Gossip Guy a.k.a. Why do I listen to these people?

Spotted: The Sun. More than 8 days in a row now. I'm hoping it will stay as long as it did the first 3 weeks I was here.

These last two weeks have been uneventful at best, what with having 2 straight weeks of class (albeit an interesting one) and this new illness I've acquired (either from drinking too much or not drinking enough, it's hard to tell).

Wine Marketing came to a close yesterday with what may have been my favourite exam since starting university. Not too easy, not too hard or obscure, with lots of room for bullshit, but also room to use what we actually learned and to even learn more. Well done, Mr. Charters!

Luckily, I get to join him again for the next 3 weeks in Wine Management. It's not quite the same thing, except that my classmates will mostly be the same (save Marco and Freya, who will be replacing Benedicte, Sandro and Julius).

The main thing I will share with you today is that Bluesfest has an incredible lineup this year!
For Dad, The Musical Box. For Mom, Santana. For Frankie, Dream Theater / Iron Maiden on opening night. For Anastassia, the Gipsy Kings. For Robert, Great Big Sea (oh, wait...) For Nada, Matthew Good. For me, 7 concerts confirmed and some I haven't been able to choose between yet (the 7 include all of the above, minus Matthew Good but with Rush added in!). And yes, I got my full festival pass. Awesome!

I am now going to go to the park to enjoy the weather with my friends.

But who am I? That's one secret I'll never tell.

You know you love me.

XOXO!

(God I hate it when I listen to Laura and Freya...)

The Last of the Vacations

Good Afternoon,

I have come back from what will be my last week-long vacation until June. Though I greatly enjoyed my 10 days in the South and West of France, it's nice to come back to a routine.

A quick recap: March saw me travelling to Prague and Turkey, with a break in between to write an exam on Mergers and Acquisitions. Turkey was fantastic, and upon my return, I started Wine Marketing, the best class of the year. Including the Easter vacation, I've had 31 days of vacation over my last 42 days. Let's see you do that. :P

After 3 days of Wine Marketing, I packed my bags for my Easter trip to the South of France. I went to visit some friends I had not seen in 10 years. They have a beautiful home in Avignon, a gorgeous town between Lyon and Marseille. I spent 2 days there, hanging out with friends Christophe and Solenne, while I was reminded 3 times a day by their mother Lise of how great it was that I came to visit. Agreed :)

On the Sunday, 'Tophe, Lise and I left to go visit brother Yohann in St-Nazaire, near Nantes. What I did not know is that he has a seaside apartment, less than 10 metres from the beaches of La Baule. Are you kidding me?

First however, was the 9-hour drive. We took a scenic route through the region of Bordeaux, stopping at the fortified city of Carcassonne for coffee along the way. For those of you who will understand this, Carcassonne is like the Southern France version of Mont St-Michel. We arrived in St-Nazaire that night and ate dinner.

The weather for the 6 days that followed was nothing short of spectacular. Though the water wasn't warm enough for swimming, and the wind not strong enough for surfing, there was plenty of opportunity for long walks on the beach, sipping Pastis, cidre, champagne, or whatever else we had, and just relaxing. For this reason, I don't have a whole lot to say about the trip. I just relaxed.

And it was nice.

Now, I have 2 full weeks of class, followed by 3 more weeks of class, then off to London for 4 days with Dad!!! I probably won't have much to blog about, so I suggest you read about Freya's trip to Morocco.

Hope you all had a Happy Easter! Enjoy April showers, if you get them. If not, enjoy the good weather!

A toute!

Troy & the Trojans (the people, not the condoms) - Turkiye Days 5 & 6

After a night in the ghetto, I got up early to go on a tour of Canakkale and Troy.

We drove to a rural area outside of Eceabat to take a ferry and the more narrow part of the inlet (this inlet is better known as the Dardanelles). We crossed to the other side, arriving in the town of Canakkale, which is bigger and more touristy than Eceabat, but very nice nonetheless. We picked up some others for the tour and drove the 30-some kilometres to the Great Walled City of Bak*...er, Troy (I'll explain this at the end).

Upon arrival, we got out of the bus and went into a small pavilion which conveniently detailed the history of Troy, thus rendering our tour guide obsolete. Still though, Hassan (that's his real name) insisted that we follow him around the city.

While time has greatly worn down the walls and structures, as one might expect, it was still surprising to see the extent to which most of the city has completely vanished. The once Great Gate of Kie*...er, Troy is now no more impressive than any other stone archway. The various ruins lying around look like they were recently scattered there by the wind, with no explanation of where they actually came from.

When all was said and done, though, I still felt that I had just walked through one of history's most amazing sites. Knowing Alexander the Great, Achilles and Hector had once been there, among other important people (most notably Brad Pitt), made it all worth it.

After Troy, we drove back to Canakkale, where the tour guide told me I had 3 hours to kill before checkout time and the bus home. Fine. So I walked through the same neighbourhood by the waterfront about 5 times. On the 4th time, I saw a barber. I real barber. One that would give me a much-needed haircut and a shave. I went in.

Barbers in Turkey don't speak English, but that's ok. Much like Freya explained in her post on her trip to Poland, hand gestures, speaking more loudly and slowly, and just letting the guy do whatever he wants are effective ways of getting one's hair cut.

My now-favourite still-living Turk proceeded to cut some length of the back, while leaving my bangs intact. He then asked me to put my head in this little sink in front of me. I obliged. What followed was an interesting but amazing experience. For you see, rather than wash my hair before the cut, cutting away, then letting me leave, only to have hair fall all over the place, this guy washed my hair twice, ensuring no excessive shedding in the hours following my trip to the barber. He also, for some reason, washed my face, neck and ears, wrapped my whole head (face included) tightly in a towel (which leads me to wonder why any religion would have their men/women do this every day).

After the most vigourous drying ever, the guy got out his razor. Then he made this homemade shaving cream and painted my face with it for about 5 straight minutes. *slice* *slice* *slice* and my beard was gone. No ears, though, so I was happy. I looked in the mirror and realized that was the closest shave I'd ever gotten. Unimpressed with his work, the barber did it again. He then put a bomb...er, balm on my face, and told me he was finished. Quite pleased with the result, I went to pay. Not speaking English is difficult whn asking for money, and I was afraid that after the incredible job he'd done, I'd have to pay 20 or more Euros. So the guy figures out the total and says "thirteen". 13 Euros is quite good for this, so I take out the money and pay.

The guy says "no, 13 Lira". After insisting that he must be mistaken, and being reassured by all the other guys there that it was in fact 13 Lira, I took back 3 of the Euros. Effectively, the guy got a 7-lira tip, but I just got a 10-Euro haircut and shave. To put this into perspective, in Canada, with tip, I pay $18 for this (about 24 Lira or 12 Euros). In Reims, a haircut without a shave is 15 Euros. This reminds why I think France is a third-world country. Great service will make people want to pay more, so forget how much it inconveniences you, Pierre. Dumbass.

Anyway, after my trip to the barber, I took the ferry back to my hotel in Eceabat, checked out, watched some more Turkish TV, then bussed back to Istanbul, where I had to check in to a different hotel than originally planned, but nonetheless a very nice one.

The next morning I woke up, had breakfast, and drove 15 minutes (averaging about 120 kph with that same driver as when I arrived) to the airport. I went through security check #1, checked in for my flight, went through security again, got the my gate, and got on the plane. The flight was long and boring, and on arrival, I had to go through security again, seeing as I might have sneaked some plastic utensils into my bag from the flight. At Charles de Gaulle this last security check is easily handled, though, as I just flashed my "carte de séjour" and instead of an inquisition, I was greeted with "Bienvenue, Monsieur Martin". Merci, Pierre. (note: all barbers and security guards in France are named Pierre).

Thus concludes my entries on my trip to Turkey. All photos are up on Facebook, and I might even put some up here today or tomorrow. As promised, here is the explanation for my "Great [noun] of [place]*": Troy was among the original places to give itself "Great" status, after the Pyramids, of course. The Great Walled City of Baku, Azerbaijan, stole the "walled city" name, while The Great Gate of Kiev, Ukraine, took the "gate". Sarah Jessica Parker also stole one of Troy's trademarks, I'll let you figure out what that is. I'm sure there are many other examples, but I'm tired, and thus can't remember as much history/geography as I'd like.

Hope you enjoyed my story, and I hope you all one day get to see Turkey for yourselves.
Buona Pasqua to everyone! Have a pleasant long weekend!