Stories
Midterm Report on Culture of Peace - 2005
Youth Report on Culture of Peace - 2006
A trilogy of books for a new strategy
Final Report on Culture of Peace - 2010
Struggling with the United Nations
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The Culture of Peace News Network continued
Missions for the Culture of Peace
Travels with Lindsay in the USA
Vacations with Lindsay in the Caribbean
The years 2009-2010 were years of transitions for both Kiki and me. In my case there was the separation and divorce. In her case it was retirement after many years working in Paris managing live-in centers for employees of the postal service.
In the spring of 2009, recently separated from Lindsay, I went to Paris to be with Kiki for a month and we took trips into the countryside looking for a retirement rental. After I had gone back to the states, she found the perfect situation in Haute Normandie in the small village of Grandcourt. It was the previous home of the landlords where they had raised their three children, and they now lived across the street in a new house that he (Sylvain) had built. He is a third-generation carpenter of the "old school", building houses with the beautiful "colombage" wood and stucco, while his wife, Marie France, raised as a farmer, now runs the town's general store. They were looking for someone who would treat the property with care and they found the right person in Kiki. In fact, we have been more or less adopted into the family, especially by their teenage son, Armand.
As evident in the following photo, the house is beautifully constructed with the classic Normandy colombage architecture. In addition their is a huge old workshop and, on the other side of it, a field with a vegetable garden, a little fishpond, flower gardens and a small clear river running alongside. We planted a maple tree one year and then fruit trees another (apple, pear, peach, cherry and plum). We made a small fishpond with goldfish and running water pumped from the river. In May and June we go to the woods to see the wild orchids.
At Grandcourt with Kiki's brother and his family
click on photo to enlarge
Kiki has always had lots of pets and now we have a dog, Marcel, a cat, Charlie, and a canary, KDJ (eventually joined by a younger male canary). Marcel and Charlie love the field, the river, the gardens and the huge workshop, as well as Kiki's sporty convertible named Lilli. Kiki and I are with Marcel in the photo. Beginning at the end of 2014, we also had Armand's goats, beginning with Clothilde and Camomille, then Louise (a gift) and Antonine and Lucien (their babies).
With Marcel
click on photo to enlarge
With Grandcourt as our base, we travel frequently. Sometimes to Paris, and more often in Normandy, searching for mushrooms, wild orchids in the nearby forests, or exploring the seacoast, the tidal basins beneath the great chalk cliffs at Mers-les-bains, the cobblestone beaches further north, and the great sand beaches still farther north at Fort Mahon. And then there are our trips into prehistory, a voyage to Bretagne with explorations of the menhirs of Carnac, a voyage to Perigord with explorations of the caves and museums of Cro Magnon and Neanderthal. Not to mention the fine restaurants of local cuisine in nearby villages and the seafood restaurants of Dieppe and Treport.
We split our time between our two "niches", the one in Grandcourt and the one in New Haven, sometimes together in one, sometimes in another, or traveling to Brazil, Spain, etc., and sometimes alone in our separate niches. On her visits to New Haven, Kiki is making it a shared niche as well as the one in Grandcourt.
Then there are also our travels in the US and Canada: California, the South (New Orleans to Memphis to Neosho and Oklahoma), Maine, the Adirondacks, Newport, Hamilton Ontario, etc.
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Stages
1986-1992
Fall of Soviet Empire
1992-1997
UNESCO Culture of Peace Programme