Salut!

France has got to be king of bank holidays!  May has 3!  2 are on Thursdays so you can ‘faire le pont’ (make the bridge) and have a nice 4 day weekend.  This weekend Thursday and Monday are holidays so "c’est la fete!"

Yesterday a farmer in the church organised a 40km bike ride!  There were 19 of us who set out mid-morning from the church leaving sun cream vapours trailing behind us.  We arrived at his farm around 1pm after riding though beautiful countryside full of vivid green barley and sunny yellow rape seed fields. 

We enjoyed a sun soaked BBQ where it was plainly obvious we were in France and not England - everybody (very sensibly) sought out the shady areas! 

We arrived back late afternoon tired, somewhat red and, for the most part, smiling!  

It was a lovely day and I’m very greatful to God for allowing me to minister in such a beautiful country!  However, continue to pray with me…all is not what the eye sees.  This country may be blessed with natural beauty but it is suffering from spiritual destitution. 

Every 1st Wednesday of the month at midday all public buildings are required by law to test their fire alarms!  Can you imagine the din?!  I live next door to a school and not far from an industrial estate so each month it sounds like we are under nuclear attack! 

I have had a LOVELY weekend!  The bank holiday here is on a Thursday so most people take off the Firday and take a little holiday.  I went down to the dordogne in Fifi to meet up with a group of people I met on holiday last August.

It is seriously the most BEAUTIFUL place.  All weekend I kept exclaiming, "Comme c’est beau!"  I had to try and stop saying it because it was getting annoying!

We stayed in caravans and ate breakfast each morning on the verada to the sound of cookoos and frogs!  During the days we went on walks through the lush country side, visited castles and caves and eat lots and lots of the delicious food.  Great holiday!

Up again quite early to finish off the cleaning in the church kitchen before heading off to Chinon with 6 other young adults for the Claire’s baptism.

Claire, you may remember, was the young girl who turned up at my house out of the blue in August 2006 and gave her life to Jesus!  She then followed the Alpha course and early in 2007 found a long prayed for job in Chinon.  So we said a sad goodbye to our new sister.  However, we have kept in contact over the year and been out to visit her last September. 

Today was the day of her baptism.  It was a wonderful occasion.  She shared so honestly about the pain and rejection she had felt in her life and the peace and freedom from fear that life with Jesus gave her.  It was a very moving time for me as she was the first person I have seen in France go from conversion to baptism.  It was a real priviledge to be there.

The baptsim itself was in a blow-up paddling pool, which in the baking sun the children had to be physically restrained from jumping in!  When the moment of the baptism arrived a little voice cried out, "She’s so lucky!" 

Another of my language flops:  I was taking with a group of people when a man joined our group who is a bee keeper.  So I lightly asked him how the bees were going.  He mumbled something very quietly and I had no idea what he said, so simply replyed, "Chouette!" (Fantastic!)  The bee leeper looked a bit puzzeled and moved on.  Paul turned round and said, "Chouette?  He just said he had lost 90% of his hives though disease."  ARGHHHHHHH!!!!!!   D’oh!

Car boot sale day!  I was at the church at 7.30am to set up the drink stall  - already the stress was showing and people’s tempers were a bit frayed!

We had a great day in the sun and LOADS of our neighbours came and wandered round.  About 100 people came into the church for the Martin Luther King Exhibition, and many encouraging conversations were had around my little drink stand.  It was a very hot, tiring, but succesful day.  Thanks God!

Friday I spent 5 HOURS with 3 other ladies making little Algerian cakes for the car boot sale.  I am SO THANKFUL to be English where a cup of tea and a slice of victoria sponge would suffice!  No, we had to make little fiddly (but very tasty) little cakes with 3 different parts to them etc. 

I mananged to escape the women and have a quiet half hour before heading out to rollerblading.  It has been a wonderful weekend weather-wise and there was about 150 people waiting outside the cathedral.  It brought memories of last September flooding back when I sat on my own, literally terrified of what was ahead of me and ashamed and humiliated that I had no friends.  How things have changed!  As soon as I arrived about half the staff came and did the French kissy hello and many other regulars greeted me.  I felt SO HAPPY!  It has taken so long to simply make relationships and friendships here and living on my own has been very lonely at times.  How much God has blessed me through rollerbalding and prooved that often we have to "Feel the fear and do it anyway"!  I had an excellent evening, got back home at midnight absolutly exhausted but very sastisfied with life. 

On Saturday we are having a car boot sale in the car park of the church and an exhibition of the life of Martin Luther King inside the church.  We hope that it will be a way of meeting many of out neighbours and people having a non-threatening oppertunity to visit the church.  The church building is a big land mark but most of the neighbourhood have never seen inside…so this will be their big chance! 

I’m going to be (wo) manning the ‘buvette’ - drink and cake stand!  nice!

Here we are starting to put the exhibition into place yesterday…

Have you seen it?  How great is it?  I’m addicted!  Even though I know the whole storyline already becuase on the internet you can find everything!  FYI: I’m somebody who doesn’t like surprizes, who reads the last page of books first and still enjoys them! 

Anyway, today I went to Chartres with 2 friends who will soon be going back to N. Ireland.  They are here on teacher training and without transport sightseeing has being a bit limited.  So, we put Fifi to good use and set off to see things!  Chartres is a great place for a day trip.   I’ve never seen such a beautiful cathedral.  Really it is magnificant.  A shame that everything is about Mary though.  They have an absolutely beautiful sculpture of the assumption right in the middle of the church.  I tried to ask the guide about the biblical references to this and she moved right on!

We went down on a tour of the crypt and saw part of the church that they believe dates from the 9th centuary!  Amazing!  Most of the rest of the building dates from the 13th - still pretty stunning!  Then we huffed and puffed right up to the very top of one of the spires and had a great view of the city.  On the way down our legs were turning to jelly and we were giggling along.  I made it down intact but the moment I stepped out of the stair well and into the solmen silence of the catheral knave I tripped up, went flying and let out an almighty scraming / laughing fit!  I then had to stiffle it quickly which made us laugh even more…even the attendant managed a smirk!

I was very proud of myself on Monday.  I cleaned and re-oiled the barings on my rollerbaldes!  Something of a DIY feat for me.    To be honest it doesn’t seem to have made much difference…!

Yesterday I had a visit from the ECM director of the Australian office, Ray.  It was nice to be able to get to know him and share a bit about France and the ministy here.  The sun was shining so we went out into the city and enjoyed a tea out in the city square - the first if the year!  In the evening I invited some friends round and we ate together.

Ray stayed overnight a Marthe’s house.  What a language nightmare!  I went with him just to translate for an hour.  Marthe speaks French and Polish, I speak Polish, French and English, and Ray speaks Ukranian and English.  Arghhh! (Ukraninan is similar to Polish - sort of like French and Spanish.)  It was a real mish-mash of languages round the table but we mananged to communicate!

I wonder how much you take for granted the wonders of language?!  How, usually, you can explain yourself to another person freely and without mis-understanding.  This very is something I can’t always rely on in French and often makes conversations a mine field.  It’s so frustrating not being able to relax and simply talk.

Today I was having a quite serious chat with a girl who is going through many problems.  The last thing I need now is mis-communication!  I was making a special attempt to slow my speech down so that I could think before things blurted out of my mouth.  (I’m learning!)  Except it wasn’t enough.  Amongst all her other problems, or maybe becuase of them, she can’t stop losing weight.  I was trying to explain that she was looking thinner and lovingly encourage her to be careful.  Except without relaising I told her she was looking skinny.  Such a tiny mistake.  At best such mistakes block a conversation for a while while I explain what I really meant and try to win back trust and confidence.  At worst they cause a complete shut-down from the listener and a feeling of judgement.

I continually wonder at the intracasies of language and how much I took for granted.  But also at the amount of grace and goodwill people have shown me when I put my foot in it.  It really is proof of their generosity when I speak seemingly good French and then throw in a gaff like that.  "Did she really mean that?  Did she know what that word means?  Is she just being nasty?"  All totally understandable responses. 

All this learning is making me slower to judge others too.  Learning anything is a painful but worthwhile adventure!