Jazz à Trivy

There is a very strong link between Jazz and France. Paris has acted as a magnet on a lot of great jazz musicians; after the war quite a few actually stayed in Paris for a shorter or longer period of time. Apart from this, France has produced some great names in jazz as well, to mention a few: Martial Solal, Daniel Humair, Pierre Michelot, Michel Legrand, Jean-Luc Ponty, Louis Sclavis and the unforgettable Quintette du Hot Club de France with Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelly. The tradition of the Hot Club is still alive in a great number of “manouche” combos.
One day we were browsing around in the Office de Tourisme in Cluny, when we got hold of a brochure called “Jazz à Trivy”. One of the first concerts in that series was a concert of Biréli Lagrène and his Gipsy Project. In Cluny the tickets had been sold out, but they told us that tickets were still available in a pharmacy in Charnay-lès-Mâcon. Charnay is not so far from here (approx. 30 km) so the next day we had tickets. Everybody who knows something about jazz also knows that Lagrène had developed from being a Django clone into a musician with a fabulous technique and a very own sound, even though he still has not forgotten his manouche background. The concert was excellent, and two seasons after the first concert, Lagrène performed again in Trivy, this time with Gipsy Project and singer Sara Lazarus. And that is what I find so amazing. Someone like Lagrène can easily fill a big concert hall, and has done so in the past. And still, this guy gives concerts in a piss pot little town, in the middle of nowhere, in a small Romanesque church which can be filled, with a lot of difficulty and after much pushing and shoving, with a maximum of 100 spectators. I am pretty sure there is a simple explanation. Possibly Lagrène was born or has lived around here, or has got some friends who live in this area and whom he does a favour; or of course a combination of both. Whatever the reason, Lagrène is a very welcome guest in Trivy. And Trivy has more to offer. The Swingle Singers of Ward Swingle were scheduled to perform not so long ago. Anyway, for jazz fans who are staying here in the summer: keep an eye out for “Jazz à Trivy”!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Bingo! (part 1)

Last year we read in the “Bulletin de Cormatin” that the “Amicale de Cormatin”, an association that organises amongst others the yearly brocante and randonnée, the outing for the aged and the Christmas party for the schoolchildren, was in need of volunteers. During the New Year’s reception at the Mairie we asked a local friend of ours whom we should approach, and she pointed Monsieur Alain G. out. We spoke to the guy and his wife, and yes, we could help; we had to be on a certain Saturday at 17h00 at Salle St. Roch to help with the Loto (= Bingo). We thought it to be a bit odd, because we were pretty sure that the Loto was in the afternoon. But maybe they needed us for the washing up, or for clearing chairs and tables.
The plot thickened when we realised that the Loto was held on a Sunday. But again, maybe we had to help setting up tables and chairs. Anyway, we arrived in time, together with a lot of other people. Every person got a handful of Loto cards, without payment, and the Loto began. Each time when a price fell, the “winner” stood up and handed in his card, which was carefully registered. And although three prices fell, nobody collected them; after the 3rd prize everyone packed up and went home. No need to say that we did not have the foggiest what had been going on that afternoon.
In the mean time we are a bit more integrated in the social life and events of Cormatin, and during the most recent meeting we finally saw the light. At the end of the meeting of the Amicale each participant received an envelope with 20 Loto cards à € 2.00 each. Every person present was asked to sell these cards to friends and relatives; the cards were numbered and had to be registered. The day before the “public” Loto, we are supposed to hand in the sold cards, the list with registered names of the absent players, and we had to play for those absent guys. The next day the proper, “public” Loto was held, and there one could also grab as many cards as one liked; however not without paying for them!
For part 2 and last click here.

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Never again! (part 3 and last)

Summary : this is part 3 about cutting down trees in a forest.
After a long, hot summer we were supposed to pick up the wood in August, with our Citroën Picasso and trailer. Fortunately we do not live far away from ‘our’ piece of the forest, and we noticed in time that the path along the affouage plot was quickly overgrowing with shrubs. It appeared that we did not have much time to loose. We got our ass in gear pretty soon, and started to go into the forest, upload wood, and carry it to the field behind our house.
Unfortunately the path was sheltering a hidden tree trunk, which made a nice dent in the chassis of the car, under the right hand side door. Result : we could neither open nor close the door anymore. Fortunately we had an ex-car mechanic on the camp site, who was friendly enough to hammer the chassis in such a way that we could use the door again. The wood had become a lot dryer thanks to the hot weather and was quite a bit lighter than in winter.
Finally we had managed to collect approx. 18 stère, which means if one neglects labour cost approx. € 2 per stère. Considering that we normally pay € 50 per stère, this sounds like a bargain. However, when ordering from a wood merchant, one gets ready to use logs in lengths of 30 cm. The main question is, how much savings one really achieves. That is of course heavily dependant on the craftsmanship and competence of the affouageurs. I will make a rough estimate:
Affuage = € 35. Chopping trees and stacking - 32 hours with 4 people à € 10 (on the black!) = € 1280. Transport from the forest and stacking - 15 hours with 2 people à € 10 = € 300. Cutting to size and stacking - 10 hours with 2 people à € 10 = € 200. Forget petrol, chains and damage to the car. Total : € 1780.
Buying 18 stère à € 50 = € 900. Considering the accuracy of the hours spent, and the fact that nobody works for € 10 per hour anymore, the wood would be quite expensive even at an hourly rate of € 5. And who would dare to offer somebody an hourly rate of € 5? Given the fact that I still have pain in my right shoulder caused by shifting the wood, the question remains whether affouage, done by a bunch of good willing amateurs is worth it. My answer to this question is a wholeheartedly : Never again!

De website van La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Never again! (part 2)

Summary : this is part 2 about cutting down trees in a forest.
We do not own a chainsaw, so we were relying on friends, who, in exchange for their labour and chainsaw, would get half of the wood. We paid the mairie, and helped with splitting and stacking. On top of that, because our friends were not exactly living next door, we would take care of transporting the wood from the forest to our field behind the house in September.
We would keep it, until they found time to collect their share. Well, cutting down trees sound easier than it really is. It is quite dangerous work, because trees tend to fall into an unexpected direction when the chainsaw is handled by someone who is not a professional. Further, thin trees are cut easily, and the pieces are easy to handle. Thicker trunks (mainly oak and beech), even when cut up in 50 cm length, are almost impossible to lift. The only way to move those pieces is to split them, with he help of steel wedges and a sledgehammer. I know now from experience, that even when one manages to split the wood, the 2 pieces are stuck to each other by the fibres, and that getting those two pieces physically separated from each other is damned hard work. Oak is worst, but beech is not much easier. When we started it was still quite pleasant weather, but soon it started freezing. The froze sap of the trees made the chain blunt in no time, which made cutting extra difficult. But the real challenge came at the end of the affouage. We had cut down and stacked everything but one last thick tree. There were still quite a few other ‘untouchables’ on our plot. And of course our last tree fell into the wrong direction.
Its crown landed in another tree, and there we were, stuck with a very dangerous situation. We had to choose between the evil and the deep blue see: either warn the forester and make fools of ourselves, or keep our mouths shut and illegally cut down the extra tree. We chose for the last option, and ended up with a bonus tree.
Finally, after 8 half days of very hard work, the four of us had managed to generate a few nice stacks of wood. The only remaining chore was getting the wood from the forest to our premises. But that seemed a doddle, by that time the wood having dried and hence being not so heavy anymore.
(To be continued in 1 week's time)

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Never again! (part 1)

Another typical French phenomenon is ‘affouage’. In the wooded areas of France the communes have the right, in consultation with the forester, to allocate plots of wood which have to be cleared, and to offer the clearing to the villagers. The affouage however is strictly regulated. One can normally register around September in the local town hall.
The forester determines which part of the wood must be cleared, and will, depending on the number of villagers having registered, divide the area in the same number of plots. Every plot has a number, and on the day one goes to pay, the payer gets allocated his plot. This goes literally by taking a number from a hat. In Cormatin there were roughly 18 registered ‘lumberjacks’ and hence there were 18 plots, at € 35 each. The size of the plots was roughly 30 x 30 m (between pole no. 7 in the foreground and myself), hence approx. 1000 square meters. On the plot everything had to be cut with a diameter under 25 cm; the forester had marked a few thicker trees as well which had to go. Twigs and branches had either to be stacked neatly, or to be burnt. There was also a time frame. Cutting down the trees had to be finished before April; the wood could stay in the wood all summer to dry, but had to moved from the forest by September.
Of course we did not have the foggiest idea what this meant, but it sounded interesting. We live in an area, where water comes from a tap, where (3 phase) electricity is almost always working, and where we have telephone and even ADSL. However, excrements disappear into a septic tank, and gas comes in bottles from the local supermarket. For our heating we are completely relying on wood, because neither electric nor gas heating is really an option (price wise). We have 2 wood burning stoves in the kitchen and living areas, and two kerosene heaters for emergencies and for our studies. It sounds a bit dramatic, but the bottom line is that we can generate very comfortable temperatures in the winter. Anyway, € 35 for a piece of a forest sounded like a bargain. I did a rough estimate, based on (guessed) numbers of trees, diameters and heights, and came to the conclusion that anything between 10 and 20 stère sounded realistic. 1 Stère is as much wood as you can get into a volume of 1 x 1 x 1 meter; depending on the way you stack 1 stère equals (effectively) between 0.6 and 0.8 cubic metres. Knowing that we get through 6 or 8 stère in a winter à € 50 per stère, the decision was quickly taken. We went to the mairie, payed our € 35 and felt like landowners, who had just acquired a piece of forest.
(To be continued in 1 week's time)

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Courtesy of the Telegraph

Johnny B. Goode

I have always thought, that sensational journalism was a monopoly of the English tabloids, and that serious media, TV stations such as France 1 and BBC 1, were not sensation-prone. Well, I have changed my mind about France 1 (which is not a public, but a commercial station). On one of those days the climate conference in Copenhagen and accompanying demonstrations were on every front page of the newspapers, the (national) TV news of 20h00 on France 1 spent ten minutes on the topic of French rock star Johnny Halliday being admitted into an American hospital. No, the guy did not die; he was simply admitted into hospital. To demonstrate how disproportional the coverage was: the journal lasts 30 minutes, of which the last ten normally are reserved for culture and sports. Hence the remaining ten minutes were reserved for such trivia as the climate conference, an escaped murderer, problems with the magistrates, the debate about the national identity and the like. Artists in France, and certainly French artists, have an enormous status compared to artists in other countries. Still, I cannot get to grips with journalists waiting in front of a hospital, interviewing people like Charles Aznavour, Sylvie Vartan and other celebrities who went to the USA head over heals; obviously there is absolutely nothing else they can talk about. Having said that, Johnny is a national hero, manages to get his face day in day out in the tabloids, and recently did a very successful farewell tour along all the big podia in France. He certainly deserves a place somewhere in the news, but not necessarily everyday as the first topic. Only yesterday, when Berlusconi got kicked in the teeth Johnny was given a second slot of 10 minutes after 2 minutes for Berlusconi. Even our local daily, the magnificent Journal de Saône-et-Loire, has got Johnny’s portrait on the front page of each edition. The hype around the death of lady Di seems to be calm behaviour compared to the hype around Johnny. Whatever will happen if the man really dies one day? Three days of national mourning, entombing his body in the Panthéon in Paris, orchestrated by Sarko himself? Time will tell....

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Cats come and go...

For those who have been following the story about our love-hate relationship with various cats, we have now another sequel. Some friends of ours have decided to return to he UK. Last year, during their holiday, we were asked to look after their cat Charbon, a big black one. The cat arrived in some sort of cage, was released, and disappeared straight away in the eaves of the toilet block of the campsite. We hardly saw the cat during his stay. He ate here, and the few times we saw him, he disappeared straight away in the wood or in the roof of the toilet block.
Our friends thought that it might be a good idea to bring Charbon again before they were leaving for England, but they had decided not to pick him up again. After all, Charbon “knew” us. Anyway, the friends arrived, the cage was put in the garden, to let Fifi get used to her new mate, and we had lunch together. After lunch we all were going back into the garden, to release the cat. Sue, who wanted Charbon to feel welcome, went back into the house to get some treats for Charbon. But before she returned, our friend had opened the cage. The only thing Sue could see was a tiny bit of a black tail, disappearing through the hedge into the meadow, heading for the forest.
And that was the last we saw of him. It all happened so fast, that I could not even take a picture of Charbon; hence a picture of Fifi, the “winner” in this duel.
Of course there is a possibility that Charbon will become a wild cat, but there are also cat theoreticians who seem to suggest that cats sometimes, after months of wandering around, return to their old home. Anyway, we still keep our eyes and ears wide open, because it would be a real pity if Charbon would become a victim of a fox or a wild boar....

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Charity (2)

The whole of Saturday 5 December was dedicated to the Téléthon, in the papers, on TV and in the streets of every self-respecting village and town in France. We have finally found out what the Téléthon is all about; it is a yearly nationwide fundraising event for a research institute for myopathy. Something like this on a yearly basis is unknown in the Netherlands, but maybe it is comparable with Red Nose Day in the UK. Each year another (mostly) French celebrity is godfather of the Téléthon, such as Alain Delon, Mireille Matthieu, Julien Clerc and this year the famous actor Daniel Auteuil (Jean de Florette / Manon des Sources). We also found out why this event is so important in Cormatin; one of the village children is suffering from myopathy, and with only 500 inhabitants almost everybody knows kid and parents personally.
We did not have time (and had no intention!) to sit and watch TV all day. After we had helped putting up the tents in front of the church in Cormatin, carried and put up long wooden tables, emptied car boots and carried boxes from car to tent, the Téléthon in Cormatin slowly got going after 10 o’clock. One tent was hosting second hand books, DVD’s and videos, another stall was selling mulled wine, snacks, wafers, ready made boxes with petit salé aux lentils (a typical winter dish from the North of France), in another women were making and selling Christmas decorations, and in yet another one they were selling roses. Throughout the day some children were playing guitar and accordeon, a local bicycle club had organised a tour around all Téléthons in the vicinity, buying something in every village, like a sandwich, some wafers, a glass of mulled wine....
Slowly it started to dawn why we had been making paper roses the week before. On the steps in front of the war memorial a huge board was mounted, with in it cut out the Téléthon logo. For each sold real rose (à € 1 a piece) a paper rose was stuck in the openings of the wooden board, thus producing a multicoloured Téléthon logo by the end of the day! Half the population was in the mean time trying to make the event a success, and the other half was supposed to hang around, buy roses or a second hand book, or spend money in any other way, thus enabling the organiser Monsieur P. to phone the central fund raising authorities to proudly announce that Cormatin had managed to clock up another € 4000 (roughly the average over the past years). This was not the first time that I had noticed that some Cormatinoises are very good in selling package deals. After we had helped putting up the tents we went off to buy the Saturday edition of Le Monde at the local Tabac. However, Mme B. did not let us leave with just Le Monde; we were more or less forced to buy two boxes of petit salé aux lentils. She was very persuasive, with arguments as “I have bought them myself as well”, it makes an excellent and easy luch, and it is for a good cause. Finally we did not leave the shop before we had dished out € 11 in return for two slips of paper entitling us to two boxes. We walked back to the stand with the snacks and in exchange for our pieces of paper we obtained the food, consisting of a layer of lentils garnished with various pieces of meat, such as streaky bacon, sausage and pork. How much the final result for Cormatin is going to be is still unknown; however, Mme B. did not exaggerate about the food; we absolutely do not mind to support next year’s Téléthon exactly the same way!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Charity (1)

Because we are finally involved in Cormatin’s seething social life, we were asked to come and help out with “folding roses” for the yearly Téléthon. We still do not exactly know what this is, apart from a big national fund-raising event. Anyway, we were asked, and we said yes. We were one of the first to arrive, and once the lady with the key to the village hall arrived, we entered and started putting chairs around the table. Soon the crowd came in, one by one. For us it is every time a surprise who the volunteers are going to be; there seems to be a reservoir of about 50 people in Cormatin, who take turns in helping out
However, there is also a small hard core who is always there. This time the majority of volunteers were women.
Cardboard boxes were carried in, which were filled with pieces of crêpe paper in various colours, pliers, and rolls of thin metal wire, normally used in gardening. Once everything was distributed across the tables, the game could begin.
One takes the corner of an oblong piece of crêpe paper in one hand, and folds the bottom long side of the free hanging bit into an harmonica shape with the other hand, whilst pushing it in the first hand. This hand also slowly revolves the folded bit, thus creating something which, with a lot of fantasy, resembles a flower. The bottom bit of the flower is then secured with a piece of wire, whereby the extra length of the wire resembles a stem. And voilà, there is one of the 360 roses ready for.... yes, ready for what? We still have no idea. It involves selling real roses, and giving the paper ones away, or the other way around, or there might still be another possibility. Anyway, all shall be revealed on the day of the Téléthon.
To be continued...

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

The times they are a-changin’...

I have always liked the way the official holidays are celebrated here. In earlier Blogs I have mentioned several times what the most common procedure is; whether the wreath is available or not, whether the official speech, dictated by “Paris”, is read or not, to which of the two monuments we have to go this time, and the real highlight of every occasion, namely the opening of the boot of Monsieur P.’s car from which, through a rickety tape deck a crackling, whining Marseillaise will be played. Last Armistice day (11 November) it was yet again one of those occasions.
Traditionally the wreath laying takes place in Cormatin only. We were stunned, when we noticed that Monsieur P. had indulged in buying a brand new neat and tidy amplifier, on batteries, which hosted a cassette player and a microphone. The mayor could now use a microphone to address his audience, and the Marseillaise was this time actually recognisable as such. At the end the mayor invited everyone for a vin d’honneur, but that was not what Monsieur P. had in mind. He is the last survivor of Buchenwald in Cormatin, but that is not the only reason why Monsieur P. has authority in the commune. A week earlier there had been a celebration at the monument for the deportees, to commemorate the fact that the monument had been erected 60 years ago. Obviously Monsieur P. was not impressed with the turn-out that particular day, so he strongly suggested that the whole crowd (which was exceptionally big this day) should go to Bois Dernier as well, even though there was no wreath. A week before the monument had been enhanced with a new inscription and a flagpole from which the French flag was flying proudly. The inscription reads “Nous sommes libres, notre drapeau flotte à nouveau, ils ont fait don de leur vie.” ; which means something like “We are free, our flag flies anew, they gave their lives”. After a minute of silence the Marseillaise sounded like it had never sounded here before. Still, whenever I pass by one of the monuments, I think with a bit of nostalgia of how it sounded in the good old days.....

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Christmas is looming

The year is slowly coming to an end, and this usually culminates in an overabundance of Christmas decorations in Chazelle and other hamlets or villages around us. But our hamlet has something special other hamlets do not have: Chazelle has on of the world’s greatest decaroteurs of all time. And certainly Monsieur N. gets his act together towards Christmas.
In the summertime his garden is inhabited by an army of garden gnomes, standing in front of their own wooden working model of a Dutch windmill, or leaning against a wooden model of a romanesque church. If you want to turn your garden into something like the one I have just described, Monsieur N. is definitely your man.
This year however, his winter urge started earlier than usual. At the end of last month, out of the blue, something appeared on the corner of the only crossroads Chazelle boasts. Seated on a fire hydrant there was a man carved out of pumpkins. This Halloween decoration was however aptly destroyed by, one assumes, a stray cat or dog. But nothing can stop Monsieur N., once Christmas is looming. Last week, quite unexpectedly, a romanesque church appeared in front of his house on a wooden table.
The space in front of the church doors was populated by figures from a nativity scene; or should I say from at least a dozen nativity scenes? Not long after that another table appeared in front of one of his garage doors, this time carrying a huge wooden stable, inhabited by what appeared to be the remainder of his grand total of nativity scenes. But that is not all. The walls of his house are now decorated with numerous tasteful light bulbs, light snakes, roof and chimney climbing Father Christmasses, etc. In a word: his house breathes Christmas from all its pores.
But the best still has to come. Each year appears, next to the aforementioned fire hydrant, a Christmas tree and something that either resembles a coffin, or a rocket monsieur N. has built for his great-grand children. This monstrosity of course has lights, but it also contains another Father Christmas, half hanging against the wall of his coffin, ready to be launched into outer space.
When one has something like this next door, who would want to travel to London for the pathetic decorations in Oxford Street?

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

A delayed funeral

Recently, during a lunch of the Amicale de Cormatin, our mayor was in a very talkative mood. It all started off with talking about the main dish. That consisted of a stew of game, which he had shot himself during one of his hunting expeditions in the woods around Mont Saint-Romain. The wine flowed abundantly, and the stories got taller. At some stage there was a story about the bell-ringer of Chazelle. One day he rang the bell with such vigour, that the rope disattached itself from the bell, landed on the head of the ringer and almost knocked the guy off his feet. Since that time no bell has ever been rung, because there is no access to the bell from within, and obviously nobody has felt the urge to fix it from the outside. From there the subject changed to funerals. Our mayor had a relative in Paris, who died there. But the funeral was going to take place in Chazelle, where the family grave is, and everything had been arranged with the funeral director in Paris. The coffin would leave Paris at 9h00, and would arrive in Chazelle well in time for the funeral at 15h00. Everything was set for the event; the family had gathered in the church, the priest was there… The only thing that was not there, was the coffin. One and a half hour later the priest was getting cheesed off, and wanted to call off the whole thing. In the end he decided to do a symbolic funeral of a portrait of the deceased, and after that everybody moved off. In the mean time Paris had been phoned a number of times, and finally Head Quarters came back with the solution of this mystery. It appeared, that the driver had entered Chazelles into his GPS receiver. Not only are there at least 4 places with the name Chazelle in France; there are even more villages or hamlets with the name Chazelles. The driver had not just miss-spelled the place name, but also randomly picked the first one that came up in his tomtom. He emerged somewhere in Puy-de-Dôme, and after finding out his mistake, reached the proper Chazelle at about 21h00. The funeral turned out to be a very lonely affair in the end…. Moral of the story: Never trust your tomtom blindly!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Virtual reality

One of the highlights of a visit to the abbey of Cluny is the 3D film shown as part of the visit. But (I think as part of the Cluny 2010 celebrations) the Cluny abbey is introducing more things to show what the abbey looked like before the French revolution. One of the latest things introduced recently are screens which display “virtual reality”.
The screens are a sort of LCD screens, approx. 50 cm wide and 1 m tall, standing on a pole. The screens can be turned by the spectators. What one sees on the screen is what one would haven seen in the days the abbey was still there. The view changes when the screen is turned. in French these screens are called “bornes”, which meens something like milestones. The first one was installed in the remaining part of the transept. This one can be turned 360 degrees, and shows the views inside the church from the transept.
In the past the abbey was protected by walls, gates and towers. one of these towers is the Tour des Fromages, whis is located on Cluny’s main street. recently a second borne has been installed in the attic of this tower. It follows the same concept. the moment the screen is turned slightly, the view changes. The interesting feature is, that when one comes close enough to the screen to see the week market at the foot of the tower, the same market, and the people walking around it, are shown on the screen. Only the background of the market has changed to the abbey in pre-revolutionary days.
To me this is a stunning piece of modern virtual reality technique, and it certainly adds something to a visit of the abbey and of the tower (which requires a separate ticket). Apart from this Virtual Reality screen is the tower worth a visit in its own right. The access to the tower is inside the Office the Tourisme, and the wooden stairs are extremely steep. Once having climbed the stairs, one finds an attic with big holes in the walls (no windows) which allow stunning views of Cluny and surroundings. And one can take pictures of the lovely panoramas without being hindered by the glare of glass.

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Pidgin German

Ever tried to translate some English prose into a language one hardly masters? Based on one’s education (in my case 1 year + 2 years German in various schools) and experience (none) this is not necessarily a doddle. When I was young, having a C or D for German was still seen as a belated act of resistance, hence why bother working hard to boost your knowledge of the German language?
Anyway, recently I wanted to post something in German on the Internet. A friend of mine, an ex-teacher (in German) agreed to take out the blatant errors, on the condition that this was going to be a one-off. This was my first encounter with German since the sixties. Was it sheer arrogance that made me revive the idea to have our website in English, Dutch, French and …. German?
I will not bore my readers with a detailed run down on my struggle with declinations, three genders, conjugations, four grammatical cases, uppercase for nouns, etc. What I would like to make clear is that some obsolete dictionaries and an ancient grammar book are not really sufficient for a smooth, quick and adequate translation, no matter how one simplifies the original text. Luckily there is a vast array of tools available on the Internet, and cross referencing with Wikipedia in Dutch, English, French and German, using Google to search for a word one assumes exists, and using the German Wiktionary helps tremendously. Still, it is a heavy task to produce something that does not automatically results in a declaration of war, as soon as a German reads the final product.
After three days of hard and concentrated work we now have a German website. Someone might actually remark that there are free translation programs available, such as Babelfish. To show the “quality” of those programs, I will translate the previous sentence from English to German and back to English again, using Babelfish.
1. Someone might actually remark that there are free translation programs available, such as Babelfish.
2. Jemand konnte, dass es die vorhandenen Programme der freien Übersetzung gibt, wie Babelfish wirklich erwähnen.
3. Someone could that there are the existing programs of the free translation, how Babelfish really mention.
Of course this a fictitious, and not completely fair test; however it certainly shows that free translators do not produce much more than pidgin German. I am convinced, that my translation is full of errors. However, read out aloud, with the right Prussian accent, it certainly sounds like German!
Mit freundlichen Grüßen, Käse aus Holland.

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The local Chinese

One of the returning questions from friends and relatives is “What do you really miss in France?”. Most are thinking along the lines of Dutch delicacies like raw herring, but one of the things I missed most is the ordinary Chinese-Indonesian restaurant, which you will be able to find even in a small Dutch village. Around here there are some Chinese restaurants, but most of them are originally Vietnamese, which nowadays have taken on board Chinese and Thai food. We have tried a few, in Mâcon and Chalon, but the quality of the food was, to say it kindly, not impressive. When we were renovating the house, we went regularly to Crèches-sur-Saône, because that was where the nearest building merchant was. Almost all shops close between 12 and 2 o’clock, and of course one day we forgot, and were there just past 12. However, we had seen a sign nearby, saying “La Route de Chine, buffet à volonté”, and we decided to have lunch there in stead of driving half an hour back and return around 2 o’clock. That turned out to be a very lucky gamble indeed. The buffet à volonté (eat as much as you like) offered a very good choice of proper Chinese food; the quality was good and the price was very reasonable (€ 11.00 without drinks). After that event we tried to plan our trips to the building merchant in such away, that we could have lunch in Crèches as well. But all good things come to an end, such as the renovation and hence our visits to Crèches. However, we had to go to Mâcon regularly, because Mâcon is the seat of many offices important to us: the prefecture, the health insurance, the tax office, etc. On one of our trips we noticed another sign, saying “Palais d’Asie, buffet à volonté”; thinking of our good experiences with “La Route de Chine” we decided to give this one a try as well. That was definitely the end of our visits to Crèches. The choice in Mâcon was not only bigger, but the quality of the food was even better, and the price (in those days) was € 10.00 for a lunch. Since then the prices have been raised first to € 11.00, and recently lowered to € 10.50 (prices in the evening and week-end tend to be slightly higher). To give an impression of the assortment: there are 6 warm starters, 2 kinds of suhi, 2 kinds of dim sum, 4 sauces and various types of salad available. There are 8 hot meat, fish or shell fish dishes, which can be eaten with Cantonese rice, white rice, fried noodles, vegetables and even French fries. The desserts are various fruit salads, 5 kinds of ice cream and cake. In a word, there is something for everybody. Nowadays we plan our visits strategically around lunch time. And as far as the original question is concerned; the Chinese has been scrapped off the list, and is replaced by something that is really not available in France : an ordinary Dutch snackbar!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

The end of an era

In my last Blog I was rather lyrical about the “old-fashioned” cattle market in Saint-Christophe. Unfortunately I was not aware of the changes that had taken place in the meantime. There was an article in the latest bimonthly magazine of the Chamber of Commerce about the market in Saint-Christophe. The article very proudly announced the introduction in June this year of a “marché au cadran”, which is a market by means of a clock. Because we had not been there for a while, we decided to see how dramatic these changes were.

The moment we arrived we saw what had happened. The traditional market still exists, but at a much smaller scale. Next to the old covered market hall a new building had appeared, a modern circular building. Inside the building was a small ring, with around it a sort of amphitheatre. One man brought a cow or cows in from the outside, and made them make a little round in the arena. In the mean time all the particulars, such as vaccinations, weight, lot number, etc. were displayed on a big screen. The farmers were bidding electronically, this time in Euros, although the price in Francs was still displayed as well, and after the highest bid the cow was lead outside the arena, to make place for the next one. It is needless to say that the sterile environment and the efficiency has advantages for farmers as well as cows. However, it is, at least for the tourist lacking the charm of the noise, the smell and of manoeuvring around heaps of cow dung, in order to see what is going on. For those who want to see an old fashioned market in its full glory, the motto is : do not wait too long. It looks like that within a year the old market will completely be replaced by the bidding via a clock. Something similar already has happened to the other big cattle market in Burgundy, the one in Moulins-Engilbert (Nièvre).
The blow was finally softened a bit by an excellent lunch at La Tour d’Auvergne. For € 13.30 we got steak frites, a cheese platter and a mousse au chocolat. Ever been to a restaurant, where, because one of the steaks was a bit on the small side (according to the waitress, they looked the same to us!) the cook had thrown in an extra, third steak? It happened to us that day!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Cattle market

When I look out over the meadows from my windows, I see some beautiful white Charollais cows (bred for meat, with AOC, and not for milk) wondering through the field. That is less strange than it seems; although we do not live in the Charollais region (Charolles is approx. 60 km from here) these sort of cows can be found throughout Saône-et-Loire. In the département there are two markets where this cattle is sold. The most important, biggest and oldest is the one in Saint-Christophe-en-Brionnais, a village even further from here than Charolles.
The market possibly dates back to the X-th century; in 1488 Charles VIII declared the market to be “perpetual”, and ever since there have been cattle markets here. We arrived at about 12h30, and the streets were completely deserted. All we saw were a few market stalls along the main street selling rubber boots. A bit disappointed we walked into a restaurant, it being lunch time. Here it was the same thing; a tiny room, with a few empty tables. We waited a few minutes, until a waitress walked in. We told her that we would like to have lunch, and the moment that magic word was spoken we were whisked away to the back of the restaurant. All of a sudden it became clear. The actual restaurant on a Wednesday (market day) was a great big hall, with endlessly long tables and benches. The hall was completely filled up with noisy farmers, obviously already having started negotiations about cattle prices at the lunch tables. The waitress found us a place, and we joined a bunch of shouting farmers at their table. The restaurant was run like a factory; very efficient. There were lots of waitresses, whizzing around the tables; unlike some busy French lunchtime restaurants around here, there was plenty of choice (although not à la carte), and not just one set menu. Within half an hour one had finished his meal, and made place for yet another farmer. Around one o’clock the hall emptied, but for a handful of tourists, and obviously that was the time the market started. The market is held in an immensely big hall, where the farmers are negotiating the prices by writing offer and demand on little bloc notes. It appears, that prices are still in Francs, although by now I do not think they are still using old Francs.
Farmers here are, as they were in the Netherlands, easily recognisable. French farmers however are generally scrawny, wear blue or dark-blue dust-coats and green or brown rubber boots, unlike Dutch farmers; the common denominator is the walking stick they carry around to hit the cows when necessary. Even though the farmers are different, the whole atmosphere on the market, with its smell of cattle and dung, the shouting and the negotiating, brings back memories from when I was a child, when I wondered across the weekly cattle market in Delft, the place where I was born. Every so often we still go back to Saint-Christophe, to taste the atmosphere, but also for lunch. Those lunches are excellent; of course no restaurateur would dare to come up with a lousy piece of meat when you serve farmers who breed what they are eating….. Saint-Christophe has two restaurants, but we find that the one we tried during our first visit, La Tour d’Auvergne, has, although the same sort and quality of food as the other, the better atmosphere of the two.
Click here for part 2.

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Cluny 2010 - Ouvrez les portes!

My better half has written a very interesting Blog about Cluny and its history, in view of the festivities around 1100 years Cluny Abbey. In stead of copying it in, it seems more logical to give the link to the Blog.
Click here to read Sue’s blog.
The Blog gives a very good written impression of how big and influential the monastic order of Cluny has been. Unfortunately there is not much left of the third church built there, but when visiting the remains of the church one can admire a 3D film, produced by the ENSAM, which shows what the Cluny church must have looked like in its high-days.
In the eighties I have seen a similar project from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT - Cambridge MA); however, if I remember correctly, that was not a 3D film, but an ordinary 2D film. Although it also showed what Cluny must have been like, the emphasis in that film was much more on what the MIT could do, than on what the monks around 1000 AD could do.
The film from the ENSAM is short (10 minutes) and in French, but is far superior compared to the 30 minute film from MIT.
Apart from this film there are a great number of models of the abbey around; the abbey museum hosts a very nice collection of various models, showing the exterior as well as the interior of the church.
The only part of the church that is still in tact is part of the transept; on the picture it is the right hand side part with the small tower with the blue roof and the slightly bigger tower next to it.
Click here for a photo album of “Ouvrez les Portes!”

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle

Frog legs

As a child I was told that there were actually people who eat frog legs. In English this does not sound so horrifying, but the Dutch call them frog bottoms, and who would want to eat some creature’s bottom? Of course, in those days I was not aware that steak is just a nicer word for cow bottom! When I lived in Singapore, one of the (Chinese) consultants I worked with, thought it was big fun to take westerners to restaurants where they served 100-year eggs, blood cubes, snake and turtle soup, iguana and frog legs. Even though I never got the hang of a couple of these things, frog legs certainly became one of my favourites. Some time ago we wanted to try out Le Rochefort, a restaurant in Cluny. It was packed each lunch time and the car park was full of local cars; normally a very good sign for a restaurant around here.
Unfortunately I had had escargots (snails Burgundian style) and frog legs a couple of days before in a different restaurant. Both dishes were served in a rather fluid sauce, completely covered in parsley (quite a common way to serve this sort of food around here). The plate with frog legs resembled a bit too much a stagnant pond covered in duck-weed with frogs floating in it (the frog legs are still attached to each other when served). Anyway, I ordered something else in Le Rochefort that day. However I saw several plates with frog legs being served around us, and they looked a lot more appetising than the ones I had had before.
A couple of days ago we decided to give it another go. And that turned out to be an excellent choice. The prices give here are the 2009 prices. One portion of frog legs costs € 21.00; a set meal (I chose Terrine foie de volaille = chicken livers, frog legs and desert) costs € 25.00.
Luckily I had shared the excellent starter with my partner, because the main course was so big and labour intensive, that I actually had eaten more than enough after an hour picking meat off minuscule bones. The desert went also to my partner, who was quite happy with the salad she had ordered and my leftovers. The frog legs were fried or deep fried, and were seasoned with parsley. Yesterday, when we were having a picnic at long tables with the inhabitants of Cormatin in the streets of Cluny to celebrate the opening ceremony of Cluny 2010, the conversation veered at some point towards local delicacies. After having been informed on how to catch snails, how to feed them flour for two days and then how to dissect and prepare them, the word frog legs fell. The consensus appeared to be that the best frog legs in the area are being served in, indeed, restaurant Le Rochefort in Cluny. A piece of advise of those who happen to stay around here and are adventurous with food : do not forget to have a meal there, and order a portion of frog legs. It is well worth the money, and not only is it famous in this part of the woods, but also delicious; take my word for it!

The website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle