America seems to be welcoming me back with particular fervor. Yesterday morning I went kayaking on the Shenandoah River, something that I plan to do every other day or as often as I can for exercise. I saw two bald eagles, one with full plumage and the other with brown immature feathers, shrieking and whistling at each other in a treetop. They must have been two males vying for territory, because I couldn't see any food between them. Two competing males is a very good sign for the species in this area.
Since I've gotten home I've been really lazy. The two productive activities I've actually paid attention to are chopping cherry wood for the winter and picking blackberries in our backyard. Other than that I've filled up my days with Age of Empires III ("le scent de la mort et la bruit des fusils") and the HBO TV series True Blood. I've been scouting around online for graduate school options through the Peace Corps, and I'm getting frustrated because although they specifically mention a degree in photography on the Peace Corps website, the closest actual program to a Visual Arts degree that I've found is Arizona State's Arts Education degree. I'll probably still do overseas volunteer work even if the Peace Corps can't help me with grad school.
Last night my father and I went to see Warren's play Up the Down Staircase, about a new teacher trying to make children care about education in an overcrowded and dilapidated New York public school. The play had the wrong mix of comic relief and grave issues; things like a girl's attempted suicide seemed really out of place for a comedy, yet the characters seemed to be built just a touch too much on high school stereotypes for it to be a serious drama. Not to brag on my own brother too much, but Warren was really the best part of the whole thing. As the Jim Stark/Stanley Kowalski character, he seemed like the only truly self-aware student in the whole school and was really effective in showing the sexual tension between him and the young heroine Ms. Barrett.
I'm thinking of beginning a new blog, simply because my time in Europe is over and I should draw this one to a close, leaving it as one complete work. So far I've only decided that the web address will be erichcampbell.blogspot.com. It should be up and ready by the first weekend in August. I want to thank everyone who's shown an interest in my travels, photos, stories, observations, musings, and rants over the past half-year. Hope to see y'all again in the future.
FIN
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Odyssey (4/4)
This night and the ensuing day really made me fulfilled in my status as a world traveler. I crossed the territory of seven countries and an ocean in a period of fourteen hours, and, looking back, the whole time I took it in stride. The most stressful moments of the whole affair were when I was still at Charles de Gaulle waiting to see if Scandinavian Airlines would accept my e-ticket.
I killed some time at CDG by writing the BOOM! post, then asked some girls from New York to watch my stuff and walked around to find the SAS desk. I went to sleep on the floor at around 1 and woke up again at four. As I trudged to the bathroom I noticed the rope lines for SAS were up, so I got my bags and stolidly sat down in front of the desk to wait.
No one else showed up until just before five. One guy came to stand beside me, then two girls, then a whole bunch of people started queuing up to my right. Five o’clock came and Lufthansa and TAP Portugal started operating their ticket desks, but no one came to SAS. At five twenty a bunch of those waiting next to me started leaving, and I almost did too to see what they knew that I didn’t, but then they started lining up again, this time behind me. I love the feeling that you were right and Everyone Else was wrong.
Scandinavians are never late, nor are they early; they arrive exactly when they mean to. Finally, at five forty, the SAS desk finally opened. The man at the counter simply asked for my passport and handed me my boarding pass. My luggage was marked heavy, but I wasn’t charged extra for it. Happily, I mounted the space-age moving ramp to the second floor to find my gate.
French security was annoying. I asked to have my film inspected visually so as to spare it a further risk of radiation, but they still put it through the machine. Apparently films under 1200 ISO can be used to smuggle explosives, but over 1200 are perfectly safe. They also confiscated my tiny Swiss Army knife on my keychain.
I was unconscious for most of the flight from Paris to Copenhagen.
Copenhagen Airport is like one gigantic mall, duty free shops everywhere I picked up some Danish alcohol and Swedish chocolate for my family, and got change for my euros in pretty silver kroner coins. I forewent getting food for myself, because I knew they’d serve lunch on the plane for free.
The transoceanic SAS plane was really nice. Each seat had a screen in the back that was continually playing fifteen different movies at once through the whole flight. I had time to watch Monsters vs. Aliens, Dragonball Evolution, Duplicity, Batman Begins, and part of Chicago. And I played two long games of Tetris. And I wrote the third blog post. The food was good, almost as well-prepared as the food on British Airways.
Finally we touched down at Dulles. The line moved pretty quickly through Customs. I got flagged because I was carrying a small bouquet of lavender and sent to a nearby inspection area. My assigned inspector was a very courteous Latina woman, not at all like the Parisian guards who treated me like a dangerous criminal. After x-raying my luggage, she told me I could keep the herbs. I couldn’t believe it, the system actually works! Must be a relic from the days before 9/11 and Bush.
I walked out of the gate and into the arms of my mother and my brother.
My father actually took a flight back early from his conference in San Diego, hoping to meet me in the airport, but since it was later than mine, he surprised us by showing up at home.
That evening we had hamburgers and corn on the cob.
Slept thirteen hours, and now I’m here.
I killed some time at CDG by writing the BOOM! post, then asked some girls from New York to watch my stuff and walked around to find the SAS desk. I went to sleep on the floor at around 1 and woke up again at four. As I trudged to the bathroom I noticed the rope lines for SAS were up, so I got my bags and stolidly sat down in front of the desk to wait.
No one else showed up until just before five. One guy came to stand beside me, then two girls, then a whole bunch of people started queuing up to my right. Five o’clock came and Lufthansa and TAP Portugal started operating their ticket desks, but no one came to SAS. At five twenty a bunch of those waiting next to me started leaving, and I almost did too to see what they knew that I didn’t, but then they started lining up again, this time behind me. I love the feeling that you were right and Everyone Else was wrong.
Scandinavians are never late, nor are they early; they arrive exactly when they mean to. Finally, at five forty, the SAS desk finally opened. The man at the counter simply asked for my passport and handed me my boarding pass. My luggage was marked heavy, but I wasn’t charged extra for it. Happily, I mounted the space-age moving ramp to the second floor to find my gate.
French security was annoying. I asked to have my film inspected visually so as to spare it a further risk of radiation, but they still put it through the machine. Apparently films under 1200 ISO can be used to smuggle explosives, but over 1200 are perfectly safe. They also confiscated my tiny Swiss Army knife on my keychain.
I was unconscious for most of the flight from Paris to Copenhagen.
Copenhagen Airport is like one gigantic mall, duty free shops everywhere I picked up some Danish alcohol and Swedish chocolate for my family, and got change for my euros in pretty silver kroner coins. I forewent getting food for myself, because I knew they’d serve lunch on the plane for free.
The transoceanic SAS plane was really nice. Each seat had a screen in the back that was continually playing fifteen different movies at once through the whole flight. I had time to watch Monsters vs. Aliens, Dragonball Evolution, Duplicity, Batman Begins, and part of Chicago. And I played two long games of Tetris. And I wrote the third blog post. The food was good, almost as well-prepared as the food on British Airways.
Finally we touched down at Dulles. The line moved pretty quickly through Customs. I got flagged because I was carrying a small bouquet of lavender and sent to a nearby inspection area. My assigned inspector was a very courteous Latina woman, not at all like the Parisian guards who treated me like a dangerous criminal. After x-raying my luggage, she told me I could keep the herbs. I couldn’t believe it, the system actually works! Must be a relic from the days before 9/11 and Bush.
I walked out of the gate and into the arms of my mother and my brother.
My father actually took a flight back early from his conference in San Diego, hoping to meet me in the airport, but since it was later than mine, he surprised us by showing up at home.
That evening we had hamburgers and corn on the cob.
Slept thirteen hours, and now I’m here.
Curiously Well-Timed Catastrophe (3/4)
I took the metro to Gare du Nord and then the Transilien out to Enghien-les-Bains, the town next to Montmorency. Marlène picked me up at about 8.
We picked up some baguettes and had breakfast at the house with Jean-Jacques. Warm brioche with thick honey; for one day I got to eat like a prince again, a very welcome change after Thérèse had us eating everything either canned or generic-brand. Jean-Jacques suggested I rest and take a shower before going into Paris to photograph the Bastille Day crowds.
After an exquisite lunch of Basque chicken with peppers, I went back to Gare du Nord, then Châtelet and the Champs-Elysees. I shopped for presents for my family at the Virgin Megastore, and then attempted to use up my last roll of color slide film.
I tried to balance my mini-tripod on two metal crowd barriers to shoot the Arc de Triomphe.
And the camera fell and the lens broke.
I would have flipped out right there if the situation hadn’t had the potential to be many, many times worse. I’ve finished my documentary, so I don’t need my film camera anymore at the moment, and conceivably won’t until I after I graduate. Also, the piece of the lens that broke is one of the plastic rings that joins it to the camera body, while the optics seem fine. It’s a relatively rare and prized model of Nikon 58 mm, so I’ll probably try to get the part replaced instead of buying a new one.
One more objective for the summer. Man, I need to find some way to make money, for the lens repair and the strategy games I want to buy. I’ll look for the usual opportunities to sell photos. My best chance will be to market to the rich landowner idiots we have in Clarke County, but it’s difficult to get them to buy any art that doesn’t feature horses or foxhounds. Oh well, I’ll figure something out.
I returned to Montmorency to inspect the lens further and to rearrange my stuff for the trip. I reduced all of my stuff to my giant suitcase, my large backpack, and my medium backpack.
We had a light but heavenly dinner of tabouli and sausages, and then drove to the airport at 10:15. We said a brief goodbye and then I headed into the airport to find a spot on the floor.
Farewell to the Alps (2/4)
For a while I thought that this would be my last summer spent outdoors in the sunshine in the company of others my own age (relatively), with no real worries other than the restrictions placed on us by the governing organization. Then I reflected that, if I’ve learned anything from Maia Dery, growing up doesn’t mean you have to become boring. Consider a year from now: I’ll have graduated from Guilford (God willing), and it’s very possible that I’ll be living in a tent again somewhere in the Andes with OxFam or the Peace Corps or UNICEF. That’s if I’m not still traveling with my family in Ireland on the trip we’ve been planning for the past two years.
This month has further sharpened my focus for what I want to do with my life; it’s shown me that no matter what kind of photographer I become, whether I’m shooting eagles in Tanzania for National Geographic or supermodels in the midst of Indian ruins for Maxim, I don’t want to give up being close to nature.
We actually got the goats on Saturday, six nannies and one kid. They’re pretty skittish around people. I think their smell alone, that pleasant earthy barnyard stink, helps to lend the fort more of an eighteenth-century feel. Sarah tried to convince Thérèse to accept the donkey that the city was offering as well, but she wouldn’t listen.
For my last day, Thérèse assigned me to the welcome desk at the Château. It was boring just sitting there, and I had to bite my tongue when tourists asked whether there was anything more than “just stones” inside the fort, but I was relieved after lunch. It was the windiest day we’ve had so far, and the long entranceway created a giant wind tunnel, so that I had to weigh down the papers on the desk with rocks and listen to the constant rattle of sheets of paper whipping back and forth. And it was cold!
After lunch, for a lack of direction, we didn’t really do much of anything. I got some shots of the goats. Thérèse gave me the keys to St. Blaise and let me catch the bus back an hour early so that I’d have time to pack. For dinner I slurped a bowl of leftover soup and made myself a mushroom sandwich to eat on the train. A new kid, Ken, arrived before the others and I showed him my vacated place in the tent. Thérèse had my passport and ticket locked upstairs in a box with the others’ valuables, so as the minutes ticked by and she still wasn’t back from the Château, I began to get stressed. After a couple of tense phone exchanges, she called a taxi to take me to the station. When she got back she calmly walked upstairs and handed me my documents. The taxi arrived a minute later and as I got in everyone turned out to wish me goodbye. The driver drove like a madman to the station and got me there twenty minutes early.
As the train wound down through Argentière and Mont-Dauphin, the mountain peaks were lit a brilliant shade of rose by the setting sun.
The rest of the train ride was better than others I’ve taken. Didn’t pay attention to the time, so I don’t know exactly how much sleep I got. Sometime around two we passed through a massive thunderstorm; I wondered if I was dreaming when I saw the lightning flashes.
At 6:35 we pulled into Gare Austerlitz in Paris under a sky gray with the sunrise.
BOOM! (1/4)
All that I’ve had to endure during this camp, Thérèse’s craziness, Elias’ immaturity, Yann’s complaining, the way Mathieu grinds his teeth in his sleep in the tent...
All that was worth it for today.
After posting at the Spirit I started walking up the mountain to the Fort des Sallettes. As soon as I exited the east gate of the city I saw six of the Régiment du Passé standing around the old guards’ quarters. Although the event didn’t start for another hour, I wanted to get a good viewpoint of the soldiers as they filed up the path to the fort. I got to the fort at 2:45, the soldiers marched up the path and promptly locked themselves inside the fort at three. The crowd of tourists that had followed them up were left with me standing outside wondering what was going to happen next.
Finally at 3:40 three tour guides showed up, organized the tourists into groups, and the fort was opened. All the tourists filed into the courtyard, but the guides said nothing.
Musket barrels poked out of the inward-facing gun slits of the fort’s lower firing gallery.
And then they fired, one after the other. And whatever sound effects you’ve heard used for musket fire in the movies is fake; muskets are LOUD. You can feel the impact of the sound against your body, and if more than two fire in quick succession your ears ring. I can’t even imagine how loud a full-scale battle must have been.
After that the three groups of tourists separated to take different routes through the fort, but I hung around the courtyard to watch the “cadets” of the Régiment go through marching drills. Most of them were younger than me, probably around 17. And that made me think, how many soldiers in all the wars of history were 17? The enlistment age for the Romans was 15, and I don’t even think medieval armies cared about age as long as you could wield something sharp. Even in the eighteenth century alone, how many boys exactly like these were being taught to march in time and fire muskets, only to have themselves blown apart in battles like Yorktown and Assaye? The thought was kind of eerie for me.
I thought I was going to be the only photographer there, but the Régiment had their own, dressed exactly as they were. Out of mutual respect, we tried to keep out of each other’s way while shooting the other soldiers. His girlfriend was there too, and she looked damn hot in a bodice. But as has been iterated countless times in Yachting circles, most girls look good in a bodice. Later, while everyone else was busy I glimpsed to two of them having a photo shoot by themselves in the Upper Gallery.
I think he’s the French me.
I sat in on one of the lectures given by one of the senior officers on the history of the regiment they were playing. It was formed in 1735 as a Scots regiment when the French tried to invade England via Scotland and reinstate the Stewart dynasty. After the campaign failed, the Scotsmen were relocated to Briançon. I noticed then that all the soldiers were wearing fresh-picked thistles in their tricorns.
The officer went on to explain how the troops learned all the steps of firing a musket by constant drills, so that in battle they never had to think about what they were doing. After another soldier demonstrated the fourteen movements involved in drawing the ramrod and placing the cartridge, the officer explained that a good soldier could repeat the sequence in twenty seconds, and an expert veteran in ten. Y’all remember how when we learned American history back in elementary school we were taught to be impressed that the colonial Minutemen could fire one shot every sixty seconds? No wonder we only beat the British once the French got involved.
I was also reminded of an idea I had discussed earlier with Niels when he remarked that the Fort des Sallettes would make a cool CounterStrike map. How come almost all the shooter games we have now are set in WWII or later? Wouldn’t it be cool to have an eighteenth-, or early nineteenth-, century first person shooter? Being only able to fire once every fifteen or so seconds with a musket, taking longer to reload with a far more accurate Baker rifle, or having the choice to charge blindly with a rapier, would dramatically change the FPS tactics involved. Or, knowing the impatience of the average 13-year-old gamer, maybe it would just result in everyone chasing each other with swords and bayonets.
This day was the perfect crowning touch to my month in the Alps.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Day of Anachronism (4/4)
As I type this post I'm sitting in the Spirit Bar in the Old City, which is owned by two English expatriates and is where I've been coming to post via their WiFi.
Last night Thérèse announced that the Régiment du Passé (Regiment of the Past) would be conducting a simulation of an eighteenth-century battle at the Fort des Sallettes today. It's not really a reinactment, because none of Briançon's forts were attacked until the Second World War, so it's really just a very elaborate cosplay session. But don't tell the soldiers that. This cosplay is serious business.
This morning, even though we had the choice to sleep in, I got up early as usual and walked to the grocery store, only to find that the photography boutique was closed. So I won't be able to include the soldiers in my documentary for lack of film. On the other hand, their film was horrifyingly expensive, and this way I'll be able to pay more attention with my digital camera in hand.
My next post will probably be made from home, unless I really feel like paying for an Internet cafe in Paris. I can’t believe it’s been five and a half months already. Europe was fantastic, but it will be good to get back to America.
For a little while, that is. I’ve only a year left at Guilford.
After that, who knows?
Last night Thérèse announced that the Régiment du Passé (Regiment of the Past) would be conducting a simulation of an eighteenth-century battle at the Fort des Sallettes today. It's not really a reinactment, because none of Briançon's forts were attacked until the Second World War, so it's really just a very elaborate cosplay session. But don't tell the soldiers that. This cosplay is serious business.
This morning, even though we had the choice to sleep in, I got up early as usual and walked to the grocery store, only to find that the photography boutique was closed. So I won't be able to include the soldiers in my documentary for lack of film. On the other hand, their film was horrifyingly expensive, and this way I'll be able to pay more attention with my digital camera in hand.
My next post will probably be made from home, unless I really feel like paying for an Internet cafe in Paris. I can’t believe it’s been five and a half months already. Europe was fantastic, but it will be good to get back to America.
For a little while, that is. I’ve only a year left at Guilford.
After that, who knows?
Documentary’s End (3/4)
So I finally ran outta film for my photo documentary on the Club. I have ten rolls, with 348 exposures in all. Good news is that I finally have pictures for y’all now that I’m shooting digital again. Now the real exercise will be choosing the film shots to print once I get back to Guilford. I think I’m gonna have to put together a show this time, one because I don’t have the constraints that came with printing nudes as part of my Metamorphoses project, two because all the shooting is already complete, so it makes sense that I should introduce another production element to the project, and three because I would like to learn firsthand about finding a display space and running publicity. If nothing else, I’ll probably be able to get upstairs Founders for a gallery if I reserve it far enough in advance.
Ugh, my D40x lens is filthy. And all my lens cloths are contaminated with salt from sea spray and grease from sunscreen. I ran out of disposable lens cleaners back in Madrid, and haven’t been able to find any more. Anyone got any advice, or should I just suffer through the lens flare until I get back?
Yesterday we cut more grass, but got an unexpected break at the end of the day when Thérèse decided to give everyone an hour-and-a-half lecture on how to behave at CVM. I guess Elias, Igor, and Sylvain mucked up the guided tour that they were assigned to lead and got into an argument in front of the tourists or something like that. I felt sorry for the German girls, because I knew they hardly understood anything, and just had to sit there, whereas I, being able to honestly say that I have been a picture of docility and obedience in comparison to the other guys, was able to derive some schadenfreude from knowing that the lecture wasn’t directed at me.
I thought we were gonna have today off, but that’ll be tomorrow, when I finally get to post this blog update. Today was Cleaning Day, where we scrubbed the kitchen and the bathrooms and swept out the tents, and then everyone went up to the Fort des Sallettes. After a very light lunch, Thérèse asked all of us to divide into partners and think of games to pass the time tomorrow. Of course Wink was at the top of my list, but Thérèse will probably say it’s too dangerous once I demonstrate it. Ya see, people who worry about things like that just annoy me. Life is danger. As Mr. D told us back in eighth grade English, you can die walking down the street by tripping and hitting your head on the pavement. Scrapes heal, and as long as things don’t get REALLY dangerous, as in bones breaking, why not have fun? Maybe this is my being twenty-one talking, but I hardly think it’s right to live in perpetual fear of anything, whether it be other humans, unseen microbes, physical pain, or even your own mortality. I’m not saying that you should never fear anything, because that’s just stupid, but letting fear prevent you from living an enjoyable life is nothing less than a mental handicap.
After the hour to think up games was over, no one called us to do anything and no one had given us any directions, so my partner Alexandre and I stayed where we were and discussed movies. Alexandre told me why he thought Shaun of the Dead was the greatest film ever made, and he made a pretty good argument, too.
If You Can Justify It... (2/4)
Ain’t there a novel about a bunch of teenage guys slaving away in the sun? Oh, yeah, Holes by Louis Sachar. Good book, and the movie wasn’t bad either for Disney. I still wanna read the alternate ending where Stanley and Zero come out of the desert and lead the boys in a blood-drenched revolt against the guards using the shovels as weapons, and then escape with the treasure to Mexico.
Man, these days are flying by quickly. I get up at 7:15, because if I take a shower in the morning everyone else is still asleep and I can take as long as I want. They all get up at eight for breakfast, we catch the bus at 8:45, and get to the Old City at 9:20. We have lunch at around noon and a snack (Are we in preschool?) at 4:30. We quit work at 5:50 to catch the bus back to St. Blaise at 6:15. Then we have about an hour of free time before dinner, and ideally time for a big game with everyone afterward, but these past few nights we haven’t finished dinner until 10, and we all have to be in our tents by eleven.
But today Thérèse exceeded even her normal insanity by randomly deciding that a bunch of us at the Château needed to go see the Briançon Ski Museum and a modern art exhibit in the Old City at the end of the day. The museum was unimpressive; around the turn of the century, the French Army decided to imitate what the Finns have been doing for thousands of years and use skis for their alpine troops; the trend spread to the civilian population and people have been skiing here ever since. Cut, print. Good thing it was free, because if not it woulda been a tourist trap just like everything else in this town.
On the other hand, the art exhibition was really cool. It’s times like this where I almost regret the skills I learned in twelfth grade Theory of Knowledge, because I up and started discoursing on how one triptych of paintings was a commentary on Sino-Japanese relations from the 1930s to the present. I was just showing off, but everyone else was rapt with amazement. They started asking me to analyze all the other paintings, and no matter what I said they became more and more impressed.
Here’s a link to a video I been meaning to post since I was back in Rueil. Not Safe For Work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKS0yISz6xQ
Man, these days are flying by quickly. I get up at 7:15, because if I take a shower in the morning everyone else is still asleep and I can take as long as I want. They all get up at eight for breakfast, we catch the bus at 8:45, and get to the Old City at 9:20. We have lunch at around noon and a snack (Are we in preschool?) at 4:30. We quit work at 5:50 to catch the bus back to St. Blaise at 6:15. Then we have about an hour of free time before dinner, and ideally time for a big game with everyone afterward, but these past few nights we haven’t finished dinner until 10, and we all have to be in our tents by eleven.
But today Thérèse exceeded even her normal insanity by randomly deciding that a bunch of us at the Château needed to go see the Briançon Ski Museum and a modern art exhibit in the Old City at the end of the day. The museum was unimpressive; around the turn of the century, the French Army decided to imitate what the Finns have been doing for thousands of years and use skis for their alpine troops; the trend spread to the civilian population and people have been skiing here ever since. Cut, print. Good thing it was free, because if not it woulda been a tourist trap just like everything else in this town.
On the other hand, the art exhibition was really cool. It’s times like this where I almost regret the skills I learned in twelfth grade Theory of Knowledge, because I up and started discoursing on how one triptych of paintings was a commentary on Sino-Japanese relations from the 1930s to the present. I was just showing off, but everyone else was rapt with amazement. They started asking me to analyze all the other paintings, and no matter what I said they became more and more impressed.
Here’s a link to a video I been meaning to post since I was back in Rueil. Not Safe For Work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKS0yISz6xQ
Exhausted and Bored (1/4)
I need a video game or a book or a magazine or some DVDs or sumthin’ for these evenings after the work’s finished. I’m a little discombobulated right now, but there’s nothing to do but write this post, so that’s what I’m gonna do. The others are playing card games, and it’s not that I’m being antisocial, I just don’t see the point in playing when people are getting called away for various predinner duties at random frequent intervals.
We worked especially hard today at the Château, but we got a double ration of chocolate as a reward. Thérèse finally bought a whetstone for the scythe, so I led Sylvain and Theo with the sickles in clearing the courtyard and the area around the site where Yann and Niels were slinging mortar to restore one of the walls. She told us with a smile last night at dinner that she had finally convinced the Briançon people in charge of such things to give us some goats to keep in the fort so we wouldn’t have to worry about the grass anymore, but we won’t have them until the 25th. I brought my camera along and was able to shoot for my documentary project in between annihilating stretches of grass. The sun would have been broiling if there hadn’t been so much wind that it was almost cold.
Among the tourists there have been a whole bunch of old-timers that have given me advice on scythework or else told me I’m doing it all wrong. No, I’m doing it exactly right, I must be, because it’s WORKING exactly right! And I don’t care if the scythe was your weapon of choice against the Nazis back in the day à la the black guy from the Soul Caliber games, it’s not up to you to criticize my work!
I also accidently called out a guy for looking too feminine today. As the work was winding down and Niels and I were sitting enjoying our chocolate, we saw two women sitting on one of the off-limits walls smoking. I told ‘em that tourists weren’t allowed there, addressing them as “mesdames,” but when they turned around I saw that one of them was a guy. I didn’t apologize, nor acknowledge my mistake in any way. If a guy and his girlfriend wanna git mistaken for a pair of lesbians, ‘at’s ‘eir business. And ten minutes later we saw them traipsing around one of the areas that was CLEARLY marked with a red and white security ribbon as off-limits to visitors! Stupid tourists, they deserve to have a wall fall on ‘em!
Yesterday Laurent, another CVM veteran, came to the site to demonstrate mortar techniques and the rock climbing safety we’ll need to work on the top of one of the walls. Since Sylvain and I are the only ones above 18, only we can work up there. I was thrilled to do some climbing, probably tied with kayaking as my favorite physical activity. If there were some triathlon where you had to cycle to a river, kayak down it, and climb to the finish line, I’d totally train for and compete in it. Everything seemed to be going well until Thérèse showed up to tell us that everything was n’importe quoi. I still don’t know what that means! She says it all the time. I can only remain hopeful that when something is finally importe quoi, she will inform us.
One great thing about the group here is that they may not be inclined to behave as nerds, but they’re impressionable enough that they’re revealing themselves as nerds under the influence of the intense singularity that is my nerdiness. Yesterday the team of us working at the Château totaled nine including Laurent, triggering what I call a Group Naming Effect. Much like the Wizard of Oz effect which occurs when four guys and a girl are together, nine guys activate the Lord of the Rings effect. Laurent is Gandalf, Niels is Legolas, Theo is Frodo, etc. I’m Gimli, because of my proven potential to grow a giant Gimli-esque beard. Later I settled a debate over whether the Nazgûl are the undead men or the flying beasts, and last night I introduced everyone to the Yachting Club game Rock Paper Scissors Everything.
In exactly one week I’ll be back in Clarke County, driving home from the airport.
We worked especially hard today at the Château, but we got a double ration of chocolate as a reward. Thérèse finally bought a whetstone for the scythe, so I led Sylvain and Theo with the sickles in clearing the courtyard and the area around the site where Yann and Niels were slinging mortar to restore one of the walls. She told us with a smile last night at dinner that she had finally convinced the Briançon people in charge of such things to give us some goats to keep in the fort so we wouldn’t have to worry about the grass anymore, but we won’t have them until the 25th. I brought my camera along and was able to shoot for my documentary project in between annihilating stretches of grass. The sun would have been broiling if there hadn’t been so much wind that it was almost cold.
Among the tourists there have been a whole bunch of old-timers that have given me advice on scythework or else told me I’m doing it all wrong. No, I’m doing it exactly right, I must be, because it’s WORKING exactly right! And I don’t care if the scythe was your weapon of choice against the Nazis back in the day à la the black guy from the Soul Caliber games, it’s not up to you to criticize my work!
I also accidently called out a guy for looking too feminine today. As the work was winding down and Niels and I were sitting enjoying our chocolate, we saw two women sitting on one of the off-limits walls smoking. I told ‘em that tourists weren’t allowed there, addressing them as “mesdames,” but when they turned around I saw that one of them was a guy. I didn’t apologize, nor acknowledge my mistake in any way. If a guy and his girlfriend wanna git mistaken for a pair of lesbians, ‘at’s ‘eir business. And ten minutes later we saw them traipsing around one of the areas that was CLEARLY marked with a red and white security ribbon as off-limits to visitors! Stupid tourists, they deserve to have a wall fall on ‘em!
Yesterday Laurent, another CVM veteran, came to the site to demonstrate mortar techniques and the rock climbing safety we’ll need to work on the top of one of the walls. Since Sylvain and I are the only ones above 18, only we can work up there. I was thrilled to do some climbing, probably tied with kayaking as my favorite physical activity. If there were some triathlon where you had to cycle to a river, kayak down it, and climb to the finish line, I’d totally train for and compete in it. Everything seemed to be going well until Thérèse showed up to tell us that everything was n’importe quoi. I still don’t know what that means! She says it all the time. I can only remain hopeful that when something is finally importe quoi, she will inform us.
One great thing about the group here is that they may not be inclined to behave as nerds, but they’re impressionable enough that they’re revealing themselves as nerds under the influence of the intense singularity that is my nerdiness. Yesterday the team of us working at the Château totaled nine including Laurent, triggering what I call a Group Naming Effect. Much like the Wizard of Oz effect which occurs when four guys and a girl are together, nine guys activate the Lord of the Rings effect. Laurent is Gandalf, Niels is Legolas, Theo is Frodo, etc. I’m Gimli, because of my proven potential to grow a giant Gimli-esque beard. Later I settled a debate over whether the Nazgûl are the undead men or the flying beasts, and last night I introduced everyone to the Yachting Club game Rock Paper Scissors Everything.
In exactly one week I’ll be back in Clarke County, driving home from the airport.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Shoulder Feels Stronger (2/2)
These past two days we’ve been ratcheting up the intensity of the work at both Sallettes and the Château, nailing boards and hauling back-crushing bags of chalk and concrete. We've learned that when using a hammer, precision really isn't all that important as long as everyone's hands are out of the way; you just swing from the shoulder as hard as you can with massive blows that make you feel like some Norse giant. After Niels unsuccessfully pursued two of the kids who’ve been trespassing in the Château, Elias and I have been assigned to block up the passage that we think they’ve been using with several old doors nailed together. It’s going well, except we have to put up with Mathieu’s remarks about how they did something similar last year. SHADDAP, moron, THIS is how we’re doing it THIS year!
Yesterday Niels and I left ahead of the others to pick up pasta sauce in the Old City. We stopped at the train station to reserve my ticket to Paris (night train, cheapest there was) and decided to wait for the new kid who was supposed to arrive in a few minutes. The train was delayed, so we waited. And it started deluging rain. We called Thérèse to tell her what we were doing. She insisted that we not walk home in the rain, even though it would only have been fifteen minutes and she’s the one who’s always insisting we’re not babies. She sent a taxi for us. We waited another forty minutes for the taxi, by which time the rain had stopped. And in the calling Thérèse to try to get her to recall the taxi, I ran out of phone credits. Damn Bouygue capitalists. Is it any wonder that I secretly dream of toppling civilization à la Fight Club and doing away with things like phone credits and phones and phone companies and capitalism? Does that seem callous of me? Perhaps even a little... barbaric?
Yesterday Niels and I left ahead of the others to pick up pasta sauce in the Old City. We stopped at the train station to reserve my ticket to Paris (night train, cheapest there was) and decided to wait for the new kid who was supposed to arrive in a few minutes. The train was delayed, so we waited. And it started deluging rain. We called Thérèse to tell her what we were doing. She insisted that we not walk home in the rain, even though it would only have been fifteen minutes and she’s the one who’s always insisting we’re not babies. She sent a taxi for us. We waited another forty minutes for the taxi, by which time the rain had stopped. And in the calling Thérèse to try to get her to recall the taxi, I ran out of phone credits. Damn Bouygue capitalists. Is it any wonder that I secretly dream of toppling civilization à la Fight Club and doing away with things like phone credits and phones and phone companies and capitalism? Does that seem callous of me? Perhaps even a little... barbaric?
The Fourth (1/2)
Yesterday was the closest thing to a real day off that we’ve had so far. We mounted a fourth tent in the morning and then took the bus to the Old City, where I checked my e-mails at a WiFi bar while the others explored the sites that Thérèse suggested. After finishing on the Web I met the others again briefly before diverging from them again to spend time in the municipal library’s English section finishing Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. I had just gotten to where Humbert is speaking contemptuously of Godin when Sarah called me to say that we were leaving early to avoid the rain.
Now I see clearly why Thérèse chose Sarah to be her adjutant, or perhaps “lieutenant” would be more appropriate. Sarah’s one of those girls, like Marion and Sarah Campbell, who manages to be surpassingly beautiful, strong, and intelligent all at once effortlessly, with a level of competence that makes the rest of us look like, to borrow a phrase from Whedon, idiot children. (Marion and Sarah, I’m not even trying to flatter you, I really do regard you this highly.) And if I didn’t know that she has a devoted boyfriend, I’d almost be tempted to imagine she likes me, though it’s probably just that we’re the most similar in levels of emotional maturity. She’s a complete battleaxe when dealing with Elias, Igor, and Batiste’s puerile antics, what Thérèse must have been like many years ago.
When we got back two new kids had arrived, Mathieu and Theo. Theo’s nice, and only fourteen, but pretty smart, effectively making him the Chiyo-chan of the group. Theo-chan. Mathieu’s an arrogant wanker. ‘E’s seventeen and he has done CVM once before, and I think he showed up thinking that his prior experience would make him some kind of team leader by default. Shortly after Niels and I helped install them in our tent, Sarah and I left to buy stuff for the hamburgers. We got tomatoes, lettuce, onions, ketchup, a cheap mustard that was spicy enough to be reminiscent of wasabi, Cheddar cheese, and something called American Sauce that I suspected I had already tasted at Quick. We even bought hamburger buns and ice cream.
By the time we got back, it was sprinkling and the German girls had arrived. Enza and Vera are both fifteen but look like they’re eleven. They don’t speak French very well, so I’m gonna make it one of my goals in the time I have left here to help them as much as I can. All morning Igor and Elias had been making licentious comments about German girls, but once they actually saw them they switched their ribaldry to other unseen women. Stupid fifteen-year-olds.
I started out cooking the hamburgers myself, but then Thérèse asked me to go back to the store in the now pouring rain, knowing I’d be the only one stoic (“crazy”) enough to do it, to get more tent stakes and the Coke that we’d forgotten earlier. Sarah took over the hamburgers according to my explicit and absurdly simple instructions. On the way back, both bags I was carrying split, so I wound up stuffing 100 stakes in the pockets of my cargo shorts and hefting three bottles of Coke in my arms.
After this dinner, I will not hear about how American fast food is corrupting French culinary something-or-other. The French done corrupted American food themselves, so why are they surprised that we’re returning the favor? First there was the obstacle of convincing Thérèse and Theo that Americans put neither eggs nor onions in the beef, earlier in the day. When I walked in the house, Sarah had put six of the burgers in the oven to cook; I’d never even thought to tell her not to, and had to explain to her how Americans believe in a perfect yin and yang of hot meat and cool vegetables in a hamburger. So we had six toasted hamburgers and sixteen the way hamburgers oughta be, dammit. THEN I find that the French, and obviously the Germans as well, eat hamburgers with forks!! WHAT HERESY IS THIS?? This is taking European formality entirely too far! You might as well eat spaghetti with your hands! You might as well dunk your face in soup and drink it like a horse!
As we were going to sleep, we heard the whistle and bang of fireworks, but when we jumped out of the tents we couldn’t see them. Looks like I’m not the only American in this town.
Now I see clearly why Thérèse chose Sarah to be her adjutant, or perhaps “lieutenant” would be more appropriate. Sarah’s one of those girls, like Marion and Sarah Campbell, who manages to be surpassingly beautiful, strong, and intelligent all at once effortlessly, with a level of competence that makes the rest of us look like, to borrow a phrase from Whedon, idiot children. (Marion and Sarah, I’m not even trying to flatter you, I really do regard you this highly.) And if I didn’t know that she has a devoted boyfriend, I’d almost be tempted to imagine she likes me, though it’s probably just that we’re the most similar in levels of emotional maturity. She’s a complete battleaxe when dealing with Elias, Igor, and Batiste’s puerile antics, what Thérèse must have been like many years ago.
When we got back two new kids had arrived, Mathieu and Theo. Theo’s nice, and only fourteen, but pretty smart, effectively making him the Chiyo-chan of the group. Theo-chan. Mathieu’s an arrogant wanker. ‘E’s seventeen and he has done CVM once before, and I think he showed up thinking that his prior experience would make him some kind of team leader by default. Shortly after Niels and I helped install them in our tent, Sarah and I left to buy stuff for the hamburgers. We got tomatoes, lettuce, onions, ketchup, a cheap mustard that was spicy enough to be reminiscent of wasabi, Cheddar cheese, and something called American Sauce that I suspected I had already tasted at Quick. We even bought hamburger buns and ice cream.
By the time we got back, it was sprinkling and the German girls had arrived. Enza and Vera are both fifteen but look like they’re eleven. They don’t speak French very well, so I’m gonna make it one of my goals in the time I have left here to help them as much as I can. All morning Igor and Elias had been making licentious comments about German girls, but once they actually saw them they switched their ribaldry to other unseen women. Stupid fifteen-year-olds.
I started out cooking the hamburgers myself, but then Thérèse asked me to go back to the store in the now pouring rain, knowing I’d be the only one stoic (“crazy”) enough to do it, to get more tent stakes and the Coke that we’d forgotten earlier. Sarah took over the hamburgers according to my explicit and absurdly simple instructions. On the way back, both bags I was carrying split, so I wound up stuffing 100 stakes in the pockets of my cargo shorts and hefting three bottles of Coke in my arms.
After this dinner, I will not hear about how American fast food is corrupting French culinary something-or-other. The French done corrupted American food themselves, so why are they surprised that we’re returning the favor? First there was the obstacle of convincing Thérèse and Theo that Americans put neither eggs nor onions in the beef, earlier in the day. When I walked in the house, Sarah had put six of the burgers in the oven to cook; I’d never even thought to tell her not to, and had to explain to her how Americans believe in a perfect yin and yang of hot meat and cool vegetables in a hamburger. So we had six toasted hamburgers and sixteen the way hamburgers oughta be, dammit. THEN I find that the French, and obviously the Germans as well, eat hamburgers with forks!! WHAT HERESY IS THIS?? This is taking European formality entirely too far! You might as well eat spaghetti with your hands! You might as well dunk your face in soup and drink it like a horse!
As we were going to sleep, we heard the whistle and bang of fireworks, but when we jumped out of the tents we couldn’t see them. Looks like I’m not the only American in this town.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
The Way Home
On the 30th I called home with Skype. My mother and I decided that if I came home earlier than initially planned we'd save money on the CVM fee. And I miss my parents. And Thérèse and I don't work all that well together. And I miss... America. Took five and a half months for me to start missing it, but I do.
So I'm gettin' back early. July 15th. 3 pm. Via Copenhagen. I'll miss the fireworks from the Fort des Sallettes here in Briançon, but I'm sure the ones in Paris will be far more impressive.
My flight from Charles de Gaulle leaves at 7 in the morning. So you know what that means. Yes, but why would I go to bed early on Bastille Day in Paris? I fully expect to forego sleep that night in order to experience Bastille Day to the fullest extent that I can before grabbing the RER B to the airport before one inna mornin'. Then I'll doze on the airport floor just like I did in Rome.
Oh, this is gonna be fun.
So I'm gettin' back early. July 15th. 3 pm. Via Copenhagen. I'll miss the fireworks from the Fort des Sallettes here in Briançon, but I'm sure the ones in Paris will be far more impressive.
My flight from Charles de Gaulle leaves at 7 in the morning. So you know what that means. Yes, but why would I go to bed early on Bastille Day in Paris? I fully expect to forego sleep that night in order to experience Bastille Day to the fullest extent that I can before grabbing the RER B to the airport before one inna mornin'. Then I'll doze on the airport floor just like I did in Rome.
Oh, this is gonna be fun.
Huit!
Coffee and Scrabble mix well. A bit too well, actually: I haven’t been this hyper for this long in months. A third influence might be the spontaneous sense of community that has sprung up in the house with the arrival of three more guys. Now it feels less like we’re a small group oppressed by Thérèse and more like, between us, she’s become a much lesser evil that we’ll just have to tolerate together.
The new guys are Batiste and Igor, who came together from Grenoble on the train. I refer to them in my head as Harry and Ron. Elias is a bit of a wankster, but nice enough based on the two hours that I’ve known him so far.
Thérèse also made three significant promises just now that’ll make staying here much more fun. One: on the 4th, I’ll be in charge of cooking hamburgers and corn on the cob, if we can find it in time. Two: soon we’ll all play Scrabble in the yard with the letters on big pieces of cardboard. Three: on Bastille Day, we’ll spend the night in the Fort des Sallettes like we did last night to watch the fireworks over the city! The explosions will be less than a kilometer away and nearly horizontal with our position! If ever there was an opportunity to dual-wield my cameras!
Yesterday Sarah arrived from Paris. She’s done CVM four times before, so Thérèse made her her official adjutant, demoting me from a position I never knew I had. Definitely not complaining, though. We spent the morning building a section of roof in the Château that we’ll use to demonstrate the composition of the roof to the tourists. Then we had lunch and hiked over to the Fort des Sallettes. That morning I had misunderstood Thérèse’s directions for getting ready, so when Diane, who arrived Tuesday, told me we weren’t coming back to St. Blaise before that night, I only had time to grab my sleeping bag, tripod, and film camera. At Sallettes we hauled up pieces of scaffolding from a storeroom, twelve-foot-long metal poles. Thérèse left us in the fort with the admonition not to venture above the ground floor.
But we did, Niels and I. With the gate locked I couldn’t get outside to get a view of the city for night shots of it, so Niels showed me a relatively hidden, that is, inconspicuous, passage from the west bastion to the balcony above. I calculated for reciprocity and took six shots in forty minutes. Niels and I slept in the top of the keep, while the girls slept in the powder magazine.
Next morning Niels and I woke up before the girls and spotted a pair of pine martens that had made a nest in the east wall. We all had pound cake and chocolate for breakfast and got to work right away assembling the scaffolding and mounting a series of CVM photos for the tourists.
Sarah and I scrambled eggs with bacon and onions in the fort’s kitchen for lunch, and then we took the bus back to St. Blaise to wait for the new arrivals. When Niels and Diane got back from the Château, Niels and I got to finish the Scrabble game we had suspended two days before. We had been neck and neck, I mean NECK! AND! NECK! since the beginning, but after we resumed he hit me with a couple of really well-placed plays making use of obscure French vocabulary, and ended about ninety points ahead of me.
We gotta go to bed now. Thiiiiiiiiis is gonna be a problem.
The new guys are Batiste and Igor, who came together from Grenoble on the train. I refer to them in my head as Harry and Ron. Elias is a bit of a wankster, but nice enough based on the two hours that I’ve known him so far.
Thérèse also made three significant promises just now that’ll make staying here much more fun. One: on the 4th, I’ll be in charge of cooking hamburgers and corn on the cob, if we can find it in time. Two: soon we’ll all play Scrabble in the yard with the letters on big pieces of cardboard. Three: on Bastille Day, we’ll spend the night in the Fort des Sallettes like we did last night to watch the fireworks over the city! The explosions will be less than a kilometer away and nearly horizontal with our position! If ever there was an opportunity to dual-wield my cameras!
Yesterday Sarah arrived from Paris. She’s done CVM four times before, so Thérèse made her her official adjutant, demoting me from a position I never knew I had. Definitely not complaining, though. We spent the morning building a section of roof in the Château that we’ll use to demonstrate the composition of the roof to the tourists. Then we had lunch and hiked over to the Fort des Sallettes. That morning I had misunderstood Thérèse’s directions for getting ready, so when Diane, who arrived Tuesday, told me we weren’t coming back to St. Blaise before that night, I only had time to grab my sleeping bag, tripod, and film camera. At Sallettes we hauled up pieces of scaffolding from a storeroom, twelve-foot-long metal poles. Thérèse left us in the fort with the admonition not to venture above the ground floor.
But we did, Niels and I. With the gate locked I couldn’t get outside to get a view of the city for night shots of it, so Niels showed me a relatively hidden, that is, inconspicuous, passage from the west bastion to the balcony above. I calculated for reciprocity and took six shots in forty minutes. Niels and I slept in the top of the keep, while the girls slept in the powder magazine.
Next morning Niels and I woke up before the girls and spotted a pair of pine martens that had made a nest in the east wall. We all had pound cake and chocolate for breakfast and got to work right away assembling the scaffolding and mounting a series of CVM photos for the tourists.
Sarah and I scrambled eggs with bacon and onions in the fort’s kitchen for lunch, and then we took the bus back to St. Blaise to wait for the new arrivals. When Niels and Diane got back from the Château, Niels and I got to finish the Scrabble game we had suspended two days before. We had been neck and neck, I mean NECK! AND! NECK! since the beginning, but after we resumed he hit me with a couple of really well-placed plays making use of obscure French vocabulary, and ended about ninety points ahead of me.
We gotta go to bed now. Thiiiiiiiiis is gonna be a problem.
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