your life is a song

As some of you have gathered, be it from my facebook status or an email or a fairy that secrets news by means of whispers and dreams, I tried escargot. Last Thursday was the Marché des Saveurs in Lyon – a market displaying the products (wine and cheese primarily but not solely) of the Rhône-Alpes region of France. I should have tried more things (but I feel bad, knowing I’m not going to buy anything ), mais c’est la vie. At any rate, when I saw the booth with jars of escargot spread, I overcame my hesitation and innate aversion to the idea of eating snails and took one of the pieces of bread that had something gray and white spread over the surface. Without letting myself think too much about what I was doing, I ate it. And was pleasantly surprised to find it tasted rather like seafood (which I suppose makes sense). Perhaps it wasn’t legit “escargot” in the form of a snail hors d’oeurve, but at any rate, in the future should I have the opportunity to try a snail, I’ll probably go for it.

This is my last week in Lyon, and should anyone be wondering, three weeks is significantly less time than four. One of those mysteries of the universe, I suppose. I confess that I am ready to continue on…it’s not like Paris in that there is something of a finite amount to see as a tourist, and I’m not really settled as a resident. But this also means that I am going to Italy on Saturday, which contains some level of nervousness. In France, I can at least communicate to some extent…in Italy, going to be relying heavily on my phrase book and any English or French the person might know.

On Saturday I took the (early!) train to Annecy…a small lake town in the foothills of the French Alps. There was a bit of brouillard (fog) in the morning, but by afternoon the beautiful blue sky had emerged. I forget how much I love the mountains when I am away from them, but certainly felt their departure as the train pulled away. Granted, if you go up Fourviere in Lyon, you can see the mountains…but they’re quite far off in the distance. At any rate, Annecy was delightful, if I had to compare it to somewhere it would be Leavenworth’s mountains and Lake Chelan. But the vieux ville (old town) was quite unique with a canal/small river (??) running through, complete with ridiculously picturesque bridges crossing between cobblestone streets on either side. Later in the day when I was walking and sitting by the lake, you could see the outlines of more majestic peaks of the Alps rising in the distance. It seems that even in the country you can’t escape the haze of pollution. I suppose this is likely due to the large numbers of people living in smaller areas. Even in our big cities (speaking only of the West coast I suppose, having not really explored the big cities in the east), we manage to spread out and find room for suburbs upon suburbs of houses.

~ by Allison on Monday, October 27, 2008.