FÉNELON SAINTE-MARIE EXCHANGE 2007
We were delighted to welcome for the second time pupils and staff from the Collège Fénelon Sainte-Marie in Paris.
To visit the Collège Fénelon Sainte-Marie website click here
Transports
of Delight
French visitors travel in style at Wirral Transport Museum
As befits the first town in the world to have electric trams, it was an electric
tram that awaited visitors from Fenelon Sainte Marie in Paris when they arrived
at Woodside. In a near blizzard they stepped back 75 years to the elegance and
comfort of a more gracious age.
A
warm welcome for all awaited at the Wirral Transport Museum. Expert staff
conducted the visitors through the history of transport, and there were plenty
of opportunities for hands-on activities.
It was a revelation for our guests to sit upstairs on the tram. The motorcycles and the open-top Austin 7 were also a popular attraction.
As the snow swirled round Hamilton Square the group gazed from the windows of the Wirral Museum: truly a sight to remember. ‘You have funny weather here,’ remarked one visitor. ‘First it is sun, now snow…’ Funny weather indeed!
Many thanks are due to Museum staff, and especially to Ernie Ruffler, Education Officer at Wirral Museum, for all his help and information.
Click on the photograph for a larger image
Smiles and tears as French students depart
It has been a good week!
Our visitors from Fenelon Sainte-Marie were treated to an extremely warm welcome and some extremely cold weather.
The exchange, in its second year, is a joint venture with Upton Hall School for Girls, and was jointly organised by Marion Holgate, for Birkenhead, and Helen Page for Upton.
The students had a full programme of visits. Liverpool welcomed them to the Beatles Museum (C’est qui, Les Beatles?) and Anfield fed the hunger for the quasi-religious veneration of le Foot, which seems a truly international obsession. Throw in the odd cathedral, (as in, ‘Zis Cathedral, it is very strange!’) and the obligatory Ferry ‘cross the Mersey, and our Gallic visitors graduated as Honorary Scousers before departure.
A day in Chester provided a look further back in time, with the medieval period jogging along with the Romans. (‘No, not the Normans, the Romans, as in Rome!’) But never mind, culture must come to an end, and there was a chance to do some shopping and visit MacDo, to grab a hamburger just like they make it at home.
The
heavy snow on Thursday proved no match for the electric tram which whisked us
elegantly from a shivery Woodside to the Wirral Transport Museum. Buses and
trams seem to be a hit with kids, and this was no exception. Another trip on the
tram, and a freezing walk brought them to the Wirral Museum, or Birkenhead Town
Hall as she was better known, to make the acquaintance of John Laird and other
worthies. The Roman Exhibition was minus the carefully constructed wigs, which
had been swiped by some light-fingered visitors.
So, after an insight into Birkenhead past and present; after evening meals taken in fluent English, (from the visitors) and hesitant French, (from parents refreshing O-levels of long ago); after the climbing wall and first-aid practice; after the joys of the dinner queue; after the sight of schoolboys in military uniform, it was handshakes all round as the cases were heaved into Huggins finest char-a-banc for the short hop to Liverpool John Lennon and the tender mercies of jetFacile .
By now, as I write this, children will be greeting parents at Charles de Gaulle. 'Ça a été?' 'Oui, maman, ça a été!'
