Happy new year and Jeff Koons

Happy new year 2015. In France, we have until the end of January to wish everyone a happy new year. So let me take this 31 January 2015 to wish you readers a good year ahead. A month is almost over and I hope you are already enjoying this new year.

Over here, things are good. My boys are coughing but not too sick to miss school. A1 told me half his class were not in last friday. A2's class was no better. There were many people down with stomach flu and the common cold. 

The highlight of this month was Epiphany. A2 loves King's cake so much that we had it every weekend (Saturday and Sunday) and I even made it twice. The whole family had the chance to be King or Queen. That just goes to show how many King's cakes we had. 

Another highlight was my company's annual dinner. Before dinner, we attended an organised tour of the exhibition of Jeff Koons at the museum of Centre Pompidou. With the guide's explaination, it helped us to understand better this modern artist and businessman. 

Below, he used stainless steel to make these statues. They were so real that I would love to touch the inflated rabbit to make sure it was hard as steel.

 This hanging heart below weighed a ton though it looked empty and light.

 

 This balloon dog was really lovely to look at. His orange counterpart fetched his master a record of US$58.4 million.

 This float was covered in aluminium and then repainted to make it look like a plastic float. Well, Jeff Koon has 100 artists working for him. I am sure it is easy for him to get his workers to execute his genius ideas.

I do like some of his works and his ideas. However, knowing that he has workers executing his art pieces, I find him more of a businessman than an art master.

If you are interested to read more about his works, I found this post talking about Jeff Koon's art show in New York. The one at Centre Pompidou was similar.click here to see the site.

Galette des rois

Despite missing Chinese New Year in Singapore, I do enjoy other festive celebrations in France. I love Christmas in France. Right after Christmas and New Year, there is the tradition of having a galette des rois (Kings' cake). Normally, we have the galette on Epiphany which is the 6 January. But we can buy the galette des rois from the bakeries and supermarkets throughout the month of January.

Last Friday, our company organised a galette des rois party. We had cidre with the galette. In each galette, there was a trinket hidden. The person who had that trinket would be the king or the queen of that day and had to wear a crown. We had 5 galettes des rois that day and ended up with 3 kings and 2 queens.

Below are some photos. First, of the whole galette. This one was overburnt. Second photo showing a trinket found. And lastly, the king with his crown.

Come February, there will be another celebration, the Chandeleur. I tried Wikipedia and the english translation was "Presentation of Jesus at the Temple". This time, we would have to eat crepes. I tried to make some last year at home but it was not well received by the family. I think I will give it a pass this year.

Next, I'm looking forward to Easter. The kids will have fun collecting eggs at their grandparents' garden.