45ème Fête des Jonquilles!!

(In front of my school!)

Eh, ben, voila!

The famous daffodil festival has come and gone with much excitement in between! There was certainly a lot of build up!

All the festivities started already Thursday afternoon, when the kids from my schools began the daffodil picking. Olivia and I went to the office of the Association des Fetes to pick up our passes and to prove that we live in Gerardmer, so we didn't have to pay the 12 euro entry fee. The office was above old factory buildings which were packed with floats ready to be decorated with daffodils for the Sunday parade. We walked in and everyone stared at us- there were a few awkward moments of "who are you, what are you doing here", when all of a sudden one of the men goes, "Oh! You are the Americans! Yes, come in!" And we got our passes without any problems. As we walked out they started shouting "God bless America" and "Viva America"... wow. We repaid with "God bless France"... haha

I joined one of my schools on Friday morning to see what the daffodil picking as all about. The schools do this as a fundraiser, because each bouquet they make brings back 0,25 euro. Each bouquet must have 50 daffodils: ready, set, GO! And the kids go running around the fields a few miles outside of Gerardmer picking flowers, trying to make their classes quota and receiving candy for their hard work. Child labor and easy days at its best!

(On the trek to the daffodil fields Friday morning)

(Counting the bouquets to see if we've made our quota!)

Friday evening Michelle came to visit from Nancy. It was actually her second time in Gerardmer, but her first time visiting me. :) But nothing was officially starting with the daffodils until Saturday.

(Olivia, Michelle, Thomas, Charlene, Me, Mathieu at "French brunch")

Saturday morning we had "French brunch", made by the frenchman in our group- Mathieu. So we all packed into his apartment for a late morning tasting of what the french typically eat. (Although the concept of "brunch" doesn't really exist for them) Then we set out to see the decorations of the stores and the floats getting ready. Throughout town radios were set up (like for the Fantastic Film Festival) and they kept announcing that they were missing 10,000 daffodils for the floats! Oh no! We didn't do much about it. Later in the afternoon we met up with a family that had contacted us through CouchSurfing. We sat in a restaurant and had delicious ice creams and cocktails!

(Michelle and I enjoying ice cream and cocktails)

That evening we played beer pong in the classroom next to our apartment and had dinner. We hiked down to town to see what was going on for the festival- a concert in our favorite bar, tons of people everywhere! At the very end of the night we ventured to see the floats and even put in a few daffodils (although most of the work was already finished and everyone was cleaning up!)

After getting back home Michelle and I watched the Pendulums concert via Ustream! It was great and I'm truly proud of the group's growth and development. Check out their videos here: http://www.youtube.com/user/tmk77721

The next morning it was our turn to make "American brunch"- a much bigger affair than French brunch! On the menu: hash browns, home fries, scrambled eggs, bacon, and mimosas! Oh yes! It took forever, but it was well worth it because the meal was perfect and we all got a bit homesick...

Then it was time to head downtown to take our spots for the parade. My goodness how many people! I was shocked to see that little Gerardmer could handle so many visitors. The floats were already in place and we took a tour around to take pictures. It was one of the slowest parades EVER... so we ended up walking against the movement of the parade to see everything. But the floats were amazing, intricate and beautiful. Crazy how many daffodils were needed to fill everything up!

(The daffodil princesses)

Of course, right as the parade ended Michelle needed to catch her bus to get back to Nancy... well, everyone else was leaving too... so traffic was at a halt. Unfortunately there is only one main road that goes through Gerardmer in either direction to Epinal or Alsace, so there wasn't much to be done. We waited for about two hours, then she waited longer and FINALLY got on a bus to catch the last train to Nancy. Phew!

(They brought down snow from the mountains to use it as beer foam!!!)

A great weekend- followed by the last week of classes, which are going well. I'm hesitant to make a big deal about it to my students, aka, I haven't told them that it's my last week. Thursday and Friday are going to be difficult and sad!