Southwest France: Day 2

    Another day started out with a lovely baguette! Then our SAG caught a bus to Bayonne where we had a tour of a chocolate museum:

Old Chocolate Ad

   Not only did we get to learn about the chocolate-making process, we also got to paint a chocolate bar with--chocolate!  It was pretty exciting and reminiscent of 4th grade art class. 

    After that we went to a city called Biarritz where we went to a museum about the Basque peoples. 

   I'm ashamed to say that I've never actually heard of the Basque people until this trip. They are a now small group of people who live in southwest France, the Pyrenees and also north-central Spain (the link I gave you gives a much better description). They are unique in that they have preserved their culture through what they claim to be centuries. I don't know how far back they claim to have existed but what I did learn was that their language is pre-Indo-Eurpoean and is totally un-related to any other language now-a-days. 

    They also had a pagan (meaning pre-Christianity) religion that revolved mainly around the elements and especially mother earth. Because of their ancient belief in a goddess they have more respect for women than their neighbors, and have a largely matriarchal society. I'd have to do far more research than just listening to a tour guide to get a full picture, but that's the general idea that I got. Also what was very interesting to me was that a family gets its name from the house they live in and once you move out of that house you lose your name. Thus, home and family are very important in Basque culture. 

    Also, there's a very famous Picasso painting of a massacre at the Basque village Guernica that I'd never heard of. 

     Basque people have also spread their main sport (pilota) all over the world. I personally haven't heard of it... but the looks I got when I asked how many goals my university's american football team scored have made me realize that I am not very clued-in about sporty things. 

    The French and Spanish monarchs forced the Basque people to accept Christianity and to build churches, so they used their boat-building skills to engineer very beautiful ceilings that look like a boat turned up-side-down. The cathedral we saw was much more fancy than most Basque churches, so the boat resemblance was harder to see--but it was magnificent!

The beautiful Basque cathedral

   After our museum tour we were allowed to go explore around and I found this delightful sign...I can't tell if it's sarcastic or not...

    We then went back to St. Jean de Luz and ate at the Le Bar Basque! I had a:

...that kept on staring at me...

...and had really big teeth...it was a bit awkward...

...but not awkward enough! It was scrumptious!