The competition asked recipients to name the dish that King Henry IV wished that the French could have every week. The answer, as five respondents correctly pointed out, is poule au pot. But don’t let the dazzling French name fool you–it’s simply chicken (hen) in a pot. Well, it does call for lots of veggies, too.

The first three correct respondents should watch their mailboxes for their edible overseas booty arriving very shortly. Well done, Googlers!

What is it about the French that makes them so, well, quintessentially “French”? For me, I think of all the folks walking their dogs and buying their baguettes and taking two hour lunch breaks. And cigarettes, too.

Here’s a top ten list that I ran across elsewhere. And just so you know, we reproduce this list with the most amicable of intentions. =) Feel free to comment to let us know what comes to mind when you think about the French and we’ll see if we can confirm or deny it.

1. The Gallic shrug… and the accompanying raspberry!
That expressive twitch of the shoulders, shift of the head, opening of the palm, raising of the eyebrows and the inevitable, audible raspberry that follows. It means, in case you weren’t sure, “Je ne sais pas”… or to give a more meaningful translation, “I haven’t got the faintest idea and why on earth are you asking me that ridiculous question anyway?

2. French eating habits – everything stops for lunch
Everything stops for lunch. Now I mean everything. The shops will close (except very large supermarkets and restaurants), all work will stop, not to begin again until around 2 o’clock. Or later, much later in the summer.

3. The “scenic bathroom”
French men have absolutely no embarrassment about answering the call of nature in a public place. It matters not a jot who else may be in the vicinity, women, children or small animals, they make no attempt to hide what they are doing, indeed, many go a step further and face the road itself rather than turning discreetly away!

4. French bureaucracy – paper, paper everywhere!
It’s official, France is drowning in a sea of paperwork. Yes, the dreaded bureaucracy is the next on the list of things that are quintessentially French. France LOVES paper. If, by any chance what you are trying to achieve is the simple purchase of a mobile phone, times the amount of paperwork and visits required by five.

5. A nation of hunter gatherers
Their ability to eat the inedible…If at all possible, they won’t go to a shop at all, preferring to find their dinner under a bush or large pot in the garden, crawling, wriggling or growing in a dark corner.

6. French food
Yes, the French are, justifiably famous for their food. What is really remarkable about the French and their food is that they talk about it all the time. The other remarkable thing about the French and their food is that they seem to have an enviable ability to indulge in all things fattening without actually getting very fat.

7. French attitudes to money
The French do talk about money, but they certainly don’t brag about how much they earn, what their house is worth or any of the other accouterments of wealth.

8. French manners
They have the most wonderful manners known to man. If you walk into a shop, a restaurant or bar in France, not only will the manager and his staff greet you with a polite “Bonjour” or “Bonsoir”, but also, probably, will all the other customers. There is, of course, all the kissing that goes on, too.

9. Fêtes [Parties]
France is famous for its fêtes. All over France, at any time of year, whole towns and villages will be getting together to have a party. Fêtes can be anything from a small village meal, as above, to a massive week long affair complete with top bands, well known comedians and hundreds and thousands of people. Any excuse for a party will do.

10. And a whole host of other thing
What is notable is that as far as dress, goes, anything goes. Adults in a group can be variously dressed in the last word in Parisian chic while their friends are happily scruffy in torn jeans and sweatshirts, and teens will blend the toughest Goths with nerds and trendies. The same rule applies to cars.

10 things that make the French French

An interesting event transpired this week that first brought to our attention the difference in patriotism between France and America. On Monday, as with the first Monday of each month, we change classes at our French language school and the professors host workshops. Our workshop explored French culture and the icons with which La France identifies herself. This naturally lead to discussing the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise.” But, of course, who can discuss an anthem without actually singing it? So, our professor sang the first stanza:

Allons enfants de la Patrie,	Arise, children of the Fatherland,
Le jour de gloire est arrivé !	The day of glory has arrived!
Contre nous de la tyrannie,	Against us stands tyranny
L’étendard sanglant est levé	The bloody banner is raised

So far so good, right? It’s just a French professor singing the French national anthem in French to her expatriate students. Well, our school shares a building with a business school which is made up entirely of French students. As it turns out, the business class meeting in the room next door could hear our professor singing the “La Marseillaise.” And the chatter must have made its way to management because later in the week our professor told us that the French students were a little unsettled by the singing of the national anthem. Really?!

Apparently, the French really only demonstrate love for country during the Olympics or the World Cup or other national events. Otherwise you’re branded a nationalist, racist, right-winger, etc., etc., etc. That’s what our professor had to say anyways. Oh dear. That doesn’t sound quite like America, does it?

We are blessed to have numerous friends who are pastors and not just pastors but solid preachers who consistently deliver clear teaching from Scripture. Their sermons have played an increasingly edifying role in our lives since moving to France as we’re able to listen in via podcast. (A podcast is simply the regular, automatic delivery of an audio file, in this case MP3′s of sermons.) While we attend a great church here, we still desire–like those to whom we’re preparing to minister in Cameroon–to hear God’s word preached in our own language, which will continue to be the language we understand best.

Just today I was listening and Emily said, “wow, this is so good for keeping up with our friends.” So, I thought I’d better blog and share the goodness. Here’s a list of the podcasts to which we subscribe and listen regularly. Check these out and leave your suggestions in the comments for others we should check out.

Podcasts

• Jim Upchurch  (First Baptist Church of Gibsonville, NC), currently preaching through Philippians. Listen
• Andy Davis (First Baptist Church of Durham, NC), currently preaching through Hebrews. Listen
• Jonathan Chandler (Union View Baptist Church, NC), currently preaching through 2 Peter. Listen
• Jan Vezikov (Mosaic Boston), varied. Listen
• Jacob Atchley (the Church at Martinsburg, WV), varied. Listen
• Matt Chandler (The Village Church, TX), about to begin Galatians. Listen

We listen to several other podcasts, too. The church we wish had a podcast? Our church here. Then we could relisten and relisten and relisten.

Others?

What podcasts do you love? We’d love to hear your suggestions.

A Professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

So the Professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was. The Professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous “yes.”

The Professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the space between the grains of sand.

“Now,” said the professor, as the laughter subsided, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things–your family, your children, your health, your friends, and your favorite passions – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, and your car. The sand is everything else -the small stuff.

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you. Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out to dinner. Play another 18.

There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal. “Take care of the golf balls first, the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.” One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented. The Professor smiled. “I’m glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

We look forward to hearing the thoughts, reactions, and questions from our MaustsOnToast faithful. Let us know what you think!

]]> http://maustsontoast.com/2010/wycliffe/feed 2 http://maustsontoast.com/2010/a-fresh-start http://maustsontoast.com/2010/a-fresh-start#comments Mon, 25 Jan 2010 00:49:13 +0000 Emily http://maustsontoast.com/?p=1213 Its seems to be the ‘in’ thing these days for new mothers to blog about their baby’s, and I can see why it has become so popular.  What a great way to record the growth of something that grows so fast and what fun for far away family and friends to keep up to date with the every day activities of their loved ones.  I feel bad that I’m only now hopping on the band wagon but forgive me, I had to really focus on my priorities if I were going to make it through the last 6 months and finishing nursing school while looking after my sweet baby girl to the best of my ability won out.  BUT NOW with more time, freedom and incentive….I want to try really hard to blog more often about Poppy in particular with a few family happenings and personal thoughts along the way.

So here begins  Poppy’s Story (from 7 months old, backtracking a few weeks with the first story).

Many people have asked how we made our birth announcements. We’re delighted to tell you because not only did we custom design them ourselves but it ended up being far cheaper than if we had used a pre-made design at somewhere like Wal-mart or Target. We decided to go with postcards instead of cards mailed in envelopes in order to take advantage of the Post Office’s cheaper postcard rate of  28 cents as opposed to the standard 44 cent rate for regular mail. When you’re sending out 100 birth announcements, the savings is obvious: $28 vs. $44. Secondly, we were able to get 100 postcards printed by an online printer (OvernightPrints.com) for around $30 as opposed to the announcements printed by Wal-mart or Target for between 40 cents and $1 each. Thus by mailing out postcards to announce the birth of our gorgeous Poppy we easily spent half as much as we could have with “birth announcements” from Wal-mart or Target.

You may now be thinking, “Yeh, you got them printed and posted cheaper but how much did it cost to design them? Didn’t you have to have some fancy-smancy, professional photo editing software?” No! Emily snapped a candid photo of Poppy and I with our Nikon D40 and then we edited it using the incredible free web application Picnik.com. Really the editing, customization, and modification of your photos using Picnik is dead easy. Scale your image to fit a postcard (this was the trickiest part of the whole process, but not impossible). Find effects you like, click it and boom you got it. Add text. Export. Send to your online printer and in a couple of days you’re ready to start addressing postcards (note that there’s a template that you have to follow when writing and addressing postcards).

That’s basically it. We know a lot of couples who are having babies in the next year or so. We expect to be receiving beautiful custom-made postcards from you!

“The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning” (US Flag Code, TITLE 4, CHAPTER 1, Section 8, (k)).

Still not sure you want to send Old Glory up in flames? The Town of Wake Forest’s got you covered with

a Flag Retirement Cerimony [sic] on December 6, 2008 in Downtown Wake Forest.  The event will begin promptly at 5pm.  If anyone has an old-worn-tattered flag they would like to have properly retired, you can bring it to the American Legion, Post #187, in Wake Forest (they are across from the Wake Forest Post Office on E. Holding Avenue) and place it in the “mailbox” recepticle in the back of the parking lot; or you can attend the cerimony [sic] and it will be retired in your presence.

Maybe this is what’s been going on in the Middle East for years; but then again that doesn’t explain the burning of presidential effigies.