W & S Francom Family: Manosque

Over the hills about 15 km to the northwest of Greoux is Manosque (man-ohsk). You drive over a winding, curvy road through the hills to get there. It is the largest city in the immediate area with a population of about 23,000. We drove over to Manosque numerous times. The children go to the Ecole Internationale school in Manosque. See: http://www.ecole-internationale.ac-aix-marseille.fr/webphp/eipaca/ Meredith takes them and picks them up every school day. The family lived in Manosque for a short time after arriving in France.

We went to Auchan (a very large, nice grocery store that sells things in bulk more than other stores), HyperU (another grocery store, more like a Walmart), an electronics store and a hardware store. The HyperU has a large, modern, cafeteria-style eatery attached to it called "Flunch." They have a large variety of things in their large grocery stores, but usually in smaller sizes than we are used to. The shelves seem to be well-stocked. They also have market day every Saturday in the town square and in the surrounding small streets that lead into it. It was fun to wander through to see what they had for sale--lots of produce and cooked food, as well as clothing, shoes and miscellaneous items. The city has a very nice park that we went to and we drove around some "modern" houses with view lots in the hills surrounding the area. Traffic can be a problem at times with the narrow roads and numerous round-abouts, but it's quite fun. Of course, I wasn't driving.

M & M and family attend church in Manosque. The branch meets in the top story of some retail buildings. They have four elders assigned to the branch. Mike is in the YM presidency and Meredith is in the Relief Society presidency. About 60 attended branch meetings each week we were there. The adult lessons were given in French, but we tried to follow along in our scriptures and on IPADs rather than have someone translate. I understand that in the younger classes the lessons are translated into English for those who need it. Once a month everyone brings food to share and they have dinner together after church. In YW, A is one of 2 Mia Maids and S is one of 5 Beehives.