Monday, August 29, 2011

Figuriada 2011




These bronze medals and this "champagne"
were are reward and awards for our craziest jumps...

Figuriada is an annual event held in Palūšė. Anyone can participate alone or in teams of two, no limitations of age, sex or nationality. The contest consists of three parts:

1. Compulsory jumps: a draw decided whether we had to play "bomb", "deadman", "total analphabet" or "scissors".
2. Homework, prepared by contestants.
3. Improvisation on a theme decided, once again, with a draw.

All events feature live music. The winners are selected by the votes of the judges, with marks going up to 10, and actually never reaching less than 7. The price ceremony is followed by a party that goes on all night and the day after (said the very humoristic program).





Palūšė, the boat that was successfully used for the Palūšė - Nida trip,
was there, showing off its beautiful celebration habits 

As you've probably understood, this contest is all about having fun, something that quite a few Lithuanian people know how to do. Perhaps even more in Aukštaitija, the region that has the reputation to be the most relaxed one in the whole country.

So our team's name was sraige, meaning snail in Lithuanian. We played with the cliches related to France...
Our first jump was the analphabet one. Florence carried Edouard on her back, and we played...
For the second, we improvised a romantic scene (what else can you expect from french people?!)
for the last, the draw decided we would play... a mountain goat! Florence was imitating the goat, while Edouard was playing the shepherd, a quite angry one because of its uncontrolable animal.

This rich program provoked unstoppable laughs among the audience, and the judges loved it enough for us to end up at the third place, behind the untouchables Šarunas and Kostas (2nd) and the winners Jonas and Vytautas.





Before the "competition"


And here is the party itself, with all the craziest jumps. You'll see our romantic jump : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2AdT4mkaDg




Everyday celebrations

We've both noticed how much Lithuanian people like to celebrate, share, give prizes, for all sorts of reasons they may find. It seems totally normal for them, but slighlty unusual for us. Like this way to celebrate birthdays, the son or daugther of one employee's past or future wedding, or even just the beginning of holidays for the director of the Park.

First thing in the morning, so as early as 8am, all employees of the Park gather in the meeting room. They drink wine and/or some kind of champagne, eat sweets, and chat about the event and other things. Although we (neither Florence nor Edouard) don't have much experience in working places in France, we really don't think that would happen that often over there. It undeniably creates a nice atmosphere at work, as well as the usual every morning half an hour-chat with a cup of coffee, in this same meeting room.






1 comment:

  1. Bonjour, Florence and Edouard! How are you? Figuriada 2012 will take place on Sunday, August 19, 2012. See you in Palūšė again! :)

    http://www.dgd.lt/figuriada
    http://www.facebook.com/figuriada

    ReplyDelete