The Carol Service
We had planned to all go to the Anglican Carol Service at 17h on Saturday.
The logistics were complicated because I was in Mérignac till 16h30 for the Gros Tubes de Noël rehearsal while the children and Pat were scheduled to be in Cenon till 16h at Club Lampadaire (the youth group). So the plan was that Pat and kids come by tram to Mérignac and I pick them up in the car to go to the Carol Service.
However the best-laid plans go oft awry, and a minor malaise meant that Pat and Catrin stayed home, Gwilym went home from the club by tram and bus and I went to the Carol Service on my own.
It was very different this year, with readings in Spanish, German, Italian, Welsh (hurrah !), Arabic and French - the text in English being printed in the order of service. The choir sang "For unto us" from Messiah, plus some Palestrina, Willcocks (Lord of the Dance) etc.. The middle of the service included a kind of western-style nativity tableau done by the kids and the christening of a lad. Afterwards I stayed behind too long to talk with my friend Didier, who is a devoted anglophile.
Everyone was agreed that the lady who read in Welsh was by far the best reader and - would you believe it - I was sat next to an elderly lady I had never met before who is from Newtown and a Welsh-speaker. Did we ? Well of course we did.
The logistics were complicated because I was in Mérignac till 16h30 for the Gros Tubes de Noël rehearsal while the children and Pat were scheduled to be in Cenon till 16h at Club Lampadaire (the youth group). So the plan was that Pat and kids come by tram to Mérignac and I pick them up in the car to go to the Carol Service.
However the best-laid plans go oft awry, and a minor malaise meant that Pat and Catrin stayed home, Gwilym went home from the club by tram and bus and I went to the Carol Service on my own.
It was very different this year, with readings in Spanish, German, Italian, Welsh (hurrah !), Arabic and French - the text in English being printed in the order of service. The choir sang "For unto us" from Messiah, plus some Palestrina, Willcocks (Lord of the Dance) etc.. The middle of the service included a kind of western-style nativity tableau done by the kids and the christening of a lad. Afterwards I stayed behind too long to talk with my friend Didier, who is a devoted anglophile.
Everyone was agreed that the lady who read in Welsh was by far the best reader and - would you believe it - I was sat next to an elderly lady I had never met before who is from Newtown and a Welsh-speaker. Did we ? Well of course we did.
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