Lunch, Entertainment and Pi

Old Fogies' Lunch

The annual lunch for old people in the village, given by the village and served by the village councillors, took place on Sunday. It was a close-run thing, it seems, as the usual caterer cried off sick at the last moment. However, the chef from a restaurant in nearby Plasians was able to fill in and did an admirable job.

The restaurant in Plasians is noted for its brawn, which is always served as a first course in its set meals and so brawn was inevitably the first course today. The second course was a salad with foie gras and slices of smoked duck. That was followed by monkfish in a tomato sauce and then the usual selection of cheeses, baked Alaska and coffee, with white red, rosé and sparkling wine as appropriate along the way. The village certainly does its old people proud on these occasions.

I happened to be sitting at a table with two English “refugees”, which got me thinking about the fortunes of war, Mali being much in the news at the moment. One, Alex, had been brought up and educated in England (he was actually at Bristol University at the same time as I, though we never met there) but his family was in Estonia at the outbreak of World War 2. The Nazis were of course greeted as liberators when they entered Estonia, freeing it from the Russian yoke (for a while). He and most of his family escaped to England. The other, Jim, is a Polish Jew who was living in Belgium at about the same time and was sent on a boat of Jewish refugees to England. There were a number of such evacuations at the time but not all countries would accept them and Jim is eternally grateful to England for allowing him in. Such can be the fortunes of war.

The Entertainments' Committee

There was an extraordinary AGM of the village entertainments' committee ( Comité des Fêtes) last week which I decided to attend. Last year some events that were supposed to happen didn't and those that did generally weren't anything like as successful as they should have been. Unsurprisingly, the chairman of the committee came in for strong criticism, lapsed for most of the time into sullen silence and, at one point, offered his resignation. This was refused, with attendees saying that resignation was beside the point; the point was to identify the problems and resolve them. I liked the lack of rancour, the fact that nobody wanted to crucify the chairman but................The problems seemed to be clear; there was no lack of volunteers or resources more generally: what had been lacking was initiative, communication/coordination and project management skills. Unfortunately, it seemed to me, the chairman had clearly demonstrated that he wasn't a person who took the initiative, couldn't communicate and, apparently had few project management skills since he couldn't identify the problems. So, in effect, he was the problem. But he couldn't be allowed to resign.

I put my name down on a list of volunteers to help and will go to the next meeting armed with some bog-standard project management sheets. It strikes me that what this committee most needs is a formal method of project control that would not only help in the current year but would mean that, for future years, it would not be necessary to start from scratch each time; whoever chairs the committee would have records of what has been done, by whom and when, the previous year.

Gay Marriage Again

This Sunday there was another large demonstration in Paris, this time in favour of gay marriage. The numbers weren't as great as for the demonstration a fortnight ago (against gay marriage) but still considerable: 150,000 to 400,000 depending on whom you believe but probably nearer the lower estimate. In the meantime I had had a chance to discuss what all the fuss was about with friend Patrick and, as I suspected, it is to do with the French conception of family, which they hold so dear. Allowing gay couples to marry entitles them up to the rights accorded under the “Code Civil”, including inheritance law. I still can't really see where there are any problems that couldn't be countered by some slight modifications but the issue is certainly a very sensitive one here in France.

Pi and Pizza

This evening I went with Mana to see the film the Life Of Pi. I had suggested it to Mana but we both ended up disappointed. The photography and special effects were admittedly spectacular but the story only of passing interest and the musings on God (or not) left us both cold. Anything on God leaves Mana cold; for my part, if I want any insight on God theory I look to the debate that has been raging for years among astrophysicists, some believers, some not. They deliberately make no mention of God, to leave aside any question of religion, but refer instead to the possibility of a Designer. Was the universe in as far as we know it designed or did it simply evolve? The answer lies somewhere in amongst some very hairy equations and mind-bending assumptions (like how many universes, parallel or contiguous, you want to assume) with a considerable grasp of probability theory required. A lot of this is beyond me but I enjoy the debate and think that this is not only the correct but (probably) the only way to approach the issue.

After the film I went to join the usual pizza evening but went for the mixed grill that Roberto was offering as an alternative. He was very late in delivering it, having started late, but made up for this by refusing to charge for it because of his tardiness. So I had two good meals for free on successive days; can't be bad.

Footnote
My son, Carl, sent me an email saying my house was now on Google Street View; and so it is.  So if any of you want to look up Les Bleus (street numbers promised for next year) in Mollans sur Ouvèze, you can.  Judging by the photo it was taken either last winter or the winter before, so there is greenery but no flowers on show.