I am back for the third time in La Reunion, I know I am quite the lucky guy and as always I plan to make the most of my stay here.
I used the short break between my stays here to go spend 4 days in Los Angeles to attend the Rock The Bells festival with a friend, there I got to listen live to one of my favourite hip-hop group: A tribe Called Quest. They haven’t released anything since they split in 1998 and it was great to see them for the first time on stage. They even played in its entirety one of their best album if not the best: Midnight Marauders. I can’t even describe how I felt when they first appeared on the stage, I can now remove them from my list of artists I want to see live.
This week-end was the first edition of "Les Guinguettes De Saint Gilles", there were things going on in the streets as well as concerts and theme parties. Unlike "Le Grand Boucan", this event was sponsored by the city of Saint Paul from which Saint Gilles is a part. If it wasn’t for the hitchhiker that my wife took we would probably have spent the whole week-end on the beach not knowing that something was happening in the city. There was almost no poster in the city to promote the event and there was even less outside of the city. I don’t know about you but when I spend a lot of money to setup an event I will make damn sure that as many people as possible come. Only at my scuba diver club did I find a huge pile of leaflets detailing the week-end activities: that is a little weird. It seemed like the city hall didn’t want any population outside of the people living in Saint Gilles to be in the know. On Sunday the main street was closed to the cars which is a good thing for pedestrians but the restricted area was so huge that it was easier to see that there were not that many people in the streets of the city centre. The organizers blocked some streets which could have been used as parking space or a concert area. The event gave this vibe of being a good idea but being setup at the last minute.
There were a lot of nice activities. A fest-noz was organized on Saturday evening near the beach, we had the opportunity to listen to traditional music from Brittany; I discovered that there was an association that promoted the songs and dances from Brittany because there is a lot of Breton on the island. I have to be honest I really can’t stand traditional Breton music but I love watching people dance, the type of dance would be announced before each song to tell the audience what step to follow on the dance floor. My ears really hurt but it was nice to watch people have fun. There was a salsa party on Sunday evening also near the beach that was very popular but for aesthetes the tango party was the place to be on the marketplace. My dear wife would love it if we could take tango lessons together one day but one can’t do everything so in the meantime we watched the people beautifully dancing to the rhythm. The advantage is that tango doesn’t hurt my ears.
There were a lot of other things to see but the best was undeniably the fashion show. 6 shops selling clothing for women in Saint Gilles gave some clothes from their latest collection for the show, that was very nice. Those shops found a good way to increase their revenue with some extra publicity, sadly they didn’t think of having the shops opened to welcome the customers interested in buying something after the show. In any case the women were beautiful and you can see my pictures of the show here.
For those who are wondering where the link is between my title and what is in this post, there is none. I discovered this morning that when you put sweet food in a bowl you will not find it later full of ants. I thought it made for a good title.
La suite!
