Brian had the pleasure of being able to go with Josiah to a school field trip last Friday.  Josiah’s class of 4th and 5th graders (CM1 and CM2 here in France) visited a steel mill and a dairy farm to learn about the processing and manufacturing of raw materials here in our region.  It was very informative and I was able to translate much of it for Josiah.  We had a sack lunch (un pique-nique) along the way.  Here are a few pictures:

Very exciting being inside the cow shed. Many of the children didn’t think it smelled very good.

Josiah had to wear safety gear to go into the steel mill.

I also noticed a couple interesting things which probably wouldn’t have happened on an American elementary field trip:

First, the adult chaperones split a bottle of wine with their sack lunch (yes, one of them brought a bottle in their sack lunch).  I was offered some, but declined.

Secondly, one of the children fell (slightly, enough to get his pants dirty) into the area where the cows poop.  The reaction from everyone was mostly a “too bad for you/tant pis pour toi — guess you shouldn’t have done that”.  I would’ve guessed a slightly stronger reaction would’ve happened in the States.