Carnaval!

Today we went to the Carnaval Marseille. (No that is not a spelling mistake, that is how you spell carnival in French.) The theme of this year’s carnival was “Extravagance”.  Anyone could entre. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. 

You can't exactly tell from the picture, but that is a dj spinnig in the glass box.

En grève et d'autres choses étranges pour les Nord-Américains

Having been here for almost six months now, we are getting used to many things like motorcycles driving into the oncoming lane to get ahead of traffic, or the fact that it always takes ten minutes to make any type of decision with a lot of hand waving and everyone contributing an opinion. There are however things that we are not yet used to and those are the subject of this blog.

The first one is strikes. The mentality around striking and “solidarity” here is so different from Canadian standards that I think labour leaders should do exchanges between France and Canada.  Perhaps this would result in some golden labour mean that would solve all of the world’s labour problems.

This is a picture of our local grocery store this morning. This is a picket line like I have never seen before. They not only all had lovely orange signs and vests, but as you can see they literally barricaded the entrance with grocery carts. Clearly no one would be crossing this picket line.

When we were preparing to come to France and when we first arrived people warned us about the frequency of strikes, but we did really appreciate how frequent they are. The thing that continues to surprise us is how everyone just shrugs them off, regardless of how inconvenient they make life. The other amazing thing is how organized strikes can be. This is a notice sent out by the public transport in Marseille. Note that this schedule was labelled as a “mild strike”. Service is reduced to various percentages depending on the line. Crazy huh?

The public transit here seems to be very active in their striking activities. Since this notice there have been at least two other strikes that we know of. We don’t know exactly why they are striking, but they are very organized about it. I must say too that their techniques work. A couple of months ago, a man waved a gun in front of a bus driver and the whole system shut down for the rest of the day. People were stranded with no time to prepare, but apparently the man who waved the gun was turned in.

Walking around on Wednesday I encountered another thing that throws me off a bit. The music. Firstly I must say that a large amount of the music on the radio here is in English, which for me is a bit disappointing. On Wednesday I was walking through a park that was hosting a kids’ day. There was a big stage for performance, games, those big inflatable bouncy castles, and music blaring over the speakers.  This all sounds like an brightly coloured family fun event, right?  Well yes in every way, except as I walked past the lyrics coming out over the speaker were something along the lines of “And now I’m F****** you, I don’t love you but I’m F****** you.”  How can parents expose their children to this? And don’t tell me they don’t know what it means. The lack of censorship on radio can be just as bad at times. I must say that my itunes includes songs with the occasional swear, and I have no problem with artists using strong language to prove a point, but I just feel unclean listen to music were every second word is a swear. What is the point?

Un Sport Civil?

So yes, as the picture indicates, we went to a car race. That’s right nature loving, granola eating Carolyn actually went to a car race. I am trying to be open to trying new things and getting outside my comfort zone, and as for a Saturday activity, watching a car race is outside of my comfortable universe by a couple of galaxies.

Now for the hard part... I’ll admit it. It wasn’t that bad. In fact it was kind of exciting at the beginning. Firstly, getting there was an adventure in itself. The route we took with our friends Pascale and Jacqueline was full of twists and turns. You know you are on an “interesting” road when it is not divided down the centre and the road is lined with trees painted with reflective stripes.  Castellet is one a plateau, so when we had finished climbing we came out to see the clouds below us. I wish I had more time to capture this image, but the some people were impatient to get to the race track.

When we turned into the facilities, my expectations were set to the standard Canadian sports venue. I expected not dirty but well used seats, bathrooms with permanent stains, and the feeling that no matter how much things are cleaned there will always be a popcorn/beer smell. Boy was I surprised. The whole facility seemed like it was brand new. The bathrooms could have been in a hotel and the inclusion or trees, grass and plants really just makes sense for an outdoor track.

 I guess the other reason my expectations were set so low was based on my limited exposure to car racing in North America. Images of people sitting on top of their RVs and big men with beer bellies, is what my understanding of racing had been up to this point. Well I can’t speak for racing in North America, but car racing here it quite the opposite. The fact that the parking lot included Ferraris, Porsches, and other cars that Keith and Pascale assured me were very very expensive demonstrates that European racing attracts a posh crowd here. Add to this the fact that most people were carrying around camera lenses that were worth at least $800 and you get an idea of why my expectations where unreasonable. It really does seem like this is a civilized sport over here.

It was interesting to see the large number of people involved in this event from people directing us to parking to all of the safety personnel and actual racing teams. Thanks to my trusty zoom lens, I was able to get a look at some of the work the teams did in preparation for the races.  

We had a picnic lunch on one of the hills overlooking a section of the track with the other spectators and enjoyed the sun. I think that Pascale and Jacqueline thought we were crazy as Keith reapplied sunscreen at lunch, and I pasted more on when taking off my sweater. Either people have no awareness of about skin cancer here, or Keith and I are just white freaks. Regardless we were able to avoid major burning and enjoy the +25 weather.

Okay so as interesting as the whole experience was by the afternoon I was getting bored. There are only so many times I can watch cars go around a track and I now have more pictures of cars on my camera than I thought possible. I did find this an interesting experience and it has burst some of my prejudices around car racing, but I would prefer a good hike or swim any other Saturday. As my attention began to wander, I started taking pictures of people in the crowd and it looks like I wasn’t the only one who was somewhat bored.

My final verdict is that I am up for trying anything new once; it expands my mind and makes me enjoy my comfort zone a bit more.

Un Peu de Soliel

So yes, as you can tell by the picture above, it is absolutely beautiful here. The mornings are still fresh and smell like spring, but by lunch time the sun is shining with the strength of a Canadian summer day. To take advantage of the wonderful weather, we went for a walk inside the twisting streets of Marseille last Saturday. There is no urban planning in Marseille, or if there is an urban planner they are one of the many bureaucrats here who has a job for life (yes that is right a job for life) and then sits around and plays solitaire on the computer all day. Regardless the fact that you can walk down a street for ten minutes and then it be completely blocked off by private residences can be fun when you are just walking around, and extremely annoying when you are trying to actually get somewhere and google maps said the street keeps going. When you come to one of these dead ends you have two choice: 1) turn around and find another way to wherever it is you want to get you or 2) Wait until the private gate to the residence opens and then try to see if there is an exit on the other side that takes you to where you are going. The fact that every apartment complex is walled in and gated makes choice number two a bit more interesting, but usually not a successful as choice number one. On our walk on Saturday we took both options at different times. The other wonderful thing about the lack of planning in this city is you can walk down what we would consider an alley in Canada and come out at the most remarkable places. A little exploring and a little adventure here in our own backyard.

By the way we walked for about four hours including numerous back tracking, stopping for pictures, and taking a lunch break... well guess who got burnt like a lobster. Yes, Keith has set a new record for the first burn of the year. March 26.

In our walk we also found this interesting house. The picture isn’t very good, but hopefully you can see the bridge for the car and people that connect the house to the road. Only in Marseille.

In addition to a bit of at home adventuring last week, I also had another immigration meeting. This one was to help me determine what my education and previous work experience qualifies me to work as in France. This meeting did give me some information in terms of searching for jobs in France, but like all of my bureaucratic encounters this one was quite memorable. Firstly, when I was finally called up to the main desk to meet my “pedagogical worker” (yes that is the literal translation of her position), she was in the throes of apologizing to someone else and explaining that she had double booked herself. Right away, I thought this is not a good sign. When I arrived in her office the disorganization was confirmed by the multiple piles of papers and the fact that she looked through them for five minutes to find my dossier. In the process of looking for my dossier, I couldn’t avoid watching this fifty something pear shaped woman in black leather pants bending over to look through piles she had on the floor. This is not a good image and as fashionable as some people are here, they really need a “What Not to Wear” France edition. She never actually did find my dossier, instead she printed a new one off and all the while I am thinking, “I have to give her all of my important documents to photocopy. She better not lose any of them!” After that, she remembered that she had to call her 96 year old mother. Really I didn’t mind this. In fact, I love eavesdropping on French conversations. It is a challenge to see how much I could understanding. 

This is where I would have rather been sitting that morning.

Now on the letter I received to invite me to this appointment it said it would take two hours. We did talk for two hours and I did get some good information and it was a bit of practice presenting my qualifications in French. In the meantime, she was taking notes and filling things out on my dossier. She also showed me a couple of websites. After two hours she said all that she had to do now was type everything up. Why she didn’t just type everything in the first place was beyond me, until she started typing with only two fingers. In the meantime I read the documents she had given me, once, twice, .... three times (and I’m reading them in French people). After half an hour of typing I pulled out my novel, which I have now realized is an essential tool necessary for surviving the French bureaucracy. There will always be a wait. After an hour of typing, and three hours of sitting in the same hard office chair, I was able to sign off on what had been discussed, retrieve my documents and head out into the fresh air of the Vieux Port.

One more meeting down, God only knows how many more to go.

P.S. Can you figure out where I touched up this photo below?

Chez Moi

As many of you know, I have been taking more intensive French classes since the beginning of February and have been realizing some of the benefits from this over the past little while. My increased ability to understand the language has made me feel much more at home here in Marseille than before.

In fact, it has also resulted in some more employment in the form of tutoring. I was able to successfully get through an interview about a month ago with an agency that matches students and tutors. I have already been tutoring a student from the university for a couple of weeks, but I will be meeting my first student from the agency on Friday. Although tutoring isn’t the same as teaching English in the classroom, I am hoping that these will be rewarding experiences which will help improve my ESL teaching skills. Regardless of how things go, all of this is a step in the right direction as I am no longer completely petrified to speak French over the phone, although it is still a HUGE challenge.

I also know that I am feeling more comfortable in the city because I have been able to drive in it and not get completely lost or frustrated. Today I was able to find my way to an interview outside of Marseille, at an international school without GPS and during morning rush hour traffic. Perhaps I am now used to the heavier level of traffic, but I it was less stressful than driving in Toronto.

As for the interview... your guess is as good as mine. But I’m sure some prayers and good karma sent my way might help the situation.

Little things like these let me know that this city is becoming more like home for me, but I must say I still miss everyone in Canada more than I can express.