L'excursion d'Alsace

Finally, I got to do some significant traveling this weekend, both in and out of town. Also, before I get started, I just want to say that I've imbibed (edit 24/6/07 - I can't believe I put "imbued" here before...) more alcohol in one week here than I did all semester at Lehigh. The first night I got here, I went with some of my classmates to an Irish pub and had a beer; Friday night, after a church organ concert at the Cathedral (more on that in a bit), we went out for beers again; and yesterday, we went to a winery and did some wine tasting (my first experience with wine, I think; not bad). Fortunately, all of these experiences have been extremely moderate, so I didn't have to worry about embarrassing myself by getting drunk after 2 drinks or anything like that. But I have a feeling that Paris (this coming weekend!) will get a little crazy; we'll see.

As mentioned, Friday night, most of my classmates and I went to an organ concert, featuring baroque music, at the Cathedral in Strasbourg (there are many cathedrals in Strasbourg, but there is also THE Cathedral, which is visible from anywhere in the city, as long as you're not right next to any buildings). I got there only 15 minutes before the concert was to begin, and I expected to have a problem finding a seat; fortunately for me, this concert wasn't well-attended, with maybe only a little over half of the seats taken. Furthermore, my classmates had saved me a seat, just in case. I didn't really know what to expect, but I certainly didn't expect a multimedia presentation. Halfway through the main chamber (I should know the term for that in a church, but it's eluding me now), there was a giant projection screen, which they used to show the organist as he was playing the pieces. This was necessary, because the organ was located high above and behind us, obscuring a direct view of the organist. The music was fantastic, but I was enthralled just watching the organist play, as he would sometimes be using both of his hands and his feet simultaneously to play these intricate pieces. I don't imagine that I'll ever achieve that level of coordination; (nerd joke)I have enough trouble with the fifth button in Guitar Hero(/nerd joke). Afterwards, we wandered over to a nearby bar and each got a beer; I got the "seasonal beer", and even though I'm not really a fan of beer, I thought it was good. It was sweeter and lighter than most beers I've had, which is probably why I liked it.

Saturday, I decided that I should finally explore Strasbourg and figure out where things are. I started off by purchasing a bus/tram pass that allows for unlimited travel for the month of June, so now I don't have to deal with the unreliability of the tickets any more (plus, I'm not sure if I'm still getting a bike or not, so I may be using the bus/tram more than I had planned). I proceeded to head over to the municipal library, where two of my classmates had mentioned the previous day that they would be spending some time studying. I joined them and got some work done, until we had had enough and decided it was time for lunch. We spent the next hour or so wondering around, having a hard time finding a place that was both cheap and served sandwiches. Along the way, we ran into a Jesus parade, in which probably a hundred or so people were participating. Luckily, this was the "Praise to God!" type of parade, not the "Woe to the non-believers!" type, so it was a pleasant experience (I wish I had taken some pictures; sorry guys!).

Not long after that, we found a café that met our criteria; I ordered a croque monsieur, thinking it was going to be a grilled cheese sandwich but which is actually a grilled ham and cheese sandwich (I guess the grilled cheese sandwich is the croque madame). From there, we proceeded to a grocery store. I needed some things which that store didn't have, but my companions pointed me to another one, and we parted ways. After making a few purchases, I went to an Internet café for a couple of hours and then to McDonald's for dinner. In my defense, I did try to meet up with others for dinner somewhere else, but after getting no response to that offer, I decided that McDonald's was a safe bet. As it turns out, you can't customize your order in a French McDonald's (either that, or there was a miscommunication), and their offerings are slightly different from an American McDonald's. I ended up with a Royal Deluxe (Big Macs are, in fact, called Big Macs in France), which is like a Quarter Pounder but with dijon mustard on it. Also, their "Super Size" (which they call something else) is equivalent to our Medium size. So even though I was weak and had fast food, it was still distinctively French fast food.

And now we come to Sunday. The only bad part about the whole day was having to wake up at 6 am. Everything else about yesterday was wonderful. This was our class excursion into the Alsace region, and we started it off right by going to a castle (and yes, I took pictures all day, which will be posted at some point). Unlike my mental image of a medieval castle, this one was red brick, not gray stone. It was initially constructed some time during Charlemagne's reign (or before, because that's the earliest mention that exists of this castle), destroyed during the Thirty Years War, and reconstructed under Kaiser Wilhelm II (1900s). (I'm recalling these facts off the top of my head; if any of them are wrong, I'll correct them later.) As castles go, I think this one is on the small side, but it is located on the top of a mountain (700 meters or so), and it was frequented by Kaiser Wilhelm II. There were some pretty cool sights in there, such as a tiny dragon suspended from a ceiling and an armory. I'll go into more detail about the castle in the captions of the pictures that I'll post.

By the end of our tour, it was lunch time, so off we went to our reservation in Colmar. I was excited at the prospect of getting to try tarte flambé (the French version of a pizza), only to find out that food had also been selected for us ahead of time (probably because this was going on the university's tab). I'm not sure what kind of meat we had, but there were also noodles and, for dessert, something that tasted like an apple quiche; delicious. Lunch was followed by a quick visit to a museum just across the street. It was a converted cloister, which was appropriate given the overwhelming Christian nature of the artwork inside. I have no pictures of this, I can't properly appreciate art, and I have no ability to describe it either, so let's just move on... :-P

We had some free time, so we went to an ice cream cart; I ordered a waffle cone with scoops of vanilla and strawberry ice cream. By the time that was finished, it was time to get back on the bus. Our next stop was a WWII memorial. Given the beautiful weather, it was very peaceful up there, as it was located on a hill that overlooks the Alsatian valley, allowing for a steady breeze. The only observation I have to contribute is that the Christian and Jewish graves were in one central section, while the Muslim graves occupied two other sections (the French drafted many North African soldiers). You could argue that it was simply a convention to use for organizing the dead, but the segregation seems inappropriate, given the equal nature of the sacrifices made by all the soldiers. Still, it's better than not honoring them at all, I suppose.

Our final destination was a winery. Our excursion leader was concerned that this unplanned trip would delay our return home by an hour; we made it very clear that we were all ok with that. The valley of Alsace is well-known for the quality of its wine, so it was a simple matter of visiting a small village near the memorial to find a winery. There was some trouble finding an open one (on Sundays, most businesses in France are closed; the transformation of Strasbourg from Saturday to Sunday was dramatic), and we even had a Monty Python moment where we rang the bell of one closed winery, causing a woman to poke her head out from a window above us (by the way, at the castle, it took all of my willpower to keep from re-enacting the scene of the Frenchmen insulting the British in Monty Python and The Holy Grail). Eventually, we found a winery consortium (as opposed to a family-owned winery) that was open and gladly served us (they made three sales from it, so I'd say it was a good business decision). We tried three wines, even going through the stereotypical steps of look-smell-swirl-taste (at least, the leader and I did), minus the spitting. While that was nice, my favorite part of the village was the fact that swallows nested there, swooping around above us and generally creating a spectacle.

Upon our return to Strasbourg, I joined some of the others in their quest for food, which resulted in a cheese pizza with mushrooms. It was supposed to be ham, but the word for ham (jambon) sounds slightly similar to the word for mushrooms (champignons), so while the person who took our order heard us correctly, the preparer did not. Oh well; tasted fine, all the same. All that was left then was to return to our respective homes, do a little more classwork, and, exhausted, fall asleep for 9 hours. Well, that's what I did, anyway.

So if I had this much fun in Alsace, I can only speculate on the adventures that will be had in Paris. I've been told to go into it with no expectations, but it's hard not to have some. I don't know exactly what we'll be doing yet, but I'd like to stop by the French Open to see what that's like (it will be the finals that weekend). We'll be driving there in a rental car (one of my classmates is from Germany and has experience driving in Europe) and staying in a hostel Saturday night. Other than that, who knows? But there's still a week of class to get through, and it's lunchtime, so that's it for now.