Month: February 2021

Here’s a pretty impressive snap of a downtown square in the southern French city of Arles, taken at around noon time – and as you can see, what should be a bustling, hectic square filled with people stands essentially empty:

I really like the way this snap turned out, I did not post-processing on it whatever. It captures the L’Église Saint-Baudile de Nîmes in the southern French city of Nimes. I especially like the way that the yellows of the building contrast with the grays of the sky.

It’s quite a new cathedral, as far as cathedrals go, having been built in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

I call them Mistral trees – but I don’t know if anyone else does. That’s because the south of France is famous for a hurricane strength wind known as the Mistral, which at certain times of year (particularly winter) can actually force traffic on highways to stop.

It’s what they call a northwesterly wind – and that can be a bit confusing. It does not mean that the wind flows to the northwest, but rather emanates from the northwest.

Here’s a nice picture of how the wind flows:

From time to time you spot a tree that has grown up directly in the path of this strong wind, such as this tree here that I spotted in the southern French commune of Sainte-Marie-del-la-Mer,

I took this snap of a pyramid in the southern French city of Nimes

France is replete with public pyramids, perhaps the best well-known of them being the glass pyramid at the Louvre in Paris. $

Far from coincidence, it shows the influence that a secret society has had on the French government, dating back to the times when many historians now believe that Jesus escaped from persecution in the Middle East and eventually took up residence in the southern French village of Narbonne, together with his wife Mary Magdelene.

OK, I don’t know if he was or he wasn’t. Probably “good” for any Roman means they kept their slaves well-fed. Anway, most scholars claim that Antoninus Pius was one of the so-called “Gang of Five Good Emperors.” I captured this snap in the southern French city of Nimes,

Interestingly, there is quite some historical evidence that I am the direct descendant of a famous Roman emperor, you can read more about it here.

As artistic a snap as I thought I could take, with the sun just hidden behind the magnificent Château de Beaucaire, a medieval fortress in the southern French village of the same name,

Continuing the series, here are some underground garbage receptacles, just in front of the ramparts of a medieval fort, in the southern French village of Beaucaire, France

How can you not love a country where people get out an enjoy a very relaxing sport?

As artistic a snap as I thought I could take of a narrow alley in the southern French villag of Agde, the dark stone used for construction having caught my eye, since you don’t see that in other French villages,

Is it a bus? Is it a tram?  It runs on tires – but are rails a requirement for a tram? What exactly defines a tram?

Well, the inhabitants of the southern French city of Nimes refer to it as a tram. I am not sure if it is of the same make and construction, but there is a similar bus/tram/thing that plies the streets of the northeastern French city of Metz.

One of the wonderful things about this tram is that by and large it runs on dedicated streets that are forbidden to vehicular traffic, but are open to bicycle traffic. So I spent quite some time on the Rhine Rider exploring Nimes by using the tram lines as bicycling shortcuts.

Some big rocks to stop the waves of the Mediterranean Sea from eroding the beaches of Fariente Plage, near the southern France village of Saint-Marie-de-la-Mer,

Continuing the series, the southern French are attempting something of a revival of the nearly extinct language of Langue d’Oc. This amazing for two reasons: first, the language is hardly spoken by anyone anymore; and second, we are talking about France, where pride in the French language is so strong even international language like English and Spanish find no acceptance here.

Nevertheless, as you wander around the downtown area of the southern French village of Arles you’ll spot street signs like this:

And like this:

France is intensely interesting, especially when it comes to the language. European countries like Spain and Germany and (especially) Italy are filled with villages, each with their own unique dialect – in some cases, so intense that it is mutually unintelligible to people from outside the village.

France is an exception. Here, standard French is spoken everywhere, there accent differences are only minimal at best – and the dozens if not hundreds of historical dialects that probably existed up until the early part of the 20th century are now – if not totally lost – only spoken by a handful of the older generation.

Regions of France have started initiatives to revive these old languages, such as Alsacienne in Alsace, and Langue d’Oc in Southern France. Given that less than 100K French people speak this language, I find it almost mind-blowing that there is a radio station (Radio Lengadoc) as well as a movement to show signs in both languages.

Here is an artistic a set of snaps I could take for the village of Béziers in Southern France.

Here is the snap for the standard French version:

And here is the Langue d’Oc version:

Interestingly, while listening to Radio Lengadoc I could understand a tiny amount. Langue d’Oc seems to be a combination of Spanish, French, and Catalan.

Interestingly, many of the songs they played had a similar tonal quality to those on a CD that I own of Sephardi Jews in Spain – coincidence?