The Long Journey

With that memory in mind, I immediately walked the short distance to the French embassy. Upon hearing my story, Embassy officials immediately provided me with a thick book listing every village in France. To my pleased astonishment, Rougeux, with its one hundred seventy one people and twelve telephones, was immediately found. I left the embassy with directions to this village located in the remote northeastern section of France. Early the next morning, I went to Victoria Station and boarded a ferry to Dieppe-an hour-long trip across the predictably choppy English Channel. Shortly after my arrival, I boarded a train for the one hundred twenty-mile ride to Paris, arriving there in early afternoon. After a fast taxi ride from the "Gare Sud" (the railroad station located in the southern part of the city), I arrived at the "Gare de Lyon" (near the place where Bastille stood before 1789). A short time later the train to Dijon departed, the city where I planned to stay over night. Arriving at Dijon in late evening, I could see from the train station platform, barely visible through the rain just a half block away, a dimly lit sign of a hotel.

The next morning I made the final forty mile rail connection to Langres as instructed, but upon my arrival was told I should have disembarked earlier at Chandilery, which was only five miles from Rougeux. As the trainmaster and I discussed the situation, a commercial bus driver overheard our conversation, and invited me aboard as a guest and drove me directly to Chalindrey. On this gray and rainy fall day, a taxi ride finally completed the last leg of my journey to Rougeux.

After dismissing the taxi in front of the hotel and climbing three steps onto the front porch, I was surprised to find the door locked. Quickly deciding to return to the taxi, I turned only to see it disappear around a curve into the rainy mist. Standing there, not seeing any public telephones and undecided as to my next move, my attention was suddenly directed across the street to the doorway of a small house by a strong, and not necessarily friendly, sounding voice of a typical looking middle aged French housewife, who was calling, "Qu'est ce qui arrive?" (Who is that who is arriving?). In halting French, I told her my name and why I was there. Immediately, her seemingly frosty reception melted into a big smile and she generously invited me to share lunch with her family – her husband and two children - and her hospitably insistent invitation to sit at their table was quickly accepted.

Prior to this, my first trip to France, I heard some visitors recount their impressions of an unfriendly citizenry, emphasized by a friend, born in Italy, who obviously did not like the French, who once told me; "The French people are all for themselves-only God is for someone else, and if you ask them, for example, for directions, they shrug their shoulders and say, "Je n’sait pas, je n’sait pas" (I don’t know).

As a result I was somewhat on my guard during the first few moments of our conversation, but I was soon overwhelmed with an enthusiastic and extremely friendly reception which was repeated during two subsequent visits with my wife Shirley in 1979 and 1984. Mark, our oldest son, and his family have recently visited Rougeux and despite her eighty fourth year, with an undiminished jovial demeanor she remembered our visits, and her recent correspondence still exhibits her charm and friendliness. In all of our somewhat extensive travels about France, not once were we treated other than cordially and were made welcome everywhere.

Upon learning of my purpose for coming, this lady, Madame Marechal, called the village mayor, a young man by the name of Jacques Karasz, who immediately rushed over from his job at the Agricultural Bank in Fayl-Billot, (about two miles away). After much animated conversation in French, which I struggled to follow, the mayor insisted I join him and his family for supper that evening.

Although this hospitable housewife no longer accepted guests in her three bedroom hostelry, before I could leave she insisted I see the new heating system she had recently installed. The system was unique in that the heating coils were installed within an old fashioned wood burning stove much like the one Mom used during the Depression. Exposed shiny lacquered copper pipes led to a number of radiators in the lobby and first floor rooms. The second floor rooms were not included in the system but much pride was evident in her modern equipment. Attached to the hotel was a barn in which sheep and a cow were stabled (which was also part of the tour) and attended by her husband (who died shortly after my visit).

Upon completion of the tour, the mayor took me to the hotel in Fayl-Billot where I visited with the owner before a very interesting meal with the mayor, his wife and two small children. During the visit he proudly pointed to the exposed, hand hewed, and ancient kitchen ceiling beams, stating they were "chene" (oak) wood.

I was apparently the first Rougeux to return there since the 1800’s and reportedly caused quite a stir in this little village.