Dancing with the Basques in Bayonne

Dear Reader,

As a traveler I've had many memorable nights, my husband too. They just come with the territory particularly if you are open to new and fresh ideas or adventures. One that I have fond memories was in a most unlikely place, Bayonne, France which is south of Bordeaux and the Atlantic coast near the Pyrenees. It's the ugly stepsister of her fancy resort of Biarritz just a bit further down the coast. . Bayonne is by no means ugly. I found it very pretty with lots of medieval half timbered buildings and cobbled streets and canals with little bridges. It was quite charming, just not a tourist destination such as Biarritz. But I had a particular reason to go to Bayonne, Basque food. The wonderful jamon, a thin but very strong ham is the main course of many dishes along with chicken and they like their food spicy. They also cook with a lot of tomatoes and cheese too. All in all, a nice change of pace and a mixture of flavors I approve of. Another specialty of Bayonne are the oysters which you can buy right on the street from street vendors. They are smaller and salty and delicious

Needless to say as soon as we arrived in Bayonne, once we had settled into our hotel, we set off in search of good food. We first stopped at an Huitres (oysters) stand and had them fresh from the sea. Then we found a good and traditional place for dinner. I had the jamon covered with melted cheese and a spicy tomato sauce. It was delicious. John had chicken Basquez which is made completely out of hot peppers and which I have since had to learn to prepare. Both dishes were really good so we were satisfied.

It was quite late when we finished dinner and as we walked the dark and deserted streets on a working night it was rather spooky but then we heard the music. First there was the base with a very familiar sound, then voices in the distance singing what was at first incoherent but eventually became more familiar as we approached. It was Pink Floyd, "The Wall" and it was very loud. So were the voices singing along with it. It appeared to be coming from the building to our left so we nodded at each other and decided to go inside.

It was a small bar with a couple of tables on one wall and the bar on the opposite wall though there was a back room which was empty at the time. The scene we walked into was great. There were two bartenders, a male and female, wiping and serving and singing "The Wall" at the top of their lungs along with their handful of guests, two females and two guys. They knew the English lyrics quite well though as it turns out they didn't speak a lick of English. Only Ernestina, the bartender spoke any English at all.

We were a bit out of place, being obvious tourists and not Basques but joined in heartily singing "We don't need no education." with everyone else. This got good notice and then we were able to order drinks. We accepted Ernestina's recommendation and drank what everyone was drinking which was quite strong but tasted good. I believe it was orange. After the song the others gathered around us talking and hoping we'd understand. I tried my best French with them and they didn't seem to understand a bit of it. Ernestina was the only person who understood me. I believe that's because she came from some other part of France but the Basques speak their own language so it looked hopeless. But Ernestina was very helpful and able to translate for us and this got a lot more attention from our new found friends. She put on a Beatles tune which we all belted out at the top of our lungs and laughed about it.

This was turning into a very raucous party. The girls grabbed me and took me aside and bombarded me with questions which I tried my best to answer with Ernestina's help. They wanted to know about work and clothes and family and America and everything. They were also smashed and perhaps also a bit drugged so they weren't easy to follow. During the course of the conversation I discovered that one of the gals daughter was in the hospital after an OD and her friends brought her to the bar to comfort her. She was the loudest and craziest of the bunch too and had a multitude of tatoos as well as piercings everywhere.

John was hanging out at the bar between two guys whom he towered over. He said they were too short to communicate with because he couldn't hear their voices way up at his height. ha ha, I figured it was more the combination of their Basque/French and drunkeness than a height differential. One guy was determined to teach John how to Basque Clap. It's very important according to him that you know how to clap properly making a hollow sound with your hands to accompany Basque music which is very sad and soulfoul and dramatic. Lots of crying and screaming accompanies Basque music. When John finally gave up trying the clapping, I joined in and learned it pretty quickly. But now another guy had latched on to John. This guy looked like a thug and he kept slapping some tool into his palm. He was trying to explain to John that he was a truck driver and had to be ready at all times for a fight because when they get into auto accidents, they always fight. He showed John how he wraps a roll of quarters in his fist to gain the upper hand. This was all interesting but a bit frightening too. Ernestina told us to just ignore him. He's always telling everyone this. So we did.

A wild song came on the radio and we all liked it and were singing along when one of the gals jumped up onto one of the dining tables and began to do a rather sexy writhing suggestive dance requiring good balance. But then while swinging her arms around, she smacked into the wall sconce and broke it right off the wall. I drew my breath because I thought she was in trouble but all Ernestina did was come dancing out from behind the bar with a push broom and we followed her around dancing in a line and patting her behind. It was so funny. After that challenge, we all had to do it, we women, that is. So the crazy gal got on a table and danced rather wildly and jerky but she didn't break any more lights, she just fell off the table. Then it was my turn. I had to try after all so I decided to be conservative and was lucky to have a song that was easy to dance to normally. I threw in a few of my best moves like spinning around and the slide but made sure not to fall or break anything. I got a big round of applause from everyone in the room for that.

Perhaps this was all a test because before I knew it the crazy girl had grabbed me by the hand hard, she had hands like vices, and slung me across the room before I could even react. She said she was going to teach me Basque dancing. I tried to beg off but she wouldn't have it and she walked up to me and spun me around and then let me go again. I was a bit dizzy and disoriented but this did not deter my determined teacher. She finally managed to teach me about 6 steps, each one requiring all my concentration not to fall, and we managed a complete dance to my amazement. She was one strong chick for a skinny broad. She grabbed me and slammed me into her and before I was oriented, would shove me away so hard I would almost fall down before she would grab my hand and swing me around her. I'm glad I hadn't had too much hard liquor that night or Ernestina would have been dancing with her mop instead.

After they all got tired they talked about going to see the crazy girl's daughter at the hospital. She started getting really maudlin so to take her mind off of it, her friends invited her out to breakfast to cheer her up before the hospital. She seemed to like the idea but wanted us to join them. It was almost 5:00AM already and we had had a big dinner so we gracefully begged off. Our plan had been to get an early start the next day for our drive along the Pyrenees and we had several stops to make along the way. They finally drug her out of the bar and we waived goodbye. Then we said goodbye to our generous hosts, Ernestina and her husband and thanked them heartily for their generousity to strangers.

It was a good evening complete with good music and good company. We also learned lots of new things so it was very educational as well. All this for the price of an orange colored drink.

A Bientot