Bike Ride and Theatre

Last Saturday, as predicted, I rode from Tours to the little up-river town of Amboise by bike. My host mom lent me a kind of old bike that belonged, she claimed, to her "voisin" a mysterious neighbor I've never met although this isn't the first time I've used his stuff. I went with my Bucknell friend Josue.

Despite the cold fall weather, the fog, and my out-of-shapedness for the distance of 49.8 kilometers (total), it was a great trip. My favorite part of the ride was when we turned into the forest for a bit of mountain biking (this probably wasn't prudent to do on a junky old bike that didn't belong to me) but it was fun to dodge around the trees and feel the wind in my face. After the forest we got lost (somehow...all we had to do was follow the river), but that gave the opportunity to ask a farmer for directions and then cross acres of farmland on an old dirt road. It was very "pittoresque" and "idyllique."

Once in Amboise, we checked out the castle façade and ate in Da Vinci's gardens. It's a cool little town and they had just decorated for Christmas. It's actually very odd that the French would choose to begin celebrating the day after Thanksgiving. But what may even be harder to understand is that the French actually celebrate Christmas publicly. In a society that forbids wearing crosses and burkas in public institutions, the municipal government puts up lights, wreaths, and Christmas trees on the main streets and blasts traditional Christmas carols (like Joy to the World) from P.A. speakers. Well, I suppose paradox is the essence of church-state controversy.

Speaking of paradox, I saw an important play last night at the "Centre Dramatique." Entitled "Kids," (or keedz) it explored the aftermath of the Balkan conflict through the perspective of nine Sarajevo adolescents who played, fought, and flirted as they tried both to understand the violence that left them orphans and to cope with the first day of peace. It was a heavy play, but with lots of strange songs and child-like dances, and a bi-frontal audience seating arrangement, we were kept from emotionally relating to the characters. This was the goal, as outlined in the program: "to grasp the reality of the war without falling into pathos," to consider the violence, poverty, and destruction from a "distance." This distance was certainly created at the end, when we see the teenagers recreate with great theatricality the horrors of war for "les journalistes de l'Occident" (Western journalists). To me, this threw the whole concept of the play into question. I'm left wondering what Western viewers are supposed to conclude or even reflect on after sitting through a piece like this. I can say, however, that it is as important now as always to wrestle with these issues of ethnic violence and to reconsider the West's response.