An Unexpecrted Visit to the Doctor and a Visit to Albi

On Monday, May 4 I had to visit the doctor to see if I would be allowed to stay in France. This was rather a disappointment because Ben and I thought it would be a useless thing to do. But we heard that if I didn't go through with it my carte de sejour could be taken away, so reluctantly we (Amy came too) all headed to the specific doctor's office that dealt with foreigner's coming to France. Once we got there, we showed the receptionist my carte de sejour and she motioned us into the waiting room, where we sat just about 10 minutes and a nurse came by to pick me up. She directed me to a little room to change for the x-ray. Once changed, she spoke to me in French and demonstrated the actions I needed to take to help her with the x-ray. That was easily done, but once done the real wait began. I looked at my watch, it wasn't nearly closing time for the office yet, but I felt like I was forgotten. Unfortunately my appointment was planned at 12 noon and we got there early so as to be seen before noon. That happened, but I had to wait for the doctor a good 15 minutes before he was ready to see me. When he did see me, he asked all the questions for the interview in French. I even told him " En Anglais, s'il vous plait" but he continued merrily in French, doing a few motions to explain what he was asking. I watched him quickly check my paper, which I figured was a good sign. Then, at the very end of my paper, he wrote a large OK. So I could only guess I was a-OK, that I was allowed to continue to live in France for the rest of the time here. He gave me another paper and I left the office, confused and relieved it was over. I told Ben all of my visit was in French. He couldn't believe it at first because he had been lucky, like so many of my friends here, and got the entire thing in English. Nevertheless I gave Ben the paper I had received and he told me he would give it to Christiane, our liaison while we are here. She would do what she needed to do with it and I could stay. I am not French, but the whole process was rather ridiculous. But such is life. Sometimes pointless things need to happen. Amy and I spent the rest of the day in Toulouse, enjoying the beautiful weather and shopping.

The next day (Tuesday, May 5) was spent on a rather different adventure, we had decided to take a train out of town. To the town of Albi. We had gotten our tickets the day before, so in the morning we arrived at Gare Matabiau early so we would be more than ready for our train. When we got there, about 20 minutes walking from the apartment, I could not see our destination on the board, the only destination that was even remotely close to our tickets was headed to a different location. It was headed to Rodez instead of Albi. That definitely got me nervous about our train, but all the other information followed our tickets. So I stuck with it, watching the Rodez stop carefully so we would catch what platform we would be headed to. It finally came up and we headed straight to it. When we reached to platform, to my dismay the tracks beside it looked to be under construction, it confused me so much that I thought we might be on the wrong platform, but everything pointed to it. After the train arrived, I knew for sure we were on the right platform. The train that appeared looked a lot like the train we took to Bayeux, so it was a smaller train, more like what you see in a metro station. There were both permanent seats and ones you could fold down. Amy and I sat across from each other on some of the permanent seats. The train was rather full going to such a small destination, but it seemed it made a few stops before Albi as well. So the train for the most part evened out, there were fewer people once we had stopped in Albi. Entering the station, I grabbed our trusty Rick Steve's guidebook which gave directions from the train station to the center of town. It was quite correct and soon we were standing under the massive St. Cecile Cathedral. We went in and Amy was amazed. We peeked around for a little bit, but I was unable to show Amy the cathedral's blind for it was closing for lunch time. So we walked out and I wondered if she was alright if we had lunch then (for it was about noon). She agreed and we walked around Albi for a bit trying to find a good deal on a meal. We found one at a petite restaurant that I unfortunately did not write down the name of. But we were able to get seats and were quickly served. Amy and I both had tarte salee or savory tarts. They were quite tasty and we savored every bite. Soon it was time for dessert and we both picked the tarte framboise or raspberry tart. It was also quite tasty, it was served with a small scoop of ice cream that just improved the taste. Our meal was soon over and we headed back to see the choir blind, which we had missed on our first visit. Once there we immediately entered the blind and I again read about the importance of the blind, that it was one of the few remaining and that each angel was holding something different. After visiting the blind, we headed to the Tresor, which I had not seen before. It held many of the cathedral's important relics, safely protected against heavy glass. When we descended the stairs, the cathedral had become busy with school children, it made it hard to get around and to talk to one another because of the noise and the amount of children. But we were able to exit by weaving in and out of the children as they stood in line. Amy thoroughly enjoyed the cathedral and I thought it was nice I had a chance to enjoy it for the second time and admire the grand artwork that adorned its walls.
The cathedral was not the only stop on the list when going to Albi. I thought Amy might like to see the Henri Toulouse-Lautrec museum as well. So we stopped by and I introduced her to his artwork. Again I enjoyed seeing the work for a second time. It was interesting to see if I caught anything different that I had not noticed before. I didn't catch much, but I realized what pieces of art I enjoyed the most. Which were his very practiced landscapes and dramatic pictures of people. Amy was quite fascinated and enjoyed his paintings more than his prints. But to each his own. Our trip to Albi was winding to a halt, for the train we were to take was to arrive in an hour. So with that hour we relaxed and sat down for a bit to enjoy the brilliantly sunny day and ponder the beauty of the cathedral and what we had seen for the day. Our rest was too quickly over and we trudged back to the station to wait patiently for the train. Many people were headed back to Toulouse, and Amy worried we might not fit. But to our happiness a larger train arrived to take us back. Without a hitch we arrived back in Toulouse to trudge back to the apartment and see what Ben was up to. I was glad Amy had enjoyed herself in Albi and what Albi had to offer. It had been a wonderfully art-filled busy day.

Bowling, Basilica and Brain Power

On Tuesday, April 28, I waited patiently for my good friend Amy to arrive and when the time came I whisked myself toward the bus stop for the airport. But to my dismay Toulouse had yet another one of France's famous protester's walk directly in my path. Waiting as long as I could, I snuck through the line of them and got to my destination. Then it occurred to me since the protester's were allowed through how then would the bus get through? The road on which they held their protest was a road that made a T so the end on which my bus was to come was blocked via police barricade. I'm thankful I was not only person anxiously watching the barricade slowly go down and cars slowly allowed back through. Then it seemed like an hour or so later the bus arrived. Thankfully I arrived more than on time for Amy's plane. I'm glad I took the earliest possible bus. Yet one more dilemma, I thought I knew the airport better than I did. But alas, I was at the wrong gate and I was happy to hear "We would like to invite Taylor Goemaat to the information booth, Thank you." So I headed straight there hoping Amy didn't feel too scared. I found her, looking anxious (as I'm sure I would feel) but greeted her cheerfully. She gave me a hug and we were off to meet Ben who would be waiting with the car. We all got back to the apartment to rest for a few minutes before we headed to a bowling alley to meet Ben's co-workers.
We were the first ones to arrive to the bowling alley. It was near the large shopping center in Blagnac and we found it without hassle. But ever so slowly Ben's co-workers arrived. Then we seemed to wait for at least 10 minutes to be seated at the restaurant area of the alley. Being a French bowling alley, the meal was the main thing. Every single one of Ben's co-workers got the menu that was offered and we had just ordered pizza. So Ben, Amy and I tried to eat the pizza as slow as possible to wait for Ben's co-workers to finish each part of their meal. It was nice to meet Ben's co-workers face to face, some of them I had never seen before and it was also nice to chit chat with them about my time in Toulouse, what French words I was having trouble with and how long Amy was staying. They all seemed nice and glad to have some conversation. After the meal was over, we headed over to give up our shoes to get bowling ones and play the one game. Ben's co-workers were scared we Americans were going to be really good at bowling, but we definitely proved them wrong. At least on my end of things. Ben and I haven't been bowling at least since College so I knew I was going to be rusty. Rusty I was, for my frames each showed a nice little zero to say I was losing miserably. Ben, being the good husband explained why I was not doing so hot. He gave me some direction and I was finally earning some points, as little as they were. By the end of the game I was pretty close to one of Ben's co-workers, she only beating me by a few points. It was fun, a different way to do bowling, at least compared to America's version. Only playing one game I was not allowed to improve my score by much, which made me miss American bowling a little because you can play as many games as you want. But we all seemed to have fun. we headed home to rest after a long day.

I have not seen all that Toulouse has to offer so, a couple days later (Thursday, April 30), Amy and I headed to St. Sernin Basilica and the Natural History museum. Since I have been here awhile, I've heard a lot about St. Sernin and why it was a good place to visit, so one might as well see for themselves. Amy was immediately impressed by the architecture, its curving domes and doorways as well as the carvings decorating the pillars. Admittedly, I thought the Basilica would be more grand than it was. Of course I am just comparing it to the cathedral's I have already seen. Compared to Albi, it did not have the painting nor the scale of Albi's cathedral, but it was pretty in its own right. The front altar of the the Basilica was elaborately done in gold, beyond the altar there were vast paintings of Bible stories some having golden outlines. The many chapels each had their own elaborate decorations displaying their patron saint, one was even bigger than the rest. One of the most interesting things about the the Basilica is the story behind its creation. It was built in honor of a Toulousain bishop that was martyred by a bull dragging him through the streets. He was a popular bishop and he had a fascinating story, so after the Basilica was finished people came from all over to see the church which was built for him. With its following the Basilica became one of the stops on the way to Compostela in Spain. After we took a few pictures and explored all that we could explore in the church we headed straight to the Toulouse Natural History Museum.
When we arrived at the museum I was expecting something different when we arrived. I was expecting more about Toulouse and its natural history and not so much about the world as a whole, which was what the museum was about. It takes you on an adventure through the different layers of the earth starting with the rock and working up to the surface. Continuing on our journey through the earth we learned about earthquakes and lava, as well about many of the beasts that can be found on the surface. The first stuffed animals we saw were birds and insects then it began to tell of the other creatures, zebras, rhinos, sloths, snakes, alligators, and many other creatures one can see throughout the globe. It was all very interesting, even though several times I had to convince myself my imagination was playing tricks on me and that the animals were not moving in the least. Besides the stuffed creatures, the museum also has a garden full of different flowers and plants. One can also see two live peacocks show you their feathers as they strut through the greenery. We were done with the museum and decided to head to its boutique to see what was there. We made quite a splash in the boutique, finding neat things to give to friends. We both enjoyed our time there, learning about the animals and our earthly domain.

The Pious and Wealthy of Toulouse

On a bright sunny day, Thursday, April 23 I joined my friend Lisa and her sister on another tour of Toulouse. This tour was on the different monasteries and mansions that once ruled the streets of Toulouse. A long time ago Toulouse was a very Catholic city, it used to have many monasteries that would take up several city blocks. In fact, Place Saint Georges nearly butted up against one of the monasteries. This monastery was the monks of St. Antoine Du T. Their monastery took up at least 4 or 5 blocks, thus nearly colliding with what is now (and was) Place Saint Georges. Monks, like football teams or high school teams had a bit of a rivalry. The St. Antoine Du T monks used to have a regular cross on their robes, but after the Knights of the Templar's came to Toulouse they could no longer have that cross, because the Knights had the same type of cross on their robes as well. So as a group the St. Antoine monks decided to use what our guide said was an Egyptian cross which formed a "T" thus making them St. Antoine Du T monks. The large monastery no longer exists, only a part of it remains. But that part is on the road tributes to the St. Antoine Du T monks. It holds the obvious name of "Rue de St. Antoine Du T" and funnily enough I use that road often to get to Place Wilson. Another interesting apart of that particular road, is that the city of Toulouse has displayed various stone pieces on a building, also attributing to the road's history. These pieces are replicas of what used to be on the monastery as decoration, their originals can be found at the Musee de Augustines.
Speaking of the Musee de Augustines, it is another monastery that held about the same amount of land as the St. Antoine monks. But unlike the St. Antoine monks, the Augustine monks would not go out into the world. They would remain in their monastery, praying, gardening and taking care of the church and cloisters. Later, in the monastery history, they decided that they wanted to get more land, so they asked the Pope if they could buy some more land. The Pope on the other hand would not give them the land unless the Augustine monks would take part in the world outside their monastery. The Augustine monks figured that would be an alright plan and opened their doors to the world. Several years later, due to their new worldliness, the Augustine monks were under scrutiny, the church had found that the Augustine monks were allowing prostitutes into their quarters. It had brought the monastery popularity, but the monks within the walls were no longer pious, their humanity brought their monastery shame. After kicking out some of the devious monks, the Augustine monastery slowly dwindled in numbers and soon was shut down.
On the other side of the spectrum, Toulouse was also home to several different sects of penitents. Penitents are religious men who aren't monks, but ordinary people who do good works for others. They came in many forms and colors, the colors could range from red to black. The color stood for how extreme their beliefs were. The red penitents would flagellate themselves in honor of Jesus' sufferings (as is one example). We only got to see two representations of the penitents that are still around. The blue penitents still have a church next to the department store Monoprix (this is about a 3 block walk from our apartment). The church is called St. Jerome. It has a somewhat unusual interior, having light blue walls and their sculptures being bright white. The inside was quiet and peaceful, a few people were inside, praying as we viewed the church. Just outside the sanctuary of the church our guide said that St. Jerome is usually quite busy, just from the use of the people. She also stated that St. Jerome is a place where people can find peace and meditation during their busy lives. I thought that was rather interesting, that the penitents, who ran the church let it remain open during the weekday to allow people to pop in and find peace in God. Another interesting fact about this church is that King Louis XV, I think, used to give money to this particular church, saying that he would continue to pray and give money to this church until his wife would give birth. As was his goal, his wife soon gave birth and money stopped being given to St. Jerome. Today there are many relics which remain with St. Jerome, these relics were purchased for the church through King Louis XV. It seems the penitents are still very gracious to the former King for all that he did for them. The other color of penitents we saw were the black penitents. Their church was unavailable for viewing because their are very few times throughout the day when it is open. But our guide said it is a very beautiful church that if you caught it open one should peek in.
Besides the Churches, we saw some mansions that were built by two different people. One, though I do not remember the architects name had a beautiful front. The building was red brick and on the second floor was a wonderful glass patio, framed by intricate metal work. The next mansions we saw were built by a different person one for his son and the other for himself. Again, I do not remember his name. The one for this man's son had a very picturesque door, with ornate carvings. They were sadly faded for it takes too much money and time to restore it. The house also had quite an array of vines climbing up it, which must also be apart of the lack of money for restoration. On the other hand, the man's house seemed very well taken care of, it is a unique house because it has a flat front decorated with beautiful Toulousain ironwork.
It was a fascinating journey from the time of the monks to the time of the mansions. The tour guide always seems to have great surprises for anyone who decides to go on her tours. I am very glad I have been able to go on them and learn just a little bit more of the city I have made my home for the past four months.

Doing as Romans Do: Rome, Italy

Friday, April 17: Ancient Rome
Rome is one of those places a person has to see. It is the birthplace of modern human civilization and has helped established of many places on the map, especially in Europe. Ben and I headed to Rome for the weekend. It is nice to know we live in a town that has flights to wherever you would want to go. Especially if one would want to see Europe.
Our flight to Rome was not too long, about an hour and a half. We arrived at the airport only to wait for our bags for a little while and then run into some men advertising a "shuttle" from the airport to the center of town. They explained that it would be cheaper and faster than the train to get where we needed to go and at that point we needed to get to our hotel that we hadn't a clue as to where it was. We waited patiently for the drivers to be ready. Our wait was soon over as we were motioned to our van, which was already filled with people, most of which whom had not been to Rome yet. The people we met were from several different places on the globe, the couple who were sitting behind us were from Holland and a couple we met while waiting for the driver were from Canada. It was nice to know that we were not going to be the only tourists in town (not that that would really be the case in Rome).
After the short drive into the city center Ben and I arrived at our hotel. We were quickly checked in and our bags were dropped in our room. Ben found that the Coliseum was not too far away, about a 2 or 3 mile walk. As we are young, it seemed easy just to walk there. The weather was cooperating, for the sun was out and it was warm. Collecting our cameras, the map and ourselves we headed out the door, ready for a Roman adventure. On our way to the Coliseum there were many touristy shops on the way. We had to peek in, for before our trip we had determined to get several gifts for those at home. Our peeking was over and we were headed out again. It seemed we were not the only tourists who had decided to walk to the Coliseum. We were following several people headed in the same direction. Once we got there, there was a huge crowd around the Coliseum. Some of which were not tourists. There were some very persuasive men dressed as gladiators that scooped us up to take a picture, with our camera, who we reluctantly shelled over 10 euro. But after that distraction we headed toward the entrance. Now I admit I have been to Rome before and this time the Coliseum did not seem as impressive. I don't know if it was all the tourists we were following, or if it was the effect of the last time I was there. The last time I came to Rome, I was with friends, and I distinctly remember coming out of the metro station and being completely awed. Perhaps the last time I came it was the transition from the modern to the ancient that really impressed me. This time we did not have quite that transition. Nevertheless, Ben at least was very impressed and I knew that the Coliseum was a great building, still standing from the ancient world. We viewed it for awhile and took too many pictures. Then we headed to the other ancient Roman sites, the Palentino and the Roman Forum. It was neat walking through the ruins of the Roman times, imagining what it would have been like to have been a Roman citizen and shopping, getting food and conversing with the fellow citizens amongst the stone structures. Leaving the ruins we walked a block away to the Circus Maximus where the Romans had chariot races and other such wonders. It is just a park now, that is heavily used by the modern citizens of Rome. We soon left the ruins and the Circus for something I had never seen in Rome and that is the famous Mouth of Truth. It was perhaps made famous by Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck in the movie "Roman Holiday." It is an unusual site. It is attached to the Church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, the church was closed, but through the gate we could see its stony faded face. There is an unusual legend attached to it, that if you are a liar your hand will be bitten off. The funny truth about the Mouth of Truth is that it is just a drain cover from Roman times and it simply gets its infamous history from the silly legend. But everyone is always up for a little fun, so I understand why such a legend stuck.

Saturday, April 18: Vatican City
We thought we would be smart and head to the Vatican City a little earlier than the average tourist, about a half an hour before it opened. We got there in good time and started our wait about a block and a half away from the main entrance. While in line, we met a couple from near London who were on a weekend getaway like we were. We had a nice chat about our homes, work and what is worth to see in Rome. But we soon parted at the door which we reached at 9:15 a.m. 15 minutes after the museums in the Vatican had opened. We were through the security and ready to see the religious artwork that was available. Unfortunately, as we walked through the museum, viewing the precious and beautiful artwork I could remember seeing some of what we saw. I felt a little deja vu, for in a another life (the life of a student) I had seen it. Continuing on our journey through the museums, I kept telling Ben we had to go through a lot of artwork to get to the Sistine Chapel, but we kept on getting sidetracked by various bits of other artwork in other sections of the museum. Finally we found the right path. The path was long and draining to the Chapel, but I was encouraged it was worth it to go through it all. As we got nearer to the Sistine Chapel the artwork got more and more modern. We soon were seeing Salvador Dali and other modern artists, sadly we did not spend much time viewing these pieces of art. Everyone in line, including Ben and I wanted to see the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo's more impressive piece of art.
The Sistine Chapel was awesome, just as I remembered, crowded and a bit loud, despite the fact that one is supposed to remain quiet while viewing the masterpiece. I have seen the Sistine Chapel before, though I have that privilege I was still very impressed. It truly is a beautiful piece of artwork that I certainly could stare at time and again and see something new and different. We were soon through what we wanted to see at the Vatican. We stopped by a building to see the Pope's carriages through the years and were amazed by the number of them and the ornate beauty of his possessions.
We left the Vatican City satisfied with what we had seen and glad that the overwhelming amount of artwork was no longer in front of our eyes. We spent the rest of the day finding souvenirs for ourselves and family. Determined not to leave Italy without a little something for those at home.

Sunday, April 19: Those Other Famous Sights
No journey to Rome is complete without seeing the Trevi Fountain. We were within walking distance of the fountain, so we took the chance to do that. When we reached the fountain it had, of course, a mob of people from all parts of the world each one doing something different, taking a picture, throwing a coin or just enjoying the sight of several hundred people admiring it. The fountain (if you've never seen it) is a dramatic picture of what I think are sea gods controlling their water steads (horses). Like the Mouth of Truth, the Trevi Fountain has a story, but its story is that if you throw a coin behind your back, your wish will come true. This was also in the movie "Roman Holiday" but I have a feeling it was famous before the movie came to film it. After seeing what we could see of the fountain, we headed for the Spanish Steps. This was also within walking distance so we walked the several blocks from the Trevi Fountain to the Spanish Steps. Like the fountain, the steps were full of people but, unlike the fountain, they were able to sit and rest on the steps. We took part and rested for a bit. In front of us, with the view from the steps, one can see a long road, this road is Rome's high end shopping district. One more thing I had not seen on my former visit to Rome as a student. I asked Ben if we could see it and he agreed, so we joined the hundreds of people walking down this road. Whatever high end thing you would desire, you could find on this road. There was a Louis Vuitton store, Prada, Gucci, Dior and whatever sort of thing you could want or need there was a store for it. We peeked in the stores, but being high end we only looked. It was fun, but it was hard to believe that someone could afford such things, even if it was just a designer name that they were buying. We soon tired of the mayhem of the people and prices and decided to go to St. Peter's Basilica, which we still hadn't seen (due to my lack of remembering how one could get there).
St. Peter's is quite a walk, so we took the metro. It was easily found just around the Vatican wall. Admittedly, this Basilica was as busy as the fountain and the shopping street, but one has to remember that it is the largest Basilica in the world. The Basilica was just as I remembered, vast and beautiful. But one thing I remember doing, we could not do. There was a mass going on so we could not go closer to the main altar. So we just stood on the sidelines, watching as a few people could get through to the mass. We continued to view the Basilica and were soon done. We decided to head back to the hotel to rest before dinner, so we hopped on the metro and rode it to our hotel (for it had started to rain). Once we were back in our room we watched a very competitive game of soccer (all in Italian, mind you) cheering for the team of our choice. Soon that was over and it was time to eat. We rode the metro to a wine bar, but unfortunately it was full. So we headed in the direction of our hotel, via the sidewalk just looking for any sort of restaurant that caught our eye. One caught it immediately. Outside of this restaurant, lights were flashing and when we entered we were greeted with great hellos and were immediately seated. The restaurant was rather homey, despite its packed nature. The walls were decorated with rustic pictures and tools. The music was fun and loud, all due to their DJ who certainly enjoyed his job. We ordered a roasted chicken and potatoes. Boy was it tasty! The chicken was moist and the potatoes flavored and cooked to perfection. It was the highlight of our trip, just having waiters and their DJ enjoy their job. If you're ever in Rome, go to this restaurant, I believe it is called Malto Calto. You will certainly experience a fun and homey atmosphere. We went back to the hotel satisfied with our meal and our day. We had throughly enjoyed our own "Roman Holiday."