Category: Daily life

An interesting meeting in the Mairie (town/village hall)

This morning, the residents of our estate and the surrounding streets had been invited to a public meeting in the village hall to discuss a problem of speeding on the main road. Several people had complained about the level of traffic and the speed of cars on the road just outside the estate. I went along with about 30 people from the neighbourhood to meet with the mayor and some of the other councilors. It was a first experience for me, and I really enjoyed it.

The mayor was a master at leading a meeting where everybody wanted to talk at the same time. He was quite down to earth, saying that speeding was a problem on many other roads. He also reminded us that often, residents who ask for improvement are the first to complain after the works have been done. But he is willing to do something to help. I also noticed he didn’t promise anything he couldn’t later achieve, which is fairly good for a politician.

The discussion was fun. I imagine you always find the same kind of people in this type of meetings. One was a lady who was clearly out of context and wanted to complain about something else in another part of the village. You had the specialist, a man who sounded like he knew all the laws and regulations concerning road works. I can imagine that he is retired and has time to spare to research these things. There was also the man who got worked up because he is a lorry driver and he is fed up with all the road improvements that have recently been made and make it difficult for a lorry to go through or turn.

But we all agreed in there were a number of problems on this road. amazingly, nobody knows what the speed limit is on that stretch of road. Not even the police. We agreed to have some speed limit signs put in place. It will now be 50 km/hr (30 miles/hour). We also agree that the council need to make some improvement on that part of the road where there is no pavement. They will mark a space for pedestrians so that the road seems slightly narrower and people hopefully slow down. None of these works will cost lot of money, but hopefully it will help.

If you had told me 10-15 years ago that I would one day sit in a town hall for such a public meeting, I would have laughed. But I enjoyed that experience, and it was an opportunity to meet some of the people living on our street.

The classroom

Last Friday, Jean-Baptiste’s teacher invited the parents of the class to a meeting. She was going to explain to us how she works and what the children will be doing this year. It was interesting to be back in a French classroom.

When you come in the room, there are several rows of desks, all facing the teacher. Each child has his/her own desk, with space under the table to put exercise books. And they are also facing a… blackboard. Yes, they still use proper blackboards, with chalk. There is no “interactive board”, no fancy technology around, there is not even a computer in the classroom. In France, teachers teach. I know that sounds silly to say, but that’s not obvious in some countries like the UK where computers have invaded the classrooms.

The teaching is fairly traditional. Children learn things by heart, they have writing exercises, reading exercises, maths problems to solve… They don’t decide what they want to learn, the teacher has a program to follow.

It was refreshing to visit the classroom and hear about the work they are going to do this year. Some things have changed, but overall, it seems very similar to the way I was taught.

What would you do if your email account got hacked into?

On Monday, I was contacted by one of our church members whose gmail account had been hacked into. Whoever had hacked into her account had changed the password, set up two-step security and changed the backup email address as well as the backup phone number. Then, that hacker had sent an email to all her contacts asking for money. The sister was in distress and didn’t know what to do.

She’d already followed the steps suggested by Google to try to recover her account. There wasn’t much I could do. I helped her set up a new email and explained that it was unlikely that she would recover her old mail box and contacts. But who knows? Google might do something. In the meantime, it was urgent to change all her passwords on the sites where she used the same one. I was hoping the hacker hadn’t already done that for her. As I left, she noticed that it was like having someone breaking into your home. The hacker had access to all her emails and part of her personal life. It was distressing, hurtful.

We often dismiss the possibility of our accounts being hacked into until it happens to us or someone we know. What would you do if your email account got hacked into? You probably store many passwords in your archive. A lot of personal information is in it. The hacker could probably make a lot of damage (and possibly profit), before you even notice it.

On my part, I am reviewing my online security steps. I am setting up two-step identification wherever I can as soon as possible. It’s a pain, but I am sure it is worth it. I will also review the sites where I’ve used the same password and change these. The following article should get you started: How secure are you online: the checklist — Lifehacker. have you thought of the possibility of your email account being hacked into? Think about it. I am sure you are keeping passwords, confidential prayer letters, details from christian friends working in closed countries…. What would happen if someone hacked into your email account?

 

I love working in the library

The children are at home and Wednesdays and it can be hard to get anything done. So I sometimes go the the library for a couple of hours to do some studying. I like working in the library. It is usually fairly quiet. There’s a possibility to get connected via wifi, but I don’t ask for a password so that i don’t get tempted. I often get more done in two hours than in 4 or 5 hours at home.

Wednesdays are for music

There’s no school on Wednesday but that does not mean we’re idle at home. Wednesdays will be music school day. In the morning, Maxime has a half an hour introduction to music with other children his age. When I first inquired a few weeks ago, there was no space left, but they took my name in case someone didn’t turn up. They rang me back a few days later to let me know a space was now available for him. Maxime was thrilled at the idea.

Jean-Baptiste will have an hour choir practice in the afternoon. Three of his classmates are in the same group. I’ll go to the library to get some work done and he’ll join me there when he’s finished. His guitar practice will be on Thursday night.

La rentrée

The children went back to school a week ago after two months holidays. Both jean-Baptist and Maxime were happy to go back and have a new teacher. Football practice has also started for Jean-Baptiste. He will also take guitar lessons in the music school, as well as take part in the choir. Maxime is too young to take up an instrument but will also be at the music school for some introduction to music, 1/2 and hour a week. He was on the waiting list and we had a phone call to say that someone had stepped down.

“La rentrée” is always a big thing in France. That’s because education is a big thing for French people. Over a month before children go back to school, supermarkets stock up on school supplies. Then, in the weeks leading up to the first day of school, the medias kick in and talk about the cost of “la rentrée” for families. They cover various subjects, including things like how school bags are getting heavier each year…

On the first day, there were lot of parents around. It was a bit hectic as no one knew where they were supposed to go. Many parents had taken the day off for the occasion, or were going to work slightly later. That was a week ago, and we’re now back into the routine.