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Candles on my windowsill |
Every year the city of Lyon celebrates
la
Fête des Lumières - an international light festival to celebrate the end of
the black plague in this region of France.
But given the recent tragic events
in Paris, the Mayor of Lyon, Gérard Collomb announced that the 2015
Fête des Lumières would be postponed till December, 2016.
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Candles in front of the Hôtel de Ville |
However, this high-profile international light show was, last night,
transformed into a vigil for the victims of the terrible Paris attacks. The
people of Lyon lit up the city by placing candles on their windowsills, which
was the tradition many years ago when I first moved to France, before the Light
Festival grew into a huge international event.
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Downtown Lyon |
Only
one work of art, by Daniel Knipper, was installed on
the banks of the Saône River, to pay tribute to the victims, with a scrolling list of
their names: Lyon’s Homage to Paris attack victims.
For more information on Lyon's annual light festival click
here.
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Given that my third book in
The Bone Angel trilogy,
Blood Rose Angel, deals
with Black Death, I became particularly interested in the bubonic plague in the
Lyonnais region.