Fête nationale

As you probably know, July 14 is basically the French Independence Day. They call it Bastille Day because it was the day the Bastille prison was stormed in 1789. To celebrate, we all went to a party that was held at the home of one of Jonathan's good friends. There was lots of fun people, good food and wine and plum moonshine, a pool, and fresh raspberries off the vine and plums off the tree.

Bastille Day party

This is Claudine. She is my favorite person at these parties. I'm so sad this picture is blurry (Impressionistic, shall we say?), but she's too lively to sit still. She speaks (at least) French, English, Spanish, and Italian, and she's always dancing to the music.

We caught the end of the sunset over the Loire while waiting for the fireworks in Saumur.

Still waiting. From left to right: Pascal, Brian, Kyle, Juan, and me. (I know it's a weird picture, but Pascal and Brian were being insistently un-photogenic.)

!!

(I was experimenting with a really long exposure here)

Finale!

Despite the beautiful fireworks show, I didn't get the feeling that there was a sense of unity or national pride. Perhaps, though, that is because I'm not French.

After the fireworks, we went to a bar/pool hall, where I surprised everyone with my pool skills (thank you Jesse!). Then the boys wanted to go to a discotheque...it was still early for the French (12:30), so we got in free. They played a lot of Latin music, so I got to do some [free style] salsa dancing with Juan and Pascal. It was such a great night!