If the devil is in the details, angels must be in the artwork

30 April 2018

Pics below

Toulouse, France (Tolosa in ancient days)—this week it was our turn for a missionary conference! The young missionaries meet every 3 weeks for a District Conference, every 6 weeks for a zone conference and several times within a transfer period (6 weeks) to do exchanges with other young missionaries. They come back refreshed, motivated and filled with new ideas. Since there are only 2 missionary couples located in the western end of France and France being a very large area, it’s hard for couple missionaries to have similar experiences. So we created our own mini Seniors Couple Missionary conference in Toulouse. We already have a Stake Conference (a collection of several congregations of Wards and Branches make up a Stake) on Saturday and Sunday. Since the other Senior couple from Australia and ourselves are both here for the conference, we added two extra days before the Stake Conference to enjoy the area, share ideas, and fellowship together. And the extra bonus? The weather was being extremely cooperative—sunny, slight winds to massage our skin and in the 70’s! Just what the Doctor ordered. Marc will reminds us his name is Marc Darrell, aka self-proclaimed “Dr” Poussard, MD…..when it comes to ordering perfect weather. Some people have all the luck, he’s one of them. Just after we finished our outdoor 2-day sight-seeing portion complete with full sun, it began to drizzle and turn to a light rain. By the time we were ready to drive home, the rain had picked up just a bit. But by the time we were on the highway heading home, it just pelted rain onto the car and highway. What luck, counting our blessings we were!

Toulouse is northeast of Tarbes, about a 2-hour drive. Old Toulouse is beautiful and like most European towns/cities the historic old-town section dates back several centuries. In the case of Toulouse, there are archaeological findings back to the Iron Age. Prior to the Roman Empire, Toulouse was an already established and central part of the great trade route between the Pyrenees, the Mediterranean and the Atlantic Ocean. We were absolutely astonished how many archaeological findings and intact statuary there was in the small, local archaeological museum. The irony was that after the museum had been functioning for many years, they excavated at the basement level of the museum knowing it was in the older section of town, and found some early sarcophagi and a lime kiln dating back to late Antiquity (the end of the Classical period and into the early Middle Ages). That’s old. We are living in a previous Roman province called Gallia Narbonensis. And as more of Marc's luck would have it, that newly excavated basement portion of the museum just opened this week, days before we arrived. We struck up a nice conversation with the ticket receptionist about the museum. Then she noticed our name tags and being that we were missionaries, refunded most of our ticket money giving us highly discounted rates. How very nice of them! And we shared a pass-along card with the ticket receptionist giving her a brief explanation of our missionary purpose: to bring others to Jesus Christ, and then we were given a clergy 50% discount which was a nice surprise.

Our hotel was overlooking part of another beautiful but more recent historic and huge plaza, Place du Capitol (the earliest structure in 1090 AD). The entire Place du Capitol area has beautiful French architecture in the greater surrounding arrondissement (borough) with wrought-iron balconies, shutters flanking each window and creativity on every corner. Plazas are part of French Culture and very early in its beginnings, the city design incorporated large, spacious plazas. In the historic area, there are many plazas within a very short few blocks of each other with plenty of open-air space for visiting, gathering, milling around….and of course cafés GALORE on each corner and down the convening streets . The French relish their cuisine and conversations that accompany every nibble. From world-famous Paris down to the smallest of villages, you can always find a café. Cafés are in their fabric of everyday living.

Stake Conference—Since there have been some recent major changes at the Worldwide Church organizational level, the implementations were discussed. The changes are by-products of an ever-expanding Church. Along with the bi-annual General Conference which meets in April and October, Stake Conferences are interspersed twice a year between those months. We receive instruction, inspiration and are spiritually fed from our local Church leaders at the Stake level. Small nuances in ministering to the emotional and spiritual needs of each other are already yielding wonderful results. Whether it’s on a grand worldwide scale or in our own individual lives, the goal is the same: How can we more closely align ourselves to the perfect example we find in Jesus Christ? How can we help others and each other who so desire to achieve the same? How can we lighten each other’s burdens and serve others better?

Another small world story, you say?—just when we think we’ve reached our quota of small world stories, up pops another one. As we approached the Stake Center this morning for Stake Conference there was a bubbly group of youth entering the building. I didn’t think much of it and just assumed they had all come as a group of Young Adults arriving together on the same metro. But it was quite curious that they all arrived together. As I took my seat while Marc went to visit with the Stake President, I saw the group more closely and what is more, heard English!! So I asked them where they were from and how is it they were in France. Then a young woman approached me. She walked closer and was saying, “Are you Sister Pous….?” Just as she got closer, I recognized Amber Schumann! We’re not sure who was more surprised. Nadya and Amber used to ice skate together for some time and of course we are in the same Stake in Poway. She was here with BYU as an organ student visiting (and playing) some famous organs in Cathedrals and the like in France. What an experience for them!

A la prochaine!