Rainey Days

Ho, Ho, Ho! I began my morning with a delightful email from Janice Beam, highlighting the (mis)adventures of her family throughout 2006! I love the annual Beam family newsletter and this year it served as my first Christmas gift. Thanks, Janice and congratulations on the car! I also opened gifts that Christy brought me from Saint Petersburg, Russia where she is a missionary. Shown here are Russian nesting dolls in "traditional" garb, as well as a teapot from a famous porcelain factory in Saint Petersburg, with its distinctive pattern. Since I was away in Paris, I missed the poor mailman who came to deliver four boxes! I will get them tomorrow morning when the post office opens again. I guess I'll open the rest of my gifts then. Christy had received a few boxes from her family (sent to my address well ahead of schedule), so she got some goodies. She graciously shared a white fudge oreo from her sister. We had a sumptuous Christmas dinner: meatloaf and mashed potatoes with...

I am exhausted! I've spent the last five days walking all over Paris, up the hill of Montmartre and down the marble staircases of the Louvre. I've walked the gardens of Louis XIV at Versailles and I've walked the dirty hallways of the labrynthian Paris metro. Christy has thoroughly enjoyed her whirlwind tour of Paris, and she was able to get her Russian visa renewed for one year (the real purpose of her trip). The two of us have very similar interests or vacation styles--whatever it is that means we are in sync with our ideas of what to see or do next. With Christy twisting my arm only slightly, we got Starbucks Caramel macchiatos three days in a row at one of the few Starbucks in France. Yesterday we came to the home of Henry and Karen Linderman, AG missionaries in the Paris area. We are spending a few days with them. Karen is the ultimate hostess, fixing great homestyle meals for us, and we've even gotten to help decorate her tree (since she was late getting it ...

I am headed off in a few hours to Paris to meet my friend Christy. I thought I would give you a picture of my Christmas decorations to look at for a few days, while I am away (and unable to post). I'll be back in Bordeaux on Christmas Eve night, so I hope all of you have a wonderful week of parties, last-minute shopping, and rich holiday foods!

Some of you may be familiar with the reputation that the French have for calling labor strikes without warning. I lived in France long enough to be very familiar with the strikes, but tonight was the first time in my missionary career here that I was personally affected. I had to take my car to the garage to be fixed (after the accident last week). I will be in Paris this coming week with a missionary friend who needs a translator/tour guide, so the mechanic offered to fix the car while I'm gone. Admittedly, this is a lot more convenient than any other possibility would be. So I drove over after work today to leave the car before they closed for the weekend. I handed over the keys, signed some forms, and headed to a nearby bus stop, intending to take the bus home. I'd cleaned out the car and dropped all my stuff at my apartment after work, and researched which bus I'd take, as well as the connections I need to make at other bus stops. I had a book with me, to read on ...

I go to a small group Bible study/prayer meeting on Thursday nights; it was one of the first things I got connected with here in Bordeaux, and from day one, I have loved the group. They welcomed me with open arms, and they have been a major support for me. But I have to admit, they are an odd group. I always think they would make a great cast for a sit-com. The couple that hosts it are Katherine and Jean-Claude. Katherine is a French teacher in a junior high school, so she is very conscientious of explaining any odd words we come across in our Bible study and she is very encouraging to me about my French aptitude. Her husband, Jean-Claude, is very nice, and always lights up when he sees me at church. He loves to make jokes and punctuates every sentence with a chuckle. Unfortunately, he doesn't speak very clearly, so I hardly ever understand what he said. I laugh along anyway, to be polite, but I feel like an idiot. Once his wife caught me at it: she said, "Jean-Claude, when yo...

Since arriving in France over two years ago, I've had so many new experiences, some positive and some negative. This morning on the way to work, I got rear-ended in traffic, so it was an experience on the negative side. A city bus pulled out in front of a line of cars, causing everyone to slam on their brakes. I braked so hard to avoid the car in front of me that my shoulder bag was airborne for a few seconds before slamming into the floorboard of my car. A half a second later, the car behind me slammed into me. Fortunately we weren't going that fast, so the whiplash wasn't too bad. I was mostly upset about the damage to my car, as we pulled over to the side. The other driver was a young man, 22 years old, driving an old, ratty compact car. Right away I saw its hood smashed in. I was almost afraid to look at the back of my Rav 4. It's little over a year old! But, the back bumper was hanging half off, with the license plate badly mangled. Further scrutiny rev...

Today I had a new cultural experience: I went to the doctor in French. Back in my language school days, a friend in my class said that we should have merit badges for difficult things we accomplish in our second language. For instance, I should have have gotten one when I had to call a mechanic for the first time I had car trouble (at an airport in Switzerland!). He wanted one for buying tires for his car, when he forgot the word “tire” in French. He said he felt pretty stupid saying “those four round things under the car” but they eventually understood and he got his tires! Unfortunately, he didn’t get a merit badge for it. I was completely supportive of his idea, because there are always tricky, almost impossible things (buying a car, finding an apartment) that constitute a whole new level in language acquisition, and we ought to get something out of it! So, today was my day for a new challenge. My workout club recently decided to require medical forms with approval from our d...

One of missionary families I know told me that their children liked to say "Mercy Buckets" as a joking mistake of " Merci Beaucoup " (thank you very much). I just wanted to tell you all how much I appreciated the cards and packages I received for my birthday! You guys really made my day wonderful. I kept all the cards and I'm reading through the magazines slowly (treasuring every one!). I really loved the card from Pasadena AG (my home church) that was signed by about a million people. I've never gotten a card with that many signatures on it! In other news . . . Voila our stand at the event in Paris. It wasn't a tradeshow, as I had originally thought. There was a Christian convention and we were in an exposition hall, as part of the conference. All sorts of ministries were on display, including ours for Muslim evangelism. I enjoyed being there and talking to many, many Christian leaders/pastors about our ministry and what their churches can do for Musli...

As much as I am tempted just to let the comments accumulate on my last post, I don't want you to think that I am a lazy blogger. I will be away for a few days in Paris for a tradeshow, so I will not be posting for a few days more. If you miss my bi-weekly musings, you can "discuss amongst yourselves." Here, I'll give you a topic: Christmas shopping. Who is the hardest person you have to buy/shop for? Or, if you want, you can continue to post comments on my last subject (sports films) because apparently that was a real barn-burner!

One of the cable channels is doing a special on American Sports Comedies during the month of November. Every Tuesday night there is a different film: Space Jam, Bull Durham, etc. I've never even heard of two of them, and from the looks of the commericials, they were WAY before my time. I haven't watched any of these movies, because I don't like the choices. So since its Tuesday night, I will put the question out to you: what is your all-time favorite sports film? (doesn't have to be a comedy) Should I tell you mine now? or wait to see if someone else mentions it? Hmmmmm, how about if we break double digits on the comments, I'll tell you.

Coffee is an important part of French culture. First thing every morning as we each arrive at work, the call goes out “Who wants coffee?” and after a quick count of hands, someone starts up our fancy-schmancy coffee machine. Our new building isn't even furnished yet, but the coffee/espresso machine was one of the first purchases for our break room. The day we bought it, my colleague Weléli read all the directions in depth, walking us all through the process of making espresso. As the machine hummed and frothed, we all held our breath in anticipation of the first taste of liquid happiness. Of course, that is just the morning cup of coffee. There is also the after-meal cup of coffee, which is the final course of any civilized lunch or dinner. It is appropriate to offer coffee to every visitor who stops by our office as well, so our machine gets a good workout every day. Now that weather is getting colder, my colleagues want to make coffee more and more and I’ve had to limit myself, ...

We are having beautiful weather here in Bordeaux. For the past week, we've had blue, cloudless skies and 70 degree days. I've enjoyed it so much, because I know that the usual Bordeaux rainy winter is coming anyday. Every day I try to get outside and walk to the local park or the outdoor market when its open. This morning the sun was up before I was, and I could see it would be another lovely fall day. The trees in the lots behind my building are all changing color and there is one beautiful red one that I admire every morning. Even though it was 40 degrees, I went out on my back balcony this morning, looking out over the trees and soaking in le soleil (the sunshine). And suddenly I was singing "Sunshine on my Shoulders" by John Denver. I might as well confess it: my name is Ariel and I am a John Denver fan. Blame it on my parents old 8 tracks, but there are certain songs that I just love. Who can resist singing "Thank God I'm a Country Boy" during the ...

Money can be a complicated thing, especially if you are a foreigner in a country with a different currency. I have multiple bank accounts in the States, for my own finances, as well as for the missions budget that pays my ministry needs. To get that money in France requires some effort, because writing a check in dollars takes weeks to clear and there is always a commission for the trouble. So I usually just pull out as many euros as I can with my American bank cards and then deposit them straight into my French bank account. That simplifies the process and takes about five minutes. However, I went to the bank the other morning, intending to do my thing, and the bank machine ate my card. Actually, it “confiscated” it (which incidentally is the same word in French!) so I stood in line for a teller to explain what had happened. She asked me to have a seat in the waiting area, which is over by the offices of the branch manager and the loan officers. I went to wait, clutching my r...

This weekend we had our second seminar of a four part series. I was very keyed up, and the proof of that was my 6:00 am wakeup! I worked over my presentations one last time and then got ready, drinking a Diet Coke on the way out the door at 8:45 am. My plan was to run on caffeine all day, as if that would help the French flow forth from my tongue! I didn't need it as it turned out. It went fine. I presented the Coran and Prayer as Spiritual Warfare from the first seminar, just in shortened "reminder" format, and then in the afternoon, I did a longer, more detailed presentation of how the prophets of the Coran can lead to Jesus in witnessing to Muslims. All the presentations went fine, and although I made a few grammatical mistakes, everyone seemed to think my personality made up for them, since I kept them laughing and more engaged than some of our other presenters. Nothing like humor to break the ice (or the cultural barrier!) I was disappointed at first to see that none...

We are now in the month of November, heading quickly toward my favorite holiday, Thanksgiving. People are always surprised that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, but I have so many reasons! First of all, I love my extended family, the Pettibones, and we always spend Thanksgiving with them. When I was younger, it was one of the only times a year that we got to see them, so I developed the habit of looking forward to their visit. Then, Thanksgiving has the advantage of not being a "hassle" because there are no outdoor lights for Thanksgiving, no lugging boxes of decorations from the basement or attic and then lugging them back in a few weeks time. Other than cleaning the house and setting the table, most of the decoration for Thanksgiving is very minimal. There's no shopping, other than perhaps one trip to the grocery store and let's face it, you're there once a week anyway. You don't have to fight the mall parking lot like you do at Christmas time. No...

Its time once again to teach a seminar in French! We have the second part of our four-part series on Muslim Evangelism coming up this weekend. This time, we are hosting the event in our brand new building in the multi-purpose room designated for such events like these. So we have lots of work to do with the logistics of hosting the event, and I have to prepare for my session on how the prophets in the Coran can form a bridge to the Gospel of Christ. Fortunately, our group sessions at the retreat in Luxembourg last weekend were on Islam and we had a fantastic guest speaker, Darrell Pack, who was a missionary in Morocco for many years. He really inspired me and I hope that the other Western Europe missionaries were equally inspired, since the influence of Islam affects all of Europe. Should be an exciting week!

One of the things that I enjoyed most about the weekend was being able to fellowship with the other missionaries. We were about 60 adults from the countries of France, Belguim, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. I got to hang out with many of the other single girls and had lots of conversations with many of the missionaries. I got to laugh really hard during our ice-breaker time, as most of us had to make fools of ourselves (always a fun game!). It was a real pleasure to connect with some people that I rarely get to see, as well as make some new friends. I got lots of invitations to come visit during the holidays as well, woo-hoo! Here is a picture of the youth hostel (that can barely be seen, sorry) where we had our retreat. It was like NO hostel I’ve ever seen. For one thing, the facilities were nicer than the college I went to! For two, it was brand new. It was right on the edges of this lake, so the scenery was beautiful. The hostel had a full cafeteria (with good food even), a four...

I don’t know how I can possibly describe the difference in my life that three days in Luxembourg accomplished this weekend. I’ve decided that I will focus on different aspects of our Western Europe Missionary Retreat during the next few days. I feel incredibly privileged to have such caring prayer warriors behind me, and I know that over the past few weeks, you have truly upheld me before the Lord. Because I know your concerns for me, I would like to keep you informed about how I am doing emotionally. When I first felt like I was depressed, I contacted Caring Connection, which oversees our missionary health (both physically and emotionally) in Springfield. During a long phone conversation with a counselor there, she agreed that I was in a true depression. She assured me that it is not only normal for first term missionaries, but that it was actually overdue! Anyone would “crack” under the strain of isolation/loneliness/culture shock that I had been fighting for months, so it was ...

So I'm sitting out on my balcony on Sunday afternoon, enjoying a gorgeous Indian Summer day. My arms are getting tan in the sun, as I idly turn pages in the book I'm reading. All of the neighbors have their balcony doors open and the sounds of children arguing, a yappy dog, a vacuum cleaner, and someone's television are all wafting on the breeze that blows over my balcony. Suddenly, I hear Michael W. Smith singing "Above all Powers" in English. Instinctively, my head turns toward my spare bedroom/office, as if to wonder if my ipod has somehow turned itself on and is broadcasting praise music through the apartment. Almost instantly, I realize that's not possible, and what's more, I think the music is coming from my next door neighbor's apartment. By this point, I'm standing on my feet, looking all around as I try to "tune in" which apartment the music is coming from. I'm tingling with interest, wondering are some of my neighbors...

What a surprise! This afternoon, Dad called me to say that when my sister Sarah went for her doctor's appointment, they decided to go ahead with her C-section today. I spent most of the evening sitting in front of this computer, waiting for news (thank God for modern technology!). Sarah and Andy Gilt are the proud parents of Olivia Ann Gilt, born this afternoon at 3:18 pm. She is 21 inches long and weighed 7 lbs 11 oz and resembles her father. I think she's beautiful and I can't wait til I can actually hold her.

My apartment is full of gnats! AGH. I can't stand it. Where are my helpful friends, the spiders, when I need them? We've been having a major weather change this week and apparently, that's driving out the gnats in full force. Either that or the 10 plagues are being revisted in France. ("The Ten Plagues" coming soon to a city near you!) My humor is kind of strange today, I'll admit. Here is a cool thing that happened to me this morning (and one I know God orchestrated!): I was working out at the gym and there was an older lady, late sixties, working out as well. I'd never seen her before, but we ended around the same time and crossed paths in the locker room. She huffed a tired sigh, and I encouraged her, saying in French "Hey, at least you finished! Now you have the whole day ahead of you, and you can feel good knowing you did your workout." She nodded but said she was still tired, all the same. We came out of the locker room exchangin...

Today when I got dressed, I decided to wear a long-sleeved striped tee-shirt that I got for Christmas a few years ago. I asked for something with stripes or a design, because all my winter clothes at that time were solid colors, dark and somber. I thought I could use a little excitement in my wardrobe. Mom bought me this very bright, very striped tee-shirt, and the first time I wore it, compliments came rolling in. All my American friends loved it, even saying it was their favorite of my clothes. However, I’ve noticed that the French look at me strangely when I wear it. Clearly there is a cultural element to taste and fashion; what is bright and fun-looking to Americans is loud and garish to the French. When I wear this tee-shirt, bought at that bastion of American style—Sears—I know that I am advertising my American-ness; I might as well be wearing the Star-Spangled Banner! But I don’t really mind, because that’s who I am anyway. All of us have distinctive features that reveal our ori...

The word “LOST” was in many headlines today, as I surfed the internet for my daily news update. Last night, the hit television series (Lost—in case you’ve been living on a deserted island and have never heard of it!) began its third season, and all the major news networks were providing recaps of the season premiere, along with conspiracies, I mean, commentary on the wildly popular program. But this post isn’t about the TV show (even though it is one of my favorites!). I have developed a tendency to lose things. It’s as if my apartment is a black hole! Two weeks after I moved in, I lost my apartment keys. I never did find them, either. I can only assume that pulling gloves out of my jacket pocket back in January dislodged my keys somewhere in a parking lot, or perhaps they found their way into the abyss of the emergency brake of my car. Who knows? Fortunately, I had a spare, and life went on. Three months after that, I lost my car keys. Again, I had a spare and used it for t...

This week represents the first week of the Muslim fast of Ramadan. Based on the lunar cycle, the Muslim calendar has only 354 days, so the month of Ramadan comes 11 days earlier than the year preceding. Millions of Muslims around the world will be fasting from dawn until sunset, denying themselves not only food, but water, medicine, tobacco, and sexual relations during those hours. Once the sun sets, Muslims break their fast with a huge meal, usually a festive family time. I can remember breaking the fast with one family in Palestine years ago, as we all gathered around the table in their dining room. A radio in the corner blared out the prayers of the sheikh (religious leader) who would indicate the moment when we could all begin eating. I couldn’t understand the Arabic, but they were all poised, literally with one hand over the piece of food they were going to grab first, as the sheikh chanted out the prayers. All the sudden, the father nodded his head at the family, and they g...

Every now and then there are moments when I think I have finally caught up with everything. The seasonal newsletters are written and posted My quarterly financial reports are (finally) finished My apartment is clean (even the dish drainer is empty, Mom) I actually went to the gym a few times this week Laundry is done, folded, and put away My plants are even watered I’m not caught up on emails, but let’s be realistic, is that humanly possible? In September I read through Proverbs, as part of my Read Through the Bible in One Year plan, and as always, I am impressed by the emphasis on discipline in the book of Proverbs. And every time I read Proverbs, I think about how undisciplined my life is. In certain areas, I can maintain discipline, but like sticking my fingers in the proverbial dam, as soon as I manage to control one area of my life, something else breaks down. That’s why it’s so nice when I have everything done—even if it’s only for a few seconds, anyway! In other news: I have ste...

This week was the Fall Pastor’s Retreat for the Southern France Assemblies of God. I went as a representative of the IC France ministry, and I really enjoyed it, since I am getting to know more and more pastors. The retreat was held at a beautiful Christian campground in south central France, lovely in its country setting and used by churches and Christian groups as a retreat center. Oddly, though, the campground doesn’t have a central meeting hall; instead, they have a “big-top” tent, where we had our two days of meetings. The mornings were spent in praise, prayer, and sermons on the theme of “The Church, Its Ministries, and Money Issues.” Thrilling! The afternoons were reserved for business meetings and reports from the various committees. As in June, the best times were during the meals. Being French food, the meals are excellent, and each time, I meet new and different people. Here is a funny story for those of you who enjoy my penchant for embarrassing myself: during the se...

Several times in the past I have mentioned my colleague, Weléli and her husband Charles. Since their relocation to Bordeaux, she has become my best friend here. We work together every day, our desks facing each other in the same room. We talk for hours, and slowly over the past few weeks, we have talked about more personal and painful details of our lives. One day she told me that over her 8 years of marriage, she has been unable to conceive. After consulting doctors, she and her husband tried in-vitro fertilization three times, but that was unsuccessful. They finally gave up, not able to handle emotional roller-coaster any more. She is 42 years old, but believes that with God anything is possible. She and her husband have wept, prayed, fasted, and trusted God for the past 8 years. When she was telling me all this, my heart broke for her pain. Weléli is a former Muslim who moved to France to be a live-in babysitter for her sister already living here, 15 years ago. When she co...

Today I got the chance to do something I have wanted to do for months! I worked on the “CoffeeBus” of my church in Bordeaux. The CoffeeBus is a ministry that converted an actual bus into a mobile café; each Thursday, an evangelism team drives into a ghetto north of Bordeaux center, parks the bus, and serves free coffee and other goodies to anyone who enters the bus. There are tracts and Bibles on each café table, along with muffins or other refreshments. While some team members walk the neighborhood with tracts, others sit at the tables in the bus to start conversations with the people who enter. Since the neighborhood there is low-income housing, it is also filled with Muslim immigrants; voilà pourquoi j’y suis allée! (That’s why I went). During July and August, the ministry stops its usual trips there, so this was the first day back in the neighborhood. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain all day here. For those two reasons, we didn’t have many people come. There were about 1...

In just a few minutes here in France, CNN International will begin rerunning its original September 11, 2001 footage as part of its anniversary memorial. When I heard that CNN was going to rebroadcast the footage, I made a mental note to watch, but now as the time draws near, I’m not sure I can do it. I think its right and appropriate to remember such an egregious attack against our country, but I’m not sure I can handle the emotional content of the images combined with my own memories. I’ve spent almost an hour writing and rewriting this post, and it comes down to this: I can’t write about it. I can’t say what I want to say to commemorate the heroes and the fallen. The only thing I can do is pray for the families whose loved ones never came home that day. Looking back over the past five years, I think our nation has become stronger, but when circumstances like 9/11 force us to realize how weak and fragile we are, I hope that we remember that the Lord is our salvation. May God ...

When I was a kid, my family used to play a game called Dark Tower. It was a quest to cross a medieval kingdom, aquiring three keys to storm the Dark Tower. If you solved the riddle of which key opened which lock, you won. That was not too difficult. The hardest part was making your way through the kingdoms, turn after turn, gathering the necessary keys. There was a motorized machine (before computer games!) which told you what happened on your turn: you could get lost, for example, or be struck by plague or worse yet, be attacked by brigands and lose your gold and your warriors in a raging battle. Fortunately, you could buy a scout (so you wouldn’t get lost), a healer (to solve those pesky plague problems) and best of all, a “beast” to carry all your gold. That way even if attacked by brigands, your gold was still safe, even if all your warriors died. Several times lately, since we’ve begun this massive moving project to our new building, I have wished I could buy a beast. It w...

This past week was a good mail week! New pictures of my adorable niece Sydney arrived on Tuesday; a bunch of ladies from my church sent a card; I got a surprise packet of sermon notes from my brother’s church plant “launch service”; a missionary friend emailed to ask if she could visit France for Christmas; and a comment on my blog made my day on Sunday! Christy’s email was la cerise sur le gâteau! (the cherry on the cake) for me. We met in 2002 in Springfield, Missouri interviewing with the Foreign Missions board. Both hip, young singles, we hung out a lot that week and later served as emotional support for each other during the stressful months of fund-raising. We chose to be roommates at School of Missions in 2003 for five weeks, before heading our separate missionary ways—Christy to St. Peterburg, Russia to work with Teen Challenge, a ministry for drug and alcohol addicts, and me to France to work with Muslims. I haven’t seen her since that School of Missions; its kind of amazing ...

"Suffering for Jesus" is what my dad has always said over the years anytime I spent a day at a Mediterranean beach. It's his little joke and I humor him (smile, roll the eyes). But the last few days, I've paid back all that beach time in blood, sweat, and the tears will come soon, no doubt! We've been doing the actual moving that we cleaned the building and packed for. Wednesday we unloaded two truckloads of boxes that had been in storage (this includes all of our stock of CDs, cassettes, books and Bibles in Arabic, French, and English--that means HEAVY boxes!) Then yesterday starting at 9 am, six of us started by loading all the furniture and boxes from our present office into the moving truck and then taking that load to the new building and unloading it. Then we did it all again with a second truckload until 9 pm. Of course both of these locations involve going up and down stairs with heavy loads of archives, files, etc. And no matter how wonderful and friendly...

Those Rolling Stones must have been smoking something, because I don't see how time is on anyone's side. Especially here in France, where the cultural relationship with time is very different from ours in America. My colleague, in particular, is well-known for being an hour late to everything. In fact, when he says he will be at a meeting at 2:00 pm, we don't even expect him until 2:45 or later. I have started bringing a pocket sudoku book to kill time waiting for him at various meetings. How am I spending my time otherwise? We are still cleaning and moving into our new building, step by step, and I appreciate your patience with my spotty blogging of late. Its not very exciting to describe how I've washed the same window 4 or 5 times and its still streaky. I think next week I will have more exciting news to report.

Sorry I haven't posted in a few days. As I have mentioned, we have a new building for our offices. Its still not quite finished, but we are moving in next week. So this week, I drew the short straw and got cleaning duty. We are talking masssssssive cleaning. The building is wall-to-wall tile, and the tile-layers left cement (or whatever they use) everywhere! So a major part of my cleaning duties have been scraping the tile with a chisel to get up excess cement and paint from the equally careless painters. At one point, I even had to scrape the inside of the electric sockets (which are recessed into the walls in Europe) with a wet rag and chisel. Thankfully, we don't have electric in the building yet--I asked about ten times before I stuck my metal object and water soaked rag into the sockets. Don't try this at home! Next up on the schedule is washing all the windows (30 or so). We've already washed them to get off paint, cement, mud, and spider webs, but now we need to ...

I thoroughly enjoyed my mini-vacation in Nantes with my friends. It was relaxing to spend time with other Americans, and they were excellent tour guides to their region of France. We got to see islands, castles, cathedrals, and more. I am not sure which part was the best--it was all so great. I found this metal sign in a store window and it stopped me in my tracks. I collect crab stuff for my kitchen here in France. I suppose its my way of creating a little niche of "home" here in France. Most of my collection is from Baltimore or Ocean City, but I am always on the lookout for anything with crabs here in France, because, well, how cool would that be! But crabs just aren't as popular here, for obvious reasons, so I have only ever found a little postcard that I framed anyway. So when I saw this sign in a window, I got all excited. Unfortunately, since its in English, it was probably made in the US or maybe in England, but the important thing is that I bought it in France! ...

I am still in Nantes, visiting my good friends Matt and Cristina Price, missionaries with the Free Will Baptists here in France. Today they took me to a 13th century castle in Angers, a town about an hour from Nantes. The castle is huge, and certainly would have scared me off from invading back in the 12oo's! I enjoyed wandering the castle and the extensive grounds, but the best part was Europe's oldest tapestry. Yes, I know you are thinking that old tapestries can't be that exciting, and normally I would agree. But this one was commissioned in the 1300's and was originally 140 meters long! It contained 70 "scenes" of the Book of Revelation. Only 37 meters are missing today, and the rest is restored and on display with a guide who gives an explanation of each panel in very dramatic French. Knowing my Bible, I was able to interpret most of the panels for myself--angels blowing trumpets, seven churches, a multi-headed beast being slain, etc. But what w...

Greetings from Nantes! Nantes is four hours north of Bordeaux and was once the capital of Brittany, one of the prettiest regions of France. I have missionary friends who work here in Nantes as youth pastors, and since I had a bit of time off, I decided to come north and visit their beautiful city. We did a walking tour of Nantes today, which was focused on the WWII history of the city, including the Resistance and the liberation of the city, which happened 62 years ago today! Yes, the Americans liberated Nantes on August 12, 1944, and we saw a smal parade today of veterans--one carrying an American flag out of recognition and appreciation. The walking tour was certainly interesting, but as my friends and I ate lunch (at a Subway sandwich shop!) we prayed that God would truly liberate the French who are still bound spiritually. Thanks for being a part of that prayer!

Just as birds fly south for the winter, the French migrate to more pleasant climates each August. Parisiens head for the beaches in the South of France, the sporty head off to hike in the Alps, the cosmopolitan come to Bordeaux to sample the wine, and on it goes like a nation-wide game of musical chairs. In fact, many families “home swap” for the month, advertising their homes in magazines and newspapers as early as February, when the savvy French traveler books his plans. Similar to other European countries, this phenomenon is concentrated to the month of August. The whole country shuts down. Restaurants and other small businesses post notices that they will be closed from the end of July until the first of September, reminding their clientele of their annual vacations. A very few places remain open to benefit from all the tourists, but choices are severely limited. Here in my neighborhood, it is strangely quiet. The outdoor market on Saturday was much smaller than usual, and I...

I took this picture of "downtown" Merignac over the weekend. I pass by this bus stop several times a day and it always impresses me with the French love of flowers and artistic beauty.

It has long been a point of contention with me that my neighbors in this building are unfriendly. Well, that is by American standards, I suppose. By French standards, they are absolutely normal, since the French guard their privacy as if German troops are invading. They say hello if they see me in the parking lot or lobby; at times one or two have held the door open for me, as I carried my groceries in, but nothing further. Never any “Welcome to the building” or “You’re invited to my party that will last all night, with music blasting loudly into your apartment as well.” By this point, I’m used to it, but I still wish I could have at least a passing acquaintance with them. The real problem is that in the past seven months, I have met some of the neighbors, but always after j’ai fait une bêtise (I’ve done something stupid)! I have met four neighbors (three of them men, as it happens—no, I am not doing it on purpose!). I met the first one when I needed a bottle opener shortly a...

If a picture is worth a thousand words . . . . well, you've already read my thousand on the Saturday market two weeks ago. This morning I took this photo, just to give you a visual aide.

“If evolution is real, why is it only in the last 30 years that we put wheels on luggage?” I read this quote about six months ago, but I don’t remember who said it (possibly Jon Stewart). If I had to define my position on the origins of the universe, I would say that I don’t believe in evolution either, but my proof would be the stupid drivers in my town, who can’t seem to realize that traffic patterns changed months ago. Downtown Bordeaux has a brand-new tram system that glides gracefully along gleaming tracks with a speed skater’s precision. Unfortunately, that same system is currently under construction in the outlying suburbs, like mine. It’s a major hassle, involving tearing up existing roads, laying the tram tracks, and then repaving the roads one lane at a time. Somewhere in there, they also redo existing pipes, electric lines, etc. Unfortunately, the worst road in town is a major access road, connecting with the town’s central highway, so traffic is still heavy, even thoug...