Adventures on Land and Sea, Carole Bumpkus, Excerpt

Adventures on Land and Sea: Searching for Culinary Pleasures in Provence and along the Cote d’Azur (Savoring the Olde Ways Series, Book 4)

Fans of Peter Mayle and Janine Marsh will enjoy this exploration of medieval villages, cultures, and recipes of France’s Provence. This travelogue is Book 4 in the author’s best-selling series, which has won the IPPY gold medal for Best Culinary Travel Series.

Join Carole Bumpus, her husband, Winston, and their friends in Book Four of Savoring the Olde Ways, her culinary-travel series. Following in the footsteps of writer Peter Mayle, Bumpus is on a quest to find the real Provençe. On three separate excursions—from Nice to Nîmes, Moustiers to Marseilles, and San Tropez to San Remy—and while sailing along the Côte d’Azur, she invites you to join her in uncovering the mysteries of Provençe. Are they hidden within their myths, festivals, or traditions? Is it possible they’re veiled in the sheer beauty of the land and sea? Could they be concealed in Roman arenas in Arles, Orange, or Glanum? Or, perhaps, within the ancient methods of traditional cooking or winemaking? Maybe they are hidden in plain sight among the locals who open their hearts, their bistros, and homes to strangers.

Yes, you may find it in chefs while cooking in ancient kitchens, in the smile of the shy barmaid who speaks no English, in the giggle of the Pizza Wagon baby, in the agreeable village baker, or in the patient waiter and harbor master—but you will most especially experience it through friends who fling open their doors to share their families’ recipes. Traveling alongside Bumpus, that is where you’ll discover the real Provençe.

(Excerpt from Adventures on Land and Sea – Tour Three, Chapter 14)

GIFTS FROM THE PAST

I drove to the center of Marseilles near the Vieux-Port (Old Port), where the fishmongers were busy selling their daily catch as the fishing and sailboats competed for dock space. I pulled into a parking garage like I knew what I was doing, and my sister, Melody, and I quickly joined a line for one of our favorite modes of transportation, Le Petit Train. 

“This will be a great way to tour the major sights of this city, especially the Basilica of Notre-Dame-of-la-Garde, which crowns the highest hill,” I said. I rocked back and forth in place recalling the first time I had heard mention of Marseilles.

“Melody, I don’t know if you remember, but when I was in high school, I took a correspondence course in French from the University of Nebraska. Even though my high school offered only Spanish, it arranged for this special course just for me. Even back then, I wanted to learn French.” 

Melody smiled. “Yes, I remember. I think your love of all things French came from our cousins who lived in Paris, right?” This time I grinned. She was right. 

“But my point is, the high school also arranged for a French tutor, Gabrielle (Gaby) Cogswell to work with me in her home every week. She was a French World War I war bride and a complete delight. Anyway, she grew up here in Marseilles. So, as we climb to the top of this city, I want to imagine how her childhood must have been back in the early 1900s. 

“I think I remember her,” Melody said to me. “She was very sweet; a gentle person, and, as I recall, very short like me!”

I laughed, “Yes, I don’t think she made it to five feet tall, but her heart was big. I remember taking my weekly lessons at her kitchen table. (Was this a foreshadowing of future interviews in France? Eating and chatting at a table?) With my sack ‘lunch’ as dinner, we would work together through the conjugation of French verbs and the study of a language of the people I would, decades later, write about with great admiration and joy.”

Melody was patient with my recollections and nodded her head.

“I remember some of the stories she told of being a teenager here during World War I, then of having been swept off her feet by an American G.I. who, after the war, took her home to Nebraska. It was there she made her new husband proud by learning English and embracing the town he loved.
“I asked her how she managed to live in a town where no one spoke French. She told me she had a great incentive: to please her husband whom she adored. I also asked her what differences she found between the two cultures, especially at the time the U.S. prepared for World War II.
‘I recall one incident in particular,’ Gaby had answered, ‘that struck me as a significant difference.’ She paused. “The U.S. had just been attacked at Pearl Harbor, but your country had never had war on its shores like in France. Because the Allies had been the same in both our World Wars, I expected the preparation to have been like what I remembered in Marseilles.”
“Melody, I don’t know why I recall this detail, but I remember she sat back in her chair, with her finger pressing gently on her coffee cup. Her wrinkled finger traveled around the loop of the handle, just like our Swedish grandmother. Grandma, too, did her best thinking in this manner.” 

Melody smiled and nodded. “Yes, she did, didn’t she?”

I continued. “Gaby then spoke, ‘I recall I was happening through the town square one day in 1944 when locals began arriving with armloads of books – books that were either written about Germany or written in German. They were collected from their homes, their personal libraries, and from the schools.’ She described a determined but wild-eyed frenzy which was being exhibited by the people she had come to know as friends. As soon as a pile of books was amassed, the books were set on fire. All semblance of German culture was systematically erased. Even those locals who were of German heritage felt the pressure to burn their own books. Family bibles, which had been so cherished, were placed on the pyre.’ Sadly, she shook her head.
“Did this surprise you?” I asked. “Wasn’t this something all countries did as they prepared to face the enemy?” 

“Mon Dieu, non! Absolutely not! In France, that was the time we were taught to draw those books to us, and to absorb everything we could to better understand our enemy: their thoughts, beliefs, culture and history. We learned early, you should never fight a people or a culture without understanding their ultimate goals. That’s one of the reasons I teach French,” she said to me, as she reached out for my hand.
“Carole,” she said, “remember, one of the most important gifts of learning a new language is not just to speak the words fluently, but to gain an appreciation and understanding of other people.”

As the Petite Train rambled up the steep hills, I realized I had tucked away her admonition. Forty years later I was compelled to write the stories of the French men and women, and their families who had lived with war.

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Category: On Writing