Funny bicycle stuff from the Internet

Recently my friend Dave sent me this link to this Kate Beaton comic which lets be honest is awesome; "see me rollin up pops you step aside". I then proceeded to spend the rest of my day looking at all her other comics, which retrospectively was a well spent afternoon.
It's really interesting to see a modern take on the history of girls on bicycles and its not the first time I've talked about this, as last June in Paris I visited the "Voyages a Velo" exhibition which chronicled (all be it not as funnily) the history of the bicycle and its influence on the development of the modern woman.

Otherwise as long as we are on the topic of funny bicycle stuff I have seen or been sent on-line, check out this gem from the great David Thorne poking fun at the cycling fanatic, again potentially another day wasted, but his stuff is laugh out loud funny.

The "craic" an Irish response to the weather

thanks to Monica for the pics

"What's the craic" is my favourite way of greeting people, but this usually recieves a few raised eyebrows from those forigners unfamiliar with the traditional Irish phrase.

After coming home to Ireland for the holidays I have come to the conclusion that the reason Irish people are all slightly insane and drink so much is because it is the only way that we can deal with the weather.

Seriously this is not the first time I have discussed the Irish weather, and a friend recently informed me about how a guide book to Ireland outlines the Irish mentality. The book describes the Irish as having 3 parts to their brain, one part deals with Logic, the second part deals with Emotion and finally the third part deals purely with this uniquely Irish element called the Craic.

Johhny forigner will often not be familiar with the craic as it is a only previlant in the Irish culture and usually reaches its climax during drinking sessions. Personal examples include "who can steal the best thing from a bar", "dancing to the river dance", "smashing glasses for no reason" and "swimming in the rain". Essentially it is doing things with no emotional or logical reason other than the result might be worth a few laughs.

Schmutzli - the Swiss Bad Santa

Every country has its traditions and rituals and one of the more quirky and oddly satisfying of the Swiss Christmas season is Schmutzli.

2 Schmutzli are seen here on either side of SamiChlaus

Just like Venom to Spiderman, Dr. Moriarty to Sherlock Holmes and Magneto to Dr. Xavier, Schmutzli is a more sinister counter point to the good that Santa represents.

The answer to how this tradition came about is once again representative of another classic battle between Christianity and paganism. Originally it was a pagan ritual called Perchten which involved good spirits driving out the bad old spirits. With Samichlaus taking the Christian "good" role Schmutzli some how managed to evolve into the dark figure.

Samichlaus is not Santa Claus however and the celebration of "St Nicolas Day"is on the 6th of December, while both Christmas and St Nicolas Day both have the same origins they take on different forms, with the latter having much more in common with its original tradition of paganism than its commercialised American brother.

What is personally appealing about this tradition is the fact that it actually give children something to fear at Christmas. No longer is the classic taunt "Santas' watching" applicable, the phrase "Schmutzli is watching" has far more fear behind it, and only rightly so, the black faced nemesis is associated with stealing children, carries a broom of sticks with which to hit misbehaving children and is even called  Père Fouettard or Father 'Whip' in the French speaking part of Switzerland.
Local teenagers have even been known to dress up as groups of Schmutzli's and go around implementing their own style of vigilante Christmas justice on younger children.

All Christmas songs now have a new tune

You better watch out
You better not cry
Better not pout
I'm telling you why
Schmutzli is coming to town

He’s got a stick, And he'll whip you twice;
It doesn't matter if you're naughty or nice
Schmutzli is coming to town

He'll steal when you’re sleeping, He'll whip you when you’re awake
He knows if you’ve been bad or good, So run for goodness sake!
O! You better watch out! You better not cry
Better not pout, I’m telling you why
Schmutzli is coming to town

Sounds like excellent incentive for good behaviour from children to me and hey its a lot less scary than the German equivalent "Krampus" who looks like the very incarnation of Satan himself.

Playing Petanque at the Bassin de la Villette

Why is it when Irish people go anywhere on holiday it rains? 

This stereotype has never been more clearly demonstrated than by my friends recent visit to Paris. one month earlier we had been basking in glorious sunshine and 30 degree heat and next thing you know Irish people arrive and we get rain, clouds and a temperature maximum of 18 degrees.

Anyway after the lamented departure of my Irish compatriots a mandatory heatwave ensued. what to do during the hot weather in Paris is always a difficult question, considering Paris has a complete lack of coast line (a la Dublin) or complete lack of swimmable rivers and lakes (a la Zurich).

Of course the city's way of compensating for this is with the “Paris Plage” this phenomenon is when they shut down some of the streets around the Seine and turn them into “beaches”. A lot of people are quick to criticise these spaces and while they are far from the real thing they do allow people such as myself to don a bikini and douse myself with ice cold water every 20 minutes right in the centre of Paris. 

Nothing seems stranger than sunbathing in said bikini while 200 tourist walk past on the bridge above you on the way to Notre Dame, but having frequented Paris Plage previously in 2008, trust me the break from the heat is a welcome relief.

the grass and deck beaches mean no sand in your swimsuit

However seeing as this year Paris Plage only starts on the 20th of July an alternative has to found, and considering the only thing your likly to enjoy along the seine at the moment is a mouth full of car and tour boat exhaust fumes, the Bassin de la Villette in the 19th seemed like a suitable waterside solution. Cycling along one of my favourite routes by the Canal I once again enjoyed seeing people out enjoying the hot weather, even if it was a little quieter seeing as it was an ordinary working day and the extreme heat was forcing people to stay out of the direct heat.

Having so few people about though was a bonus and upon arriving to the canal I managed to find a perfect spot by the waterside, but with lovely tree casting a shadow onto the ground nearby.

After spreading out my picnic blanket and pillow people slowly started arriving. While the aim of the day had been to play petanque (see my version of rules below), chilling out and chatting seemed higher on the agenda. While we did have one or two games we only ever played to first to 5 instead of the traditional 13. We even managed to get our photo taken for the local website (bottom right), in an article about the heat wave.

our picture from the article

With the sun still beating down and shadows on the south side of the canal becoming more and more scarce we switched sides before hunger finally drove us home. Seeing as it was now quite late in the evening, the canal had completely changed from a meagre scattering of sunbathers earlier in the day, to crowded and busy, with brasseries and cafés in full swing.

Over all a good day and some nice cycling. Also I was very grateful to have my saddlebag with me so I could put the game of boules on my bike, because an 8 ball set is quite heavy.

For those of you not familiar with petanque here is a quick summary the rules I know.

1.    Each person gets 2 balls or “boules”
2.    Someone throws the small ball called the “le cochonnet” or jack
3.    Everyone takes turns to throw 1 of their balls closest to the jack
4.    The furthest person away goes first in the second round of ball throwing , followed by the next furthest ect.
5.    The person with their ball closest gets one point
6.    If the same person owns the 2 closest balls they get 2 points
7.    This traditionally continues until someone reaches 13, or what ever number everyone agrees on, as people get bored easily
 

Apparently you can play in teams ect, but not too sure about that. I do know that if you are only 2 people you can split the balls evenly getting 3-4 balls each, which means the points go up faster and the game is shorter.

A Ride through Cycling History

Postponing this exhibition until my fellow bicycle fanatic friend Helen arrived, I was not disappointed.

This exhibition called Voyages a Vélo, is located in the heart of the Marais and is not very obvious to the public being located up a small side street in a generally unremarkable building.

After a quick snack of excellent falafel and a coffee, we felt the time was right to go for a spin into check out these bicycles. The exhibition costs €3-€6, and after asking for the “tariff reduit” we quickly viewed the small section upstairs before making our way down to the main exhibition space downstairs.

I took one photo without any flash before being told that all photography was forbidden. However you can still take more in secret without the flash as there are not too many security people.

The exhibition chronicles the development of the bicycle through time, and starts out appropriately enough with the “hobby horse” style bicycle before starting to explain the popularity of this type of transport as well as its development. While the exhibition is all in French some of the funniest parts were the posters and articles in English from England which clearly demonstrates the type of stuffy upper middle class people that would have been able to afford a bicycle at the time.

The exhibition is overall interesting enough and has a great selection of bicycles as well as bicycle paraphernalia from different eras. Having read up a little on the history of the bicycle before going I especially enjoyed seeing the development of ladies and cycling. Originally the ladies bicycle was a giant cumbersome beast of a contraption kinda like a giant 3 wheeled tricycle, the ladies eventually  saw how pointless these were and instead of developing the bicycle decided to develop their clothing to be more suited to riding “men's” bicycles. Hence ladies trousers or “bloomers” were born and women started to develop “rational dress” . All joking aside the bicycle was credited to have greatly effected the women's rights movement and this can clearly be seen in the fact that most of the posters in the exhibition have a woman in the foreground. Including the poster for the exhibition itself.

What was also really impressive to see was how organised cyclists were back then and you could view old cycle lane maps for around the greater Paris area as well as leaflets telling you how to defend your rights on the road as a cyclist.

Overall the exhibition takes a look at the development of bicycles and bicycles as a hobby and I really enjoyed it. The Exhibition also has a great book that accompanies it but it sadly costs €20 and is only in French. If you have any interest in bicycles get on your bicycle and head over to this before it ends. Ironically though its central location on a small street in the Marais means that bicycle parking is not easily available and you will have to walk a bit to get there.

Rock and stroll - Cité de la Musique

With only 2 days left before my 26th birthday I finally managed to get out to the visit the Cité de la Musique. This Museum is not as central as the rest and is located in the 19th Arrondisment in the Park de la Villette, this however is a bonus as it allows me to take my favourite route along the canal to get to the museum.

Arriving to the the museum the entrance is clearly posted and is actually incorporated into one of Bernard Tschumi's  red “folly's”. When you enter the space you are instantly impressed by the size of the space. 

After getting my free ticket I proceeded through the music shop to the start of the exhibition. Clearly a question that had come to my mind before attending the museum was how do they exhibit something visually, that can really only really be experienced by listening, without having a series of clashing speakers blaring out random sounds in an effort to compete with each other. Well the solution was actually easier than I imagined. This museum provides every one with a audio guide, this guide has headphones and allows you to key in a number beside displays, screens and instruments. This allows you to synchronise up to the relevant TV screen and listen to the opera being performed, the historical background of the instrument, interviews and you can even listen to individual instruments being played.

The museum itself has a large collection of very ornate and old instruments and as you slowly wind your way up to though the different ages it becomes very interesting to learn when and how new instruments that we now take for granted were invented and introduced to the public, as well as seeing instruments that are now nearly obsolete.

triple guitars?

The day we were there was very quiet but there was still a live demonstration by a very talented man on the trombone. He explained the instrument how it worked and how he created the different sounds, as well as playing some very good music.

Arriving into the final space is the most impressive as this is housed in the topmost roof space.

This space also starts to chronicle the development of modern recording and mixing techniques, and has a good selection of early mixing desks which now seem so large and cumbersome that its funny. However the museum does only have a limited amount of stuff about the development of modern music, as it seems to concentrate mainly on the classical side, which is a shame as it hardly acknowledges the development of rock punk techno. But then I suppose you would need an entire other museum to properly chronicle the development of music in the last 100 years. 

The final displays deal with instruments from different cultures such as India Africa and China, these sections are quite small though but still impressive.

Only after exiting the museum  did I see the sectional model and realise that there is actually a entire theatre music space located just beside the museum, and that is why the entire building is called the Cité de la Musique. Next time I visit I plan on seeing a performance.

the museum is the small narrow part on the left of the auditorium

Otherwise the museum was very enjoyable even for someone who has no grounding in music and does not play any instruments it was very basically and easily explained. The museum is also much larger than I thought and as a result my audio guide ran out of battery in the last portion of the museum. With lots of bicycle parking located in the park de la Villette right outside I would recommend going for a picnic with some friends before heading in.

Middling visit to the Middle Age Museum

So having passed this museum on soo many occasions it was finally nice to  get a chance to see what its like on the inside. Hidden behind a bunch of trees right on the Boulevard St Michel is the Musée du Moyen Age. This is hidden gem of a museum and after a quick walk around the corner I discovered the entrance, which appropriately enough has castillations.

Entering the museum through the small courtyard I got my ticket and was in. The museum starts off modest enough before opening up into large banqueting like spaces. 

There are info sheets in three languages  located in every room, and from these I learned some interesting facts, such as that the statues on the façade of Notre Dame were in fact vandalised and the original ones are actually here in the museum.

Moving on through the rest of the museum I generally enjoyed the exhibit which consisted of statues, religious relics, paintings, stained glass and many many tapestry's. Included the most famous of these the Lady and the Unicorn. 

Most of all though I enjoyed being in a museum that had the genuine character of what it was exhibition. 

I suppose the downside to the museum was that I didn’t really get a feeling for what Paris was like in the middle ages, its more looking at artefacts. Where as my personal preference would have been maps and artists impressions, but then I do love maps so maybe that's just me, also a lot of the war armour, swords ect, is all at the Musee de l’Armée, which I went to the other week, and it was Awesome(capital A)