good friday?

21/3/2008

good friday. i'm really not sure why it's called this. somewhere in my years of catholic school and religion classes i'm sure i learned the reason, but now, years later, i have no idea. it should be sad friday or mourning friday. i mean isn't this the day christ was crucified? not until today did i realize the influence of catholicism in this country. everything was closed. i mean this was worse than sundays and mondays! this of course is everything except for a few restos and churches, of course. so i spent much of the day in notre-dame de strasbourg.

they were showing the video of l'horloge (the astronomical clock) for free sot hat was a plus. the video explained how it worked and explained some of the paintings, and described in detail what would happen at 12:30. about 5 minutes after the video ended, the show began! it was actually pretty interesting, and to think about the amount of time it must take to make something so intricate!

afterwards i made the challenging ascent to the top of the narthex... 332 stairs! i realized, or i guess solidified, that i have a fear of heights. as i took each step my grip on the handrail tightened and the dizziness grew. it's not really a fear of all heights, which is a good thing considering my job will require me to be very high in the sky. it's more a fear of heights just where i can feel the outside maybe? i'm really not sure how to explain because i don't completely understand...

so i continued to walk around the dead city and finally found a place to stop and eat. i had this plate with brats, salad, and fries and felt like that required a beer instead of wine, wilfort or something like that. i can't remember the name, but it was good! originally i looked for something without meat, but i just couldn't find anything appetizing and i wasn't going to spend money on something i didn't really want. so there i sat, eating my forbidden meat on a lenten friday, drinking my beer, staring out the window at the front of the cathedral... ironic, n'est pas? every time i looked out the window the church was mocking me, scorning me for my dining choice. after lunch i grabbed a waffle dipped in chocolate, not as good as i expected though. i walked around some more but became too bored and couldn't feel my limbs any longer so i decided to take a nap at the hostel.

my nap was going great until tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum walked in... i don't know there names because they didn't speak english or french. first they couldn't get the door to open; i swear they tried to break it down. after making plenty more racket once they got in, they finally left the room and i saw the sun come out so i decided to get up. i went back into town and this time there were more people out even though things were still closed. i continued to window shop, this time finding new places and making notes to return tomorrow. i stopped at a cafe for some hot tea and read a little more of my book. i swear elizabeth gilbert is one of the smartest people ''i know.'' after a salad (which had more sausage) i came back to the hostel.

sitting in my usual spot in the game room, i was surrounded by teenage boys who eventually came over and started talking to me. they are soccer players from belgium and in normal-hormonal-teenage-boy fashion they tried to get me to go to their rooms, asked me if i had a boyfriend, invited me to their soccer tournament, etc. i finally gave in when they asked me to take a drink at the hostel bar. i met their parents, drank, and watched them play some weird card game. their cards are very weird too by the way since their words aren't king, queen, and jack... it makes sense, i just never thought about it.

they were entertaining to say the least and i know i will be seeing them tomorrow so that's something to look forward to!