Goodbyes

The news arrived the other day of the sudden death of one of my cousins. People from South Wales usually have lots of cousins, and so did I, though the number is falling fast. Weddings and funerals are important occasions to get together and acknowledge the place that family plays in our lives. We usually can't get home for them, and I doubt if this one will be any different.

Meanwhile a senior colleague is leaving Bordeaux. He's a wonderful man who knows the area really well. He's retiring up to the Dordogne - I teased him about going to live in the English region - and he'll be a big loss to the Bordeaux scene. I wouldn't want to retire up there - maybe to the coast - but he says he needs to give his successor some scope, and that everyone can understand.

This week in Bordeaux they've been filming a period drama about the life of Chopin in Paris. Bordeaux was remodelled around the same time as Paris, so people often call it "the little Paris" - same beauty, less stress and fewer Parisians, though I think we're catching up. They strew the Place du Chapelet with straw and horse-muck (judging by the smell), built a few false shop fronts and a comically small triumphal arch. By the time I was able to stroll through the stuff was piled up ready to be hauled away. They also used some of the older parts of the city. La Reine Margot and Les Misérables were also filmed in part in Bordeaux.

Our book group met last Saturday. Pat was prevented from going by a mild flare-up of her back issues. The book under question was Wuthering Heights. I decided that I didn't need that much darkness and violence in my life, so I found some Spark notes and read the selected lowlights and a family tree to sort out who was who. It was good to see people again. We plan one more book before Christmas - yet to be chosen by internet poll.

We went to a son et lumière show, entitled "Genesis". It was held in the Chapelle du Crous, It's a neogothic chapel built for the great seminary of Bordeaux on the site fo the former Capuchin monastery. After 1905 it came into public ownership and is not usually open for visitors, so I was keen to go and see it again. The show exists in two formats, I think - with a live orchestra for a large sum of money, and with recorded music for much less. So we went and recited on bean bags, listening to the usual suspects (Mahler, Haydn et al) while the six days of creation were artistically interrupted on the ceiling and walls of the building. It was really good! 30 minutes of total immersion, though the music could have been louder. Though octopus do not swim like that.

I've been wondering about friends who leave the simplicity of evangelical faith for some of the rather more spectacular forms of expression available. I'd love to see a serious study of people's reasons and motives. For some I'm sure there are factors in their history - broken relationships, a challenging upbringing, perhaps. For others I can see the sensory attraction - hey, we get son et lumière every week, and we get to do it for God. One can see the attraction of dressing up and processing around while everyone watches. Sometimes I wonder about exchanging one kind of rigour for another. 

Another restaurant has opened in our area. We'd been watching the signs go up and the furniture arrive. Our area has a cruel lack of shops and restaurants. Even our fried chicken place shut down. (Partly our fault. There's only so much fried chicken you can take.) And there's no baker! The town hall has addressed the situation by sending food carts every day at lunchtime and a veg man on Thursdays. But now we have Le Boeuf Gourmand (The Greedy Cow). We went yesterday. Their lunchtime menu seemed really good value, but it's only available in the week. OK. So I had a steak and legumes du soleil (ratatouille) while Pat had a spiced kebab with green beans. Note to reader, the waitress' warning was unnecessary, the spiciness of the kebab, while far too strong for her, was undiscernable to the British palate. The food was really good, and we were plied with a little salad on arrival and some flutes of champagne at the end of our meal, to celebrate their first week of opening. I hope they do well. Not sure how many steaks we can realistically consume, either, so everyone else will have to pull their weight to keep this place afloat.

The café has been quite busy this week, and our broken down coffee machine has returned from repair under guarantee by the business we bought it from. We're so glad to have it back in time for the autumn rush for hot chocolate! The café is not a financially viable business, funded basically by gifts from the brethren assembly and the international church, with occasional gifts from the UK. I'm always touched by the generosity of our folk, especially those who are currently job-hunting. We've got through this month OK, and we'll be OK for next month, too.

I'm not on duty at church today, so we intend to go by bike.