www.siyabona.com/safari-lodge-kings-camp-south-africa.htm">Kings Camp</a>, belongs to what’s called “the Greater Kruger Park”. Its full name is “Kings Camp Timbavati Private Nature Reserve”. We flew there on the 2nd of November, 2014. <br /><br />When you are staying at lodges, the game drives (two per day) are done in safari four-wheel drive cars. Usually in an open Land Rover unless you are inside the Park and then the Land Rover or the Toyota has to have a roof. Plus you are never on your own. You are with a <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">f</span>ield <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">g</span>uide or “<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">r</span>anger” and his <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">t</span>racker. You are not supposed to leave the car unauthorized and it is strictly forbidden to talk in a loud voice, to stand up or to move around in the car whenever you’d feel like taking the best picture ever… Just sayin’.<br /><br />In Kings Camp, the Land Rovers are roofless. The <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">f</span>ield <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">g</span>uide is driving and has a rifle within arm’s reach. If there is any danger, his instructions are to shoot to kill. Kind of scary, I know when all you want to do is to take pictures… peacefully after all. And then you learn to live with it. Actually you forget about the rifle very quickly.<br /><br />The <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">t</span>racker is facing the “whatever” can appear suddenly and his seat is not at all comfortable, said Swee’Pea who couldn’t resist to try it out. But this is the place where tracks can be seen at best…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The first and the second drives were quite uneventful even though we spent quite a long time watching a young female leopard, several buffaloes and a couple of rhinos. They weren’t very close to us. And it was obvious that they were very used to the cars from the reserve because all they did was to observe us briefly while they were going about their business, looking utterly bored by the way!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />The savannah was more or less what we had expected to see in Kruger, maybe a little bit more desolate than we thought it’d be. The skies were mostly grey and cloudy which boosted the bareness. November is the beginning of summer but there hadn’t been much rain in winter either. Nothing to compare with the drought Kruger Park has been going through for more than one year though.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />That afternoon, we drove around past the waterhole. It was mid-afternoon already so no wild beasts around. Too late or too early!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And then there he was - our first <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_elephant">bush elephant</a> in the wild. A bull. “Not very old”, said our <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">r</span>anger. Elephant bulls live on their own while the females gather together with the calves until mating season.<br /><br />I wanted to take pictures. Who wouldn’t? The elephant was quietly watching us, leaning against the skinniest skeleton of a tree. Later on, I was <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">reminded</span> that our <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">r</span>anger then made a strange decision. He switched the engine off. I don’t think I noticed. I was in the mood “I-am-taking-pictures-and-don’t-ask-me-to-notice-anything-else-around-me”. <br /><br />For a long time or what seemed to be a long time and actually was a very, very short time according to my camera clock, the bull watched us from behind the tiny trunk. During exactly 59 seconds. Not very friendly because anyway who can expect friendliness from a wild animal even when your mind gets totally distorted from watching too many Disney movies… or you have been dealing with tamed animals in zoo-like facilities.<br /><br />No. This elephant bull was watching us very inquisitively. He knew there was “something” there except that there was silence where there should have been a motor running. (We learnt much later on that they have been experiencing problems with electrical cars in Kruger. Wild beasts are used to the purring of the engines and not to the cars per se. They are born and live with that sound around them. They recognize engine sounds but not cars. Electric engines are very silent. Take away the sound and the animals will tend to feel they are in danger when facing silent cars, the “unknown” for them. When the park was trying out a few electric cars, rangers were faced with unusual aggressiveness from the “Big 5”. End of electric cars in Kruger National Park, so far.)<br /><br />So no engine running. But… and I guess this was really wrong… There were three people taking pictures in the car. A nice Australian honeymooning couple sharing a camera, Popeye and me. And I was probably and by far the most active of them all, producing rather loud clicks at regular and close intervals. <br /><br />The place where we had stopped was rather quiet. So just imagine: “Click! Click! Click!”…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The bull probably decided that enough was enough. He had to investigate. He took one step forward. Click! Two steps forward. Click! He did not even start trumpeting which meant that he was not this upset. He just kept on coming straight at us. Which was for me the most perfect angle I could have dreamt of. He was exactly at right angles to the side of our car, coming <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">directly</span> towards me since I was the one sitting right behind the ranger. Such a perfect spot!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I kept shooting and shooting. He kept moving forward and forward. What a sight! (Through my lens, of course.) I loved the way he was swinging his trunk with every step which was becoming more and more determined. Oh, what a sight! I kept shooting. I was not in a hurry. Wow, this elephant was such a magnificent bull. Besides being our first wild bush elephant!<br /><br />And then, he loomed up almost unexpectedly extremely large!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I then heard the young bride say something nervously, a few words I did not really catch, so totally hypnotized by this encounter and still clicking away.<br /><br />Popeye was sitting on my left. He bent towards the <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">r</span>anger, gave him a not so friendly little tap on the shoulder and said: “Let’s move off. Now!” <br /><br />And we moved off, just like that, giving him a wide berth. The bull looked bewildered. So this had been a car all along… after all! He turned around at once and walked away, taking long, placid and stately steps. We managed to follow him for a while. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I was feeling a little bit irritated though. This had been such a perfect moment… for a photographer!<br /><br />They were all very nice to me. Never tread on a photographer’s toes when she thinks she is hoarding up great pictures. Just wait… <br /><br />We had an excellent sundowner in the middle of nowhere, at sunset, all together. We did not talk about the elephant. The young couple was flying back to Sydney the following morning so there was a lot of small talk and it was fun.<br /><br />I had enough time to download the pictures of the afternoon drive before dinner was served. And then I had a real moment of panic! I remembered having to zoom out and constantly bringing the bull into focus. I remembered feeling very nervous because this was the first time I was taking pictures of a wild animal on the move.<br /><br />But I had not fully realized that from 4:40:35 p.m. to 4:42:59 p.m., the bull had gotten much closer to me than I ever felt he was.<br /><br />From over there...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> <a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VgYAxCH_a9s/WAE8uZuegxI/AAAAAAAAEt0/It2x_-hXatYK1AsiOjq82aDufKf-VLTeACK4B/s1600/18.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VgYAxCH_a9s/WAE8uZuegxI/AAAAAAAAEt0/It2x_-hXatYK1AsiOjq82aDufKf-VLTeACK4B/s640/18.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This elephant never displayed any real anger though. He probably <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">had been</span> rather distressed by the sudden lack of sound of a motor and by my clicks which would explain why our <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ranger </span>and the <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">t</span>racker were not overmuch worried. The question remains: What would he have done when meeting with the physical obstacle of the car, assuming that our <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">r</span>anger would have allowed him to get that close?<br /><br />Grab my camera? Definitely not! Push the car away which would have meant overturning it? Hard to find a really satisfying new ending to this story because as they say, all’s well that ends well! <br /><br />All in all, spending one week in Kruger Park, going on eleven game rides and having many very close encounters with the Big 5 plus lots of other wild beasts, we felt perfectly safe there. Certainly safer than walking around Cape Town or even in Paris at night, waving an iPhone like a red rag!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night* </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-49330198275883905652016-10-05T09:48:00.001+02:002016-10-05T09:48:17.226+02:00About One "Earth-Mother", Clouds and Rainbows in Northern Brittany<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Two years ago, while he was landscaping the seawards garden, Yves needed to create new contour lines which sometimes meant digging deep into the ground in order to add new rich soil. I stayed at Les Tertres to oversee the whole process. One late afternoon, Yves knocked at the door and with a grin, he presented me with an oblong and rounded granite rock. “I think we just unearthed the Celtic goddess who’s been watching over your gardens and protecting you. Do you want to keep “her”?”<br /><br />It was an enjoyable and poetical theory and “she” rests on a huge rock Yves had put down while landscaping the first garden, some fifteen years ago.<br /><br />My “Earth-Mother” looks good, happy and contented and the stone does look very much like a palaeolithic idol after all.<br /><br />And now what’s the relation between a stone, clouds and rainbows?<br /><br />I have deep Celtic roots which explain why this stone means so much to me… besides the fact that this chunk of granite was found so deep in the ground, a place where it did not belong to. Something that my Celtic forebears from the “Montagne Noire” would have liked so much. I remember old people from my village pointing their forefinger towards the laden skies: “Children, be careful, the sky is going to fall over our heads”, in a most sepulchral tone. Were we scared? Not really but weren’t we all somehow “Chicken Little” at one point of our young lives!<br /><br />I live in Brittany, another Celtic “Mecca”, and because my house overlooks the ocean, I spend a lot of time watching the sea and the sky. Not because I fear it’s going to fall. But simply because the sky in Brittany is breathtaking from sunrise to sunset… And do not get me started on talking about the Milky Way at night! <br /><br />There are places in the world where you open your eyes in the morning and you know the sky will be blue from morning till night. Not a cloud. The sun shines all day long. So boring!<br /><br />The sun shines all day long in Brittany too. It does. It has to from a scientific point of view, if I may say so. But some days you only see it from time to time or not at all. In Brittany we have a saying: “The weather is fine at least several times a day.” We use it to convince our friends that living in Brittany is not too much of a hardship actually.<br /><br />Before I start ranting about our cloudy skies, let me make clear that I am not about to give a lecture about clouds. Wikipedia does this a thousand times better than I ever would. I won’t even try to post pictures of specific clouds, because tonight this is not my point. I just want to share with you our Breton skies when one lives by the sea. Most of the time, they look like scenery for a movie filled with magnificence, enchantment, sumptuousness, grandeur and drama of course. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Whenever we don’t wake up surrounded with fleeting wisps of mist coming up from the sea, our blue sky is never totally clear. Translucide clouds leisurely float away (a “vaporous mass” in meteorological vocabulary). And the sky looks like a crisscross of plane tracks. Our Breton skies are filled with evanescent aerial freeways… all day long!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Then the clouds may get more powerful. There are strong winds in Brittany. Clouds move away and then they come back stronger and more intrusive, not necessarily rain-bearing, and very often in strata, in very closely spaced layers, almost in 3-D.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most of the time cloudy skies do not mean that it will rain. Do you see the blue streaks here and there. Sunny weather may not be this far away! The wind blows and sweeps the clouds out. But they will come back because above the sea, the air mass is very unstable. (Listen to the meteorologist!)<br /><br />And they can get very impressive…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even sunsets are cloudy, some so cloudy that the sun is barely discernable. And then there are days when clouds bring out a fiery sundown.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What about sunrise? In my area, the sun rises over the fields (east) and the clouds over the sea (west) take on a delightful pink hue.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Beautiful, I know but does it rain in Brittany? Will those clouds end up being useful besides being a delight to the eyes?<br /><br />They do. They do. It rains a lot in Brittany. One has to learn to live with/under the rain. I enjoy sunny days but in the summer, one look at my garden and I wish it’d rain more often… Brittany is a very important agricultural area in France. Farmland needs rain.<br /><br />And I need to talk about rain clouds if I am to write my story about the most incredibly strange rainbow I have ever seen in my life. <br /><br />So don’t worry, it rains in Brittany. And rain clouds can be glorious too. The sky never looks dreary, at least not where I live! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fascinating how you get to see the waves of rain coming before they are actually going to come down on you!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Stormy weather is often backed up with the most wondrous luminosity. Storms coming from the ocean are usually extremely violent with high winds. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The sun is shining again after the rain. This fact is very well-known, isn’t it?<br />In Brittany like everywhere else, the stopping of the rain and the return of the sun may give birth to a very beautiful phenomenon: a rainbow. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have watched hundreds of rainbows in Brittany, like this one. They appear quickly and then they fade away so gently. Lovely rainbows.<br /><br />We arrived at Les Tertres on Friday. It was raining. On Saturday morning, we woke up at dawn which is not extraordinary actually since the sun rises around 8 a.m. nowadays. Eastwards, there was the most fiery sunrise at the end of our garden, over the fields. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">Westwards, the sky was a little bit cloudy, hazy, I’d say, over the sea. No rain at all. Not yet! It was still quite dark though besides the reddish glow from the rising sun over the clouds.<br /><br />And then on our right, half a rainbow appeared, arising from the horizon, right from the ocean. Really. One half of a rainbow, taking shape determinedly. A slice of rainbow. Not enough time to run upstairs to grab my camera. My phone would have to do!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"> A few minutes later, its other very incomplete half appeared over the hill on our left. Not as strong though. Almost dull, probably because the sun-bathed clouds below had this glimmering orange glow.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At that point, we were standing outside on the terrace facing the sea.<br /><br />And this incredible thing happened, right in front of us. The two halves tentatively met for a very ephemeral moment. On the right a double rainbow appeared, so faint that it looked quite ghostly… </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Then the rainbow fanned out, complete with a dantesque setting of sulphurous clouds and dark slats.<br /> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One gigantic fan which did not fade away as usual. It simply vanished in a few minutes. Behind us, the sun was still flaring up but not for long. Very dark rain clouds were sweeping into the sky.<br /><br />Then dolphins appeared from nowhere, energetically fishing right below our house. About fifty of them. They had probably been there from the beginning but we were too mesmerized by the rainbow. We only noticed them a few minutes before they moved away, still giving chase to a school of fish. <br /><br />It looked like rain and it rained all day long! I love Brittany.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span></div>
Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-11202603683175748422016-09-27T21:58:00.001+02:002016-09-27T21:58:51.949+02:00Picture of the Day - Mammodouy's Pictures<br />
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sXSmZumKEhc/V-rKUAGjG3I/AAAAAAAAEnU/IHpl4_cn7C40cIVmPK0FMh95b_RXZq1mACLcB/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-09-27%2Bat%2B21.36.00.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="163" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sXSmZumKEhc/V-rKUAGjG3I/AAAAAAAAEnU/IHpl4_cn7C40cIVmPK0FMh95b_RXZq1mACLcB/s640/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-09-27%2Bat%2B21.36.00.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">My faithful readers have noticed that I have become a very erratic writer. It is becoming harder and harder for me to write on a regular basis even though I am still full of imagination. Ideas keep buzzing through my head and then the humdrum routine of everyday life overrides my literary and artsy longings. <br /><br />One cause may be that my life has become rather complicated those past two years. I travel a lot more and I move around a lot for many reasons I won’t dwell upon. It’s rather boring! The funny backwash being that sometimes, I feel I am turning into a suitcase. Does a suitcase write stories? No, it does not. But since I am not really turning into a suitcase either, there must be another reason for my obvious lack of work.<br /><br /> This is when and where I have to acknowledge one major failing. I am a born procrastinator. There are tons of real and irrelevant and certainly always useless things to do that freeze me up! <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2010/05/procrastination-im-so-good-at-it.html">I have written a post about this. Enjoy!</a><br /><br />On the other hand and because life is never all right nor all wrong, I also happen to loose my grip on writing regularly because I get most of my ideas from things I see, places I go to and pictures I take and when things and places and pictures get too plentiful, my willingness to write (and maybe my brain too) tend to slacken off as if my thoughts were caught in a traffic jam… <br /><br />I end up spending a lot of time gazing at clouds, smelling flowers, watching the sea or the passers-by, enjoying life with the greatest intellectual laziness and of course, picking a book which I will read from cover to cover with great joy and then a second one and… and… and days go by. Sometimes I even forget there is a world where I do enjoy using words of my own and telling stories.<br /><br />In June 2014, I wrote a post I called : <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2014/06/writing-interview-mammodouys-way.html">“Writing Interview - Mammodouy’s Way”. </a>It still is very relevant. <br /><br />Mid 2015, I decided to get a very professional website besides my professional website. A website that would allow me to combine my two blogs - <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.com/">“The Storyteller” </a>and “<a href="http://mammodouypictures.blogspot.com/">Mammodouy’s Pictures</a>” which most of you are not even aware of plus a couple of “serious” writing projects.<br /><br />I got in touch with a web designer. A woman. We got along just fine until November 12 when we exchanged our last mails. I had sent her important information she needed sorely. She had answered me immediately, telling me that progress on my website would go very fast from then on and that she’d get in touch with me, before the end of the following week, so that we’d meet for a follow-up as soon as possible.<br /><br />For those of you who don’t really keep track of dates, the following night was the night of the terror attacks on restaurants and the Bataclan. November 13, 2015.<br /><br />My web designer kept silent from that day on. I am pretty sure that she did not die on the 13th of November because the government issued a list of the names of the victims several weeks later. But there was no list of the wounded, of course. No list of people who had lost their loved ones or of people who were suffering from PTSD, for obvious reasons. <br /><br />I know I should get in touch with her company. At first, there was the shock, even if I wrote that I was not feeling hatred and that I was not afraid, I now realize that I spent a few months totally shell-shocked. Time went by with no news from her, maybe for the same reasons that distress me… And now it is getting harder and harder to get on the phone. I feel numb.<br /><br />All this to explain why from time to time, one of my posts from the “Storyteller” blog will be called “Picture of the day”. You’ll find under this title the picture posted that day in “Mammodouy’s Pictures”. I encourage you to go look at it in the blog itself because the settings there are much nicely fit for pictures than in a blog dedicated to stories! And the picture will be much bigger!<br /><br />I published many pictures in that blog, starting in August 2010 till now. They are pictures I really like but that I don’t think I’ll ever exhibit. Except that life is always full of surprises. One of them will make its way to the Grand Palais in Paris in February 2017. <br /><br />But this is another story…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">Here is my "Picture of the Day" (yester-day actually...) - "<i>Could This Be Africa Floating Away from Table Bay, South Africa?</i>" </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">A few words about this picture - Last March, I was on top of Table Mountain, in Cape Town, South Africa. It was windy and rather cloudy. I was looking at Robben Island in the distance and all of a sudden I spotted the shadow of a cloud on the ocean below. The cloud itself was banal. Just a cloud already frayed by the wind. But this shadow into the light became priceless... Short-lived and yet such a symbol...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"> </span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-33569486399879229462016-09-23T19:23:00.000+02:002016-09-23T21:49:27.818+02:00My Travel Book - A Sudden Gust of Wind Blew Us up to Cape Point, South Africa<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9pSy5WdR-k0/V-VXTpJTxPI/AAAAAAAAEkA/cl3sP7X9jdoIdMB921zbqxVE158oYJZvgCK4B/s1600/Cape%2BPoint.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="270" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9pSy5WdR-k0/V-VXTpJTxPI/AAAAAAAAEkA/cl3sP7X9jdoIdMB921zbqxVE158oYJZvgCK4B/s400/Cape%2BPoint.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">After spending some time at the Cape of Good Hope and taking tons of pictures, don’t forget to drive to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Point">Cape Point</a>! This huge peninsula stretches forcefully into the Ocean and is much more impressive than the Cape of Good Hope since its ragged cliffs are towering about 200m above the sea. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Didn’t I tell you how grand it must be to reach the Cape by sea?<br /><br />Once again we never did go by boat. But Swee’Pea looks pretty happy anyway even if this trip probably was his umpteenth time there… and even though he’s carrying one of my camera cases, the heaviest one, of course!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Tourists aim at reaching the “old” lighthouse. People like Swee’Pea and his friends will hike from the Cape of Good Hope and will walk even further than this lighthouse. They will trek around Cape Point, all the way down to the “new” lighthouse and back up again… One day of hard trekking!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Besides trekking, there are two solutions to get up there. If you are in a hurry or not feeling like walking, hop aboard the “Flying Dutchman”* (and make sure you do not loose your return ticket… they are not very understanding up there and you’ll end up walking down which is quite worse than to walk up there). </span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6Xk7LTAEXlU/V-Vb1VDKriI/AAAAAAAAEko/KVIn_g7qMvMXnltxzxcZOzvlghJJ_mQbwCK4B/s1600/4.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="426" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6Xk7LTAEXlU/V-Vb1VDKriI/AAAAAAAAEko/KVIn_g7qMvMXnltxzxcZOzvlghJJ_mQbwCK4B/s640/4.jpg" width="640" /> </a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The second solution consists in walking all the way to the lighthouse. There is a rather easy path, very steep indeed with lots and lots of stairways but where you can rest from time to time. Mainly you get to enjoy one of the most magnificent and breathtaking view ever. The whole way!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Once you get to the lighthouse, you’ll have literally to brace yourself against the wind. Its strength is really, really impressive. And I’ve also seen people getting very dizzy there. Not funny because they still have to go down.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This lighthouse built in 1855 is no longer used. Its light was either seen too early which meant that captains would navigate too close to the coast or it would become invisible behind the fog and the clouds that tend to float at a very high level there. <br /><br />In 1911, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Lusitania">SS Lusitania</a>, a Portuguese liner (not to be confused with the British liner RMS Lusitania which was torpedoed and sunk in 1915 by a German U-Boat) was lost at sea because of the mist hiding the lighthouse.<br /><br />Consequently a new lighthouse was built on Cape Point, much lower and much more powerful. Actually the most powerful lighthouse in South Africa.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Swee’Pea and his friends told me it’s a lot of fun to hike down to this lighthouse. I never did. So I had to rely on Wikipedia to show you what it really looks like. But I know that my "inquiring mind" will drive me to do the trek one of these days! <br /><br />While I am not a great hiker, I love birds. I spend so much time in Brittany that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cormorant">cormorants</a> are part of my life. It is always interesting to watch them fly very close to the sea surface and then dive into the water to catch a fish. Afterwards they spend a lot of time on a rock, spreading out their wings to get dry.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On Cape Point, the cliffs are so rugged that the winds and the waves have created furrows where colonies of cormorants nest during the breeding season which happens more or less from October till December in the Southern Hemisphere.<br /> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />In Brittany, a cormorant’s life is very easy. At Cape Point, it’s a steadfast fight. Whoever is not sitting on the egg has to go fishing… to feed its partner and a few weeks later the young.<br /><br />From our point of view, this should be very easy, shouldn’t it? You go fishing, meaning that you dive down to the sea level, you fly for a while over the water, see a fish which you grab and then you fly back to the nest, not even feeling overloaded since you have swallowed your catch. You’ll only have to regurgitate the fish once you get back to your nest.<br /><br />Actually a cormorant’s life is not this easy after all at the tip of Africa. The winds are fierce there. Airstreams are quite forceful.<br /><br />We spent quite a long time watching them, not even feeling entertained by their efforts some people might have considered as antics. Truly feeling a lot of empathy. Swee’Pea and me, we have weathered heavy storms those past few years and it was truly gripping to watch how those rather “small” birds (as compared to the hugeness of the settings) were able to land wherever they wanted to after so many vain attempts most of the time. So many landing bids! And then success!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">They leave the cliff, fly over the sea, defying the waves and the eddies until they get to a calmer area where they fish.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> This one was on his way back and ended up being tossed like a rag doll by some airstream. It simply let itself fall down again, flew back again, fell down again and again and again and managed to land by its nest, exactly by it. Probably exhausted but still able to feed its partner since he had kept the fish safely in its throat.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This one fought hard too and managed to land but by the wrong nest, in the wrong furrow actually. It looked dismayed (yes, it really did) and flew away again, turned around, tried a new approach. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A fourth attempt later, it did land at the right place. Looking a little bit ruffled up, feathers wise, I mean. But home.<br /><br />We eventually had to leave and go back to Cape Town.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Paris was so far away but who cared!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I was so happy. Imagine… One of my oldest dreams fulfilled! And so many more opening to me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*The “Flying Dutchman” refers to the legend of the said galleon captained by a Dutchman, Hendrik van der Decken. In 1647, the Flying Dutchman was going back to Holland when she got close to the Cape of Great Hope. There was a sudden and very violent storm which ripped the sails. The crew was terrified even though the captain had rounded the Cape many times before. They asked him to turn back. Van der Decken refused, lashed himself to the wheel and swore he’d sail around anyway even if it’d take him till Doomsday. <br /><br />Ever since 1647, many mariners have sighted a ghostly sailing ship around the Cape. She glows red in the night and is steered by a mad captain. Her sailors get into rowboats to deliver letters to be sent home to their families. Those who accept those letters are never to be seen again.<br /><br />*This legend won international and everlasting fame thanks to Richard Wagner who wrote an opera in 1843 about it and called it… “The Flying Dutchman”! Except that the Flying Dutchman no longer rounds the Cape but sails on the North Sea, by Norway! (What a shame!)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night* </span></div>
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Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-16952689080857035822016-09-17T16:19:00.000+02:002016-09-20T12:11:34.500+02:00My Travel Book - Time-Out but Still in South Africa on Our Way to the Cape of Good Hope<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I am sorry I left you behind on Boulders Beach for so long. Huge time gap. Time-out. There are times when life takes strange bends. For a long time, I was very busy negotiating a few of them but all is well that ends well. Here I am again, ready to take you along on my journeys to South Africa or elsewhere.<br /><br />I hope you did not feel too stranded on Boulders Beach and that you had brought along earplugs. Penguins are hard to live with, aren’t they? Braying little jackasses!<br /><br />Well, well, we were driving to the Cape of Good Hope and we were running late… in October 2014, two years ago. Two years to travel from Simon’s Town to Cape Point - a 15 minutes drive in practice! <br /><br />“I am late! I am late!”… but seriously now…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One should only approach the Cape of Good Hope by sea. Unfortunately, it’s done by land most of the time. On second thought, I am pretty sure that I would hate to brave the foaming sea, the breakers and the reef where so many boats were ripped apart.<br /><br />In November 2014, our flight back to Paris happened to be our captain’s very last flight. He was thus allowed to fly at a very low altitude over this amazing Cape of Good Hope, gliding over the whole area so slowly that all the passengers were speechless until the plane turned around and back towards its faraway destination, Paris. And then clapping broke out.<br /><br />Going to the Cape by land is very spellbinding too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Some days you may even be greeted by baboons at the main entrance. They look very sweet and funny but don’t be fooled. They are cunning. They are looking for food and they will literally jump at the opportunity to find some in your car if you are careless and open your window even for a few seconds. And they bite hard, very hard!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Once you pass the main gate, you are on your way to the Cape of Good Hope and its counterpart, Cape Point. The scenery is exceptional, unparalleled and magnificent.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Before you get to the entrance of the highly protected part which is called “Cape of Good Hope - Table Mountain National Park”, you will drive through some more barren scenery, some of it sometimes bearing the marks of wildfire. You may be lucky enough to spot ostriches, antelopes and baboons. We did. Not every time though but never forget that the Cape is not a zoo. It is a wildlife sanctuary. Animals move around.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There you are. The entrance to the National Park. Most of the time, not this empty. But worth waiting for a while… when there is a long line of stranded cars there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The scenery changes drastically. The vegetation looks more abundant, luxuriant even. Of course the colours vary from Summer to Winter and in-between. This is what’s magical about the Cape. It never looks colourless nor bleak the way our European landscapes do, right after Fall or before Spring. I missed the full bloom though. One day maybe! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Do not expect trees there. Not even bushes. Fierce sea winds sweep across the Cape area all year long and dwarf the vegetation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">On your way to the Cape, you may notice a huge white cross. It is the Gama cross, erected by the Portuguese government to commemorate Vasco da Gama who was the first explorer to make landfall on the African coast, on November 4, 1497. There is a second one called the Dias cross in honor of Bartolomeu Dias who discovered the Cape of Good Hope in May 1488 and the passage from Europe to India. Gama and Dias crosses are navigational beacons. When aligned, they indicate the position of a rock called the “White Rock”, a terrible shipping hazard in False Bay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Incidentally, Dias encountered storms so violent there that he named the cape he was seeing from his boat, “The Cape of Storms” (Cabo das Tormentas). A little bit scary but very real in May, a wintery month in the Southern Hemisphere. Who would have liked to navigate around the “Cape of Storms”?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">John II, king of Portugal, renamed it the “Cape of Good Hope” (“Cabo da Boa Esperança”). Merely because navigating around this cape meant hope for opening a new trade route to India and the Far East.<br /><br />Keep on driving and get ready to face and maybe brave the Cape of Good Hope… Because even on dry land, you’ll come up against raging winds as soon as you step out of your car.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There it is. Not very impressive though, at least from this view point. This is the most south-western point of the African continent. The southern tip being Cape Agulhas, 170 kms south-east of Cape Town, the real divide between the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There is a footpath to trek up to Cape Point from the Cape of Good Hope. Next time probably…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This sign attracts tourists from all over the world. In March 2016, there were two buses there: one filled with French tourists and another one filled with Chinese, all of them competing to get their picture taken as close to the sign as they could and preferably by themselves… </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One of them won the whole sign for himself but not for long! And then they left. I did not really miss watching their absurd behaviour. We enjoyed the peacefulness… Thoroughly. Including the waves that were playing around a colony of seals… (Bad contre-jour shot, I know… You’ll have to believe me. There were a lot of seals enjoying the rollers while resting on the main rock.) </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span></div>
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Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-16659871882464077892016-06-30T01:13:00.004+02:002016-06-30T01:13:58.347+02:00Not a Stranger - Part Two<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">On Sunday morning, we got up quite early. H. was cheerful. She knew she was on her way back to India. We only hoped that everything would be all right and that she’d be able to fly home.<br /><br />It was very hard to get to the airport. Roissy was and remained under lockdown for a long time, or what seemed to be a very long time. Nothing very serious actually - a couple of “forgotten” suitcases that the army had to blow up. Such a routine operation. Except that we still had to buy a ticket for H. and get her through all those unpleasant check-ins we all have to go through nowadays.<br /><br />We bought her ticket without any problem. The flight was not full.<br /> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The next thing was to get her through check-in. She was getting very tired and bewildered and a little bit frightened by the crowd around her. She had to go to the check-in desk on her own. Could we leave H. on her own? She was not very keen to go to the check-in desk by herself. She was grabbing my arm from time to time. Roissy had definitely been a terrible experience for her.</span></span><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Security was very tight at Roissy. Our president had
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">This was where and when Popeye’s Air France status card came very handy. And the “mathematician-from-India-who-has-spent-two-days-totally-lost-and-forgotten-in-Roissy-and-who-is-extremely-under-stress-and-now-wants-to-go-home-very-badly”. Wonders did not cease. The “card” and the “mathematician stuff” got H. AND Popeye priority access to the closest check-in counter. No luggage. Great. I was standing back, waiting for them. No need to push our luck. Popeye made it through to a place where no one is ever allowed to be without a ticket. He made it. I waited.<br /><br />By then time was running short because of the bomb scare. We still had to get H. through the passport check.<br /><br />Popeye used his card again to get her through the priority line. There were hundreds of (angry) people around trying to use this priority line because the airport had remained under lockdown for a long time and there was only one hostess to check the cards and the tickets before allowing their holders to go through priority or not. She was very patient and extremely firm. “The other line, please. Thank you.” <br /><br />Once more I stayed behind and let Popeye do the talking. With his card but no plane ticket, dragging H. along with her plane ticket but no card, he managed to get her on her way to the police and passport checkpoint. He did not go far though. A woman from security stopped them before they arrived to the booth. No ticket. No entry. And the card was of no use. The “mathematician” stuff did not seem to work. H. had to go on her own. She did not look very happy but she walked away. Then the woman from security shrugged, turned back and walked with her to the checkpoint. We were waiting very anxiously. What would happen there?<br /><br />The woman talked a couple of minutes with the policeman, then she turned around and motioned to Popeye to catch up with them. And she came back to her post. From where I was, I could see Popeye and H. She had already handed her passport to the policeman and Popeye looked like he arguing. Long minutes went by. He was still there talking and talking and then he was holding her passport. He gave it back to her and patted her shoulder, talked to her again and then she went through, through to the unknown, to a place where Popeye could not go, not anymore. She was on her way to her departure lounge.<br /><br />Popeye walked back towards me, looking very tired and depressed. “Well, this could have been a real disaster. Expired visa. The guy wanted to send her to a detention center until her embassy got in touch with them and sorted the visa problem. And then deportation after a few days in detention. I argued with him and I won. I finally got him to understand that after all she was very different from an illegal immigrant. She did not want to stay in France. She wanted to go home. Expired visa or not. I had quite a hard time to get this message through but the guy finally agreed with me and… oh well, he waved her through.”<br /><br />And it hit us hard. What if she did not find her departure lounge and got lost again?<br /><br />We almost ran back to the Air France desk where we had bought her ticket. A stewardess was there. Once more, the card and the mathematician stuff in a hurry this time because passengers to Mumbai were already boarding and the flight was scheduled on time. We begged her to go to the departure lounge and make sure that H. was really getting on board of the plane bound to Mumbai. And then maybe she could let us know that everything was all-right.<br /><br />The stewardess said no. “No, no and no. There are strict rules and the desk cannot interfere with the people in charge of boarding passengers. And it is totally forbidden to let strangers know if someone is on board of a plane. And… and… and.”<br /><br />We probably looked so miserable that she said: “Wait for me here. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” And she left.<br /><br />We waited and waited. Boarding was over and we were still waiting, still very worried and getting depressed. The stewardess would never come back and we’d hear from Niruj that H. was not on the plane in Mumbai and… and… <br /><br />And there she was, the stewardess with a big smile on her face: “Your friend will be in Mumbai on time. That is all I can tell you.”<br /><br />I could have kissed her but I didn’t. We thanked her profusely and shook hands instead. And we left. <br /><br />We sent a new message to Niruj whom we had been constantly in touch with, all morning long. “Flight AF… Mumbai 00h05 local time tonight. We got confirmation she’s on it.” He then called M. to let him know.<br /><br />A few long hours later, M. was at the airport and drove his sister home. A few days later she was admitted to an hospital where she stayed for a few months. Now she’s out. On medication. She should be getting back to her life as a mathematician. Hopefully for good.<br /><br />A few days after all this happened, Niruj said: “This would be an incredible story for you to write, wouldn’t it?” And I said: “I don’t think I’ll ever write anything about H. Too personal and harrowing.”<br /><br />And then it all came back when M. told me what his friend had written about us. This was very, very kind indeed but a little bit extreme as far as I was concerned. <br /><br />Because now it is the right time to thank all the people at Roissy who helped us so much - several stewardesses, quite a few people in charge of security and one policeman, all of them perfect strangers who offered us a helping hand, most of the time going the extra mile so that H. would go back home safely. Strangers helping strangers... </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span></div>
Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-76154802802748285592016-06-28T17:34:00.000+02:002016-06-28T17:42:08.952+02:00Not a Stranger - Part One<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Today, this message from a very faraway country: “A close friend… asked me to convey… [his] most sincere regards… I would like to share what he wrote: ‘What they did for a person who was a perfect stranger, restores my faith in humanity.’”<br /><br />The story is strange and moving indeed. What happened was very sad and stressful, especially for "the perfect stranger" but I never felt like we had done something quite so special as to restore someone's faith in humanity. I still don't feel this way and this is the reason why I have to tell the story the way it happened.<br /><br />Those of you who have been reading my blog for a long time already know <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2010/06/my-indian-friend-with-bag-of-spices-in.html">Niruj, our Indian friend</a>. He has been back to India for quite a long time now but our friendship endures and we keep in touch. A lot.<br /><br />On the 9th of January, late in the evening, I received a message from him: “Need to chat urgently… help needed for friend and can’t get hold of ‘sp’”. We got on Skype instantly.<br /><br />“My friend M. received a mail from his sister two days ago from Roissy. She has missed her flight back to Mumbai and he hasn’t heard from her again. She’s somewhere at the airport without any money and no ticket. And oh, she is sick. He’s been in touch with the embassy but there isn’t much they can do. Can you call the airport and try to check on her?”<br /><br />Luckily we were spending the week-end in Paris.<br /><br />Call the airport? Popeye and I know that no one ever calls Roissy to check on a lost passenger, especially on one who has been lost for the past two days. If you want to help, you have to go there and start looking for a needle in a haystack, several haystacks actually besides the fact that we had never met H.<br /><br />We left at once. While we were on our way to Roissy, Niruj phoned his friend asking for pictures of his sister which he sent us immediately through WhatsApp. Plus more information about the airline she was supposed to fly with, which was great because we knew at least which terminal we’d go to first.<br /><br />Actually this story is also all about modern technology… linking people from faraway places in a split-second. Mobile phones, Skype, WhatsApp. Sending pictures and documents using mobile data. From India to France.<br /><br />We learnt that H. was a brilliant mathematician, about fifty years old, that she had been invited to Paris to attend a conference and that she was suffering from a mental illness with a possible worsened condition since she had most certainly stopped taking her medication while in France. <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A "beautiful mind" lost in Roissy. </span><br /><br />Very stressful. We had thought that it might be a good idea to involve the police at the airport to help us find H. and now we knew that this would be utterly impossible. If they found her before we did, she would end up in a hospital in France and we had already made up our mind. She had to go back home and be with her family. We had to find her on our own. We had no idea how but we were very willing to give it a try.<br /><br />We finally got to the Roissy air terminal where we thought she was most likely to be and we started looking for her, phone in hand with her picture. We walked up and down the terminal, once, twice, three times. Lots of women asleep but no H. in sight.<br /><br />Why not ask an airport hostess to issue a call for H. asking her to meet us at the information counter? We were a little bit worried about the way the woman would react to our very unusual request. We explained that we were looking for our friend from India who was lost in Roissy ever since she had missed her flight. Because we know that people usually think that astronomers are awesome, we decided to mention that H. was a mathematician. The woman smiled and said: “Mathematicians are not like us, I imagine and so now she’s lost. Poor thing. I am going to make that call and we’ll find her.”<br /><br />(This mathematician thing was so useful that we used it shamelessly until H. was safe and sound on her way to Mumbai.)<br /><br />Except that when we showed her H.’s name, she just simply couldn’t pronounce it. We had to call Niruj again to teach her how to pronounce it correctly. Totally surreal. She did make the call. She even did it twice after fighting with her boss. “Only once. Only once.” We kept waiting for H. for quite a long time and she never showed up.<br /><br />We still were at the information booth when we called Niruj. “We are so sorry but we have to go to the police now.” I turned around towards Popeye, feeling very helpless and sad. Behind Popeye, there was a row of seats. On one of those seats, a woman had curled herself up. We were not having visions. We had found H. Unbelievable but true. <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">T</span>here she was at last! <br /><br />As soon as I got close to her, she opened her eyes. She was frightened, so frightened, ready to bolt actually. I smiled and said: “Hello, H. Do you remember Niruj? He is your brother’s friend and we are Niruj’s friends.” She had such a terrified look in her eyes that I sat down not very far from her, put my hand on her arm and called Niruj, once more. “Please talk to her, ok. Tell her that she has to come with us, that she is safe now.”<br /><br />He worked wonders. She gave me my phone back, looked at me and smiled: “Are you going to take me to your home?”<br /><br />I have to admit that our initial plan before we got to Roissy was to find H., take her to a hotel for the night and then drive her back to the airport the following morning to get a ticket to fly back home.<br /><br />But H. looked so exhausted, helpless and so lost that we answered with one voice: “Yes, we are going home.”<br /><br />It took us less than one hour to get home. The ride was strange. She told us a lot of very odd stories about her stay in France. Then from time to time she was making sense for a few minutes and then she’d get lost again. She asked me a lot of questions too. Most of them about the meaning of life.<br /><br />Popeye and I knew how to react. One of our friends’ son is very bright and bipolar. As soon he stops being on medication which happens a lot, he goes through a new crisis and he uses the same dialectics. It is impressively logical in a way which is not our way at all and you simply have to adapt to a different world. <br /><br />Once at the apartment, I did not have much food to offer since our plan had been to go to the restaurant, before Niruj’s call, that is. Thanks to Swee’Pea being in Paris at the time but not that night, it was vegetarian food. She was famished. I don’t know how long she had been without food but she told us that she had managed to sleep in the toilet area while she was lost in Roissy. She took a much needed shower, and borrowed a nightgown from me. You see, no luggage. How she had managed not to loose her passport is still a mystery.<br /><br />Popeye started looking for a flight to get her home as soon as possible. We found a direct flight with Air France, the following morning, quite early. Getting her on an Air France flight was a great idea anyway because of Popeye’s Air France flying status (after travelling all over the world for so long). This was to be a great help at Roissy, the following day. We could not buy the ticket on line (too close to departure, I imagine). This would have to wait until morning at Roissy but we knew that there were still seats available on the flight. <br /><br />H. went to bed at once. She was exhausted but very happy. We called Niruj and sent a mail to her brother who had gotten in touch with us right after Niruj had talked to her. A human chain from Paris to India and back around H.<br /><br />And we went to bed. The night would be short and we were a little bit worried about what might happen in the morning at Roissy.<br /><br />“The perfect stranger” no longer was a stranger!<br /><br />(To be continued)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night* </span></span></div>
Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-17047710759428628112015-12-02T18:05:00.000+01:002015-12-02T18:05:50.711+01:00My Travel Book - The Western Cape (South Africa) - Simon's Town and Penguins on Boulders Beach<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is an easy way to go from Cape Town and from Muizenberg to Simon’s Town. You can get there by train. Using the Southern Rail Line Route, you’ll travel along the coast which is very beautiful. Of course, <a href="http://www.capemetrorail.co.za/">reading the safety instructions on the train website </a>will probably put a lot of tourists off. Just remember that these instructions apply to any place in South Africa. Be careful and your travel will be very enjoyable.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We chose to go by car since the trains don’t run to Cape Point, the terminus being Simon’s Town. We wanted to drive through Simon’s Town on our way to Boulders Beach and from there, to the Cape of Good Hope.</span><br />
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<br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One or two words about Simon’s Town. As usual, it was named after a former Dutch governor, Simon van der Stel who arrived in the colony in 1679 and decided that False Bay would be a much safer alternative to the Cape Bay during winter. Its Afrikaans name is Simonstadt. For the past two centuries, it has been an important naval base, first for the Royal Navy and then for the South African Navy as early as 1922.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Victorian buildings in Simon’s Town have been very well preserved, at least along St George’s Street and quite amazing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />There is a “Historical Mile” just like in Muizenberg but we were in a hurry and we were famished. We stopped at the Seaforth Restaurant mainly because it has a very convenient outside deck which overhangs the sea and offers a beautiful view of the False Bay mountains. And… the icing on the cake… there they were, my first penguins... Just don't forget to turn onto "Gay Road".</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Facing the restaurant, there is this huge building which is the South African Institute for Maritime Technology. Read institute for defense research “to satisfy South African MoD strategic needs for techno-military support, products and services and to establish applicable technology and systems to further the interest of the SANDF.” A very serious place to work indeed but since you are in South Africa, lunch break turns into beach time which can be a real perk, I think. Quite a few people there do not hesitate to don swimming suits and plunge into the water while others take a walk along the beach. Nice, isn’t it!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I couldn’t wait to get to Boulders Beach which is a very beautiful place. Guess why it is called "Boulders Beach"!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The reason why I couldn't wait... Because this is the place where one couple of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_penguin">African penguins</a> decided to settle down some time in 1983. The area was already highly inhabited by humans but the penguins took up residence there anyway and the colony expanded. Now they are very protected and to watch them you need to follow a wooden walkway. But first you have to pay an entrance fee (60 rands. About 4 dollars or euros). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are rangers all over the place in order to insure the birds’ security . And the tourists’ safety also, by the way. Penguins are known to nip intruders and they have razor-sharp beaks. And this can be a disagreeable experience, I have been told.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">African penguins are an endangered species. There were millions of them when the Dutch settled in the Cape area in 1652, and still millions of them in the 1930s. Less than a century later, there are only about 1.200 mating pairs left. Why? Well, you know, always the same problems more or less. Pollution and oil spills. Dwindling fishing ressources due to climate change and industrial fishing. Nesting in a rather unsafe environment even if they are protected from the tourists, they are not protected from mongoose, genets nor cats and dogs and kelp gulls too, of course.<br /> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those penguins are rather small and far less good-looking than their Antartic counterparts, the Emperor Penguins. Probably because they do not belong to the same species. The Emperor Penguins are Spheniscidae (and are called “Manchots” in French) while the African Penguins are Alcidae. They used to be nicknamed “Jackass” penguins because they are rather noisy and kind of bray, a lot like donkeys even when they are young, believe me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of course, they are fun to watch. They waddle along but as soon as they hit the water edge, they turn into sea missiles, sort of. They can swim as fast as 7 kms/hour. They usually go fishing way off from their colony and therefore they are very vulnerable to predators like sharks, Cape fur seals and sometimes killer whales.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">In October when we were in Boulders, it was moulting season which is not really the best time to watch them. Someone said that they look sad and depressed… How would you feel if you were to loose your feathers and worse if you were fasting for two months? Because this is what moulting is all about, starvation. Penguins do not swim out to the open sea to feed while they are moulting. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was hard to leave Boulders which is a magnificent place and the penguins. But remember, we were on our way to a place I had dreamed about for a long, long time… The Cape of Good Hope. And we were running late…<br /></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-19568770238687362502015-11-21T14:20:00.002+01:002015-11-21T14:21:10.691+01:00"This Morning..." <br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This
morning, the sun is shining over Paris. Blue skies. Spring-like
weather. It feels definitely strange, abnormal even. It should be dark
and raining, shouldn’t it? Because our hearts are heavy and in despair.
Because we are all grieving, seriously grieving.<br /><br />Popeye and I had
planned to spend this week-end in Paris staying at Swee’Pea’s apartment
since Niruj, our friend from India (and Swee’Pea’s) would be in Paris.
I had missed him so much for several years that I was really looking
forward to meeting him again.<br /><br />On Friday night, Popeye and I
decided not to go out for dinner and stay home instead. We were
expecting a message from Swee’Pea who was on his way to Montreal. We
were peacefully reading on the couch.<br /><br />My phone rang around 10:30
p.m. SP from Boston airport. Which was very strange and could only spell
trouble. We mainly communicate through WhatsApp messages and Skype if
we need to talk. <br /><br />“Mom,” he said. “I am at the airport waiting
for my plane. I am watching CNN right now. Horrible things are happening
in Paris right in the Oberkampf area.”<br /><br />We don’t watch tv and the
district where we were staying is quite far away from the 10th and the
11th districts where hell was breaking loose, unknown to us. We were in a
very quiet area. We only started hearing the sirens of the ambulances
that were bringing a lot of casualties from the Bataclan to the nearby
hospital around 1 a.m. And by then we knew a lot about what had happened
even though we did not fully grasp the extent of the devastation we
would awaken to.<br /><br />While I was talking with my son who was really
worried about his friends in Paris (some of them live right where the
attacks were happening), I started getting messages from Niruj. “saw the
news? attacks in Paris… am seeing the news in a bar .. sounds really
grave”<br /><br />We turned the radio on. The newsmen were so confused that
it was very hard to understand what was going on. There were talks about
shootings and explosions and the President being ‘exfiltrated’ from the
Stade de France where he was attending a football game. They then
started having those “man on the street” interviews. “Well, no, I did
not see anything. I heard firecrackers and my neighbour said…” You know,
those highly emotional and mainly false accounts they are keen to use
to stay on the air just in case…<br /><br />So we turned the radio off and turned our computers on, browsing hopefully reliable newspapers websites. <br /><br />What
we were reading was terrible. And the accounts were still quite
incomplete of course. But it sounded so horrible. Last January, when
terror hit Paris twice, almost all of us in France became “Charlie” and
we did believe this would never happen again. Not in Paris.<br /><br />Of
course it had happened again and again in Irak and Lebanon and
Afghanistan and Syria of course but it all seemed so far away and in
such unstable places that French people kept feeling safe in Paris
because it is so easy to live blindfolded. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />But
we did keep busy arguing about refugees who were fleeing from the very
dark forces that would attack and try to destroy our very complacent
quietude a few days/weeks/months later. Becaus<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">e it was <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">so much eas<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ier</span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">for so many peop<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">le in Europe to turn against innocent victims than to think that one day, monsters were <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">amongst us, as European as <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">we are<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">, born <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">in Europe and raised and schooled in Europe. European citizens.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span><br /><br /><i>Early
last night, someone tweeted that it only took a few hours of mayhem in
Paris to get us to start understanding why thousands of refugees were
willing to jump aboard an inflatable dinghy and risk their lives to live
safely.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i> </i><br />I am not even sure that this is going to happen. A story
was already going around as early as Saturday morning. A kamikaze had
supposedly lost his passport which had supposedly been issued to one of
the refugees in Greece. This may be true or untrue. They tend to think
right now that the passport was stolen. Anyway, who is going to remember
what Gandhi said about the dirty drop in the ocean? <br /><br />“You must
not loose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the
ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”<br /><br />But in
France, voices are already being heard asking for refugees to be sent
back to Syria or elsewhere. Right at the moment when we should feel a
lot of empathy because suddenly we feel pain and hurt and it is ghastly.
You know, feeling insecure and in peril. <br /><br />Yesterday, Paris was
totally empty. Vacant. Everything was closed. The news were still quite
imprecise. State of emergency had been solemly declared. Fear and ache
were so tangible and yet it was still so unreal. You hear that Paris is
under heavy fire and that there are a few casualties and during the
night (nobody slept much last night), you learn that there are at least
129 dead plus more than 300 wounded persons, 99 of them between life and
death, all of them because they had been shot.<br /><br />I know that
numbers do not mean much when read out of context. I read a post today
written by a famous American travel agent who was trying to convince his
countrymen that it would be safe to travel to Europe anyway since in
the States, some 30.000 people die every year (just about 100 persons by
day) because of gun violence. (I am brief there…)<br /><br />The very high
death toll on French roads cannot be compared to what happened on Friday
night. My brother died in a car accident with a very, very high
alcohol level in the blood. People whose family members and friends
died last night while they were peacefully dining out or listening to a
concert won’t most certainly mourn them the way I grieved.<br /><br />Because
whenever I travel by car, I hope that I won’t meet with some drunk
driver who felt perfectly fine to take the wheel like my brother did.
Even though he was the only casualty. <br /><br />We are talking about
accidental deaths which should be treated like manslaughter. In the
States, there are a lot of first-degree and second-degree murders
because of guns.<br /><br />On Friday night in Paris, it was terrorism at
work. Ugly and deadly terrorism. People shot at random, not even because
of religious bigotry (Muslims killing non-believers. Because a few
faithful Muslims were also killed at random that night). People shot at
random because this kind of shooting is aimed at creating terror, hence
the terms used to define the killers: they were first and foremost
terrorists.<br /><br />I still remember Paris in 1982 and 1983 and 1986 and
1995. Sometimes up to 6 terrorist bombings in one month. This was truly
terrifying. We all kept on living rather normally because first there
was no other choice for Parisians and second there was only one way to
fight terrorism: we refused consciously and maybe sometimes
unconsciously to show that we were afraid. At least we tried to. We were
probably showing off mostly but it was very effective.<br /><br />The
hardest thing was hearing on the radio that a bomb had exploded
somewhere you knew that one of your friends might have been during the
day. There were no social networks then. We did not have cell phones
either. I remember calling my friends: “Oh, great. You’re home. You
allright? Your family?” And then life started anew again until the next
bombing.<br /><br />Last night Facebook was overflowing with messages. <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Lots</span> were filled with pain and sorrow. <br /><br />We
have been warned that there may be replicas. Brussels too is under
siege now since a few terrorists lived there before going on the rampage
in Paris. The Belgian police has made quite a few arrests today and we
know that there are nests of potentially dangerous fundamentalists in
Brussels. This is where we’ll be heading tomorrow morning. Then we’ll be
back to Paris because Popeye has meetings there and I need to go to the
hospital. And then back to Brussels by train and back to Paris again,
etc. Life must go on.<br /><br />We have to keep living normally, at least
the Parisians who came out of this terror rather unharmed. I mean, those
who haven’t lost friends or family members. Those who haven’t been
hurt. Those who haven’t lived through those horrible moments when their
life was plunged into chaos and terror just because they happened to be
at the wrong place at the wrong time (except that it was totally the
right place and the right time until the terrorists arrived).</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We
have to keep on living normally on their behalf. Yesterday, we went to
the restaurant with our friend as planned. We were "happy" because it
was full of people. Parisians were indeed showing they were not afraid. <br /><br />Well, maybe a little bit though. Cafés were totally empty outside but chairs and tables had been put up there as usual. <br /><br />Anyway, don’t we keep flying all over the world when terrorists keep blowing planes up?<br /><br />All
my life I’ve been impressed by the Londoners’ tremendous courage during
the “Blitz” (the Battle of Britain). The way they kept on working and
living and loving while their homes were bombed at random and their
neighbours, friends and loved ones were buried beneath the ruins.<br /><br />Were Churchill still alive, he’d say again: “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.”</span></span><br />
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Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-73638181169153574842015-11-15T21:43:00.003+01:002015-11-21T14:28:41.354+01:00This Morning...<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This morning, the sun is shining over Paris. Blue skies. Spring-like weather. It feels definitely strange, abnormal even. It should be dark and raining, shouldn’t it? Because our hearts are heavy and in despair. Because we are all grieving, seriously grieving.<br /><br />Popeye and I had planned to spend this week-end in Paris staying at Swee’Pea’s apartment since Niruj, our friend from India (and Swee’Pea’s) would be in Paris. I had missed him so much for several years that I was really looking forward to meeting him again.<br /><br />On Friday night, Popeye and I decided not to go out for dinner and stay home instead. We were expecting a message from Swee’Pea who was on his way to Montreal. We were peacefully reading on the couch.<br /><br />My phone rang around 10:30 p.m. SP from Boston airport. Which was very strange and could only spell trouble. We mainly communicate through WhatsApp messages and Skype if we need to talk. <br /><br />“Mom,” he said. “I am at the airport waiting for my plane. I am watching CNN right now. Horrible things are happening in Paris right in the Oberkampf area.”<br /><br />We don’t watch tv and the district where we were staying is quite far away from the 10th and the 11th districts where hell was breaking loose, unknown to us. We were in a very quiet area. We only started hearing the sirens of the ambulances that were bringing a lot of casualties from the Bataclan to the nearby hospital around 1 a.m. And by then we knew a lot about what had happened even though we did not fully grasp the extent of the devastation we would awaken to.<br /><br />While I was talking with my son who was really worried about his friends in Paris (some of them live right where the attacks were happening), I started getting messages from Niruj. “saw the news? attacks in Paris… am seeing the news in a bar .. sounds really grave”<br /><br />We turned the radio on. The newsmen were so confused that it was very hard to understand what was going on. There were talks about shootings and explosions and the President being ‘exfiltrated’ from the Stade de France where he was attending a football game. They then started having those “man on the street” interviews. “Well, no, I did not see anything. I heard firecrackers and my neighbour said…” You know, those highly emotional and mainly false accounts they are keen to use to stay on the air just in case…<br /><br />So we turned the radio off and turned our computers on, browsing hopefully reliable newspapers websites. <br /><br />What we were reading was terrible. And the accounts were still quite incomplete of course. But it sounded so horrible. Last January, when terror hit Paris twice, almost all of us in France became “Charlie” and we did believe this would never happen again. Not in Paris.<br /><br />Of course it had happened again and again in Irak and Lebanon and Afghanistan and Syria of course but it all seemed so far away and in such unstable places that French people kept feeling safe in Paris because it is so easy to live blindfolded. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br />But we did keep busy arguing about refugees who were fleeing from the very dark forces that would attack and try to destroy our very complacent quietude a few days/weeks/months later. Becaus<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">e it was <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">so much eas<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ier</span> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">for so many peop<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">le in Europe to turn against innocent victims than to think that one day, monsters were <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">amongst us, as European as <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">we are<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">, born <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">in Europe and raised and schooled in Europe. European citizens.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span><br /><br /><i>Early last night, someone tweeted that it only took a few hours of mayhem in Paris to get us to start understanding why thousands of refugees were willing to jump aboard an inflatable dinghy and risk their lives to live safely.</i><br />I am not even sure that this is going to happen. A story was already going around as early as Saturday morning. A kamikaze had supposedly lost his passport which had supposedly been issued to one of the refugees in Greece. This may be true or untrue. They tend to think right now that the passport was stolen. Anyway, who is going to remember what Gandhi said about the dirty drop in the ocean? <br /><br />“You must not loose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”<br /><br />But in France, voices are already being heard asking for refugees to be sent back to Syria or elsewhere. Right at the moment when we should feel a lot of empathy because suddenly we feel pain and hurt and it is ghastly. You know, feeling insecure and in peril. <br /><br />Yesterday, Paris was totally empty. Vacant. Everything was closed. The news were still quite imprecise. State of emergency had been solemly declared. Fear and ache were so tangible and yet it was still so unreal. You hear that Paris is under heavy fire and that there are a few casualties and during the night (nobody slept much last night), you learn that there are at least 129 dead plus more than 300 wounded persons, 99 of them between life and death, all of them because they had been shot.<br /><br />I know that numbers do not mean much when read out of context. I read a post today written by a famous American travel agent who was trying to convince his countrymen that it would be safe to travel to Europe anyway since in the States, some 30.000 people die every year (just about 100 persons by day) because of gun violence. (I am brief there…)<br /><br />The very high death toll on French roads cannot be compared to what happened on Friday night. My brother died in a car accident with a very, very high alcohol level in the blood. People whose family members and friends died last night while they were peacefully dining out or listening to a concert won’t most certainly mourn them the way I grieved.<br /><br />Because whenever I travel by car, I hope that I won’t meet with some drunk driver who felt perfectly fine to take the wheel like my brother did. Even though he was the only casualty. <br /><br />We are talking about accidental deaths which should be treated like manslaughter. In the States, there are a lot of first-degree and second-degree murders because of guns.<br /><br />On Friday night in Paris, it was terrorism at work. Ugly and deadly terrorism. People shot at random, not even because of religious bigotry (Muslims killing non-believers. Because a few faithful Muslims were also killed at random that night). People shot at random because this kind of shooting is aimed at creating terror, hence the terms used to define the killers: they were first and foremost terrorists.<br /><br />I still remember Paris in 1982 and 1983 and 1986 and 1995. Sometimes up to 6 terrorist bombings in one month. This was truly terrifying. We all kept on living rather normally because first there was no other choice for Parisians and second there was only one way to fight terrorism: we refused consciously and maybe sometimes unconsciously to show that we were afraid. At least we tried to. We were probably showing off mostly but it was very effective.<br /><br />The hardest thing was hearing on the radio that a bomb had exploded somewhere you knew that one of your friends might have been during the day. There were no social networks then. We did not have cell phones either. I remember calling my friends: “Oh, great. You’re home. You allright? Your family?” And then life started anew again until the next bombing.<br /><br />Last night Facebook was overflowing with messages. <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Lots</span> were filled with pain and sorrow. <br /><br />We have been warned that there may be replicas. Brussels too is under siege now since a few terrorists lived there before going on the rampage in Paris. The Belgian police has made quite a few arrests today and we know that there are nests of potentially dangerous fundamentalists in Brussels. This is where we’ll be heading tomorrow morning. Then we’ll be back to Paris because Popeye has meetings there and I need to go to the hospital. And then back to Brussels by train and back to Paris again, etc. Life must go on.<br /><br />We have to keep living normally, at least the Parisians who came out of this terror rather unharmed. I mean, those who haven’t lost friends or family members. Those who haven’t been hurt. Those who haven’t lived through those horrible moments when their life was plunged into chaos and terror just because they happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time (except that it was totally the right place and the right time until the terrorists arrived).</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We have to keep on living normally on their behalf. Yesterday, we went to the restaurant with our friend as planned. We were "happy" because it was full of people. Parisians were indeed showing they were not afraid. <br /><br />Well, maybe a little bit though. Cafés were totally empty outside but chairs and tables had been put up there as usual. <br /><br />Anyway, don’t we keep flying all over the world when terrorists keep blowing planes up?<br /><br />All my life I’ve been impressed by the Londoners’ tremendous courage during the “Blitz” (the Battle of Britain). The way they kept on working and living and loving while their homes were bombed at random and their neighbours, friends and loved ones were buried beneath the ruins.<br /><br />Were Churchill still alive, he’d say again: “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night* </span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-3212705353139606272015-11-13T10:19:00.000+01:002015-11-13T10:22:06.747+01:00My Travel Book - The Western Cape (South Africa) - Fire? Let's Go Surfing in Muizenberg!<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Our third morning in Cape Town. <br /><br />We had spent the day before mainly assessing the condition of Swee’Pea’s appartment at Sea Point. Not really fit to live in yet. We had aired it and brought sheets and stuff to the cleaners. Not that they were dirty. A bit smelly and damp as could be expected after such a long absence and a vacant appartment by the seaside, all winter long. (Remember? Cape Town is in the southern hemisphere.)<br /><br />As I got up to draw the drapes, I was feeling very excited since this was the morning we had chosen to go to Cape Point. We had spent a long time planning the day. We were to start having breakfast at a place called Hout Bay. I had been dreaming about this small café by the beach ever since Swee’Pea had sent us a picture of him and his friend Sebastian looking very happy facing a huge breakfast spread out on a white wooden table and looking at an incredibly beautiful bay.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">It was quite early. What was this brownish cloud right in front of my eyes? Getting stronger by the minute. I am a Southerner and I am used to fires. I also knew that fires are quite common in South Africa, especially around Cape Town. The only puzzling thing was the lack of reddish glow, sure sign of flames.<br /><br />I called Swee’Pea. “Fire,” I said. I imagine this woke him up quite swiftly. And then : “Not at all. Mom, this is fog coming up from the sea.”<br /><br />“Fog?”<br /><br />“Yup. Change of plans. We get breakfast at the hotel because we’ll have to go to Cape Point using the other road, across to False Bay, the one we were supposed to travel on on our way back to Cape Town. Sorry. No breakfast at Hout Bay.”<br /><br />Breakfast at Hout Bay was to become a family joke. Because we tried three times to get breakfast there… Oh well!<br /><br />Actually, this is one of the reasons why I like the Western Cape so much. Not missing having breakfast in Hout Bay but because just like in Brittany, you have to adapt to atmospheric conditions without hesitating and enjoy your day to the fullest no matter what. <br /><br />We had (some great) breakfast at the hotel and we left. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The fog was extremely dense for a while but it would probably clear out in the afternoon. And we drove towards False Bay. First stop: Muizenberg on our way to Cape Point.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">False Bay is a strange name for a beautiful and huge bay, isn’t it. Those were times without Google Maps nor GPS system. No kidding. Who would nowadays mistake Cape Point for Cape Hangklip (“Hang-ing Rock” in Dutch)? Cape Hangklip being called Cabo Falso in Portuguese and False Cape in English… So easy then to call the bay in-between “False Bay” i.e. not being Table Bay which the sailors were trying to reach rather desperately sometimes!<br /><br />As soon as we moved away from the seaside, the fog disappeared. Blue and sunny skies. Amazing. Great landscapes.<br /><br />We did arrive on the other side of the Cape, by the sea. False Bay and Muizenberg (spelled mew-zin-burg). (From Sergeant Muys ("mouse") who was one of the earliest postholders. Hence the name Muys Zijn Bergh - Muys' mountain.)<br /><br />I had heard so much about Muizenberg from Swee’Pea. We’d call him on a Sunday morning and he’d say: “Sorry. I’m leaving in two minutes. I’m going to Muizenberg. Surfing with some friends. I'll call you when I get back. Bye!”<br /><br />I only learnt about the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_white_shark">Great Whites</a> much later. I can’t remember how. Swee’Pea probably mentioned one day that there were watchers at Muizenberg so it was really safe to go surfing there.<br /><br />“Watchers? What for?” (In metropolitan France, you get watchers on the beaches to check on the swimmers.)<br />“Shark watchers, Mom, for… white sharks.”<br /><br />Great! Well he surfed there a lot with a lot of friends… and he’s still alive. So are his friends who still keep on surfing in Muizenberg.<br /><br />I was eager to go to Muizenberg. I am not too much into surfing but I wanted to see the beach, 20 kms long (more than twice as long as our beach in Brittany) and probably much more beautiful because of the mountains and steep cliffs that surround it.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I loved the stunning beach. White sands. Beautiful waves. Interesting brightly colored beach huts that reminded me so much of the Netherlands, except that they looked a little bit more battered… Sorry.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But when we got there, there was a flag waving in the wind. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A black flag with a white shark outline. “Well,” said Swee’Pea. “Murky waters. This means that they won’t see the sharks coming.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“But…” There were surfers everywhere. People swimming. “Did you go surfing whenever there was a…?” Sometimes I am such a fool. Surfing is a lot about adrenalin. So imagine with sharks probably lurking about! </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Well, I’ve never seen a green flag here. Never ever.” <br /><br />I did not even ask whether they went surfing anyway when the red flag was on.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Muizenberg looks quite run-down though and a perfect home for surfers! <br /><br />Nowadays it is hard to imagine the once very elegant beach surroundings when Agatha Christie came to surf there in the 1920s. Yes. Agatha Christie used to surf in Muizenberg. I wonder if in those times, there were watchers and sirens wailing whenever a shark was spotted. But let’s not forget that Muizenberg <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">is</span> supposedly the birthplace of surfing in South Africa. A Mecca for surfers.<br /><br />I missed a lot in<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muizenberg"> Muizenberg</a> though. We were in a hurry. Precious time lost because of the fog. So I did not get to walk along what is called the Historical Mile with the Posthuys (1673), the Casa Labia (1930) and Rhodes’ Cottage Museum. “We’ll be back,” said Swee’Pea.<br /><br />But since <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2013/01/my-son-never-was-astrologer-he-is.html">my son is an astronomer</a> well-versed in scientific outreach, I did not miss the <a href="https://www.aims.ac.za/">AIMS</a> (African Institute for Mathematical Sciences) which is a very important African center for education and research in mathematical sciences.<br /><br />We left Muizenberg with no regrets even though Swee’Pea had mixed feelings about not being able to go surfing, I’m sure… <br /><br />Our next stop was to be Simon’s Town, home to the South African Navy and African penguins. <br /><br />Guess what I was awaiting with keen anticipation…</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-57324545991339449862015-10-22T13:59:00.002+02:002015-10-22T14:00:01.893+02:00My Travel Book - Cape Town, Love at First Sight<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It just so happens that for many reasons, I have been feeling terribly homesick lately. Homesick? What for? I am back from Brittany and I am quite happy to travel back and forth between Paris and Brussels. So what’s going on?<br /><br /><a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/search/label/South%20Africa">One year ago almost to the day</a>, Swee’Pea and I flew to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa">South Africa</a>. We landed in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Town">Cape Town</a> on the 19th of October around 10 a.m. in the morning. After a twelve hours flight, direct from Paris.<br /><br />We had booked two rooms at the <a href="http://www.belmond.com/mount-nelson-hotel-cape-town/">Belmont Mount Nelson Hotel</a>. “A very secure place,” Swee’Pea had said since our initial plans were to split upon arrival. I’d stay at the hotel for a few days while he’d go back to his apartment. The reason was evident. He had lent it to several friends while he was in France and he had not been there since the end of May so he had no idea whether or not it’d be fit for me. All right, I tend to be finicky!<br /><br />And then we changed plans. Both of us would be staying at the hotel for as long as it would take to get the apartment ready. And we decided to spend at least a couple of days there just enjoying Cape Town without worrying about clean sheets, food and stuff like that. <br /><br />Actually I have no idea how long it took us to get back to the apartment and settle there. Probably from 4 to 5 days. We went to the apartment almost right away though because we needed to get the car. The Discovery was very sweet and started up first time. After so many months in its garage, this was a real miracle. Old car but nice nature.<br /> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But let’s go back to our check-in in the hotel. We had been upgraded. So nice. They walked us to my suite - ladies first and wow, this is what I saw from my bedroom balcony!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.tablemountainnationalpark.org/">Table Mountain</a>. And I think this was the very minute I fell in love, hopelessly in love with Cape Town. Which really was a nice opening for the rest of our voyage. Love at first sight in Cape Town which grew into a very profound feeling towards South Africa.<br /><br />I don’t know what I had expected. I had read books and watched documentaries. But there it was. Powerful. Monumental. Majestic. Hieratic. Of course this was where the God Tsui used to live before the Portuguese arrived.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And then, on the right, Lion’s Head which I still have to hike. Not enough time besides the fact that Swee’Pea was a little bit worried about me getting tired. I want so much to see the <a href="http://www.cape-hike.co.za/fynbos/">Fynbos</a> there. South African flora is so extremely beautiful and varied. <br /><br />Speaking about tired, my first foray into Cape Town started like this… before we had lunch.<br /><br />“Let’s go take a walk around,” I said. <br />“Really, mom? Aren’t you feeling tired?” was the answer which became a leitmotiv throughout all our stay. I never felt tired in Cape Town and South Africa. I guess that I probably made my son’s life some kind of misery! I was always willing to move around… One day of rest and I’d feel like I’d be missing the most important thing ever… <br /><br />Even though he proved to be a very good guide after all.<br /> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mount Nelson Hotel is right where a hotel should be — in the heart of the historical center. And right by the wonderful <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company's_Garden">Company’s Garden</a>. <br /><br />And this was where I wanted to start exploring Cape Town.<br /><br />One word about the Company’s Garden. It was created by Jan van Riebeek in 1652 because the Dutch settlers needed fresh produce for the ships. A vegetable garden which was slowly converted into a renowned botanical garden in the 18th century, thus enabling the Dutch settlers to export bulbs, etc. to Europe.<br /><br />And it is right by the hotel. How could I miss such an opportunity? Off we went. It was not a long walk after all. Swee’Pea kept providing me with names and names of buildings. I was trying hard to be all ears and yet I was only half listening because of the sounds and the scents and the people and the flora and the animal life. <br /><br />It was so different and surprising that I did not take many pictures then. I kind of tried to immerse myself in the Garden. Imagine a park filled with city workers and high school students lunching and resting there and hundreds of pigeons and squirrels fighting over crumbs. </span><br />
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exotic flowers, gigantic trees. Sculptures and historical buildings.
Fountains and Egyptian geese. Such a vibrant and yet so peaceful place.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With such a wonderful view of Table Mountain.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />I was flabbergasted and enthralled. I felt so perfectly safe there. And we were. I went back there several times, sometimes on my own and never ever felt any hostility nor aggressiveness there. Even with my expensive professional camera dangling on my chest. (Johannesburg will be another altogether different experience but this is another story.)<br /><br />I always felt at ease in Cape Town. I knew there were obvious things not to be done. Which more or less applies to Paris, Brussels and New York, etc.<br /><br />On our way back to the hotel, Swee’Pea set up rules when he realized that I’d be kind of getting out of control because of my euphoric state of mind… </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Always be on the look out. Good! (Paris, Brussels, New York, what’s the difference?) Accept never to take a walk alone after sundown! (I wouldn’t even do that in Brussels anyway.) No staring at people (which is something I may do a lot but only with a picture in mind). Ok, so no to staring at people. (I learnt to look at people on the sly… Not too hard since I already do that in Paris, while riding in the subway.)<br /><br />And I was told especially not to stare at Blacks. Why should I be staring at Blacks? Oh my God, I had forgotten that in South Africa, people are legally defined by their origins… and you talk about people as belonging to a group: Blacks, Whites, <a href="ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coloured">Coloureds</a> and Asians (Indians). Quite hard to stomach for someone like me who tend to be color blind, but this is again another story. So I promised. When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Except that whenever I would feel like staring at an outstanding human, it still would be hard for me to make a difference.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And night fell quite early.<br /><br />Tomorrow was to be another day. But I already knew that parting from the Cape Town area would be very painful.<br /></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-85270666260186294362015-10-06T19:11:00.001+02:002015-10-06T19:11:58.568+02:00Going Back to School or Going Back Home?<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It all started again with the picture of the Canal du Midi my friend Carol published on Facebook. Memories emerged from way back in my life and they kept on pouring from my mind or wherever they were hiding.<br /><br />Pictures are sometimes fearsome. The role they play in my life is boundless.<br /><br />In 2011, Popeye offered me <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/08/my-birthday-surprise-carcassonne.html">a wonderful birthday gift</a>. He flew with me back to Southern France - Carcassonne and <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/09/my-birthday-surprise-chapter-two-going.html">Arfons</a> and Lastours and quite a few other places in Languedoc. The trip triggered a lot of memories and I harvested so many pictures that I think I could write a novel. Well, probably not.<br /><br />The summer before last, Swee’Pea and I went back to Southern France again. We needed to find someone <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2012/07/mending-wall.html">to mend our wall</a> in <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/10/arfons-slow-death-of-my-village.html">Arfons</a>. We had also decided to stop in Saissac on our way back from Arfons to Carcassonne and visit my mother since we had not seen her for a long time. (The visit ended in a fiasco and no pictures were taken which can be attributed to that.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We travelled by train from Paris to Béziers where we rented a car and then proceeded to Arfons. On our way, we went through Capestang where I had spent my first school year. Leaving the village, Swee’Pea noticed a road sign. Montels, 4 kms. He said: “This must be the village where you lived while you were going to school in Capestang. Let’s go. I’ve never been there.”<br /><br />Honestly, I did not really wish to go back there but what can you do to put a damper on a young man’s enthusiasm? Or was it my idea after all, on the spur of the moment? I am not really sure now.<br /><br />Anyway, we drove to Montels on the same road I had walked on every school day on my way back from school. From junior high school in Capestang to the Montels elementary school, the one where we were living in since my mother was the teacher there.<br /><br />My life has revolved around schools for a long time. <br /><br />I still remember living in Normandy in a very small cabin, a gift from the American government to the village which had been heavily bombed and had lost its elementary school for girls. We lived there in two rooms (two adults and three children plus my <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2010/10/my-best-picture-ever.html">Bonne-Maman</a> whenever she came to help us). There was a bigger room where my mother taught school, which we used as a living room and where the children would sleep as soon as school was over. This was a few years after the war. My sister and my brother were born there.<br /><br />Then we moved into a much bigger and brand new house by the new school when my brother turned one and I was seven. There wasn’t much privacy. The house was really close to the school, less than ten meters away in some sort of a compound. At that time I was mainly homeschooled, most of the time on my own… Funny for a headmistress’ daughter. Life was very complicated, I guess.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Then my parents’s relationships went from bad to worse and my mother decided to move back to Southern France. She was transferred to a very small school, in a tiny hamlet, Montels. One school and a few houses. 20 kms from the city (Béziers) and 4 kms from the nearest village, Capestang.<br /><br />She had been the headmistress of a three classes school in a big village in Normandy.<br /><br />In Montels, they had reopened the school because that year, there would be 6 children from 4 to 11 years old (including my sister and my brother) in the hamlet. Two children spoke only Spanish. I remember my mother really felt demoted instead of relishing in the challenge. Besides the fact that we were free from our father’s violence.<br /><br />For me, this all turned out to be a happy year. I was going to school for the first time. I loved the new experience. I developped an extremely good relationship with all the teachers. For the first and last time in my life, I did not have any trouble fitting into the system. I did not make a lot of friends there since I was not living in Capestang. But the kids in my class, boys and girls alike, were nice with me even though I was from 2 to 3 years younger than most of them. <br /><br />The school in Montels was a derelict old house. Nobody had lived there ever since 1940, I think. There was no bathroom. No running water either. One sink. And no heating system besides a huge fireplace in the living room. We did have electricity though! And I had my own bedroom.<br /><br />Getting water from the public pump was quite a harrowing experience. The wheel was huge and water would only get to the faucet after the wheel had revolved at least five times. I remember the village women would queue to get water at about the same time. They were mostly Spanish refugees. You only needed to energize the wheel once… So there always was one very unlucky woman to start the process! And afterwards, we’d talk a lot, mixing gleefully French and Spanish.<br /><br />Once again, I was the youngest one. There were only a couple of boys my age in the hamlet and there was not even one teenager there.<br /><br />The house was in a sorry state, gloomy and very moist inside. I remember that my mother kept the footboards of our beds dipped into deep bowls of water to prevent small and rather dark scorpions from getting into our bedding. Every morning, we’d shake off our slippers and shoes and clothes… and one or several scorpions would run away… We had a big bucket outside filled with water where we’d throw the scorpions as soon as we caught them! It was fun… and not fun…<br /><br />Mice and spiders have never bothered me very much as I grew up!<br /><br />The road was still the same. But the hamlet has grown into a small village with brand new houses, all of them with swimming pools. The school and its surroundings still look quite neglected though.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I expected a surge of emotions but I felt ok. Almost as if I had never belonged there… However memories came back quite easily.<br /><br />There have been a few changes ever since we had left Montels, never to come back, in 1959.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The two gates are still there. One wonders. Why two gates for such a small school? When we arrived there in 1958, the school had been closed for more than fifteen years. Before and even after WWII, boys and girls were not supposed to mix at school. In Normandy, there were two separate public schools. One for the boys and one for the girls.</span><br />
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<br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In Montels, there never were enough pupils to have two schools. The playground was divided in two by low railings. Boys and girls would enter the school through two different gates, left and right and then they would get into the schoolroom through two different corridors. Then they would sit on their designated side of the room, one for the boys and the other one for the girls. No mixing of the sexes, you see. Even though the curriculum was exactly the same.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The school boasted a sign that said “coeducational school” since they could not have two different buildings after all. <br /><br />When my mother arrived in Montels (before we did), she had a meeting with the mayor, I think or whoever had authority over the school and she asked for the railings to be removed. The discussion was extremely stormy, she said. The man had gone to school there and he just couldn’t see the point of allowing boys and girls to mix anyway. But she finally won. <br /><br />At the start of the new school year, the railings had been removed. And on the first schoolday, she opened one gate. Only one. The children went in together. All this fuss was pretty incredible when you realize that there were only one girl and three boys coming from the hamlet since my sister and brother were living in the school building.<br /><br />They also went in the classroom through the same door, the left one. My mother had barred the door on the right since it also opened onto our private stairway. Which gave us some privacy, after all.<br /><br />At first, parents looked worried but since they were really too busy to come and look for them after school, the boys and the girl would walk back together to their homes. My mother’s decision never had disastrous consequences for us since all year long and almost every morning, we found fruits, vegetables and even sometimes small game (plucked and flayed) on our doorstep. Anonymous but nice.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The school still looks more or less the way it was 55 years ago. Two gates. Two doors. There are a few changes though. On the left, a small building has been built above what used to be a wall and a door has been opened up, probably to accomodate a teacher. And on the right, a very tiny public library has replaced one of the small covered playgrounds. <br /><br />Our old living quarters above the classroom looked totally forsaken. I wondered if someone else has ever lived there since our departure. People moved away from Montels after we did. There were no children there once more. They closed the school.</span><br />
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<br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since there are now 229 people living in Montels, there are most certainly several young children who go to school there again. The classroom windows and doors look new and they have decorated the covered playground with a most awful fresco! So weird!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nobody was there. We decided to have a look around. I was afraid the door to the garden would be locked. It was not and obviously someone had kind of tried to break in a while ago into the building. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was very surprised by the size of the garden. It looked so small. I remembered a huge fig tree and several pomegranate trees because we gorged with their very exotic fruits. In 1958, it was just like being in the Jungle Book, minus the wild animals. Well, we were ten, six and four years old!<br />In 2014, it looked like a sad and small litter tray.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I stood looking at the backdoor for the longest time. Behind this door, there used to be a huge bookcase, from floor to ceiling. I had never seen anything like it before. And it was totally filled with books, dozens and dozens of old bound volumes. Dusty, smelly and mouldy books. Lovely books.<br /><br />I became a bookworm in Montels. No friends around and so many books at my entire disposal. They were all there. So many great authors from the past, from Homer and Victor Hugo to Jules Verne, Alexandre Dumas and Pierre Loti and Charles Dickens and Lewis Carroll and so many others who broadened my mind and probably triggered this unquenchable thirst of learning and reading I have felt all my life. <br /><br />I would like to know who has built up this incredible reservoir of knowledge nobody ever used for ages until a ten years old girl discovered it. And why? <br /><br />I wonder if the books have been kept safe after we left. Could I have found them in that tiny village library in the schoolyard? I’ll never know but I hope they are still there.<br /><br />My mother was promoted, the following year. Besides the fact that they had to close the school once more. We moved to Béziers. A big city with a public high school for girls and a public high school for boys. No kidding!<br /><br />My parents were back together, alas. And my troubled school years were only beginning but I could care less. I had discovered a new endless treasure trove: the town library!<br /><br />Good bye, Montels and the school I never went to but which I called home for one whole year.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span><br />
<br />Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4926741499062285039.post-72592062582410819192015-10-05T16:07:00.003+02:002015-10-05T16:07:47.787+02:00The "Canal du Midi" and Yours Truly<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I spent a few hours on a weird emotional low after coming upon this picture my friend Carol posted on Facebook. Why should a Facebook picture have such an impact on me? <br /><br />Carol and her husband were on a trip down South which is something they do quite often since they bought a house not very far from where I grew up. Carol always posts a few pictures on her Facebook page to share what they see and enjoy with family and friends. I am always on the look out for her pictures because she’s got “the” eye. She really is a good photographer. (And I like her a lot too!)<br /><br />My friends were in Capestang probably walking on the towpath along the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canal_du_Midi">Canal du Midi.</a><br /><br />I gasped when I saw the picture and I couldn’t help but leave a very demonstrative comment: “Oh non! Where are all <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platanus">the plane trees</a>? I went to Junior High in Capestang. The Canal looks so forlorn now.”<br /><br />And Carol answered: “They have a fungal disease and had to be cut down. To keep their UNESCO status they have to plant more. Didn't know you went to Jr. high there!”<br /><br />The elliptical shortcut I used is quite interesting. Plane trees and Jr. high! Too many memories barreling along, I guess. I went to junior high for one year in Capestang. I was ten and this was to be my very first (official) school year but I made it to the seventh grade right away. The year spent in Capestang and Montels (where my mother was teaching school), two miles away, was <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/10/growing-up-in-arfons-southern-france-in.html">a great year for many reasons</a> and my “outdoorsy” life included long walks along the Canal. Platanus and junior high! The Canal du Midi and a much younger self.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">I’ve been living in Brittany for a long time now but I’ll never forget the Southern country roads lined up with stately plane trees, the same plane trees that protected the Canal against the sun, offering friendly shade to the barges and to the horses that towed the barges and to the men who were leading the horses.</span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Let me digress now. Thirty years ago or so, because many reckless drivers ended up dead in their cars coiled up around plane trees, some town councils decided to cut the trees down and some even replaced them with plastic trees… People kept driving madly and ended up dead anyway in ditches or in vineyards. Somehow politicians understood that the fault lied with the drivers. They stopped sacrificing trees. <br /><br />My sister had told me about <a href="http://www.replantonslecanaldumidi.fr/en/incurable-illness">the canker that was killing a lot of plane trees</a> but I had heard about some kind of vaccine. So I was not overly worried about those wonderful trees.<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now the plane trees are very sick along the Canal du Midi. In some places like in Capestang, “they” have decided to cut them down. And like Carol said, because the place trees were part of the <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/770">UNESCO deal</a>, they’ll have to replant. Meanwhile there will be stumps. And it kind of hurts.<br /><br />You see, my personal history with the Canal du Midi goes back a very long time.</span><br />
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<br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was one year old when my mother took me for a walk along what is called the “Rigole du Lampy”. (I can produce proof of what I am saying. But I don’t have the picture at hand. You’ll have to believe me!) <br /><br />(By the way, I was an early walker but that day, I probably ended up in a stroller, like any normal baby, believe me because it is a long walk.) </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The important thing is that I grew up convinced that the Canal du Midi did start its majestic life a mere 4 kms from <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/09/my-birthday-surprise-chapter-two-going.html">Arfons</a>, my grandmother’s village I wrote about. All my friends were likewise sure that the Lampy reservoir shaped like a genuine wild lake was the womb where the Canal fed itself from, so strong was our belief that the Canal was a living entity. (<a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/09/my-birthday-surprise-chapter-two-going.html">And I obviously still believed it in 2011!)</a><br /><br />Actually it does start not very far from the Lampy but not at the “Rigole”, <a href="http://www.canaldumidi.com/Montagne-Noire/Alzeau/Alzeau.php">some 20 kms away. </a>So it still belongs to the “Montagne Noire” and was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canal_du_Midi">an extraordinary achievement in France in the XVIIth century.</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of course we were told that the Canal had been built as a umbilical cord between the Mediterranean area to the Atlantic Ocean. For centuries, food and staples were transported from our sea to the ocean on barges pulled by horses until the day motorization spread across Europe including Southern France.<br /><br />Bye-bye, neighing horses and men swearing like a trooper along the towpath. Hello, chugging sounds. <br /><br />The trees were still there. The barges became scarce what with the development of rail and truck transport. But the trees remained and the Canal kept flowing slowly but surely.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Southerners are resilient. They breathed new life into the Canal. Tourism was a godsend. Nowadays tens of small barges take up the Canal, carrying their load of tourists from all over Europe.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not very far from <a href="http://mammodouy.blogspot.fr/2011/08/my-birthday-surprise-carcassonne.html">Carcassonne</a>, <a href="http://www.plan-canal-du-midi.com/details-ports/?t=TREBES-%28Port-de-Tr%C3%A9bes%29&id_port=34785">Trèbes</a>’ banks were converted into some kind of marina, one of many such places on the Canal.</span><br />
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<br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The XVIIth century locks are still useful and most of them are still operated by lock keepers.<br /><br />Hikers and riders appropriated the towpath and believe me, it is a great place to go for a hack. At least it used to be on a vey sunny day, underneath the arch of stately trees.<br /><br />The trees are disappearing. My memories are not fading away. All I need to do is close my eyes and conjure up the spirits of the plane trees of yesteryear.<br /><br />I guess I’ll keep my eyes shut for quite a long time. But I know trees and I am patient and if faith can move mountains, it also can help young trees grow again along the Canal and become just as stately as their ancestors.<br /><br />Hopefully.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*Good Luck, and Good Night*</span>Mammodouy's Storieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08292086864997652597noreply@blogger.com0