Home-schooling in the Vosges

We went to la neige (snow) with the home-school group, Les Enfants D' Abord for a week before Kat and Boz came and we went to Basel. The home-schooling group trip started out fabulously with Anja and Sofie playing with all the lovely French children. But then children started falling ill with the flu and there were rumors of lice at which point more than half the crew abandoned ship. It was nice for me that so many people left as it made it easier to listen to their heated conversations about the Controller, the person who came to their house yearly to see if they were really teaching their children. Though Anja had already fallen ill with fever, so we couldn't go anywhere to escape the lice, though I think we managed to avoid them as no-one has noticed any yet, and it has been a few weeks now. We washed everything in hot water, staining Anja's pretty pink Les Enfant D ' Abord t-shirt a dingy grey-pink. This I think will help us to always remember the week as it really was, starting out pretty pink and fading to dingy grey-pink.

Basel

We went to the zoo in Basel and met this lovely family of five. They had two children and he had a second wife. Probably why he was so exhausted, he only got up once the whole time we watched them. But both females stood the entire time, one always by the cubs. Going to Switzerland really made me realize how much french we've learned. Because we couldn't understand word one of the Swiss German. And when the returning train neared Geneva they switched announcements from German to French and everything was easy to understand and we felt home again. Very odd, as we thought we were still lost in France upon leaving for Switzerland a week earlier. We learned that the Swiss have four national languages; Swiss-German, French, Italian, and Rumantsch. What's so fascinating about this last language is that it is directly derived from Latin as in very similar to Latin, but spoken, and considered very beautiful. In elementary school, the children choose to learn one language other than their native tongue plus everyone learns English.
While purchasing shoes and calling-cards in Switzerland we did meet some people who spoke little or no English and giggled at us some. Then we ended up giggling at someone speaking Swiss German to us later. This was all fun with no hard feelings which strikes me as somewhat different than our interactions in France. The French do take their language very seriously and I would never giggle at them. This might be due to the fact that one really is SOL if they can't speak any French in a little town like Cluny so it is a more serious matter. In Basel, there is always someone within earshot who could translate for you in a pinch. Or it might be just a matter of national pride. Or the fact that Basel has a University and is filled with light- hearted young people. Besides that, German is a funny language! I quite enjoyed listening to it all around for the week, not to mention the constant music playing and confetti dodging.

Fasnacht!

Fasnacht in Basel is a sort of Protestant Swiss version of Carnaval, or Mardi Gras. It began last Monday morning at 4AM with Morganstreich (spelling of all words not English may be incorrect) which is a sort of striking in the morning with over 200 cliques (groups) of Piccollo or drum players marching through the street with a large lantern decorated with their message of the year. Each player marching wears a mask and a small lantern on their head. Kathrin's cousin, Caleb's cousin once removed, Hans invited us to the unveiling of their lantern the evening prior to Morganstreich. This ceremony usually includes the clique and sometimes close friends or family. Then they re-cover their lantern and march through the streets, piccollos only. After Morganstreich, there are three full days and nights of parading ending at eight AM on Thursday. During the parades the people wear different masks and there are many floats carrying people costumed as veggis (pronounced vay-ghees-closest translation- hillbillies) with giant large upturned nosed masks, throwing candy and confetti. They sometimes grab people and completely cover them in confetti. The people put up their arms and say, "Veggis, Veggis" in hopes of getting loot. We managed to acquire, special thanks to Anja and Kathrin who worked extra hard, much candy, toy cars, little stuffed animals, red glitter hair spray, cough drops, kleenex, countless blood oranges, a fake red rose, and real acacias and roses. When we arrived, we went to our family's lovely, spacious apartment right in the center of town. We were met by cousins who presented Kathrin with a long list of family to call in the short week we were there. She managed to complete her list and we had many lovely meetings with the family including home-made meals and teas. We had a special Fasnacht dessert which was something like the crunchy cinnamon things you get at Taco Bell, or elephant ears from a carnival. Though they didn't have cinnamon on them, only powdered sugar.