Clement Family

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Originally uploaded by whitneyherrington.

The Clements are well named
In Lille, we are staying with a family whose last name is Clement. This word means the same in both French and English, agreeable or pleasant. Pascale, Xavier, Quentin, and Lou are all terrific people, the kind of folks we would be friends with if we only lived close to one another—or even on the same continent. Their friends are fun and “tres simpa,” people with whom we enjoy spending time. One night, we all ate dinner together with some friends of theirs. Everybody at the table was/is a teacher, and the evening was filled with laughter. Lou and Krista had fun making the dessert, a delicious tarte made with cherries that they picked from the tree in the yard; Lou made a copy of the recipe, and we plan to make it when we return home. We made them a Tex-Mex meal (as best as we could using ingredients we could find here), and they exposed us to an even-better-place-than-Paul’s for pastries (although Paul can’t be beaten for the breads and mille-feuilles*). We also have internet service** and a fully-functional washer and dryer*** here, so we’re living rather high on the hog here. Their daughter Lou is 13, a perfect fit in the “Tween” world in which our girls live. Pascale teaches English, and she speaks perfectly as you might well imagine. Ken and I try out sentences that end up sounding like Tarzan trying to speak French (“we going to some dinner that night”), and she says sentences like “Furthermore, when I saw your now ex-President Clinton at the tennis match in Paris, he was surrounded by an entire entourage of bodyguards” (a semi-verbatim example). She came and worked hard with us two of the days we did the soup kitchen ministry. We have enjoyed her company so much, and we’re hoping for a visit from her and/or her family in the next couple of years!

*mille-feuilles
means a thousand leaves, and it is a pastry with a fabulously smooth cream and perfectly baked leaves of a pastry dough similar to that used in baklava. Fortunately, if I understood the baker correctly, there are no calories in this concoction, so I’ve eaten as much of it as possible.
**internet service
Thus, you can read this blog, although their .fr internet service doesn’t come with the “my-friend-Gayla-does-all-the-computer-work” program, so it’s a bit sluggish.
***washer and dryer
I have found, however, that European washers and dryers don’t work the same way as ours do in the U.S. The most astonishing feature here is an incredible ability to shrink clothing; mine, for instance, which fit very well a month ago when we left, are now at least two sizes too small. This technology could be put to good use if America were able to harness it, minimizing large pimples or rats for instance. I’ll think about some other interesting applications while I eat this mille-feuilles.