Soissons, France, August 2003
Yves and I were invited to attend his cousin Hélène's wedding in August 2003. Not needing further encouragement to book a holiday, we also arranged to spend a week visiting Toulouse and Narbonne after the wedding.
The wedding took place in Soissons, about 50km out of Paris. Like all marriages in France, Hélène and Stanis first tied the knot officially at the mayor's office in front of family and friends and then held the Wine of Honour to celebrate their union.
The Wine of Honour was held on the lawn of a picturesque ruined castle. We drank champagne in the sunset and a few of us explored the castle while the wedding pictures were being taken. The castle was really something! Inside is a tower of uneven stairs winding around and up 2 storeys until you reach an opening which looks like it used to be a room, but now looks like a balcony. From up here you can get a good look at the area surrounding the castle and, as we discovered, it provides a good vantage point for spying on the people drinking wine down below. Coming back down in my best gear and new high heels was a bit embarrassing... I lost my footing on one very uneven step and twisted my ankle! There's no handrail and no break in the stairs for the entire passage so I came down quite quickly and painfully. I'm not sure which was more injured though -- my pride or my ankle. My dark purple outfit was covered in white dust. Ouch...
A few hours later we all drove to the reception at a function centre. We dined on a delicious six course meal with practically a different type of wine for every course. During dinner we were entertained by Polish dancers from Stanis' (the groom) side of the family. The dancing closely resembled Russian Kosak dancing and we were all in fits of laughter at the sight of these grown men trying to kick their legs out from under their bum after a few drinks. After the meal we all danced the night away to a crazy mix of mp3s ranging from traditional French café music to the theme from Grease. We gave up at around 2am and headed for our hotel to get some sleep.
The next day we did a bit of sight-seeing at a ruined abbey, which was bombed in World War II, before meeting up with some of Yves' extended family for breakfast at a café. We had the traditional French breakfast of croissants and a short black and sat around for a while enjoying the morning sunshine. After breakfast we explored an historic cathedral and then had a leisurely drive back to the function centre for the second half of the wedding.
This second day is much more informal and is where you go back for lunch with the newlyweds to finish the leftovers of the night before plus some fresh salads and cold cut meats. It was a much smaller group who attended this event but enjoyable nonetheless.
We got a lift back to Paris later that afternoon with a cousin of Yves'. While driving along, the guy said Yves' French was very good for a Scotsman...!! The two cousins had never met each other until that day and knew nothing of the other except from snippets of information passed on by relatives. Somehow the stories had been crossed however, and this guy had thought that Yves and I were Scottish. The misunderstanding was hilarious!
Back in Paris Yves and I sipped beer and watched the world pass by in the warm summery afternoon before heading off on the train to Toulouse (6 hours... ick!). We stayed there for a week to visit Yves' mum and brothers and also spent a few days in Narbonne during this time. Photos for that part of the trip are coming soon.
