Hey everybody.
During theses holidays I went to Taizé, in France... There, thousands of young people meet all the time, especially during the summer holidays.
It was the fourteenth time that I was going there for one week. I used to come with my parents every year, now I go by my own.
The first day, when I arrived, they made a mistake : they put me in a girl bedrooms. So I was with 3 German girls and two French girls. I also met some french guys the first day.
Everyday, there was a prier at 8.30 am, then we had breakfast. After that, at 10 a.m, I worked till midday. With a little group we had to raise some big tents which are used in summer, when there are a lot of people.
After that, at 12.30, we had a prier again till 1 p.m. Then we had lunch. At 3.15, there was a biblic introduction followed by a sharing in small groups. But as I was "contact person" of my group, I had to be there at 2.45. At 5.00, we had some tea and then a large free time before getting dinner at 7.00 pm. After the meal, at 8.30, there was the evening prier. We had to "go to bed" at 11.00 p.m even if we never slept before 00.30 a.m.
In my group of sharing, there was 2 French girls and 4 Portuguese girls. We had quite a good talk even if the French girls weren't able to speak English, so I had to translate all the time for them...
Otherwise, I was mainly with a group of French people who live near Douai and Cambrai, in the North of France. I got on very well with them. Each time that I was crossing the group, they said " The Belgian one !!!" in a very dynamic way ( they were really shouting that ). Once, in the queue to get the meal they even carried me above all the people and they song a song for me. It was fantastic !!!
Oh, and something amazing now... I met a French girl who speaks English really very well, much better than I do. It was the first time that I had heard a French person who really could speak English without the huge accent French people have.
I hope that I'll keep in touch with that girl and I'm looking forward to seeing her again. She is very interesting and I wrote and spoke a lot with her. She's amazing. She's able to speak Russian, English, Spanish and French ( of course =p ). It was very funny to write her in English when she was just beside me.
Thursday we had a time of silence that we spent alone. That made me good. I think that we never take the time to focus on oneself in our daily life so it was a nice opportunity to do it.
Oh yeah, I remember something else. In the trip to go to Taizé, I spoke with a Lebanese boy who was very nice and on the way back I spoke with a Dutchman. We spoke in English. It would have been impossible to make this kind of talk in Dutch because my level isn't high enough. We spoke about all kind of things like economy, politic and so on...
I'm going to go back in Taizé next summer, maybe during a month. I will probably try to make one week in silence. I think it will be very hard because I love meeting people but that kind of experience can be very useful...
I certainly forgot some things to tell about this week but anyway, I'll add later if I need...
Cya
Adrien, The Belgian one =p