A travel journal, part 4

One of the boys on the trip Really wanted a croque monsieur sandwich while he was in France. With the food challenges we had, it was difficult for him to find one. One of our last opportunities to get one was in the beautiful seaside city of Biarritz.

He finally found a restaurant that had croque monsieur on the menu — but it wasn't available that day!

The good new was that there was a McDonald's right next door to our hotel. It was a popular spot that evening. We kept them busy!

They may not have had a croque monsieur, but the had some amazing chocolate and a fantastic cheeseburger with pommes frites!

 

A travel journal, part 3

We next traveled to Bordeaux, but it was just an overnight stay. We got in late and left early. The highlight was the hotel, the Meininger Hotel Bordeaux Gare Saint-Jean, a funky hotel in a happening spot. My favorite feature was the square toilet. 

Our next stop was Dune de Pilat, the tallest sand dune in Europe. We had good weather that day, and the kids had great fun climbing and playing in the sand dunes.

The bus driver was a little less excited about the kids tracking sand into his workplace! He was very thorough in making sure we all had clean feet before getting back onto the bus.

Seriously, the toilets had square seats!
 

A travel journal, part 2

If you've traveled in Europe, you may have noticed that restaurants and stores either close down or have significantly reduced hours on Sunday. That's great — unless you want to eat while you're on the road.

Our itinerary had us eating at the restaurants or kiosks at Chenonceau, a famous castle/château in central France. There was one restaurant open, but it could only serve about eight people at a time. Our group was 40+ people.

Despite the variety of selections in the vending machine, we left hungry.

We were able to talk our tour guide into stopping for food at a gas station along our way. The Eni station isn't like your corner Chevron or Texaco with overwarmed hotdogs and nasty nachos. It's more like a refined Buc-ee's with a grill and restaurant.

It wasn't the fine dining we might have had at the château, but it was good enough for our group!

A variety of wonderful food in one of the cases at the gas station.

Another cheesy cartoon

For some reason I seem to have a lot of zombie cartoons set in France. I'm sure there's some deep explanation for why that is.
 

There's no place like the temple

One of the main purposes of our trip was to go through the Paris Temple. We were not disappointed.

The people there were so kind, helpful and friendly to us. They made us feel welcome — and wanted!

The temple uses different flowers as motifs throughout the building: hollyhocks, cornflowers, lilacs and lilies. The flowers are reflected in the decor, including the stained glass windows that seem to be everywhere!

The gardens and courtyard — which feature a statue of the Christus — are beautiful, peaceful and full of many of the same flowers featured in the temple. It is welcoming, and invites you to linger longer. It is harmonious with the temple and the surrounding environment.

Not far from the temple is the Palace of Versailles, with its Hall of Mirrors and amazing gardens that stretch as far as the eye can see. It truly is magnificent. The temple, on the other hand, has a beauty that is eternal...and it feels like coming home.

The primitive church

We ran into two wonderful sisters at the Paris Temple Visitors Center: Sis. Kleinman and Sis. Montalvo. They were excited to hear Mme B's missionary stories — stories that happened before either of them were born...making Mme B (in their eyes) an historical artifact!

If you have a few minutes, let's talk!

I was relieved to see that the Notre Dame Cathedral looked a lot better than I expected it to! Except for the missing stained glass windows, the outside looks strong. There is a lot of work going on around and about the cathedral — note the cranes in the photo — but it's difficult to see because there's a fence all around the perimeter.

The inside is a long way from usable, however. We saw a news update on the progress of the work, and there's a lot still to be done. The story was about church officials viewing the interior. They were dressed in their vestments and hard hats.

I think that it would be very tempting as a missionary to do some street contacting in the area and really cue in on the message of the Restoration. But that's just me. 

It's worth a try

To be honest, most people were very patient with — and amused by — my French.*

On the other hand, Mme B (who served as a missionary in Paris, taught French at the MTC, and currently teaches at the high school level) has an accent that usually passes for Parisian. People wondered where we were from when she spoke, but when I opened my mouth, they knew I was American.

*There was an incident at the supermarket, but we'll get to that later!

Paris

Regular readers know that Paris is a place near and dear to us. Every two years we take a group of students to Europe, and each trip ends with a magical night in Paris. The highlight is an evening cruise on the Seine and a nighttime visit to the Eiffel Tower.

Along with many others, our hearts were broken upon hearing news of the attacks. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the people of Paris, the people of France.

The yellow tie rides again!

The Tour de France just came to an end. Missionaries get a different type of tour.

For those nit-pickers, Roen is more in the middleish of the France Paris mission, so really it's only about half a tour, but you get the idea...

It's a worldwide church, right?

Half of this is true for us.

Does anybody really know what time it is?

The kids weren't the only ones who wanted cartoons drawn about their experiences — some of the teachers did, too. This is Mr. Haws' experience of enforcing curfew.

One more memory to share

This one somehow didn't make it in with the rest of the Europe trip cartoons.

I was amazed at how quickly the kids were able to get stuff posted on social media — even in places without WiFi. It was also amazing to see how many historic and significant sites you could almost see in the backgrounds of the selfies!

Trip Scrapbook No. 6

It's always fun to see the students — and chaperones — experience a new culture.

Especially the food.

Coming back home, we had just a little glitch in Customs.

All in all it was a great trip, with a lot of amazing experiences. But as they say, there's no place like home!

Trip Scrapbook No. 1

So we just got back from two weeks in Europe. Not as exotic as it sounds, because we were tour leaders for three dozen high school kids on a trip encompassing several countries. It was an eventful trip to say the least.

Our itinerary took us to Italy, Austria, Germany, Switzerland and France. We saw a lot of landmarks, historical sites, and interesting places. The next few days will feature cartoons based on our trip — some inspired by and some drawn from real life experiences.

So, no, we didn't actually have anyone fall into the canals in Venice, but some of the selfie taking got a little out of hand.

Food was an adventure. In every city the kids wanted to try as much of the local food as they could. So why not roll it up into one dish?

Enjoy the trip with us. Salud!

Retiring, part 2

After graduating from West Point, he served in the Army in Public Affairs. He has two stories that he likes to share:

His peers double dog dared him to put an exploding cigar on his colonel's desk. Succumbing to peer pressure, he did. Later that day, there was an explosion heard in the colonel's office -- two explosions, actually. One from the cigar, and one from the colonel. Luckily, the colonel had a good sense of humor!

While stationed in Germany, he and his buddy thought it would be cool to travel around Europe. As war and history buffs, they thought it would be cool to travel to Paris and see the Bastille. They got to where their map of Paris said it should be...but there was no Bastille! Finally he gathered the courage to ask a gendarme where they could find it. "It was here," replied the gendarme. "Before the storming of the Bastille, in which it was destroyed!" Oops! They'd forgotten that part of the story!

Monday Sketchbook: International edition

I really liked this idea, but as I was sketching it out, I realized that for it to really be effective, it would have to be a little more graphic than my censors would allow.

Salud!

Lost in translation

Missionaries run into all kinds of people. Sometimes it's hard to tell if they're interested in the message, or interested in something else.

Don't be Mad

So one of Mme. B's students was complaining the other day that she's NEVER been in ANY of the French cartoons. Could I PLEASE draw one of her...and Justin Bieber. I kinda drew a line at including the Biebs (although he made an appearance one time, a long, long time ago).

So the background behind this is that over the winter break, the French Club went to see Les Miserables. This particular young lady didn't go, however, in part because of the reason I reference in the cartoon. And as the Academy released the Oscar nominations this past week, it seemed appropriate to run a movie-themed cartoon as well.

2012 Countdown: Honorable Mentions

I usually call these my runners up, but this year I thought "Honorable Mentions" might be more accurate as these are some that have special significance to me.

No. 5 - One of the oldest ladies in our ward, Marjorie, passed away in May. She was well into her 90s, yet she always told the bishop that she was willing to do whatever was needed. She was awesome. I ran this cartoon on the day of her funeral, and it got way more hits than I anticipated.

No. 4 - I have a couple of other cartoon blogs that I draw. This one is from Good Heavens, which is set in the afterlife, and honors author and illustrator Maurice Sendak, who also passed away in May.

No. 3 - The other strip, Zarahemla Times, went through a transformation this year, changing from a "daily" size to a "Sunday" size, and going from black and white to color. This is one of the first ones that ran after the change.

No. 2 - Call me a geek, but I really like Pioneer Day. I'm sure that it is in part due to my heritage -- my ancestors helped establish a lot of the early Mormon Pioneer settlements, both in Utah and in Canada. This is a Pioneer-themed cartoon that probably won't run anyplace else, but it's one that I really like!

No. 1 - As faithful readers may know, we took a group of high school French students to Europe this spring -- most of whom were lovely young ladies. This particular cartoon is based on an experience one of our girls had during a nighttime cruise on the Seine in Paris.

Tomorrow: Part 1 of the 2012 Top Ten!