We finished our breakfast at about 11 am, suspecting that whatever church service that would have taken place in the Metz Cathedral would be finished by then. Doug said that in the entire two months he had been there in '93, he had never once attended the Mass in the cathedral, but he had figured it would be unintelligible and thus excruciatingly boring and, like this morning, always decided against it. But he had been inside the cathedral many times before, and he knew I would definitely like it, so we decided to go there first. When I could see the outside of that cathedral, I was already impressed. A small, Carmicheal-sized city had a cathedral this beautiful?! It was not the size of St. Stephen's in Vienna of course, but (as I would soon find out) it was even taller, more spacious, and far more beautiful than even Notre Dame in Paris! But the real beauty lied within, as we were about to discover....

When we got close enough to the entrance, I could hear it....there was a choir in there! And it was really good! Let me by! Push those old ladies out of the way...you are keeping me from a choir here! Finally inside, the entire cathedral was serenely filled with a musical Latin mass--a huge woman's choir surrounded an orchestra on the altar. Curse it! Why didn't we get here sooner?!? Even though it sounded to me like they were in the middle of the Gloria, I wanted to get as close up as I could, and walked all the way up the aisle to two open seats 12 rows from the front. I immediately took out our pocket binoculars to get a better look at the musicians. But...nobody up there, save for the conductor and one string bass player, was more than 13 years of age! Yes, 200 children were responsible for the heavenly, professional-sounding music emanating from the altar. Only in Europe!

Though I understood no French and even Doug had a hard time comprehending it given the confusing echo in the impressive church, that service was anything but excruciatingly boring. Luckily for us, the choir and orchestra's role in the service was not limited to the one piece we walked in on--like it was intended centuries ago, the musical mass was divided into its respective parts and sung throughout the service. We played a game with ourselves to try and figure out who's mass it was...it surely sounded classical, though it had tinges of Baroque, yet it was far too interesting to be Mozart. Some parts were just plain huge, and overall it was amazingly appropriate. Guessed it yet? It was the Mass of Gonoud, of "Ave Maria" fame. Yep, it fit. And interestingly enough, during the places where a "Alleluia" might be appropriate, they instead sang a tune I recognized, "Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God". Since it was at a point where the congregation was standing, I quietly sang along with the English words. I got shocked looks and smiles from the people around us for that one.

It was also neat to observe the differences, not only in a French mass, but in a Catholic mass for that matter. Incense and smoke clouded the many priests cloaked in ecclesiastical garments at the already mysterious altar. It was really obvious when the Lord's Prayer came up, and I think we gathered a few eyes again when we said it in English instead of French or German. Occasionally the Priest spoke in German as well, though again it was far too difficult for me to really understand. They also offered communion, but as Doug attested, they served only bread and no wine. During the sermon, I tuned the pastor out[112] and instead surveyed the beauty of the church, especially one particular stained glass window whose colors illuminated the entire church. When the time for offertory came (the universal language of money!) we gave them our last 10F. Europe on $0 a day.

After the service was over[113], we went up to the altar to thank the priest personally and ask him a few questions about what we just witnessed. We asked him if he spoke English, and he said "It has been a while, why don't we use your good French", but you can guess that we conversed much easier in English. He was very interested to find that we were tourists and from California, because people like us just don't show up in Metz very often. From him we found out that this service was not a regular occurrence at all...those kids were a touring group from Germany who had graced the presence of that cathedral that day only. Talk about perfect timing! And to think we almost missed it entirely!

After that wonderful experience, we stopped by The Cold Box on the way to the train station, where we hoped we might find a place to exchange the 20 SF and 50 AS bills we had left if we couldn't cash a traveler's check. Though it was almost 13:00, our room had not been made up at all; when we asked the woman downstairs why nobody had cleaned it, we thought she said it was because we hadn't paid for the next night yet. So we paid for both of our next two nights, hoping to settle any question that we had wanted it cleaned. Then we went to the train station, hoping to find something open on a Sunday. The woman at the bookstand there said we could probably change money at the room on the end of the hall....but wait, this was a bar! We asked a bartender anyway, and sure enough they would change cash for Francs. So we handed over our two foreign bills and got totally reamed in the exchange process, but at least now we had nearly $20. Europe on $20 a day!

Strolling around slowly and enjoying natural beauty-- what a European way to spend a Sunday!

The whole time we sat in that park, or even walked to it for that matter, we were totally conscious of every eye or glance or total double-take we received whenever anybody overheard us talking. "I could make a lot of money as a chiropractor here from all the rubberneckers every time we speak English!" Doug exclaimed, and he was right! As we sat on a bench in the park, we were very aware that the woman with an infant on the next bench was staring at us the whole time. As we walked by her, she got our attention and started talking to us in English, wondering, as so many did when Doug was there last, why on earth we were there in Metz. She thought we should instead be in Paris, the most beautiful city in the world to her. But would we have been able to have this much relaxation in a city like that?

We explored the rest of that park, disappointed that the aquarium and aviary that used to be there were closed down. However, we did find a fenced-off pond with very brave swans that would come up close enough to me for me to touch their bills and let then nibble on my fingers. A lot of French people, especially kids, were amused in watching me do this, and Doug took a bunch of pictures, but I'm afraid that they just didn't reflect how frisky this one swan was. Too bad I couldn't "grab the neck!", but it was still a lot of fun.

Doug then continued showing me the places that were of significance to him when he lived there. From the bench of a small park, we could see up to the tiny little window of where he used to live; we even walked up to the outside door of the complex, the name of his landlord still posted on the intercom list. He also showed me the place he used to love that had a sign saying "La Plus Vieille Église en France "[114], but the sign was no longer there. As we purchased the very last lemon bar and 5-layer chocolate pastry at the nearby boulangerie before it closed[115], we sat in the huge park near that "no longer the oldest" church, watching the giant waterfall and the brown curly-Q splotches of land Doug explained normally had flowers sprouting out of them. It was obvious to me that this all brought back a lot of bittersweet memories for him, but I think he also found it very cleansing that he could `write over' those memories of loneliness and solitude with a new experience...being there with his loving wife and his much fuller life! I believe this was very important to him.

Afterwards we stopped by our room yet again, to find that it had not been cleaned yet again! The ***[116] woman who supposedly it would be cleaned after we paid now claimed that the `maid' had the day off on Sunday. But we thought she said she was the one who cleaned the rooms! Oh well. So we straightened it up ourselves and headed out again to, you guessed it, go eat again. But no, it was not McDonald's this time; we instead found another fast food chain called "Pasto Mano". It was also cheap, took credit cards, and offered us a $12 meal of lasagna, calzone-type thingee, and 1664 beer[117], as well as a clerk who got a real thrill out of speaking English to us. Afterwards we walked down to Doug's favorite hang out in '93, the "Irish pub"...but like everything else on a Sunday, it was closed.

We were resigned to returning to our room, but were treated to a very welcome evening of entertainment in English when we chanced upon Woody Allen's "Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy" subtitled, not dubbed, in French on out TV. Normally this would have been a disappointment, but we were definitely soothed to finally hear our home language again. Simple pleasures, for $0 a day.