I think today marks our six month anniversary. In some ways it seems we just got here and in others it seems we have been here much longer. Our experience continues to exceed our expectations. For me, this week was all about France. How strange is this: If someone moves into your property and stays for more than 48 hours you can get them out pretty quickly if it is your primary residence; but if you do not do it in 7 days (or if it is not your primary residence), here is the process. First, you need to know their names. Often these “squatters” are gypsies from Romania and they know what they are doing. There is no way they will tell you their names and they usually don’t drive cars–so you can’t get their names from the license department. Once you have their names, you start a 3-month eviction process. If you win, the police will serve them with the eviction notice and they have 20 additional days to find a new place to live. However, you cannot evict them during the winter which is between November 1 and April 1. So, if the squatter moves in, say, in August, they will be able to stay until June 1 without paying rent, utilities or anything. And what do you do without a place to live for 9 months? The only public purpose I can see in this law is passing the cost of homelessness onto property owners. So, I’m having to deal with that along with another crisis in France.
The highlight of this week was an interview we conducted in our Church History assignment. Recall that we are taking oral histories concerning the 2013 British Pageant. This week, we interviewed a family with 5 children who were all in the production. Although each cast member worked on parts, songs and dances at home for several weeks, all of the formal rehearsals were conducted the week before the production. All day–every day and then all day for the entire first week of the play. There was a second cast that took over for the second week. So, both parents had to be available for two full weeks. Kids had to put summer sports on hold, food had to be planned, and many who came a distance would find housing with family or members. The picture is–major sacrifice. I won’t go into all the details, but this was a huge undertaking. Check it out at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qExA8G34Dmw. The children in the family we interviewed were 4-16. Every one of them described a “Zion” like experience. Absolutely no regrets. They expressed significant spiritual growth and genuine love for all their fellow actors. So, our interview was inspiring to us and, hopefully, the oral history will make it the same for others. After the interview is over, the work begins as we have to catalogue and index the recording. That takes listening to the entire interview about 1 1/2 hours and noting the time of each subject discussed.
Last weekend, we drove to a re-created town called Beamish. Check it out at http://www.beamish.org.uk/. It was quite educational, but the incredible part is that they obtained every piece of materials to construct the city from period buildings that were being destroyed. From there, we went to the northeast coast of England. These are some beautiful beaches and fishing villages. A couple of pictures may capture the image.
Beach Village
Whitby
We spent the night at Lumley Castle and then visited Alnwick Castle–where they filmed some of the Harry Potter movie–particularly where he was taught to fly a broomstick.
Alnwick Castle
Kathy wanted to learn to fly for the grandkids–I was having no part of it. So she did the class alone, but at the end, begged me to take a ride. I gave in. I know this is far too frivolous an activity for (senior) missionaries, but, for the record, here it is:
First we summon the broom
And away we go
Scary stuff. That’s asking a lot of a broomstick.
Signing off for tonight. Our love to all.