Novembre et decembre: Noël approche

We didn’t get an early warning in September that Christmas was on its way. Things only started happening at the end of November when the Christmas lights went on around town: tiny lights festooned through the trees, mostly white but with accents of colour in various squares around the town. I was happy that our little square had bright blue lights and suddenly acquired Christmas trees at shop doorways and by lamp-posts

One of the shopping streets. Not quite Oxford Street but still pretty.

I’ve become a volunteer at the Croix Rouge française (French Red Cross). Apart from the better-known first aid side of things, we provide a service of domicilation: offering a postal address for people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to receive mail. Of those whose backgrounds I know, there are immigrants from many countries, those just waiting for somewhere permanent, travellers, asylum-seekers and one man sleeping in his car. We log the mail as it arrives, put in the appropriate file and then the people sign it out when they collect. I went on a “Welcome to the Red Cross” training day in Lille in early December. We were told about the history, ethos and current activities of the Red Cross. Being in France, the lunch was rather good.

I was particularly impressed with the tiny bottle of salad dressing.

We continued the investigation into the restaurants of Valenciennes with a visit to an estaminet, whose had advertised in our butcher’s, so we reckoned it would be worth a visit. We walked a mile or so across town, along a road next to the dual carriageway and through a small industrial estate, across a dark car park and into Le Bonne Franquette: a bar crammed with bottles, red checked cloths on the tables, a Yorkshire terrier sitting on the first one…………..  It’s a different way of life and we seem to be getting used to it. We opted for going straight for the main course, pork steak or carbonnade flamande (beef stew) with chips, then some salad. It was huge, delicious and we ate it all, washed down with a bottle of red.

The pudding was some sort of ice-cream thing. I think eating the main course made anything else pale into insignificance. At least the walk back across the car park (crunch, crunch), through the industrial estate (ssh, ssh) and by the road (roar, roar) wore off a few calories.

For several years I’ve been meeting my “original” running friends on or very near the Solstice to see the sunrise. We’ve had many grey days when the sky just gets lighter, once with snow and one glorious day when the sky was deep blue and orange as we looked out form Clifton Suspension Bridge up the river Avon. Unable to meet this year, we opted for doing our own thing so I set off and headed along the Avenue de Verdun which was my best bet to see the sun between buildings. The very best view of the sky would, in fact, have been from the flat but that seemed to be missing the point. The sun rises about half an hour later here than in Bristol (8.44 instead of 8.15) as we’re towards the west of European Time so I had a very pleasant walk through the square and out of town.

At the appointed hour I was on a straight stretch of road with no real distinguishing features so I settled on a banner as my turnaround point and a way of reminding people to do something important. 

I’m unable to give blood while I’m in France as they won’t accept UK blood because of a perceived CJD risk. Back home for breakfast. It was lovely but not quite our usual Solstice bacon butty.

 A beautiful sunrise in early December, looking towards the museum.