Messe Rue

So I'm sitting here on a lazy Sunday afternoon minding my own business. My windows are open, I'm reading one of my favorite chapters from Les Miserables, and I'm humming along to Pink Floyd.

All of a sudden I become aware of someone speaking to a crowd through a microphone nearby - it's coming in my windows decently loudly.  I try to ignore it (today is a municipal election day so I thought it had something to do with that, since the main voting area for my arrondissement is just around the block) but it is pretty loud.  I stick my head out my bathroom window, which does not face the town hall but rather faces the river and Notre Dame cathedral, and I can hear the words more clearly.  I still can't make out a lot of them but get the idea that it's some kind of prayer.

Hmmm I think, we just had a couple of Catholic holidays that were unfamiliar to me (Pentecost and the Ascension) could there be another so soon?  Perhaps it's a Muslim holiday but the Paris Mosque is too far away for me to hear.

The guy who was just speaking starts to chant! Cool!  (Some might remember that I occasionally go to the Gregorian chant mass at Notre Dame on Sundays because I looove Gregorian chant.)  That rules out a Muslim or Jewish holiday but what is going on here?  And so loudly that at least 3-4 neighborhoods can hear it clearly?  I might add here that on Pentecost Notre Dame rang its bells for about four hours straight, so they're certainly not adverse to being loud.

I can't figure it out but it does put me out of the mood for Pink Floyd.  After searching Google for a good twenty minutes or so (sure I could have gone to check it out myself but you know, seven flights of stairs and a jaunt across the river is daunting just for the sake of curiosity) I find this: http://www.paris.catholique.fr/Festival-de-la-Rue-et-Messe-Rue-a.html

It's some kind of outdoor mass festival in the square outside Notre Dame, but for some reason the focus is on artists.  There are photographers, painters, comic designers, model makers...lots of stuff.  Also in a couple of hours there will be an "animated" mass as well as a comedic play based on the life of Saint Paul.  Not the funniest guy around but, uh, okay.

Anyway, this event isn't that significant but I wanted to illustrate something that happens here probably at least once a month: I hear some mysterious crowd noises, speeches, or music and it turns out that there is some very random festival happening in my neighborhood.  This happened with two consecutive weekends of a festival/parade of marching bands, a protest/parade of homeless people and their supporters, and of course some rallies surrounding the presidential election (which I will describe in more detail sometime later). 

For the record, the live chant is still going on.  I don't know how Parisian feel about this but I love it!