Funny & Interesting.

We had some interesting moments. First concerning the language barrier. In all of our class you can sense the frustration of not being able to communicate with others. There is a German couple in our class who speak very little English as well, I can only imagine how lonely they get. Twice now I have been asked directions by a French person and not been able to help them out except to say, "Je parle un peu de français, désolé." (CULTURAL EXPLANATION: The french especially in Paris love to help with directions, if you ask and they do not know, they might even help you find someone who knows, which happened to Angie last week. The will go somewhere not knowing where the place is located and just ask directions several times.) I did go to the bank today and get an appointment to set up our accoutn all by myself, and the teller spoke no english, pretty good huh. One of the students in our class was noticably having communication trouble when he asked the teacher how to say, "Don't rip me off you crazy baker!" Another interesting item, we found out that almost all the baptist churches here do not have a problem with Alocohol as a beverage conservatively; however many of the churches will not even baptize an individual if they smoke. I found that interesting seeing how smoking seemed to be socially accpetable in France and was not prohibited in restaurants until the day before we arrived. A hilarious moment happened last night. Angie and were in the bathroom (salle de bain, or WC) when Micah (3 yr old) came in to use the restroom. He was wearing Lilia's heelies (thoughs shoes with wheels built in). Through a lot of trouble and unsteadiness he managed to do his business and afterwards turned around and said, "Wew". Then he took them off to brush his teeth. You would have had to been there to see how funny it looked him trying to pull his pants up and down. I wish we could have taped it. Both the boys went to school yesterday without any tears, they just walked right in. That was a relief. Yesterday in class we went over how to say when you Birthday is. What are the odds that yesterday, two people in our class of ten had a birthday that day. And on of the kids of a classmate had a brithday, all that same day. There was a joyful singing of happy brithday (joyeaux anniversaire) and later one of the students bought everyone a Twix. Monday in Bible Language class, It was pointed out that part of our homework is to memorize the books of the Bible in french. Wow. That was something that I didn't even consider having to do. I going to have to memorize John 3:16 and the Roman road, etc. It seems a little overwheliming when you think about it, but we will just take a little at a time. Thanks for taking the time to read up on us, God bless, JASON