After arriving in Amiens and dumping our bags in the hotel, we immediately took a taxi out to the new interactive Australian War Memorial at Villers Brettoneux. When Tony Abbott was PM he pumped a slightly obscene $100 mill into making this war memorial and no doubt it's tastefully done but the continuing deification of the whole ANZAC thing does leave me with somewhat mixed emotions. Our primary reason was to have a look at the fields where my grandfather, Herbert Champion Hosking, as a 21-year-old was in the front line as a Lieutenant in the 10th Battalion. This was after he'd previously landed at Gallipoli on the morning the April 25 landings. He got shell shock at Gallipoli, was sent back to Adelaide but they thought he was orright so they sent him back to the Western Front where he was involved in the Battle of the Somme. Bit rough if you ask me. Somehow he survived that too but another case of shell shock sent home for good.
The Villers Brettoneux museum was interesting and very interactive (too interactive for my poorly functioning phone, you need one by the way if you go), especially good for children to get a sense of what life and the impact and destruction of war can bring. The3D battlefield reenactment was particularly powerful. The cemetery and stone memorial with accompanying tower was put in place after WW1 and actually fighting took place there in WW2 with the bullet holes still clearly visible. In the tower we bumped into some other Australians who were there as part of a professional development trip as they were history teachers. It certainly is still a place many Australians feel compelled to visit. Us included of course. It was very hard to imagine the calm fields with corn and wheat swaying gently in the breeze being the location of the industrial scale slaughter of people. Even as I write this a couple of months later, it still doesn't seem real. The rows and rows and rows of crosses for each grave and many an unknown soldier, difficult to fathom.
Amiens was a surprise but only because we are ignorant. The cathedral is extraordinary and kind of sneaks up on you because you can't really see it till you wander around a corner close to the building. There is still evidence of WW1 everywhere with photos all about the town and cathedral. Apparently many an ANZAC wandered through and there is a photo outside the cathedral of them on parade. Inside they really did know how to throw some rocks together to whack up an impressive structure so we had a brief wander around despite the protestations of TGT2.5:3 about "Another bloody cathedral!". (These protests were to get louder and more determined as TGT progressed). We wandered around the inside admiring the extraordinary space and occasionally stopping to inspect one of the many photos from The Great War including one where both the inside and the outside of the cathedral were filled with sandbags. Apparently, during the war, the Bishop of Amiens contacted the Pope to have a quiet word with the Germans to please not bomb the cathedral when they were getting a bit close for comfort. The Germans agreed. Civilised war. Hmmmm.
Suddenly amongst all these photos of destruction, an extraordinary voice rang out as a soloist was practicing for a service to be held later. She was singing Ave Maria in a voice both breathtaking and beautiful. Now I'm no Christian, and I'm no singing expert but this was something quite astonishing and we were very lucky to experience it.
The next day we hired a car and headed into Belgium, Ypres or Ieper, to be precise for some more WW1 history. The photos of the town at the end of the WW1 are difficult to believe. It was practically flattened including the cathedral (no such deal with the Germans there) and the famous Cloth Hall. But you wouldn't know it as they were rebuilt brick by brick and it now appears as it did before WW1. They did a remarkable job rebuilding Ypres and it turns out the ANZACs are still favorably remembered there as well. Ypres is home to Menin Gate where they play the Last Post every night of the year at 8pm. It being no particularly special occasion, I was expecting maybe a dozen people to be there. Hundreds!!! If not a thousand. An incredibly touching experience. The night we were there it was the turn of some Kiwis to lay wreaths. The gate itself is inscribed with the soldiers who have no graves. Lots of them. I mean a LOT!
To continue the war theme, we went to a still existing trench at Hill 66 before heading to Dunkirk. Now I've known about Dunkirk for as long as I can remember but it was only really the movie which drummed into my thick skull what an extraordinary achievement it was to get 350,000 troops off the beach and much credit must go the Cheese Eating Surrender monkeys for keeping the Germans at bay. We wandered down to the beach and had a swim in the Channel before coming back later in the evening low tide to wander in amongst the skeletal remains of some of the bombed ships that are still there 78 years later. Some magical photos by TGT2.5:2, 4, and 5 and a memorable way to spend TGT2.5:3's 14th birthday.
The next day it was a visit to Flanders Fields where the Canadian Doctor who wrote the poem was stationed for some considerable time. So many graves everywhere we went. After that, it was back to Paris after returning the car at the surprising large city of Lille. I had survived my first few days of driving on the right-hand side of the road but till that point, the roads weren't too narrow so I didn't do too badly. The narrow roads and associated freaking out was later in the Le Tour.
Another TGV back to Paris and this time staying a bit further out in Clichy, the beginning of the suburbs. Tell you what Paris is a little bit different out there. Not so glamorous. A tad edgy you might even say. TGT2.5:2 and I went for a jog along the Seine near Zac des Docks and frankly it was very unglamorous indeed. Paris, Asian city. Good to see even such a glamorous place as Gay Paris is a bit rough around the edges.
On this, our second stay in Paris we went to the Catacombs which we'd never been to before. It seems TGT2.5:2 just can't stop herself going underground in Paris. Not poo this time but lots of bodies. Just weird and for me, frankly a bit unnerving. So many bones and skulls. I had to consciously tell myself not to think of them as people as otherwise, I would have freaked the hell out. TGT2.5:4 was with me on that one as he started to freak out a bit too. To make pretty patterns with skulls and thigh bones was all just a bit too disturbing for me and I confess the combination of bazillion human remains, claustrophobic and muggy atmosphere was starting to take its toll on me and I was very glad to get the hell out by the end. It's fascinating, but unlike Le Tour Eiffel I won't be doing that again. The other members of TGT seemed to cope with it much better than me, including TGT2.5:5 who finds such things endlessly interesting and is not the slightest bit squeamish about it. Ask her to eat lasagne though......
We also made a trip to Ile de la Cite and went past Notre Dame but not in as the queues were enormous and anyway we'd just been in the Amiens Cathedral and this little black duck couldn't tell the difference. We were headed for the finest ice cream shop in Paris where we'd visited 7 years previously. It had obviously got a bit more popular in the intervening period as now it had opened up a 2nd store across the road. Yum
We then headed to our final Paris destination, Sacre Coeur and the little vineyard on the northern side of the hill. Remarkable view and I still can't believe the kids haven't watch Amelie yet. Must do something about that.
Anyhoo it was an early TGV the next day to Montpellier so we needed our sleep.
The south was beckoning!
No comments:
Post a Comment