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I haven't been to the photojournalism festival in Perpignan for years (four to be exact -- thanks Blipfoto!). This is mainly because it's so depressing -- full of war, famine, and suffering of various kinds. But realising that Lesley is currently here, and she often goes to it, I contacted her earlier in the week, and we agreed to meet there today.

I caught the train there. It's a lovely ride between the salty lagoons and the sea -- the water was a brilliant blue, and there were hundred of flamingos, dozens of herons, an egret or two, and some unidentified stubby little waders.

We'd arranged to meet in a cafe -- I arrived early and started wondering if I'd recognise Lesley as it's so long since we last met. I was looking for a lone person with a camera, which turned out to be a mistake as she arrived with her camera in her bag and husband P in tow. We had a coffee and then walked to the Couvent des Minimes, which is the main venue for the festival. It's like a Tardis -- we spent a good two hours going round, and that was missing out the parts we couldn't quite stomach (most of the Ukraine war, a series on Afghanistan entitled The World's Saddest Country and the Worst Country for Women). There were some excellent photos, but also some (by a Magnum photographer no less) that left me thinking: "Why didn't he even get this in focus? And it's muddy and underexposed, yet with blown-out highlights". The one photographer who did make me smile was James Balog, who had done a lovely series on animals in captivity. He'd deliberately decided to photograph them in a non-natural environment, so they were either in a white room, or against a white cloth backdrop, in strangely human poses. But he has a lot more strings to his bow, with excellent abstract landscapes and amazing photos of glaciers. So he's the one whose work I would hang on my wall. There are a few of his photos on this page.

That done, we headed to a tapas bar that Lesley and P had visited previously, for a leisurely lunch. It's in a pleasant shady square a bit hidden away from the main drag, and to our surprise we easily got a table, given how busy Perpignan was. The tapas were very good, and four between us were plenty, while leaving room for dessert -- top marks from L for the café gourmand and from me for my lovely crema catalana.

P headed off to the airshow at Perpignan airport while L and I decided to brave more exhibitions. More grimness, but some good photos. My blip is of the Eglise des Dominicains -- looking back at my previous blips of this event, I realised I'd posted two near identical ones, so I definitely needed a change.

Before we knew it, the time had flown by and it was 5 o'clock, so we walked back to the station where we had a drink before Lesley headed for the bus station and I headed for the last train to Lézignan. It was heaving -- standing room only before it even left Perpignan. At Narbonne, so many people tried to get on that many of them were left stranded on the platform and we sat in the station for 20 minutes while the SNCF rustled up a bus for the overspill. 

I nearly got Tivoli'd at Lézignan -- I got up in plenty of time to allow for fighting my way through the solid mass of bodies to the door, following a woman I thought was getting off too. But no -- she stopped short of the doors to chat obliviously to someone, blocking all further progress. I had to shout, tread on toes, stumble over two bicycles, and nearly get knocked flat by the people getting on the already full train, but I made it onto the platform for a rainy drive home. A good day though -- thanks L and P!