On Sunday morning, we set off for the 10am meeting. It was a half hour drive away, just down the road from Waterloo, the site of Napoleon's last battle – and, unlike our Ireland trip, thankfully we had no trouble finding the right place this time!
It was a French speaking meeting, but much of it was translated into English for us by the lady of the house, Valerie. Singing in French was another brand new experience for us, but the important things were just the same. Very special indeed!
Afterwards, we were invited to stay for lunch by Lucien and Valerie, who were very good company and had lots of interesting stories! Valerie was originally from London. For lunch we ate shepherd's pie and cabbage, and trifle for dessert. They invited us to stay for the afternoon so that we could follow them to the 5pm meeting at Lucien's brother's house, 20 minutes away. We were also able to gaze out at the convention grounds from Lucien and Valerie's windows!
During the afternoon, Valerie and one of their sons, Daniel, who lives with them, took us to Waterloo for a look. The Battle of Waterloo took place there on 18 June 1815, when Napoleon was defeated by the Duke of Wellington. Many thousands of men from both sides died during the 10-hour battle. There is now a visitor centre at the base of an impressive monument called The Lion Mound – a 43m-high man-made hill topped with a 28-tonne statue of a lion symbolising England's victory. The Lion Mound is on the spot where it is believed the Prince of Orange was injured during the battle, and it was commissioned by his father, King William I of the Netherlands.
The four of us took a tour around the battle fields in a little bus with an audio commentary playing in three languages. The bus would stop at significant locations while the commentary explained what happened there. It was very interesting, although impossible to comprehend what it must have been like during the battle, and how many people died in those paddocks in the space of a day. The paddocks were quite empty and bleak looking now, due to the winter, but Valerie said it is quite pretty at other times of the year.
The afternoon meeting was much smaller, and was translated for us by Daniel this time. Afterwards, we were invited to stay on for a sandwich tea with the couple of that house, Jean and Leah! Jean did not speak too much English, but Leah's was better and we were certainly able to carry on a conversation and understand each other. It was lovely!
After tea, Jean and Leah's son Lucas, his wife Beatrice, and their two daughters Laetitia (11) and Elise (8), who all live right next door, came over for a visit, along with their adorable new puppy, Precious! They brought with them quite an enjoyable state of pandemonium, as Precious skittered back and forth around the room and under the table, Laetitia enthusiastically ran around the table kissing us all on the cheek (as is the custom), Elise grabbed our hands from our laps and shook them vigorously, Lucas was on the phone as he was on call for his work, and they all chattered to each other in French as well as carrying on a conversation in English with us!!
Luc and Bea, who spoke very good English, then invited us to their house! We had a short and entertaining visit with them but didn't let them give us any food or drink as people had been feeding us persistently all day!!!
All in all, we had a wonderful day and met lots of lovely, kind people! Hopefully we will see many of them again within the next year.
Anyway, I had hoped to get through telling you about Monday as well, but it's past 1am and I would like some sleep! We're off to Germany tomorrow. I'll continue this when I can!
Goodnight!
1 comment:
loving all the food! sounds great to me :D just got back from convention, have had chrissy, still have a ton of relations around so things are pretty busy :D will email (a LONG one!) as soon as things slow down a bit :P much love, delle oxoxo
Post a Comment