Thanksgiving and Normandy: The Longest Weekend

My apologies once again for having not updated, but in my defense this last week and a half has been the absolute craziest since I got here.

It all started a week ago last Thursday with Thanksgiving. IES and the France-US group in Nantes sponsored a Thanksgiving dinner for us at a local restaurant. It was...an interesting meal? I sat with Kara, whose host mom is friends with my host mom, our respective host mothers, Julie, who is the TA and does my phonetics lab, and a few members of the France-US group. Julie's a lot of fun, it was nice to get to see her outside of a school context. The food was...an attempt at an American Thanksgiving, but only a half-hearted one. Nobody I've talked to afterwards was happy. The only good part of the meal was the dessert, pumpkin pie and apple tart. The problem was, the slices we got were about half of an inch at their widest point. After dinner, Derek played two songs and sang while he played a third, then Allie and John played the guitar and sang, then Aisha got up and sang a few songs. It as all very nice, though you could tell they were nervous. The whole thing started at 7:00, and my mom and I didn't get home until past midnight. It was exhausting!

Friday after classes Alison and I booked it down to the train station to figure out what was going on with the trains. If you saw in the news, Paris was practically shut down by the strikes, and it touched us out in Nantes too. We weren't sure which line to stand in, so we both hopped in different ones. Mine ended up being the right one, so she came over and stood with me. Our first train was cancelled, but there was a second train that was going to the same stop at nearly the same time, so he gave us tickets to that, just like that. He also "bravoed" us on our French! Yay! I grabbed a sandwich and we stood around a little bit. The platform came up, we walked over, got on the train no big deal. We arrived in Le Mans with plenty of time to catch our next train.

At Le Mans Alison and I decided to buy our tickets for the last leg of the trip, from Caen to Carentan, our final destination. The lady took our tickets as we had them and got everything figured out for us, so we bought tickets for that day and for the return trip.

We got out onto the platform, stood there for a good twenty minutes. Alison was very nervous about whether we were on the right platform or not. The loudspeaker came on all the sudden and said that instead of being on the platform we were facing, it was going to come into the one right behind us. Okay, no big deal, we just turned around. Then thirty seconds later it came back on and said that no, it was going to be back on the original platform. We grumbled jokingly about how mean it is to do that to non-native speakers, when the loudspeaker came on again. This time we didn't actually hear what got said, but there was a mass exodus by the people around us towards the exits. Alison panicked a bit, so I grabbed her and we followed the crowd. As they were leaving the station itself, we asked a woman what was going on. She said that the train had been canceled and they were taking us by bus instead. Cool. After a little bit of confusion as to which bus we were supposed to get on, Alison and I settled in, bus buddies once again. And then we started laughing, almost to the point of being hysterical.

We were rolling along, enjoying the countryside when Alison's cell phone rang. It was the owner of the bed and breakfast we stayed at, telling her (in French, of course) that the train from Caen to Carentan had been canceled, so instead of picking us up at Carentan he was just going to meet us at Caen. Wow, way way nice. So we got into the train station, met him, piled into the first real mini van looking thing I've seen in France, and drove for about 45 minutes an hour. Along the freeway in France there are signs that tell you what famous monuments or attractions or castles are at the next stop. So we're driving past signs for Omaha beach, Utah beach, Point-du-Hoc, the American and British cemeteries. I'm geeking out a little bit. We pulled into the b&b, were greeted by the wife, and she showed us our room. The whole time she's telling us how its nothing special, and its this gorgeous little room!! It was so pretty! We tossed our stuff down on the beds, freshened up, then went downstairs. In the emails, they'd told us that they'd give us a small dinner Friday night. We get down there and they served us the biggest dinner I have had since coming to France. First we had little appetizers and apple liquor, then we moved to the table and had apple cidre, ham and cream, potatoes, salad, and bread, then for dessert a baked apple with mixed berries and cream. It was SO much food!! Needless to say after dinner Alison and I both crashed pretty hard, it had been a stressful day!

We woke up the next morning, got ready, and went downstairs for breakfast. For breakfast they gave us giant croissants, four different kinds of homemade jam, hot chocolate, fruit, and homemade plain yogurt. I tried it, if you put sugar in it it was actually quite good. After breakfast we met up with the guide that Alison's dad had arranged, and we were off.

Our first stop of the day was Sainte-Mère-Église. If you've ever seen the movie The Longest Day, the scene that probably stands out the most in your mind is when one of the parachuter's parachutes gets caught on the steeple of the church. This actually happened to a man named John Steele, who survived by playing dead. Today the town has a mannequin hanging from one of the corners of the church by a parachute, but according to our guide it isn't in the right spot. Also in the town is a museum dedicated to the U.S. 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions. Alison's grandfather was a member of the 101st, and is featured in the museum. We bopped in there, looked at his little exhibit, glanced around quick, watched a "moovie", then met back up with the guide outside. From there we drove to Utah Beach. It is actually one of the prettiest beaches I've ever been on. Lots of sand and shells....and pieces of metal left over from the invasion. Don't worry, I grabbed a couple. Our guide gave us a really good overview of the attack on Utah, why it was important and what the objectives of the various groups were. Then he gave us awhile to wander around. Utah is considered to be the least deadly of the beaches that were attacked, but the reality is that it was only because the troops didn't land where they were supposed to. Its very easy to imagine what things might have looked like.

After Utah we drove to a little church whose name I forgot. Its not the normal stop when seeing the sites, but has its own unique story. Our guide was trying to impress upon us the gratitude of the French people, even today. This little itty bitty town, population of like sixty, has spent thousands upon thousands of dollars to put up a little memorial to the two soldiers I'm about to describe. Someone had put out flowers within the last few days, the grass was freshly cut, and the American and French flags were flying overhead. These people, for all of the destruction and death that we brought with us, are still today thankful for what the Allies did on D-Day and after.

In the little church two men...boys, set up a first aid post. They were both younger than I am, one had five months of medical training, the other a day. But between the two of them, they were able to keep over forty men alive....Americans, a French boy, and even German soldiers. You can still today see blood stains on the pews. Over the last few years there has been a movement to help the town rebuild the church, which even by Normandy standards is old. Stained glass windows have been put in, commemorating either the saints the church is dedicated to or the soldiers who helped liberate the area. One was dedicated to the two soldiers, both of whom survived and are still alive today. The window was designed by an American, and when the mock-up was shown to one of the soliders by his daughter, he sat and cried. Our guide had the chance to talk with him, and he asked why he'd cried. The veteran said that when he comes to France, people hug him, kiss him, have parades, give him flowers. They recognize what happened, what he did. But in at home in the states, people ask what he did in the war and then stop listening. He had never had another American actually care, and to have someone not only recognize it but then go out of their way to create and pay for a stained glass window in the very church were it happened was a great honor.

From there we went over to Point-du-Hoc, which is well known for its assault by the Rangers with their ladders borrowed from the London fire department. The entire cliff, because that's all it is, is covered in giant holes which were created by the bombs dropped leading up to and during the assault. There are still German bunkers all over it, and you can actually crawl around and see them. The most impressive thing, other than the wall which the rangers had to climb up, is the artillery storage bunker they blew up. Giant chunks of concrete which were the roof now sit 40 feet away. The unfortunate thing about the cliff is that it probably won't be around in two or three generations. The bombs that were dropped created fissures in the cliff, and weather has expanded those so the cliff is slowly falling to pieces.

From Point-du-Hoc we drove to Omaha Beach. I was expecting some big, lonely, obviously the site of thousands of deaths beach. But its not that, at all. There are houses, restaurants, shops, right underneath the cliff. In front of those is a road, then a little hill, then you're on the beach. It is easy to see though why it was so deadly. It is just beach. There is nothing else, for ever. And the Germans were sitting on the top of a cliff looking down. When you step onto the sand, you can feel the change. There are certain places in this world that I believe very, very strongly, hold onto what has happened there, and if you go there, if you see those places and you know, you'll be able to feel it. Off the top of my head, the standing stones I've visited, the Statue of Liberty, etc. You see these places, these things, and the air around them is different. Maybe this sounds hokey, idk, but I truly believe it. Stepping onto that beach was like that for me. Our guide again did his wonderful draw in the sand explanation, then let us wander for a bit. I grabbed another rock, then we piled back into the car.

From there we drove to the American cemetery. They have in recent years opened a visitors center which also has some information about Alison's grandpa, so we decided to start there. We got in, and there was a guest book. Alison and I both went over to sign it, and I nearly fell over. The person two up from where I was signing was a woman from none other than Ankeny, Iowa. WHAT are the odds of that? I spent the rest of the time looking for anyone that looked exceptionally American, and was with another woman (from Grinnel), and I think I found them but I didn't recognize them, so I didn't say anything. We walked down to the bit about Alison's grandpa, then decided that instead of spending our limited time going through the visitors center, we wanted to out to the cemetery. I have been to Arlington before, so I am familiar with the rows upon rows of white crosses, but it still is almost a punch to see that many all perfectly aligned. If anyone asks me again why I am a pacifist, why I don't believe that war is an appropriate answer, I'll tell them to visit that site. Could WW2 have been won without an attack? No, I don't believe so. But since then there have been so many, too many conflicts in which someones son has killed someone else's son. There are no good guys and bad guys. Everyone always believes their cause is the right one, and if they don't then they are following what their government has told them they should do. Why should anyone get killed because of that?

Sorry I'll get off of my anti-war rant and keep going with my story. On the hour, the bells held somewhere I couldn't see started chiming. They chimed the hour, then started playing "America the Beautiful". That, combined with the fact that technically I was standing on US soil for the first time in three months, and surrounded by the reflection of the immense loss of life that was the Normandy Invasion set me to tears. These boys, the men that were in the graves around me, they were my age. Our guide showed us lots of pictures of them, and there were quite a few, "oh, he was attractive" thoughts. Two of my very good friends from high school, Zach and Jeremy, are going into the military. I can't get to far into this thought process or I'm going to start crying again but I do not want them to end up being a white cross in a perfectly straight line in some country across the ocean for a cause that may or may not have been one that necessitated war. Sigh. Two interesting things about the cemetery: One, the chapel in the center is actually a multi-faith chapel, which I thought was really neat. Two, the cemetery itself overlooks Omaha beach, you can see it when you're standing there.

After the cemetery we drove back towards the bed and breakfast. We had one more stop to make, and it was the most important of all. We finally arrived at the church where Alison's grandpa had landed the morning of the invasion. The town has put a plaque on the wall of the church so you can see where he landed. His story is remarkable. He landed WAY far away from his supposed drop zone, but was still determined to get to his target and carry out his job of taking out the German bridges. The problem was that there were a lot, a lot of Germans in between him and where he was supposed to be. No matter how he tried to get by them, he couldn't. He did whatever he could where he was, blowing up a power box, cutting phone lines, general sabotage. He was crawling through a hedgerow when he, unfortunately, literally fell into a pack of Germans. One of the Germans took his uniform and his dog tags, and he was shipped off towards a POW camp. He managed to escape, but was captured again. VERY long story short, he ended up in Russia, where he joined up with the Russian army to fight against the Germans. The German who had taken his dog tags had been killed, and it was assumed that the body was his. His family received the telegraph saying that he was missing in action, then killed. It wasn't until several years later when he met with a US ambassador in Russia that he was able to convince them, after forcing them to take his fingerprints, that he really was who he said he was. He made it home finally, and only passed away a few years ago, but not before visiting France again several times.

We said goodbye to our guide and went back to the B&B. The man then told us he'd arranged a meeting for us with the woman in whose home Alison's grandpa had hidden. We walked over to their house, and met this couple. The woman had just been a little girl, but explained a lot to us about what it had all been like. Then she pulled out this big envelope filled with pictures, letters, and Christmas cards all from Alison's family over the last so many years. The fact that she'd kept all of that, plus how important she considered it all, made me choke up, much less Alison. They gave us some sort of alcohol and little crackers, then I took pictures of them and we went back to the b&b.

We sat with the couple and told them all about our day while eating appetizers and, luckily, orange juice. The Normands really like their alcohol. We went to dinner, which was white asparagus with cream, then something whose name I can only remember in French wrapped in salmon covered in cream, then something else I can't remember for dessert....sorry, its 12:15 Monday morning and I've been working on this blog all weekend, but darnit I am going to finish this!

Sunday we took the train from Carentan to Caen, and it was SO exciting we had a HARRY POTTER STYLE COMPARTMENT!! We were both pretty excited about that. We got off the train, then proceeded to wander around the city trying to figure out their buses and trams, most of which were not working. Finally we made it out to the Memorial, a giant Rick Steve's recommended museum. It talks about the history of Europe from 1918 today, and is very, very interesting. It is VERY well done, and I'm kind of a museum snob. They had a specific exhibit on the Cold War, an exhibit about peace, and of course big sections on the World Wars. They also had two really interesting videos. We spent all day there, then figured out how to take the buses back to the train station. Luckily, all of our trains worked, and we made it back to Nantes in one piece!

I'll write about last week maybe tomorrow, but now I'm going to go to bed! Hope you're all enjoying the snow at home! I'm so jealous!!