lundi 28 juin 2010
On Sunday, Alain and I went to his annual karate club end-of-the-year Paella. The main karate teacher, who Alain knows for about 20 years now, has a large non-constructible piece of land, in the middle of the vines outside Pelissane. There is a small cabanon on the lot where they have disco night (luckily far from other houses) once or twice a year. No toilets. Fun. I avoid as much as possible.
So Sunday morning Alain dropped me off at his parent's house while he went to play karate, then came back around noon, took a shower, and we went to the paella.
Spent the afternoon drinking beer, wine, pastis, and coke, chatting with others and waiting for the paella to finish cooking. I am not a huge paella fan. I usually surreptitiously pass about half of what is on my plate to Alain (octopus? mussels? unidentifiable meat? what could be part of a mouse? here dear, you eat it).
After the paella, some rounds of boules were organized, for the yearly championship. When I signed up, I thought it would be just for fun, throw some leaden balls around, hope to not hit any small children, and have fun. But I under estimated Les Provencaux. This was serious stuff. Bring-your-own-set-of-boules stuff. Some poor woman got stuck with me. "Vas-y doucement, doucement, essaie de ne pas toucher ma boule qui est le plus proche. Ah. Bon. La prochaine fois alors."
We lost the first round 13-2, then played against Alain and his partner and also lost, though closesr this time, around 13 to 11. I didn't really pay attention to how the scoring worked or anything.
Honestly, a hot summer Sunday afternoon, in the middle of vines, pine trees and olive trees, listening to the cicadas cricking away, drinking rosé wine and playing boules.
Can anyone think of how it could be MORE Provançal?
So Sunday morning Alain dropped me off at his parent's house while he went to play karate, then came back around noon, took a shower, and we went to the paella.
Spent the afternoon drinking beer, wine, pastis, and coke, chatting with others and waiting for the paella to finish cooking. I am not a huge paella fan. I usually surreptitiously pass about half of what is on my plate to Alain (octopus? mussels? unidentifiable meat? what could be part of a mouse? here dear, you eat it).
After the paella, some rounds of boules were organized, for the yearly championship. When I signed up, I thought it would be just for fun, throw some leaden balls around, hope to not hit any small children, and have fun. But I under estimated Les Provencaux. This was serious stuff. Bring-your-own-set-of-boules stuff. Some poor woman got stuck with me. "Vas-y doucement, doucement, essaie de ne pas toucher ma boule qui est le plus proche. Ah. Bon. La prochaine fois alors."
We lost the first round 13-2, then played against Alain and his partner and also lost, though closesr this time, around 13 to 11. I didn't really pay attention to how the scoring worked or anything.
Honestly, a hot summer Sunday afternoon, in the middle of vines, pine trees and olive trees, listening to the cicadas cricking away, drinking rosé wine and playing boules.
Can anyone think of how it could be MORE Provançal?
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Provence
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3 commentaires:
sounds perfect;)
Do the French ever just play boules for fun?
Oh, I want some of that. I love provence in summer and it sounds like you got the best of it there. Except for the spoilsport boules woman.