Vacances en Toscane ...

- Partir à cinq adultes en Fiat Punto : il faut être inconscient ou simplement con pour penser cela faisable. Ou alors, comme nous, avoir une médaillée d'or de la tétris de bagages. Ou comment savoir utiliser littéralement chaque centimètre carré de libre dans la dite voiture ...

- Avoir de la famille là bas : on se dit «cool, on part en vacances, on va être tranquilles sans voir personne». C'est oublier qu'il y a, effectivement, toute la famille là bas, c'est à dire le 95% qui n'a pas émigré en France. Donc voir personne, ca ne marche pas. Mais c'est quand même des vacances : la même chose qu'en France, mais en italien (et croyez-moi, ça change tout !)

- Août 2012 : on voulait du soleil, après un été intégralement pluvieux. On l'a eu. Il n'a pas plu en Toscane depuis plus de trois mois. Sécheresse, plus de 40° tous les jours, la nuit rarement en dessous de 20°. Il faut pouvoir tenir le choc, dans un appartement dans climatisation. (heureusement, l'appartement est aussi situé en montagne).

- Dépaysement : en fait, c'est comme un pays arabe, mais avec plus de sous, moins de guerres, et plus d'eau (enfin, les autres années oui). Moins de déserts aussi. Quoi qu'on en dise, les cultures méditéranéennes sont suffisament similaires pour qu'on en parle au singulier.

- En Italie, la mozarelle de buflonne et les glaces sont moins chères qu'en France. Les pizzas aussi. Programme bouffe annoncé ...

- La Toscane, mieux qu'une musée : tout est vieux et chaque pierre a son laïus plus ou moins multi-centenaire, mais à la différence d'un musée, ça vit. Les gens y habitent et mènent leur vie quotidienne. Etrangement on a plus l'impression de vie là bas que d'autres régions «historiques», alors que sur le plan démographique le pays se meurt ...

- En Toscane, fidèles au cliché, les gens parlent fort et avec leurs mains. On a enfin l'impression d'être normaux.

- Au restaurant-pizzeria classieux au milieu de la vallée pleines d'oliviers, la serveuse t'engueule presque quand elle voit que tu ne finis pas les plats. «ben quoi, c'est quoi ces restes ? Vous avez pas faim ? C'est pas bon ou bien ?». Mais c'est normal, c'est la forme de politesse du coin.

- En Italie, les pâtes (bolognaise ou autre) est un des plats d'entrée, rien d'autre. On l'oublie toujours, jusqu'à ce que la maîtresse de maison ramène la suite : les viandes, les patates et les légumes.

- La déco intérieure des maisons, c'est comme dans les pays arabes : souvent dépouillé et kitsch à la fois. Y compris une certaine persistence de la «bondieuserie»*, version catholique. Tout un art.

- En Italie, les gens tendent à vivre dans d'énormes maisons à plusieurs générations - une par étage en général. De l'arrière grand-père aux petits enfants, de façon patrilocale (la femme vient vivre dans la famille de son mari).

- La Toscane, ça ressemble à la Palestine : des collines et des oliviers partout.

- Fait linguistique étrange constaté : quand un italien te parle, tu ne comprend pas (toujours). Quand trois italiens te parlent en même temps, tu comprends (beaucoup plus).

- En Toscane, j'ai découvert que la famille de mon père et leur nom, assez banal dans le coin, remontait à une ancienne famille noble du 12-15ème siècle qui vivait dans un village-château dont il ne reste que des ruines. Et un blason ! Pour nous fans du moyen-âgeux, et moi qui peint des fresques, des emblèmes et des blasons sur les murs quand l'envie m'en prend, c'est une découverte motivante ... 



* «bondieuserie» : sans les guillemets, nom péjoratif désignant toute sorte de manifestations de pratique religieuse. Avec les guillemets je voudrais donner un sens plus neutre, désignant effectivement des manifestations de type religieux, ou plutôt ces restes, souvent des objets, qui sont universels, qui relèvent plus du porte-bonheur ou de l'amulette, ou même de simple trait culturel (la personne les possédant pouvant ne pas être religieuse du tout) et esthétique. En Italie on accroche des images de la Vierge comme d'autres mettent des citations philosophiques ou bouddhistes. La personne concernée peut tout à fait voter communiste aux élections sans y trouver de contradictions ...

ذكريات (١) ـ مصر

كنت في السادسة عشرة من عمري - أول مرة وطئت أرض أفريقا وأرض من العالم العربي ...

كنت نائمة في الباص السياحي الجديد والمكيّف الهواء في وسط درجات حرارة البلد. حر جدا بالنسبة لنا السياحيين مع أن كان ربيعا جميلا. كنا منتقلين من مكان سياحي لمكان سياحي آخر وقد تجاوزنا موقع قبر “هاتشيبسوت” المرأة التي كانت فرعون في زمانها. فيما بعد كنا نعبر قرية صغيرة وفقيرة. كنت نائمة لأن كنا نستيقظ بكيرا جدا ونذهب الى النوم متأخرا جدا لنستوعب الأكثر من كل ما كنا نزور في البلد من خلال أسبوع واحد من العطلة. فكنت أستغلّ من كل أوقات صغيرة مثل الرحلات في الباصات من منظر الى آخر وأنام ... ضد إرادتي معظم الوقت لأن ما كنت أشاهد في الرحلات من الحياة اليومية المصرية كان مثير للإهتمام في نظري. 

خلال الرحلة ذاتها لا أعرف لماذا استيقظت لثوان ،ربما كنت أحس أن قد يفوتني شيئا مهما. كان الباص يصير بسرعة وخلال اللحظة فتحت فيها عينيَّ وجدت نفسي أنظر في صبي واقف على بعد قصير من اباص ، لا أكثر من مترين، صبي واقف جانب الطريق (الطريق يعني الرمل الأكثر ممهد وسط مكان حيث لا تجد إلا رمل) وكان هذا الصبي قد خرج من برميل القمامة كبيرة (مزبلة) يصحبه في البحث عن الطعام معز هزيلة مثله. كلا من الصبي والمعزة هزيلان بشكل مخيف. هذا الهزال الذي نحن الغربيين نشاهدها فقط على التلفاز في الأخبار عن المجاعة في أفريقا ولأسباب مختلفة على عارضات الأزياء ... فكان الصبي يخرج من البرميل ليرى حيث كان الباص متجه، يرانا ولا يرانا في آن ولكن أحسست كأن ينظر اليّ مباشرا. 

في مشهد العسر ذاك ما أدهشني وأثّر في كان هو ناظر الصبي، عيناه. حيث أي منا قد يتوقع التوسل أو الحزينة أو الغضب أو أي شعور قوية مثلها التي “تناسب” ذلك المشهد فما فوجدت إلا سكون وهدوء. ناظر مليئ بالسكون وتقريبا شيئ من الإطمئنان والتساؤل ولكن لا من الفضولية. حتى لا فضولية لأن باصات فاخرة وسياحيين غنيين هو منظر يومي اعتاد عليه بكل وضوح. شيء مؤلفة مثل البحث عن الطعام وملابس. نحن الاجنبيون ما استحقنا حتى فضولية أو أي شيئ آخر من قبله. فقط رفع رأسه ونظر إلى الباص ليعرف إذا كان في خطر بالنسبة لمسار الباص. 
وهذا اللحظة منت أنظر في الصبي وكان ينظر فينا طالت في ذهني لمدة ساعة وانطبعت في ذهني أكثر من أي شيئ آخر في هذا البلد خلال رحلتي هذا أو في أخبار التلفاز ... لا شيئ يواسي الواقعية المباشرة. 
لقد اكتشفت حينئذ أن باقية العالم ليست في حاجة الينا وتعاطفنا (المتكلفة كثيرا ما) ودموعنا على وضعها وإلخ ... بل كان العالم يتبادل النظر معنا “الغربيين” بمساواة وحتى بشكل أقوى لأنهم ما عندهم ما يخسرونه فيما نحن نحتاج لكل شيئ حتى لمكيف الهواء في ربيع جميل.

 
ما كان يحتاج الصبي إلى شفقة. إحتاج إلى طعام لكن بدون أن يسأل أحدا لذلك وببساطة اكتفى بالبحث عنه بوحده. ويتسأل عن امكانيات الحصول على طعام وعن الأسباب التي تدفع سياحيين أجنبيين للعبور بقريته في غاية الاستعجال كل يوم. 
أو من الممكن أن ذلك هو ما استخرجت مما كنت أشوف في ناظره. لن أعرف أبدا ما كان وراء هذان العينين ولكن اكتشفت حينذاك عالم جديد تماما على بعد من أقل مترين مني. 

(the english version of it is here)

Going parisian ... Not my intention, though.

    I began my studies living in a 160 square meter flat, for free. I'm on the verge of continuing my studies in a 9 square meter flat (well, a more appropriate description would be «cupboard»), which I pay for 400€ a month. I don't want to imagine in what I will finish my studies. 

    Anyway, how can 9 square meters reach such a price, and what's more, be considered to be cheap ? One word : Paris. 

    Sadly for people living there, this town has the (bad?) luck of being the most visited in the world. So, on the living costs level, one of the most expensive one, even more than London or New York according to a study I read about last year. That means that for a university student with no money, it's a nightmare. University is almost free (for a governement funded student - anyone who can't be fully aided by his family - the university fees are 4€ a year. Yes, 4€, the price of say, 3 breads at the bakery. For a "normal" student, the uni year cost between 200€ and 400€. Which is about nothing as compared to what goes in any english-speaking country). 

     I'm about to take a huge loan at the bank, like most of american or british students, in a country where university is so to speak free, not to pay uni fees, but to pay the city in which the university has been built. That drives me crazy. I can almost accept the idea of paying a university (though I strongly believe that education should be free) because it pays the professors' salary and the staff's, but getting indebted to pay a ridiculously expensive rent, ridiculously expensive food, in a ridiculously expensive city ...  

      A city which I always wonder what is so special about it, seriously. "Paris, the most beautiful city in the world". That makes me laugh everytime. Because it's obviously not complicated to take a map, and plan a trip in any country where there are some reaaaally beautiful cities, way more than Paris : Italy, Spain, Morroco ... (for my personnal taste I would add any middle eastern country, and asian countries too). And any of these cities have also a strong important feature that Paris doesn't have : nice people. If you're a foreigner, that you had the strange idea of wanting to visit Paris, and met there someone who actually smiled at you, or even spoke to you nicely, there's only one explanation : that person was also a foreigner, or possibly, a frenchman/woman from outside Paris. (that second option is debatable, french people as a whole are not known for their smiling at strangers). 

     So here I am, moving to Paris, in the cliché Montmartre (the one with the painters and Moulin Rouge and that stuff), but then, I didn't see anything in Paris that was not rendered cliché by a whole lot of movies, french or foreign (the latest being "midnight in Paris" by Woody Allen ... I usually like his movies, but not this one. It's just a huge cliché from beginning to end. Couldn't stand it. "I dream of walking in Paris under the rain with a baguette under my arm" ... Who in the world want to get bread wet with rain ?! Not even telling that there is a lot more interesting stuff to do in life than waking in that city under the rain.) 

     Anyway, I'll just write posts about stuff I do find interesting in that city, but it won't be the Eiffel tower... But I'll try to write positive posts about it, promise.

Memories (2) - Egypt again

     Of the group of tourists we were part of I was the only one to be fully clothed. For several reasons I didn't want to wear anything else than a long skirt and long sleeved top, when everyone else was in T-shirt or less, shorts and the like, making the most of the springtime sun and looking like real tourists. I didn't care a bit about the sun, especially since I discovered that my stupid white skin was the sort to get burned but never tanned (first reason). So I didn't bother with the sun, and I always prefered wearing long clothes, more graceful to my eyes than all these dreadful tight little clothes everybody else was wearing but fitting noone (second reason). 

      I had only the slightest consciousness that wearing full lenght skirt might be a good idea to help me cross the cultural divide between me, tourist, and the local population, always covered up, men and women alike. So it was not the main reason since I was barely conscious of ir, but I just liked it best, even back home. But none the less it made me stand apart both inside the tourist group and outside among the locals, which I think was the third reason, not wanting to be seen as another of "those tourists". I attracted the "locals"' attention much more than my cousin, though she was the prettiest, and that you could see much more of her than me. I didn't understand why and didn't care much, I was too busy eating the good food all around us on display at all times. That's when I discovered the marvelous stuff called fresh dates (I loved the sugary dry ones you can find anywhere in the world, and never knew you could eat it fresh). It was one of the best things I ever ate, and never managed to found the same again.  

     Anyway, the really funny part came when we were visiting around Cairo, or maybe Karnak, we were looking at temple ruins, along with japanese people, when suddenly a couple of them saw me, and insisted on taking a picture of me in front of the ruins. One alone by myself and another one with them. 

     To this day, I know I'm in the picture of a japanese couple in Egypt, and I still haven't the slightest idea why. Did they manage to find out I was french and found that great (as happened to me later in Australia)? Or did they just thought, for some unkown reason, that I was egyptian and looked local enough to look good on the picture (as happened to me even later in the West Bank ?). I don't know why people think french is cool, and even less why they should think I look egyptian, but long skirts can have a funny effect on random people.

Memories (1) - Egypt

     Asleep in the tourist bus, brand new and air-conditionned against the heavy temperatures of the country. Heavy for us tourists not used to egyptian weather, even though it was a nice spring. We were being taken from a tourist site to another, we had just passed by Hatshepsut's funeral site. We were now passing by a very poor neighbourhood. I was asleep because we woke up early and stayed up late, in order to be able to take all of what we could of the country in this very small week of holidays. And so, wanting to take all in, I slept through most of our coming and goings, thus missing whole sceneries adn views ...

     During this particular trip, I don't know why I woke up very briefly, thinking that maybe I was yet again missing out on something great. The bus was fast, and just as I opened my eyes, for 2 seconds, I found myself staring at a boy, less than a meter or two from me, behind the window, out in the street or what was passing for a street (a length of dirt flater than elsewhere), the upper half of his body down a roadside bin, with a goat beside him also head in the bin, both awfully skinny, skeletons of a human and a goat respectively, both looking through the garbage, obviously looking for anything that could be eaten. The boy got out of the bin just as the bus rode by with me in it, looking straight at us though not really seeing us, but it felt as if he was staring back at me, precisely me and no one else. 

     It was living scene of extreme misery, but what shocked me even more was this stare, his eyes. Where any one of us could have expected to find some pleading or sadness or anger or some strong emotion «fitting» with what we were seeing, I found nothing but calm. A calm look, serene, with maybe a hint of interrogation, and not even curiousity. Rich tourists passing by were a daily occurrence to this boy, just as not finding food and no clean clothes to put on. So we didn't deserve curiosity or anything else. He just happened to hear the noise of the bus, wondering if he was too close to the road, so he just glanced at the bus' curving trajectory. In that glance, for a quarter of a second that seems an hour in my memory, I saw this incredible stare of a starving boy in the middle of nothing but old houses and dirt. It disturbed me much more than any TV news I had seen on poverty or any other sort of subject usually linked to the «third world», the majority world I had never seen up until that moment, this unexpected holidays in Egypt I spent when I was 16, with my godfather and his family.

     I discovered at that moment that the rest of the world didn't need us, and especially didn't need pity or tears or the like, and possibly could be better off without us. That the rest of the world was staring back at us as an equal, and possibly a «stronger» equal in that it had not much too lose, unlike us, the rich tourists who couldn't survive a mild springtime without air conditioning.

     The boy didn't need pity. He needed food, but didn't ask for it, he was looking for it by himself. And wondering how to come by it, and how things came that rich tourists were passing by his village everyday. And maybe how all this could be changed. Unless that is what I wanted him to think, when it's more plausible he was being fatalistic, thinking that the only thing that was within his grasp was to look for food in trash bins. But then that too, could be only what an intellectual would like to think, that all arabs are fatalistic ...

    What was behind these eyes, I'll never know for sure, but I discovered a whole new world, less than a meter or two from me. I remember this boy more clearly now than the pyramids or anything else in Egypt.

  بالعربية هنا

Um Qays

     Quel plaisir que d'emmener des gens sur des ruines et de les voir heureux comme des gosses, émerveillés par les vieilles pierres. C'est le cas d'une amie que j'ai emmené aujourd'hui à Um Qays, où se trouve un village romain-bysantin-ottoman avec une vue magnifique sur le lac de Tibériade. Un paysage bucolique plein de fleurs de toutes les couleurs, et trois pays en un seul regard : Jordanie, Syrie ( et Golan ) et Israel-Palestine. Paysage bucolique et pourtant si tendu de barrières plus ou moins invisibles. Un pays occupé, un pays sans gourvernement plus loin ( on peut deviner le Liban au delà de quelques montagnes ), un pays en révolution ou guerre civile, on ne sait pas trop, et la Jordanie, bizarrement calme au milieu de ses drôles de voisins, se contentant de quelques manifs le vendredi.

     En tout cas un des lieux de Jordanie à ne pas rater, 3 dinars l'entrée, 75 cents de minibus de Irbid à Um Qays.

     Puis de terminer la journée dans un restau, à 4h, car peu importe l'heure, il y a toujours à manger, et surtout du mansaf, le plat typique jordanien ( riz, viande ou poulet, le tout arrosé de lait de mouton épicé ) simple et affreusement bon.