Feliz !

Joyeux Noël . Merry Christmas . Feliz Navidad.
Que cette journée soit remplie de magie et d'espoir.


Josée

Afternoon...

The sun was shining.  I was happy to be out on assignement with the station vehicule.  My recorder in hand, I headed first to a high school in the region.  There, I asked a class of grade 12 students what news event stood out for them in the last year ?   The answers were interesting and it was clear that this group of students followed attentively the news as it happened during 2009.
My next stop was at the Elgin Street Mission in Sudbury, a place that has been working with Sudbury's inner city since 1989 .   During my stop there, I was to record Pastor René Soulière for a x-mas promo, something that took no more than a couple of minutes .  As I was walking back to exit the premises,  I passed a long line-up of people waiting for the Mission's soup kitchen to open in order for them to get a hot meal .  Seeing those people in need stopped me in my tracks.   I stood there for a moment and then a young woman came towards me . I said hello and immediately asked her what a place like the Elgin street Mission meant to her ?    I asked her if it was o.k. if I pressed "record" on my machine during our conversation .  She nodded with a yes and then proceeded to tell me that the Mission helped her get off the streets,  helped her get off drugs , helped her get out of prostitution.   It is here that every day , she comes to see her extended family .  The people that come to the Mission to seek help and also the volunteers whom she has come to know very well over the past years .
Following our conversation, I approached a short man with a huge smile .  I could see in his eyes that he had a story to tell .  I was all ears.  He has been coming here for the past 14 years .  Incredible really .  He stressed the point that the people here , are also part of his extended family and that every community should have a place like the Elgin street Mission . Sometimes he says, it's a question of life and death .   Because of this centre, people have a chance to work towards getting a better life .   After our chat was done, three more women came to tell me their stories.    Touched by my afternoon visit at the Mission,  I drove back to the station with a recorder full of heart warming stories .    I'm glad I was the one there to listen , even if I had a microphone in one hand and my recorder in the other.  One thing is for sure... my ears were wide open . 
The people's stories made it to air .  C-fantastique !