"Lord, Reign in Me"

On our Choral Tour back in April, the Harmony Chorus had a repertoire and a fixed order that we stuck to every night. Our last song was "The Lord Bless You and Keep You," but our last last song (as we almost always sang for an encore) was our French translation of "Lord Reign in Me" which, translated back to English, is:

"Be the Lord of my desires,
My life, my heart and my future
I submit to you all that I do
Come be the King over all of me."

And in this last minute of the concert, this song would produce a flashback/forward moment in my head, "back" for a view of all the crazy things I'd done in the past year as a missions apprentice, and "forward" as though peering over a cliff into the unknown of location, vocation; singing next to Joelle who has all the same questions plus that of marriage and finances; looking out over an audience that had just sat through a spiritually moving evening that challenged them to reevaluate what they were living for; hosted by a church congregation so small that its future was clearly in the hands of God.

Three months after the concert tour, I have finished my year as a CEMiste/missionary apprentice and am back in a position where anything can happen if I rest in God's hands.
And you, faithful reader, I challenge you to accept the challenge of "Lord Reign in Me", and the lessons you've learned from this blog and to "be strong and courageous."

The Harmony Chorus at All Saint's Church in Dublin

The 2013 Graduating CEMistes ready to face the future!

This is intended to be the last official post, but if you wanted to hear any more anecdotes about the year of CEM or have any questions for me, feel free to comment below.

Time Travel Day

I am spending my last 2 weeks in France volunteering as a counselor at Harmony Bible Camp, at Centre Bonnefoi (the camp which Pitman COC was fixing up a few weeks ago). The theme verse is "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and for eternity (Hebrews 13:8) and in our morning devotionals, we TRAVEL THROUGH TIME to hear the stories of faithful Christians throughout the Centuries. Our voyage is directed by 3 blumbering, quirky characters who never arrive at their intended destination in time and space.

The Friday that is smack-dead in the middle of the week is THEME DAY, where we form 12 teams of 10 kids of all ages, and compete together/against eachotehr in a variety of creative games.

Theme day began with our excellent time travelers disequilibrating, disengaging, and straight-up-breaking the time travel machine. The teams were set out to find clues which would help us find the missing part that could repair the machine, by journeying to 12 different time periods! The games included:
A Roman Relay: an obstacle course run in teams attached as slaves by a cord
A 15th Century Pirate Naval Battle: launching "cannon balls" to knock down bowling pins
A visit to Martin Luther King Jr., where groups wrote poems describing their dreams to improve the world
A Bible Copying Relay at an 8th Century Monastery
Identifying ingredients in a possibly poisoned drink for King Louis XIV
An 80's Dance Composition to a Michael Jackson Remix
Build a human pyramid for the Pharaoh and Queen Cleopatra

The challenges concluded with each team assembling their clues into a puzzle, and then each team's puzzle fit into a larger puzzle which contained the clue as to where the missing part for the machine was hiding.

Upon reinstallation of the part, the three bumbling time travelers still could not bring us back to our own time period!
Because the time space continuum was still entirely screwy, the monk from the year 792 appeared. Though he came from a technologicaly-impaired era, he was able to inform us of what our machine was missing. The monk knew that what was essential for travel in the space-time continuum was a fixed point. "When you traveled through time and met so many different persons, was there any person who was there for all of it? Who is present throughout all of time?" The key point, around which we could orient our machine and our lives permanently in space and time is Jesus himself.

After his speech, the monk exited the scene and our voyagers oriented their machine (their most difficult acting assignment yet) and took us back to the future.

After years of coming/sending other people to Centre Bonnefoi from the Pitman Road Church of Christ for their week of construction and renovation of the camp, it is neat to see the Harmony Bible Camp in Action.

The camps' mission statement includes getting kids to appreciate God and his creation. Until our evening of tent camping, and hearing all the whining of "I can't wait to get back to where everything is paved over!" I didn't realize how many of our campers were uprooted right from the city and plopped into the mountains.

As a counselor, I lead devotionals with my 4 campers every night. They are usually quite tired after a long day of 2 activities of choice, an hour long Bible class, and an evening activity, but they enjoy discussing the Bible passages and singing songs simultaneously in English, French and Italian (I have 2 French and 2 Italian girls in my room). It is already Monday, and camp ends on Friday.

I also have to organize four activities for the campers. I already lead a class of the Hebrew Alphabet and sewed Hackysacs. Tomorrow I am leading the first French version of World Vision's Tribe game, and Thursday we will be making Flipbooks and learning about the Animation process.

Time flies when you're having fun!

The Parable of the Sower

This past week of "Christians on Mission Intense Summer Session" was spent sowing seeds for the Kingdom, as they say...

During CEM week, we spent our mornings hearing great speakers talk about relevant Bible topics; the seeds of knowledge.
Young people from all over Europe met each other and learned that they are not alone as christians: the seeds of hope.
7 CEMistes received their certificates of apprenticeship completion, sending them back from whence they came; I'd describe us as faith saplings ready to be transplanted.
5 nursing homes in Marseille were visited by 20-person choirs of young people, showing the elderly that the youth haven't forgotten about them.
A choir of over 60 people sang in concerts on Thursday and Friday night and 20 people participated in skits that share aspects of the Christian life and the plan of salvation in an amusing manner.
A group of about 10 people went every morning to share croissants and coffee with persons "without permanent residences." Meeting, sharing and talking with the downtrodden will prepare Europe's future for a life of service and a more heart-felt desire to help with the problem of homelessness.

On Saturday morning, we took time to share feedback on our weeks. A teen from the Geneva church shared the following insights on the seeds we've been sowing:
"I feel really uncomfortable around older people; I even left a hospital room earlier than everyone else because I felt so uncomfortable. But, when we went to the nursing home, I tried very hard to overcome my discomfort and to talk to the residents.
I started by asking a woman her name. She said "oui oui."
The next woman I talked to, I asked her name and she responded, in a rather unfriendly manner, "why?"
I moved on to the next woman, who responded with her name but didn't want to talk anymore.
I asked a fourth woman her name, and she not only responded, but we launched into a great conversation!"
And this is what evangelism is like!"

This teen relived and then recounted to us a modern version of the Parable of the Sower, and learned a whole lot about evangelism, discouragement and persistence from 30 minute meet-and-greet after our concert.

So Much to Do...

...so little time!
It is hard to believe that only 1 month of CEM remains!
This past week was our only hard-labor week of the year at Centre Bonnefoi with a group of 40 Americans organized by and mostly constituated of the Pitman Road Church of Christ. My first ever mission trip, where I first learned that I could serve the Lord by cleaning toilets and other manual labors, was to Centre Bonnefoi in 2003, so being on a work week again there kind of brought my CEM/France experience to full circle; coming back to the roots of why I ended up here for a year.

Photos of our diverse projects are available thanks to our team photographer on the Pitman website:
HERE BE PHOTOS

The highlight of the various projects on which I worked was an erosion-control attempt to prevent a mountain from eroding over the roof on the side of our annex building. Sound almost impossible? We called ourselves "Team Mustard," because with faith as small as a mustard seed, you can tell mountains to fall into the sea. We were hoping that with our faith and some preventative meausres we could prevent the mountain from falling on our building! We're not expecting too much, given the tough winter snow melts that our little terrace and water-velocity breaking rock sachets will have to endure.

Upon return in Marseille, we exchanged our 40 visitors from the States for 50 visitors from the US, Belgium, France and Switzerland for a week of Mission in Marseille, called CEM Ete, or Christians on Missions Summer Session. It is a one-week version of my year, and a great week for the young people of Europe to do some intense service, evangelism, and take some good Bible classes as well. We have 2 classes each morning, then the usual and formidable 2 hour lunch break, then an afternoon activity (i.e. attending a Bible study or visiting the nursing home), then choir practice, then dinner hosted by Marseille locals (which includes me this time!) Our CEM Summer chorus will perform concerts on Thursday and Friday.
Well underway!

Out and About

Today ends officially the "academic" portion of CEM. This trimester, we had less time for classes (the trimester being shorter, and the traveling being more frequent) and only 3 courses:

Church History
Spiritual Leadership
The Old Testament in the New Testament: Acts and Revelation

Along with our church history course came 2 field trips. Our first field trip covered the earliest history of the church. We started with a visit to a Roman bridge and Glanum, a Roman village buried in sediments and recently discovered.
Our second field trip was to the Pope's Palace in Avignon and to a Cistercian Monastery built in the Roman style.

It was great to take advantage of our being in Europe to see real landmarks of church history.

A Roman bridge that puts modern bridges to shame. If only they had made it wide enough for trucks to pass!

Glanum: all is not lost!

The pope's palace in Avignon. A rather depressing part of church history, where the Papacy was claimed simultaneously by Popes in Avignon, Pisa and Rome.

The Cistercian Monestary, built over a period of 150 years. Built in the Roman style but newer parts begin to show Gothic influences as architectural technology develops.

And CEM itself is not over until the end of July! Coming up we have:
A tiny break
A work week at the Bonnefoi Center with a team from the Pitman Church of Christ
CEM Intense Sampler Week
2 weeks as a counselor at Camp Harmony

Stay posted until I see you all again in August!

We're Certainly Not Wasting Away

Within the past month, the CEMistes have hosted two excellent meals at our church in Marseille.

Island Night, May 17
On May 17, Joelle expressed her passion for food, evangelism, and her tropical family roots in hosting the "Soiree des Iles," or "Island Night." By signing up church members to make a variety of dishes and making about half of them herself, Joelle offered a free island-themed, seafood meal to over 50 people, packing our tiny fellowship hall. "At risk of becoming a food blog," there was ice cream, fresh fruits, beautiful salads, and many varieties of chicken, rice and seafood. My contributions were a pepper/carrot/sweet potato soup and banana pudding It was a great opportunity for church people to bring their friends and family. Our friends from Lets Start Talking came and we also invited a local church that has a large Malagasy (from Madagascar) population.


Joelle arranging our formidable selection of food. The Soirees Des Iles was a chance for all the CEMistes to work together cooking, serving and chopping vegetables.

We began the evening enjoying an island exhibition in the chapel which included fake palm trees, island posters, and the slideshow from our mission trip to Madagascar.

Church Breakfast, June 9
Exactly 6 calendar months after our last Church Breakfast (Dec. 9) the CEMistes hosted another Breakfast to ensure that everyone was well fed and coffeed up for Bible class at 10 AM. Breakfast featured Crepes (with sugar, nutella, or jam), baguettes, cinnamon rolls, sugar cookies, corn flakes, hot milk, coffee, baked oatmeal and a Lebanese breakfast specialty brought by a friend from the University.



To make the breakfast, I had some help from Foi en Folie! Foi en Folie is the church's group of 7-12 year-olds, who get together every 2 weeks on a Saturday night to eat, play games, and to grow in their faith. One of the important and practical aspects of faith-growing at a ripe young age is learning to be a servant, so I enlisted the service of Foi en Folie to help get Breakfast ready for the next morning!
The kids helped me set 40 place settings for the meal the next day, and then, sharing one rolling pin and a bag of flour between them, each rolled out and cut their own sugar cookies. Next, they kneaded, rolled out, sugared and raisined their own 1/7th of a double batch of cinnamon bun batter. Baking with 7 children is almost less frustrating than baking with 2 or 3 because I didn't have time to notice who was sneaking dough into their mouths and possibly breaking other laws of sanitation. What we don't know will hopefully be cooked off at 200 degrees C.


I was very glad that I stayed for Foi en Folie, not just because I benefitted from the free labor, but because I learn alot from observing the dynamics of such a diverse age-range and the way that the Bible is made fun, yet not sanitized or dumbed-down, for the kids in Foi en Folie.


After making baking, eating, and playing a board game about the Romans, we built a scale model of the temple and talked about the function of each temple element. We finished our lesson by talking about Jesus' sacrifice and the access that every Christian has to God!

Tall, Fat and Blonde

During CEM orientation, my Parisian roommate informed me that I was not a real American because I was neither tall, nor fat, nor blonde. In sharing an apartment with a Parisian, I learned that the French do indeed shave and bathe regularly.

I attend an English Conversation Hour at the local University twice a week. In English conversation hour this past Tuesday, we discussed stereotypes. The group was about half French and half Americans, and we split up into national teams to write down as many stereotypes of the other country that we could think of. Then the Americans wrote stereotypes that we think the French have of us, and the French team did the opposite. We compared what we cited at the end, and the results were surprising! Or maybe the French team was just trying to be nice.

American stereotypes held by our French team:
Americans...don't know how to cook, chew gum all the time, are always concerned about time because time is money, speak loudly.
Our reactions:
Americans: "We were surprised you guys didn't say, 'fat' or 'tall'!"
French: "We were going to write 'fat', but we took it off the list because all of you are normal sized!"

French stereotypes held by our American team:
The French... are very proud, only speak French, eat bread, wine and cheese constantly (true), smoke all the time (false), wear berets and tights (false), are fashionable, are skinny, and sit in cafes all day.
The French team thought that Americans would think of them as... grumpy, know-it-alls, going on strikes, good cooks, loungers on the French riviera, well-educated, and connoiseurs of good wines.


I think most people stereotype the south of France and assume that I live next to a beautiful beach like this.


Rather, I live here.

Sweet Hours of Prayer

Tuesday was a day of prayer, as every day should be.
Tuesday morning, as part of an exercise in Craig's class on "Spiritual Leadership," we split into small groups and prayed for a subject that was on our hearts, based around a scripture.
In my group of 3, the verses shared were:
Mark 9:24: "I believe! Help me in my unbelief!" We expressed our love for God but our shortcomings in our faith, which He can grow in us.
Matthew 28:20: "Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." When we leave CEM and go back into the world, we will need to know that Jesus is always with us.
1 Peter 1:22: "Love each other deeply with all your heart." As members of the church and students in our Bible School, we need to show more love and concern for one another.

Almost every Tuesday night, the church gets together for an hour of song and prayer. This Tuesday, the hour was the most animated ever. About half of the usual group was missing because they were rehearsing for this Saturday's Musical. They were replaced by our new American interns and Let's Start Talking Team. Usually prayer night is only for adults, but this time a 10 year old boy from the church joined us. At his request, we sang "Humble Yourselves in the Sight of the Lord" and "This Little Light of Mine" complete with hand motions and chair dancing, which is about as wild as the Church of Christ ever gets. There was a spirit of light-heartedness, almost-giddy joy and simultaneously deep devotion and communion with God about the evening and faces were (figuratively) glowing.

Long awaited photo of our church.
Photo props to Katrina Koski!

Let's Start Talking

Let's Start Talking is an organization that sends teams of American Christians around the world to host one-on-one English conversation sessions. We are welcoming a team of 4 students from Pepperdine University for the next 5 weeks.


Our LST Team!

LST is open to everyone in the community, of all ages and all levels of English. At the moment, they are meeting with each student (or "reader") twice a week, or more as requested. We have 25 students so far.
Their conversation sessions are hosted in our church's classrooms. The conversations are based on short texts that the student reads out-loud, found in a workbook assembled from the book of Luke. In addition to the weekly one-on-one sessions, LST hosts weekly parties where all the students can get together for a cultural exchange and more conversational English practice.

We've spent the past week getting to know our new LST team: eating together and showing them some of our weekly activities. LST is also getting involved at the local university by hanging out with students studying English. This week and the next, they will be attending an English class as living "show-and-tell". Having them here is a great experience for them and the entire church. And the cultural exchange goes both ways: at English conversation hour on Friday, our LST team learned how to shoot a bottle cap in the air and how to split an apple in quarters using just your hands.

You can read this story from LST's point of view on their blog, here!

CEM gets Psyched!

Two psychology professors from Abilene Christian University are wandering through France. They started in Lyon, spent the week with us at the retreat in Ardeche and came back with us to Marseille. They directed a few sessions during the retreat and preached at our church on Sunday.

On Monday, they taught our 3 hours of CEM class and gave us some practical insight on personality, identity and communication. Haven taken psychology in High School and remembering some of it, I was surprised by how useful and Biblically applicable the material that they presented was.

Some topics we covered:
Confirmation bias - when you make a first impression judgment of someone, your observations of their behavior tend to confirm your judgement (he's smiling because he's mocking me! vs. he's smiling because he's a nice guy)
"We're not as reasonable as we think we are."
"The easiest solution, when you have an issue with judging people, is to practice humility."

Johari window - a 2x2 grid of things you know/don't know about yourself and others know/don't know about you. There are even things that you don't know about yourself and others don't know about you that have underlying effects on your behavior. The goal of the christian should be to minimize his blindspots and unknown self, and to share his private self to try to become a transparent, open public person. More information: Johari window
"In the Old Testament, there is an example of David confronting problems with his unknown self: he knows that something is wrong in his life and he prays that God will help him to make it right."
"Someone who is Biblically/spiritually/age mature but who doesn't open himself up to others can have a HUGE blind spot which can lead to conflicts."
"Keep expanding your public self."

Conflict resolution -with the help of some role-playing, we illustrated passive, aggressive and assertive styles of addressing conflict.
"If a person isn't ready to hear assertive criticism, say it anyway. You need to have an honest, transparent relationship."
"Many times when people come to our office, they share things that they could have shared at church. They didn't share them there because they would be too afraid of shame. It's a shame if our churches aren't a safe place to share our struggles; ideally they would be."

The Beauty of: The Countryside, The People, the Love of Christ, etc.

I just returned of traveling 2 weeks in Ireland, England, Germany and Switzerland.

The most common response to one's first site of Ireland is "it's so beautiful!" which is stating the obvious that I thought everyone knew already.


Of course it's beautiful!

Besides seeing the beautiful Irish countryside, we hung out mostly with a neat team of American missionaries, or "Christ Followers seeking other Christ Followers" who took the time to explain to us their vision of the world and their mission on earth. Here are some quotes, which were almost-tear-jerkingly inspirational for our team. The subjects they covered mostly related to working on a mission team and how to resolve conflicts. Here are some quotable quotes:

"Our mission is to let Jesus live in us, and to let Christ shine in us."
"I was reading John 17 with a friend, where Jesus prays that those who follow him will have the same UNITY that he has with the father. The friend will see that in our community: we love each other like that!"
"We are here to help people on their faith journey."
"Our friends NEED to see our love for one another. How to we show that? We forgive, we compromise, we don’t hold grudges."
"Because we love each other and are important to each other, we WANT to resolve conflict."
“Everyone you meets needs a deeper relationship with Christ."
“I’m a Christ follower and I’m here to find other Christ followers and walk with them.”
"I need to love people more. God loved us BEFORE we loved him."

In Ireland, we sang two concerts: one in St. Anne's Church in downtown Dublin, and one in All Saint's Church in Raheny.


a view of St. Ann's Church

From Ireland, we flew to London and sang in Nottingham and Wembley. In our free time, we visited some castles and I got a tour around London.


Wollaton Hall, aka Wayne Manor in "The Dark Knight Rises."

Our concert in London was on a Friday, and our next concert was scheduled for next Friday in Geneva, so the Chorus dispersed for a week vacation and regrouped again in Geneva.

After we sang in Geneva, the majority of the CEMistes headed to a tiny gym outside of Zurich, where our brother and sister churches convene every year for a soccer tournament! There were 8 "Professional Teams": Bern, Geneva, Vicenza, Paris, Marseille, Antwerp, Brussels and Augsburg. On Saturday night and Sunday morning, we had a worship service (translated in English, French and German) and sang songs in 5 languages. It was a fairly small gathering (a sampling of church members in shape for a good game of soccer from around Europe). The diversity was encouraging and our team's show of sportsmanship was impressive: stopping until the guy you accidentally knocked down gets up again, saying you're sorry, not being too obnoxious after scoring a goal*. We finished 4th and returned to Marseille rather sore but satisfied.


We begin every game with a prayer led by a member of each team.


Other beautiful experiences:

-witnessing baptisms!
-a big Irish, English or German breakfast every morning!
-a tour of London by night and by day
-seeing family and friends again at various stops along my journey.
-having family and friends almost everywhere
-visiting ornate palaces and churches
-having the chance to go running by the riverside every morning, without fear of robbers.





*not counting our goal against the #1 team, Paris, in which our obnoxiously loud rejoicing was heart-felt and justified.

Our Choir - On Tour!

Chorale Harmonie started our Spring Concert Series last Sunday, with a performance at Les Accates Retirement Home.


A photo from our concert. Photo props to Morgana, a teen from the church who came to watch our concert.

I had the chance to talk with some of the women living in the home, and learned that the population there is about 40% former nuns! I always wondered where nuns go when they retire! I imagine that they never really retire according to the usual definition of the word: stopping doing what they're doing, because their job is praying, serving and praising the Lord (professionally), which a Christian should keep doing, right up until they kick the bucket.*

On Friday, we had our big annual Easter concert at our church, la Chapelle du Fuveau, which was quite a success. We got an encore. (Ironically, the French don't say "encore! encore!" though it is a French word that means "again." They say "bis! bis!")

We have another concert in Marseille tonight, and then Paris tomorrow! Here's the official tour schedule!

April 14 @ 7 PM, Paris, 4 rue Déodat de Séverac 75017 Paris 19h
April 16 @ 1:15 PM, Dublin: Saint Ann's Church
April 16 @ 8 PM, Dublin: All Saint's Church Raheny
April 18 @ 7 PM, Nottingham, England: Eaton's Road, The Roach Stapleford, Nottinghamshire NG9 7EB
April 19 @ 8 PM, London: 92 Barnhill Road Wembley, Middlesex, HA9 9BS
April 25 @ 7 PM, Geneva: Eglise du Christ de Geneve

After the choir concert in London, the choir will part ways for a few days of vacation. Then we will reassemble for the concert in Geneva and head to the Church of Christ Soccer Tournament for the weekend.

This past week was busier yet than usual, because we spent the weekend as part of the tail-end of an evangelism campaign in Pau**, and then had our CEM 2nd Trimester Exams Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. In the midst of our hyped up chorus rehearsals, Joelle and I had rehearsals for our "English Club Theater Show" at the local University, which we had Thursday night. We prepared a 1 minute sketch, and there were 8 other sketches performed by (real!) students. The show lasted a half hour and was hilarious! We covered Monty Python, Flight of the Concords, and some Shakespeare! All the students' worked really hard to learn lots of lines, in English, and to perfect their pronunciation. Here's a link to the sketch that Joelle and I interpreted anew:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkqbO0P5IQc
I'm hoping to get a copy of the video of our performance.


This is the English Theater Club's version of Flight of the Concords "Business Time." If you don't know what I'm talking about already, please don't look it up.


*As I now attend 2 English conversation groups at the local University as a token "native speaker" I shall try to use as native a language as possible! Here is an idiom that is possibly inappropriate given the context.
**Post about this coming relatively soon. I will probably not post again for the next two weeks to give you all a break.

Mauritius, March 12-19

In Mauritius, we met 3 missionary couples: Tony and Caroline, Chris and Isabelle, and Candan and Stephanie. The latter 2 are former students of the Chretiens en Mission. We also spent a lot of time with the Churches of Christ at Cascavelle and Richterre.


Our first day celebrating Mauritian Independence (from England) in the Indian Ocean.

Our first day in Mauritius was the 45th Independence Day of the country! Most everyone had a day-off, so we spent the day on the beach with the church of Cascavelle. We sang together on the beach, and the CEMistes got to hear Tony and Caroline’s story of how they became missionaries in Mauritius.

Our next day we sung 3 times around Mauritius: as a surprise for Chris’ coworkers at his office, at the SOS Children’s Village, and at the new Cascavelle Community Center. The Center is just a block away from the house where the church meets, so after the concert we were welcomed to their home to eat a delicious meal with our hands.


Our choir! (This picture is from Madagascar, but this is the stylin' garb that we sported throughout our South-East African Journey. No, we didn't get these outfits in Madagascar, we got them from Congo, via Bradley's mother in Paris.

We were available to do anything and everything! We spent a day helping Candan work on the house he had built for his family of 6 (they are currently living with his in-laws). Many hands make lighter work.



Candan took us to visit his parents. His mother prepared us a delicious meal and we learned about his father, a man of humble means but extreme generosity. Candan also gave us a tour of a Hindu Temple and explained some of the belief system to us.

We spent our last weekend in Mauritius on a retreat with the two churches. We got to go to the beach again, play many games with the teens and teach children’s classes.

Here is a picture of me and the Dodo bird, the unfortunately extinct unofficial mascot of Mauritius.

Apologetics: Doing Our Homework

Throughout the first and second trimesters, we have been working through an introduction to Apologetics (subtitled: Defend and Establish the Christian Faith!) We started out by going through a review of modern Western Philosophy in what facets these thought patterns subvertly oppose the Christian faith. Of course, no course on Apologetics would be complete without discussing Subjectivism, Objectivism, and if truth really exists (thus validating the existence of our class as well!) We reviewed some of the arguments for the existence of God: causality, the order of the universe, the historical argument, and Pascal's wager*.
After our introduction, we started a brief study of comparitive religion, where we compared Christianity to Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and the newest major world faiths, Modernism, Post-Modernism, and Neo-Paganism. In these sessions we covered the very basics of each religion and related the religious system to our faith.

In France, we encounter Modernism, Post-Modernism, and Neo-Paganism. On our trip to Mauritius, we had the chance to learn more about Hinduism. Every time a CEM group comes to Mauritius, they visit a Hindu temple to learn more about the religion of 70% of the people in the country.


We walked around the temple with bare feet, which we found rather painful after the stones had been cooking all morning in the hot sun. I may be betraying my sinfulness in admitting my pain. Our guide says that during the ceremony where the faithful make a pilgramage to the temple and then walk across hot coals, being burned reveals that you are a sinner!
There were many mini-temples or shrines located outside of the main temple, housing "guardians" and demi-gods that you could pay respect to in order to get protection.
The temple was more terrifying to us than beautiful, with so many painted eyes leering down at us. We were glad for the experience but happy to go at the end of our tour.



On the first stage of our plane ride home (Mauritius to Antananarivo, Madagascar), I sat next to a Muslim woman from a nearby island. We started out by talking about the economic development of Madagascar vs. Mauritius vs. Comoros and the different attitudes and awareness within the countries of their problems.
I explained the purpose of my missionary voyage and what we'd accomplished on our trip. My new friend said that she admires how Christians are always serving: building orphanages, working as doctors, etc. From their, we launched a discussion of our faiths and I got to explain some of the fundamentals of Christianity. We discussed our different views of who Jesus was and the character of God.

On our next flight, the 12 hour leg from Madagascar to Paris, all the CEMistes were together, so I was disappointed that I would be having a more predictable conversation. We were all surprised to find ourselves seated in business class. We had been pampered more than expected at every stage of the trip, and now we were really spoiled! Can't complain.

What else did we do in Mauritius?

We spent alot of time at the beach!
Hmm, that does not sound like a very good missions-trip, you say.
If you happen to be called as a missionary to a country where everyone you should be evangelising happens to be hanging out on the beach, you should go hang out on the beach with them, too!**

We got to help a missionary couple finish building a house for their family of 6 to live. We performed our choral routine at the SOS Children's Village***, at the new Cascavelle Community Center, and at the home of a visitor to the church.
The 2 church families that we visited in Mauritius meet in homes.
We ate two delicious meals with our hands and 2 meals of Lo Mein during our stay, illustrating the mixture of cultures found in Mauritius.
We spent the last weekend of our missionary voyage on a retreat with the two church families.


Our group photo from the retreat in Mauritius, with the churches of Richeterre and Cascavelle.

Notes:

*In short, what do you have to lose if you believe in God and are wrong? (nothing) What do you have to lose by not believing in God and being wrong? (eternity)

**If this opportunity for serving the Lord sounds too good to be true, maybe you should try "Big Break." http://big-break.com/

***SOS Villages offer an alternative to the orphanage or the children's home. Find out more about the organization here: http://www.sos-childrensvillages.org/Pages/default.aspx

Madagascar 4

Dear Readers,
Thank you for your patience! I returned from my missionary voyage to Madagascar and Mauritius about a week ago, and slowly have been assembling my notes from the trip. Here is Part 1, Madagascar, and I'll have a brief report on Mauritius by next week!

The first good question is, what was I doing in Madagascar? It's never really been on my list of places to see; I haven't even seen the movies! (bad joke) This voyage to Madagascar was part of the very very practical stage of CEM; observing a humanitarian mission and evangelism in a completely different cultural, economic and hemispheric context. Our "living classroom" was a 4-day medical campaign and a visit to an orphanage in Madagascar, and then a week with 3 missionary couples in Mauritius.

We arrived early Saturday morning in Madagascar.
As we had nothing to do until Sunday, we visited a nearby orphanage. 27 children live there. We sang “Dieu Fidele” and “Si ya Hamba” and “Papa Abraham” with them, and then we had them sing for us. They sang a couple of songs for us in English and Malagasy and French. Afterwards, we played soccer and other group games, and I had my hair braided.

The orphanage that was visited on Saturday.

The first stage of our trip in Madagascar was the medical campaign, which began Sunday, at the Antananarivo airport, where we met up with the rest of our group. Besides our 11 from CEM, there is a group from Geneva and the group from the US. Our "medical team" is about 50 people! 10 doctors, 1 dentist, many nurses, and about 20 non-medicals who ended up on the evangelism team.


The entire Partners in Progress medical campaign team.

The goal of the medical clinic is multi-faceted. The obvious goal is to help sick people and to teach some preventative medicine. I think our clinic saw about 200 patients per day. We can temporarily relieve the suffering of as many people as possible, but this certainly isn't a sustainable fix.


A (posed) view inside the pharmacy.
The second goal is evangelism: everyone that comes by the clinic gets a packet of information inviting them to 2 "Conferences" held in town, a sign-up form for a Bible correspondence course. Many people were interested in the correspondence courses: I hope the postal service here is reliable, or a lot of people will be disappointed. At each of the conferences, our CEM chorus opened with a 20 minute concert and then the local ministers gave a message.
The third goal was to help out with PR for "Madagascar World Voice" which is constructing a monstrous radio transmitter on the island. The project has been under construction for over 7 years and they are now waiting for a go-ahead from the government to switch on. Our work will hopefully get them the attention of the government and the permit they need to go forward with the project.

Because the clinics were overstaffed (better overstaffed than not), the CEMistes and the group from Geneva were almost all on the "Evangelism team". I was put in charge of puppet shows and entertaining the children who came by the clinic (not that they couldn't perfectly well entertain themselves.) Whenever we had a significant crowd and a Malagasy-French translator, we performed a skit of the Good Samaritan or performed a David and Goliath puppet show.



A scene from our David and Goliath puppet show. Note the size differential between David and Goliath.

I got to use my talent for drawing in our very-mini education campaign. I drew pictures with useful messages like "wash your hands" and "brush your teeth" and had the kids trace new copies and color them in. The most important message (and one of the more awkward drawings I've done in my life) depicted how to spread the parasite schistosomiasis-by peeing in bodies of standing water.


We also spent alot of time playing games with the children who came by our clinic. They taught us many games and patiently tried to teach us a few songs.

In the 1 hour flight back to Antananarivo, I took a lot of pictures out of the dirty window. We can see that Madagascar is a very hilly country, but abrubtly-not smooth and rolling. The rivers are red brown, I assume because of the soil. The roads are few and far between, and very curvy.

An aerial view approaching Antananarivo.

We spent the weekend at the Betikara orphanage, where there are currently 36 children residing. We ate our meals with them, washed our clothes together, and slept in the dormitories. We tried to integrate ourselves into life at the orphanage and make lots of new friends, despite the language barrier.


This weekend, the water pump was out of service so we had to fetch our own water from the lake at the foot of the property. I learned to wash my clothes in lake water, which was one of my goals in life.
The orphanage building also houses a school and a church. On Sunday morning at 9 AM, the whole church went down to the lake to observe a baptism.
For more information about the Betikara orphanage, visit this website:
http://www.madagascar-mission.org/orphanage.htm
Mini commercial: if you are interested in helping out the orphanage, they need funds! One of the orphans, Andry, is running out of the money he needs to pay for his weekly dialysis treatment.


On Sunday, we all went for a hike through the rice paddies.
Andry, on the left, is the orphan in need of dialysis treatment.


Our hike through the rice paddy.

In the Antananarivo airport, waiting for our flight to Mauritius, there were 2 missionaries from Korea who are pastors at a church in California. They were on their way to South Africa after 10 days of evangelising in Madagascar. They had a guitar and were singing praises, which attracted our group. They learned that we were Christians, and asked us “do you love Jesus?” That was so refreshing to hear such a simple confession of faith. They wanted to know that we shared their passion. They sang praise songs with us until their plane started boarding.
Stay posted for the report on our time in Mauritius. Let me know if you have any questions or want to see more pictures.

My Trip to Madagascar and Mauritius, in Firsts

We *just* got back from our missionary voyage to Madagascar and Mauritius, so I have a lot of stories to catch you up on! To start off, here's a quick trip summary in terms of some of my "Firsts" there.

The first time that I:

visited an orphanage
washed my clothes in a lake
performed an outdoor puppet show
started a very small-scale preventative medicine campaign
hiked around a rice paddy
fell in a rice paddy
helped in a pharmacy
signed someone up for a Bible correspondence course
had a dance party in a car
had a dance party at a missionary's house
visited a Hindu temple
swam in the Indian ocean
taught a children's Bible Class in French
flew business class
shared the gospel on a plane
slept in a hammock



our hike through the rice paddy


Our visit to the Hindu temple.

Missionary Voyage to Madagascar and Mauritius

As you may have seen in my handy sidebar calendar, our short-term missionary voyage will be March 1-18! We will be traveling to both Madagascar and Mauritius, which are pretty close neighbors. In both countries, we will be visiting former CEMistes who are now missionaries!

According to Wikipedia, Madagascar has a population of 22 million, more than 90 percent of whom live on less than $2 per day. They are a former French colony and thus most people speak French. The majority of the people adhere to christianity or traditional beliefs, or mix the two. We will be flying into the capital, Antananarivo.

For the first four days, we will be joining a 49-person medical mission team of doctors and other volunteers, mostly from the US. The organization we are traveling with is called "Partners in Progress." I don't know much about them besides their name, but if you want to know more you can check their website: http://www.partnersinprogress.org/ The medical mission trip will be near Mahajanga, a northwestern port city with a population of over 135,000.

From Mahajanga, we will be flying back to the capital of Madagascar to spend the weekend at an orphanage. This orphanage is supported by the French-speaking churches. The children at our church give money every Sunday, and we will be presenting the orphanage with the collected sum when we go there. We are planning a mini-retreat for the orphans, with songs, meditations, games, and (I hope) puppet shows.

After our weekend at the orphanage, we will be flying to Mauritius, where we will participate in an evangelism campaign and then a church-retreat. As far as culture prepping goes, we learned that Mauritius will be much more of a culture shock for us than Madagascar, because Madagascar has such a French influence. In Mauritius, we are likely to encounter idols around every corner.


A schema of our voyage. Thanks to http://www.alphavilla.net/index_files/map_indian-2.jpg for the map! A fine educational website.

Our voyage is in only two weeks, and we are just now realizing how much we have to prepare! Prayer team, here are some requests to present before our God: 2 of our CEMistes are still waiting to receive their passports (should be any day now). Help us to not forget anything essential and to not get sick so that we are well-energized and helpful. Help us to be culturally sensitive and to learn as much as possible.

40 Hours in the Desert

Women's Retreat in Lille

11 women (that includes five CEMistes) took the TGV from Marseille to Lille for the annual Church of Christ French (and Swiss) Women's Retreat. I think this was my second women's retreat in my life (I seem to remember to going to one with Pitman at a hotel. What I remember the most is Cordelia's outfits as MC.)

The churches in Paris, Geneva, Lausanne and Lille were well-represented. We stayed in an old St. Ignatious monastery/nunnery/abbey that is now used as a spiritual retreat center, for spirt-building activities of all sorts. Typical monk food, as I'm told, is stale bread, soup and a glass of beer, so the food quality/diversity was better than you would expect, but it was still not very good. The building was very impressive on the outside, quite a Chateau. Inside, it was rather banal, and silence was imposed as much as possible in the hallways and in our rooms at night.


The CEM girls in front of the Lille Retreat Center.

The theme of the retreat, set by the Marseille ladies, was "the desert." We performed a humorous-yet-pedantic sketch depicting visitors to "The Desert." I played a camel, well equipped by God to live in the desert environment, unlike my whiny Bedouin master. The presentations were "Why the Desert?" (Answer: So much of the Bible takes place in a desert setting), "When my life is a desert" and "an Oasis in the Desert." My transcription/slation of the last talk is provided below:

An oasis in the desert
Who would like to be blessed? Who is blessed?
It’s true that sometimes we suffer in silence, and no one knows it, but that’s our fault. No one should suffer in silence when he is in the Lord. If we are ashamed to confess our faults and to share what is going wrong in our lives, we have a problem. We are not a family. It is a sin to suffer in silence. We have too many verses in the Bible that tell us that we are a family. We are wrong and we sin against God when we suffer in silence. We are missing out on the richness of the desert God is sending us through.
We know our Bible verses, but we don’t hear them anymore.
Recount your desert. The Bible is a book of witness. We underestimate witness. It’s not just coming up before a group and crying. It’s glorifying God in your life. If we don’t witness, we are keeping God from blessing us and others. We each have a desert; each desert is different.
When we cross the desert, what do we see? Sand, sand. We are standing in the desert, we lie down in the sand, not to take a nap, but because we can’t survive anymore. We eat, drink in the desert, but we drink and eat sand.
Suffering is suffering. Don’t try to compare your suffering. Each one suffers with what he has, what he is. At the giving moment, in the desert, we are crushed by the heat of the sun. In this desert, we are alone. Why? Often, because we have chosen to be alone. We are tired. We finish by sitting down in the sand. From this moment, we start to ask good question. What are the good questions?
There are 2: What do you want me to do? What do you want me to learn?
When I asked God these questions, two verses came to me. Matthew 6:23: "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his justice." I prayed this verse after that. Why did God give me this verse? “All these things shall be added unto you.” After I started asking these good questions, I abandoned my solitary life. Ask God to forgive you. We have feelings that we’ve injured God; we shouldn’t stop to ask him to forgive us. When we are suffering, we feel like we don’t exist, like we’re useless.
Sitting down in the desert, we put ourselves in position to listen to God. In this period of suffering, we don’t think about blessings. We don’t see the way out.
(reads Footprints in the Sand)
Can we be blessed in difficult moments? Yes! The first blessing is that when you are suffering so much, your Father carries you. Blessing and promise are basically the same thing for God.
Blessing is a good thing that appears at the right time, if we are faithful to God.
God gives us his blessings. We have the blessings of God every day. We “wait for” blessings, but they are already there! Unfortunately, we have forgotten the blessings! We haven’t meditated enough on the word of God. We don’t need to search for blessings, they are there. We have everything we need: God and us.
Blessings:
Before he left them, Jesus said to his disciples, I will give you the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit contains the Fruits of the Spirits. We have the peace of God in our oasis. Are we convinced that we have God’s spirit in us?
The Love of God. Unconditional, real love that is a force in suffering to overcome guilt.
We have the gentleness of God. Anger, rancor keep us from coming near God. Gentleness helps us to help others. Others will come to us and we can tell them what isn’t going well in our lives. When you are in the desert, don’t have a face that tells people to stay away from us. Be careful of what your face is communicating.
Faithfulness. It is in perseverance that we will have deliverance.
Kindness. Are you conscious of how much we have? We search for good for others. Without kindness, we spend our time worrying about our suffering, instead of helping others.
Goodness. The world doesn’t need hopelessness, it already has enough. God shows us how we can get away from hopelessness.
Patience. God gave us his entire spirit: don’t say you don’t have patience! God gives us what we need to endure until we can resolve our problems.
Joy. When we are convinced that we are delivered, that we are more than conquerors despite the circumstances. We know that our suffering will not last forever: it’s not in the plan of God that our suffering endures. God gave his son a quick death, his suffering does not last long.
Self-control. Will help us to avoid creating other problems instead of dealing with the problem we already have.
Use these blessings! When it’s going badly, ask God what fruits of the spirit you need fortified.
Barbara told me to read Romans 8. I know what’s in Romans 8! I’ve already read it. Barbara said: Read Romans 8 every day! I read it because Barbara told me to. Roman 8 is a summary of all the blessings we have, of everything we have that will help us cross the desert.
Listen to Barbara, read Romans 8 every day!
I was thinking of other blessings of God, and in the spirit, other blessings came to me. One of them is the Presence of God.
Praise.
Light. The Lord is my light and my salvation: whom shall I fear?
Rest. It’s not you who will win the battle. God fights for you.
Protection.
Thankfulness.
Strength.
Service.
We need to be on our feet! What do we ask God? God, give me strength! Get me out of here! We ask for things for ourselves. We demand comfort and blessings. But maybe it’s not for us that we are suffering. We should be serving those who God has sent us. That is how we grow his kingdom. We have every gift that we need to serve him. We have gifts and talents. The only way to get out of the desert is service! Service is a double-blessing. Buy one get one free. Why don’t we use our free will to help others, to work for each other? That doesn’t mean we should crush ourselves in serving others. We should be ready to listen. No one should suffer in silence. God had another plan. We’re going to get out of the desert. We want to get out as quickly as possible, but if we don’t use what God gave us to, we’ll never get out. We might die there.
HOW do we use the blessings that God has given us?
“I have come to give you life, and in abundance.”
Stop thinking blessings are just for you.
“Alphabet of God’s promises.” Written by an old woman. We have a lot to learn from old woman. “Worries never keep me from sleeping. I say to the Lord: take care of my worries, and I sleep well.” She reads the promises of God, she falls asleep by the time she gets to promise “D”. But be like this woman, who says to God, “You can take care of my problems, so I can sleep. Then I can have the strength so I have a good night’s sleep and can attack my problems tomorrow.”
Don’t be a hypocrite with God. He knows already that we have problems. God wants us to tell him when we have problems.
What is the final goal of these blessings?
First, to change us. To feed us spiritually. God’s response is spiritual. We want to be comfortable in our bodies, but that’s ephemeral. Physical problems never end.
The final blessing that we have is eternal life.
The 2nd purpose of blessings is to teach us to know the law of good. We’re afraid God will ask us to do the things we don’t want to do. We should ask him what his plan is.
Mary said “I am the servant of the Lord. May it be unto me as you have said.” We have a fear of the unknown. God will never give us a task that won’t nourish us.
The third purpose is to teach us to live for the essential. What is essential for God? Listen and serve. We can’t just do anything that we want.

Night Out on the Town with the Charismatic Catholics

Last night, Joelle and I “snuck out” after Chorale Cool to take the subway downtown. We headed to the Sacred Heart Basilica, where our friend Marie had invited us. We met Marie at the service for prayers for Unity a couple of weeks ago, and she had invited us to her prayer group. Marie is Catholic, and her prayer group consists of Catholics “who pray with the gifts of the Holy Spirit.” When my church talks about “praying with the Holy Spirit” we mean being unusually perceptive of someone else’s need for encouragement or being led to a Bible verse with a message we needed to here. I expected something similar from Marie’s group, especially considering that she was 1) Catholic and 2) over 70 years old.*

We arrived on time for the mass. The Basilica is huge. The first four rows were filled with members of this prayer group, wearing white and blue, and behind us were the regular Tuesday night church going crowd (the size of the group wasn't very impressive but I am impressed to find even 20 people in the Tuesday-night-churchgoing-crowd.)

The priest's sermon was on Christian martyrs, including a martyr buried in the Basilica’s crypt. (Our meeting was in a crypt, but I didn’t see any bone-burial markings.)

After the mass, we descended into the crypt, and then it got funky. There was a drummer, a guitarist, a flutist, a pianist, and about 40 people who joined us. The bread, the body of Christ, was placed on a pedestal before us. We then proceeded to sing. In between songs, people would spontaneously offer prayers or give testimonies (“today, I gave a poor person something to eat, and shared the love of Christ!” or “two weeks ago, I met these two young girls at the Prayers for Unity service, and they came with me tonight.” That would be us). One woman shared visions and their interpretations.

The worship was very lively; some members of the crowds had tambourines, people were raising their hands and dancing in place all around us. There was a very festive feel to the worship, like the ark of the covenant had returned to Jerusalem, or like we should have all the time. The crowd was mostly in their ‘60’s and up, but there were a few persons in their 30’s and 40’s. I’d say we were the youngest.

Joelle and I had a good time until the end, where almost everyone went up front to get down on their knees before the the body of Christ itself up on the pedestal. Joelle and I didn’t go down and at least 2 members of the community came and asked us to go forward and ask for prayers, applying quite a bit of pressure that made us start counting the minutes until the end.

After the service, Marie drove us home (she lives in our neighborhood) and explained a little more about the movement to us. Marie has been a member of the Catholic Charismatics since the beginning. A priest was healed by some Pentecostal Protestants in America in the early 80’s, and so he started this movement within the Catholic church to use the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He came to Marseille and started the communities here. Marie says that her group is still a part of the Catholic Church, though they strongly resemble the Protestant charismatics.

Joelle and I are at the same time encouraged (by the fervor of the love of Christ we saw displayed by our Catholic brethren), confused and a bit creeped-out (because of the altar call and the atmosphere of the crypt). I don’t know if we’ll go again, but now we know that the Charismatic Catholics exist and what they are about.

*No offense meant to anyone in one or both of these demographics. But I'm sure you too have preconceived notions about how someone in this demographic would comport themselves at a prayer group. Mainly, that they don't dance around and see visions.

How to Support a CEMiste

Throughout this year, I have been encouraged by the support I've received from my friends, church and family: prayerfully, financially and encouragement through cards and emails. This support lets me know that I'm not "out of sight and out of mind."

My CEM roommate does not really have a church family, and her biological family is not willing to support her. Over the past 6 months, she has received checks in the mail from people she barely knows or wouldn't have expected to have the money to support her. It is touching to see the financial sacrifices that others are making so that she can stay here at CEM. We really have seen her prayers answered.

Other forms of support mean alot too! One of the women in our church is great at doing hair, and fixes my roommates hair for her, saving her loads of money. We are frequently invited over to eat (at-least) 3-course meals with members of the church, providing us with good company and good food. Our food budget is cut in half by the left-overs we receive from the camp and from events at the church. I was invited on a day trip to see a Car Show in Nimes by a Marseille Church member, an opportunity to travel that I otherwise wouldn't be willing to pay for.

I also want to encourage all you older-than me church-people to encourage and mentor the youth around you! I had a really great experience when I was working this past summer in Germany. The families at the Church in Bremen, seeing that I was alone in a new country, took me under their wing, so that I was mentored (and fed and watered) by many families and Saints older and wiser than I. If you don't already, hang out with someone younger than you to share your life's experiences and your faith with them.

P.S. If you're not already "Supporting a CEMiste", you are welcome to do so! Contact me to find out how. Some of our CEMistes need more support to be able to finish the year in Marseille. We/I also love getting mail!
P.P.S. To all my supporters and my church family: Thank you so much for your prayers and support!

Christian Unity

"Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace." Ephesians 4:1

The past 2 weeks, I have been meeting more of the Church in Marseille.
The Friday I got back, I went to a lecture hosted by a local church, entitled "A Brief History of the End of the World", given by a Professor at the Theologoical seminary at Aixe.

That Wednesday, the CEMistes were invited by a young-adults group from the Parish of Merlan. The Catholic Parish of Merlan includes the University where Constantin lives, so the group is largely composed of students. We ate a 3 course meal, about 40 of us around the table, and after we did the dishes together. Doing the dishes was my highlight of the week. About half of their group and half of our group came into the kitchen to help with the dishes, and while we worked we sang joyous songs.
After the dishes, we all sat together in their lounge and prepared 3 songs together for the "Prayers for Unity" service the following week. Then the youth of Merlan sang us some of their choral songs from a variety of African countries and languages. One fellow drummed along with all of our singing.
The CEMistes loved being with the Merlan group; they are so full of life and love for the Lord. Most of the students are from Africa and are shocked to arrive in "Christian" France and find hardly anyone who believes in God. Some of the students at the Merlan church aren't Catholic, but find the Merlan Parish youth group their best refuge on the faithless campus.

The "Prayers for Unity" service was Wednesday, January 23. There were 4 nuns there, at least 2 priests, members of the Syriac church, the students from the Merlan parish (who brought their drums and guitar to lead the singing), an Indian family, Catholics, Protestants, some folks from Britain and many others that I didn't get a chance to meet. Our small chapel was pretty well packed.
Praying for unity is the best way to achieve it. Churches have been "discussing," arguing for ages over doctrinal/vision differences, splitting and splitting. Rather than discussing with eachother our differences, we bring our differences before God and ask Him to bring us together. If we supplicate at the same time and the same place, we are already together! Praying for unity is the win-win solution to our disunity.

Second Trimester

The second trimester is underway!
It began with a 3-day seminar on the book of Hebrews, taught by Charles White, a preacher at the Lyons Church who has written a commentary on the subject.
Our regular classes are:
The Old Testament: The Prophets
Mission and Marriage
Romans
The Gospel of Luke-continued from the Fall
Apologetics-defending the christian faith

We'll continue with the same afternoon activities. We're all looking forward to traveling this trimester. February 8-10 is the women's retreat in Lille, France. March 1-17 is our Missionary Voyage in Madagascar. We will spend 5 days working with a medical mission campaign, 5 days at an orphanage that our church supports, and 5 days participating in an evangelical campaign on the nearby island of Mauritius.

Lisbon, Portugal

A cheery welcome to Portugal!

I had the chance to fly TAP, Portugal's Airline, to and fro New Jersey. "Had the chance" meaning getting the cheapest flight available which happened to come with a large layover in Lisbon each way!

On the way from Marseille to NYC, I had a 17 hour overnight layover. I booked a hostel and in the morning, walked along the Rio Teho and by the World's Fair '98 grounds. This is the Vasca del Gama bridge across the river.

On my TAP flight back to Marseille, I had a 7 hour layover in Lisbon. I kept my city map from my last trip there, so immediately upon my plane’s half-hour early arrival at 5:30 AM I walked out of the airport, across the parking lot, and onto some street of Lisbon. About 5 minutes later I found a street sign and was navigating myself in the direction of the river. The walk to the river was rather depressing: I walked along highways and passed alot of apartment buildings with peeling paint. I reached the river a few blocks south of the furthest distance I’d walked the last time I was in Portugal, which had been a lovely park with interesting art, sculptures and museums along the way. The part that I hadn’t reached is, apparently, where it starts to get more industrial, so I quickly gave up on traveling along the river.
I walked along some uprooted railroad tracks for a while, then along a main highway, and finally into a more residential part of the city. At first, I thought the buildings were wall-papered on the outside but then I realized that they were tiled. Even the buildings in the snobbiest center of Lisbon have peeling paint; I realize that this gives it its charm and character.

By around 9 I started hitting the touristy area: I passed the Convento do Beato, the Museu do Azulejo, some Military building, the Museu de Artes Decorativas Poruguesas etc. I went by the Panteao Nacional and went in two large Cathedrals where I stopped in and thanked God that I was surviving my walk.

I ended my trip to Lisbon at the Praca do Comercio, the “largest Square in Europe.” It’s certainly the largest square that I’ve been to thus far. There’s a very impressive statue of the King in the center that is currently under wraps. I stopped at Café Aura for a cappuccino com gelado, to rest my feet and shoulders, and to write my postcards. Today’s my Dad’s Birthday; I just missed being home for it.

I finally got the great view of the River I was looking for from the Praca do Comercio!

I took the subway back to the airport, unfortunately rushing through another fancy touristy part of Lisbon to get to the Station in time. Now I know where to walk to if I have another long layover.
Google Maps says I only walked 12 km and that I could have driven my 5 hour walking route in 20 minutes. That is discouraging. But I have covered an impressive portion of my tourist map of Lisbon.
Now I’m back in Marseille and ready to start up classes again tomorrow. I’ll be glad to see the other CEMistes again.

A warm welcome and "see you later!" from some public art at the Praco do Municipio.