Woke much too early but had to get to Gare de Lyon train station in Paris for the TGV (France's express train) to Cannes. It was raining and luckily we left early as the police were about to close the Champs Elysées for the French Armistice Parade (end of the war). I am now heading backwards to Cannes! A lovely train ride down, about 5½ hours, and we (me and the train) made our way south, cutting through the country side passing farm after farm after farm, whizzing by quaint little villages delivering their morning wake up call. I can't tell what they are growing and I don't know how to ask that in French but there are acres and acres of vibrant green occasionally offset by a patch or strip of vibrant yellow. Mustard perhaps as it reminds me of the Napa Valley. Maybe we are near Dijon? It is a rainy, gloomy, gray day but the prospect of sun in the south of France keeps my spirits high. The conductor came by collecting tickets and he smelled to high heaven. Between that and riding backwards, I am getting a bit nauseous...
I arrived in Cannes with breakfast intact and checked in to our hotel, the Pierre et Vacances, in Cannes La Bocca (3 miles down the beach from Cannes proper). The only good thing about it is the view of the Mediterranean. This view (picture above) kept me sane. If you look very closely at the picture you will see a blue pool slide on the bottom right that runs directly into...the wall of the Jacuzzi! Many times we saw hotel maintenance standing over it looking very confused. This is a frequent occurance in France. C'est la vie...
The hotel is cold, damp, musty, and cramped! We have an apartment set up that sleeps 5 people with 1 bathroom. Let me rephrase that... 5 women, 1 bathroom! 4 young film students still in college and me. I am officially in hell. I have my own room, thank goodness, but it too is cold and damp and musty and so small that I had to put my suitcase on my bed as there was no room on the floor! Another student from my cooking school is also on the trip and we walked 3 miles up the beach to Cannes. We ate lunch at a restaurant right on the beach, Riviera Beach Restaurant (Blvd du Midi, Cannes). The beach was covered with swarms of topless Magdas (Cameron Diaz's neighbor that smoked and tanned in the movie "Something About Mary")! We just cracked up. The waiter was a bronzed, toned French man wearing shorts, a tank top and sporting a pony tail and who was just digging life. We then walked to the Palais de Congress about a half mile up the road just past the old port starting to fill up with yachts of all shapes and sizes. Well the size range was actually from large to larger. The Palais de Congress is the main building or convention center where the Red Carpet is and where the premiere screenings are held. It is conveniently next to our tent, the American Pavilion as it is called. This picture is last year's [2003] opening night premiere. Photo by Larry Laszlo/CoMedia. The red arrow points to our tent. Pas mal ;-)
We walked back to the hotel for our meeting with the culinary team of about 20 cooks consisting of lots of young people in their early to mid 20s, and about 6 or 7 from the same cooking school in Arizona, the Scottsdale Culinary Institute. Once again I feel like the oldest, like I don't fit in at all… We had our meeting and I must admit, I was scared to death. Those doubts of "What was I thinking?!" and "What if I can't do this??" were swirling around in my head (completely unfounded as I soon discovered!). After the meeting, I went in search of an internet café. I stopped at one restaurant/cafe and of course there was no internet connection that night for some reason that they were unable or unwilling to explain to me. I saw a large table of cooks from my group there having dinner. I walked by the table to say hi and not one person asked me to join them. I felt awful, left out, high school all over again :-( I guess I could have asked if I could join them but at that point I just wasn't up for it.
The weather is freezing! It is overcast and cold and windy and I have no warm clothes! All the clothes that I pulled out of my suitcase at the very last minute to make the airline weight limit are exactly what I need right now. There is a woman from San Francisco State, Yael (pronounced ya-el) Braha, on the Kodak film student program as well (more on that later) with a movie here who I would like to meet. There was a snipet on her on NPR before I left. I am also anxious to see Michael Moore's movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, which Disney won't distribute. It must be a doosie! The next 3 days we, the culinary team, are visiting local wineries and markets and restaurants and then it's work! Tomorrow is a visit to the open air farmers market in Nice! Ooh la la!
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