Today, two weeks after the fatal attacks in Paris, the French flag outside the town hall in Sète was finally unfurled and back in its usual flying state. This just goes to show how deeply the pain of these attacks have been felt across France, even here, at least 4 hours away from the capital, and that's on the fast train. In the week that followed the Charlie Hebdo attacks there was a tangible sombre, almost depressive sense in the air. Just walking through the narrow streets of Sète you would pass 'Je suis Charlie' signs in nearly every shop window, and people seemed to walk in an odd silence, partly out of shock and sadness, but also partly out of fear - everywhere was on high alert, and suddenly normal activities like going shopping in the first weekend of the sales in Montpellier were deemed potentially hazardous - several of the teachers in my school remarked at how unusually quiet the shops were for this time of year. The French are very proud and quite patriotic people, so an attack on their beloved capital city, Paris, and on such a well-known French institution, Charlie Hebdo, almost felt like a personal attack.
The town hall in Sète claiming that we are Charlie.
The day after the attacks on the Charlie Hebdo offices, a Charlie Hebdo collector handed out old copies for free in the main square in Sète, many of which have ended up being stuck on walls around the town.
Frontignan town hall playing on the patriotic french slogan 'Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité'.
In that first week we were watching a French rolling news channel pretty constantly, watching as more horrific events unfurled in what has since been described as 'the three days of terror'. We watched the controversial live reports of the hostage situations in Paris, the speeches made by President, François Hollande, the momentous turning off of the lights on the Eiffel Tower in rememberance of the victims.
Nothing else was reported on the news for at least a week, which proved to be particularly problematic for us when, on the Friday, just after the hostage situations in Paris had been resolved, one of the assistants who lives in Montpellier posted in our group messages that there had been a bomb scare in the train station in Montpellier, and that now there was a hostage situation in a 'bijouterie' in the city centre. Fortunately, this hostage situation turned out to be a robbery gone wrong, and wasn't related to the events in Paris, which needless to say most people had been assuming. To attempt such a thing on that day was a particularly stupid idea given the high security alert! All was resolved in the early hours of that Saturday morning, and luckily Amy's boyfriend, who was travelling to Sète from New York that Friday evening, was unaffected, and we were able to go into Montpellier that weekend for dinner and to a birthday party of one of the assistants.
On the Sunday there was the huge rally in Paris, and across France, including in Sète, where around 5000 people attended. We went down to see what would happen, and as we came out of our front door we came across streams of people making their way to the nearby square where the 'mairie' is, and where the march was due to start. There was an unexplainable, odd yet beautifully emotional, sombre and reflective atmosphere, as people started to march together. There was a definite sense that people felt that it was their duty to be there; to show solidarity with their fellow citizens. Being in the south of France, there were people from all races, religion and ages, which made for an impressive sight. The importance of unity was highlighted by a man who heard us speaking English, and came over to speak to Amy, saying thank you for joining us and how important it was that people showed peaceful and loving solidarity against terror. It was an honour to be a part of something so memorable in history, and whatever debates there have been, and I am sure will be, about the Je Suis Charlie slogan, I think this show of solidarity was a beautiful moment, and will hopefully be a positive influence on what are already tense relations between the French and their Muslim co-citizens.
Anyway, on to happier things! I had a visit from Elliot, a friend who studies French with me at Warwick, and who is currently studying in the Sorbonne university in Paris for his year abroad (basically the unpaid, actual studying version! But he loves it, so well done him!) We were very lucky with the weather which was seemingly having unusually high temperatures for January, with temperatures up to 19 degrees! We did the usual tour of Montpellier, and also went on a day trip to Carcassonne which was fun. Apparently you can't leave Carcassonne without trying their local dish of 'Cassoulet', which is basically sausage, duck and beans, all in one dish - sounds weird, but was actually quite delicious!
The old 'cité' was very impressive, and despite most of the shops and cafés being closed due to being out of the tourist season, we were still able to see all the famous tourist attractions, and even managed to get into the Château Comtal for free because we are European students!
On the Friday I also had another 'fun day' in a tiny little town close to Frontignan called Poussan. Two other assistants and I were there to help the teachers and my 'responsable', Vincent, to run the day, which apparently had the theme of 'British towns'. There were Union Jack flags everywhere, much to the dismay of the one American assistant we had with us! However, it seems they had got slightly confused with American and British cultures, as most of the children and teachers were wearing checked shirts, jeans, and cowboy hats as one of the activities was line dancing! We didn't like to point it out to them, so just went along with it! We rotated around various activities which included snakes and ladders, reading 'We're going on a bear hunt' (again!), and playing with a parachute. All the teachers were really lovely, and very excited to meet me, as clearly Vincent had told them about me!
This week all of our visitors have gone, so it has been a lot quieter, and Amy and I took the chance to go into Montpellier to the CAF office (the lovely people who will hopefully be giving us money towards our rent!) and handed in all our documents, so hopefully that will all be sorted soon, but with French beaurocracy you never know!
This is how happy we felt afterwards!!In a similar typical French style, two of my classes this week were cancelled but I wasn't informed until the actual time that I was supposed to be in the class, so I had a fair amount of sitting around to do! Fortunately for me, the English lady I met last term, Penny, was kind enough to invite me to her house and gave me lunch in the free time I had! Apart from that, school was fairly normal, and I got given another present by one of my students which was very cute - apparently I spell my name 'Rachelle', and I am her favourite teacher, which is very sweet, especially as I only teach her for 45 minutes each week!
I think that is all I have to report, so I'm going to sign off here! I only have a few more weeks until our 'vacances de février' which is crazy, but nice for me because I get to come home for a bit and see people at uni and in Plymouth, before going to visit my sister in Madrid! So, if you're around and want to see me in the week of 6th Feb, let me know! Next week after my days of work I'll be going to visit Emily in Angoulême, which should also be fun, and I'm sure will provide lots of stories and photos to share!
So, au revoir for now!
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