Albi - 2

Still Saturday 2 July

 

Started the day with a laugh by trying to check out of the hotel, but dates in and out weren't tallying, there was an extra night here on my booking sheet, had to pull out the next town's hotel booking, arranged to leave my pack down with the bike, then 100m along the street, realised I'd left the next booking slip behind.

New receptionist today, she was waiting for me, I really was booked again tonight, and I slowly recalled I had planned to do a TdF loop out and back from here, forgot all about it.

I did the dumkopf circle finger round the ear sign and muttered "trop beaucoup jolie femmes", and she threw her head back, flashed a smile with some good-humour mirth, and took hold of my arm, shoo-ing me back upstairs with my pack.

Donc... I go nowhere today, but downtown.

Dig the size of those peppers

Its Saturday, market day, and stalls line the morning street, huge, healthy looking fruit and veges, bread and other bakings, the biggest toms, aubergines and peppers I've ever seen.

And that's not all, there's more in a modern 2-story mall further into the old town area. You think the price of fish is bad enough, try $60NZ/kg for big fillets like terakihi or cod, $5 - $10/kg most fruit and veg, but tomatos must be in season, $3/kg. I dont think to check the price of meat, but I spot a skinned lapine, with its glassy eye looking at me.

A genial shopper starts chattering to me, I apologise and say j'ne pas Francais, I am not French,

so where do you come from?.., New Zealand, very good, you speak good English!

Is this your first time en France?... non, je visite devant, l'anee long temp

How you like France now?... the girls are prettier, and he snorts, giving the international throat cut gesture like he'd rid the world of them all.

 

The old cite's like a spoked wheel of streets radiating out from the cathedral, nearly 20ha odd of boutique shops and cafes, summer sales are on, 30-70% off, mens casual shoes E40-70,  and I spot a stylish LBD in a ladies-wear window, E70, women would love this place. French women are nicely shod, nice feet and ankles.

I find the tourism office and share my encounter at the market, with the girl there, the office boy overhears, and we all have a laugh. French humour is quite interesting, I dont think its the single punchline that tickles them, its more amusing if several meanings can be drawn from it.

I buy an Albi City Pass for E6.50, which gets me into the cathedral inner sanctum for E1.0 and into the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum for nix.

 

The Cathedral Sainte Cecile is stupendous, started in 1280 AD, finished around 1390, but added to or modified over the centuries, the largest brick cathedral known. The inner chapels, altars, and choeurs are carved from limestone, soft immediately after mining but hardening with age, done by Italian artisans, as are the many centuries old paintings. There's a huge mural at the main altar end, of the Last Judgement, done in 1490, one side depicting the saved rising naked from their graves, the other the damned with their book of life hanging round their neck awaiting assessment, while below 6 panels depicting the 7 deadly sins, (sloth hadnt been invented then), show all sorts of stuff pending if you havent been good, rape by monster, water torture, boiling in oil, and no drinks beside the pool with Dave Allen or Benny Hill.

I get the headphone English audio guide, find the lot quite interesting, the painting of the overhead vaults is 500 years old, never been renovated, the scaffold work to do it must have been something to behold. There's a model showing how the bricks got hauled up a slide. The organ has 3500 pipes in original form.

The story of Ste Cecile is quite a sad one, born into a poor family she took a vow of celibacy, her mother forced her into marriage with a suitably rough man of similar station, who she set about gaining acceptance of her vow and eventually converting, as she did hordes of other folk, which didnt go down well with the male hierarchy, was tried 3 times, escaping ultimate condemnation under law not having to face a 4th, but dying in poor shape in the arms of the chief bishop of France who came to intercede. She was made the patron sainte of arts and music.

The ticket gets you into the cathedral treasury, and among the relics you get to see her skull, (I think).

The purpose of such a grand scale build was to impress upon the people of the time how huge the church and faith was/is, and I have to confess getting to feel a bit of the over-awe and oppression, those times did have a surprising sector of the dubious.

It would mean so much more to those of the faith, fascinating, but I was conscious of being in another man's domain.

During the Revolution the cathedral was near sacked, any of the heraldry pertaining to local nobles was defaced or removed, and the place incredibly put up for demolition for 1m francs, but no takers.

The bishopry next door, similarly all of brick, including the vault arches, normally done in wood, but brick as a fire safety measure, as is also the high exterior facade and embattlement. It seems all throughout, the church being so involved in the political comings and goings, being in the clergy wasnt all that safe an occupation.

Now it houses the Toulouse Lautrec Museum.

My comment yesterday about his dissolute ways was taken from the Lonely Planet guide-book, but I find on viewing his life of art that the inference is much a malignment, he was so prodigious in such a short life, engaging in a whole raft of subject themes, family, friends, notables, dogs, and even horses, life in Paris from cafe scenes to serious student life taking orals in front of professorials, to poster art for Follies Bergere and Moulin Rouge.

I'm no art expert, but I found a lot of comedy captured in his caricature, and his work is a fine depiction of life in France during his time, late 1800's.

His venture into brothel life is thus understandable, despite Napolean's attempt to regulate the industry the life of a "lady" was one of near bondage to the trade and the madame, he's capturing the futureless detachment in the faces of his subjects.

Lautrec's noted for his minimisation of brushstroke, most of  his oil work looks like pastel. I bought a couple of prints, and on reflection will go back this morning and get the little book on his horses. They dont have the attempt at perfect form of a Stubbs, but again are caricatures of snorting, galloping, or just standing still horses, even the owner/trainer paddock scene is so recognisable as a contemporary setting.

The girls in the museum shop were very helpful, I commented to one how fortunate they were to have such a depth of history, and she answered, you are the first guy from New Zealand I have ever met, and well, you are such a young country. All I could do was shrug and say, we got le rugby, which got a giggle. League is pretty big round here, but have noticed a sports magazine poster headed "Tetu", with a heavily moko'd rugby player on the front, "nos heros de rugby", the article inside. A pharmacy near the hotel I pass regularly has a poster featuring "Le Beast" Chagal advertising some pain relief rub, beside the suppositoire one that touts for the constipation relief that Mayle so amusingly takes the mickey out of in the book I'm reading now, Toujours Provence.

Last tourist gink for the day the old pont, bridge, over the Tarn, built in 1040AD, and still there. The town dosent have much of an early Roman evidence, but apparently things took off with this bit of strategic asset building, and the town established a significant trade route mein.

That's about it for this town, to my places list I could add, Place I could live in - Albi.

The urban pops a tick over 50,000, add another 30k to cover the surrounding prefecturage, E250 to 500k will get you a decent sort of hacienda with a swimming pool on 3 to 8ha of land, 200k for a reasonable townhouse, but rent looks dear at E300 - 600. I spot a Century 21 shop, and am reminded seeing one of their signs on a ranch gate in Montana, everywhere man...

I Googled for nightlife but dosent appear there's any other than opera and classical concerts, other than that I joined the local populace for cafe dinner about 9pm, rips du porc  avec pommes de terre, spare ribs and baked spud, with a head like perfume glass of rose. Whole families out for dinner, and I guess thats your nightlife, discussion and bon homme, pretty cool, rather than the down home Ulyssian age disgracefully, you could do it rather gracefully here.

Recommended eating, St James Pub et Brasserie, along Place du Vigan a bit, alfresco under spreading broadleaf, good menu, plats du jour change daily, reasonable price, and excellent service, I notice clientile greeting their regular wait staff with a handshake.

A Rocket in France

There's a handful of boy-racer boom-boxers doing rap, on the street, and more than a few reverse cap, low slung shorts American apers around, but guys round here love their bikes, seen some really smart looked after latest models.

Most incongruous sight was the first beggar seen so far, sitting at the entrance to the cathedral, he looked so arab I was tempted to ask him what he thought he was doing panhandling at the door of the infidels. I passed him downtown later, hope the cops had moved him on.

The gendarmes municipale do their beat on push bikes. The hotel is a mass of security, CCTV every passageway and portico, we're even on breakfast TV, and the reception area shuts right down at night with metal garadoors, you let yourself back in through a security code door after 9pm, manned last night, but havent seen any suspiscious coves around. There's the inevitable aging, bitter-looking barflies in the bar/tabacs, I avoid those places.

 

Thats it for today.