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April 17 Monday Bicycle touring France Draguignan France Draguignan means dragon. Found out that people name their houses here. One was Les Miserables. Some are about the dragon -- Dragon's Lair. Madeleine works for PTT the French Post Telephone Telegraph or as she calls it, Petite Travail (small work), like government jobs are known as. For petite dejeneur we had a soft cheese spread with onions in it. We spread it on toast named Cancoillotte al'ail. Madeleine had three invitations that she canceled because we are staying with her. "I see them every year," she said as she waved away our protests that we could take care of ourselves while she went to visit her friends. We still have two invitations that we are going to visit with her. One was for dinner previously, but Madeleine changed that to just a visit. She phoned to cancel, fibbing that her Canadian friends had just arrived unexpectedly last night. That is why she was phoning so late to cancel. It's our fault -- we didn't think we would be staying this long. We had midi. Chicken stuffed with a bouquet of fragrant green herbs. Tender and delicious. Long flat noodles and salad. Dessert was figs from the freezer. They are from a tree in her yard. She picked them last year. Before we ate them, she set them out in the sunshine on a windowsill to thaw. We put a thick raspberry sauce on top. Exquisite. We finished up with a wonderfully tangy black currant ice cream. Bon appegross! We went to visit André and Andrée. Andrée is Madeleine's yoga teacher. Both André and Andrée speak some English. We had French pastries, coffee with brown cane sugar, and chocolates shaped like turtles and fish. André and Andrée have a large property with lots of flowers, trees and vineyard. The house used to be owned by silkworm farmers. The house is stone and monstrous. The house records date back 200 years, and it was built before that. They don't know exactly when it was built. There is a large cellar where a spigot pokes through the wall. A huge cask on the opposite side used to hold wine in days of yore. André stores wine in shelves. There were two large freezers in there also- - very uncommon for France. The outside of the house is scabby and peeling. Inside is gorgeous. André keeps the outside like that on purpose to hopefully fool thieves. "They'll think I'm just a poor country boy," he explained. (Madeleine has Monsieur and Madame on her shutters to fool people. And she keeps four toothbrushes in the holder near the bathroom sink, so if thieves break in they won't think she lives alone. I told her to get a large pair of old construction boots and set them out on her steps. Next we went to Les Arcs, and stopped to see Helene and Paul. Helene was dressed up to meet Madeleine and looked very fine. Even Paul was out of his ever-present blue bathrobe and had gone through the trouble to dress smartly and even put in his teeth. A nice touch. They both looked less tired than when we last saw them ... although Helene said their departure date feels like it is getting farther away, rather than closer. She still hasn't received any mail -- the postal strike has been going for six weeks now and counting. On a positive note, on the news they showed postal workers throwing bags of mail into the sea. Great. I hope it wasn't my bicycle touring journal that I mailed last week. If it was, I hope it floats in the general direction of Canada so a Spanish fishing trawler can pick it up and deliver it. Helene hasn't sold her car yet. It has been sitting on a car lot, but so far no offers. It is an automatic and everyone in France drives a standard (except for very old people or people who have lived in America ) for more power and fuel efficiency. "Why would I want an automatic? I'm not crippled yet," is the standard reply from prospective buyers. They're so backward, Helene says. Automatics make a lot of sense with all the stopping and starting on steep hills in towns. Sharon got too close the other day while stopped behind someone and almost got rolled over when they let out the clutch to go up a hill. "Remind me not to get so close from now on," she said. Other backward things: electric wires for lights that just dangle from the ceiling. Plug-ins are four feet up the wall (wires from appliance or lamps look terrible drooping down the wall). Showers don't automatically switch back to the faucet when you shut the water off. Madeleine got sprayed this morning when she turned the tap on after I had used the shower, but didn't turn the level back when finished. I meekly explained to a sopping Madeleine that in Canada it automatically goes back to faucet. I should have known. They like standard here, no automatic anything. Madeleine brought some lilacs to meet Helen and Paul. She said it is a polite traditional gesture when visiting someone's house for the first time to bring them a single flower. It turns out that Madeleine buys her wine from the woman downstairs who owns the house that Helene and Paul rent the upstairs portion from. Paul says the wine is very good, but it is expensive. And since they are not so pleased with the owner right now, they don't buy their wine from her anymore. Its label is St Pierre Chateau. We have been drinking a bottle of the stuff every night since we have arrived and I have become quite adept at removing corks, after a lesson from Gilbert. The sparkling rosé is flavourful too -- not harsh at all. As we say good-bye, Helene whispers that Madeleine is perfect for us. She's priceless, Helene says. She has been laughing since we arrived at Madeleine's stories. Madeleine told Helene we were like kids -- but, truth be known, she is the biggest kid of all ... and usually the instigator. Clowning, she calls it, while telling us not to tell her grandkids. But I'm not too worried ... I'm sure the grandkids know all about Grandma's penchant for humour already. Madeleine was telling us that one time Jean Jac was visiting and they were eating supper, but one of his girls wouldn't eat. She was just sitting at the table with her arms folded, looking blithely away. "Eat," her parents said. No response. "Claire, eat!" No response. "Claire!" "I'm reflecting," she says. She's seven. At that point she was sent to her room to reflect some more. Sharon tells Paul how good he is looking and tells him she hopes he continues to improve. "Well, I'm 75," Paul responds, "so I have no illusions." Always the pragmatist. Or, as Sharon would later tell me, "He sounds like he already has one foot in the grave." Next we went to Madeleine's friends in Les Arcs. This is a couple with two foster kids. Sebastian, is a blind ten year old boy. He greets Madeleine and then is introduced to me by Madeleine, "Sebastian, this is Neil." "Bon jour, Neil," he says and shakes my hand and kisses me on the cheek and then turns his head so I can return the greeting. Then Madeleine introduces Sharon. "Sebastian, this is Sharon." An awed breathless, "Wow!" escapes his prepubescent lips. I guess Sharon looks good even to the blind. As Sebastian passes Madeleine's car he sticks out his hand and feels along the trunk and fingers the nameplate. "Peugeot," he says. Their daughter and son-in-law live with them. They have a two year old daughter. The little girl moves a latch on the shutter and it swings open. Her tiny voice utters "voila" over and over as she plays with the latch. Too cute. Frogs are croaking by the pool. She and Sebastian go to investigate. Sharon has some water to drink. They tell her you'll get frogs in your stomach if you drink too much water. "Frogs?" I say. I thought it was pigs. No wonder Madeleine laughed until tears came down her cheeks when I drank a big glass of water and said my pigs were thirsty. It's a tricky language trying to keep all these sayings straight. I'm still pretty sure about the fat ankles though. I almost blew Madeleine's cover about us just arriving unexpectedly yesterday. They were talking about eating rabbits. I was going to tell them we had some with Madeleine at the cantina a couple of days ago. The only thing that prevented me was the length of time it took me to construct the sentence in my head. They speak no English. Luckily my French is so slow that by the time I figured out how to say it, I remembered Madeleine had told them we just arrived unexpectedly last night. Engage brain before speaking is always a good idea. Madeleine would have died from embarrassment! What a tangled web we weave when at first we practice to deceive. They ask what we eat when we're camping and bicycle touring in France. "Pasta." "Surely not everyday?" "Oh, yes. Nearly. Different types." "No fish?" "No. Too many cats follow us." Madeleine bought some liquid medicine for my sore lips. The medicine is made out of rhubarb extract. It works great, but it makes my lips yellow. We had more expensive French pastries and Swiss chocolate. Bon Paques! Supper at Madeleine's lasted five hours! Lots of eating, talking, and laughing. Madeleine took a roll of photos of us laughing. One of the vegetables we had for supper was asparagus. We dip the end in homemade mayo and then munch on it. Asparagus has a weird strong smell. I think this stuff is a little less potent than the wild asparagus we had in Arbatax with Bruno and Iole though. We gave Madeleine the Quebec flag that Helen had given us. I think Madeleine was actually eyeing up my Canada flag. She says she will send some photos to mom and dad. |
