Kalashnikovs, drug rings and songs

I'm only here for one more concert with the community choir and that, true to its ideals, will be in Le Viguier, one of the deprived suburbs of Carcassonne.
Yesterday's paper describes the arrest of 12 people said to be part of a drug ring, and the seizing of a Kalashnikov, a first for the Carcassonne police apparently. And this was in Le Viguier.

One of the pieces we will be performing is a rap composed in one of the Chapeau Rouge workshops and sung/spoken (very rapidly) by a young man, with references to the deprived quarters of the town. Some of the lines go "From Viguier to Grazailles, from La Conte to Ozanam. There aren't only criminals, there are poets too.  Pass me a pen, I will beautify my town."  Sorry about the translation - it scans in French.

I'm still going to the choir in the next village, where I took some Dundee cake for the break this week. It's different from anything you see round here, where the cakes are all very light and not heavily fruited like that. Felt slightly embarassed though that I couldn't give the recipe as it was just a supermarket buy.

Other singing is going on in the English class where Tom has decided to get the class singing songs in English to work towards a performance at the end of term, which, unfortunately, we will miss. Tom has enlisted the help of an Irish singer/banjo-player and we're working our way through When I'm cleaning Windows, Molly Malone, My Way, Beyond the Sea (La mer) and Just a Gigolo.  There are (over-)ambitious plans to produce mussels and chips from the barrow when we they do Molly Malone at the end-of-term party. OMG!