I will trust you! (Wow!)

Something very unusual happened today. I want to write about it, first for you guys, and then for myself. This is something I must never forget!!

Yesterday we made an appointment for an oil change. I was blown away by the amount they wanted. . . 70 euros, and with the dollar being worth only 63/100’s of a euro these days, it was especially hard for me to swallow! An oil change for about $105-110! After talking with the service personnel a little, it became clearer that in addition to changing the oil (about 40 euros. . . $60), they would also change the filter (well of course!) and do some “checks” on tires, other fluids and electrical system. It still seemed awfully steep to me! I stopped at a gas station (not a garage) and found out that a can of 10W40 oil costs 10 euros! That’s about $15 for what we’d pay about $5 for in the US. (Of course, by now a can of oil might be $7 or even higher in the US!)

But we needed to change the oil, because we’ve put nearly 20,000 kilometers on the car since buying it last August, and never yet changed the oil. And tomorrow we’re going to Calais, on the French northwest coast, then to Dover England, to get our passports stamped so that we’ll be legal on the continent for another 3 months. Stacy will join us and come with us to Seneffe, where we are in Belgium and then take a high speed train back to London, where she will arrive after a 2 hour trip. (Wow, again.)

All of this is introduction to the story.

We were supposed to arrive at “Auto 5,” kind of like Pet Boys, at 9:15 a.m. Our appointment was for 9:30, and they wrote on the work order, “Promised for 10 a.m.” We drove up to the garage and people were standing around outside! The sign said “Open at 8:30 a.m.” but it wasn’t, and the people standing around were employees! But the shift manager, with the key, had not arrived! Finally about 9:40 or 9:45 the “general manager” arrived and said we’d be served first. Alice had a piano lesson to give on the other side of town. I told the manager about that, and asked if I could come back at 10:15. OK, they said. So I drove Alice to her lesson and came back at 10:05. They didn’t get started until 10:15. None of this sounds worthy of remembering. You can imagine that I was not happy about things.

Then I realized that Alice had all the money in her purse. I seldom carry much money. I have a US Visa card. We have a bank card for our French bank, but Alice had that too. I told the manager I had the Visa, but that it might not work. I told him I would have to take the car after the oil was changed, go get Alice and the money, and come back and pay him.

Now the surprise.

He told me he would trust me to do that.

Wow!

I waited for the work to be done. He came over to me after a while and apologized for not having the shop open (it was his mid-level manager who goofed). I said, “things worked out, and I especially appreciate your willingness to let me take the car and go get the money to pay for the work.”

Afterwards I reflected on why this happened. We certainly sense less of a “we’ll trust you” attitude in Europe in general, and in Belgium in particular. Maybe the guy felt guilty. Maybe, and I really do think this is the real reason, maybe it was because I have white hair (am an older person), and was dressed neatly, and was shaved and had a neat (conservative) haircut. In other words, I really do believe appearance had a lot to do with it. And that’s what I want to remember. Oh yes, maybe the fact that I speak French fluently, but I really do think that was less of a factor.

Anyway, that’s the “aventure du jour.” (Note: aventure, not adventure.)

I still feel like things are not rolling nearly as well as they did in Strasbourg. In Strasbourg, people going on vacation was not such a problem as it is here. Yesterday I called a guy and asked if we could come, and he said, “Yeah, after Sept. 15.” That’s 6 weeks away!!!

Alice seems to be picking up some more piano students. I think she says she has six now, but most of them are at a pretty basic level, and we have to go to their house. Most of them are active members, some are inactives, and one is a non-member (and she’s going on vacation for 3 weeks! Dang it!).

Music can certainly help! I believe that almost anywhere outside the US, there is a crying need for more music in church! And hopefully we can use it to get more people either re-activated or interested in investigating.

The rest of this message is especially for Marc and Gloria Woolley, since Marc mentioned in a recent email to us that he knows the areas where we are: Nivelles and Charleroi. Yesterday, in Nivelles, we visited with the Robaeys family: Marie-France and her mother. They do not remember you, Marc, but have seen so many, many, many missionaries, that that is not surprising. But they told us about people who were among the first members in Nivelles: The Delauws (André and Anne), and their sons John and Johnathan (yep!) and the former stake president, Michel SAUTIER and his wife Franca. They mentioned other names too, but I didn’t recognize them. Marie-France’s sister Christiane is married to Christian NICOLAS, and they have 2 sons, Kevin and Jason, who went with 12 other kids from the Brussels Stake to Utah for 3 weeks, including EFY, etc. etc. I wish I had been able to hook you up with them, but we were not even able to get our daughter Nicky and her husband Benjamin to spend time with the son of the family with whom we are living. I guess their schedule was very full.

They mentioned that the VanNuvel brothers are relative newcomers to Nivelle. Probably the same for Jorge VARELA, who lives in Waterloo.

One other family in Nivelles you might recognize is Brogniet, owner of a jewelry store, and presumably the first family baptized in Nivelles, maybe in the late 60’s. He was the first person baptized here, and was the branch president, about 43 or so years ago, but is now inactive.

In Charleroi, we are closest to members of the bishopric in Charleroi First, located rue de la Tombe, south side of Charleroi, as you know. The bishop is Philippe WERY, a “Santa-Claus” type of guy : big, big-hearted, and big testimony! He says he’s been a member for 19 years, and this is his second stint as bishop. He was released as bishop about 10 years ago, I guess. His father & mother are members too. I am a little surprised by this, because maybe his parents joined shortly after or before the time he did, but it’s not frequent for "grandparents" to join after their adult kids join. The bishop has white hair like his mother but his father has semi-black hair, and I almost did a double take when he said he was the bishop’s father. Most interesting of all, is that he reminds me of Keith Johnson (same size, same face, but speaks French instead of English, and has a little more hair).

The Charleroi ward is mostly older members. . . many of them probably baptized in the 60’s. There are few youth, and when youth do join, they leave because of the depressed economics of Charleroi (old coal mining and smelting town. . . now 30% unemployment). Some older members are Ben COMELLI (a sealer in Holland temple), Xavier ROUSSELOT (patriarch), Claude YYPERSIER (who takes a group of Francophones to Church sites in the US every other year), les BULTIELLE, and a family we really like, Claude and Hediwege HAVRENNE. Sis. Havrenne seems to me like a Gen. Authority’s wife! Truly a wonderful person. They travel nearly 40 kilometers every Sunday from their very lovely home located southwest of Charleroi (right on the French border). Last Sunday she gave lessons in both R.S. and Sun. School! (Too many people on vacation!) They invited us, 2 elders and a senior couple from Brussels to dinner at their place 2 weeks ago. Exquis! (That’s “exquisite!”) They’ve done a temple mission at Frankfurt, and hope to do another one there soon, but they’ve heard that temple may soon close for renovation (surprises me). They “pressured us” to go to Frankfurt too, because there are few French speakers there, and that temple services much of northern France.

We've also met Robert LEONARD and several of his descendants. Also had contact with the daughter of Fr. DELOGNE, who was patriarch during the 80's. She now lives in Michigan. We helped her by getting together a lot of genealogy work he had collected. Then we mailed it to her.

Sorry for stopping so abruptly. Gotta get ready for this trip to England. I wrote all the proceeding while Alice was teaching 3 piano lessons.


luv,
Gerry and Alice (or otherwise appropriate parental titles).