normandy travel blog

When i was 13, i went on a tour of Northern France with my basketball team to play at High Schools in the most grey and sullen towns that Normandy could muster (think The Road). This 5-day series of sporting Waterloos (i wish) was punctuated by a pretty incongruous day out at a war memorial site. I can't remember its name but it was absolutely vast, and a seminal pit-stop on a tour of Great War attrocities . It should have been a solemn place, but it wasn't. Oddly, there was no sadness in our teenage mourning that freezing afternoon, and as far as I can tell, the mourning of the other visitors.

There was a well-thumbed book in a monument building - a Yellow Pages of those who fell in the War and were buried there. We each took turns to leaf through the laminated pages in search of a war hero who also bore our names. (Predictibly, I didn't find one matching my non-surname - a pesky registrar and illiterate ancestor made sure of that many years ago) There was little remorse in this, but a boyish pride and nostalgia. For me, it was not put there to allow a personalised account of the thousands of white marble crosses, but a chance to feel some visible patriotism, by knowing that a relative contributed to the grand declarations of chivalry plastered on the walls. This was a chance to revel in the regalia of the catalogue of the dead, and in the achievement of people i felt i knew. Like looking for friends in a school photo or a sibling's name on the board of sports captains in the school hall.

It felt like mourning to be seen as mourning; outwardly paying my dues for not having to speak German. I remember my self-congratulations at the saintly humility of trudging down the rows of allied men, then turning to walk with the Schmidts and Mullers. I'd like to think that ever year on the 11th November, i stand at the rain at the Old Steine for different reasons. I'm not convinced.

I' about to leave the flat to meet a colleague for a tour around the China People's Revolution Military Museum. I've a feeling it might have a slightly different vibe...