Cool French Stuff

While in France, I found this brilliant store called La Marelle. All of their products from tattoos to note cards to luggage is little girl off the wall charming. Below are some tattoos like none I've ever seen before. (The next three photos are courtesy of their website. These are some of the adorable postcards.

And now Burlesque -

I also read in one of the French magazines that Paris will be hosting its first Burlesque Festival from the 21-25 October. There's also a group that gets together each Saturday - a Burlesque for Beginners class at the Bellevilloise in Paris. It's called the L'Ecole des Filles de Joie translated School for the Joyful Girls. I'll bet. As far as my French permits, I think they practice on a Saturday and then perform many Saturday evenings. They're obviously very serious about this.

My curosity got the better of me and I searched what was on in London. Apparently, there's a London School of Striptease and the London School of Burlesque! Apparently Mama JoJo can help you learn a new life skill. Didn't life skill used to mean cooking or weaving? Do watch the video of this lady who can sure make her pasties twirl.

What I want to know is who are these people taking the classes?

A Lille Adventure in France!

Last weekend, my boyfriend and I went to Lille in France because he had to work over there. We traveled business class on the way out, which for 10 pounds more, I highly recommend. The seats are 1/3 bigger and champagne, wine, and dinner are included.

Statues of angel and demon babies were there to meet us upon arrival. They were on display for the Dan Brown/Tom Hanks “Angels & Demons” movie coming out soon. Why gigantic baby statues in a small French town and not London or Paris, I have no idea. Anyway, the horned babies struck poses in the sky with their bat-like wings and their long slithery tails. They were truly gruesome chic!

To sum up Lille, the food wasn’t brilliant. Lots of restaurants catering for tourists who will be there only once. The large art museum in the center of town had as its main display a video piece about a woman in a pod who zooms to Istanbul from London. Sounds cool, but basically, she spills water in her pod seat and her lettuce leaf salad dinner flies away. Oh no! I’ve ruined the ending for you. On the same Turkish theme, there was a short film about slaughtering cows in Turkey. It was absolutely heart wrenching, but mesmerizing. I haven’t eaten meat since. Is this really art – watching cows being slaughtered?

On a lighter note, the best part about the art museum was the hot chocolate in the café. It was wonderful, thick, creamy with a foam top heavenly hot chocolate. My boyfriend said it tasted like Charbonnel & Walker drinking chocolate. I recommend buying some and trying it at home.

The only crafty place I could find (not counting the one store with card tables spread out with some random assortment of the worst fabrics I have ever seen – really gruesome and not at all chic) was on outdoor market with tons of vintage books and one stall in the middle with vintage postcards, stamps, and letters. Here’s one of the gorgeous postcards I found for 1 Euro. I can’t wait to use it in a craft. If anyone would be interested in the vintage postcards, let me know and I may post them as a download.

So after moules et frites (mussels & chips) for lunch and moules et frites for dinner, we happened upon a funfair. I was so excited to see what a French funfair was like. Much the same as at home in the US – packs of teenage boys walking with their trousers sagging down showing their underwear butts and baseball caps perched on top of their head (truly balancing on top – odd) following packs of girls with too much eye make-up. All of the rides were painted with a South American or USA theme. Lots of wonky knock off Mickey Mouses.

To sum up Lille – For a medieval city, go to Brugges in Belgium instead.

Stay tuned – Coming up tomorrow – gruesome chic French sticky tattoos and French burlesque. (This burlesque theme seems to be following me lately…)

She should cover up or she's going to catch a chest cold.