My last month in China has been a period of many transitions. While dealing with all the uncertainties of this stressful relocation period, I was trying to keep inner peace and focus on one aim: I would leave China on 19 October.
On Sunday 21 September I produced my last musical service for the Evangelical German-speaking church in Beijing. Having spent close to four years organising the music for these church mini-projects of the Deutsche Kantorei Peking, the pastor and I were both very satisfied by our collaboration to prepare meaningful music for one service every month. In particular, I found it really interesting to look for choral or solo vocal pieces, which would provide a musical illustration of the day's theme or reading, all along the Christian calendar year. Rather self-satisfied by this part of my life in Beijing, I ended this last service with a song aimed at myself: the comforting motet by Mendelssohn on the words "LORD, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace". Some members of the congregation later said they had cried when hearing us sing. For me, that was a sign of success: we had touched our audience with our musical spirituality.
I woke up on my birthday on Tuesday 23 September with sad news: my cousin in France had left me a message overnight announcing the passing of my grand-aunt Odette Laulom at the age of 97. Aunty Odette was the last person still alive from the generation of my grand-parents. Her last two years were painful for her family because she had dementia. On my last visit to see her at the old person's house in the Summer of 2024, she did not recognise me. Upon reflexion, I thought the motet I had just sung two days before on "LORD, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace" was also a fitting musical send off for Aunty Odette. She had spent a lot of time of her married life in the kitchen preparing delicious traditional French food; my grand-uncle insisted on eating a full meal of 10 courses at every lunch and dinner. He would only eat a bite here and there but there had to be soup, fish entrée, meat entrée, fish main course, meat main course, a dish of vegetables, tossed green salad, cheese, cake and fruit at each meal! When I was younger and went to my grand-uncle and grand-aunt's house for lunch, I did not yet realise the amount of work needed to prepare all those dishes and be able to serve a variety of dishes at each meal. We would just stuff ourselves with the delicious food. My brother would take two helpings of soup and already be full. I woud start feeling uncomfortable at the meat main but still insisted on trying out all the cheeses served on the platter, and the cake too! I now realise my grand-uncle's passing in 1998 was actually a liberation for his wife. She could at last have the time to do what she wanted and would only serve the full course of 10 dishes on large family celebrations. Dear Aunty Odette now eventually rests in peace.
During the Chinese national day holiday from 30 September to 4 October I joined a group from Hikers Family to trek in the Tibetan mountains in Danba district of Sichuan province. This being a national holiday in China, there were tourists everywhere. We encountered mass tourism at 4200m altitude and did not like it. A good half of the tourists we encountered on our 2nd day's hike would pay for a motorbike service to take them up the mountain to the photogenic viewpoint and back down again. The problem was that the motorbikes were using the same path as all the hikers, and honking all along so hikers would make way for the speeding and smoke-belching machines. All we wanted was some peace and quiet while walking in nature but that day's trek was ruined by those motorbikes. On the next day, we persuaded the guides to take us on a path that did not lead to a photogenic viewpoint but that was free of motorbikes. We were delighted to walk in peace to our heart's content.
On Thursday 16 October I gave my farewell party with colleagues and friends joining me at Fugue bar in the Zhongguancun university-and-hightech district of Beijing to celebrate five years of work as an agricultural counsellor at the French embassy in Beijing. I served canapés of duck pâtés and foie gras from my home region of Southwest France; we drank 24 bottles of champagne I had slowly stocked over the preceding year for this occasion. I sang a programme of songs on the themes of food and longing due to parting. I started singing a solo and invited other singing friends to join me one by one for a duet, trio, quartet, etc. up to an octet with eight different voices. I was glad so many of my friends from my time in Beijing could come to party with me before I left with the sensation of a job well done to keep French-Chinese cooperation on agriculture going despite the current difficult geopolitical and trade context.
As planned, I left Beijing on 19 October with a one-way ticket to Paris on the Air France flight. I have started a new temporary job at the French ministry of agriculture's Directorate-General for education and research before heading off to another more permanent and exciting posting in January 2026.
Herr, nun lässest du deinen Diener in Frieden fahren
Felix Mendelssohn, Three motets op. 69 no. 1
