Friday, July 17, through Wednesday, July 22. Paris and Poyanne.
Our taxi driver arrived at the flat promptly at 9 am to drive us to Ashford International Rail Station for our Eurostar Chunnel train scheduled for 10H55 (10:55 am Greenwich Time). Our passports and tickets were inspected, our luggage x-rayed and checked, and then we walked and wheeled our way to coach car 4, seats 15 and 16. Right on time we left the station, and the English countryside swept past our window until suddenly and more quickly than expected we plunged into the tunnel, and not long thereafter the French countryside was sweeping past our window.
We pulled into the station at 13H47 (1:47 pm Paris Time), and Ingrid's cousine Evelyne greeted us and led the way to her parked car down a narrow stairway, our luggage weaving and clunking behind us. Soon she dropped us off at her address on Rue des Moines (Street of the Monks), and we climbed the stairs to her first floor apartment. Evelyne went back to work, after giving us walking directions to the nearest train station so we could book our tickets for the TGV to see Ingrid's Oncle Pierre.
When we arrived at the Gare de Pont Cardinet we were directed to a ticketing office. After waiting a short while in a row of seats facing a row of desks and ticket agents, our number was called. At this point I need to pay tribute to Ingrid's linguistic competence, because without her ability to hear rapidly-spoken French, and to parler in return, all our hopes for visiting her uncle would have been dashed. The nub of the problem: July and August are the great times of vacances, and all the trains were apparently booked. Through patience and persistence, and Ingrid's français and beaucoup de bonne chance, we managed to book the last two tickets on a train leaving from Gare Montparnasse at 15H50 the next day, arriving at Dax at 20H03. (The distance is 480 miles, so you can calculate how grande was the vitesse!)
After work Evelyne drove us to the western suburbs of Paris, where Evelyne's mother Janine and her sister André live, for dinner at Le Vilgacy. On the way to the restaurant, we passed through the village of Le Raincy, and glimpsed the house in which Ingrid's mother and Oncle Pierre grew up, and the elementary school that they attended.
Left to right: Janine, Ingrid, Evelyne, and André.
On Saturday morning we visited Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris. Here are Ingrid and Evelyne on Pont Saint-Michel.
Inside, among the beautiful and ancient statues, paintings, and chapels, there is a remarkable tableau decorating the north and south sides of the Cathedral's medieval Choir Wall. The first photograph, taken at the beginning of the north wall, shows scenes from Mary's visit to her cousin Elizabeth to the visit of the Magi; in the second photograph, from the south wall, Jesus greets the women at the tomb, and then Mary Magdalene.
And here is a photograph of the magnificent North Rose Window:
Our TGV left the station on time, and the French countryside sped by our windows, slowing only as we crossed the Garonne River and eased into Bordeaux's train station for a quick stop. When we pulled into Dax, Oncle Pierre and his daughter Natalie were waiting for us on the platform. After an emotional reunion with her uncle, whom Ingrid (and I) hadn't seen for more than 20 years (and may not have seen again were it not for the Lilly Endowment), we embraced Natalie. Ingrid hadn't seen her for more than 25 years, when she attended Natalie's marriage to her late husband Stéphane, and it was wonderful for me to meet Natalie for the first time. Soon we were on our way, driving north and west about 16 miles to the tiny village of Poyanne, where Oncle Pierre lives in a house dating back 100 or 150 years (depending on what part of the house you're in), and Natalie lives in a modern split-level house with her college-aged children, Emmanuelle and Thomas.
For the next three days we relaxed and enjoyed Oncle Pierre's hospitality. On Sunday morning he and I went to the local boulangerie and bought some French bread (the real thing, of course!) and the region's speciality, a Pastis Cake, for le petit déjeuner.
Here is Oncle Pierre's home on Rue Place de la Mairie, followed by the view outside our first floor chambre, looking past the palm tree in his side yard to the California-like roofs of the village hall and offices. (Out of sight, and off to the right, is Poyanne's bull ring!)
On Sunday we walked across the street to St. Bartholomew's Church, and then beyond to the 17th century Chateau de Poyanne. In the foreground Oncle Pierre is telling these visitors about January's devastating European windstorm Klaus, before taking them and me on a tour around the chateau and its former stables and monastic dwellings.
For lunch we sat in Oncle Pierre's back yard, while lizards enjoyed the afternoon sun on the wall behind us:
Early that afternoon we walked over to Natalie's house for dinner. We had just enough time to say bonjour to Thomas before he fell into his bed after being up 24 hours, playing the clarinet for a singing and dancing gig. The rest of us enjoyed a delightful afternoon and evening together. Natalie took us on a tour of the extensive orchard she and Stéphane had planted, including apple trees and pear trees and cherry trees, pine trees and transplanted Christmas trees, and oaks.
We had canard for dinner, done to perfection:
After dinner I showed some of our photographs on my laptop, and then Emmanuelle showed some of her family photographs on her laptop, including many of her father. It was a memorable occasion, and it was a great joy for me to be a part of Ingrid's extended famille française.
On Monday, Oncle Pierre drove us seven miles to the Intermarché supermarket in Pontonx-sur-L'Adour, where we bought biftecks and chèvre and haricots verts and baguettes and glace and Madiran Chateau Coulane for our last dîner chez Pierre. Oncle Pierre created a culinary masterpiece, assisted ably by sous-chef Ingrid.
After lunch on Tuesday I finished transcribing notes from Common Fire: Leading Lives of Commitment in a Complex World, by Laurent A. Parks Dalos (and others), one of the three books I had read to inform and supplement my Sabbatical experiences. The others books are Ian Mobsby's The Becoming of G-d and Anthony E. Healy's The Post-Industrial Promise: Vital Religious Community in the 21st Century.
By mid-afternoon we were packed and ready for our return to Paris. Oncle Pierre drove us to the train station in sweltering heat, and stayed with us on the platform until our train arrived. At 16H12 promptly we were on our way, and arrived a little after our scheduled time of 20H30. Evelyne, Ingrid, and I had dinner at a neighborhood restaurant, Sans Gêne Batignolles, and returned to her apartment for a not entirely restful night.
On Wednesday morning we made final decisions about what we would take to Madagascar and what we would leave behind, and then Evelyne drove us out to Charles de Gaulle International Airport for our 10:40 am Air France flight to Antananarivo, Madagascar. For some reason there were passengers in the back of the plane who couldn't manage to stow their carry-ons or stay in their seats for the passenger count, so our flight was delayed for nearly an hour. By the time we landed at Ivato Airport it was nearly midnight. As we taxied down the tarmac we could see very few lights in the airport or beyond it, and what lights there were shined dimly. It was our first intimation that we were entering one of the world's Least Developed Countries. We stepped out of the plane and down the stairs to the tarmac, and walked toward the terminal. It took three attempts to get our visas stamped, and a long wait to get our luggage. When, finally, we crossed the threshold into the waiting room and spotted Todd McGregor waving to us, it was Thursday. A new day and a new adventure had begun.
Comments