N'importe Quoi: December 2010

Here's a very late update from September...

So Friday the 24th of September I was told by Dominique that we(family and a few friends)would be doing the Vendange(grape harvesting at the family's vineyard, what I had done last weekend on Sunday with Rotary)... Perfect way to spend a Saturday huh? I wasn't exactly thrilled about it, but I thought I would rather do that than stay home and do nothing... The nice thing about it was Dominique had told me I would not have to wake up at 6:00am(like the rest of them) to start and she said I could sleep in tomorrow. I was really thankful of course. I woke up on Saturday the 25th of September at about 10:00am to an empty house. I walked into the kitchen and found a note from Aurelie, Dominique and Maurice saying they were at the Vineyard getting it started and while I was home alone I could watch TV or use my computer and that's what I did. A couple hours pass and they arrive home. They arrived with the other people who helped out with doing the Vendange. George and "Fafie" Dominique's brother and sister plus Fafie's dog Shapii. Isabelle and Thibaut relatives of the Fornas Family. Florian a good friend of Damien in Alaska and another guy who is a neighbor(I forgot his name)(meeting so many people here name's are hard to remember). There was also Grandma Nanette(Mother or Maurice and Damien and Aurelie's Grandma.) We had a late lunch at the house consisting of a fresh garden salad with Lyonnaise dressing(spicy mustard and olive oil), boiled potatoes and sausage and fruit salad. I felt spoiled because I got to sleep in, wake up late and eat lunch right away zhile they had been working since 6am cutting grapes... After we were done eating lunch I immediately got dressed into clothes I didn't mind getting dirty in(like last weekend) and dressed with layers because it was actually a little chilly that day. We all headed out to the Vineyard at about 1:30(except for Grandma Nanette of course). And everything needed was already there such as buckets, grape cutters, wheel barrows, big bins, etc because they had already started everything in the morning. We were going at it pretty fast and I'm at least glad I had experience from last weekend so I was working as efficiently as everyone else. However after about 30 minutes I wanted to stop because my back hurt, but of course I didn't. As if things couldn't have gotten worse...they did. It started raining like I have never seen before... It was raining so hard almost as hard as a typical day in Juneau, Alaska... Grrrreat. So as soon as the rain hit we ran for cover under the cars and put on some badass looking green Rain suits. As soon as we suited up we took a short break and went straight back to working. It was muddy and rainy hahah, but in a way kind of fun. Time went faster and we got done quick. But it wasn't over... We then had to load the giant bins of grapes into the truck(it didn't take long, but there was a lot of them). After that when I thought we were done we had one more vineyard to harvest from. But it went really fast and at that point I just wanted to be done with Vendanging... In about 4 hours we were completely done with the harvesting. AWESOME feeling. Though we were done Dominique had asked me if I wanted to see where the grapes we picked would go and I said yes so while everyone else went home I stayed and rode the truck along with George and Florian to the wine factory to take the grapes to. We drove to the Wine Factory only to realize we would have to wait about an hour because so many people were turning in their harvests. Then it was our turn. We drove up to this lady and there was this HUGE bucket thing and we were supposed to dump all of our bins of grapes into them and that would calculate the money we earned. George and Florian did that while I collected the bins and stacked them hahaha. Then for a brief second I got to see all the grapes we had collected go under this giant press that smashed them into grape juice mash stuff. At the grape factory there were a lot of empty wine bottles for the wine to be put in. We then went to this ticket lady at the front who gave us a paper telling us the stats of our grape harvest. Florian said we did a good job. George drove us back to home and we just had leftovers from the lunch we had that day. I was tired... really long day... Before I was about to go upstairs to take a shower Dominique had told me this was the last harvest for the year. It's cool I got to be a part of it, but I am so glad it is over with. So much work goes into the making wine it's no wonder so many people appreciate it so much. But there is no way in hell I would do that again hahah(well maybe just to remind myself of France in the future). But two times is enough for me...

I don't know if you can tell, but it was raining

The Team: Me, Maurice, Isabelle, Fafie, Aurelie, Thibaut, Neighbor who's name I forgot...

Backdrop from the Vineyard

Grapes ready to be made into wine

Beautiful Grapes

Loading the Grape Bins

Hahah there's a hole in my rain pants...sexy green rain suit though huh?

The whole team minus Dominique taking the picture

I'm so sick of grapes...

Fafie's dog who kept us company at the Vineyards: Shapii

Grape Crushin' Machinery

Wine factory

The wine factory interesting to see the process...

It's sad because I had to wake up early on Sunday the 26th of September because I had my first "official" soccer match:( I woke up at about 7am because my game was at 9. I didn't feel like playing too much. This would be the first official match I would participate in and I was nervous. Maurice dropped me off at the field and had said they would come back to watch in a few minutes. I arrived and greeted my teammates. It was actually kind of cold that day and my coach kept on saying I'm probably warm because I'm from Alaska hahah. The opponents looked the same size as us so it wasn't intimidating, but I was especially nervous because this was my first official match here in France. I didn't get to play until halftime and when I did it took a while for me to start getting warmed up, but I was proud with how I played that day. I connected some good passes and had some good opportunities to score(but didn't...) I saw Dominique, Maurice and Aurelie on the sidelines with Carlos from Brazil(Maurice picked him up) But I played the majority of the second half and bench warmed the first. We scored several goals in the game and won. Exciting huh? After we hung out at the field for a little and after every sports match here the French always provide drinks and a snack hahah. We left and took Carlos with us home and we had lunch at the house. We had Garden Salad, this vegetable with chopped bacon and a beef filet thing. After they had told me to change because we would be going to see "Cars go boom"... well that's how they described it hahah. It was kind of demolition derby meets amateur Nascar racing. And it was pretty awesome actually. Dominique gave me and Carlos winter coats because it was actually kind of cold that day...(It's funny how I assumed France would be so much hotter than Alaska when it turns out it still gets cold here...I'm so smart...) We drove to the town where the car festival event thing was hosted and payed our tickets through a little booth before going in. As we walked in a bunch of cars were painted in random colors with numbers on them and there was a giant tent selling concessions with tons of people eating, socializing, etc. We took a seat on the hill side with a good view of the figure eight dirt track. The race when on for about 3 hours and there was nothing, but Crowds of people surrounded the track waiting eagerly for it to start and really short amount of time it did. First all the drivers presented their cars and themselves and took a few free laps and then it began. For about 2 hours races with 10-15 cars raced and it was EPIC. There was crashing, smashing, cars that flipped completely the other way and smoke(all the things an action movie junkie would love). They started with just a circle track and then later on in the day opened up the rest of the track and did the figure eight. I was very entertained that day and again tired as usual hahah(I'm always tired here). After it was over we drove back home and dropped Carlos off at his house... I was dreading school the next day because the weekend ended on such a good note. But all good things must come to an end right?