A Trip to Aix-en-Provence

At the beginning of the month, Epiphany to be exact, I made it up to Aix-en-Provence to look around and do a little shopping. I ended up buying an incredibly delicious chèvre cendrée (goat's cheese with an ash rind--it sounds gross, but it is not! Just don't eat the ash) and Turkish apricots that were to die for at the farmer's market; drooling over a pair (...make that several pairs...) of Ubu earrings at a boutique; and hightailing it to the Musée Granet to see some of the lovely works of native son Cézanne--as well as other Impressionist, etc., artists.

Paul Cezanne lived here once

Santons: little figures for your Nativity scene made in Aix!

For my first trip to Aix, I'd say this was a success! I wish I had enough money to buy myself a pair of Ubu earrings, but the trip itself will have to suffice for my little birthday present to me. I thought about buying some santons, the little Nativity figurines that are made in Aix and a staple of Provence at Christmastime, but I realized, if you buy one, you have to buy a set--and those don't come cheap, either! They're something you buy as a collection: one each year to add to as the years progress: finding the perfect one is half the fun! But for me, I didn't think it was worth it, knowing I probably won't be able to collect year after year...I'm not going to be in France forever! Then there's the question of which figure to collect first: Baby Jesus, because he's most important? Or one of the Three Magi? Maybe Melchior because he has the coolest name...and there's where I left off, because I cannot make a decision, if ever so inconsequential, to save myself.

Here are some more pictures of santons:

And here are more pictures of Aix:

Hotel de Ville

A protest?!? In FRANCE?!?

One thing I learned at the museum, which was small but good, is that Cézanne and Emile Zola met when they were kids at school, and continued a lifelong friendship, even after they each became famous! Definitely cool. I also learned the French for "still life": nature morte. It just seems so much more philosophical and expressive! 

Here is a famous Cézanne nature morte:

Guard Dog: Marseilles

Little doggie sitting in front 

Of the door to the fur coat shop

So sad

And yet so vicious!

Who needs a fur coat in Marseilles, anyway?

The Phone Shop around the Corner

I never realized how convenient it was to live in a city-city until I went to three phone shops on my excursion Saturday and didn't get a phone until the third. This after I spent several hours in Paris trying to figure out how to get a SIM card. My experiences?

 1) The first one had three people working, but one was "tech assistance only," one was helping another customer, and one was shooting the breeze with the tech guy. (By the way, France, expressing poor customer service skills to an American is just going to fuel more stereotypes!) I left without being served.

2) At the second place, it was just a girl about my age who had run out of SIM cards and said her shipment would be in next Thursday. She was nice, but I figured I'd hedge my bets that another shop would still have them, rather than wait almost a week for a phone.

3) The third place is run by a young couple with a bunch of kids. They cater to a phone shop crowd, i.e. older clients from the Maghreb who use a pay phone to call home to Morocco, etc., once a week. The guy could tell I spoke English right away, so we conducted business in English. His was pretty good--he had a bumper sticker on the register that said "Don't Mess with Texas," which makes me wonder if he studied there. He thought I was Irish, which I thought was hilarious. Long story short, I got my phone.

I'm expecting things to be more expensive in La Ciotat, since it does cater to weekenders and holiday-goers who find themselves held captive in their little bourgeois bungalows. However--I know that Marseille is more working-class, and, thus, will probably be cheaper. So far, I have not been outraged at prices. But then again, I'm used to what they charge in Vienna...