Letters from France - 4th July 1947 - 1

Yesterday afternoon we bathed again - quite a nice pond but feet of oozy mud at the bottom. There were quite a lot of children bathing, as Thursday is a half-day - here anyway. After supper we went into the town to M. Durand's allotment and picked and ate masses of gooseberries and currents etc.

It is not true here that one only says "Merci" when one means "No thankyou". They say it all the time for "Thankyou". Close friends and family kiss on both cheeks every time they meet, and everyone else shakes hands every time, including M. Durand every time he comes in from work etc.

All the children play leisurely in the middle of road, and make no effort to move for bicycles. The cars all toot much louder and longer than in England.

On account of the shutters the windows open inwards. This only occurred to me last night as the reason for a certain amount of inconvenience I was conscious of!

These people drink "wine" with all their big meals - never plain water. But it is scarcely wine. The midday (12.15 approx) and evening meals are huge - I am full after about half the courses! The forks and spoons are placed are placed the other way up from the way we do it in laying the table.

I have just had the final confirmation of the success of the past year's work - the favourable result of my Intermediate exams.

The trains shake the houses like anything as they go past in the night - all the transcontinental ones - to Belgium and so on - they give a fresh thrill every time one goes past - so soon have I caught the travel bug.

M. Durand says these houses are in Moroccan style. Coming back last night several lads who were lounging about shouted at us, remarks that I partly understood!, and Lucette asked me if the young men are "bêtes" in England too, to which I of course replied yes! (Best translated as "stupid" or "foolish" I think.)

On the wireless yesterday I heard a French translation of an English hit-tune "The Gypsy". They had kept the original word "gypsy" however.

This morning we went to the market - partly open air, and partly under-cover. Very like an English market, of course, tho' some of the goods appeared of better quality than in those English ones of my acquaintance. That is difficult to judge, however. There are some very pleasant sunhats worn, of straw, and a sort of panama. A lot of the women wear rope soled slippers with canvas tops for knocking about. [Espadrilles] In white or colours, and one pair I've seen embroidered at 6/- approx. I've seen one or two pairs of raffia shoes - the latest hit in London at well over £5 in some cases - and here worn to slop about in and considered impracticable.

I wonder if you remember an old blue leather wallet, with a white thong threaded round the edge and a pattern worked on it, that belonged to Gandee. I saw them in the market this morning!

I am glad I brought tea, otherwise I should have had none, and I find that it is to me what smoking is to most. A bad thing that!

I collected my food tickets this morning from the Town Hall, on presenting my Passport. Unfortunately the bank here won't change my Travelers' Cheques - I must go to Creil 7 miles away.

There is quite a different atmosphere in the French radio programmes, the music especially, tho' I haven't been able to think of a way of describing it yet. They have the radio on nearly the whole time - I haven't managed to grasp much of the set up, except that things are advertized over it. (That may have been Luxembourg.)

Referring back to the meals, the majority of courses are eaten off thee same plate - cleaned between times with bread, and one eats as much as one can with the fork, in the right hand, only relinquishing it to cut up meat now and again.

Several people said to me before I came, something to the effect of "You lucky thing, a month's holiday in France", but I felt at the time - tho' it was hard to explain - what I now find to be true, that to begin with at any rate it is not so much a holiday as a visit. It is quite had work in fact, as I not only have to adjust myself to life in a different country, but in a different type of family also. And of course they get up horribly early (to my way of thinking). I have slept late at 8.15 am. (Well Judith, you used to get up at 6.45 - Yes, but they sup rather late at night too, and I can always sleep until 10 am quite happily.) Lucette is ready to go shopping by 9 or 9.15, having accomplished half the "ménage" [housework]. So at the moment it is not so much of a holiday as I could have wished for.

Englishmen are not the only ones to shout at foreigners as tho' deaf. Lucette does it a bit too.

Letters from France - 2nd July 1947 - 2

Well, Pont-ste-Maxence is a small industrial town with four factories, somewhat similar in atmosphere and appearance to a Cotswold town, or village (tho' a greater knowledge of my country would probably suggest to me a better likeness). The factory in which Lucette and her father work makes artificial leather. This is definitely a working class family, and I shall find it rather difficult to distinguish between the customs of the class and those of the country as a whole. Such things as the small breakfast are of course well known, and putting jam on bread and biscuits with a spoon and not a knife is national too I think. They don't even appear to use dessert spoons at all.

The railway runs just outside the house, which is a bit grim, but it is right on the edge of the town with lovely country all round. The house is very small - two up and two and scullery and lav down. No bathroom, but electric yes. All the houses in the village have shutters - which are left shut at night! Just enough air, but I should like a lot more! I was a bit shake to find that I must sleep in a double bed with Lucette - a thing which I abhor, tho' I daresay I shall get used to it. She speaks much less English than I expected, but we make out very well. She says I speak French very well!!

As I hadn't arrived till after ten, we soon went to bed when I had supped. This morning we went shopping, collected my cases with some hazard on a bicycle, and I unpacked.

The loaves of bread are like Vienna rolls in shape but about 2ft 6ins long. They seem to eat a good deal of salad - in oil and vinegar dressing. They have chickens too.

3rd July -

After dinner the three of us - Jaqueline, Lucette and myself - gossiped, so far as we were able, which was quite a lot, as J. speaks some English having stayed in England already, and I showed them all my photos. About 3.30 we went and bathed in a small lake or large pond. Most odd sensation, as the water was warm and cold in patches of about 3 or 4 yards. We walked back along the road in our costumes only - imagine doing so in Alfrick!!! Then I made them some tea, as they are not very accomplished in the art (being so, they wouldn't realize that I am not either!)

After tea I started this letter until Lucette and I set off just before seven to a "réunion" with the abbé and some other Catholic friends. We went on bicycles, and in spite of great concentration I nearly unseated another cyclist on a corner who growled "à droite” at me in a peeved manner. However, L . explained that "elle est une Anglaise" and we went on our way. I didn't understand much of the goings on, except that they gabbled a prayer so fast that every now and then one of them got completely left behind and had to stop and start again! We came back and had a huge supper - salad, then a slice of ham, then fried spaghetti, then bread and cheeze, then biscuits and jam. It is rather odd the way they don't combine the courses - we should eat salad with the ham, and perhaps the spaghetti too. We walked along the bank of the Oise after supper, and then went to bed.

I am finding it very easy to accommodate myself to the somewhat crude manners of these people!! Also I find the two girls very easy to get on with. I began to feel I should never learn to speak French, and then I realized that it was my first day, and I had already learnt a word and a phrase or two. I can understand a great deal more than I can speak, and read some of the magazines and papers almost like English. I am afraid I shall learn a good deal of slang here!

This morning I went out shopping with Jaqueline and contrived to keep to the right side of the road this time. She will be away for the next week so I am going to sleep in her bed, which will be a relief. She lives next door. It's very warm here - when I am sleeping on my own I shall open the shutters at night!

The shops in Pont have the name of their kind in prominence, not of the owners, e.g. Boulangerie, Patisserie. The Pont itself - a wooden one - is being rebuilt after bomb damage, so a sort of suspension foot bridge has been put up, and a larger one for "voitures".

Well, I have brought you up to the present moment, and will write again soon. Will you forward this to Mummy, as I don't want to write such a detailed letter in duplicate. My love to Jane, and of course she may read this if she is interested. (I am not sure about "can")

With very best love,
Judith

Letters from France - 2nd July 1947 - 1

chez Mme Durand
40 rue Pasteur

Pont-ste-Maxence

OISE

Dear Daddy,

Many thanks for your letter which was a very pleasant surprise. The journey was beautiful until I got to Paris - I will relate my activities in turn.

Pete [my aunt] took me to the Boat Train and there was no difficulty with customs, just a half-hearted questioning if one had anything to declare. Nobody did anything about my Ration Book. I could have had breakfast, but had already had some.

We reached Folkstone just before eleven, and after having our passports checked (where I made friends with another girl my own age travelling on her own for the first time) we went on board The Isle of Thanet. My knowledge of boats being confined to rowing boats, it seemed more like a luxury hotel than anything else. It was such a heavenly day that I disregarded all advice to get a seat on deck and stay put (so as not to be sick,) and wandered all over the boat, and then stood as far forrard as possible and let the wind blow away all the London cobwebs. It was simply glorious and I never had a qualm. The crossing took from 11.21 - 12.50 (i.e. 11.50 French time). There was some sort of reception for the boat, and God Save the King and the Marseillaise were played. It took an hour for us all to have our passports checked, declare our money and have our hand luggage inspected, and we left Boulogne in a very comfortable train at one o'clock. Sybil [Pete's friend] had made me some sandwiches which I consumed at once.

For the first hour I gazed enraptured from the window, noticing all the frequent level crossings (all operated by women it seems) with bright whitewashed houses. Everything about the railway seemed a great deal cleaner than in England. I could see that the French houses are different too, but in what way is difficult to say. It occurred to me to wonder if the cattle could distinguish between English and French etc. Unfortunately somnolence overcame me and for the next hour I slept.

All the stations that we passed through except Paris itself were clean and bright with trees and flowers. The majority of the French workmen seem to wear berets, and although the women seem to dress the same as ours, there is a definite distinction between the clothes worn by a good many of the French men and ours. Of course it is largely working class people that I have seen.

Well, we piled out at Paris at 4.21 pm and then the trouble began. I couldn't find Lucette's friend. I waited for some time, getting more and more bothered, and asking several people if they were Jaqueline, and then decided that I had better go and rescue my baggage from the "douane". Having paid a porter some colossal sum to transfer it from the customs (where they only went thro' one case, and I declared the food) to the cloakroom, I purchased a platform ticket and returned to the "quai" to wait for the next train from Pont, hoping Jaqueline would be on it.


While waiting I managed to buy myself a foul glass of coffee and a biscuit like wood. I had expected to feel as tho' I was in the Tower of Babel, but actually people's voices aren't so prominent even in a different language. Of course I was a dead loss with regard to tips, and I am sure I have handed out double what I need have done.

Well, the train from Pont arrived, and no girl. So I decided to make my own way to Pont, and with much help from the "chef du gare", at 7.30 I took a ticket, and got another porter to collect my luggage from the "consigne" and put it on the train for me. A local train, it rather resembled a tube train, and as the "fermeture automatique" of the doors didn't work, on crowded trains the men and boys sit on the floor with their feet dangling, inspite of the notice (more or less):

LES BEAUX JOURS SONT RETOURNĖS

ATTENTION AUX ACCIDENTS

Ne reste pas sur les marchepieds

I had to change onto a diezel at Creil, where I found that the sous-chef-du-gare spoke a little English. Various kind folk helped me in and out with my luggage, so I got thro' the day with only 2 porters. At Pont I left my "grand baggage" at the station for the night and with several enquiries in the growing dusk, peering at undecipherable numbers on the houses, I found my way to 40 rue Pasteur.

They (Lucette and her father, her mother is away) welcomed me with open arms, so to speak, and we discovered the mistake. My telegram had said I would arrive at 4.21, and they got it as 21.00 - that is 9 o'clock. So the poor girl waited for me till midnight and then gave up. I was to have stayed with her in Paris for the night and after looking about a bit come back this evening. However, I have met her now and she is very nice too.