Au Pair Picnic 2011

Started off the day with Hillsong this morning.  For those of you that don't know, Hillsong is a network of contemporary churches, the main church based out of Sydney, Australia.  They are based all over the world, Kiev, Cape Town, London, Paris, New York City, Moscow, etc.  The senior pastors reside in Sydney and they were scheduled to come to Paris for a visit today.  Everyone was excited they were coming and the theater was packed.  After a great 45 worship through song, not even 5 minutes into Brian's sermon the lights go out and the fire alarm goes off!  Most people kept their seats, but a few left, and it wasn't until 15 or 20 minutes later we were able to resume the service.  I'm glad to say that they will be returning again next week in lieu of today!  It's so cool to be a part of such a global network of people!  

Today was the big annual au pair picnic.  We were anticipating about 150 girls.  Omphile and I walked together over to the Champ de Mars after church and waited for the rest of the girls to arrive.  Shortly after we found a good bench, it started to drizzle.  Figures.  I was waiting on Laura to arrive and wanted to be sure she found us so we stayed put.  Laura is the new au pair at Ashleigh's family.  Ashleigh and Laura studied together at NC State and became really good friends over the course of their time together.  As Ashleigh's family was searching high and low for an au pair to come close to the time and energy she had put in, her friend Laura was wondering what to do with her life....ta da! Instant fix!  Laura had something to do with her life and her family had an awesome new au pair with a personal reference!  

I don't mean to make Ashleigh jealous on this post, but fearing that it will anyway, we spent a great afternoon getting to know each other!  Getting to know everyone!  There were only about 50 girls that braved the rain...but that's 50 more than I knew this morning!  We all gathered under the peace pavilion that sits at the far end of the Eiffel Tower.  This is what our day started off as:

It was strange all standing around in circles cramped under a little bit of cover and felt kind of like a round of recruitment at Ole Miss sorority rush, but the weather eventually cleared up and we finished the day off actually on the grass!

Met lots of girls from England and the States actually....several from California.  Finland, Denmark, Germany....you know, your usual EU countries.  It should be a good year.  It's always so interesting to hear everyones takes on the world and au pairing, different cultures and customs, why they've decided to come do this, and about all the different families involved.  Some girls who have it good and some girls who have it not so good.  Some girls who think they have it good but I can tell by experience and what they've told me that in 3 months they will tell you its horrible!  ha!  That's one thing I love about this experience is that I now have friends all over the world!! Who wouldn't want global friends?!  I don't only want to hang out with girls from the states because.....how boring would that be?  I already know about their cultures and customs (even though I think California is an entirely different country in itself).  

Now looking forward to an excellent year full of friends and all things France, an excellent first school day with Marie-Césare tomorrow, and Taylor's arrival on Tuesday morning!