Les Baux de Provence

One of my goals for this year is to really explore Provence. It has completely surpassed its reputation. It has a little of everything- there are more cute picturesque villages than you can shake a stick at, olive groves, mountains, valleys, castles, and beaches.

Last friday I visited Les Baux, one of the priettiest towns in Provence. Getting there from Aix was a little complicated. I went with two other friends. We took a train to Marseille, where we had to wait for 40 minutes before getting a train to Arles. From arles we got a bus to another small town whose name I have already forgotten. I'll have to ask the others.

The town consisted of a school, a church, 4 bakeries, and a store that sold nothing but fire extingquishers. and thats about it. We stopped at a bakery to get baguettes and asked for directions to Les Baux. It was only 4 km, easy walking distance. We ate a picnic lunch and set off again.

About ten minutes into the walk we decided to explore a path leading off to our left and stumbled upon one of the prettiest parks I have ever seen. There were large rock mounds surrounded by rosemary bushes and pine trees. We climbed several of the mounds and had a great view of the town and countryside.

It seems almost ridiculous that there are so much natural beauty here.

After that magical little detour we continued on towards Les Baux. When we started passing large fields filled with olive trees we knew we were getting close.

We reached the city about 20 minutes and several photo ops later, though we had to climb a long flight of awarkdly small stairs to get to it. Worth it. The town is small and pretty much dead since its still not tourist season, but it was obnoxiously quaint and crowned with a castle. We paid to get into the castle and picked up our free audio guide. We listened to it for about 5 minutes and then decided it would be more fun to just climb all over the hill and explore on our own.

It was like the worlds largest and oldest jungle gym. There is just enough left of the foundations and castle that, with a little imagination, you can tell what was what. We climbed down to the dungeons, played with the recreated battery ram, and crawled through the kitchen.

From what was left of the tallest tower you could see mountains, olive fields, stone cliffs, the town, and way off in the distance there was a little patch of sparkle- the sea.

After we'd warn ourselves out in the castle we head back towards the bus stop in the first small town. We had some time to kill so we stopped at a morrocan restaurant for thé à la menthe.

a bus and two trains later we were back in Aix and exhausted. I slept very well.

Bologna

Day two of the Italy trip was devoted to Bologna. Christen and I got up early and walked into town. I was so full from eating an entire pizza the night before that I didnt eat breakfast before we head out. But we passed an outdoor market on the way and after browsing through the meats and cheeses i decided i was hungry again. So we got ourselves some canoli.


when we got to old town and piazza maggriore and my jaw dropped. its a large open square surrounded by marvelous medieval buildings. There is a large bronze fountain of Neptune, a palace, the huge and unfinished bascilica Petronio Basilica, archways leading to crowded market streets, gelateries, street preformers, and we took several minutes just turning in circles in the middle of this, trying to soak it all up.


We started our city tour with the Basilica of San Domenico- according to the lonely planet guide mozart once played the organ there. Its also where the Dominican order was founded.


Then we went to the University of Bologna- the oldest university that is still operating and granting degrees, they think it was founded around 1088. famous students include Dante, Petrach, and Albrecht Durer. It was great, every inch of wall and ceiling was covered in student and professor family crests, many of which were left blank. We also checked out the universities anatomical theater. Its a large room decorated in wood carvings. There are benches surroundind a central marble table, where animals and humans were dissected.


Next up we set out for a church that supposedly combined 7 different architectural styles. We found it, but it was closed. In the meanwhile we also stumbled on a huge antique market and perused the stalls there. I found some cheap old sun glasses.
From there we went back to the main square and visited the bascilica. I think that brings our total bascilica tally to 7. Not bad for two days.
Lunch was a nice sit down restaraunt that Christens friend had recommended. We both got the special- buttery pasta with mussels and octopus. like little baby octopus with the tenticals cutely curled. Chewy. dessert- gelato. The labels were long unpronouncable italian words so i pointed to two and hoped that i hadnt just ordered cotton candy and mocha or some other weird combo. Nope, delicious. We wandered around the streets a little more. The architecture was incredible. We saw the famous two towers, which lean drunkenly over the sidewalks.
We went back to the hostel around 3:30, picked up our luggage, and went to the bus station. The minute we stepped under the bus shelter it started to rain. we turned back towards the city and no joke, there was a clear and bright rainbow arcing across the sky. a double rainbow no less. I could barely believe it. I think that trip gave me a very distorted impression of italy- I will always remember it as a perfect land of friendly people, sinful food, and magical sights.
The bus ride back was about 14 hours including stops. I managed to get a decent amount of sleep again.
We got back into aix around 7 am and I had a long cold walk home. I was actually glad to be back at cuques. one of the best parts about any trip is coming home.

Ravenna

This weekend my friend Christen and I took a night bus from Aix-en-Provence to Bologne. The bus left aix gare routiere at 10pm thurs night and arrived in bologne 11 the next morning. Yeah, it was a long ride, and not very comfortable, but i managed to get a decent amount of sleep. I came up with some creative leg formations that im pretty sure could be yoga moves. also, the bus driver corrected my pronunciation of bologne when we got on the bus ( not bah-logna, boh-logna). after that he said BOH-logna to me every time i got on or off of the bus at rest stops.

When we collected our bags from the bus belly they were rather damp and muddy. eh. we realized that we had no idea how to get to the hostel from the bus station, so we bought a map at the gas station next door and asked for directions. well, neither of us knew any italian. so we just said the street name while looking as confused as possible. they got the idea.

turns out the hostel was only a ten minutes walk away. dropped off our baggage, got train times from the front desk (they spoke english!) and went to catch a train to ravenna.

Ravenna was the seat of the byzantine empire in the 6th century but is now a small town whose only real tourist bait is byzantine mosaics. I took a class on byzantine art back at IU and studied several bascilicas in Ravenna, so I was pretty pumped to be there.

after another hour of sitting we arrived at ravenna. we got lunch, debated over whether or not to tip (you dont in france, but we had no idea for italy) and ended up leaving some change just in case.

We started with saint apollinare nuovo, a bascilica plan church with a long mosaic on each side of the central aisle. The mosaics show a procession of virgins on one side and a procession of martyrs on the other. there is also a mpsaic of the palace of theoderic. there used to be figures in the niches between the columns, but they were replaced with decorative curtains during the iconclast controversy. you can still see a disembodied hand on one of the columns though.

Then we walked to San Vitale. By far one of the most beautiful things i have ever seen. its a cross in square plan with a painted central. the paintings were beautiful, though from a much later period. lots of flowers and cherubs and trompe l'oiel. that part of the church was dimly lit, i assume for conservation reasons. the real stunner however was the apse. Every inch of the walls and ceilings were covered with mosaics. There were biblical scenes, flowers, geometric patterns, random urns and peacocks, and the famous scenes of justinian and theodora. It was like being inside of a jewelry box. I am a big fan of the byzantine gold background. I took an embarrassing amount of pictures.

Just outside of san vitale was the mausoleum of Galla Placidia. I had seen pictures of all of these mosaics, but i had never realized just how small it was. It was a much more intimate and personal beauty, the mosaics were so much closer and compact. it was almost refreshing after the overwhelming splendor of san vitale.

christen and i then walked back to the train station, getting lost and rained on en route. we got there and waited for the bus to saint apollinare in classe. we could take either the 4 or the 44. We stood at one bus stop and watched both buses pass us and stop at the round about across the street. and of course the minute we crossed the street to that bus stop the bus pulled up the stop we'd just left. so we ran back across the street and almost missed the bus a third time.

Saint apollinaire in classe was not as stunning as the others, though still impressive. large, less detailed and ornate, gold background and some very odd looking sheep. i think at this point i was getting basilica fatigue. It was still interesting to see the mosaic in person after studying pictures in class.

We ended up having to wait for awhile in the cold before the bus came. We got off at the train station and rushed to catch the 7:35 train, only to find that it didnt run on weekends. so we hung out at a café until the 8:35 train. some confusion at our transfer stop, we asked the man behind the desk for help ( again, this was just me holding up a ticket and looking confused while mis-prounouncing bah-logna) and he ended up talking politics with us. it went kind of like this:

train conductor dude: america?

us: oui (wrong language)

train guy: obama! good?

us: si (right language this time)

train guy: bush, not good!

us: si!

it was odd.

anyway we got back to bologna at ten and still hadnt had dinner, and we were too tired to walk into town in the rain. so we asked the concierge for a good pizza place and he said there was one just around the corner.

we went, and it was FANTASTIC. the prices were good, so we ordered 2 pizzas expecting small personnal pizzas. what we got were huge. one with eggplant and ricotta, the other with wild mushrooms, ham, and artichokes. complete with cute old italian waiter who gestured wildly while using his entire english vocabulary to tell us that america is big and italy is small.

i ate an entire pizza. im pretty proud.

a visitor!

Last weekend Michael, a friend from highschool, came and visited me in Aix. Michael is spending the semester studying engineering in Metz, a french city in Lorraine near the border of Luxembourg.
He arrived friday afternoon and we toured the city, before coming back to Cuques for dinner and rest. Saturday we were joined by another engineering student who was visiting a friend of mine before heading on to spain. We went into town and explored the market, where we breakfasted on free samples, then sat outside of a café. We talked and watched the vendors break down the flower market. At around 2 we caught the bus out to Monte Sainte Victoire. It took us awhile to find a real trail, and there were several faux amies, but once we got going we made good time. The day had started out sunny but was looking more and more like rain, and the wind was picking up. I wasnt too worried though. both michael and brad happen to be eagle scouts, and are therefore capable of building a several story shelter with running water using nothing but our baguette for a hammer.
The climb was cold, we couldnt even see the peak through the clouds. We stopped behind a large rock and ate a picnic (baguette and cheese, what else) while looking out over the country side. We could just make out aix in the distance.
We stretch just before the peak was tricky- the wind was unbelievable, and there was still slush and snow on the rocks. But it was worth it stand up in the clouds looking over the misted country side. We didnt stay up there long- it was freezing and the wind was fierce. We took the easy path down.
That night we ate a big pasta dinner with a bunch of americans at my friends apartment. That evening michael filled me in on all the cincy news and we revisited highschool memories.
The next morning michael and i wandered around the city a bit more, then i saw him off at the bus station.
All in all a great visit!

Also, the culinary adventures continue:
Yesterday my friend carmen and i used a friends oven to roast vegetables with olive oil and herbs de provence, and it was fantastic.
Tonight my friend laurie and christen and I had dinner together. Laurie, a local, shared a french recette with us:
Tartaflette- potatoes sliced thin with creme fraiche ( just pour it over the potatoes in a casserole dish) , thick slices of Robechon cheese, and bits if ham. Bake on high temp for about 20 mins, until potatoes are soft. It was delicious and took about 5 minutes to prepare.

This weekend I am off to Bologne!

femme de menage

One of the quirks that comes with living in the Cuques dorm is the femme de menage, or 'cleaning woman'. There is one for each pavillion. En principe, her job is to clean the bathrooms, kitchens, and hallways. but en fait these are always filthy. The other part of her job is to knock on everyones door once a day to make sure that they are either not in the room, or if they are there, that they are not dead. Apparently a few years ago a student committed suicide here and no one realized it until the body began to smell.
Our femme de menage is fantastic. She is short, wears reading glasses on a chain, teal sweatpants, pink socks with sandals, and a pink cardigan. She also smokes like a chimney. She smokes while hosing down the showers (because they dont get wet enough already?), while checking the rooms, and while sweeping the hall. You can tell where shes swept from the trail of cigarette ash.
I wasnt always such a big fan of the femme de menage. On each floor, there is a common kitchen. One of the big kitchen rule is you must take out your trash when you are dont cooking. Whenever trash is left in the kitchen you can expect to be woken up between 8 and 9 the next morning by the femme de mebage pounding on random doors and shouting 'c'est qui a laissé la poubelle dans la cuisine??' Early october, one of these morning wake up calls got ugly. The femme de menage had heard from several corsican girls on our floor that it was the Americans who had left food and trash all over the kitchen. This was NOT true, in fact we hadnt even cooked on that floor that day, and earlier that weekend i had gone in there and taken out someone elses trash and scrubbed the burner. But the femme de menage was pissed and didnt care to listen to our thickly accented explanations. Instead, she started shouting that it was always the foreigners, always the americans, who made a mess, and that we had better figure out who had done this or she would go to the director of the dorm.
Things have since settled down, and our femme de menage has been incredibly friendly the last few months. Im not sure what changed, though i suspect that it may have to do with the fact that we reported the incident to our program office, who talked to the dorm director, but life has gotten much pleasanter without the angry wake up calls.

markets

Since I have arrived in southern france, i have become obsessed with food.
It all started with the markets. In Aix, there are several outdoor markets. One takes place every day in a small square in town which is surrounded by cafés. vendors sell local honey (my favorite is lavander honey), wonderful fresh produce, whole fish, whole roast chickens, cheese, sausage, bread, herbs, and flowers. There is another larger market near the palais de justice which happens three times a week (teus, thurs, and sunday) where you can get all of that and then some. There is food on one half and a flea market of sorts on the other. You can get local olive oil, sun dried tomatoes, mushrooms and truffles, spices, nuts, dried fruit, bio products, eggs, whole skinned rabbits, octopus stew, chevre tarts, pies- you name it, chances are its there. You can also get old books, vintage post cards, leather bags, scarves, fur coats, shoes, underwear, socks, kitchen appliances, little tin lanterns, hand made baskets, lavender, soaps, used cds, and tacky metal signs. I try to go to the market as often as possible and try whatever is currently in season. When I arrived, figs were in season. I had never had a fresh fig before, and they are the new love of my life. I actually found a couple of fig trees in and around aix and picked a small basket full. Then it was peaches and nectarines, squash and apples, kaki and clementines, and i think currently its litchi and star fruit.
In the dorm, I have a small refrigorater and access to a microwave and hotplates. Unfortunately, no oven. Eating out is very expensive in Aix, so i tend to prepare most of my meals myself. here are a few of my favorite dishes to make in the dorm:
- sautaued vegetables with couscous and curry, cumin, and tumeric
- lentils with squash, spinach, and zucchini and cumin and salt
- spaghetti with eggplant, zucchini, onion, garlic, basil
- fish ( its fun to fillet yourself, though there will be scales everywhere), lemon, butter, and basil
-home made french fries
-apples sauteed in orange juice with crumbled buiscuits
-crepes with just about anything, though i like mushrooms with creme frais and ham
we cook almost every night, and weve had to get creative to keep from getting bored. But what started out as a practicality has become a new hobby. I love cooking!

This week a friend of mine is dog sitting for one of the directrices in our program. We went over to her house tonight and cooked an apple pie. However, we didnt have a pie dish so it was more like an enormous apple casserole or loaf. We used granny smith apples, and a crust of butter, rapeseed oil, sugar, salt, and vanilla. We had to combine several recipes for the crust, I may want to experiment with proportions. It turns out there are four basic components in any pie crust: salt, sugar, liquids, and fats. the liquid can be water, fruit juice, or milk, but should be very cold. The fat could be butter, oil, shortening, or lard.
Id also like to try it with ground walnuts in the topping and either dried cherries or cranberries mixed in the crust. As it was, it was wonderful. I never thought id bake my first apple pie in france!
I've been collecting recipes and ideas to bring home, and will try to post some of my favorites soon!