Bonjour!
Prepare for a slew of old posts! A lot of things happened the first month I was here and it all left me with no time to post about the amazing things.
The weekend of September 17th was the Forum du Patrimoine which is a national French holiday where all of France celebrates its heritage (patrimoine=heritage). Many museums are open free of charge and have special exhibits. Other buildings that are normally private give free tours just for the weekend. Here are some, make that a ton, of pictures from that weekend:
On the way to the library my host, her friend, and I happened upon this art market! (My host is the one in the brown shirt and her friend is to her right)
These enormous books reside outside of the library. I read Le Petit Prince in my high school French class and my college's theater department put on Moliere's play The Imaginary Invalid my freshman year!
One of Aix's quiet electric buses decorated for a wedding!
Near my my school there were many tents set up with artisans demonstrating their crafts:
Action shot!
That's all wood! It looks like a painting. Too cool!
Aix from above!
Told you it was for a wedding! They're arriving at the cathedral.
I couldn't help myself from taking a picture of this!
This is an old add for shoe shiner! Who woulda guessed? Certainly not me!
Time for a free museum!
Little dolls dressed as the French royals!
Angel ceiling!
Another demonstration: I don't know what this is called but it's cool so look!
Now some painting and doll restorations:
Free tapestry museum!
Except I only took one photo of a tapestry.
I was much more interested in their temporary exhibit on Lotte Reiniger who made amazing silhouette animated films in the 1920's and 1930's.
If you have time definitely check out the video below for an example of one of her films!
[View:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2S9uEz3lNA]
The following pictures are from the amazing cathedral which is right by my school (in fact my education class is actually taught in the cathedral!)
The is the cloister (where the monks used to work):
Paintings inside the cathedral:
My host drove her friend and me to this house which is normally a private home but was open for tours for the holiday.
It had its own chapel!
Then I got free entrance into a theater with a gorgeous ceiling!
More free museums!!!
Yes, there used to be dinosaurs in Aix!
I was distracted by the museums lovely doors! Museums back home just don't have random really old pretty doors.
This is the first square in Aix which was made by a wealthy man with too much money who bought the neighboring buildings and tore them down.
On the last day I was lucky enough to see the fantastic wooden doors of the cathedral which are typically covered up for their protection.
Wide view:
Close up on door 1:
Close up on door 2:
Amazing right?!
Watch out for the pile of posts coming your way!
Au revoir!
Julie