During August 1971 I worked as a young priest and responsable at a L’Arche house in a small village, Ambleteuse. The surrounding area along the northern French coast, some ten or less kilometres from Boulogne-sur-Mer, is very beautiful. My memory of that time is richly filled with days at L’Arche, beautiful sunsets over La Manche, visits to Cap Gris-Nez, Normandy, and the never-ending beaches stretching away towards Belgium.

Several young, non-ordained Jesuits from Canada worked as responsables there that summer. One of them wrote to me in London, where I was spending the summer, enquiring whether I might come to Ambleteuse to celebrate daily Mass and help out. Since they were without a priest, he urged me to get back to him quickly. I was interested, so decided to telephone. No problems were anticipated in doing that, but little did I know!

Canadians at the time were the most frequent telephone-users in the world, or so we were told. Our telephone system was among the best anywhere, up-to date and functioning seamlessly. Not so in England or France. Indeed, their systems were antiquated and terribly frustrating for anyone from North America.

The problem was I didn’t have a number for the L’Arche house in Ambleteuse. Naively I presumed this could be had easily enough from a French operator. I dialled the London operator–there was no direct dial to France– and got a young man who spoke fluent French. I explained what I wanted but that I had no number for Ambleteuse. He assured me that the operator in Paris–all operator-assisted calls in France had to be routed through Paris–would assist us.

He made the connection which was very poor. “Allo, Allo”, he shouted to a faint but somewhat irritated shrill French voice saying, “Oui, Oui, Oui. Ici Paris. Que voulez-vous?” Ignoring the rudeness, he carefully explained that he wanted a connection to a number in Ambleteuse which he didn’t have. “Ambleteuse?” the now doubting and higher and shriller voice said. “Ambleteuse n’existe pas!” She cut us off.

“I’ll try again” he said to me with a light chuckle. With good luck I had reached a London operator who knew well how to deal with Parisian operators. Be patient and don’t give up! He tried again only to get much the same response. “It does take patience,” he reassured me. After several more unsuccessful efforts, a connection was made with the curé in Ambleteuse. We finally got through to the L’Arche Community.

Three days later I arrived by boat-train to spend several glorious weeks at L’Arche on one of France’s most picturesque coastlines.