After Greece, we caught a flight to Marseille, France.
Those of you reading this that have been keeping up with our life over the past few years know that we had a teenager from France, Abigael, live with us for about 8 months just before we left for Thailand.
Abigael is the younger sister of Gabe's friend Edouard. They met when they were in Panama together on DTS in 2007.
Abigael's parents live in Marseille. Her father trained to be a pastor and has helped pastor the local church there for about 23 years. Her mom works to help cultures learn to understand each other and also as a mediator.
Abigael is interested in law and mediation, so she's one year into a very intensive 2-year program to prepare her for getting into one of France's to law programs.
We arrived just before the end of her term, so it wasn't ideal timing for her to have guests, but Abigael and her parents were great about giving us time when they could and letting us come and go when they needed to be doing their normal life.
Abigael lives in this awesome, ramshackle apartment in the middle of Marseille. We loved the apartment - it's got these awesome tucked away rooms, twisting hallways, clever little quirky storage spots, and extremely comfortable furniture. Like our apartment that Abigael came to live in, it hails from a different (and antique) era, but it is charming. And I personally loved the books! Abigael's parents have such a wonderful book collection for a book-lover like myself. I read a book on organization tactics while I was there, and I learned several really clever things!
While we were there we were able to do some walking/easy hiking around Marseille, drive out into the countryside and see birds and villages. We went and got some really fun flavors of ice cream one day (olive oil, lavender-honey, thyme, rosemary-honey, etc... So delicious!), and we ate such wonderful, in-season produce: eggplant, apricots, tomatoes, nectarines, peaches, melon, etc. Abigael and her moth had planned a list of foods for us and every meal was a French-family experience!
On our own, we also walked to some of the sights to see in Marseille - which was actually a port for the Greeks 3,000-ish years ago! We went to the church on top of a rock outcropping with fabulous views of the city, we walked through the old town, and popped into shops and wandered through markets and practiced our little bit of French one day, and each night we'd come home to conversations about cultural values, faith, missions, and family.
It was such a blessing to be with Abigael and her parents for a week. We are so proud of how our visiting teenager has continued to grow and seek the Lord's guidance and see Him at work in her life. It was hard to say goodbye, because we never seem to know when we'll see these wonderful people we spend time with again, but it's special to know that when we do meet again, we'll have all kinds of new things to share and new ways to marvel at God's goodness it us!
- Dani
Those of you reading this that have been keeping up with our life over the past few years know that we had a teenager from France, Abigael, live with us for about 8 months just before we left for Thailand.
Abigael is the younger sister of Gabe's friend Edouard. They met when they were in Panama together on DTS in 2007.
Abigael's parents live in Marseille. Her father trained to be a pastor and has helped pastor the local church there for about 23 years. Her mom works to help cultures learn to understand each other and also as a mediator.
Abigael is interested in law and mediation, so she's one year into a very intensive 2-year program to prepare her for getting into one of France's to law programs.
We arrived just before the end of her term, so it wasn't ideal timing for her to have guests, but Abigael and her parents were great about giving us time when they could and letting us come and go when they needed to be doing their normal life.
Abigael lives in this awesome, ramshackle apartment in the middle of Marseille. We loved the apartment - it's got these awesome tucked away rooms, twisting hallways, clever little quirky storage spots, and extremely comfortable furniture. Like our apartment that Abigael came to live in, it hails from a different (and antique) era, but it is charming. And I personally loved the books! Abigael's parents have such a wonderful book collection for a book-lover like myself. I read a book on organization tactics while I was there, and I learned several really clever things!
While we were there we were able to do some walking/easy hiking around Marseille, drive out into the countryside and see birds and villages. We went and got some really fun flavors of ice cream one day (olive oil, lavender-honey, thyme, rosemary-honey, etc... So delicious!), and we ate such wonderful, in-season produce: eggplant, apricots, tomatoes, nectarines, peaches, melon, etc. Abigael and her moth had planned a list of foods for us and every meal was a French-family experience!
On our own, we also walked to some of the sights to see in Marseille - which was actually a port for the Greeks 3,000-ish years ago! We went to the church on top of a rock outcropping with fabulous views of the city, we walked through the old town, and popped into shops and wandered through markets and practiced our little bit of French one day, and each night we'd come home to conversations about cultural values, faith, missions, and family.
It was such a blessing to be with Abigael and her parents for a week. We are so proud of how our visiting teenager has continued to grow and seek the Lord's guidance and see Him at work in her life. It was hard to say goodbye, because we never seem to know when we'll see these wonderful people we spend time with again, but it's special to know that when we do meet again, we'll have all kinds of new things to share and new ways to marvel at God's goodness it us!
- Dani
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