France-tastic

Well, my first (and so far definite favourite) visitor has arrived and is enjoying Paris, and I'm enjoying having him here! Alex arrived very, very early on Saturday morning, and luckily the airport trains waited until Sunday to go on strike (and they're still on strike- everybody loves a grève in France).

Obviously a situation that required coffee! So Alex was sent to the kitchen to earn his keep...

And it has been rather a musical week since he arrived, including last night's Sankta (Saint) Lucia concert at the Eglise Suédoise here in Paris. 13th December is Sankta Lucia, a Swedish tradition where a bunch of people sing some special Sankta Lucia songs and christams carols, while carrying candles and wearing white robes, one girl with a red sash for a belt and a crown of candles, the other girls with tinsel belts and crowns, and the "starboys" with white pointy hats with stars on them. Judging by the "Saint" bit, this obviously has some sort of religious background, but I must say, I don't really know too much about it. Something about a girl who came and saved and/or gave food to some people who were underground, and she had to have the candles on a crown because she needed the light to see and her hands to carry the food. Anyhow, the concert was really lovely, and some nice glögg (like a mulled wine) warmed us very nicely afterwards.

We also found a busker concert in one of the metro tunnels, literally a small orchestra- about 10 violinists, cellos, and even a double bass! You often see buskers in the tunnels, but this was the most impressive I've seen!

And just before Alex arrived, I went to another churchy christmas concert, this time at the Romanian church with Ruxandra and Raoul from the lab. The Romanian choir wore sheep fur skins, and although I can't claim to have understood much of what they sang, it was beautiful.

# posted by Jenny @ 14:38