Dali Exhibit at Centre Pompidou

After returning from the weekend in Brittany and Normandy, Monday morning was recovering from a long weekend and Monday evening was spent at the Salvador Dali exhibit at the Centre Pompidou! From the outside, Centre Pompidou doesn't look like much. I dont like the exterior personally...

But the inside was pretty cool and the Dali exhibit was even better. We got to see some well known pieces and some studies. There were movies that Dali did as part of his art in the Surrealist movement that were pretty interesting as well. Some of the stuff was interactive, like one of his paintings as a photo op where you can position yourself anywhere on the final picture. I def got one!

I thought it was very well done as an exhibit, but I really like Dali and Surrealism. It was totally worth the hour and a half wait on the very last day! Some people would say it wasn't. Both French and foreign people were waiting forever just to go through the exhibit out of curiosity for such crazy art done by a wacky guy with a wacky mustache to match. Some Americans thought the lines were too long for what was inside, but upon researching it to know what I was in for, it turned out some French reviews of the exhibit said the same thing. I think it just comes down to whether or not a person likes Dali or surrealism in general to appreciate the exhibit and decide if its worth going to. 

Weekend in Brittany & Normandy

The weekend before Easter, we took a trip out to Brittany and Normandy on the northern coast of France. Needless to say, it was absolutely amazing and beautiful:

We stayed in Saint Malo, a medieval town on the coast and it couldn't have been more picturesque or perfect as a retreat. As is with most super urban areas, Paris gets overwhelming with the sky high buildings and its easily claustrophobic, so it was nice to come out to a more open space by the ocean, just like home in San Diego! First on the itinerary was Mont Saint-Michel, the famous medieval abbey situated on a sort of island in the middle of an estuary. 

Aside from dominating the horizon, what makes Mont Saint-Michel unique is that the road leading to the island during a strong high tide is completely covered, and only when it is low tide does the road reveal itself. It was really cool! Part cathedral, part fortress, the abbey is at the very tip of the mount and is surrounded by a very tiny village of souvenir shops and little eateries that cater to the centuries of religious pilgrims and tourists that have come to Mont Saint-Michel. 

The little towns of the north tend to look more like they did during Medieval times, unlike Paris which was completely redone in the 19th century in the style for which it is known for today. Tiny, narrow streets with exposed wooden exterior. The abbey itself was enormous:

It was really cool, and the trip got even cooler as it went on. Our first night in Saint Malo, we went out for seafood as Brittany is well known for its high quality seafood coming from its waters. We spent the rest of the weekend eating some of the best seafood I've ever had- oysters, salmon, mussels and fries. It was heartbreakingly good :(

Our last day we went to Normandy to visit Omaha beach where troops landed on DDay to free France from the Nazi regime. Sometimes its easy to forget in the middle of being a tourist that being in France comes with being immersed in a lot of history, especially when it's as recent as World War II. The American cemetery is situated on the cliffs overlooking the landing beaches where literally thousands of soldiers arrived by land, sea, and air not expecting to come out of it alive. The sheer number of pure white marble crosses that sprawl across the cemetery reflects this number; many of them are graves for unknown soldiers who were never identified after their death.

 Near the entrance there is a museum that explains a lot of what the cemetery means to both Americans and the French who were freed by the men buried in it. It is said that the people of Normandy, of all the French, don't forget. They still commemorate D Day as a holiday, recognizing the World War II veterans and their sacrifice for the preservation of freedom. The mosaic on the ceiling of the chapel in the cemetery depicts a lot of this sentiment :

On the top is Lady Liberty sending the soldiers and ships to France, and the woman representing France crowns the dead soldier with a laurel wreath representing peace. To Normandy, the DDay invasion wasn't just about saving their country but preserving the values of freedom and liberty and protecting those rights as human beings, not just as Americans or British or Canadian soldiers. It was really sobering to be at Omaha beach that morning, I really appreciated going to see the cemetery and seeing history commemorated. Again, something that could never happen in America, but really amazing to see on the trip.