Grenoble Diary -

Day by Day at the 1996 European Juggling Festival

by Andrew Conway

 

Thursday August 8, 1996. Somewhere over Canada.

Vin de jour: 1995 Cabemet Sauvignon Bodega Vina Rosa from Chile.

 

After showing my face at work for a few hours yesterday I returned home for frenzied packing and house cleaning. For this trip we are exchanging homes with a French family we have never met. This means that our rambling Edwardian shack must be put in suitable condition for total strangers. Paula has been leaving Post-It notes on appliances explaining how they work. I put one on a clock radio saying "This telephone does not work very well" and another on the sewing machine saying "This note was placed here by mistake."

 

The kids both want to take their unicycles along. It turns out that two kidsized unicycles taken to pieces will fit in one large suitcase. I make a selection from my massive collection of juggling T-shirts, and stuff those between the spokes along with socks and underwear. There does not seem to be any way of stuffing a juggling club between the spokes of a unicycle, so this will be one more juggling festival where I turn up without clubs.

 

Virgin Airlines has three-inch TV screens set in the back of the seat in front, with six channels of movies and rock videos. This keeps the kids amused for most of the flight watching "Jurassic Park" and "James and the Giant Peach."

 

Friday, August 9. Lyon.

Vin de jour: Greene King IPA.

 

We make it to the apartment in Lyon without major incident. It is in an old building on the Place Bellecour. It is large and luxurious, with a refectory table that would seat 10 in the kitchen and a master bedroom about the size of Portugal. On the kitchen counter a half-eaten Camembert is ripening. I taste it, and know for sure that I am back in France.

 

Saturday August 10. Lyon.

Vin de jour, Gargantua Cote du Rhone, 1995.

 

Spent the day exploring the neighborhood and recovering from jet lag. I put the unicycles together, and take the kids across the Place to the playground nestling among the chestnut trees. Dan zooms here and there while Ian wobbles along hanging on to my arms. "Keep your weight on the saddle," I tell him, "Sit up straight." I can't ride a uni, but I do know enough to be a critic.

 

Sunday August 11. Aix-Les-Bains.

Vin de jour: Chanre Cigale Core du Rhone.

 

On to Aix-Les-Bains for a walk on the lakefront, and dinner at a bistro. It takes about half an hour before a menu arrives at the table, and this sets the pace for the evening. To hasty Americans, used to the rigors of dinner and a movie in the same evening, this rambling French approach to gastronomy is a little too leisurely. After one brief fight, the kids sleep in the car all the way back to Lyon. Tomorrow - "Renault Twingo" is French for "Your luggage will not fit".

 

Monday August 12. Grenoble.

Vin de jour: Cidre Brut.

 

The sun is shining through puffy clouds, and it is cool enough that I almost regret my choice of shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt. (The guide book solemnly warned us that shorts are not considered to be appropriate wear by the French, and that men are likely to be refused admission to churches if they are wearing them. In spite of the peril to my chances of salvation, I have decided to inflict my knees on the French nation anyway.)

As well as trading homes with M. Ribaud, we have also traded cars. It takes a lot of creative effort to pack the American Family Conway with all our luggage for the next couple of weeks into a Renault Twingo, but we manage.

 

Grenoble is set in a deep valley between beautiful mountains ­ wooded slopes leading to limestone (?) cliffs. We circle the town on the Rocade Sud, and eventually make it to the Domaine Universitaire. Signposts lead us across the campus to a jugglers' parking lot where we are greeted by security guards who warn us not to leave valuables in our car, even for an instant. Apparently four cars were broken into yesterday, before the festival had even officially started.

 

But registration and the camp site are across a footbridge and round a field, about a quarter-mile from the parking lot. This is too far to carry all our valuables. There are rumors of a back entrance which is closer to the camping, and by getting lost several more times we manage to find it.

 

When I make it over to the camping meadow I suffer from culture shock. There is a vast sea of tents, crammed next to one another. It is hard to cross the field without tripping over guy ropes. Many of the eventual 2,247 jugglers are already here, and I hardly know any of them. I am used to being able to walk into any congregation of jugglers and recognize at least half the faces.

 

We find Tom Renegade near the registration desk and chat with him. We ask him if there will be a show tonight. "Yes," he says, "but they can be pretty awful. They can go on till 5 a.m. with one bad act after another." I am amused that the person who pioneered open stage shows at juggling festivals is so pessimistic.

 

Over a snack in the restaurant tent we chat with Jochen Schell. In the public show he is performing the ring routine he showed at the IJA festival in Vegas. "I don't do diabolo at juggling festivals any more," he tells us. "Now everybody can do my tricks." Moves that were innovative and breathtaking eight years ago are now commonplace. Luckily for Jochen, he is still as creative as ever, as his ring routine demonstrates.

 

We finally get around to putting the kids to bed at about 11 p.m., as the open stage is starting. We make it to the last three acts of the show. There is a woman called Noelle who does a dance and diabolo routine, a guy called Phoenix who swings fire, (two ropes with three flaming wicks on each, a nice effect) and a guy from Egypt who does a very hot diabolo routine. He needs three attempts for a move that goes from a whip catch straight into a duicide, but he nails it in the end. The show certainly does not live down to Tom Renegade's expectations, either in length or quality.

 

And so to bed, carrying not all my valuables, but at least cash, passports, tickets, credit cards, and the laptop on which this deathless prose is being crafted.

 

Tuesday, August 13. Grenoble.

Vin dujour: Biere Kronenbourg.

 

There is great juggling in the gym this morning. Francoise Rochais is cruising with six batons and getting good runs with seven. Next to her someone is working on three diabolos on the string - he usually gets them around three or four times before the pattern falls apart. It is very fast - making corrections to that one is going to be a bitch, but I am sure someone will master it before long. Awesome two diabolo routines are becoming commonplace, so somebody has to push the limits.

 

Outside on the grass I find a clear corner to crack whips. A German whip cracker, Ullich, comes over and we work out together for a while. While we are practicing I see somebody stack two spinning balls, transfer the stack to his left hand and then put more spin on the bottom ball with his right. OK, so that is how you keep a two ball stack going forever!

 

On the other side of the campground from the gym and race track, there is the main service area with restaurant tent, bar tent, workshop tent, three vendor tents and a big top for the open stage shows. I find the Kaskade table in one of the vendor tents and meet editor Gabi Keast. I have corresponded with her a lot while working on articles for Kaskade. It is nice to put a face to the Compuserve account.

 

There is a meeting in which one of the organizers explains how they are dealing with problems. Apparently more telephones and more portable lavatories are on the way. The portable toilets that are here are the uniquely French design that have a shallow bowl and two platforms for your feet. OK, I can deal with that. Harder to deal with are the signs everywhere saying "Please do not mistake the trees for toilets." This seems most unrepresentative of the typical French attitude toward elimination. A friend of mine when inquiring for the pissoir was once told, "Mais Monsieur, vous avez tous la France."

 

In the afternoon we are bussed to downtown Grenoble for the parade. Perhaps there are 1,000 jugglers there, blocking traffic, jumping into fountains, climbing onto bus stops, lamp posts and churches, spitting fire and, oh yes, juggling. Going down a narrow cobbled alley, a diabolo tossed high is caught by a lady leaning from a third floor window, to great applause. Around the corner we pass Rabelais' house, though I don't think he lives there any more. The whole thing is great, exuberant fun, a quarter-mile rolling parry led by a fine group of drummers, and followed by a fine bunch of party animals.