Oh, my. How can I even begin to describe what happened yesterday? It feels like a dream, but at the same time it's so real and vivid. (I suppose it helps that my new laptop background is a certain photo...) Regardless of how positively difficult it might be, I shall attempt to chronicle the events of yesterday. (If I don't, I seem to have a habit of rapidly forgetting it.)
Yesterday started out like normal, of course. I woke up at 6:45, got dressed, and went to take a test in my Québec culture class at 8:30. As much as I love the subject matter, I found the class itself to be immensely difficult. But that's beside the point. I finished the test at around 9:30 and, since it was raining, took the underground tunnel system from le Pavillon Desjardins to Lacerte, my residence building. It was actually the first time I'd taken the tunnel system, having pretty much forgotten about it, but I intend to show it to Lauren today at some point since she'll love the art all over the place. Anyway. I went back to the dorm, took a small nap, and finished getting ready. I was originally going to wear the long, black dress I got for The Lion King last summer, but I wanted something a little less dressy, so I settled with my light blue top with the laced back and a denim skirt. Not bad, methinks. Since we needed to leave very shortly after Lauren got back from her class at 12, I made us some PB&J sandwiches and had them ready by the time she got home so we could munch and go. Which we did.
The rain had lightened up by the time we headed to the bus stop at Desjardins. I had been worried about the weather all week since weather.com insisted that Québec and Lévis would be plagued with scattered and isolated thunder storms and the concert was outdoors. Nevertheless, I refused to let that bring me down too much. We took our regular accordion bus to the Station Place d'Youville, which is right by where we stayed in our hotel at the beginning of July, and squeezed our way through the crowd down rue St-Jean. We made it all the way down the steps to Basse-Québec and then finally down to the ferry station to take the, you guessed it, ferry to Lévis. We arrived at exactly the right time, 1:30, and the ferry left mere minutes after we got on. I had been planning everything to the T for about two weeks, making sure we knew exactly where we were going, and everything went smoothly. Go me.
Lauren and I arrived in Lévis at about 1:45 or so. The first thing we did was find the stage. What we needed to do was go right a little ways down the street and up the side of a cliff by means of a steep staircase. Boy, was that fun. Then the stage was directly up the street (literally up - don't you love hills). The first thing we saw was a barrier closing off the road to traffic, so we figured that was it. When we passed the barrier, it became all too clear that we were, in fact, in the right place. Directly in front of us was the stage, which was situated in a little square area. Lauren and I hung out for a bit, looking around. We saw Maurice, Bruno's tour manager, to whom we would need to speak a little later. Then Lauren froze.
"Ashlee," she said, her eyes growing wide, "turn around. That man . . .that man in the plaid giving the interview. . . . Is that . . .?"
I turned around and, sure enough, there he was. "Yep, that's Bruno," I said, sounding amazingly calm. I don't know why on earth I was so calm since I had been bouncing off the walls the entire past week. Lauren was in shock, but for some reason I was mellow. But it was an amazing moment for both of us, just to see him for the first time. For me, I hadn't seen him in almost four years. Lauren had never seen him. She had been waiting six or seven years to see him and there he was, just casually standing there in front of a camera. He was giving an interview not too far from us, and we inched slowly closer, not wanting to get too close and get his attention, but just a liiiittle closer. When he went to go give another interview a few paces away, Lauren and I decided to walk around Lévis a bit until we met up with Ekaterina and her family.
What's interesting to note is how chill everyone is. If this were a concert in the U.S., Lauren and I wouldn't have been able to get anywhere close to the stage or to Bruno. When I was in Montréal, my friend François told me that if people saw Bruno on the streets, they would just be like, "Oh, look, it's Bruno Pelletier." The idea is that celebrities in Québec are just people, which is true, but it's such a different way of looking at it from the American standard. In America, celebrities are mini-gods. The Québec view is one of the reasons why I love the fact that I have so many favorite artists in Québec: because they are so accessible. For crying out loud, I had singing lessons with one of my all-time favorite singers. How often to fans of American artists get to do that? (I'm not saying that one nationality is better than the other - I like plenty of American groups and artists. I'm just saying I love the personal accessibility.)
Lauren and I (well, I kind of dragged her) decided to walk in front of the stage on the sidewalk on the other side of the square to get to another street. This meant walking by Bruno. He was off to the side, a good distance away from us, and we wanted to be absolutely sure that we didn't get his attention, distract him, or anything like that. Honestly, we just wanted to walk. We passed Maurice and his tour people with no problem (again - not something that would happen in the U.S.) and glanced at Bruno to our right as he gave the interview. Well, I did. Lauren refused to.
We had a little time to kill, so we walked up to the Terrasse de Lévis to get a view of the river and of Québec. We absolutely love looking at the Château Frontenac, even though we've seen it so many times. It never gets old. As we sat down on a bench, Lauren and I began to notice just how much our attitudes had switched. I was pretty chill and calm about the whole thing, but she was bouncing off the figurative walls. It was quite adorable. I was the exact same way when I saw Bruno for the first time, so I'm not one to talk.
At around 2:30 we headed back to Côte du Passage, the street where the concert would take place, and met up with Ekaterina and her family. It was like one big Bruno celebration. (I'd never met Ekaterina beforehand, but now I can probably safely say I've met three-fourths of Bruno's U.S. fans.) We talked a little about meeting Bruno, and she said that she had been told that Bruno remembered me from last time. It took a second for me to register this fact. We hung out for a little bit, chatting until it was time to go meet Maurice. We were instructed to find him from three o'clock to four, before the sound check. Though we had seen him earlier, he had disappeared by this point. We waited by the barriers the blocked off the area beside the stage with the tents and the trailer for about five minutes until Maurice suddenly appeared. He and Ekaterina greeted each other and then Lauren and I introduced ourselves. Maurice informed us that we would be meeting Bruno separately, and, all of sudden, told Lauren and I to follow him and told Ekaterina and her family to wait there.
The only thought going through my head as we followed Maurice to the small parking lot/trailer area was, "I'm not ready. I'm not ready." By now my calm, chill attitude had completely vanished. I was freaking out. I didn't know what to say, what to do. Last time I'd met Bruno, I had made a fool of myself. I didn't want to do the same thing three-and-a-half years later. We stopped outside the big, white trailer and Maurice popped his head into the door to let Bruno know that we were there. While we waited, we chatted a bit with Maurice, about how last time I couldn't even speak French and that now I was really nervous, and he said it was no big deal.
Then, suddenly, the door to the trailer opened and Bruno appeared. I stopped mid-sentence, turned to look at him, and chirped, "Bonjour!" Apparently Lauren could only stare for a moment. Bruno came down the steps and greeted us, first talking to me for a moment and asking how I was. I admit, my voice was a little high-pitched for a bit. When he asked Lauren her name, it occurred to me that he really did remember me. He had spoken to me like he knew me, not like someone he was meeting for the first time. Him remembering me from October of 2009 was not something I had anticipated at all. He meets so many fans all the time, how could he possibly remember one young woman from four years ago? I find it rather crazy.
I wish I remember exactly what we talked about. He asked us how long we had been in Québec and if we liked it. He asked Lauren what she was studying in college, and she said that she was going to be a graphic arts designer, which he seemed to think was cool. When he mentioned my own studies, he seemed to kind of already know. I think he said something along the lines of, "So you're studying French . . .?" to which I replied in the affirmative. When we were talking about the fact that Lauren is an artist, I kind of nodded toward the white folder she was holding. He looked at it and said rather mischievously and knowingly, "Do you have something to show me?" Lauren smiled and said, "Yeeeees," in her adorable, shy way. Both he and Maurice were very impressed with Lauren's art. Bruno said he remembered the two photo shoots, when they were, and said that "it really looks like me." Bruno also said that she is very good at capturing faces. Lauren about died, let me just say. At the bottom of one of the drawings was where Lauren had signed it. It's said, "Bon anniversaire, cher Bruno! Lauren 'rat-patooty' Priest (18)" He read all of this aloud (at which point Lauren and I remembered to wish him a bonne fête en retard) and the way he said "rat-patooty" was quite funny. I explained that it came from the would "ratatouille," and he nodded as if that made sense, and Lauren explained that it was her name on deviantART. He asked what the 18 was for, and she said that that was how old she had been when she drew it. He replied, "So how old are you now?" and when he both replied that we were almost 22, he looked at me and said, "You have almost 22, too?" Heehee. Have. I love it.
Bruno is very inquisitive. He asked lots of questions, like why Lauren had a key around her wrist, when we were going back to the U.S., etc. What I thought was wonderful was that when he saw that Lauren was a little shyer and not saying much, he made an effort to talk to her, both in French and English. He spoke mainly to me in French, because that was what I wanted, but he took Lauren's lead and spoke whatever language she wanted. In the beginning, he'd asked if she spoke French, too, and she said she was "studying" it, and I had to assure him that she did, in fact, speak French. He and Maurice both seemed impressed by the fact that I spoke French almost the whole time; probably since they knew I hadn't spoken it at all the last time I saw them. What Lauren and I both noticed was that, while talking to Bruno, my French and my fluidity was the best it's ever been over the past few weeks. I rarely stumbled, and if I did, I picked myself back up again. I've never been able to speak to fluidly or quickly, and I had been worried that I wouldn't be able to speak French at all. The fact that Maurice even told Ekaterina later that I spoke French the whole time, that he was that impressed, made me oh so very fuzzy.
What was probably my favorite part was when we mentioned that we went to Montréal a couple of weekends ago. I told him that I had met Gabrielle Destroismaisons and that I had had vocal coaching with her. I also told him that she had practically threatened my life if I didn't say hi for her. My words were, "Elle m'a dit à te dire qu'elle dit 'Bonjour.'" I also added, in English, that she had said, "Really, tell him I say hi! I have his personal email, so I'll know if you tell him or not!" Bruno thought this was quite humorous, and said that he would Tweet her on Twitter to let her know that I said hi. I hope he does; if not, I will. :P He then proceeded to ask about the coaching that she was doing, so I explained what exactly it was, and told him that, at the end, we all wanted to sing a song together that we all know, so we decided, "Aime!" He thought this was rather funny, as well. I told him that we all just sat together, the three "students" and Gabrielle, and sang Aime, and he just laughed and said, "Oh, Gabrielle." Bruno said that she is such a good singer and that she has such a good soul, which I found adorable since she said pretty much the exact same thing about him.
One other thing we talked about was the fact that I had begun to study French just because I wanted to understand his lyrics, and I thanked him for his music and for giving me this new-found passion and life in French, and he was just like, "Ah, no biggy." It was funny. At one point, while we were in the middle of talking, a woman walked by and positively gushed at him, squealing about how much she loved Le temps des cathédrales and asked if she could take a picture with him. Bruno was very polite and said, "Of course!" and gave the camera to Maurice to take the picture. As he got into position, he said, "Sorry, girls," to us, switching to random English for a moment. When the woman left, we happily resumed our conversation. After what felt like two seconds but was actually probably closer to 10 to 15 minutes, it was time to go. Lauren and I asked if we could each get a picture with him, and he responded with the same, "Of course!" I was first, and when he put his arm around me, I about died. Why? Because when I first saw him in 2009, the Swine Flu was going around, and he wasn't getting that close to his fans for pictures. And now his arm was around me. It was awesome. XD After my picture, I took Lauren's camera to take hers, but for some reason it wouldn't take. When I put the camera down, he started to head back into the trailer, but I quickly asked him if we could try again. There was no way I was letting Lauren leave without a picture. She had me take a picture of the ground to see if it worked (it did - and she posted it on Facebook for some odd reason) and then I took the picture of the two of them. We thanked him and said goodbye, and headed back out to where Ekaterina and her family were waiting.
My personal favorite songs of the evening were Ma vie, Kiss from a Rose, and With or Without You. Of course I loved Le temps des cathédrales and Miserere - who doesn't? He had a new arrangement of Aime, which was absolutely beautiful and a little different. He teased the audience about not knowing the words to Hotel California (I think Lauren and I were the loudest ones singing with him), said that that day was his wedding anniversary and was thereby obligated by his wife to sing their song, Just the Way You Are as "payback" for not remembering at first what the 8th of August was. Ooooopsie.
Lauren and I arrived in Lévis at about 1:45 or so. The first thing we did was find the stage. What we needed to do was go right a little ways down the street and up the side of a cliff by means of a steep staircase. Boy, was that fun. Then the stage was directly up the street (literally up - don't you love hills). The first thing we saw was a barrier closing off the road to traffic, so we figured that was it. When we passed the barrier, it became all too clear that we were, in fact, in the right place. Directly in front of us was the stage, which was situated in a little square area. Lauren and I hung out for a bit, looking around. We saw Maurice, Bruno's tour manager, to whom we would need to speak a little later. Then Lauren froze.
"Ashlee," she said, her eyes growing wide, "turn around. That man . . .that man in the plaid giving the interview. . . . Is that . . .?"
I turned around and, sure enough, there he was. "Yep, that's Bruno," I said, sounding amazingly calm. I don't know why on earth I was so calm since I had been bouncing off the walls the entire past week. Lauren was in shock, but for some reason I was mellow. But it was an amazing moment for both of us, just to see him for the first time. For me, I hadn't seen him in almost four years. Lauren had never seen him. She had been waiting six or seven years to see him and there he was, just casually standing there in front of a camera. He was giving an interview not too far from us, and we inched slowly closer, not wanting to get too close and get his attention, but just a liiiittle closer. When he went to go give another interview a few paces away, Lauren and I decided to walk around Lévis a bit until we met up with Ekaterina and her family.
What's interesting to note is how chill everyone is. If this were a concert in the U.S., Lauren and I wouldn't have been able to get anywhere close to the stage or to Bruno. When I was in Montréal, my friend François told me that if people saw Bruno on the streets, they would just be like, "Oh, look, it's Bruno Pelletier." The idea is that celebrities in Québec are just people, which is true, but it's such a different way of looking at it from the American standard. In America, celebrities are mini-gods. The Québec view is one of the reasons why I love the fact that I have so many favorite artists in Québec: because they are so accessible. For crying out loud, I had singing lessons with one of my all-time favorite singers. How often to fans of American artists get to do that? (I'm not saying that one nationality is better than the other - I like plenty of American groups and artists. I'm just saying I love the personal accessibility.)
Lauren and I (well, I kind of dragged her) decided to walk in front of the stage on the sidewalk on the other side of the square to get to another street. This meant walking by Bruno. He was off to the side, a good distance away from us, and we wanted to be absolutely sure that we didn't get his attention, distract him, or anything like that. Honestly, we just wanted to walk. We passed Maurice and his tour people with no problem (again - not something that would happen in the U.S.) and glanced at Bruno to our right as he gave the interview. Well, I did. Lauren refused to.
We had a little time to kill, so we walked up to the Terrasse de Lévis to get a view of the river and of Québec. We absolutely love looking at the Château Frontenac, even though we've seen it so many times. It never gets old. As we sat down on a bench, Lauren and I began to notice just how much our attitudes had switched. I was pretty chill and calm about the whole thing, but she was bouncing off the figurative walls. It was quite adorable. I was the exact same way when I saw Bruno for the first time, so I'm not one to talk.
At around 2:30 we headed back to Côte du Passage, the street where the concert would take place, and met up with Ekaterina and her family. It was like one big Bruno celebration. (I'd never met Ekaterina beforehand, but now I can probably safely say I've met three-fourths of Bruno's U.S. fans.) We talked a little about meeting Bruno, and she said that she had been told that Bruno remembered me from last time. It took a second for me to register this fact. We hung out for a little bit, chatting until it was time to go meet Maurice. We were instructed to find him from three o'clock to four, before the sound check. Though we had seen him earlier, he had disappeared by this point. We waited by the barriers the blocked off the area beside the stage with the tents and the trailer for about five minutes until Maurice suddenly appeared. He and Ekaterina greeted each other and then Lauren and I introduced ourselves. Maurice informed us that we would be meeting Bruno separately, and, all of sudden, told Lauren and I to follow him and told Ekaterina and her family to wait there.
The only thought going through my head as we followed Maurice to the small parking lot/trailer area was, "I'm not ready. I'm not ready." By now my calm, chill attitude had completely vanished. I was freaking out. I didn't know what to say, what to do. Last time I'd met Bruno, I had made a fool of myself. I didn't want to do the same thing three-and-a-half years later. We stopped outside the big, white trailer and Maurice popped his head into the door to let Bruno know that we were there. While we waited, we chatted a bit with Maurice, about how last time I couldn't even speak French and that now I was really nervous, and he said it was no big deal.
Then, suddenly, the door to the trailer opened and Bruno appeared. I stopped mid-sentence, turned to look at him, and chirped, "Bonjour!" Apparently Lauren could only stare for a moment. Bruno came down the steps and greeted us, first talking to me for a moment and asking how I was. I admit, my voice was a little high-pitched for a bit. When he asked Lauren her name, it occurred to me that he really did remember me. He had spoken to me like he knew me, not like someone he was meeting for the first time. Him remembering me from October of 2009 was not something I had anticipated at all. He meets so many fans all the time, how could he possibly remember one young woman from four years ago? I find it rather crazy.
I wish I remember exactly what we talked about. He asked us how long we had been in Québec and if we liked it. He asked Lauren what she was studying in college, and she said that she was going to be a graphic arts designer, which he seemed to think was cool. When he mentioned my own studies, he seemed to kind of already know. I think he said something along the lines of, "So you're studying French . . .?" to which I replied in the affirmative. When we were talking about the fact that Lauren is an artist, I kind of nodded toward the white folder she was holding. He looked at it and said rather mischievously and knowingly, "Do you have something to show me?" Lauren smiled and said, "Yeeeees," in her adorable, shy way. Both he and Maurice were very impressed with Lauren's art. Bruno said he remembered the two photo shoots, when they were, and said that "it really looks like me." Bruno also said that she is very good at capturing faces. Lauren about died, let me just say. At the bottom of one of the drawings was where Lauren had signed it. It's said, "Bon anniversaire, cher Bruno! Lauren 'rat-patooty' Priest (18)" He read all of this aloud (at which point Lauren and I remembered to wish him a bonne fête en retard) and the way he said "rat-patooty" was quite funny. I explained that it came from the would "ratatouille," and he nodded as if that made sense, and Lauren explained that it was her name on deviantART. He asked what the 18 was for, and she said that that was how old she had been when she drew it. He replied, "So how old are you now?" and when he both replied that we were almost 22, he looked at me and said, "You have almost 22, too?" Heehee. Have. I love it.
Bruno is very inquisitive. He asked lots of questions, like why Lauren had a key around her wrist, when we were going back to the U.S., etc. What I thought was wonderful was that when he saw that Lauren was a little shyer and not saying much, he made an effort to talk to her, both in French and English. He spoke mainly to me in French, because that was what I wanted, but he took Lauren's lead and spoke whatever language she wanted. In the beginning, he'd asked if she spoke French, too, and she said she was "studying" it, and I had to assure him that she did, in fact, speak French. He and Maurice both seemed impressed by the fact that I spoke French almost the whole time; probably since they knew I hadn't spoken it at all the last time I saw them. What Lauren and I both noticed was that, while talking to Bruno, my French and my fluidity was the best it's ever been over the past few weeks. I rarely stumbled, and if I did, I picked myself back up again. I've never been able to speak to fluidly or quickly, and I had been worried that I wouldn't be able to speak French at all. The fact that Maurice even told Ekaterina later that I spoke French the whole time, that he was that impressed, made me oh so very fuzzy.
What was probably my favorite part was when we mentioned that we went to Montréal a couple of weekends ago. I told him that I had met Gabrielle Destroismaisons and that I had had vocal coaching with her. I also told him that she had practically threatened my life if I didn't say hi for her. My words were, "Elle m'a dit à te dire qu'elle dit 'Bonjour.'" I also added, in English, that she had said, "Really, tell him I say hi! I have his personal email, so I'll know if you tell him or not!" Bruno thought this was quite humorous, and said that he would Tweet her on Twitter to let her know that I said hi. I hope he does; if not, I will. :P He then proceeded to ask about the coaching that she was doing, so I explained what exactly it was, and told him that, at the end, we all wanted to sing a song together that we all know, so we decided, "Aime!" He thought this was rather funny, as well. I told him that we all just sat together, the three "students" and Gabrielle, and sang Aime, and he just laughed and said, "Oh, Gabrielle." Bruno said that she is such a good singer and that she has such a good soul, which I found adorable since she said pretty much the exact same thing about him.
One other thing we talked about was the fact that I had begun to study French just because I wanted to understand his lyrics, and I thanked him for his music and for giving me this new-found passion and life in French, and he was just like, "Ah, no biggy." It was funny. At one point, while we were in the middle of talking, a woman walked by and positively gushed at him, squealing about how much she loved Le temps des cathédrales and asked if she could take a picture with him. Bruno was very polite and said, "Of course!" and gave the camera to Maurice to take the picture. As he got into position, he said, "Sorry, girls," to us, switching to random English for a moment. When the woman left, we happily resumed our conversation. After what felt like two seconds but was actually probably closer to 10 to 15 minutes, it was time to go. Lauren and I asked if we could each get a picture with him, and he responded with the same, "Of course!" I was first, and when he put his arm around me, I about died. Why? Because when I first saw him in 2009, the Swine Flu was going around, and he wasn't getting that close to his fans for pictures. And now his arm was around me. It was awesome. XD After my picture, I took Lauren's camera to take hers, but for some reason it wouldn't take. When I put the camera down, he started to head back into the trailer, but I quickly asked him if we could try again. There was no way I was letting Lauren leave without a picture. She had me take a picture of the ground to see if it worked (it did - and she posted it on Facebook for some odd reason) and then I took the picture of the two of them. We thanked him and said goodbye, and headed back out to where Ekaterina and her family were waiting.
Siiiigh. While we waited for Ekaterina to finish talking to Bruno, Lauren and I gushed and gushed and gushed about what had just happened. We were in shock. When Ekaterina and her family emerged, we all walked down the street to Chocolats Favoris, a great ice cream shop. You can have soft-serve vanilla dipped in hardening syrup. I had vanilla dipped in white chocolate. AMAZING.
After our ice cream break, Ekaterina, Lauren, and I really wanted to go watch Bruno's sound check. Her family didn't, so they went to go hang out while the three of us super-mega-fans went back to the venue, settled in the chairs that Ekaterina had brought, and watched. It was rather fun. He grinned at us at one point, and that was even more fun. When they finished the sound check, he said "Merci, tout le monde!" with a grin to all those few who had been watching, and left the stage. A little while later we saw him heading down the street, presumably to get some dinner before the show. Sooooo we waited.
And waited. And waited. And waited. Not that we minded. We hung out, talked, gushed, talked, and gushed some more. When it was about an hour before the start of the performance, Lauren and I left the chairs to stand in front of the barrier, which would be our spot for the evening. Let me just say, it was an amazing spot. We would be right to Bruno's left, literally about ten feet away from the microphone. At 7:30, the sponsors and directors for the festival came onto the stage and talked for quite a while about the festival itself and its sponsors and money and all that fun stuff. Finally he introduced, "le GrosZorchestre!" and the group came out: Julie Lamontagne on the piano, Dave Watts on the bass, and Richard Irwin on the drums. They did an opening number before Bruno jogged out in a lovely suit with a dark blue shirt and sang Just You, Just Me and then Fragile. It was so amazing to see him in front of us, singing with that unreal voice of his. It was incredible.
My personal favorite songs of the evening were Ma vie, Kiss from a Rose, and With or Without You. Of course I loved Le temps des cathédrales and Miserere - who doesn't? He had a new arrangement of Aime, which was absolutely beautiful and a little different. He teased the audience about not knowing the words to Hotel California (I think Lauren and I were the loudest ones singing with him), said that that day was his wedding anniversary and was thereby obligated by his wife to sing their song, Just the Way You Are as "payback" for not remembering at first what the 8th of August was. Ooooopsie.
The show was absolutely amazing. When it was all over, Lauren and I were in shock. But, gradually, we came to. We said goodbye to Ekaterina and started back on the walk down the hill and the long staircase. On the ferry, looking out at le Château Frontenac, we got a little emotional. We knew that our trip was just about over. We were ready for classes to end, but not ready to leave Québec. We're still not. The past five weeks have been absolutely unbelievable. I am so incredibly lucky and blessed to have had so many amazing opportunities. All I know is that I have to come back. And hopefully it won't be another four years before I can do so. :)
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