Penultimate day

The last full day of our trip.... Just as the beginning of the trip came up on me unexpectedly, so has the end. It feels like the trip is just starting, and now it is time to leave.

Today we had a lot of wrap up work to do... We did a bunch of laundry and gave Chloé's apartment a thorough cleaning, and we also had to pack up all our stuff and gifts. For our last Parisien lunch we had... quiche from the bakery. A bit anticlimatic, unfortunately. So was supper-- our old boeuf bourgignon, with an extra 1/3 of a bottle of rosé.... The sauce was pretty powerful!

We got finished with all our errands just as it was time to leave for the meeting. It was a good meeting, a couple of double-ups on the parts, so it seems like there is some extra work shared all around due to the "vacances". I got a chance to chat with Georges Temeng a bit more, which was cool. He has had some really interesting experiences, and it was too bad that I didn't have more time to spend with him. Would have been great to take him and his wife out for dinner and hear some of his stories from Senegal and Sierra Leone.

It was Aléxia's last meeting, so there was a lot of buzz afterwards. Before the meeting, a sister (Ruth Tandier) came up to me and Joel and said that she wanted to take us out afterwards, so after we finally finished saying goodbye to everyone we hopped in her car and left. I was kind of in a bit of a down mood, cause I would have liked to have spent our last night with the Thomas' or others, but I figured we ought to make the most of it. Ruth had brought along her flatmate, Sandrine, and another sister from the congregation, Aline. Aline actually was in Toronto some years ago and knows Glen.

As we were driving along, Ruth lets us know that she is taking us for drinks to the Ritz Carlton (!). That was pretty cool... Joel and I both had cognacs, super smooth, tasty and sweet. Smelled like maple syrup. It turned out that it was Rémy Martin VSOP! But I'm pretty sure that what they export to Canada is different than what you get in France. There's absolutely no comparison between what had tonight and what you get in Toronto.

Anyways, the whole Ritz experience was pretty neat. Ruth was making romantic advances on Joel and Joel kept encouraging her. A very interesting way to end the trip, to say the least.

So, tomorrow is the real last day. It's been a great trip, and I am sad to leave. Paris definitely has a permanent place in my heart.... And I've met a ton of cool brothers and sisters that I would love to come back and see again, but probably never will, unfortunately. But, this is the right way to end a trip... Better to end the trip 3 days to early than 1 day too late.

Well, I hope I'm wrong and I get to come back sometime, hopefully soon. Now that I've gotten all the obligatory tourist stuff out of the way, I can come back and see the real Paris. There are so many restaurants to be tried, patisseries to visit... I'd love to do some service in French, go to a French meeting. I feel so torn at the end of this trip! I know I have to go home, and that there is a lot of work to be done... But I'd love to do some more exploring and get to know some of these new friends better.

But, life marches on... So tomorrow shall come, and in less than 18 hours I will be at home!