nuit blanche

This is the second year that the City of Amiens has organized a Nuit Blanche. Roughly translated, this means the city is pulling an all-nighter. Most public buildings are open, and there are all sorts of events to see. This year, bands played in cafés and clubs, there were special art exhibits in the Cathedral, the library, the museum, the Maison Jules Verne, on the lawn of the town hall...nearly everywhere you could imagine. I went with Virginie & Rodolphe and their friend Peggy. We had a nice Italian dinner first, then wandered the streets of Amiens. This year, the excitement was accompanied with the tension of the XV de France vs. the New Zealand All Blacks in the quarter-finals of the Rugby World Cup. Much like people gather around big screens in bars to watch the OU game, people were crowded around TVs on the sidewalks to cheer on the Bleus.

We had talked about rugby in English class for a few lessons. Finally, I found something that would keep the students' attention! Sentences included "Neither Adèle nor Lise like rugby" and "Both Théophile and Alexis think France will lose the match." I told them they had to be optimistic (a recent vocabulary word). To cheer the team on, the cafeteria served kangaroo (seriously!) and kiwi, and passed out France bracelets. Still, the outlook was grim.

The first time we stopped to check the score, it was 13-13. Not bad - games are good when the scores are close. Later on, we heard some cheers. And more cheers. The yelling didn't stop, and was joined by car honking. We knew then that France had won the match. And we were reminded of it for several hours to come... the reveling went on and on! I however had to call it quits around 3:00am.