After A Terrible Night, A Horrific (Penitent's) Walk

After having slept for two hours, we had to get up at 7 o'clock. At last, I was going to warm up… And annihilate that f*****g metalic tap! The others seemed to have slept rather well, actually. I wanted to get out of this crappy place. But before doing anything else, we had to clean that big room up… What a kerfuffle! We first packed our bags and stuffs, then we took a broom and brushed the thick layer of dust on the ground (a wooden one…) while girls were trying to have a wash with the frozen water.
(Now, I wonder how they managed to pee with such frozen toilets… We, boys, don't have this problem. Except for the fact that when we get outside to pee, our privates are frozen, too…)
The point is that the so-called "hotel" was cleaner than at the time we first entered it… The owners should be hanged publicly! It's a shame to let people sleep there—and make them pay for it! We had breakfast and we prepared sandwiches to eat on our way.

That day's goal was to reach the town of Spa, which lies round 20 kilometres further, by walking through the Fagnes, a protected natural area. On the day before, it had snowed. On the day in question, it rained…

We left that alleged "hotel" (without any bit of nostalgy) and we walked towards Stavelot, then penetrated the depths of the Fagnes. It looked as if it was only a big hill… And the snow conjugated with rain made matters worse… We were exhausted. Soaked socks. Hungry, starving… Fortunately, I had brought sugar along. I was thirsty. My bottle of water being soon empty, I had to eat snow to refresh myself… It was a white hell. I wanted to commit suicide.

We walked for five hours in the wet snow, passing through dark woods and climbing steep pathways. We were completely exhausted. I only had a bit of a chocolate to get some energy… we climbed, we climbed, we climbed…

At 2 o'clock, we finally arrived at M. Delrée's sister's house. We devoured our sandwiches rapidly (this was the best chocolate sandwich I've ever had), while M. Delrée and Schyns were trying to light a fire to heat us up. Stinky, we got back on the roads to continue that hellish walk.

After another 10 kilometres, we walked in the snow-covered Fagnes, where the wind blew terribly. M. Delrée told us there was a coffie shop two kilometres away, so I decided to go as a scout. I was completely annihilated when I found out that this coffie shop was not open—even if a ironic board stated that it was opened! No Cécémel. I would have to wait a little bit more.

We continued and finally arrived to our destination (of the day): a kind of hotel held by sisters in Nivezée, on the highs of Spa. There, we were absolutely thrilled that we had rooms (!) for 3 (!) with three radiators (!) with hot water (!) and a bath (!) and plenty of food was waiting for us. In the evening, our two teachers prepared a barbecue for us, as you can see on the picture. I think I ate 2 kilos of meat—no kidding. And I was still starved.

Later, a man came and talked to us about fairtrade and we took part in a role play, where I had to play a soldier being corrupted by banks and honey producers, while being faithful to a Big Boss, whose role was played by M. Delrée, who was really suitable in this role of dictator…

We went to bed and we slept tight. At last.

Guess Who's Coming For Dinner Tonight?

OK, the title of this post is not great, but this is what I thought when I saw this picture in my album. This is the Rancor, a creature that we see in Star Wars – Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, which wants to eat Luke Skywalker, sent to death by the sluggy-shaped Jabba the Hutt (Tatooine's greatest gangsta). In fact, this is the puppet which was used to shoot the seen: it's only 30 cm high!
I saw this puppet at a Star Wars exhibition in Paris: yes, once again, I went to Paris, but just in the suburbs. It was round the beginning of March, I think. You won't get other picture, because I find them terrible: fearing not to have enough power in my batteries, I had switched off the flash, so that my pictures were ruined, in the end. This one is just correct. But going to Paris, that is to say 500 km from my home, was worth the trip, because my family and I saw many actual suits used in the 6 films (Darth Vader, Amidala, the Wookies, R2D2, Anakin, Jango Fett, etc.) and many other stage properties.

Disgusting, Wretched Pidgeons of Paris

I know I already said that I went to Paris in April 2005 with the school, but I went there again in August. Apart from being a special trip during the holiday, this would give the opportunity for me to show to my family a shop not so far away from Notre-Dame, a real "Cave of Ali-Baba" (if this rings a bell, because I don't know if this idiom is correct) in which you find all sorts of collectibles over Star Wars, the Lord of the Rings, comics, mini-figures, books, cards, etc.
Anyway, our day started by the visit of the Arche de la Défense, a huge square building with a hollow in it (google it). As we were having a break, eating bread, pidgeons came to us, begging us to give them some of our food. They were so wretched that I couldn't resist. And I took these pictures, where you can see some of the most ugly pidgeons in the world. (I know, it's silly to take photographs of that, but still.)

Fort Boyard

While we were in the North-West of France, we decided to go to La Rochelle, and more particularily the little town of Fourras, where a company organises trips to go round the well-known Fort Boyard. It was really interesting to see for real something that you saw about 100 times on TV. When you are close to it, you recognize those places where the candidates dive in the water, etc., or you can figure out the size of this peculiar building on the sea, which was meant to be a marine defensive point in the time of Napoléon's.
On the left of the picture, you have the "dark side of the Fort" (because you never see it on telly, with a platform where the candidates and filming crew arrive.

Le Mont-Saint-Michel

In July 2005, my parents, my brother and I went to the North-West side of France, just to see how it looked like. So we went to see the beaches of Omaha, etc., then to the West. We arrived at this well-known place, the Mont-Saint-Michel, an island (sort of) on which a monastry is set, in addition to thousands of shops for tourists coming from all over the world in order to see this curious city which gave the inspiration for the visual look of Minas Tirith in The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.

Whistler's Mother

"Whistler's Mother" or, as it reads on the picture in the Musée d'Orsay, "Portrait de la mère de l'artiste", by James Whistler. This painting was made famous the catastrophical movie "Bean", where our favourite Brit destroy the painting and tries to replace it… by a poster… (This film is one of my favourites.) In the French version, Bean says: "C'est le portrait d'une vieille peau, d'un débris, qu'il aima par dessus tout"… Brillant!

The Choice of a Hotel is not Easy

Again a picture taken while being on a trip in Paris. We were all walking in the streets, going from famous place to famous place. Here, we were in front of the Ritz, on the Place Vendôme, probably the most expensive area in Paris, where the biggest jeweleers must have a shop. On the picture, you can see M. Jacquet (on the left), my tutor and Latin teacher, and M. Simar, French teacher. They look as if, while pointing the Ritz, they think they'd better have chosen this hotel instead of the inexpensive (but comfortable, though) Formule 1 in Saint-Denis.