Entre Les Murs

Teaching Children To Drink

There was a notice posted at the Alliance Francaise this morning, requesting volunteers to do something that I translated as "assurance of the studios" at the Musée du Vin. I wasn't sure what it meant but I signed up and headed over anyway, based on the intriguing venue.

The Musée turned out to be half restaurant, half museum. It's tucked in a hillside by the Seine, was once the site of a monastery and latterly served as the cellar for the restaurant of the Eiffel Tower. As part of something called La Semaine du Gout (the week of taste?), they had a string of tables set up with aspects of wine-making explained at each: the grapes, the sounds, the smells, the corks.

After being shown each of these stations and having them explained to me, it eventually transpired that each of the volunteers was to pick a table and manage it while several school groups trooped through. I took the smells table, which had a dozen jars with a little sponge in each that emitted the odour of a common wine nose, like cherries, lemon, vanilla and... burnt toast? At two o'clock, about twenty eight-year-olds descended. At my station they had to match the numbers on the jars to the smells in their list. Chaos, but they were for the most part well-behaved, so it was altogether pretty cute.

After they'd completed the exercises at each station, they were given a drink of grape juice, being permitted to choose red or white. The teachers made very clear that there was no alcohol, that alcohol is never for children. This statement was greeted with scepticism. One precocious brat attempted to persuade me to make an exception, pleading implausibly that it was his birthday.

I've always said that alcohol isn't a problem if one learns to drink properly and moderately when one it growing up, as opposed to all of a sudden being presented with it in quantity at university. Clearly the French embrace my point of view.

posted 11.10.05