Retirement

I wanted so much this last project demo of mine to be successful.
I knew I needed luck because the project was a demo only and not a finished product and in matter of image processing which it was about, the fine-tuning of algorithms with different lightening conditions is a long process I did not have time to finish.
It worked very well, “thanks God”. Laurent, Bernard and Phillippe were well impressed and appreciated the technical features of this C# project.

Friday September  30 was my last day in office.
The management had asked me if I wanted a farewell cocktail, I said yes (because this was the best way to say good-by to many people I’ve known there) and they arranged everything for me. Including two gifts from the company which I chose by myself: a home cinema Hi fi amplifier by Yamaha and a Sony camera.
Some sixty people came to the cocktail in the cafeteria
Bernard and Laurent spoke about my professional career of which 27 years were with this company.
I expressed my gratitude to the company and greeted the colleagues, thanked them for their sympathy and support in difficulties and for their farewell, this particular moment when the presence becomes a souvenir. I thanked them for the money they collected for a gift for me and announced I decided to give the amount to a cancer research programme (Institut Curie).
After the speech and the applause, there was a glass of champagne and some light snacks (to me, not sufficiently vegan though).
There was also some music I brought with me: video recordings of mazurkas of Chopin played by Fei-Fei Dong and by Ingolf Wunder during the 2010 Warsaw piano competition. Some people including Jean-Pierre, Zaiqun and her boyfriend Gabriel asked me more details about Chopin competition.
Many people came and talked to me and wished me happy retirement.
And that was it, simple as I had wished and yet a high moment, not only to me, I suppose.
Thank you, Yvette for your help in arranging this event.

Invitation 2011 Sept, 30

with Claude, 1985

with J-P, Marina and G, 1985

with Samira and Henri-Martial, 2010

Disruption

As I was leaving Poland in October 1972, I knew it was for a long “trip”.
I think my family also knew although, to avoid pain we had never discussed it.
Communist Poland of those days was offering dull prospects for young people and the dissatisfaction was widespread. That was some years after March students’ manifestations and invasion of Dubcek’s Czechoslovakia in 1968 and many years before KOR-Solidarnosc movement and John-Paul II.
I had graduated from the Warsaw Polytechnics two years earlier and had been working for a state owned company in Warsaw while still living with my parents.
In Paris, I stayed with family’s friends who offered me shelter.
I started looking for a job but as soon as a company was willing to employ me, I crashed against the immigration laws and bureaucracy.
After four months of vain efforts, of many hours spent in police immigration lines and interviews it became clear that France was not willing to accept me.
Disappointed, despite support from friends, I was about to decide for a different destination, Australia or Canada when unexpectedly one employer, using his personal relations, obtained a work permit for me. Then I acted unfair and untrue with him and used the work permit for a job which suited me better, with a different company. I apologize to you, friend.
I could envisage life in France now and was planning to marry the daughter of my friends whom I had known for some years and who was a support to me during tough months.
Few months after I started my job, a routine health scan showed that I had tuberculosis and I was sent to the Alps to the Sancellemoz cure house.
The illness is so discouraging when you are young and need all your energy to build your life. Some of the antibiotics I was treated with were really pulling me down to an abyss.
I wanted to go home.
In those days, a visit of friends was a comfort I remembered long after.

Some months later I was cured and was able to resume my job.
We married one year later and rented an apartment at Montmartre.
It was a very happy September 1977 day when our daughter was born. Our son was born ten years later.

CHEN

Chen left our company end of January, a year ago.

The management insisted on economic conditions and despite my efforts it was impossible to arrange a new work contract for her.

I felt sad to see her go away although I knew, for her professional and personal development it was better to find another job.

I liked her curiosity and willingness to learn when she arrived for her internship two years earlier and during her stay with us she fulfilled the job expectations.

She opened my mind to the Chinese culture and speaking with her, I learned a lot about it. We visited together the Guimet Asian museum in Paris. It was interesting to see it with her who is familiar with this culture. The exhibits I liked most were yet not Han but Tibetan Buddhist deities expressive of passions and Korean ancient paintings and logically structured Taoist manuscripts.

She used to be very fond of traveling and she went on several trips in Europe during those two years she spent with us. I liked her Norway landscape photographs and those from her last Christmas trip to Laponia.

I once invited her to our place and she showed us very nice pictures from Budapest. It was a pain to me to see that my family members did not try to be more open to her and didn't show much interest to her Chinese background.

Like many foreigners she suffered injustice from immigration laws in France and from egoism of many people.

She suffered pain early in life, loosing her mum at age of eleven and more recently being ill.

All the difficulties she had experienced have not affected her courage and her determination to build her life her own way, a true Chinese phoenix, Fenghuang.

After her internship with us she graduated from the French school and I must say Chen, on the ceremony day you looked beautiful, in your qipao.

I learned from your friend, another Chinese girl who is working in our company, that you found a job in Luxembourg and moved there.

Today, like everyday, I wish you all the best from life, Chen and happiness you look to.

Graduate

Eating Rice

with Fabien

with Fidel

Solving a Problem

Problem Solved

Snow

Today again we had an unusual snowfall in Paris.
It amounted to some 10 cm over last night and car traffic on sloppy and slippy streets is difficult today.
Luckily it's Sunday so we do not need to move much away from home.
Alicia came by metro with her two babies.
Theo is enjoying the first winter he can be aware of.

 First snowman

 Interior games

Christmas

What ideas do you associate with Christmas?

By judging from the shops traffic before Christmas, to many people it is gifts to the loved ones and being together in family that count most.

As I experienced it yesterday, this prevails also for my own family, as we have invited my wife’s 89 years old mother and my daughter with her companion and with their one year old son.

My grandson Théo received many toys yesterday. It’s true that he was looking joyful while discovering and trying to open them. But the toys were so many, that he was not able to really play with any single one.

I do not think this abundance will help with his development. Luckily, many toys will remain in our home and will be proposed to him here later, when he comes to our place.

Being together also means a special meal for the occasion.

My wife proposed for this occasion shrimps, a pie topped with asparagus sprouts, ostrich meat with leeks and frozen chocolate cake with green tea.

As I am vegan, I prepared my own menu: tomatoes with alfalfa sprouts and black olives, yellow and green lentils, buckwheat grains and leeks which we all shared, and finally hot cooked apple with cocoa powder on it (very nice aroma).

I regret animal lives sacrifice and the fact that I have little impact on my family food options.

Apart of being together in family, on previous night I also assisted to the Nativity service in St. Gervais church in Paris.

It was a full, more than two hours long celebration with relevant texts being read, different processions, prayers, beautiful organ accompaniment and especially, fervent monks and nuns choir.

We had some snow in Paris the week before Christmas, but it was gone since and the Christmas day was sunny though short.

St Gervais

In a Park

Farewell to Wanda

It was a short visit to Warsaw for the burial of my mother.
Hugo wanted absolutely to come along, to honor the memory of his Granma.
We took the Swiss plane to Warsaw via Zurich and stayed in Warsaw at my brother’s place.
Monday was completely busy with the ceremony and with the family gathering.
Among those who accompanied her was also Jurek, the physiotherapist who helped her a lot, both physically and spirit-wise in the last period of her life. He too was afflicted by her passing away.

It was a sort of relief when it was all finished.
The next day we did some basic shopping (I usually buy in Poland some « organic » food which is better than in France). Later, we walked in the Old City, a relaxing walk in a sunny day.
We had an early lunch with my brother’s family in the Korkociag restaurant (their vegetarian food is not really the best in class) and took the plane back to Paris.

Warsaw trip pictures:

Farewell to Wanda

Saturday, Nov. 21

The next day after I my mother decease was a Saturday.

I felt I needed to spend some time in a spiritual place.

I went to the Chapel of the Miraculous Medal in Paris because I’ve read about this place but have never been there.

From the Luxemburg metro station I walked across the Luxemburg Park by the senate palace up to the Rue d’Assas street and then to the Sevres Babylone metro station. From there, the du Bac Street is only a short distance walk, yet not easy to find because so tightly squeezed by the Bon Marché stores.

As you enter the Chapel yard, you realize that this is a place of exception. The shop on the right hand sells the medals and other religious items. Cards for personal prayer, printed in different languages are presented on the side wall. You can pick one, fill it and deposit in a special box in the chapel.

The chapel has a relatively modern and timeless interior with benches on the ground floor and in mezzanines which are closed by windows. http://www.chapellenotredamedelamedaillemiraculeuse.com/EN/b3_Guided_tour.asp#

As I entered, an office in Spanish was under way. The place was well filled with assistance but it was still possible to find a sitting place. I realized that many people here were carrying and spontaneously offering the emotions they were experiencing. Like that lady with antibacterial mask on her face, exposing to the public a cross and prayer beads which she hold in her hand.

What appears immediately is the bright white and blue altar devoted to the Saint Virgin (usually, the main décor is the cross). With the words “Come and pray at this table and the grace will be given to all”. At the end of the Spanish office, the assistance sang beautifully Salve Regina, those soothing words in Latin “…after our exile, wish to turn your eyes on us and recommend us to your Son…”

Soon after the Spanish office, a group of scouts arrived and was given place in front of the chapel and an office in French followed. I heard: “…who is my mother my brother and my sister? These who listen to my words are my mother, my brother and my sister…” and then, later: “…O Lord, remember our brothers who passed away and wait resuscitation. Receive them in your kingdom…”

To me that was all I needed, I prayed for my mother’s soul, for my family who need it and I prayed also for Chen, who strives for living in France and for Yuin Yin who fought cancer, who is so generous and of whom I knew from her internet blog: http://yuinyin.com/

I was thinking about the French writer Zola who, while on visit to Lourdes saw many believers and the commerce associated with the faith but had had no experience of God.

As I was leaving the chapel, a young Rome woman asked me for money and as soon as I gave her a food ticket (I get them from the employer), another woman came to me and asked me to buy something for her in the nearby store that bridges the du Bac street. She took some pampers for her baby, which I paid almost 40 Euros. I noticed that she was well dressed and didn’t look miserable. Further on my way to the Boulevard Saint Germain, I saw many more beggars in bad need but didn’t help them.

Back home, I sent on Internet a blog devoted to my mother. Like a Tibetan prayer flag…