The parade ends in a park in the center of town. After a break, the four Stromboli Brothers put on a show. They play mostly bluesy rock music, do physical comedy and juggle. The juggling is not particularly technical, but I suspect the character development is good. It's hard to tell, though, as the lighting on the outdoor stage is poor. I'm sure I miss a lot by not understanding the lyrics to the songs. Anyhow, for me the show is only barely worth sitting on gravel in stretch Iycra for.

 

Wednesday, August 14. Grenoble.

Vin de jour: Vin rouge a 20F/litre.

 

I have breakfast with Todd Strong this morning. He is planning to move back to the States in a week. Paula wants some time away from the kids, so I am on duty with them until 5 p.m. At 11 a.m., we board the navette (shuttle bus) to go the other gym, which is newer, larger and 20 minutes away. The Gandini Juggling Project is setting up for a show at one end.

 

How to describe the Gandinis? Strange, wonderful, magical, innovative, rough in places, and telling you more than you every wanted to know about the British cherry­growing industry. There are two women and three men who manipulate the standard juggling props - clubs, balls and rings - in new and unexpected ways. There are multiple­person Mills Mess steals with one person's arms snaking in and out of another's. There are clubs snatched out of balances almost before they are stable, and rings caught by other rings.

 

In the middle of it all is the puckish figure of Sean Gandini, grinning, leading the dance, directing movement, whispering secrets to his partners, and obviously enjoying his drops as much as his catches. There are no obvious applause points, so the audience is forced to applaud more or less at random. Sadly, the show ends. The audience wants an encore, but Sean holds his arms up for silence and says with his usual grin, "I'm sorry, but we've done everything we know, and we're very tired, so go away and leave us alone please." The audience loves him even more.

There is an open stage show that starts around 9 p.m. I miss most of it putting the kids to bed, but catch the end. The audience has spilled out of the sides of the big top and is spread on the grass all around. There are a couple of three ball routines, fire and light swinging, Boppo doing impressions, and another hot diabolo routine. In a desperate attempt to keep his valuables with him at all times, as the organizers suggest, Boppo walks on stage with his backpack.

 

By far the best act I see is Peter Weiss with his accordion. He starts by dropping his music and picking it up all muddled. The then plays a jumbled medley of every classical tune you ever heard. The audience laughs on hearing each new tune. In a particularly expressive moment he destroys his music stand and is forced to substitute a broom, which will not stand up. He does a lot of physical comedy with the broom, trying to play one-handed, holding it between his legs, balancing it on his chin and his foot. He ends up idling with one foot on a six-foot uni while balancing the broom on the other foot and, of course, still playing the accordion.

 

Thursday, August 15. Grenoble.

Vin de jour: Cidre Loic Raison.

 

It's hot today, and none of us feels very energetic. Todd Strong's dice stacking book is in the proof stage. After this he is planning a book on three ball tricks. I point out that there are lots of good three ball books out there already, but he proclaims, "This will be the best. Soon everybody will be juggling three balls." I recall that I have seen far more diabolo routines that three ball routines so far at this convention, and he is responsible for that craze, so maybe he is right.

 

My son Dan and I cruise the vendor tents, checking out the props for sale. The tents are only open four hours a day, which gives the vendors a chance to enjoy the rest of the festival, and puts the customers into a shopping frenzy which is apparently good for business.

 

At 11 p.m. there is a UV show followed by an open stage, but I'm going to opt for a sauna (there's one right next to the gym) and bed.

 

Friday, August 16th. Grenoble.

Vin de jour: Perrier.

 

The organizers have a pleasingly relaxed attitude toward the rules. There are tents in the "no camping" areas, there is a pirate bar opened up in the van camping area and there are even rumors of people pissing on the trees, but nobody is getting hassled. Paula has managed to talk her way into an "officials only" parking area close to the camping with the explanation that we have small children and can't carry all our gear.

 

We decide to take the morning off from the festival, and head into central Grenoble to do tourist stuff. We ride the telepherique up to the fortifications overlooking the town. The telepherique is two sets of five plastic bubbles hanging from a cable. Each bubble seats six, and as we rise over the river Isere and up the bluff we get a panoramic view of Grenoble and the surrounding Alps. Did I mention that there are spectacular mountains everywhere you look? There are. Above the mountains there are clouds today, and from the battlements we see rising above the clouds still more mountains in the distance, a jagged line cutting into the sky.

 

The bullwhip workshop goes off OK. About a dozen people turn up. One woman gets a couple of welts that will heal eventually and two of my whips lose their poppers. I talk about the stuff in the bullwhip FAQ and then try to teach people the three basic cracks. Bullwhip takes lots of space, of course, and the only open space is outside the portapotties. We end up with a line of a half-dozen people with bullwhips guarding the entrances to the rest rooms.

 

The public show is that evening in a huge modem theatre in what looks like a convention center. It seats about 1,200, so it takes a while to bus everyone there. There is a second show later, as not everyone will fit in one sitting. Things are a bit hot and sweaty, and the show is a half-hour late starting, but that is about par for the course at a juggling fest. There are people sitting in the aisles and nobody tells them that they can't do that. How strange.

 

Sem and Teresa Abraham open the show with their killer unicycle routine. Aurelien does a devil stick routine with flamenco music and dance. There are a lot of moves involving trapping a devil stick between hand stick and wrist, and hardly any standard devil stick moves at all. He finishes with two devil sticks, both between two hand sticks and as propellers. Very nice.

 

Francoise Rochais does the routine she performed in the public show in Vegas, followed by five fire torches. Sigh. Marcus does a black light swinging routine to a story about the Phoenix.

 

Edward, who trained at the Kiev circus school and now lives in Israel, performs some very nice stuff with one to five soccer balls. He juggles three balls with the right hand continuously rolling balls across his chest to  then four with one balanced on his head and a hoop on one leg. He finishes by rolling the one off his head and juggling five.