Ski a(t) Chamrousse

Today, we went to a ski resort named Chamrousse situated 30 km from Grenoble. There we rejoined our cousins coming from Mexico (above Vanessa with her two children Xilonen and Paul, and also Paul and Tom). We were more or less 20, as also my brother Nicolas, my sister Nathalie, my uncle Bernard and my cousins Bruce and Gaetan with their families were here / Aujourd'hui, nous sommes alles a Chamrousse, rejoindre Gaetan et sa famille (qui viennent du Mexique) son frere Bruce, ses parents Bernard et Claude, et mom frere et ma soeur et leurs familles.
Smiling Lisa / Lisa sourit
It has been a sunny day in the mountains, but not in the foggy valleys, as you can see behind Tom and Paul. / Beaucoup de soleil en altitude, mais les vallees sont restees dans la crasse.
Smiling (?) Paul (AlexSnoopy's influence?)
Sun and Tom

2001 : l'odyssée de l'espace

Ce soir, nous avons regarde 2001, l'odyssée de l'espace avec Tom et Paul.
Ils ont bien apprécié,
meme si le méchant ordinateur CARL (HAL en anglais) les a impressionnés.
Apres le film, nous en avons discuté, notamment du fait que le réalisateur laisse le spectateur sans explications.
Et en surfant sur Internet, nous avons trouvé un site Internet qui en donne, site que nous vous conseillons : http://www.kubrick2001.com/

Paul and Leeloo

Noel / Christmas

Tom and Paul and their cousins waiting for gift time

Tom, Paul et leurs cousins et cousine attendent l'heure des cadeaux.

Christmas tree and gifts

Le sapin de Noel et les cadeaux

Des enfants contents / Happy children

Happy child / Un enfant content

Col de Porte

Herve and his two brothers (Nicolas and Alex) went to a ski resort named 'Col de Porte'. Avec mes frangins Nicolas et Alex, nous sommes allés au Col de Porte.
Also our children, and Sarah, Alex' wife / Nos enfants etaient la aussi (Tom, Florian, Paul and Thibaut) ainsi que Sarah, la femme d'Alex...
... and the Snow Yorkshire / et notre Yorkshire des neiges : Leeloo !
Chamechaude, the tallest peak of Chartreuse / le plus haut sommet de la Chartreuse domine le Col de Porte.
Left to right:Sarah, Alex, Florian, Paul, Thibaut, Tom, Hervé, and Nicolas

Anita

Messages pour Anita: - tout d'abord, merci pour tes commentaires sur le blog, ca fait toujours plaisir - ensuite, qui es-tu ? Au vue de tes commentaires, il semble que tu habites Almaty. Es-tu expatriee ou es-tu du Kazakhstan ? Je te demande ca, car lorsque tu postes des commentaires du style 'j'aime bien cette boite de nuit'ou 'je n'aime pas le kumis', c'est toujours plus sympa quand on sait qui est 'je' A+ Hervé

Ski a(t) Tabagan

Tabagan panorama (click on the picture to enlarge it)
Fabien, Julie, Sylvain...
... myself...
... and Olya went skiing at Tabagan
Not so bad weather!

Ski a(t) Tabagan (cont'd)

The view from the cottage / La vue depuis le chalet
Friendly local people / Le contact avec la population locale est tres agreable
Sun and snow cannons / Le soleil et les canons a neige
Icy stalactite
Warming fire

Stalactites

There are many stalactites falling from the roof of our cottage... / il y a beaucoup de stalactites sur notre chalet...
... but one is very strange, with an incomprehensible angle / ...un de ces stalactites est tres etrange, qui forme un angle incomprehensible.

Christmas party (1/2)

This evening, it was the Christmas party of Schneider Electric Kazakhstan, held in a good restaurant. The idea was, every department is supposed to make a show, best wins.

I acted out a traditional Russian tale with Karina from my team. The story is: a farmer of the South, who doesn't speak very well Russian (easy for me), tells the issue he faced with a huge vegetable that he is unable to extract from earth. So everybody tries to help him, his wife, his daughter, the Grand Mother, the cat... and at the end with the ultimate help of the mouse, they get the vegetable. Karina translates from bad Russian to Russian, but with a strong Muslim accent, to make the audience laugh (which was the case!).
Zhana and Bogdan danced the Salsa.
Some sang a song.
I just can't remember what was the idea of this show ???
We also ate a lot.

Christmas party (2/2)

The Logistics Dpt also sang a song.
Vadim (Marketing Dpt) dressed up as cheese or mouse (or both?)
The boss sang 'Aux Champs Elysees'
The evening finished with Santa Claus... and his wife, and a good cake.

Christmas party (cont'd)

Other pictures of my show

New contest: an international dinner

Yesterday evening, with 3 Schneider Electric colleagues coming from France and Russia, we went to Issyk, a typical Kazakh restaurant with dance show. The fact that we were 4, with 4 different citizenships, gave me the idea of a new contest: try to find the citizenship of my three colleagues, knowing one is Hungarian, one is Polish, the third one is Russian. First to post the right answer wins Kazakh vodka. It goes without saying that the 3 colleagues are not supposed to compete.

Hier soir nous sommes alles diner dans un resto Kazakh avec 3 collegues de Schneider. Comme nous etions tous de nationalite differente, ca m'a donne l'idee d'un nouveau concours : trouver la nationalite de chacun et gagner une bouteille de vodka. Il y a un hongrois, un polonais et un russe. Bien sur, les 3 interesses n'ont pas le droit de concourir.
A

B

C

A gift from KLM

Am I to understand that I am a good customer?