Of silk and spring rolls

This is actually an article I wrote for the newspaper I work for. They published it cut in half and, to compound the felony, spelled my name wrong!


We walked across Place Bellecour, the main square in Lyon - named Lugdunum by the Romans who established it - shivering slightly in the mid-morning chill April breeze. The drive to the small city southwest of Geneva and south of Paris had been a nailbitingly stressful one, with fog whiting out the valley that dipped from the lofty mountains of Switzerland to the plain sandwiched between the Saone and Rhone rivers and the Fourviere and the Croix-Rousse hills that gird the historic old town. We checked into the Hotel Britannia, where we had stayed 20 years earlier, when I was a child in braids. Just across the street was the Vietnamese restaurant where I had learned to use chopsticks and eat tangy spring rolls in what seemed like a lifetime ago. And that’s just what I did this time, too – sitting primly in two inches of lukewarm water in the ubiquitously French hip bath, reading, nibbling on rice-sheet-wrapped veggies dunked in spicy sauce. If there is a heaven, this must be it ….

The next day was a bright and sunny one, albeit chilly. While Papa went to his meetings, Mum and I explored the city that wove a history of our favourite fabric into its culture. Lyon in the 16th century was a rich and burgeoning centre of the silk trade and even today is home to some of the best boutiques de luxe, starting with Printemps and filtering into tiny holes in the wall with prices fit for a roi…or at least a new-age rock star. As a follow up to spending some of Papa’s hard-earned euros, we dropped into the Musee des Tissus, where we listened, sometimes uncomprehending, to details of silk manufacturing, carpet weaving and, to my delight, clothes design. From there, it was a logical step to Musee de Beaux-Arts, where a gorgeous Byzantine head in yellowing ivory caught my fancy – could we get a postcard, s’il vous plait? The next hop was into a make-believe world at the Institut Lumiere, capturing the origins of cinema in the very city that the Lumiere brothers lived and worked. We came out with our eyes dazzled by the klieg lights and our heads full of Gallic verbosity.

It was almost time for lunch – at least, that is what our tummies were saying, mine louder than Mum’s. On cue, just a few steps away from us, was a cart, its containers steaming gently, wafting over a wonderful whiff of fresh bread, sharp mustard and melting cheese. The man in charge beckoned to us. “Bonjour!” he was obviously charmed by Mum, as people inevitably were by her haute chignon, high cheekbones, patrician nose and striking eyebrows. While Mum and man gabbled French at each other, complete with gesticulations and many ‘oui’s, a large vat belched white puffs of steam from under its lid. A big oven emanated an aroma of hot yeasty bread that was a siren call to a clamouring stomach. As we finally walked away from the cart, the man’s ‘au’voir’s echoing across the square, Mum held a daunting length of hot, crusty baguette, slit open to lovingly encase a slab of brie and a slather of butter. In my frozen fingers was ‘le ’ot dog’, in essence a hollowed out tube of the French loaf nesting a hot sausage and a sinus-sparking scoop of ‘extra-fort’ Dijon mustard. We munched contentedly and, in my case, eye-wateringly, wandering towards thanksgiving.

The Primatiale St-Jean in the old part of Lyon is a Gothic chapel that is a soothing place to be grateful to the powers that be for life and all its pleasures. We were just in time for the 16th century clock to ring the hour, and stood watching and listening to the rooster crowing, angels trumpeting and bells pealing. Inside, Mum and I lit candles, saying a silent prayer and heartfelt thanks for everything, from our existence to spring rolls that always made the senses dance.