Bastille Day!

[caption id="attachment_662" align="aligncenter" width="800"] The parade Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

This Bastille Day was celebrated with the usual style in our village. I have photographs of this going back twenty years now, and it's amazing to see how people have aged. Children who used to run around the square or sit on the banc outside our house have children of their own now. It's always the same band, who come from the next town.  And it's always the same tunes...The gentleman below is the band leader, and durng the less formal parts of the programme he wanders about entertaining the masses

[caption id="attachment_665" align="aligncenter" width="800"] A traditional vin d'honneur was served Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_664" align="aligncenter" width="760"] Village kids put on a spectacle Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

The children from the local school always put on a little show for Bastille Day.  In years gone by this too was much bigger, but rural depopulation is biting in la France profonde, unhappily. Still they do their best.

[caption id="attachment_663" align="aligncenter" width="726"] Village kids put on a spectacle Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_661" align="aligncenter" width="711"] The crowd gets smaller every year but they still enjoyed it Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_660" align="aligncenter" width="790"] More of the crowd Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_659" align="aligncenter" width="714"] Bastille Day: Les anciens combattants Pic: Rod Fleming[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_658" align="aligncenter" width="800"] TheMayor, Christian Poulot, lays flowers during the Ceremony of Remembrance Pic Rod Fleming[/caption]