Do you like reading? Do you like writing? I enjoy both, but I wish I was better at it and more consistent. Well, every November for several years now, there is National Novel Writing Month. I’ve given it a go a few times, but unfortunately I have not stuck with it the entire month. You’d think it would be easy to come up with enough stories for an entire novel after all the places we’ve traveled and our many experiences overseas, and at home.
The other day I was in a small grocery store looking for a snack while I waited for the laundry to finish up at the local laverie. I noticed ahead of me was an older gentleman with a very long grey ponytail, tied up low on his neck, the way I tie my hair. Well, I am always on the lookout for people to meet, and ways to meet them, so I thought my own getting-long ponytail might be just the thing to forge a connection here. I walked up the aisle, and when he turned, I saw him look at me and my hair. Instead of an anticipated head nod or some other acknowledgement, he gave me a sideways smirk and turned away, shaking his head! Needless to say, I felt a little hurt! How could a long-haired gent so easily dismiss another? Well, suffice to say, there very well could have been cultural dynamics at play.
I was a little nervous about coming to France with long hair. Back in Central Asia men generally did not do that. To have long hair suggested that you also smoked drugs, drank lots of beer, and were generally up to no good. Sadly, many dudes I met with long hair in Central Asia actually fit that description! So I kept mine short for a long time, even though it pained me.
Here in France however, I discovered something amazing (two things): Many men wait until their 3os to start a family, and those same men have long hair! Imagine my surprise to be standing outside the kids’ school waiting for them, and to look around and see that most fathers had hair longer than mine! And were my age. Astounding. I’m still in the process of meeting them, but it has been a pleasant experience thus far.
Michelle has befriended and older lady at the church who needed some help cleaning her apartment. Kind Michelle of course offered to help, and while there the older dame gives Michelle French lessons! She has introduced Michelle to a few other older lady friends who are in the same situation as she (living alone, difficulty getting out and about, cleaning and tidying), so Michelle has met some and is working out how to bless them all. Pray for her!
Our chickens are still with us, but one, Popcorn, is not feeling well. Please pray for her. We don’t know what is wrong. We’ve read that chickens can get depressed from cloudy and rainy weather, and well, we’ve had a lot of that lately (almost every day this month has been rainy). Despite her laying eggs again suddenly after a lengthy spell, she has returned to some kind of funk. This is Liberty’s chicken, so Liberty is also worried for Popcorn. Please pray!
Popcorn, on the ground, is not feeling well these days.A big tree blown over by the wind
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. The place God put us to start our ministry in Bayonne is an amazing blessing. Did I ever tell you how it came about? Well, going way back to March in Caen, we knew we had to start thinking about moving to the south. Little did we know the incredible challenge it would end up being.
We needed to start the residence permit renewal 3 months before the end date. We actually started about 4.5 months, just to be safe. This is because every sort of official document change/application requires a rendezvous, an appointment with an official at the prefecture offices. So we made our rendezvous a month before the start of the 3-month countdown. We went to the meeting and began submitting our paperwork. This means we had a meeting, and an official went over our paperwork with us to ensure we had everything. We did. Then the official asked us which date we would prefer for the renewal interview – late October or Novmber 2019. ? Quoi!? We told her our permits expire in August… and thus we’d be in the country illegally. She just shurgged her shoulders. We asked her what do we do in the meantime. She again shrugged. Then, we made a fatal error! We told her we would also have moved by then to the south; would we have to come all the way back to up Normandy in Oct/Nov, or could we get the rendezvous transferred to the Pyrenees-Atlantique prefecture. Ohh!
As soon as the Normandy preferecture realized we planned to move they told us to just do the renewal down south. Ok. So we tried to book a rendezvous for the prefecture in Bayonne. But everytime we tried the booking website would say “Closed”. How were we to book a meeting then? We even called the office, and they also said go online. We tried for about 2 weeks but always got the “Closed” notice. We called again, and THIS TIME we were told, “Oh, the booking site only takes bookings on Mondays.”. Wow.
So we waited till the Monday afternoon and tried to make a booking. But it was still closed. We spent the rest of the week trying to call the prefecture, and finally just sent an email. Wonders of wonders they replied to the email explaining that the booking site makes renedezvouses only Monday mornings, between 9 am and 12 noon! Ok, so we waited for the following Monday, made an appointment, then got an email later in the week saying it was cancelled. Now, it is important to keep in mind that these appointments are usually for dates 4 weeks ahead of the current date. So we were now in late May. Then we got busy and didn’t try to make another appointment for 2 weeks. We tried again, but it was cancelled again. We couldn’t understand.
So I looked at the booking site really closely. I realized at the section where it was asking for my address I had been submitting our current address in Caen, in Normandy. And we guessed that that must be why our rendezvous requests were being cancelled – because we weren’t in the Pays-Basque region yet. We decided to just drive down there and go to the prefecture in person because weeks and months of internet attempts and phone calls weren’t getting su anywhere. So in late June we drove down and went to the prefecture. They were helpful, and generally kind. It was quite different altogether compared to the Normandy prefecture. The Normandy prefecture was dealing with hundreds of people a week, a day even, it seemed. If you had to go there, and it opened at 8, you had to be in line outside before 6:30 am or you woudn’t get in before the noon lunch break!
Anyway, the Pays-Basque prefecture explained that we had to make the appointment online, and coached us on how to do it properly. But remember, it is now mid-June, and our permits expired August 3. Taking into consideration the 4-week advance window, we had to make an appointment immediately. But alas! June was proving to be popular, and we could only get one appointment for July 25, for Shane. Michelle’s would be August 14! The last thing the prefecture told us was that we must have a local address or they could not do anything.
All along we had been looking for a place, using sites like leboncoin.fr, pap.fr, and various other sites. But, this was nigh impossible because we weren’t actually in Bayonne in person to look at possible places. No one wanted to do a deal from a distance. (We also have a continuing problem that most agencies require tax returns as proof of sufficient income, but France tax returns. So many agencies with prefect options for us refuse to work with us because, as foreigners, we have no France tax return.) But how in the world would we find a place before July 25? We even looked while we were in Bayonne, but the tax return issue hampered our attempts.
Well, the about 10 days before my July 25 appointment I talked with the teammates we were going to join and I mentioned the housing problem. The husband paused and said, “You know, I might know someone. I will call you back.” So he called someone who had helped his family when they first moved to Bayonne 7 years ago and asked. It turned out that the house that that guy’s church uses to house their pastors was empty, and would be empty until April 2020! And the last council meeting for a few months was the next day! He told my teammate he would raise the question of whether the Cookes could stay in the empty house. We waited with bated breath.
The next day our teammate called back to say yes, we could stay there! So I arranged to go down immediately and meet the council and hopefully sign a rental contract. Off I went, back to Bayonne, and met my teammate and the person in charge of the empty house. It was in need of renovations before we moved in. He asked me when we wanted to move, and I suggested early August. In the end we agreed Aug 14 would be possible. And the morning I had to leave Bayonne to get back to Caen I met the person one more time and we signed the rental agreement! He actually met me in the parking lot of a Burger King, and he was dressed in white and red, on his way to have fun at the Fêtes de Bayonne! I hopped in the rental car and drove back to Caen with some relief. A few days later I returned to Bayonne for my prefecture appointment, ready with all the paperwork.
Fêtes de Bayonne!
This is where things got tricky again. Because we weren’t continuing to be students, and we had no job in France, what status would be applicable for us?? In the end I had to apply for a Visitor Status, good for only 6 months, and this being dependent on a sufficient salary from Canada.
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OK, so my application was accepted, so I asked the lady at the interview about my wife’s appointment being Aug 14, 11 days after her permit expired. So she gave me a Post-It note with her name and date and a brief explanation which would act as a unofficial notice excusing that Michelle would be late, not because of laziness or ineptitude, but because of the dynamics I have just shared with you! (I told her the whole tale too.)
We had been trying to figure out how to move then. We decided on renting a moving van from France Cars. There were some complications there too that I won’t go into detail, but they were resolved by our local bank, BNP, raising our spending limit on our bank card on the spot, something they told us would normally not happen without… an appointment and a long history of banking with them. They were so kind to do that for us!
Due to other details, such as the moving van not being able to be rented one-way and needing to be returned, we decided that Michelle would go down to Bayonne with all her paperwork on the Aug 13, the day before her appointment. The kids and I would load up the moving van the same day, Aug 13, and leave that evening for Bayonne. Let me tell you, the kids did amazing with helping me load up the moving van! And we had our own deadline – 3 pm, when the landlord would come by to check the apartment. At 2:55 we had the apartment totally empty and clean, albeit with a full entrance on th ground floor with our stuff. By 4:30 we had put the last of the stuff in the moving van, said a prayer of thanks to the Lord, and the kids and I began our moving journey down south. We had heard from Michelle, letting us know she made it to Bayonne. (She had to leave early early on the 13th, take a train to Paris, and transfer to another train to go to Bayonne.)
August 14th came. The kids and I had stopped for the night at La Roche-sur-Yon. Michelle called us late morning to let us know her appointment went well, all her papers were accepted, and she too had to switch to the Visitor Status. But, the official did say that due to the computer automatically entering data, there remained the possibility that Michelle would get fined for being late. This is one reason why ask for prayers about our permits… we haven’t heard yet if they’ve been finally processed, and if there is a fine or not. If so, it could be as high as 700 euro!
So, here we are in Bayonne, living in a nice Basque house. There is a yard, trees, an the old chicken coop which is now home to Popcorn and Charlie. But. There are mosquitos. TONS of mosquitos. They especially like Van and I. Poor Van, his legs are covered in red dots, despite spraying anti-pique spray. But I don’t want to complain about the mosquitos! Thank God for this house, our first place in Bayonne!
Hi! Summer went by quickly, didn’t it? Here we are in September already. Hard to believe. Liberty and Van have begun their respective school years. This time they are different schools. We were all a little apprehensive about this sort of change, but there was no room for Van at the school where Liberty is attending; we had looked forward to them going to the same school. Fortunately, just across the street, was another school which had room for Van (in fact, students who get waitlisted for the school Liberty is at often attend this neighbouring school until the following year and they are assured a spot then). So, it is fine, we can walk with them both to their schools since they are close together.
Below is a map of our region. There are a few names for this place, and we aren’t sure why. Colloquially it is called BAB – Biarritz, Anglet, Bayonne. I think we shared that we’d be moving to Biarritz/Bayonne when we were first looking into the area. We have since discovered that Biarritz is a much ritzier and expensive town compared to Bayonne. Anglet is in the middle. Not specifically for this reason, but we have moved to Bayonne. This is mostly because it is the most central of the towns in the area. Before we truly knew too, the school that caught our eye online for Liberty and Van ended up being here, so it has all worked out.
However, the place that God opened up for us is only available until next April. We are going to have to move again. But this is an important question! The region shown on the map above is not too large, but it is the area for which we feel burdened. Since we don’t have a vehicle we will need to find a place that lets us get around by bus or bike. See the map below?
The neighbourhoods we are considering are Arènes, Saint-Léon, Marracq, and Petit Bayonne. If we have to we could consider some of the areas outside the ones I just wrote about. If we were to live further abroad than these areas then Liberty and Van would probably have to change schools, and honestly, we are hoping to avoid that.
So, even though we just moved, we are already keeping an eye out for the next place. Typically places are rented out for 3 years at a time, so we anticipate the next place becoming more homey than the current one.
But! The one we are in now has a wonderful advantage – a ready-to-use chicken coop! 2 weeks after we moved in, we cleaned up the coop and decided to buy two chickens! The red one is called Popcorn, as chosen by Liberty, and the black one is named Charlie, by Van. They’ve begun laying eggs too!
So please pray with us already, giving thanks to God to where he has led us, as well as about where to move to next. Thanks! Merci!
Back in Central Asia we rarely had pets. Our last two years there we did have two pet guinea pigs. It was so hard for Liberty and Van to leave them behind. We fortunately we able to leave with the same lady from whose pet store we bought them from. She was happy to have them back, nice and fat!
Well, here we are in France and the kids have been asking for a pet. But they had inspiration: A chicken coop was already in place in the backyard of where we are staying. We asked the owner, and the neighbours, if we could get two chickens, and everyone thought it was a splendid idea. I imagine they were fine with this because across the back lane from our house, and the other houses, is a fenced-off section where a miniature pony and two goats live. So, two chickens would not be a problem.
We looked online and found a farmer selling chickens for only 12 Euro each. We drove out to his place, and picked a black chicken and a red chicken. Liberty wanted to red one, and named it Popcorn. Van chose the black chicken and called it Charlie. It took a few days for the two hens to adjust to their smaller and more private accomodations, but before you knew it they were walking around eating bugs and grass, AND laying eggs.
So, the kids have ‘pets’. We have a sort of mosquito/pest control system. And we have one fresh egg a day. Yay!
You just get used to doing things a certain way. I was talking with the neighbour the other day and he asked me if we used our bikes. Like, alot? He said always sees us on them. He wondered if that meant we don’t have a car. I told him we don’t have a car. That’s a funny thing about our overseas life: We have never had a car overseas. The week we get back to Canada though we buy something. One reason we don’t have a car overseas I suppose has to do with safety/insurance. Life can be tough as it is, so why add potential complications to it?
What this means in Caen, for us, is taking our laundry up to the local laundomat, or, lavomatique. We discovered these during our previous short visit to France and needed to do laundry while on the road. We discovered that these are all over the place. Most neighbourhoods will have one. They are super handy! But I imagine we are quite the sight, loading up the bikes and hauling our bags of laundry there.
Our lavomatique
But while there alot can happen. We study our French books, or listen to french lessons. We have to solve problems. One time I put in money and nothing happened. So, I called the number on the wall, not sure of what would come next, and somehow was able to explain the issue and understand that the remote technician was going to start the machine for me (he did) and then refund the money if I would place my laundry card to the payment machine. It worked! I couldn’t believe I managed to achieve that. And then the other day I met a young guy from Cuba! He was all excited, telling me that they don’t have such machines in Cuba (really?) and asking me to take his photo with the machines in the background.
We have been learning alot about French culture. One important aspect has been the evening meal, and the order of the dishes. Near the end a platter of cheese is often served. Now, this is not North American cheddar cheese, the kind we put in Kraft dinners. No, this is _real_ cheese. Cheese like Camembert, Pont l’Evêque, Pavé d’Auge, Livarot, and Brin de Paille. Cheese from cows, AND goats and sheep! I admit, the strong scent and flavour of these are challenging for someone like me to manage. To eat. It doesn’t help that many other foreigners commiserate, and generally we all have been avoiding these cheeses. Now, this is fine in your own home, but what do you do when you are visiting French friends and they serve the cheese platter?
So, the other day Michelle, Liberty, Van and I went to a fair of sorts near our apartment, at the Parc des Expositions de Caen. It was called “Fêno, le meilleur de la Normandie à Caen”, and it displayed the best of various industries located in Normandy. We could read about the rockets developed for the French space program, to the last sewing needle manufacturer in Western Europe, to food and drinks. It was while we were walking through the food section, with its vast showcases of cheese from Normandy, that something was really driven home. _They love their cheese._ And I realized that if I was really going to fit in here, and settle, that I too would need to learn to love the cheese.
So today at lunch, I ordered a cheese platter. I think there was Camembert, and Pont l’Evêque, and another goat cheese. These were all cheese that I previously would take a small nibble and then drown with coffee, or coke, or anything, to mask the taste. But no. I had to eat it plain. Eat it straight. Without grimacing or gagging. So I did. It wasn’t easy, but, it wasn’t that hard either.
If you wish, try a new cheese from France this week. Your local grocery store probably has some. Give it a try, and let me know how it went for you. Bon appetite!
It’s been a long time since we lived somewhere new. Well, that isn’t true. We’ve lived in several ‘new’ places in just the last year. But living in a place for a little while vs living in a place with a long-term commitment… it is different.
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We are so busy with language learning in the form of classes at the university that it has been a challenge to get a rhythm.
Sunset
Language Study – Meeting People
Liberty and Van are doing well in their schooling. Actually, we think they are pretty amazing considering that they entered the school not knowing French! Fortunately they have made several friends, and even a few who speak just enough English to help them with school assignments and telling them what’s happening in class. Both Liberty and Van tell us that often they are working away, and they sort of hear the teacher saying something, and suddenly everyone is getting up and leaving… and Liberty nor Van know what is happening! But praise God, they have done well, academically and socially. Liberty has been getting involved in sports. Van has had to deal with a bully, and managed to do so in such as way that he and the bully are now friends, high-fiving each other when they see each other.
Each day for lunch at school they have a 4 course lunch, which they thoroughly enjoy. As well, there have been many opportunities to play and do sports. In the first month they have gone on a 2 night bicycling camping trip, archery, fencing, another bike ride to the seaside, various trips to galleries and natural museums, handball tournaments, a soccer tournament, and this week they are starting volleyball. Wow.
Bike Riding
One activity we thought we’d be doing a lot of in France was bike riding. We had thought everyone would be riding bikes here and there. Well, it isn’t as widespread as we thought, but we still wanted to do this. So this week we finally bought a bike for Michelle. Now, she and Liberty and Van all have bikes. What about me? Well, I signed up for Velolib! So I can use a bike for a small fee/per use for the year.
This news is coming to you via the blog rather after the fact! We did indeed, by God’s grace, find an apartment to live in for the year. It is just a 15 minute walk to the kids school. And from there, it is about 25 minutes to the university where Michelle and I are studying the French language. All in all, it worked out well. The landlady just recently had it painted totally in white, so she encouraged us to not get too creative with decorating, especially since we expect to be in this apartment only for one year. She doesn’t want to have to paint again.
But before we found this one, ooh boy, we looked at a lot of others. They all had their appeal. One had a nice balconey. One had a finished kitchen. One had lovely views. But they had drawbacks too. One was in view of a prison (did we want prisoners looking out their windows into our place?). One had single pane glass doors on the balconies (cold!). Another had a sink and counter so low it was too low for even Liberty to work on! Praise God, the place we have is just right.
Caen
Caen is a very nice city. The bus service is really good, and attached to the bus service is a rental bike service too. So we have gotten monthly subscriptions for the bus, and I signed up for the bike. Bikes are not as prevalent as I was expecting here, but life in general is ready to incorporate bikes, like this storage on a train for a bike.
Bike on a train
There is a lot of history in this region too. The landing beaches of Normandy are just down the road, and every where you go you can find a plaque, or a monument, or a statue commemorating the soldiers who fought in WWII as well as WWI. The city itself too retains an old “European” charm.
When we began our search for schools for Liberty and Van in late August, most were still closed. So we focused on finding an apartment. That was actually easy as there are many options for finding houses or apartments. What we realized after several days was that rental agencies wanted someone from France to act as our Guarantor for our rent, with a salary of 3 to 4 times the monthly rent.
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Who has that kind of money?? So we reached a point of discouragement, and really, it came down to trusting God to lead us to an individual landlord who would trust us and not insist on a guarantor.
In the meantime, schools opened and we could visit them. One after another we were told, “Sorry, no room.” So we found ourselves with no apartment, and no school for the kids. What to do? We had met one landlord who seemed willing to trust us, but hadn’t heard from her clearly.
Then, mid week last week, we visited one school. The Director said there wasn’t room, technically, but she could call the class teacher to see if one more child could squeeze in. She tried calling, but there was no response. So the Director decided to call the next door school to see if there was room for Liberty (who is in a higher grade). The Director smiled as she was told that one student had just cancelled their spot: There was room for Liberty! This seemed to embolden the Director who, being impressed with how quiet and patient Van and Liberty had been waiting, said she would try to make sure Van could get in. This way, they would be in the same school. We thanked her profusely, and went off to meet another missionary who lives in Caen with his family. He had offered to help us talk with a few schools, but since the one for Liberty had opened up we decided to go there first and start Liberty’s registration. While there the Director from the school we were trying to get Van into called, and spoke with the Secretary of Liberty’s school. When she heard we were there right then, with a friend who spoke French, she yelled for joy (we could hear her over the phone!) and asked for us to come back to her school (Van’s) once we were done at Liberty’s school. So we finished up, and went back to Van’s school to hear the great news that Van’s class’s teacher had willingly offered Van a spot. So just like that, both kids had found their schools; both schools were eager and happy to have Liberty and Van!
Below I am including some pics of the unfinished apartment.
The title is simple. France. This is because, as most of you know, we are finally, actually in France! It was really a tumultuos process, filled with some uncertainty and ambiguity, but we truted God, and did what we could, and voila, here we are.
Hello from Les Halles
So where are we? Right now we are
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in a city called Lisieux, in the Normandy region. And we are in this housing while we travel back and forth from another city, about 45 minutes away, called Caen. It is in this city that we will be based for a year, studying French (language and culture).
Caen centreville
Please pray as we look at schools and rental flats or houses.
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