Faerie Caves

An enormous column in the Cabrespine cave.

The other day we went to visit the caves at Cabrespine and Limousis – gorgeous, natural cave formations up in the mountains, tucked into these little valleys accessible only by steep and winding roads. It was incredible. The view is amazing, for one thing. Then you step into these caves and it’s like entering another world – a world of rock and water and crystal, stone that looks like it was poured into place, where the temperature is 14 degrees, year-round, no matter what the weather outside is like, and with endless strange, impossible shapes all around you.

The Cabrespine entrance is artificially constructed, and opens onto an enormous chamber, about 250 feet deep and god only knows how high. It was discovered by some young cave explorers, who followed some chambers they discovered behind a wall in another cave and eventually came out at the very bottom of Cabrespine. It’s huge, echoing and vast, with lots of little nooks and crannies and some amazing columns and stalagmites. In addition to the short tour we took, they also do spelunking trips, which are several hours long, into the depths of the cave.

A chamber that used to be full of water at Limousis.

As incredible as Cabrespine was, though, I preferred the caves at Limousis. Instead of one giant open cavern, you walk through a natural entrance into a series of connected chambers – one of the longest chains in Europe. The Limousis caves are also famous for the high concentration of aragonite crystals, which is apparently quite rare in the natural world. And I can tell you, it’s beautiful. Walking through those chambers was like walking through an old palace, one built by nature for some fantastical, magical race.

Check the gallery for some more amazing pictures from Cabrespine and Limousis, including some shots of the gorgeous aragonite crystals!

Cité de Carcassonne

The Basilique Saint-Nazaire, as seen from the ramparts

Today we went to visit the Cité de Carcassonne, a walled medieval citadel town in the middle of the Carcassonne city proper. There’s just no easy way to describe what it was like. Yes, as the “best preserved medieval citadel in Europe,” it’s very obviously geared towards tourists, but there’s something more to it. It’s like you can almost feel the old stones surrounding you – not pressing, not even supporting, but comforting, stable and eternal, as if they know they’re never going to change.

It’s beautiful.

I could never live in a place like this, overrun by tourists every day, and with the prices so high in every shop… but there’s something so achingly touching about it. It makes me wish I could have seen it in at the height of its time, or when the stones were first being laid, or when construction on the Basilique – easily the most beautiful church I have ever been in – was finally finished.

This whole country makes me restless. Inspiration makes me restless.

Sweet Night Air

I have discovered a wonderful place to think: the windowsill of my borrowed bedroom. There is no screen, since there are very few biting bugs, and the window itself and the roof outside are constructed in such a way that I can easily lift myself up to sit curled up on it, looking out over the front yard; the view is quite nice and it’s so peaceful out here, especially after dark has fallen. And I have come to realize that I want to have more experiences like this.

I want to sit on rooftops and look at the stars. I want to run until I can’t run anymore and collapse in a field. I want to let songs rip their way out of my throat and fill the empty air, loud and beautiful. I want to wander naked at night. I want to smell the wind at night and let it carry me away. I want to talk with a stranger in the park for hours. I want to do a lot of things – experience life so vividly, to release this restlessness that always seems to be hovering beneath my skin. Sometimes the only thing I can do for it is run until I can’t go any farther and scream into the sky. I realize, I like feeling restless, sometimes; it’s like a sweet, beautiful ache that never quite goes away. And I realize why I feel the need to write.

Writing is another cure for the restlessness. It’s an endless urge that never really fades. I feel the need to validate my existence, to share my experiences, my feelings. Somehow, nothing is quite real until it has been put into words. I feel, sometimes, that in trying to slake my restlessness, that I have inadvertently stumbled across some nameless deeper meaning to life, and I am helpless to do anything until I have tried to let others grasp it as well. I do not write, as I have always supposed, out of a desire not to be forgotten – but out of a desire not to be alone.

Bienvenue à Toulouse!

Hello, Canada! I am now in Toulouse! It is full of awesome and I have lots to talk about. Just a warning, though, my internet usage may be spotty for the next little bit since the hotel’s internet connection fails half the time.

Some things about flying:

Entry to an airport with ten pieces of luggage, five carry-on suitcases, and five personal carry-ons is an exercise of precisely organized chaos.

I always see a lot of pretty or interesting people when I’m travelling and it frustrates me to no end that I can’t just stand around and take pictures of them. African ladies in awesome clothes especially.

Flying is always more fun on no sleep! I got up at 9:30 EST, got on a 5:30 flight, arrived at 8:20 local time, and went to bed at 10:00 that night. That’s 4:00 PM in my home time zone – meaning that I was up for about thirty hours, with only an hour of napping in the afternoon.

Exhibit A!

The French are awesome. I have come to this highly scientific conclusion based solely on the fact that their airplane food doesn’t suck. Also: watching Slumdog Millionaire on the airplane with my mother – most epic thing ever.

France – at least the bit of it that we flew over – is covered in fields. Fields everywhere! It’s insane. Also: Paris? Ridiculously large.

Some things about Toulouse:

I love this city! Like, what the heck, it’s awesome! Beautiful and full of the coolest architecture I’ve ever seen. It’s kind of gritty, but, me being me, that just makes me love it more.

So many awesome shops! We found a sweet vintage store, a thrift shop with a wall of Converse, two amazing goth stores – one of them very loli-goth, it was so cute – an awesome market, a manga store… The awesomeness is slightly offset by everything being more expensive here, but oh my god. So cool! New project: get a map of the city centre and start noting the cool shops.

Restaurants are brilliant, too. All so unique, full of delicious food, and, bonus – all the prices are tax and tip included. Also: patios!

The French are strange and eat dinner at like 8:00. This means that they basically go to bed right after dinner. They take like two hours at dinner, though, so that’s okay.

A lot of things are weird, really. The plumbing is odd. The electricity is weird. Everything is, really. Not unusable, but still. Very weird. Like that bathroom that was mixed-sex, but had urinals right out in the open, and the guy from the restaurant who came in while Shona and I were there and just started peeing.

Streets are narrow. Sidewalks are narrower. Some of them have cobblestones – most of those the pedestrian-only streets – and there are fountains and churches everywhere. Half the buildings are made of this pink stone that is apparently really common around here – Toulouse is la Ville Rose. Also, lots of parks and huge old trees.

The Rivière Garonne cuts through the city. There are also canals. It’s really pretty, but I wouldn’t want to swim in it. Lots of bridges, too – my favourite is the Pont Neuf, which is the last of the old stone bridges in the city – a name I find delightfully ironic, as all the others are newer than it.

French people smoke a lot! Will have to adjust to this. There don’t seem to be any laws about smoking in public places – or drinking in public, either. Apparently people also pee on the streets sometimes, since public toilets cost money.

Lots of universities means lots of students, which means lots of awesome things happening in the parks – like that group who had instruments out and were playing French reggae. Bob Marley’s face was everywhere at the market we went to.

French boys: apparently not shy about flirting. Ever. People keep looking and smiling at me, someone blew my mother and I a kiss, and someone else has already asked my sister for her number. The best part? Even if she wanted to, we don’t have a number to give out.

Lots of hot girls and pretty boys. If I’m not careful, they’re going to start spawning into characters. Also, people here are very flamboyant in their dress – lots of strange outfits. I don’t feel out of place. Not quite sure how to feel about this.

French people will buy sandwiches, panini, or flatbread for lunch and just wander over to the nearest park to eat it. It’s awesome.

Toulouse is a crowded city. Lots of cars, lots of crowds, lots of people – and all of them are shopping.

SEE WHAT I MEAN.

Lots of graffiti. I think it’s something of a local art form. Walls are covered – sometimes with layers and layers of tags, sometimes with gorgeous murals. We saw one commemorating Michael Jackson.

There are lots of cool cars here. Cars that don’t exist in Canada. Some of them are covered in graffiti.

Can’t wait until we move into our apartment downtown. Must brush up on my French.

More updates will follow as we continue our adventures! Hopefully my internet will remain stable. Hope everyone is having a good time in Canada. À bientot!

Going to the Fair

The classic fairground centrepiece.

This evening we went to the church fair just down the road from my aunt and uncle’s place. It was held in the building’s parking lot, with your classic portable small-fair rides and carnival stands. It wasn’t big, but the kids were sure excited; I don’t know that they’ve ever been to a fair like this before.

It was an interesting experience for me, who has been to many similar carnivals in Canada. There was something different about this one; a distinctly American flavour, from the candy stand lady with the Southern drawl who called me honey to the colours of the American flag adorning everything. And there really were American flags everywhere – even splashed across the wristbands we bought to guarantee us entrance to every ride. You wouldn’t see anything like this in Canada, except maybe on Canada day; even then, it wouldn’t be held in a church parking lot with rented carnies.

The carnies, too, were a wonderfully mixed group: a portly gentleman who smiled when I thanked him, a guy with a shaved head and what looked like prison tattoos on his face, an African-American man with the Rastafari colours embroidered on the pockets of his capris. This isn’t something you’d see just anywhere; typically, they wouldn’t be in a church parking lot, either. As I was walking home, I saw that the people in the house across from my aunt and uncle’s had set up a pavilion to host a party in their backyard. This is the real East Coast American heartland, and I can’t imagine a better place for my cousins to grow up.

On the Road

Well, today the vacations begin in earnest. Yesterday was graduation – I’m still not over it, by the way – and then I went out to dinner with my family, my grandparents, my girlfriend, Nami, and my best buddy, Meaghan. I got a camera for a graduation present, so as of now you can expect pictures to start showing up in my blog posts. Meaghan cut out for a while to go to another friend’s grad, but then she and Nami and I all crashed in my room. This morning we got up at eight, Meaghan and Nami left, and the family headed off to Connecticut to visit with Aunt Zed (short for Elizabeth), Uncle Colin, and our new fostered/adopted cousins.

The drive itself was not particularly exciting. In fact, I’d say the highlight of the ride would have been listening to the Tonight: Franz Ferdinand album for the first time – which was excellent, by the way, and I heartily recommend it. I took a few photos, but not much in the way of excitement.

My aunt and uncle's house: supremely New English.

I could tell we were getting close when the scenery started to take on a decidedly “New English” feel. You may not really recognize the term, but I feel like you’ll know the look. The houses are square and flat-fronted, with shutters, windowsills and window boxes, front porches, and American flags; it’s the sort of place where the roads wind, the village fire halls are more often than not contained in a barn, turkeys walk by the side of the roads, and the signs are hand painted. I always feel like the people who live here are the sort who bake apple pies and leave them to cool on their windowsills, take picnics in manicured parks, still borrow eggs and sugar from their neighbours, and are intensely – but politely – proud to be American. It’s a foreign environment, but a homey and welcoming one.

We arrived at my aunt and uncle’s house to excited young children shouting and were introduced to our new cousins. The oldest, Isaiah, is four; he is followed by Keanah (Kiki) and Aniah, three year-old identical twins; and baby Tatiannah, one and a half – yes, that’s right, the baby has my name. They’re very sweet kids and were very happy to meet their new big cousins.

Everyone is reading.

After bouncing off the walls for a while, we settled down to dinner, and then the kids went up to have their baths and go to bed. Now we’ve settled in to a thoroughly calming, comfortable atmosphere. For the first time in quite a while, I feel peaceful. The future holds many unknowns, but for now, there is no need to worry. It’s slow and sleepy around here, with a bit of an old world feel; whatever may come, I’ll be looked after.