a perfect day for human-watching

Yesterday, I took advantage of the incredible 60 degree, sunshine-filled day by picnicking at the Parc de la Tête d'Or with two friends. For once, the weather reports were right on the money, and there was not a single cloud in the sky as we feasted on tomatoes, pain, chèvre, and bugnes - an Easter-season lyonnais specialty resembling funnel cake. I had a ball perusing the market on Quai Saint Antoine because I don't really get the chance to do food shopping on my own -- my host family graciously provides all the food I ever need. Here's a picture of our delicious oozy cheese:



The mission of the day (as it is every day, let's be honest) was to get in some good people-watching -- or, as one of my Japanese friends has taken to calling it, "human-watching". I think I'm going to adopt her terminology. There was no shortage of adorable French children kicking around soccer balls bigger than their heads, and we were treated to a casual rugby match a few meters from where we had set up camp. We then spent the whole afternoon promenading on the Berges du Rhône, where it seemed like all of Lyon had decided to show up. A fanfare that I've seen a few times around the city even came out to perform a few songs (including Britney's 'Toxic' -- imagine that one on a tuba).

This morning, however, the weather took a turn for the worse, and it seems like the rest of the week is going to be cloudy and drizzly. But I was still able to pull myself out of bed for the enormous marché aux puces in Villeurbanne, a banlieue of Lyon with a somewhat seedy reputation. I had never been that far outside of the city center before, and it was quite impressionant to see such a large gathering of the Maghreb community in one place. The delicious smell of kebabs wafted through the rows of designer knockoffs and kitchen appliances. There was a fair amount of bric-a-brac too - we even saw one man selling a motorcycle! I'd like to go back on my own sometime and really take my time to browse.