My life in Ambialet...: Toulouse, Cyrano, and Bingo

Hello!

I don't have long, so I am just going to post a few pictures to update you all on what I have been doing for the past week!

Last week for our excursion day we traveled to Toulouse and visited the Musée Saint-Raymond and St. Sernin Basillica. St. Sernin is one of the largest Romanesque churches in Europe and is considered one of the most sacred sites for pilgrimages, due to the vast amount of religious relics housed inside.

Saint Sernin Basilica

construction began in 1070

The apse of the basilica, where the remains of the first bishop of Toulouse (St. Sernin) are located.

The basilica on a map. This is the standard design of a pilgrimage basilica.

Walking down into the crypt where all the relics are housed!

The crypt

One of the relic side chapels

The following pictures are from the Musée Saint-Raymond

(Carly's photo)

I loved this one!

(Carly's photo)

Mosaic

stone coffin

Pretty lights in the streets of Toulouse

Cyrano de Bergerac

On Friday we went into Albi to see a local production of Cyrano de Bergerac; the story of...

Deux hommes, Cyrano et Christian, sont amoureux de la belle Roxane. Bien mis de sa personne, Christian est incapable de lui parler joliment d’amour, tandis que Cyrano, complexé par son fameux nez, manie à la perfection l’art de la conversation. Ce dernier, par amitié pour son ami, se sacrifie en lui prêtant son éloquence. Il devient le souffleur de l’ombre. Ainsi, Edmond Rostand invente un monstre à deux têtes constitué de beauté et de laideur, d’ignorance et d’esprit. (taken from an advertisement for this production)

In preparation for seeing the play we watched the 1987 loosely based rendition, Roxanne, starring Steve Martin (in English) and the 1990 more accurate rendition, Cyrano de Bergerac, starring Gérard Depardieu (in French w/subtitles). Both of these preparations helped us understand what was going on in the play, because of course there were no subtitles! The actors, set, and costumes were all fabulous and the night was a complete success.

Group photo before the play

(Megha's photo)

Carly, Me, and Colleen

(Carly's photo)

Private booth in the theater

(Carly's photo)

Preparing the "set" for the play within the play, while everyone took their seats

(Jessica's photo)

I snapped a secret photo during the play

Cyrano!

(Carly's photo)

17 actors, 40 characters

BINGO!!

This weekend I had the opportunity to play the French version of bingo at Ambialet's town municipal building. I was shocked to get there and find hundreds of people, the town grew exponentially! Anyway, the playing cards are a bit different (as you will see below) and I purchased 3 for 10€. Each number is drawn randomly and the announcer simply calls out the number in French (no b, i, n, g, or o)...this was great practice for knowing my French numbers 1-90! The goal is to get all the numbers in a single horizontal line or a "blackout" during certain rounds. Most often the top prizes were items such as a duck, a turkey, etc. not living, but ready to go home and cook for dinner! If you got bingo at the same time as someone else you drew a numbered chip and the one with the highest number received the prize for that round and the runner(s) up received a bottle of wine. There was even an intermission after the first hour and a half or so where they came around and served us each a slice of pound cake and coffee/wine if we wanted it. It was a wonderful afternoon!!