Thursday, May
28
 After
the usual morning classes, we broke for lunch and met again at
2pm for a short bus ride to the castle that overlooks the nearby
town of Menthon-Saint Bernard. We walked the last few hundred
yards up the access road and saw the castle loom larger as we
approached. As its name suggests,
the castle is tied to the legend of Saint Bernard, who was born
in the castle in the 11th Century. While hagiography claims that
the future saint was carried down by angels from the tall castle
keep to begin his life of devotion, local legend reports that
the young man, destined to be married, fled the castle down a
rope made of bedlinens in order to avoid impending matrimony.
The family line was saved when a brother stepped in and took
over the role of groom.
  
As Christina, Christie and Christine
waited patiently for the castle tour to begin, some students
climbed a tower overlooking the entrance, while Angie, Kiki and
Lisa assumed a pose "like French people." (We've been
studying French body language).
The oldest surviving part of the
structure, the XIIIth century "donjon"
or castle keep, now houses an awe-inspiring library which includes
priceless illuminated manuscripts. While picture-taking is forbidden
in the castle, the current Comte de Menthon (Earl of Menthon)
allowed us to take some digital pictures
so that we might update the castle page on the Serveur
Savoie.
  
The photo at left shows a Book
of Hours (prayer book) hand written and illuminated around 1415.
The current earl, seen gazing at his library in the photo at
right, is the guardian of a castle that has been in his family
for some forty generations, and whose upkeep has become his life's
calling.
 In the
Great Hall, the students saw an impressive array of paintings
representing many generations of the Menthon family, and a Gobelins
tapestry given to the Menthons by King Louis XV; they learned
about the earl's father, a jurist who was the French judge at
Nuremberg, and who later was the first president of the European
Commission. Notable also in the visit was a bedroom decorated
entirely in verdure tapestries dating back to the Renaissance.
At the end of the tour, many of the students bought books, post
cards and various souvenirs from the earl who gives all profits
from the shop to the Abbey of Saint Bernard, which is located
high in the Alps, between Switzerland and Italy, at an altitude
of 2500 meters. Even with modern road-clearing equipment, the
abbey remains snowbound ten months of the year.
Friday, May 29
The second of our day trips began
early as we left Faverges under a threatening sky. We headed
for the town of Reignier, outside of which we found the age-old
dolmen (stone table, or quoit) that is the best
surviving example of such a structure in Savoie. It is now believed
that this was a burial chamber, and was originally covered with
earth. Such a burial mound is commonly called a tumulus. Looted for gold and treasure probably
as early as Roman times, if not earlier, the stones of the dolmen,
too heavy to be  moved,
were left in place. Archeologists date this particular example
to some 2800 BC, earlier than the famed Stonehenge of England,
though it quite likely was made by a similar or related culture.
France has thousands of these monuments, though few are in such
good repair, many having been damaged during the Counter-Reformation
by zealous congregations eager to destroy the "fairy-stones"
that were quite inaccurately connected to devil worship.
After our stop at the dolmen, we
headed into Switzerland and the city of Geneva. After our bus
had parked on the lake shore at the center of the city, we hiked
up into the old city to see the cathedral. While the weather
was cloudy and rather cool, we enjoyed the picturesque old streets
and learned of the history of the Protestant Reformation which,
in 1536 in Geneva, enacted the very first law requiring the schooling
of children. From this XVIth century event was born public education,
of which The University of Akron was a natural consequence.
   |
|
Julianna
and Christie in the Grand-Rue; Cathédrale St Pierre; Julianna
points to John Calvin's chair |
After listening to the noon bells
of the cathedral, we went back down into the center of the city,
observing the quaint street names, numerous stores, banks and
fast-food restaurants
  
From the cathedral square we
passed uniquely Genevan street names and shops; we went from
Rue d'enfer (Hell Street) to Rue de Purgatoire. which seemed
like something of an improvement, and then reached the main commercial
street, the Rue du Rhône, where students went shopping
for chocolate and other Swiss products.
.   he
After lunch, the weather had cleared
nicely, and we had a splendid view of the lakefront with the
famed Jet
d'Eau de Genève
(600-foot fountain), the only world landmark that is turned off
during rainstorms and at night, when the Swiss feel nobody would
be looking at it anyway...
We then returned to our bus for
the short ride to the League of Nations compound, where we were
given an extensive tour and a very clear explanation of the history
and role of the numerous United Nations organizations that are
located in Geneva. Students did not fail to see irony in the
fact that Switzerland is one of only two countries on the planet
that do not belong to the U.N. (and that the US, while the richest
nation on the globe, is one of the few that does not pay its
dues...)
From modern conference halls to
1930's League of Nations building, we saw many interesting rooms,
statues and tapestries that have been donated by members of the
U.N.
 
Most impressive was the conference
room in which numerous peace accords and treaties have been signed.
This vast hall's walls are covered by enormous allegorical paintings
by the Spanish artist José Maria Sert. The scenes represent
humanity's progress as it embraced international law, abolished
slavery and child labor, and granted basic freedoms to all people.
By this time it was getting very
hot and we were eager to get home to the cool mountains of Faverges.
On the road back , we made one last stop at the Pont Charles-Albert,
a suspension bridge that dates back to 1839. A marvel of engineering
in its day, and still quite impressive today, it spans the 600-foot-deep
Caille river gorge.
  
Even the acrophobes in the group
dominated their fears and came to the railing to look over the
side to the very distant bottom of the gorge. Their uneasiness
changed to awe as they considered the dangers of building such
a structure long before the modern technological age and computer
simulations.
We returned to Faverges shortly
after 7pm, ready for dinner with the host families.
Saturday was a day off, though
the annual AFA banquet was scheduled for Saturday evening. AFA
President Yvette Millot worked tirelessly setting up the whole
affair. About 130 people attended and got to sample Yvette's
catering.
  
The photos above show a few of
the elaborate preparations of cold cuts that began the meal.
These were followed by tartiflette, a local cheese,bacon and
potato dish, and then by salad, cheese, apple tart and coffee.
Funds raised at the dinner will be used to pay for the all-day
AFA trip to Miolans , Apremont and Pérouges that is scheduled
for June 13th.
  
Suzanne & Paula
enjoy a "Kir"; group photo (click on it) Christine,
Christie and une
amie
Live music was
provided through the whole evening and into the morning hours
by local musicians who performed many familiar hits, from the
"Macarena" to "Just a Gigolo"...
  
As students dined,
danced and celebrated the warm reception given by the people
of Faverges, Yvette toiled long hours in the kitchen to provide
warm food to the assembled masses. We should also like to acknowledge
the contributions of the Town Hall of Faverges, which lent us
the hall, the local supermarket Provencia, which graciously provided the white wine
and blackcurrant liqueur for the Kir cocktails, and the numerous
shops in Faverges that generously gave prizes for the AFA drawing.
A good time was had by all.
Though Monday is (yet another)
holiday in France, we will be having classes as usual as we work
our way through the textbook and prepare for the upcoming Paris
trip.
Next report on
Wednesday
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