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On Sunday, I took the afternoon off work and went to the Massena Museum, which tells the history of Nice. I've been to Nice many times, but I've never been there before.

The Massena Museum is small as a museum, but the villa of the Massena family, a prominent family in Nice, was donated to the city of Nice and is exhibited as a historical museum. The mosaics on the ceiling and floor, which resemble those of an aristocratic mansion in ancient Rome, are magnificent. There is also a dome-shaped room that looks like a small glass greenhouse.

On the second floor, models, clothes, and ornaments are used to explain how Nice went from a small fishing town to a world-famous resort, and how national heroes such as the Napoleon family and their families came to stay there. Amazing exhibits that make you wonder, "Why are they here?" are eye-catching, such as the cloak and crown worn by Napoleon I's first wife Josephine at Napoleon's coronation in 1805. By the way, Napoleon I was from Corsica, an island in the Mediterranean Sea, and his birthplace on the island is now a national museum. However, I was a little surprised that it was a very small building, even though he was an aristocrat. A long time ago, when I was working in Geneva, I went sightseeing during my Easter holidays, and I was deeply moved by the fact that a boy born on such a remote island had risen to become the Emperor of France.

The Mediterranean coast was discovered by the British, who became wealthy during the Industrial Revolution, and developed into a resort area, where beautiful azure coasts (Côte d'Azur in French) can be seen everywhere. The long promenade in Nice is named "Promenade des Anglais" (Promenade of the English). In the good old days of France, the period known as the Belle Époque, many travel campaigns were held to encourage people to leave the cold of Paris and spend the winter on the warm Mediterranean coast, and beautiful posters were created. The posters from that time clearly show the influence of Japonism.

Even now, the highway from Paris to the Mediterranean Sea is so beloved by the French that it gets jammed during summer and winter vacations. By the way, in the past, when I came to Nice, I saw many Russian tourists and often heard Russian around, but this time I didn't hear any Russian at all. I'm sure the wealthy Russians are sad that they can no longer come to the Mediterranean Sea.

Before the war, there was a casino on an artificial island on the coast of Nice. A model of it and paintings from that time are on display, and it is very luxurious, so I imagine that the people of Nice were proud of it. However, according to the explanation, during World War II, the German army came and blew it up with dynamite. I often heard stories of beautiful buildings being blown up by the communist government in Berlin and Leipzig with dynamite, but here the beautiful buildings were blown up by the German army. I heard that when Hitler retreated from Paris, he ordered the city of Paris to be blown up, but his aides stopped him. It makes you realize that beautiful things are destroyed when a crazy person becomes a dictator.

Traveling around Europe, you can see that there have been many conflicts and wars throughout its long history, and that borders have been redrawn. One of my French teachers told me, "There are no such things as 'pure French' in France. Because various ethnic groups have mixed together over its long history. There are some languages ​​that are only used around the borders with neighboring countries." Nice was once part of Italy. And there is a language called Niçoise, which is neither French nor Italian. The traffic signs in the town are written in two languages, French and Niçoise.

Around Biarritz on the Atlantic coast where I studied French, "Basque," which is neither Spanish nor French, is still used, and the traffic signs there are also written in two languages. Europe, where history has been created by the complex mixture of diverse cultures, is exotic to me and I make new discoveries wherever I travel.