Avignon

Below are the details of my trip to Avignon, beware, it’s long, really long.

Once a year the finance team here in France has an offsite teambuilding event. I was lucky enough to be here when it was scheduled to happen. We went to Avignon, which is a town in the south east of France. I had to get up extra early on Wednesday morning to catch my cab around 6am and pick up another co-worker that lives in Versailles. We were going to meet the rest of the team at at Gare de Lyon train station which is near the middle of Paris (I think). Paris is a beautiful city during the day but at night, or really friggin early in the morning when its still dark out, it is incredible to look at. Our taxi took a route that followed long the Seine River that is interesting because it doesn’t have a single stoplight. We went through the tunnel where Princess Diana died. When we got to the train station we had some extra time so we stopped in a cafe for a quick breakfast and a cafe. The rest of the team started to trickle into the station while we ate, we finished eating and hopped on to our train. Our team made up 90% of the car and as soon as the train started to pull away the team split into the people who wanted to sleep and the rest of whom who wouldn’t shutup (Can you tell what side I was on? ). After about 20 minutes of trying to get some shuteye I gave up and figured this would be a good time to get to know some of my co-workers. I switched seats and sat next to one of the managers. I had my Ipod with me and his eye’s lit up when I sat next to him. “What groups do you have on there?” he asked. I have a wide range of musical interests and wasn’t expecting him to recognize many of the groups. But to my surprise he knew almost half of my list. We discussed musical interests and then the conversation turned to computers (who woulda thunk!). I mentioned I have a Macbook Pro and he started to ask questions about it which eventually turned to us talking about computer games. He enjoys, when time permits which isn’t often, strategy games. I have only played a few but we talked about them. It was nice to hear that someone who works a “regular” job still enjoys gaming.

We ended up talking for a little over an hour, the entire trip was around 2 hours. So before I knew it we had arrived. We left the train and met our event planners for the week who took us to our bus and headed out. The south of France is known for its agriculture so I talked to some people about what they grow here etc…. At one point my director turns to me and says with a huge smile “Paul, this is a first for you!” I replied “Philippe, everyday is a first for me!” I wasn’t intending for this to be funny but half of the bus started laughing. We didn’t go to the hotel right away. We went to an old ruined castle, Chateau Beaux (I think). And of course I forgot my camera in my bag on the bus, but some of my co-workers took some nice pics. The castle resides on the top of a big hill in a range of small hills. The french call these hills “The small Alps” We had a tour guide telling us about the different parts of the ruins. We started with the catapults, which I found very interesting. Surprisingly, these giant rock throwers were accurate up to a few meters. I always thought you loaded the catapult crossed your fingers and let her rip. The guide took us to the area where people lived and explained how they survived. The tour was in French but I was provided with a phone-like device that I would give me the tour in english, the only thing I missed out on were the jokes the guide would toss in throughout the tour.

The tour ended and we piled back in to the bus to head to a restaurant for lunch. This is when the group really started to get going (read:alcohol was being served). For some reason anytime I sit down at a table to eat and I am around people I don’t know well I got in to super-polite-boring mode. Which was the opposite of the rest of the table. I started to loosen up when I was instructed to have some sort of aperitif, champange, wine, something with alcohol. I choose champange. Everyone was talking and joking around in french and I was keeping up for a little while. Sidenote: Its tough sometimes, someone makes a joke and everyone starts to laugh, but I don’t understand so I am put in an odd spot.I really want to understand the joke and join in on the laughing. So, do I laugh with them having no clue as to what they are laughing about? Or, do I just ignore the fact that everyone is laughing? If I laugh with them someone always asks me “You understand?” Of course I haven’t the slightest idea so I answer truthfully and say no, which makes me look like someone who is desperate to fit in (which may or may not be true). But if I ignore the fact everyone is laughing I feel like it brings down the good vibes of the group. So I normally choose to just put a big goofy smile on my face, which basically says “Someone explain the joke the this dumb american.” At some point a joke was made about me and I was oblivious to it, which made it funnier to the group. Someone translated it for me as I was in the middle of a sip of champange. “Some of the women here want to know where in Versailles you sleep.” This caught me off guard and I chortled my champange all over myself, which of course was hysterical for everyone and then blushed REALLY badly which was the icing on the cake for them. I became the focus of attention for a while. People asked me various questions about the differences living in France and the USA, what do I do in my free time, etc…..

Our meal was eventually served, the main entree was some type of fish. I must have made a face because someone asked me “Do you like fish?” So I had to explain to them that I was mildly scarred when I was young. My mom (SORRY MOM!!) didn’t cook fish very well and I couldn’t stand the smell and taste, and I basically haven’t had fish since then. This was replied with “WTF!? faces” by everyone at the table which made me laugh. I explained that I will eat this fish because it looks/smells good. No one could understand how I didn’t eat fish, fish is very popular in France. This led to questions of what do you make for yourself at home. Things settled down after a bit and everyone focused on eating. I actually enjoyed this fish, I would consider ordering it on my own at some point. After lunch people mosied outside to smoke before we boarded the bus to go to the hotel. When we got to the hotel we were given our rooms and we dropped our luggage off and headed to the meeting room for our first business meeting.

After the meeting we were gathered by a group of amateur actors who began to explain to us that we were going to play a game during dinner. This was going to be a Dinner Murder Mystery. Everyone was given a character with some background, and a secret that you couldn’t tell anyone. Two murders were going to take place and it was our job to figure out who committed the murders by talking to everyone. So a quick translation was done for me which I more or less understood and we were ushered in to the dining room. Everyone started talking to each other and I suddenly felt WAY over my head, completley overwhelmed. This was the first time I felt this way since I’ve arrived. After about 15 minutes of feeling like this I decided to step outside real quick to gather myself. I excused myself and walked out the front of the hotel and down the steps and proceeded to sprain my ankle. The steps were made of stone and were uneven. It wasn’t a bad sprain but enough for swelling to occur right away. I was able to walk on it without limipng which was good because I didn’t want anyone to know how much of a klutz I am. I walked around a bit and decided to head back in where I found one of the event planners and asked for some sort of pain medication. She left and went to get the meds, I thought. Next thing I know two of my co-workers come over with big concerned looks on their face. My explanation of what I did wasn’t very good (imagine that) and I basically said I broke my ankle. So I had to explain and show what I had done and tell them all I needed was some pain meds and I would be fine. The rest of dinner went well I had no idea what anyone was saying but I played my character and eventually we “solved” the mystery. I enjoyed myself because everyone else was having a really good time. I decided to try and get some sleep and ice my ankle so I headed to bed right after dinner. Some people stayed up a bit longer to drink.

The next day we started off with a meetting followed by lunch, more fish, and then climbed onto the bus to go to our next activity. All we were told is to be ready to get wet and bring a change of clothes. When we arrived we found out we would be canoeing. I was excited for this for two reasons 1) It wouldn’t put much stress on my ankle 2) It was something physical and outside. We split up randomly and climbed into our canoe’s. The water was pretty cold so of course what does everyone do when the canoe’s get close to each other? Splash till one canoe cries uncle, or whatever the hell they cry in french. I shared the canoe with two people my age that I had not talked to much. We started asking the typical “get to know you” questions. I mentioned that I was interested in the Rugby World Cup and asked what bars were good to watch matches in, hoping that I would get an invitation extended to watch with them. On cue, I was invited to watch the France vs England match with them and their friends on Saturday. (There will be a post later about this adventure) We paddled for 5km and took a break for a snack and water. Alot of people were already tired and weren’t looking forward to the next 5km. The next 5km was no splashing so it was easier to talk to my canoe-mates When we finally arrived at the end we beached our canoe’s and headed to the bus to change and go back to the hotel.

When we arrived at the hotel what did a bunch of people want to do? Swim in the pool of course! (WTF) I didn’t really want to swim but I wanted to get to know everyone so I threw on my bright orange swimsuit, which got a bunch of “WOW’s” from my co-workers. I know its a loud suit but I guess its louder than the norm. I swam for a bit and then headed to my room to change and then to dinner, sort of. Everyone met the event planners by the pool for dinner we thought, but they had an activity for us. The activity ws to create what are definition of Finance is on a wooden plank shaped like a puzzle piece. There were 4 pieces so naturally 4 teams. This was not a competition just one of those artistic, creative activities. Many of us were pretty hungry and wanted to eat so the begininng was rough. After two hours we all took a break to eat and the puzzle pieces were brought up to the dining room for us to finish while/after we eat. During dinner people were organizing a trip to the downtown part of Avignon for the pubs. Cabs were arranged to pick us up @ 1am and bring us back @ 3am. I initially said I would go but as the night wore on I was really starting to drag and my ankle was swelling up again. So I had to pass, of course I got shit for backing out but rightfully so.

The thrid day we woke up, had breakfast, and our last team meeting. We had lunch after the meeting, more fish!, and checked out of our rooms. One of the co-workers brought a soccer ball and some of the guys were juggling/passing it around in the parking lot. I stepped into the circle and got a chance to show that some Americans know how to play soccer. After a few mintues of this it was time to leave. Again, we piled on to the bus and were off to another unknown activity. We eventually stopped at a farm, a bull farm. I was under the impression, don’t ask why, that were going to ride the bulls, but I didn’t say anything right away. After a few minutes of listening to the head bull farmer talk I learned we were going to see how they raise the bulls and what bulls are selected for different bull fighting games. We watched a bunch of guys on horses round up bulls to show us how they can manipulate the bulls to go a certain way, pretty interesting stuff. These bulls were not very big, nothing like we see on TV. We eventually made our way to a field where the bulls would graze and generally hang out. Everyone was quiet and taking pictures at first. I leaned over to one of my co-workers and pointed to one of the biggest bulls and said “When do I get to ride that one?” He started laughing and told some of the other people around us what I had asked. “You have to come back later to ride him” “We will bring the camera” my co-worker replied.

We headed back towards the bus where a snack was waiting for us. We munched on this and mingled until it was time to get back on the bus and go to the train station. Everyone was pretty wiped when we got on the train. It was an uneventful ride back to Paris, and a quiet cab ride home. I had a great time on this trip, minus the sprained ankle. The entire trip people were encouraging me to speak french even if I butcher the language. I really enjoyed this because I am embarrased to speak because of my low level of skill and this provided the push I needed. I noticed my french improved a bit from the time we arrived in Avignon to the time we left.

~ by Paul on October 24, 2007.