Flower Market Amsterdam

I've just spent most of the last week in Holland! It was fabulous. One of the many wonderful places we visited was the Flower Market in Amsterdam, the Bloemenmarkt.

A whole block of floating stalls.

I'd expected it to be a sea of fresh flowers. And there were some. 

But it was mainly bulbs on our visit. Of every type, and in every form. 

I'd never seen cyclamen bulbs before

Buddha Palm bulbs

There were a few reminders that it was Amsterdam after all. 

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I'm a bit excited

I'm going to Europe.

Amsterdam. London. Paris. My holiday is like a t-shirt!

I've been to Paris before, twice, and am giddy with excitement about returning once again. I love Paris. The first visit we were there for a week. We spent a glorious two weeks last time. This visit we'll have about four weeks in Paris. I just can't get enough.

Why wouldn't I be excited? When churches look like this?

Sainte Chapelle

When a hospital courtyard looks like this?

Hotel Dieu

Where department stores look like this?

Galleries Lafayette

And the Opera looks like this?

Opera Garnier

Where fun can be had in so many ways 

Air Swing at Fete des Tuileries

Metro Palais Royale 

Where cliches abound

but are wonderful

 And that beautiful Parisian light suffuses every vista

I'm looking forward to Amsterdam and London too of course. But I've never been to those cities before, so it's a different sort of excitement and anticipation as I don't quite know what to expect.


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Joan of Arc

I really thought that I'd love this book. It should have been a no brainer for me. Michael Morpuro is fabulous, his Private Peaceful remains one of the most moving books that I've ever read. And I've been quite fascinated by Joan of Arc since 2011. Sadly though, it wasn't meant to be.

While I'm still fascinated by Joan's story I found this book hard going. Michael Morpurgo uses a story within a story technique to tell Joan's rather famous story. Sixteen year old modern girl Eloise Hardy grows up in Montpellier under the shadow of a portrait of Joan of Arc.

Eloise is quite fascinated with Joan, and after her family moves to Orleans she enters an essay competition to win the chance to be Joan for a day, leading a procession to mark the anniversary of the relief of Orleans on May 8. Which is ok, but then Joan's story is told with Joan being kept company by a white sparrow called Belami. For some reason this annoyed me from the get go, and my interest in the book never recovered.

Of course there are interesting facts along the way (and I do believe that this is rather a faithful retelling of Joan's life).

15th century France was quite different

Joan hates the Burgundians even more than the English who have occupied Northern France for many decades.

They're of our blood, they're French, and they ally themselves with the English, parcelling up the country, my country, as they see fit. English, Burgundians, they raid and rob wherever they want, and we have no power, nor any will, it seems, to stop them.

Joan jumped from the tower at Beaurevoir

Joan was betrayed by the very king that she spent her life fighting for, the king she saw crowned in Reims. 

King Charles himself, it seemed, the king she had restored to his throne, had personally ordered the bridge to be destroyed, and the attack on Paris to be halted. Behind her back he had come to terms again with the Burgundians and the English. Paris and the north of the country would be left to the Duke of Burgundy and the English, if he could keep all the conquests to the south. The king was going to disband his army, her army, leaving the English still in France. 

Throughout Joan refers to the English as Godoms, a term unfamiliar to me, and one that I've had no success Googling. There is no glossary, and it isn't in my Shorter Oxford Dictionary either. These English Godoms were to pay 10,000 pounds for Joan. 

After her trial, Joan was sentenced to death in the cemetery at Rouen, she then recanted her story about her voices, her apparitions. The next day she was to retract her recanting, and was of course burnt at the stake in the market place of Rouen.

There were no cheers now. Many cried openly at what they had just witnessed. 'We are lost,' said one of the English soldiers. 'We have just burnt a saint.'

Also published as Sparrow

Books on France, a great 2013 challenge from Emma at  Words and Peace

Dreaming of France, a great Monday meme
from Paulita at An Accidental Blog

Meeting The French- Boulangerie Esnault

Three years ago we had an amazing family holiday in Paris. Next week we leave for Paris again. I'm a bit excited. So of course my thoughts are turning towards Paris once again. 

One of the many highlights of our last trip was a visit to a working bakery which we booked through a company called Meeting the French. At the time we visited what was the oldest working bakery in Paris, Boulangerie Esnault, 51 rue de Richelieu, 75001. It was celebrating 200 years of business. Sadly it has now closed it's doors due to rising rents. 

It was a great experience. Meeting the French sent along a translator so that we tourists all understood what was being said. It was great to see the bakery cat wander through looking nonplussed in the way of all cats, wonderful that a bakery cat is even allowed, I'm sure it wouldn't be here. 

It was a fascinating glimpse into the world of two French staples. Baguettes and croissants. We learnt that boulangeries are quite regulated in France. Their days off are mandated so that all the bakeries in a certain area are not closed on the same day. Their holiday periods are assigned to ensure that the people have access to bread. The ingredients of a baguette are controlled. The French take their bread very seriously, and rightly so. 

We watched the process of making baguettes, and got some hands on action too. 

We learnt how to roll croissants, and that the shape is also an indicator of ingredients. Butter croissants traditionally are straight, while the crescent shaped croissants are generally made from margarine. 

Meeting the French still run a boulangerie tour at another bakery, and a range of great other tours. Perhaps we'll do another tour this trip? I hope so. It was a fascinating insight into French culture and food. 

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Pearlie in Paris

I'll read pretty much anything set in or about Paris. I do particularly like kids books set in Paris though. I've read a few now. Mr Chicken Goes to Paris. Oops. I get a thrill seeing Paris even in picture book format, and get that familiar buzz, of "ooh, I've been there." So, Pearlie in Paris leapt into my hands recently. 

Wendy Harmer, started off as a journalist, to become one of Australia's most popular comedians back in the late 80s. She then had a career in radio. After her children were born she turned her very clever mind to writing. She has written for adults, young adults and children. The popular Pearlie series of books kicked off with Pearlie in the Park.  I read Pearlie in the Park a few years ago to quell my curiosity. There are now quite a few titles, all very pink and sparkly and designed to appeal to young girls. Pearlie in Paris doesn't disappoint.

Pearlie travels to Paris in spring to visit her friend Fifi, the most famous fairy in Paris, who lives in the Jardin du Palais Royal.

Fifi has been hard at work on her Spring Collection for Fairy Fashion Week. But sequin eating snails cause havoc. Pearlie comes to the rescue with some particularly Aussie solutions. 

Colonnes de Buren

Everyone loves them

Any kids book that uses Zut Alors and Hurly-Burly must get a thumbs up from me. 

The Magic Pudding

It's always tough approaching a classic. You've heard of it, know things of it, but don't know it yet. I feel keen to read it- finally. Will I like it? I always feel somewhat pressured to like it. What does it say about me if I don't? I felt all these conflicting emotions approaching The Magic Pudding. Voted last year as number 7 of the 10 Aussie Books to Read Before You Die. Oh right. No pressure then. 

Happily, I really enjoyed The Magic Pudding. Norman Lindsay's classic tale depicts the adventures of Bunyip Bluegum an affable young koala who lives with his whiskery, curmudgeonly old Uncle Wattleberry. Bunyip Bluegum has to eat his meals outside their small tree house to avoid whisker soup, but Uncle Wattleberry refuses to have his whiskers trimmed. So Bunyip sets off to see the world, in quite a dapper fashion, taking his Uncle's walking-stick, and "assuming an air of pleasure" starts off on his journey. 

He found a great many things to see, such as dandelions, and ants, and traction engines, and bolting horses, and furniture being removed, besides being kept busy raising his hat, and passing the time of day with people on the road, for he was a very well-bred young fellow, polite in his manners, graceful in his attitudes, and able to converse on a great variety of subjects, having read all the best Australian poets.

Bunyip Bluegum soon meets up with Bill Barnacle, the sailor, and his friend, Sam Sawnoff, the penguin bold. They are "in the very act of having lunch", which of course consists of the rare talking cut-an'-come-again pudding Albert. Of course Magic Puddings are highly desirable objects and professional pudding thieves abound. A simple tale, very well told in four slices with many verse inclusions, The Magic Pudding is well deserving of it's classic status. 

On my recent visit to the 
Norman Lindsay Gallery at Faulconbridge 
I also saw lots of Magic Puddings.
There was one outside the main house..

Initially I had to get over my surprise that the Magic Pudding was a steak and kidney pudding and not a Christmas pudding, which I'd always assumed it was. I guess steak and kidney puddings were more desirable in 1918 than they are now. Norman Lindsay famously set about writing The Magic Pudding as a bet. He had a debate with Bertram Stevens, the editor of Art and Australia who believed that children ultimately preferred stories about fairies. Lindsay disagreed and thought that "food was far more interesting for children."

There is a Magic Pudding display the etching studio

My 90th anniversary edition has wonderful bonus material at the back. Fascinating reviews of the first edition which often focused on the price, a guinea, "a stiff price for a desirable book primarily intended for youngsters". A biography by Helen Glad, Norman Lindsay's granddaughter. One section is rightly titled A Creative Life. Norman Lindsay certainly did have a creative life- author- his fiction work included "thirteen light-hearted novels about the absurdity of the human race, as well as numerous other titles", artist, sculptor, illustrator, model ship maker. Norman Lindsay had so many creative pursuits that he was to never own a television or even a radio in his lifetime. There are even a few recipes at the very end of the book- steak and kidney pudding of course, apple dumplings and the enchantingly named plum duff. 

Featuring props of stage productions

Letters included in the back of my copy show that Norman Lindsay wasn't always proud of his achievement. In a 1918 letter Lindsay writes

Your request re the lady who wants to recite the Pudding embarrasses me. That sort of thing is the last sort of notoriety I care for. I wouldn't mind if the damned stuff was worth reciting but of course, if it was worth reciting, no one would want to recite it. The truth is, I'm not at all proud of having produced this little bundle of piffle, and regret very much that I did so. However, it's done now and can't be helped. I wouldn't have minded if it had come out as a kids' book, to be sold at a price that would allow the kid to tear it with a clear conscience, but to have it produced at a quid, while my serious work is produced at 12 bob seems to upset any serious effort to put a proper value on anything. 

Norman Lindsay used a wonderful vocabulary not often found in more modern children's books- firmament, unmitigated ruffian, malefactors and  verisimilitude. He has a rather liberal use of neologisms as well, words such as bungfoodlin' that made me think of Roald Dahl's delicious use of wordy fun. 

Winter

Today is the first day of winter in the Southern Hemisphere. And it's certainly a cold, windy, rainy miserable day to kick it off.

So after my morning workout and Zumba I headed to the fabulous Dotted Eight for a Chai Latte. I'm not much of a hot drink drinker. I can't abide coffee, don't like tea really, although am quite fond of a Chrysanthemum tea at yum cha, and the occasional green tea at a Japanese restaurant. 

I'm becoming rather fond of this Chai Latte now.
I've had three in the past month!

And it is such a cold miserable day that is was time for the first Curried Chicken Pie of the season.

Aussies love our pies
I usually pick a curried chicken

Which is all very nice on a cold day, but in a mere few weeks I'll be heading to the European Summer. YAY. 

Saturday Snapshot is a wonderful weekly meme now hosted by Melinda at West Metro Mommy