Life's Illusions

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

La Toussaint - Deuxieme partie (Part 2)

What was supposed to be a long holdiay weekend for the French didn't turn out so well. Here are some headlines from the daily newspaper nice-matin:

My apolgies to those who speak and read French, but this blog does not recognize nor allow me to enter accents.

lundi 1er november (November 1-All Saints Day)
Deluge de Toussaint (I don't think this requires transaltion)

mardi 2 november (November 2-All Souls Day)
Trois longues journees de deluge (Three long days of deluge) and
my personal favorite Tourisme: un week-end cauchemardesque (Tourism: A nightmarish weekend)

Yep. It poured all day on Sunday and when it looked like Monday might see some sun, it poured again. Which caught me off-guard as I decided that I sould honor All Soul Days by visiting the Nice Cimetiere (Cemetary). So to be able to take my photographs unencumbered, I left mon parapluie a la maison (my umbrella at the house). Not only was the day gray, so were the monuments, and day-light savings ended on this day which meant that it was dark gray and wet by 1700 (5pm).

I love the peace and quiet of European cemetaries (not US cemetaries as they have always be rather frightening to me since I was a child). I love looking at the tomb sculptures and in Nice there is a great selection dating back to the 19eme siecle (19th century). They may not be great art but I find they display the love and emotions of those who erected them in honor of their departed.

Not everything is gray though, there is plenty of green in the park-like settings, but in addition there is a wide range of colors from the flowers left in memory by the family survivors.

Many graves are lacking flowers as the families have died off or moved away. This monument of the Grosso family is said to be the most photographed in the Nice cemetary. I found it dificult to get a good picture as it is so large, but this distance shot caught other visitors with une parapluie that was almost as colorful as the flowers.

I'm sure these visitors are viewing these two beautiful portraits of the departed Grosso children.

Grosso sounds Italian to me, no? So many people ask me why I like Nice so much. Well there is a strong Italian heritage here as well as French. Just in this alley of the cemetary I noted the following names:

Imbrosciano
   Bruno
      Casiglia
         Chrubini
            Beringeri
               Tagliafico
                  Pasquale
                     Pellegrino
                       Magnani


So when I come to Nice, I can have my French and my Italian too! The best of both!

I should mention my French lessons. I'm up to level 2 of Rosetta Stone (RS), but after one month of living in Nice, RS has determined that I cannot pronounce Merci (Thanks) or Salut (Hello)! How do you say DUH!!! in French?

Yet RS passed my pronunciation of this word...quincaillerie (hardware store)! Like anyone uses that word here as all they say is Bricarama which is a store much like our Home Depot! So spending a day in a cemetary wasn't so bad. No one was correcting my pronunciation.

With that said, hopefully you too will find this grave art to be as pleasing as I do.

In honor of the these souls I offer these photographs in silence.

By the time I took this photograph I was as wet and cold as the marble.

In my earlier post I mentioned that the cemtary in St. Paul de Vence had a view, well so does Nice. It is perched well above the Bay of Angels.

Saturday, October 30, 2010

La Toussaint

All Saints Day in France is part of a two-day national holiday known as La Toussaint. The French celebrate All Saints Day on November 1, the day for remembering Catholic saints, and All Souls Day on November 2, the day for praying for the souls of the deceased.

As many of you know, I have a proclivity for taking pictures of statues, many of which I find in European churches and cemeteries. I have only visited one cemetery on this trip, so far. The cemetery is located in the fortified hill-top village of St. Paul de Vence, France.

I remember thinking before I took the following picture..."Wow. A graveyard with a view." I'm sorry, I'm being irreverant. But look, you can see the Mediterranean Sea from this spot.

I'm not a religious person but for years I have found beauty in old churches and religious icons, especially throughout Europe. Maybe it all started when my Lithuanian great-aunt took me to a Russian Orthodox church in Bethlehem, PA when I was around 10 years of age. I remember the imagery of the church was overwhelming. In fact I still find Russian Orthodox churches to be especially beautiful and there is an excellent example here in Nice. The Cathedrale Orthodox Russe de Nice was built in 1912.

I tried to take some interior pictures of the cathedrale, but the rather large woman patrolling the area caught me. The French and Russian courts have decided that this building and it's land are the property of Russia, so I thought I shouldn't press my luck. I wasn't carrying my passport!

The trio of photos above were taken last year in Cinque Terre. The town is Levanto and the property is the Agriturismo Villanuova. This was an 18th century summer residence for the Genovese family Massola. The family has turned the estate into a B&B where I went to take a cooking class. The estate has it's own chapel, unfortunately only being used for storage. There I found the two religious icons. I really like the skewed halo.

The only other religously themed pictures taken on this trip are the three below. The first is the war memorial in Nice. The other two are churches; one in Villefranche-sur-mer, France decorated by the artist Jean Cocteau and the other is the cathedral in Antibes, France.

Although La Toussaint is a religious holiday, it is also a long weekend holiday for the French. Many sites and services will be either closed or operating on a limited schedule.

Therefore I have a lot of time on my hands and in honor of La Toussaint, I thought I would share with you a collection of the many church photographs that I have taken over the last 2-years.

To make this fun for all, I'm presenting the photos in a random order. All of my travel has been in France, Italy, Greece and Croatia. Try to match the photos to their geographic locations.

Answers are below.

P.S. When viewing the blog, you can enlarge a picture by clicking on the image. Who knew?