Well, here I am, in this really cool spot known as John’s Friends!  And apparently in the company of Owo, Keboitse, Rumbidzai, and for all I know a few other mighty fine folk! This is gonna be mondo fun-o!  Get to contribute a few lines now and then to a truly stimulating rubrik on life, justice, humanity, art, beauty, and airport lounges of the world…

So I am just like many of you out there: born in Tennessee, raised in Texas, moved to my father’s home area in northern California because engaged to the lovely Beth, married in 1981, went to France in 1985 and stayed 19 years, along the way raising 3 children: Claire, Patrick and Laura…Working to reach French youth and their families from many cultures, visiting oh about 12,347 cafés, followed God’s leading to Sweden in 2004 (has it BEEN 6 years?!), to be a catalyst in the creation of new expressions of the community of Jesus Christ, to love and serve the people in this land (and even other lands you can get to from here), now with a daughter in Berlin, a son in Santa Cruz CA, and a daughter at home in Åkersberga.  So I speak Swedish with a southern French accent, which means that Norwegians from Trondheim understand me perfectly and immediately ask if I am Finnish…I say, Not yet, give me more time!…Anyway I am now in my present incarnation (oops!  Went Hindu just for a second, must be my Anoushka Shankar music playing!) on staff at New Life Church and so get to hang out a lot with, among many many other colorful people, John and his wife Ineke.  Glad to be here!

So I just got back from Belgium…Actually the very first place I ever landed in Europe in 1979. We have had good friends there for about 26 years who started Jeunesse et Vie Belgique (which, for you non-French-speakers, means ‘Beautiful Youth and Awesome French Fries’), or Young Life, and we have managed to do some ministry together over the years…And let me just say this:  Thank God for Young Life, anywhere!…These folk are out there where the youth are, week after week, showing who Jesus Christ is and loving kids from all kinds of backgrounds, they are ‘gettin’ it done y’all!’…And in Brussels, Wavre, and Charleroi it’s going big-time on a growing scale.

It felt really good and so natural again to live and play and serve in French all week long, although Swedish words would often pop out typ liksom sådär va...And JV Belgique knows how to do a camp! So it was a chock-full week of play, day trips to places like Luxembourg, messages, music, creative camp cuisine and new friendships formed…One of the most powerful moments in my own history of youth camps occurred near the end of the week, as we leaders presented silent Cardboard Testimonies of our own encounters with Christ to the kids, ‘Before’ and ‘After Jesus’ on flip sides of the cardboard pieces…Tears flowed all around…in the hours that followed some teens opened their hearts to Christ…

Belgian impressions:  Thick green forest of the Ardennes, with grey cut-stone farm-houses with red geraniums in the window-boxes…teenagers fallen asleep in the seat-rows of our Opel van after fun at the pool…’Friterie’ signs around every town for those pommes frites…Dutch cars with kayaks on the roof…World Cup football matches on every TV-screen in every bar and café…Lush leafy up-scale suburbs of Brussels, upscale entire country of Luxembourg…Worship in French in Stockel…Grilling sausages, summer-relaxed laughter, late-night hang-outs…wearing my slashes: Belgian French for ‘flip-flops’, the footwear that dare not show its face on Götgatan.

Charleroi…Pre- and post-camp, we are at Sergio and Roselie’s house in Marchienne-au-Pont, on the ragged edge of Charleroi…It is one of several former company directors’ houses built in the shadow of the huge Thy-Marcinelle mills, big and stately, cheaper rent now, and perfect for mobilization of the whole family for myriad camps and clubs over the years…The constant klang-whoosh-boom of plate steel-stamping, sulfurous air at moments, soot, skyline of hulking buildings, smokestacks, giant pipelines and iron bridges snaking over road and rowhouse rooftops, backdrop of brown-red brick and slate and dirt…Backyard oasis at Murrus’…If you like post-war mid-crisis industrial landscapes, and I do, only Ostkreuz in Berlin and parts of Detroit rival this.  Not much of Charleroi would, frankly, make it into The Cool and Beautiful Euro-Cities Guide for the Travel Glitterati. And yet…

People matter most: Here is home for many in Wallonia’s capital, many hard-working people, men from other lands for the past generations working the mines, now hanging out in groups, students, business people, artists, speaking French, Flemish, Italian, Turkish or Lingala…I like Charleroi and similar cities because of the humanity, the human striving to make it all work, the easy contact with folk on the street…Or in front of the Friterie wagon in Mont-de-Marchienne as sudden thunder-storm sweeps through:  we seek shelter as we await our order with Roselie and Priscilla, easy conversation with a small round man in a tank-top and young local couples with small children on this sultry evening, he with a large tattoo of a Zebra and Charleroi’s Football Club on his wide shoulder:  I love this!  Wherever I am, this is all I need!  So then, home to fries, family and celebration of a blessed 11 days together.

Back home again…On Österskär Strand near our house, cold water, archipelago skyline, Silja ships cruising by, clanking of forks and knives on the nearby café terrace, contrasts are stark, but with grateful images of Belgian friends in mind…Mind wanders to new horizons:  When could I visit Botswana? And how is Owo these days?

Stewart