Easter

Bona Pasqua!

In celebration of the Easter holiday we headed out on Friday night (10pm) to catch an Easter parade from the cathedral.

The outfits (aside from the awesome Roman soldiers) are a bit creepy if you come from the States and associate people in pointy capped white cloaks with a very dark part of our nation's history, but the children and community bands are easy to love with their brassy charm. The floats are Jesus in various forms (often in distress), and were elaborate works that reflected what we can only assume to be the love of the group who made/carried them (they were ported by members of the hooded brotherhoods).

Interesting to note, there appeared to be as many women as men in hooded robes, and children participated in the robes without hoods.

The parade drew a very large crowd well in advance of the event (which is interesting considering "Spanish time"). It is also interesting that while children receive candy for Easter, we didn't spot any of the large commercial Easter baskets at the grocery store. We indulged in Kinder Sorpresas and stacked the toys on our banister.

Love, fishes, and robots!
Chrissy and Chee Sing

Toulouse

On the 28th of March we packed our bags and headed for the bus station! We were off to spend the next few days visiting some of Chee Sing's friends in France. Ali and Aaron were nice enough to let us crash on the extra bed at their place (not to mention loan us a phone, keys, act as our tour guides on multiple occasions and even take us back to the bus station).

Long story short: Chee Sing is lying when he says he can't speak French, Chrissy is not (although she can read it with some accuracy). France is pretty darn cool.

The highlights of our trip included:

The Basilica of St. Sernin.

The Pont Neuf bridge (this is where Chee Sing points out "Pont" means bridge).

The Capitolium

The Hotel de Assezat


The McDonalds - Because Chrissy had to have a "Royal with Cheese" just like Pulp Fiction tells of.

Shopping and Exploring - Over half of the people could have popped straight out of various fashion catalogs. It was really fun to watch them and we found the most delicious coffee shop to sit at.

Parks! - The Jardin des Plants, Jardin Royal, and a couple of others that all linked together with cute paths and footbridges. Chrissy was jealous that Toulouse seemed to be greening much faster than Girona, but we enjoyed romantic walks and some well earned bench time.
Eating - It was great coffee, and the food was really tasty (even the Royal with Cheese).

Overall, we would really recommend a trip to Toulouse. It is great to explore, the people are friendly (and seemed much more social than in Girona, even with each other), and the weather is nice this time of year. We hope to go back and explore the Natural History museum (which like much of the city is closed on Monday).

Love, fishes, and robots!
Chrissy and Chee Sing

P.S. Fanta limon is lemon here, not lemon-lime like in Chile...