Welcome to Basse-Normandie: the land of D-Day, Mont-Saint-Michel, and Desperados. To be fair though, I think everywhere is the land of Desperados.
Yesterday morning, we all left for our weekend-long group trip, and made our first stop along the way: Honfleur. There, it was raining (of course), but we saw the coolest museum of all time: Les Maisons Satie. It was basically a multimedia representation of the composer, Erik Satie's, life and work, and took place in different amazing rooms of the museum. It was definitely the coolest educational place I've been to in a LONG time.
After the museum, we walked around for a while, got some coffee, got back in the bus, went to another town, got lunch, walked around, got attacked by rain, got more coffee. Honestly, I don't remember the sequence of events because everything is so similar, yet so wonderfully different here. I don't know how to describe it. It's like I get lost in time and space in each new town I visit. This country can be so magical. This world can be so magical.
So anyway, we left from there and went to Bayeux, where we saw the famous (and ancient) Bayeux tapestry, depicting the Battle of Hastings. Actually, very cool. Also very cool: the pictures that Maddie, Allie, Ante, and I took outside of the museum on the bench. I love us.
That night, we ended up at a hotel in Bayeux, where I ate dinner, didn't shower (and instead styled my hair a la Steph Milton), went to a single hotel room with everyone, and slept on a bathroom floor. Overall, a great success (minus the multiple noise complaints that were made on the room). Needless to say, this morning was painful, and it took me a little while to come to terms with the fact that it was actually 7am when the alarm went off. Two hours of sleep will do that to the brain.
So, three croissants and a yogurt later, I was on my way to les plages du débarquement. I don't have words for Omaha Beach. I visited there four years ago with the Severn French exchange program, but this time around, I was completely struck by the enormity and power of the cemetery, containing over 9,000 fallen soldiers (less than 30 percent of those who died during the American attacks on the French beaches). What was particularly amazing about my experience at Omaha Beach this time was that we got there right before the raising of the American flag at 10am. The man in charge let us raise both flags in the cemetery, and then gave us a guided tour of the beach. He told us about the history of what happened there during WWII, statistics of the people who are buried there, stories about movies filmed about D-Day, the Roosevelts' connection with Omaha Beach, and the most amazing (true) love story I have ever heard.
I will update this more later - I'm just really struggling to get through this post tonight. I guess that's what happens when I leave more than one day to write about at a time. Especially days so full of activities and excursions. I just want to say that I love my friends here, and they are making this trip wonderful for me. I am so grateful to them for being who they are.
Also, I can't wait to update this more to tell you about my swim in the Atlantic Ocean. In October. Awesome.
Love, Josie
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