27 July-29 July

27 juillet

Today I went out to meet Marzia where we were supposed to meet and she wasn’t there.  10 minutes later, she still wasn’t there and we had a bus to catch!  So I called her and her roommate from Spain answered the phone and I can never understand her when she speaks French or English because it just sounds like Spanish to me.  All I understood were the words malade, toilette, and desole (sick, toilet, sorry) so I assumed that they were sick.  I thought at the moment that they were probably hung over but found out later that they had gotten food poisoning.  So I was on my own for the day.  I went to the nursing home to visit Madame Gallet but then found out she had gone out with her son for the day.  I checked on another lady that I was supposed to visit and she was asleep at the moment but the animatrice told me that they were doing karaoke at 14h30 and so I could come back and do that with her then.  I told them I’d be there.  Then I went back to my apartment with nothing to do for the morning so I journaled and took a nap. 

At lunchtime, I went out to eat with Jared and his new work partner Anastasia.  She is from Russia and I love that that is her name.  She is from an area near Moscow (only a 9 hour bus ride away she said!).  She speaks French and English super well but we talked in French the whole time with her.  She talked about how it was different with European and American people because they all smiled so much.  I asked her if she liked Tolstoy and she told me no, he uses too much detail.  But she gave me another author name and book title to read that according to her, better illustrates the mind set of Russians.  Jared and I shared a delicious mozzarella and jambon pizza. 

Then I headed back to the nursing home to go to the karaoke session with Mme Pellanq.  Mme Pellanq is such an inspiring person.  She was orphaned at age 2 and has been handicapped and in a wheelchair her whole life.  But she always is wearing bright red lipstick and is always smiling and laughing and enjoying what is going on in the moment.  If I ever think that I have a reason to be sad or whiny, I’ll just think of Mme Pellanq and know if that she can keep her chin up after all that she has gone through, then surely I can too.  I sat and chatted with Mme and listened to thea group of about 30 nursing home residents reading and singing the lyrics to these old French songs.  It was hardly ever on key but was still so beautiful as these people that often don’t really look like humans anymore regained some light in their eyes as they moved their lips to the words or just tapped their hands on their wheelchair armrest.  I of course didn’t know really any of the songs but I enjoyed listening and chatting with Mme who kept asking me questions about my life and how I like Marseille and such.  She would keep saying how she was so grateful that I was there and how les petits frères is her family because she has no one—but always said it with a huge smile showing the lipstick that had rubbed off on her teeth.  A little snack break was taken after some songs and little cakes and drinks were passed out.  The animatrice lady came over and asked me if I sang…I couldn’t lie and say no.  So she told me to come and look at the English songs that she had.  Anywho, I got roped into singing a center stage, miked solo of My Heart Will Go On (from Titanic)!  Ha!  I started getting nervous, but then realized that this was probably the least judgemental crowd I could ever have.  I got introduced as the special treat for the karaoke session.  I sang the song as I read the lyrics on the screen and people joined in to sing with me on the chorus.  I did not have a super clear tone really but nonetheless, I got a huge applause and cheers when I finished.  I took a bow and they clapped even more.  Haha it was a very memorable moment.  My favorite part though was that Madame Pellanq made sure everyone knew that I was with her and that I was her friend and visitor because she was so proud of me and wanted to show me off J.  I don’t think I will ever be able to listen to that song again without thinking of the Etoile maison de retraite (nursing home).  I said goodbye to Mme Pellanq at the end of the activity and she made me promise that I would be there next Friday at 14h30.

Then I went and visited Mme Gaillard who I had never met before.  She is in the same nursing home complex but lives in the hospital.  She broke her legs two years ago when she fell and has never really recovered from that and so is always in a wheelchair or in her hospital bed.  I’m not sure what else is wrong with her that keeps her in the hospital, but I know that she is given food and water through tubes and tried to eat a cracker earlier that morning but threw it up minutes later.  Oh but what a sweetheart.  I felt her kind heart and soul as soon as I started talking to her.  When I asked her Vous allez bien? Ca va?  She replied Ca va doucement.  (How is it going? It’s going slowly/softly).  She is all alone since she never had any kids and her husband has already passed on.  She was in a depressed state which I wasn’t sure if that was her norm or if it was a particularly bad day.  She kept telling me that she never imagined finishing out her life like this, in a hospital room, but in her words of acceptance “C’est la vie” (that’s life).  She reminded me several times “Il faut profiter de la vie” which means basically don’t take life for granted and merit and profit from it as much as you can.  That’s such a hard situation to know what to say to someone who is on the threshold of passing into the next life but you don’t want them to be sad when it happens.  So I said a quick prayer that I could figure out what to say to her to make her smile and lift her spirits a bit.  I started by commenting on how beautiful her wedding ring was because it was a beautiful silver band with topaz and diamonds in it.  That got her talking about how she had been married to her husband for 50 years and I told her that that was true love right there and she agreed.  I asked her what she had done for work in her life and she told me she had been a nurse.  I marveled and told her that she had helped so many people throughout her life as a nurse and she agreed with me and said one must truly love people for that type of work.  I reminded her that lots of people must remember her for all the kindness that she rendered to others.  I pointed out how lovely the view outside her window was with a view of trees and flowers.  She has a shelf in her room with lots of little trinkets from all around the world and she told me that she hadn’t traveled those places but had been given those things by friends throughout the years and she brought them here to make her room feel more like home.  I pointed out that wow she had so many good and true friends and she agreed.  I asked her if she was going to watch the Olympic opening ceremonies that night and she said yes!  She said she loves the Olympics and was looking forward to watching the opening ceremony tonight and the games throughout the next few weeks.  I told her that I loved the Olympics too and we talked about what our favorite sports to watch were.  She is a sucker for figure skating..but unfortunately it’s not the winter Olympics this time around.  I had a thought in my mind that she must wonder if this is the last Olympics she’ll ever see…or how many she has left to see…  Il faut bien profiter de la vie like she told me.  I helped refill the drawer by her bed with little cakes.  She has trouble sleeping at night and she says that that is hardest part of the day because she gets bored and so she has these little cakes to pass the time.  When I was saying bye to her, she smiled for the first time since I had come into the room and said she had thoroughly enjoyed our visit and thanked me for coming.  I didn’t want to leave her alone for the next two days because the weekends are always lonely times for people in nursing homes and so I asked if I could come visit her Sunday afternoon and she said Volontiers (of course!).  There is no better satisfaction in life than being with other people and trying to lift their spirits.  Best feeling ever.  Today was a great day of reminding me why I’m really here even though it’s frustrating at times when people seem to not want to see us or when logistics get complicated. 

On the bus ride home I was trying to remember what British English accent sounded like and I could not for the life of me remember.  I tried to think of lines in Harry potter or pride and prejudice, but I could just not do it since I have been so overloaded with French this past month.  So when I got home, I watched the first 45 minutes of the first Harry Potter movie that I have on my computer and thoroughly enjoyed it.  But I never get sick of listening to French people talk.  The JAs think that English is so pretty to listen to and are shocked when us Americans say we love the way French sounds. 

That night, instead of a film night, the JAs had a “ball” or a dance.  I first went upstairs with my computer to see if I could find the Olympic opening ceremony online to watch…but malheureuesment, I couldn’t find anywhere to watch it that didn’t require a sign in.  For the NBC site, you have to sign in with your cable provider information and contract info.  I was kind of bummed about that because I knew that at home, Mom had for sure planned a super cool party/activity and everyone was watching it at home.  But I’ll just have to watch it when I get back to the states because they are always such cool shows and I have awesome memories of always watching them with the family.  I don’t think I’ll get to watch much of the Olympics here because I don’t have a tv but I may be able to catch some glimpses of stuff going on in reading the paper and watching tv with people I visit.  

So the dance was just the JAs and the guys had gotten a hold of this huge awesome stereo system and played really good music.  It was funny though because there were only like 12 of us and they left all of the lights on….and I am much more comfortable dancing in these types of settings when the lights are off.  We had pizza and popcorn and cookies and enjoyed hanging out and listening/dancing to the music.  I also sat in the kitchen a lot of talked with Sis. Rutman and Coralie.  Coralie asked me if I knew how to do a braid with 4 pieces of hair rather than 3.  I had no idea what she was talking about and so she looked up a youtube tutorial video and I realized that she was talking about what we call in the states a fish hook braid.  I did it on her long beautiful dark hair and she loved it!  Then I did it to Sis. Rutman’s hair so that Coralie could see how to do it.  Then I taught her how to do a French braid…and she laughed that it was called a French braid and we both had no idea why.  I also showed her how to do a waterfall braid.  We played musical chairs later and I won the first game then got out about in the middle in the second game.  At the end of the evening, Stephanie and I missed the last bus to the metro stop and so we had to walk to metro stop which took aabout 20 minutes.  Sweet Florian who had walked us out to the bus stop, with such sweet new convert faith, said a prayer for us there on the road and then sent us off knowing we would be safe. 

28 juillet

Stephanie and I made plans to sleep in just like last week.  Then we went and got on the train around 11:30 to go to Cassis.  Cassis is a famous beach town that is about a 20 minute train ride away in going east along the coast.  Whenever you ask people around here what you should see at or near Marseille, they say Notre Dame de la Garde, les Calanques, and Cassis.  The Rutmans have been there several times and told us it was a must-see.  We got off the train and figured out it was about 3 km to the city center and the coast and instead of waiting for the bus for 20 minutes, we just decided to walk there since it was a downhill trek.  And oh man I’m so glad we did!  We passed beautiful vineyards, farms, trees, flowers, and produce shops.  There were lots of cute countryside houses and the cigales (cicadas) were chirping loudly away as always.  I’m so glad I have my camera to take pictures that can almost truly capture the beauty around me. 

We made it to the city center and oh man, Cassis is such a cute town!  There were obviously lots of vacationing people here, but they were all French.  We ate lunch on this cute square with huge shady trees and lampposts with overflowing hanging flower baskets.  We walked around the city public garden and then walked down to the beautiful port and finally the beach.  I keep thinking I’ve seen my favorite Mediterranean beach, but then the next weekend I go to another beach and find another most favorite beach ever.  You’ll just have to see pictures of this beach but it was just incredible.  The water was clear and white and then a beautiful turquoise blue in some parts.  There were big mountains/cliffs in one direction with castle ruins on the top.  This beach had great waves and it was enjoyable to just ride the waves and listen to the children screaming with fright and joy at the experience.  I never wanted to get out of the water, but we had a boat to catch at 16h so we had to start drying off sometime.  We went over to these huge rocks down the coastline a bit and just laid on the rocks to dry off and watched the waves foam and crash at the rocks. 

Next, Stephanie and I did an hour and a half cruise that took us to see 8 calanques!  It was such a fun experience!  The boat was super rocky which I was not expecting but added to the experience.  We sat on the top of the boat and took lots of pictures of the beautiful white cliffs, greenery, and clear blue and turquoise water.  We saw lots of people kayaking, rock climbing, boating, and picnicking.  We got to see 8 calanques!  It was so so so cool.  The guy on the boat narrated the ride and pointed out things in the landscape and the names of certain rocks and the unique things about each calanque.  We went past the island where they found Antoine Saint-Exupery’s plane where he had crashed it and died.  He is the author of the famous French book The Little Prince.  We also went past the calanque where we had gone with the JAs earlier that week.  The views were incredible but with all the rockiness of the boat, Stephanie and I both had a headache and were ready to get off by the end. 

After the boat ride, I introduced Stephanie to Amorino gelato that we ate all the time in Paris then we bought some postcards.  We went back to the square where we had eaten lunch and wandered through the handcraft market that was there.  Then we went back and walked around the port and looked at the work of local painters…if only I had a couple extra hundred euros…I would have bought something.  Then we kind of walked around getting lost and rewalking the same streets but we finally found the bus stop that took us back to the train station.  We didn’t want to walk this time since it we were both more fatigued and it was an uphill walk now.  We grabbed some bread, cheese, meat and haribo gummy bears to eat for dinner on the train back.  A super funny moment was when I told Stephanie that the bus stop was by a casino.  Casino is the name of a common grocery store but this time it was actually a casino, gambling casino.  So we are walking past the casino and Stephanie starts walking towards the front door.  And I’m like ummm where are you going?  I think the bus stop is going to be on the road over here.  And Stephanie says oh I thought you wanted to buy a baguette and some food for dinner?  And I responded in the casino?!  I don’t think they have that there to buy.  And then she realized it was a real casino…we still laugh over that J.    

Stephanie and I were sitting on the side of the train station on a little bench eating dinner and looking at pictures as we waited for the train that was 20 minutes late.  We lost track of time, because thing we knew, the train that we had wanted was leaving the station!  We hadn’t even heard it come up to the station or anything!  It was a shorter train and we had wrongly assumed that we would see the cars pull up in front of us.  It was a bit frustrating but there was nothing we could do so we just laughed at our stupidity and waited another 40 minutes for the next train back to Marseille. 

29 juillet

We made it on time for choir and it was actually happening this time!  We rehearsed the song and ran through it several times since we were going to sing it in church that day.  I waited out in the hall for the first half of relief society as I was waiting for Jared to come with Anastasia so I could take Anastasia to relief society with me.   In sacrament meeting, they had the hymn number for silent night listed up on the board and Jared and I were laughing, wondering when they would realize it and change it.  It took until before the sacrament hymn when the chorister pointed out to the bishopric and another hymn was chosen.  The choir number went well!  The a capella part at the beginning where the women hum the melody and one of the basses reads the lyrics always feels a bit jolted at the end when the piano comes in and realigns the key…ha but I doubt many people noticed or cared.  Transfer assignments were given on Friday and so 3 of the 6 missionaries that were leaving bore their testimony.  I hung out and talked to people for a while after church then went back to my apartment. 

I really really really wanted to take a nap and not go back out into the heat.  But I had promised Mme Gaillard that I would come and visit her.  I was so tempted to call her and cancel it.  I rationalized in my mind that maybe she would forget that I had told her I was coming.  But then I thought about the conference talk about things that are good, better, and best.  It would be good to relax on a Sunday afternoon in preparation for a new week.  But it would be best to keep my promise and be unselfish and go visit her.  I knew I would be annoyed with myself for the rest of the day if I didn’t go.  So I went.  And it was enjoyable!  She seemed to be in better spirits today and was keeping food down.   She told me about the opening ceremonies and how they were incredible.  She told me that the whole royal family was there and that the queen carried in the torch or lit the torch, I’m not really sure which.  She told me about what medals had been awarded so far.  Then we watched a bit of the basketball game between USA and France.  I stayed for about an hour and a half and then took the bus back home.  Stephanie had gotten back by then as she had done one visit that afternoon too.  We both were exhausted and fell asleep from about 5-7:30.  Then we got up to eat and get things done. 

So I am supposed to teach the FHE lesson on Thursday about how I’ve been to church in different countries and about how it is still the same and is still true all over the world.  I’m having some difficulties figuring out where to take it…but I’ll figure it out.