Remembrance And Education

Remember, Remember

I have fun explaining to the French why we Brits celebrate November the 5th. After all, celebrating an attempt to blow up the democracy of which we are all so proud is ironic in a very British way. We didn't go through it this year in the English conversation class as we had already done that last year. Then I explained that although traditionally it should be Guy Fawkes who was burned there had been local variations. In the village in which my mother lived, for instance, it used to be the Pope who got burned. That would be politically incorrect nowadays of course and, anyway, I find the idea of religions persecuting one another rather obscene. However, I think the idea of burning (in effigy) someone almost unversally disliked has some merit. Anyone for Trump, Boris Johnson, Theresa May……?

It is also a time to remember the dead in both world wars of course: the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. For some reason I keep meaning to investigate, the ceremony in the village is at 12;00. I seem to remember that that changed from 11.00 a few years ago and I think it must be because winter and summer time didn't exist at the time of WW1, so 11.00 then would be 12.OO now. Maybe someone decreed the change in the last few years but I still don't know for sure. Anyway the ceremony went off almost smoothly in the village, when the names of those from the village who were killed are read out individually followed by the words «mort pour la France». I find it quite moving. At the end (before the obligatory communal aperitif) the children at the village school sing the Marseillaise. They were to be accompanied by the music but, enthusiastic as they were, they started off well in advance of the music and the singing and the music never really got together again. A shame, I suppose, but it had a very sympathetic Clochemerle feel to it. Perhaps that is how it should be, a living and improvised contrast to the otherwise formal proceedings to remember the dead.

Education

The last couple of English conversation classes have been particularly good, running seamlessly for 90 minutes. At the beginning of the one this evening I proposed an idea I had had and checked with Steve that we should offer the class toipics for conversation (generally of their choice) but that we should start with education. After all, we have all been through it (and may be continuing it) so we all have experiences, good or bad, to talk about. The idea went down well. Steve and I will provide a vocabulary beforehand to help the discussion along.

The idea came back to me while I was helping my son compose a rather sensitive letter. I well remember offering to read my daughter's thesis before she submitted it when she was at university and her refusal because, she said, I would criticise her grammar. Grammar was not in question when I was helping my son but niceties of expression and pereption were. Language can be such a supple and nuanced instrument for communication that I feel more than ever that the period when it was «taught» (in English schools certainly and, I gather, in French schools too) as simply free uncritical expression was almost criminal. Just tick the right box, or Eats Shoots And Leaves, if you know the book.

Cold Snap

I gather there has been a cold snap in the weather in the UK and so has there here, although the cold during the day is only evident if the wind is blowing (it's the Mistral) and you are not sheltered from it. However, snow has been falling on the summit of Mt Ventoux for the past week and that doesn't usually happen until around mid-December. I hope this doesn't herald a harsh winter but I think I'm now going to have to protect the plants I have that will not survive a hard frost.

Sustaining Rural Communities (And Parcel Delivery And Autumn)

Parcel Delivery And Scams

Parcel delivery happens every day to thousands of people without problems. But, if there are problems, how do you unravel them?

The thought occurred to me only because my daughter had said to me a fortnight ago that she had sent me a parcel that I haven't (yet) received. Then I received an email from DHL saying that a parcel had been sent to me and would be available at my local collection point, without indicating where that collection point was. So I went to the Post Office and asked if they had the parcel; they didn't but said there was a local collection point in the stationer's in Buis. So I went to the stationer's in Buis and asked if they had a parcel for me and they said no. So.….……….Later I opened my post box and found a letter from Chronopost, the French Post Office parcel service, with a reputation among the French of my acquaintance for unreliability, saying that they had a parcel for me but needed a phone call and extra information from me within 14 days or they would return it to sender. I duly phoned them and all they apparently needed was my phone number. All this happened while there was apparently a scam going on related to parcel delivery, of which I was aware, which sought to elicit personal details for the use of the scammers (which I was anyway never going to divulge for simple parcel deliver)y. Initially, I couldn't understand why Chronopost, even given their apparent reputation for unreliabiliy, hadn't simply left the parcel at the Post Office in Mollans, having apparently failed to deliver it to me.

So what, I asked myself, was going on? Where, for instance, did the email from DHL fit in? Was this a scam? I gradually came round to the following probable explanation (the problem is not resolved at time of writing). I surmised that when Chronopost tried to deliver my parcel it was the afternoon, when the local Post Office would have been shut; so they couldn't leave it there. They could have left it at the Post Ofiice in Buis (open all day) some 8kms away but apparently chose not to do so. So why didn't they leave a note in my letter box saying they had tried to deliver? That I can put down only to Chronopost's own procedures and reputation. The notification arrived by post some days later. But what about the DHL email? Again I can only surmise. But what I think must be the case is that Amazon (from whom the consignment was purchased) ordered DHL to deliver the parcel. Had they done so the parcel would have been at my local collection point in Buis. However DHL (again I surmise) decided that it would be cheaper or more convenient to delegate that task to Chronopost.

Two things disturb me. If delivery fails and the parcel is returned to Amazon, who accepts responsibility and picks up the tab (or whom do I threaten to sue, if it comes to that)? If Amazon did not accept prime responsibilty (and I have no idea whether they would or not) I could see a lot of finger-pointing and blame evasion going on, a long drawn-out process. Legally (according to UK law) I think the prime responsibility lies with Amazon, who impose this by inference on DHL who then........…. But I'd hate to have to go down that path. Whatever the case, when Amazon ask for feedback on this transaction, they will get it. Thus does a simple transaction become a potential saga.

The Village Butcher And Local Support

My heading sounds like a potential title for a French film from this region (The Cook, The Thief, His Wife.........…....….) but is more important than that, if I have been informed correctly. What I know is that the village butcher's closed earlier this year. I'm told it declared bankruptcy for reasons I won't go into. I'm told that the village council then decided that a butcher's was needed in the village and so the council bought the business. I know that the mayor promised a new butcher and one has recently been installed, presumably as a tenant. Whatever the case, the village now has a butcher's again.

What, for me, is important in all this is that the village council has the concern, and the budget, to keep the village alive as an entity. A couple of years ago I posted an account of how the village kept a Post Office when that was threatened with closure. The important point, again, is the encouragement and means provided, directly and indirectly, by the gouvernment here to keep small local communities alive and thriving. In the brief time in the late 1990s when I was important enough in the UK for at least some people in relatively high places to pay attention to what I was saying, I came up with a proposal to keep British villages alive through protecting the local Post Office and making it the hub of village communication and activity. There were people interested in this proposal and, indeed as it turned out, those who had made similar proposals; but no one in central or local government. If you want to know why local rural communities in the UK are dying (and will continue to do so) that is why.

Autumn

The autumn since the beginning of September has been brilliant. We still have afternoon temperatures of 22-23 degrees and it is still a pleasure to eat out at lunch-time in shirt sleeves, though it is too cold to do the same in the evenings, but you can comfortably eat outside then with a sweater on. What we don't have is rain. Thanks to the reduced temperatures and the hours when they apply, I now have to water plants only once every 5-7 days. But I've never seen the water level in the river Ouveze so low. It is reduced to a shallow, and narrow, stream in most places. I think I've already commented that the grape harvest as a result is smaller than usual, but more concentrated, promising some good wine albeit in reduced volume. The same cannot be said for olives. The harvest is in November and December and olives don't increase in goodness in the absence of rain to give them volume; they just get less flesh on them, to eat or produce oil. That could be a significant problem.

So I'll probably have to pay a bit more for wine and olive oil next year but that's not too much of a worry for me. What I'm most pleased about is that the front of my house is showing more colour than any others around. There is colour a-plenty in flowers in the shops but this is all chrysanthemums for All Saints'Day. The mounds of flowers look attractive but the plants have mostly been forced to flower now. In the past I have bought one to separate the plants and try to grow them on individually but with no success. The oleanders, the main source of colour at this time of year apart from from tree and vine leaves turning to autumnal shades, have finished flowering. However, my fuchsias, pansies and French marigolds, as well as the odd geranium and rose, are showing plenty of colour out front, as in the photo below. The fuchsias in particular are doing well, as below.  It's a small personal consideration but important to me.

English Conversation And Autumn Gardening

English Conversation Resumes

Last Tuesday was the first of the new term of English conversation classes and, as expected, the tournout of participants was sparse; just four in fact. At this time of year some of the regulars are on holiday and some still have summer visitors. One of the absentees has definitely been helped by our efforts, though, as he has now achieved his goal of getting a job in England and going to live there for a while.

Steve and I hadn't thought much beforehand about what we were going to do this term but have come to the conclusion that the synthetic conversations we created and used a lot until the last term have a lot more mileage in them. No doubt we'll get more ideas when we question the class more closely about what they find most difficult, as we have before. Pronunciation is one of the items we can work on, as well as the tonic accent, but the amazing lack of rules for these in English doesn't help. Vocabulary is certainly another consideration but is as long as a piece of string and, without a definite context, is difficult to bound. Steve and I have taken the view that what a visitor to England, for a holiday for instance, might need is the best guideline we can have.

Another problem, I feel, is how far to take the class into the English use of prepositions to qualify the meaning of verbs. We are concentrating on colloquial conversational English so verb and preposition combinations (verb plus, in, on, up, down, over, etc) inevitably occur frequently and the temptation is to extrapolate when one such occurs. The problem is that the possible combinations and alternative, context-dependent meanings with a verb such as «to put», for example, are so many that the class could well end up losing patience or being totally confused.

Anyway, time will tell what challenges the new term will bring; the one thing I'm sure of is that we shall have some fun along the way. We now have our old room back, the salle de réunions, renovation of the Mairie now being almost complete, which is a bonus, even if it comes some eight months later than originally scheduled. That's just a normal delay in these parts.

Letter To The Mairie

My letter to the Mairie (see a couple of posts ago) suggestung a narrowing of my road and installation of a toll booth has now been circulated to friends and neighbours and we've all had a good giggle. One neighbour seemed to take me seriously, though, and was at pains to explain to me that the Mairie didn't have the authority to make the road a toll road. Pity about that.

Autumn Gardening

The autumn gardening is just about done. I've planted about 20 or so of the irises I culled from the back garden to make an extra row in the roadside opposite my kitchen window. I've also planted crocuses around the edge of the pot by the wash-house and more in a pot in the front, plus around 40 narcissi and daffodils that I've found space for here and there. So the front is done and looking pretty good, as in the photo below.

You can just about see the cyclamen high up on the balcony. The French marigolds in the hanging baskets are still blooming, as are the fuchsias either side of the front door, and the rose arching over the porch (Penny Lane) has decided to start blooming again.

I have a bit more clearing up to do at the back, one or two more irises to get out and a cistus to cut back. I went to the market in Vaison this morning to see if I could find any perennials I fancied and bought a white buddleia and a cassia. I'll get those in in the next couple of days, plus some bulbs. All in all I feel quite pleased with what I've done.

Rémuzat And Friends Leaving

Rémuzat

The three days in Rémuzat for the boules tournament were just about perfect. The sun shone for all three days, the vultures came out to do their pitouettes in the sky, the food in the Lavandes holiday village was great and so was the company. Players and their sometimes non-playing partners came from Sarrians, Beaume de Venise, La Gaude and, of course, Mollans. The tournament was essentially a free-for-all, with the teams changed after each game so that you got to play with and against just about everyone. My personal score placed me somewhere in the middle, not as high as the fifth place I had previously achieved, but that didn't matter at all. In all respects it was a very enjoyable three days. The photo shows the view from my bedroom window.

Also, the latter part of the drive to Rémuzat is spectacular. Just north of Nyons, where the last of the olive trees give out, the road follows the river Aygues into a narrow cleft between high cliff faces which become sheerer as the river becomes narrower as you continue. Finally you enter a tunnel under the cliffs before reaching Rémuzat. In past times, before the road was built, the narrow shallow river must have been the only practicable way out of or into Rémuzat. The small mountains around are known as the «pré-Alpes». I jokingly suggested that this could be because there are «prés» (meadows) in the Alps but of course it is because these are the foothills of the Alps. The French seem to love «jeux de mots» (play on words) as a sign of wit, their beloved «esprit», so the joke went down well, although I personally find it a fairly easy and shallow form of wit.

On my return I found the grape harvesting in full swing. The crop this year is much smaller than in previous years but predicted to be of higher quality, a function of the hot dry summer. That may mean higher prices for wine next year but the price of good wine here is so low compared to prices in the UK that that won't matter much either. A further consequence of the hot dry summer is that the grapes on the vine over my balcony that I haven't managed to eat or give away, and which I usually just leave for the birds or wasps or to rot, have turned themselves into raisins. A friend some years ago gave me rasins seeped in muscat wine and so I have picked them and done just that with them. They should be good to eat with ice cream or a dessert of some kind.

I've bought some bulbs to supplement those already planted and am cutting back the growth in the small back garden to clear the stone steps that run across it so that I can get to the top without endangering life and limb. I'm also clearing out irises that have started taking over the garden in places and have given some away; the others I shall find room for on the roadside opposite my kitchen window. I've also bought some cyclamen which I shall put in pots where I can find spaces. I usually put them in the hanging baskets but those are still flowering, as are the solanum, fuchsias and michaelmas daisies below but I'll find space somewhere. You never know, the village council may actually decide to take up my suggestion to narrow my road.

Friends Leaving

Hallie and Mary, my American cook friends, are leaving at the weekend and so came round for a final aperitif this evening. They are the last of the summer visitor friends to go. Both give cooking lessons in the USA and bring some of their students to Mollans in the summer. Now, however, they have decided they have had enough of this small enterprise and have put their house up for sale. They propose to still come to Mollans in the summer but simply to enjoy themselves while here. I took a photo of them having the aperitif on my balcony, below. 

Autumn And School Histories

Autumn Has Arrived

The seasons have started early this year and that applies to the autumn too, although the leaves are not yet falling. Some of the high August heat usually spills over into early September but not this year, though daytime temperatures in the low 20s are welcome after the summer heatwave, even if the evenings are rather cool. Welcome also is the need to water plants perhaps only twice per week. Most importantly, the sun keeps shining, ensuring its average of ~300 days per year.

I see the difference in my fruit supply too. Apricots disappeared from sale some weeks ago and now the peaches, nectarines and melons are following suit, to be replaced by grapes and figs (and the perennial apples, oranges and pears, of course). Soon it will be mushroom time: chanterelles, lactaires, trompettes de la mort, etc. Autumn usually lasts into mid-December and winter (usually) is mercifully short.

Alternative School Histories

A round of emails exchanged with old school friends triggered a thought in my mind. Many schools have a long history and, with that, a tradition. The tradition is often cherished and, just as often, largely mythical. The tradition is sometimes described in books about the school. My own old school, Rutlish, had been a private rather than a state school before WW2 and seemed to try to hark back to those days. There was a notuceable amount of snobbery among staff who dated back to the private school days or who had been pupils at the time. One of the changes the school had made was to switch from playing soccer to rugby; as one teacher putit to me when I enquired about the change, «if we played soccer, which schools would we play?». What he meant was that the school, with it's private heritage, had to somehow distinguish itself from the new county grammar schools, brought in by the 1944 Education Act, and which played soccer. What horror to be confused with them!

But schools are primarily about education and teaching so, obviously, Rutlish would consider itself superior on that score too. However, my discussion with former school friends turned at one point to the subject of which of our teachers (they actually stuck to the term «masters» rather than the term «teachers») were actually any good at teaching. A few, we all agreed, certainly were but Rutlish also had a good share of duds. There were also a good number of unfortunate or downright chaotic episodes in classes in this very formal, conservative school. All of which made me think: why don't people write alternative school histories; how schools actially were rather than how their tradition would have you believe they were? I'm not sure if a website to hold such stories already exists but there must be hundreds of thousands of people worldwide who would love to debunk the traditions of their old schools and expose the myths. Any takers?

Letter To The Mairie

I ocasionally get the urge to extend the area I can grow flowers in around my house and recently thought how nice it would be if the road out front, although already quite narrow, could be made even narrower. I would then have more room to plant either side. My excuse would be that it would slow traffic. Anyway, the following very tongue-in-cheek letter has gone to the village Council.

Chers membres du conseil,

J'ai apprécié les efforts que vous avez déjà entrepris pour embellir notre cher village, ce qui m 'a fait

penser à un autre projet possible que je voudrai vous soumettre aujourd'hui. Le voici avec les trois

avantages qu'il entraînerait .

En dépit du gendarme couché dans la rue du faubourg, les voitures y roulent toujours un peu trop

vite. Il est vrai qu'il y a d'autres petits ralentisseurs (des gendarmes cadets couchés?) mais ceux-là

servent à peu de chose. Ce que je propose est de rendre la rue devant ma maison (n¨39) plus étroite,

peut-être juste suffisante pour laisser passer le camion des poubelles. Dans l'hypothèse où le

goudron de chaque côté était enlevé je m'engage à entreprendre la plantation de fleurs et d'arbustes

dans l'espace ainsi libéré. Cela serait beau, n'est-ce-pas? En complément on pourrait introduire un

péage à cet endroit, pour récupérer les frais de cette modification et éventuellement en faire

bénéficier les écoles. Il y a déjà eu un précédent pour le péage. Il me semble que c'était à l'époque

où il y avait un pont-levis sur l'Ouvèze. En conclusion, on pourrait par la même occasion ralentir la

circulation, faire rentrer de l'argent et embellir davantage le village.

Voilà ma petite suggestion. Nul besoin de réponse à cette lettre; je vous laisse y réfléchir et prendre

la bonne décision.

Veuillez agréer, Mesdames, Messieurs l'expression de mes salutations les plus sincères.

Ian Hugo

Back From Scotland

Back From Scotland

I left for the UK on the 28th of July, visiting London on both weekends and spending the intervening week in Scotland. The imperative was to see my grand-daughter, my daughter Natalie and son-in-law Andy in Glasgow but also to see my son in London and as many friends as could be accommodated at the same time. As it turned out I managed to see only my friend Margaret, with whom I stayed in London. The weather was suitably British, cool and often rainy, slightly warmer in London than Glasgow but anyway a welcome break from the heatwave in Mollans.

I had intended that my visit should allow Nat and Andy some time out together but I was too early for that, grand-daughter Eilidh being still too young to be left with me. But there were plenty of photo opportunities, for me with Eulidh and Eilidh in her Chelsea kit, as shown here. I knew that Andy wasn't particularly interested in football so thought the Chelsea romper would be uncontroversial; I didn't know that both of Andy's brothers were Liverpool supporters but that probably just means that Eilidh will be getting a Liverpool romper as well.

The journeys both ways were easy and uneventful. I hate large airports, in common with most people probably, so flew from Avignon to London City, and was through airport formalities both ways in no time at all. I wonder how long that will be possible if Brexit happens. Even the hurly-burly that London can provide passed me by and I found people generally aimiable and kind. As ever in the places in London where I end up I was surprised at the sheer variety of ethnicities. Round the corner from my friend Margaret's house were restaurants specialising in Chinese and Caribbean food and a coffee bar run by Somalis. And on one bus ride I overheard a conversation between a passenger and the driver in Russian. Who wouldn't want that diversity?

I met my son Carl in my favourite Zédel brasserie just off Piccadilly Circus, very good food, wine and impeccable service at well below central London prices. The restaurant, as large as a ballroom, is three floors below ground level and was an air raid shelter during the war. Carl, as ever, was up to his eyeballs in IT and looking tired, obviously having been burning the candle at both ends. However he seemed happy with it.

I had the requisite, on trips to the UK, fish and chips in Glasgow and pints of bitter in London so it was a successful trip in every way.

The heat seemed stifling on my return to Avignon where I collected my car 30 yards from the arrival/departure lounge in the free car park. Does anybody know another airport that has free car parking, let alone 30 yards from check-in/arrival? Then it was back home to continue the watering that friends Steve and Jo had kindly been doing while I was away. They'd managed to keep my plants alive and, a day later, it rained heavily almost all day which gave me a couple of days' grace before I had to lug the watering cans around again. I was glad to be able to indulge my passion for fruit again, now including the grapes from the grapevine over my balcony which were well ripe and the damsons from my neighbour's damson tree that overhangs my back garden. So it's back to fruit, boules, mussels and chips outside the Bar du Pont on Thursday evenings and meeting again the many summer visitors to Mollans that are friends.

High Summer

High Summer

It's high summer here now. The official start of summer here is the Feu de la St Jean, on the 23rd or 24th of June, with a bonfire on the river bed and music in the square in front of the Bar du Pont. I usually love this celebration but was disappointed this year. The square was virtually deserted until after 9.30, perhaps because there was a pancake stall but no other food on offer, and when more people came I found only a handful that I knew. Also the music provided turned out to be a hard rock band and few people got up to dance before I left, early. Fireworks were added this year to the ritual bonfire and they were good but there seemed little reason for me to linger after they were set off.

The high temperatures that started in June have continued with only infrequent cooler days, which has meant watering plants front and back on most days. The two photos here show most of what there is now in front of my house, the jasmine on the balcony and the honeysuckle and clematis by the front door, and there won't be much more for the rest of the summer. The few sunflowers I have nurtured from seeds dropped by the birds at my feeders into various pots have finished blooming so I shall root them out, leaving the heads for the birds to feed off again. Lavendar is in full bloom all around but I have only a couple of those plants by the bench opposite my kitchen window. Come August and it will be oleanders and geraniums and not much else. I feel I need an oleander in front of the house but can't think where to put it.

And it's high season for fruit too. Strawberries have all but disappeared, a few weeks earlier than usual, but apricots, peaches, nectarines and melons abound in the shops and markets. I eat far more than I ever did in England and particularly love the melons and white peaches. The flat white peaches are particularly good and cost next to nothing. And the grapes overhanging my balcony are ripening nicely and should be ready to eat in a month's time. I had never imagined livong anywhere where I could sit in the sun/shade (as I choose) on a balcony and simply raise my arm to grab a handful of grapes but that is what I will soon be able to do.