This week at Church—Today the records of two new members to our Branch were read in! They are both single brethren and each bore an emotional testimony today during Fast and Testimony Meeting. One bore his testimony in his native language, Spanish, with our French/Spanish/Chinese speaking Elder as a translator. Fast and Testimony Meeting is held the first Sunday of each month where we come fasting from food and water for 2 meals over a 24-hour period. We give the cost of the missed meals to the Church to support those without daily food and with other needs. And we grow spiritually closer to Heavenly Father by placing our temporal needs to food secondary to our spiritual desire to be more in tune with the Voice of the Lord. It really works! The testimony portion is a free-will invitation to come to the microphone and share spiritual experiences where God has visibly blessed our lives during the past month. We talk about the role the Atonement of Jesus Christ has been manifest in our lives.

I, Marc, thought I would finally add some things to our mission blog that Meg has been writing (thanks Meg for writing all these blogs!). Here are a few things from my perspective.

Life is keeping busy here in southern France, as I spend a lot of time writing emails and texts to people in the Branch to start up programs and keep things running. Google translate and I are best friends. I couldn’t communicate with the volume that I need to without it. It is not only choosing the right words and grammar, but also putting in all those accents in just about every word! Talk about slowing down my already slow typing ability.

We also visit several members every week and go on teaching appointments with the missionaries to teach people that are interested in the restored Gospel. Many people are not interested in religion, but when people have grown up without knowing the full story of why we are here on earth, what our purpose is here, and what happens after we die, it is hard sometimes to be enthusiastic about religion. I grew up that way so I can relate to someone that might believe in God, but not be too interested in joining a religion that has not met their needs in the past. Having the Book of Mormon has really helped me understand the big picture of what is going on with our lives and who God and Jesus Christ are. The Book of Mormon covers a lot of things that the Bible is silent on or that the Bible covers in an abbreviated manner. In our religion we use the King James version of the Bible and the Book of Mormon together.

When we arrived in Tarbes, our Branch consisted of about 20 people, but it had been down to as little as 8 in the months before. We have been slowly finding people and reactivating some others that stopped attending church for various reasons. We now have some families with children which are adding a lot of activity to the Branch, sometimes to the chagrin of some older members that enjoyed the previous serenity. We now have a music program with a choir that seems to be very popular. Now that we are enlarging the congregation a bit we just called people this week to add another hour to our Sunday schedule by adding Sunday school which most LDS congregations already have and take for granted as being there.

Starting up Sunday School took some footwork behind the scenes to get all our ducks in a row—ordering the books, calling the teachers for both Sunday School, Primary and Young Men/Women’s who would need coverage during adult Sunday School time. We now have enough members to support the need for instructors. We did have to get a little creative alternating some teachers every other week and doubling up on some callings. But everyone is stepping up to the plate to grow the Branch and the programs that help us in turn grow.

One challenge in a small congregation is barely having enough people to fill the callings/positions necessary to run all the organizations of the church. When there is barely enough people to run the programs the people that run the programs get burned out because there is no one to step in and relieve them. Thus we are trying to increase the number of members so we can have sufficient people to rotate in and relieve people in the more demanding positions. Now back to Meg’s comments…….

Villes et Villages Fleuris—this is a very distinguished and sought-after award given to any French city, town or village that plants a certain number of flowers for its citizens and visitors to enjoy. To give you an idea, a number of visits ago to Paris, the city had one tulip planted for every citizen living in Paris. That’s several million tulips! And we happened to be there in tulip season. It was an unforgettable and touching experience to think each person was thought of, enough to plant a flower representing their individual contribution to the fabric of lives that make up Paris.

The really neat aspect to these “Floral Cities” is that there are many, many communities that participate and qualify. As you enter a designated Floral town, city or village, the proud sign announces your town as a “Villes Fleuris.” Tourists and residents alike drive more slowly to drink in what nature and a green thumb have provided. Tarbes is a “Villes Fleuris.”

Nature is a big component of French culture. Here the children don’t learn about a “pine” tree for example. They are taught the specific type of pine tree or the specific name of what we might just call a “flower.” No, that would never do just to call something a flower, bush or tree. They take the time to learn the exact variety. E.g., a pine tree is really a sapin

One reason we like living abroad is the joy of noticing big and small differences in cultures. It’s very enriching seeing differences. In the US, we have our naturalists and nature enthusiasts, hikers, bikers and campers. And that exists here as well. But the general population of France seems more in tune to the seasonal changes of the year that emphasize flowering trees, bushes and flowers. Many yards look like tropical paradises with such a splashing array of colors. Right now, roses are coming into bloom alongside Azalea and Rhododendron bushes which are just now peaking. Wisteria is fading, which we are sad about. Each color from the rainbow of floral colors seems to be represented in the Azalea and Rhododendron bushes. Then, a gentle breeze begins to blow and rose fragrances waft by—we are certain we are in heaven already. The extra bonus is that the Azalea & Rhododendron bushes have been here for years and so are fully mature bushes and then some. Whatever is in their soil is magical.

Lourdes (two weeks ago these were snowy mountains)

Also Lourdes. Yes those are palm trees in a snowy environment.
Not sure how, but they manage to adapt

Distinguished Flower Award

Missionaries with investigator Louise

Admiring Louise's garden.
No visit is complete in France without visiting their garden.

With reason.

Azalea

Rhodedendron

Looking for Henny Penny the chicken; two chickens and a dog...

Here Henny Penny, Penny, Penny.....

There's Henny Penny! And she had so much to say!

After Henny Penny was on the ground she just chatted away.

(Researchers say chickens have between 24 and 30 phrases)

Henny Penny was "singing"

Lady (chicken) talk excerpt....

Laying cackle-A hilariously annoying sound that sounds like the hen is REALLY proud of her egg laying accomplishment and wants everybody in the entire neighborhood to know it. It says “I just laid an egg and I rock.”

Broody hiss-A snake like hiss often accompanied by fluffing of feathers and a dirty look while the hen is sitting in her nest box. It says “I’m warning you to leave me and my eggs alone.”

Broody growl-Much harsher than the hiss and gravelly, the broody growl says “Leave me and my eggs alone or I will destroy you.” It is often accompanied by a hand peck as you are trying to collect eggs.

Singing-Usually rapidly repeated notes with some amount of randomness. Similar to someone happily humming as they go about their business. It says “All is well.”