My vision for our sons

In a recent post, I briefly alluded to how I would like our sons to turn out as adults and thought I would do a full article about it.  It is natural for parents to have views on how their children will turn out, even if plans can very easily be scuppered.  Firstly, any parent who wants the best for their children will want them to grow up in the Lord and become born again.  We will provide our sons with the best theological education we can and pray that he will come to saving repentance, but under the principle of Unconditional Election, God has decided who He will bring to saving repentance and man cannot change His decision, so we can only do our best and pray.

The view of Bilal and myself is that there is no merit in treating boys and girls as if they were the same.  Feminists want to get rid of gender differences, rather than celebrate them, which in my view makes them the misogynists.  A girl such as myself is keen to make the most of her femininity, even if Zoë Williams dislikes the use of the word, though I think it is very good at communicating femininity.  If I have a daughter, I will pass on to her all the beauty secrets that have been passed down through the family and make sure her first phrase is "la moitié, s'il vous plaît" and, although it is good for women to be ready for physical labour, we will still treat her as weaker vessels.  On the other hand, regarding our sons, Bilal plans to trip them up and push them over (on soft, grassy ground, never on concrete), playfully punch them, throw them high in the air (obviously catching them afterwards), play "knuckles", "slapsies" and "mercy", tickle them and other ruff and tumble activities that ensure they accumulate lots of bruises.  His expectation is that if they fall and hurt themselves, they will get up again for more.

I want our sons to be both rugged.  Our sons will not be pampered wimps too accustomed to air-conditioned environments.  In keeping with Touareg custom, they will begin training as a herdsman when he is three years old, as well as being trained at Bilal's farm near Marseille.  Bilal's relatives have already agreed to have them during our spring when the weather is very hot, though Bilal has threatened very serious consequences if they so much as mention Islam to them.  Bilal is also learning mountaineering, so that he can get them used to mountain environments in mid-winter: - Bilal wants to climb Mont Blanc (4808m above sea level) when he is able and take our sons with him.  He also has homies from the Côte d'Ivoire and Congo in La Savine, through whom he is beginning discussions about jungle survival training: - Bilal is not used to jungle environments and wants to learn, so as to teach our sons.  As our sons grow up, they will also ensure he spends plenty of evenings and weekends with his grandparents in La Savine, so as to get him used to gangland environments and toughen them up.  This means operating in them, rather than mimicking their culture, MDR!  Part of this will involve fighting skills and learning to box, which Bilal already knows a lot about.  Ultimately, we want them to be unwilling to shy away from physical hurt in pursuit of noble aims, be this fighting for their country or stepping up to protect a lady falling victim to dangerous drunkards, rather than running away because they are afraid of damaging their nails, MDR.

However, as well as rugged, I want them to be gentlemanly.  I don't like much about Britain, but the traditional British gentleman culture is something I want them to learn.  This will involve learning  how to conduct themselves in different social situations, how to dress neatly, how to be properly groomed and everything else.  People often misunderstand what being gentlemanly means: - some view it as flirting with women one has no intention of pursuing and making them swoon.  We will want our sons to understand that being gentlemanly is the complete opposite: - it means avoiding excessive familiarity with women unless they are seriously pursuing them as a potential wife and not leading them on.  Providence enabled Bilal to find a wife who loves him for who he is and isn't offended in the slightest when he refers to attractive women as "well buff wifeys" or "bufft'ings", but I want our sons to know how to refer to women properly, just in case ladies they desire are sensitive about that sort of thing.

We will make sure they are extremely diligent in their academic studies.  We want them to be brains as well as brawn.  We want them to graduate from university in useful vocational subjects, rather than a Mickey Mouse arts degree.  Maybe they will be enthusiastic enough to do PhDs?  Who knows.  Oxbridge and Ivy League institutions are very prestigious, but Bilal and I would worry about our children being deep in cesspits of liberalism such as these.  They aren't exactly known for their tolerance of different points of view.  Bilal liked the fact that studying engineering at university meant he was relatively free of the social scientists!

We haven't got fixed ideas about what career our sons ought to go into, though we have got some ideas about what careers might use the various skills we intend to teach him.  A commission in the Foreign Legion might be one way.  I would love to see them in blues uniform and the ladies swooning over them!  I also wouldn't mind them becoming rolling stock engineers like their father and grandfather: - the TGV network is one thing that makes France great.

When will the boys become (gentle)men?

From the very beginning, Bilal has been open about his desire for a large family with me.  He told me that whilst he would never force himself upon me, he will push me to agree to more children as long as the opportunity is available.  I was slightly taken aback by his honesty, but I quickly remembered that I have lots of female acquaintances who have married men who turn out not to want children (particularly if they are older and have previous marriages behind them), or they have lost their enthusiasm for more children after the arrival of the second or so.  I mentioned this to sisters-in-Christ and they expressed the view that such a desire definitely increases a man's desirability to them.  A few weeks after our son was born, Bilal raised this issue with me and said he wanted to try for our second child with no delay.  Even with our second child not yet born, he is already talking about trying for our third one.

Bilal comes from a society where life expectancy is extremely low.  According to the World Health Organisation's 2015 statistics, France's life expectancy was 82.4 years, whereas in Mali it was 58.2 years (near the bottom of the table).  The situation for the Touareg people is even worse, with Minorityrights.org saying that their life expectancy in 2013 was 48 years.  From all I have lead to believe, this situation results in the Touareg people taking the view that time is always limited for doing things in life, in particular childbearing.  There is no time for men to do things like long, extended university studies, followed by time travelling, followed by time spent drifting in one's career and finding one's feet many years later, before finally getting married in one's fourties and grudgingly having children as one's fifties approach.  Touareg men have the mentality that they won't be around long, so they have to work hard to save up to get married, get married as soon as possible and then have as many children as they possibly can in as short a period as possible.  They will typically learn to start keeping livestock at the age of three or four.  I quite like this mentality, as it means men grow up very quickly: - no Peter Pan characters there!  Death isn't a taboo theme with Bilal, as he has maintained his Touareg mentality of life being short: - he also received regular reminders when he witnessed gang shootings in La Savine.

Putting aside the issue of religion, I would seriously advise women frustrated with men who are indifferent about their female biological clocks to seriously think about a Touareg husband!  Bilal is not afraid of getting his hands dirty, putting himself in danger for others, working hard in very arduous conditions or anything like that!  I remember when we were out walking in Marseille one summer evening and he was walking a few metres behind me.  I passed some guys in their mid-30s dressed like teenagers who had set up their X-Box One on the street for some al fresco playing and were puffing away on joints.  One of them said, "That chick is hot!  I want one like that one day!"  They didn't realise Bilal is my husband and he turned round and said to them, "Man agrees: - manz wifey is well buff, innit?  Dat's why man pursued her all the way up da aisle.  Maybe you'll get one too if you do something besides playing computer games, be a man, make something of yourself and go after one?"  One of them then said, "What?  You think you're a bigger man or something?"  Bilal replied, "Yeah.  I knocked her up straight away after marrying her and then again only a few weeks after our son was born."  I was trying hard not to laugh when I heard Bilal say that. When he caught up with me, I told him it wasn't appropriate to accuse some he didn't know of being immature based on little evidence, to which Bilal said he knew them well.  Bilal has never really cared about being a gentleman and I am aware many feminists wouldn't like to be spoken about in that way, but I do because I love real men!  MDR.

In some ways, Bilal is quite feminine.  He spends more time with our son than I do, as his job has regular hours and doesn't require him to travel: - dealing with a screaming baby when at the front row of a fashion show is not easy, MDR.  Our childcare arrangements mean he could spend the evenings socialising with his "homies" if he wanted, but he has chosen not to do that: - he has told his "homies" very bluntly that he is happy to socialise with them, but they have to either visit him at home or they have to go somewhere baby-friendly.  He also found his gym wasn't very amenable to men bringing in small babies, as it wasn't the type of image they were trying to create.  He threatened to take his custom elsewhere (and with him all the women who come along to gawp at him and men who come for his advice) and they soon backed down.  A few men unfamiliar with him initially poked fun at him for bringing our son along, but that was before seeing his body in the changing rooms, MDR.

Large families used to be common in times gone by in France, though I am doubtful many French men were as open as Bilal about how conception was a boost to their egos, MDR!  The Church of Rome has had a consistent policy of opposing contraception, though its power in France has been severely curtailed ("laïcité"), particularly with the 1905 law separating church and state, long before contraceptive methods became available.  I think it is good that the Church of Rome's influence has been restricted in France, but it is a shame that a consequence of this has been people's unwillingness to have children.  Much is made of France's high fertility rate, but the reality is that it tends to be the immigrants having children.  French men don't know how to be men any more!  With the great figures we Frenchwomen have and the female-biased gender ratio, few men can justifiably claim the absence of options, particularly if they lived in nearby Vitrolles in the late 1990s.  Bilal is aware of the baby bonus that Catherine Mégret briefly introduced for children born to at least one French/EU parent.  I remember someone asking him about her, assuming that he would dislike her on account of her supposedly "xenophobic" policies.  Bilal replied, "Fam, she used to be quite fit, though not as fit as manz wifey".  MDR!

Much is made of French men being seductive, but in my view, they have become wussies over the past few decades.  Prior to my relationship with Bilal, I was often approached by men, who I am sure never bothered to call my father when I gave them his business card.  Giving them my father's business card was never intended to put them off per se, it was intended as a test of their manhood!  I love the way Bilal talks to his "homies" about his marriage to "a well buff wifey" like me as being a conquest.  He first asked for permission to court me aged 18 (he was starting university, but already had a large income from his share-trading activities), which my father declined.  Bilal made several more attempts over the next few years while I was at university and subsequently working in the fashion industry before he finally conquered my father and subsequently me.  Bilal's ignorance about how to speak about women in a gentlemanly fashion didn't help, but Daddy later came to realise that he is a man with some rough edges when his activities at church became more apparent.  Daddy tried to turn him into a gentleman during our courtship and engagement without success.

French life expectancy has increased dramatically during the past few centuries, even the past few decades and doesn't appear to be slowing down.  People had more children in times gone by because of the low expectation that they would reach adulthood, i.e. having lots in the expectation of getting lucky with a few.  As mentioned, this is part of Bilal's subconscious mentality.  It is likely that many people have no rush to get married and have children because they think they have all the time in the world.  They prolong adolescence.  It is not such a problem for men when they do this in France, given the gender ratio and the fact that they are surrounded by fabulous women, but the numbers are not really in women's favour, as discussed extensively in an article entitled "The case for settling for Mr. Good Enough".  Also, given the expectation that the man will initiate, courtships tend to be according to the man's timing.

I am hoping that our son will grow up to have my French finesse and Bilal's ruggedness.  Bilal has said he intends to take him on regular holidays to Mali to develop them as herdsmen (I didn't argue, as I support this fully, even though I know many French mothers wouldn't).  Bilal finally managed to find a farm suitable for livestock somewhere near Marseille, so that our son (and future children) will be able to practice even when he isn't in Mali.  Bilal is also learning about mountaineering so that he can teach our son to operate in such environments in the absence of deserts here in France.  This won't be possible full-time, as he will need to be diligent in his academic studies, but the aim is that he will be well-prepared for both lifestyles.

On the other hand, I have insisted that I and my male relatives teach him how to be a gentleman and to speak proper French.  Obviously, it is still quite early to think about our son's career, but I was thinking a commission in the French foreign legion might be a profession where both these qualities are required.  They are based in Aubagne, which is more or less on our doorstep in Marseille.

I came across an article about Memminger High School in Charleston, South Carolina, which has a "Gentleman's Club" (in my view, a very unfortunate double entendre), which teaches young inner-city boys to be gentlemen.  To me, given Charleston's position as the epitome of Deep South gentility, it seems a shame that the boys didn't pick such things up.

A quick Google search also revealed the London School of Etiquette, which does this, but in a paid formal setting.  I am not enthusiastic about sending our son to a boarding school where he would learn this, as I believe that raising children is the parents' job, but I would be delighted if our son grew up to have all the airs and graces of both suave Frenchmen and stereotypical English gentlemen in addition to Touareg ruggedness.  Nobody can say if he will grow up to be sufficiently well-suited to the military lifestyle, but I could just imagine him in a Foreign Legion officer uniform (their headquarters is in nearby Aubagne).

I am not talking Bilal down, as I recognise that he has the personality traits that really matter: - finesse is not one of them.  However, it would be a shame if our son were held back in life or weren't able to woo the woman of his dreams because Bilal passed on his ignorance of gentlemanly conduct.  Certainly, there is an abundance of French men who have a reasonable amount of finesse, but there is a deficit of French men who know how to be real men, rugged and pursue a woman properly.

Why Bilal is a real man

Donald Trump's inauguration will happen soon.  In spite of being a macho man, he won a clear victory in the electoral college vote (with liberals continuing to go on about how he lost the popular vote) over Hillary Clinton, who I and many others are glad to see the back of.  Traditional masculinity has come under attack in recent years.  I am a super-attractive, glamorous and successful woman and I have no objections to women being like me, but I always found real men more attractive than the emasculated men we seem to see these days.

I was recently reading an article about the marks of Christian manhood that talked about marks of Christian manhood and it got me thinking about how Bilal is every bit the real man I desired.  The marks they gave were: -
1. Spiritual maturity sufficient to lead a wife and children.
2. Personal maturity sufficient to be a responsible husband and father.
3. Economic maturity sufficient to hold an adult job and handle money.
4. Physical maturity sufficient to work and protect a family.
5. Sexual maturity sufficient to marry and fulfill God's purposes.
6. Moral maturity sufficient to lead as example of righteousness.
7. Ethical maturity sufficient to make responsible decisions.
8. Worldview maturity sufficient to understand what is really important.
9. Relational maturity sufficient to understand and respect others.
10. Social maturity sufficient to make a contribution to society.
11. Verbal maturity sufficient to communicate and articulate as a man.
12. Character maturity sufficient to demonstrate courage under fire.
13. Biblical maturity sufficient to lead at some level in the church.
Bilal demonstrated 1. in his leadership of Sunday School classes and his informal mentoring of various other boys inside and outside the church (e.g. his boxing club) and demonstrated 2. in countless situations.  He has demonstrated both 3. and 4. with his day job with "Le Trom de Marseille" (as he calls it) and his accumulation of a fortune through shrewd online investments in shares.  He demonstrated 5. by refusing physical contact with unrelated women, which included holding hands with me during courtship (obviously, I learned on the wedding night what he had been labouring diligently to keep under control).  He has demonstrated 6. and 7. through his prolonged willingness to stand apart from the world and its evil practices at whatever cost to his own popularity.  He has demonstrated 8. by how passionately he carries out his church activities and is able to shield himself against outside distractions where necessary.  He has demonstrated 9. by how much joy he has brought to other believers in their fellowship with him, in spite of how shy he is.  He demonstrates 10. by his immense labours within the church and community to spread the Gospel message and help keep young La Savine boys out of trouble.  11., 12. and 13 are not that obvious, given his shy character, but he never shirks his duty to speak about the Gospel when called.

Beyond these issues that are, without doubt, the most important ones, he has shown himself to be a real man by both secular and religious criteria and I am glad I have him, rather than several other half-men who have approached me, but not demonstrated anything an it-girl like myself required.  Bilal has demonstrated manhood in every department.

His early life was spent in the Sahara Desert as a Touareg herdsman.  This is physical hardship at its best: - fiercely hot days, cold nights, defending his family's livestock from predators etc.  He lived in La Savine (probably Europe's toughest housing estate) upon arrival in France and only ceased living there when we returned from our honeymoon.  He feels rather lost in the immense luxury of my penthouse apartment overlooking the Vieux Port, but he likes the proximity of a metro station ("Réga du Trom" as he would say).  All these things have contributed to make him the rugged man he is today.

Bilal has been into strongman training since he arrived in France and came across a Marseille gym during early exploration of the city.  He was not old enough to be allowed in, so he occasionally watched from outside and sought advice from members as they left the gym.  When he was old enough, he took out gym membership, doing odd jobs to earn money to pay for this and other paraphernalia associated with developing the strength necessary for strongman contests (this was before online share trading became common).  He very quickly gained in weight.  He was a fairly shy child, preferring to sit in a corner reading the Holy Bible and other religious literature during break times and was therefore often the victim of bullying (I often used to see him with bruises on his face at church).  However, this soon ceased after he started gaining weight and physical strength.

I think that the ability and desire to have children (coupled with acceptance of all the responsibilities parenthood entails) is a mark of manhood.  If one is among the few people gifted for celibacy, fine, but otherwise, I think avoiding having children (apart from being against Psalm 127:4) is a mark that a man wants to live a freewheeling bachelor lifestyle and is, in reality, a boy rather than a man.  On the occasions before our wedding I mentioned this subject with Bilal, he always said abruptly, "Children are an inheritance from the Lord and I want to conceive as many as the Lord, in His almighty grace, will allow me to conceive".  Sure enough, when we got married, he wasted absolutely no time.  I admit he isn't always politically correct about this: - the Sunday at church after the test confirmed my second pregnancy, I overheard him say with enormous pride to his church "homies", "I've got her pregnant again!  Yes!", punching the air and behaving with the excitement of a football fan whose team has just scored a goal (in a way, he had scored a goal himself).  Someone in the group of friends (hip-hop people, of course: - the image below is from Wikimedia commons and does not depict him or anyone else we know) immediately spudded him and said, "Brap-brap-brap!  You're a big man doing that so quickly both times!  Regardless of what feminists think, I am pleased to have a husband who views the ability and willingness to conceive as the height of being a macho man.  I wouldn't want a boy who viewed children as an encumbrance to his freewheeling bachelor lifestyle: - Bilal also views the ability and willingness to conceive and properly raise children to be a mark of manhood: - he is keen to have a third child as soon as possible following the birth of our second.  I am due in a few months and have still not yet accumulated flabber!

In other respects though, he doesn't fulfil traditional macho values.  He does at least half the work of caring for our son, doesn't mind being seen pushing our son in his pram in public and is seen cradling him in church for most of the day: - he certainly takes much more of an interest in our son than pretty much all fathers I know.  He is generally a very quiet and shy character, but with the glut of people with an opinion to publicly express and the dearth of people interested, a few more quiet people in the world wouldn't go amiss!  I agree with most of Tomi Lahren's views, but she seems capable of little besides ranting!  The media needs people who will go out there and dig out stories, rather than just ranting aimlessly about what is there!  My fashion magazine is a great example of how to do this: - it is at the vanguard of fashion trends, not just reporting them, but predicting and defining them!

Here's to looking forward to a very large happy family with Bilal and gloating to women who lose self-control over their diet during pregnancy and have flabber to lose after giving birth!

The wedding

As discussed, Bilal and I got married during the summer of last year.  Very many apologies for the very long delay.  I continue to be keen to share with the world how impossibly perfect we French women are with the world, but with being a wife and mother, there are many distractions.

It was a fantastic affair and the Marseille high-society event of the year.  Some members of Marseille's high society were miffed that an it-girl such as myself would get married to a hip-hop person from da ghetto like Bilal, but I have no doubt that Daddy vetted all suitors very carefully: - he was the first and only suitor to get through Daddy.  If a man expressed an interest in me, I would give him Daddy's business card and say to go through this channel if he was serious.  I would always advise men to be ready to e-mail Daddy a copy of their Christian testimony (i.e. a brief summary of their life and their coming to Christ).  I must have given out thousands and thousands of business cards out in my time.  Whether they viewed this route as an expression of lack of interest, whether they didn't have the guts to approach Daddy, whether they approached Daddy and Daddy realised there were holes in their Christian testimony, I don't know.  It no longer matters.  Bof (I would light up a Gauloise at this point if I were a smoker, MDR).

After a few months of courtship, Bilal made a proposal of marriage, which I accepted straight away.  As soon as the news of the accepted proposal was public, the wheels of planning swung into action.  Bilal is a very down-to-earth person, but an it-girl with probably the narrowest waistline in the south of France like myself naturally wanted the best!  But sometimes, the best does not come at a great price!  A Frenchwoman who invests the necessary work in knowing local designers (which I do, as a fashion magazine editor and owner), local producers of high-quality food, local beauty spots etc is likely to get a better deal at a crucial time like this!

For the wedding attire, I used my own contacts who I knew were capable of delivering stunning attire not just for me, but for Bilal, since I had never seen him in a suit until our wedding day!  His build is similar to that of Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson, a.k.a. The Mountain from Game of Thrones, meaning that he would look silly in any suit that was not tailor-made.  As traditional Touareg and hip-hop clothing is normally loose-fitting, he does not normally experience this problem, but he needs tailor-made clothes if they are intended to be tight-fitting.  With my unusually narrow waistline, I also needed to ensure the skill of the designer was sufficient to illustrate my wonderful feminine French figure to everyone present!

The food needed to be all-things-to-all-men, though there were limits to my willingness to accommodate.  Some English relatives on my mother's side complained about the exotic nature and the small portions, as if I care: - these silly people wanted daft things, such as bangers 'n' mash, fish 'n' chips, curry etc.  For Bilal's family (who entered the church extremely reluctantly), there was an extremely large container of chicken and jollof rice, but this was the only concession we made.  I would like to educate them and the English relatives about what good food is, but I am a busy woman, so I have to pick my battles!  For everyone else, we had a delectable and divine selection of Provençale cuisine served obviously in dainty portions!  The dishes included that quintessential Marseille dish, bouillabaise, made with the freshest seafood.  Olives harvested that morning also featured prominently.  There was a whole smörgåsbord of local specialities, another one being calissons.  Wedding cakes are a very English tradition which we naturally eschewed, so we opted for the French tradition of croquembouche (gluten-free on Bilal's account of course).

In France, the legal part of the wedding can only be carried out by the mayor, so we went to the mairie and got this part over and done with and then went to our church for the religious part of the ceremony.  The church was packed, unfortunately with many people who don't remotely care about what it does and only viewed the wedding as the place to see and be seen (such people were invited for business expediency, rather than because I truly wanted them there)!  Still, the pastor preached an unashamedly evangelistic sermon, which resulted some return visitors, at least one of whom I know to have now been baptised and taken out church membership.  I say with full sincerity that this makes the presence of all the other superficial people worthwhile.  The hymns were "Comment ai-je pu?" ("And can it be that I should gain"), "Béni soit le lien" ("Blest be the tie that binds"), "Croire obéir" ("Trust and obey") and "Je suis tien, Seigneur" ("I am Thine, O Lord"), all of them favourites of Bilal and myself.

Bilal was a sight for sore eyes in his fitted suit.  He looked extremely uncomfortable, as tight clothes are not his thing, but it was nice to finally see him dressed in a suit for the first time.  My wedding dress was absolutely fabulous, as were the bridesmaid's dresses and the suits of the leading men.  It's a shame I may never see him in a suit again, but obviously, now we are married, I get to see other things.

We opted for an open-air reception at the Calanques, with a reserve order of marquees made in case of severely unseasonal weather.  We chose a lovely secluded beach and were undisturbed the whole time: - it was a case of security by obscurity.  Bilal is a very capable swimmer, but will rarely do so in public, as he doesn't like non-family members seeing any part of his body except his face, hands and feet: - Touareg men tend to cover their heads with a tagelmust.  I wonder if this would enrage the opponents of the burkini?  Tee hee!  Anyway, maybe when our family grows and an apartment proves too small, we could choose a new home away from the city centre with high walls and a swimming pool within the ground, so as to give Bilal the privacy he desires.

For the honeymoon, I wanted a destination that was French-speaking, unfamiliar to both of us, offering unbridled luxury and beautiful.  We chose the Van Horne Suite of the Château Frontenac in Québec City, Canada.  Bilal looked rather strange in his hip-hop clothing when we walked in.  I could see that the staff were trying not to stare, so I insisted that Bilal wear a Touareg outfit for dining.  Having spent a lot of his time in Mali living in tents and often with no shelter in the desert, followed by La Savine, Bilal was not used to such opulence and looked rather lost in the hotel.  He isn't really used to eating non-Touareg food and found himself embarrassed asking if they served jollof rice.  Poor Bilal!

Both of us enjoyed the historic city and its waterfront situation.  When we arrived in the city on a ViaRail service (shamefully slow), we were struck by the beauty of the station.  Unusually for the Americas, the city has a city wall and citadel.  We made various journeys on the ViaRail service: - as the speeds are so low, there is an emphasis on service.  Wi-fi has been standard for a long time and there are cheery stewardesses serving food as if it were an airline.

As mentioned in previous posts, Bilal has always been very good with children.  He was determined to experience fatherhood as soon as possible and he wasted no time on ensuring this would happen as soon as we arrived.  I realised I was expecting part-way into the honeymoon.  When we arrived back, he announced that he had booked a dietician appointment for me: - he had been worried that I was not eating enough to ensure the baby's good health, so he insisted I attend it.  The dietician agreed that there was nothing wrong with my diet: - I knew this all along, but Bilal needed some reassurance.  I continued to eat well during my pregnancy and I gave birth to an entirely healthy baby boy with my weight no higher than what it was when I measured myself on the day of the wedding.

But that is another story.  I am sure I will go into more detailed aspects of the wedding later, but I also expect there will be many posts about motherhood.

I'm engaged

Today, Bilal made a proposal of marriage!  This is something I have been eagerly awaiting for several months and I can now announce that it has finally happened!  I accepted without hesitation.  Bilal and I are very different people, but I appreciate his exotic nature, with him being a mix of Touareg and hip-hop influences.  This is evident in his language usage and clothing.  He is definitely my tall, dark (and heavily-built) stranger.

Bilal has moved into my parents' home (readers will note that I live in my own flat a short distance from the Vieux Port).  The reason for this is to adapt him to French culture a little bit more, as I have no willingness to live in La Savine, even if a top-floor flat would offer fantastic views of Marseille and the Mediterranean Sea.  Such a rough gangsta area is not appealing to a sophisticated haute couture Frenchwoman such as myself.  I would get tired of people greeting me by saying "Wesh-wesh toubab?" ("Wagwan honky?")  For some reason, Bilal never looks entirely at ease when in some more typically French areas in a way that he did in Mali (I cannot vouch for what he is like in La Savine, having never been there) and often appears homesick.

In the longer term, we are wondering about what sort of arrangements will be most agreeable to us.  One option we are considering is purchasing a livestock farm that would enable Bilal to feel at home.  Although the Common Agricultural Policy allows French farmers to get away with many backward and inefficient agricultural practices (hey, I suppose some compromises are necessary to produce the pure and natural products that a Frenchwoman desires), they are still a world apart from Touareg practices.  Another possibility is for us to construct a mountain home in the mountains to the north and east of Marseille to allow him to life a hill farmer lifestyle when he is not at work.  If anyone has any suggestions, please e-mail me at mariannegaboriault@gmail.com : - we are looking for countryside that is as rugged as Bilal is, MDR!

Even if we struggle to find somewhere that causes Bilal to feel completely at home, Bilal has told me he is willing to endure feelings of homesickness for the rest of his life in order to be with me, adding that I am "une femeu bien faite" (French for "a well fit bird") even by French standards: - obviously, when he is living with my parents, they will attempt to smooth some of his rough edges.  Bilal was never a macho man, but he has spent so much time around people who speak in this manner that he uses such words as if they were normal words.  He managed to restrain himself for job and university interviews, but found it too tiring to keep up a pretence beyond that.  This is partly why he tends to gravitate towards tasks that involve doing things in the background at work: - he can prove himself by the quality of his outputs and is unlikely to be obstructed by his hip-hop use of language.  At university, he would just turn up for lectures, practical assessments etc and just go home again afterwards to do his study: - he did very well academically and he was very diligent with his studies, but he never had any interest in being involved in the extracurricular life of his university, as he never really felt at home with the white middle-class liberal atheistic students the way he does in da 'hood or at church.  He feels at home at church because he knows that in this world, we are to regard ourselves as merely sojourners and if a church is a sound church, it is the closest experience a believer will have to the world to come.  Obviously, the wedding will take place in our own church (not the one shown below).

Obviously, given my obsession with food and Bilal's coeliac disease, we will need to expend a lot of thought about what food will be served at the wedding.  It will not be nice for me to have to share a marital bed with Bilal if the food served at the wedding has caused him bowel problems, MDR.  Unless a gluten-free croquembouche is available, we may unfortunately have to have an Anglo-Saxon style wedding cake.  Maybe we could have something along the lines of Mireille Guiliano's flourless chocolate cake?  Bilal is awfully fond of this recipe, but given that it is a recipe Mireille Guiliano approves of, presumably I shouldn't worry, MDR.

I think Bilal will look absolutely gorgeous in a morning suit, but he doesn't like suits and as far as I'm aware, the only time he has ever worn one in his life was for his job interview with the "Trom de Marseille" (as he and his homies call it in Verlan, MDR).  He is very fond of his Touareg attire and some of this looks gorgeous upon him though, especially the bright indigo garments.  Because he is such a handsome man, being around him requires a greater amount of self-restraint and I am pleased that with our engagement, the amount of time I will have tocontinue to exercise this self-restraint is getting shorter.

I will be looking for the most beautiful bridal dress I can find.  Apart from the fact that I am the bee's knees and worthy of the best, it would not do for a fashion magazine editor to turn up for her own wedding in an unfashionable bridal gown.  This will be my biggest worry when it comes to wedding preparations (apart from possible legal hiccups obstructing the legal validity, e.g. the registrar being sick on the day of the wedding).  However, as I have always been dainty in my eating, I will certainly not have to worry about how my figure will look in the dress as lesser women do!  All I can say is roll on the wedding day!

Postpartum dainty figures

Recently, Bilal and I had a discussion about the subject of childbearing.  I asked him what his views were on the subject of how many children to have.  Eventually, after several questions that were essentially identical, but done from different angles, he said he would definitely like to have a "famille nombreuse" (large family).  When I probed why, he cited Psalm 127:4 (which talks about how a large family is a blessing to a man) and his love for the Touareg culture i.e. his desire not to "westernise" and turn his back on his culture by having a smaller family.  The fertility rate for Touareg women in Mali is apparently 6.6 (admittedly using out-of-date statistics).  Also, it is plain for me to see that Bilal is very fond of small children: - he is not as reticent about initiating interactions with them as he is with non-Touareg adults.  The wife of someone he is reasonably friendly with at church gave birth to a son a few weeks ago and I regularly see Bilal cradling the baby, obviously entranced.

Bilal said that he didn't want to push this on me, given that he would not be carrying the children around for 9 months each, but said he would be overjoyed if he did have a large family.  I said that although I don't yet know first-hand what stresses pregnancy puts on a woman's body, once we are married, my plan is to offer no obstruction at all to creating a large family, even if this means no sleep and working at home for a few days each month.  Why?  Because I love him so much.  He has brought me so much happiness and if children and more children will bring him enormous joy, then that's what I plan to give him.  After all, provided we are married at the time, given that he is the most attractive man I have ever seen, why would I ever have any desire resist him?  I would also enjoy a large family myself.  Visiting people from the United Kingdom have told me that they have noticed that in France, having children makes you that much more socially acceptable.  All part of impossible French perfection I suppose.  I know I am always grumbling about taxes in France, but one thing that is great about France is how the income tax brackets favour  couples with lots of children, even if I don't like the way the tax advantages diminsh steeply after the first child.  Then there are various other advantages, including the Carte Famille Nombreuse for discounts when travelling on the trains: - I don't suggest that anyone has children for the sake of financial advantages, but I think it is great that France is doing things to incentivise people to have children.

Some people might call me an enemy of feminism because I plan to give Bilal as many children as he wants and I am always preaching about the importance of having a dainty figure.  How would I respond to such suggestions of betraying feminism?  If I were a Frenchwoman with the characteristics portrayed by Zoë Williams, I would just light up another Gauloise and say, "bof", MDR.

"But aren't you bothered about your figure any more?", Bilal asked me.  I said I didn't think it was a dichotomy.  It is quite possible for a woman to have a wonderful figure very soon after giving birth or even immediately thereafter.  I recall a photo of Catherine Zeta-Jones that appeared around the time after her wedding showing how much baby weight she had lost on account of her desire to look good in her wedding dress: - unusually for a British (in this case, Welsh) woman, she had a fabulous figure in the photo.  I have no expectation of being in this situation, because neither I nor Bilal approve of fornication, so I would argue that Catherine Zeta-Jones could have saved herself the bother of crash-dieting prior to her wedding by not committing fornication, but anyway.  That example aside, I also remember the controversy over the Norwegian WAG Caroline Berg Eriksen's postpartum selfie of her figure.  What would I say in response to this controversy?  I say you go for it girl!

If you've got a lovely figure like that so soon after giving birth, show it to everyone so that women will be willing to aim high!  Why should this woman listen to the grumblings of women who are just jealous that they don't have such a wonderful postpartum figure?  This is what I would call the "crab mentality" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crab_mentality): - people become jealous at the success of others and try to "pull them back down".  Of course, such wonderful postpartum figures are the norm in France.  There is the perception that a Frenchwoman is so stupid that she doesn't know that heavy drinking and smoking during pregnancy are bad for the unborn child's health, but none of this is well-founded: - in fact, heavy drinking is characteristic of a British ladette, rather than a Frenchwoman.  A pregnant Frenchwoman eats a little bit more than usual (given the need to nourish the unborn child), but her self-discipline when it comes to dainty portions means she has absolutely no weight to lose after she gives birth.  She looks with derision on Anglo-Saxon women who view pregnancy as a time to indulge themselves and then find themselves miserable when they find they have lots of surplus weight after having given birth, possibly suffering post-natal depression as a result of their weight gain, though I admit I would find it hard to avoid post-natal depression if I gained as much weight as Anglo-Saxon women do during pregnancy!  MDR!

I recall the Little Britain character Marjorie Dawes (one of the few British people with the good sense to realise the benefits of halving portions), who commented to two of the fatties at Fat Fighters who had gotten married and were expecting a baby that their decision to have a child was somewhat selfish, given that the child would be born with an addiction to food and would therefore have to go cold turkey.  As far as I know, an addiction to food is not heritable: - after all, my English-born mother was overweight before she began to spend time in France, yet here we are, both with very dainty figures.  However, if an addiction to food were heritable, I would whole-heartedly agree with Ms. Dawes' assertion that they were selfish.

In conclusion, I have absolutely no apprehension about what pregnancy will do to my impossibly dainty French figure.  I am not doing to do a Scarlett O'Hara and refuse to have any more children on account of such fears, knowing that continuing to eat dainty portions, rather than birth control, will preserve my impossibly perfect and dainty French figure.

Visiting Mali

As some of you, my readers, might have deduced, I was keen to visit Mali at some point.  I wanted to visit Mali and Bilal's family and generally experience the environment that has made him the man he is today.  This is the reason why I have not posted for quite a while now.

Our journey commenced at Marseille-St. Charles station.  Marseille has very good connections to Charles de Gaulle Airport via the high-speed lines, with the trains leaving the main route shortly before Paris and entering the LGV Interconnection Est.  Given François Hollande's very high taxes, I feel the need to pursue cheap train fares where this option is available (hey, some sacrifices are sometimes needed if one wants two penthouses and eat only the highest quality food!) and I was delighted that Bilal and I managed to find cheap idTGV fares between Marseille-St. Charles and Charles de Gaulle-TGV stations.  Vive la France! From there, we took a flight to Bamako, the capital of Mali.  We could have flown onwards to Mopti, but Bilal wanted to show me Bamako first and we figured that car rental choices would be better there.  I rarely seem to travel by car, but in Mali, it turned out to be necessary: - we didn't have enough time for travel by camel to be practical.  Even though I, as an impossibly dainty Frenchwoman, love to walk everywhere, the distances were too great to be practical.  Tee hee!

Another reason for hiring a car was that some members of Bilal's family met us at the airport.  Even though I am able and willing to walk long distances, the relatives who met us were not!  We needed the car in order to have the flexibility of visiting relatives of his in different parts of the country.  I said Bilal comes from the Timbuktu area, which is true, but the definition of the word "near" is somewhat flexible here!  The word "near" could mean several hundred kilometres in a vast and empty nation like Mali!  MDR.  Being a Touareg, the question of where he comes from is somewhat nebulous.  However, the specific town he is most associated with is Douentza.  Douentza has an airport, but we had no success in finding information out about flights there anyway.  Douentza is quite small, with a population of only about 20,000, but they seemed very hospitable, even if they are under the yoke of Islam.  Douentza sits in the middle of nowhere in between two beautiful mountainous areas.

I always viewed Bilal as being very athletic and rugged, but I was in for a shock when we went into these mountainous areas!  Training as a herdsman began for Bilal at the age of approximately three to four years, in line with tuareg custom.  Various people in La Savine are pseudo-tough, as are some people in the dodgy Paris suburbs.  So too are the wiggers in various middle class areas of French cities!  If one wants to see tough, one should see what people who have been surrounded by gangland culture in La Savine and grown up as a herdsman in the harsh, unforgiving environment that Bilal grew up in!

As I have often said, Bilal is very much a hip-hop person, having grown up in La Savine.  When he speaks, his French is somewhere between a Marseille 'hood accent and a Malian accent.  When he is in France, it sounds more like the former, whereas during the trip to Mali, it sounded more like the latter.  Given that we were in Mali, he toned down his hip-hop vocabulary, knowing that people there would not understand words like "pineco", "darblé", "renoi", "rebeu", "racba" etc!  He was also easier to understand for me as well, as the gulf between Malian French and French French is much smaller than the gulf between La Savine hip-hop slang and French French!

Being the Impossibly Dainty French Woman, the thing that was most notable during the whole of the visit was the attention given to my weight.  In France, I am rightly admired for having a dainty figure, but various stupid people in Mali looked upon me with pity!  People were constantly asking me if my father did not feed me properly, to which I had to reply that I was earning my own income and that my impossibly dainty figure is something I consciously chose!  In Mali (and indeed many African nations), obesity is regarded as a sign of prosperity.  In France, we regard it as a sign of stupidity.  Luckily, Bilal was willing to be a dissenter and tell people around him that he simply did not find it attractive for a woman to be overweight.  Also, I found that there were a few relatively Westernised people in the larger cities (e.g. Bamako, the capital) who follow Western fashions and therefore know that being thin is attractive and a sign of sophistication.

Shopping for local attire was difficult, as the (relatively) high-quality clothing tended to be made for disgustingly obese women, whereas the clothing suitable for impossibly dainty women such as myself tended to be lower quality on the expectation of such people having lower incomes.  In the end, I just visited a local seamstress who made something for me, having taken my measurements.  I don't like dressing in a way that exposes large amounts of flesh, as I feel it is not befitting of a Christian woman and does not look attractive anyway.  However, on this trip, I felt it would be practical to cover even more of my flesh, given that the sun is very intense at this time of year in Mali.

Obviously, given that we weren't in France, the food was not of such good quality as I am accustomed to in France.  However, it wasn't as bad as in the Anglo-Saxon world!  MDR!  Taguella is a ubiquitous part of Touareg cuisine and tends to be made out of millet: - as I understand things, it can be made out of wheat, but fortunately for Bilal's bowels, this is relatively uncommon common in Douentza!  Millet porridge is very common as well: - it is relatively easy to grow millet in hot and dry climates.  People tend to eat sheep, goat and camel meat as and when their finances allow.  I got the right 'ump (said in a Cockney accent) when I found myself having to eat the latter, MDR.

As a result of the lower quality, it was inevitable that I would find myself eating more.  However, that wasn't a bad thing under the circumstances, as I was even more active than normal.  The reason for this is that I tended to accompany Bilal on his journeys to look after his family's livestock.  Just following him was exhausting enough!  However, being a quintessential Frenchwoman, I was well prepared.  As I have often mentioned, a Frenchwoman does not like to use lifts or escalators and prefers to use the stairs where possible.  I live in a penthouse in a tall and luxurious building near the Vieux Port in Marseille (which has a lift as a grudging concession to the wealthy and overweight foreigners who have bought flats there), so I am naturally used to such exercise!  My physical fitness attracted stares from puzzled locals, but who cares?  Anyway, I found that my dainty Frenchwoman portions were not enough for the physical exercise I was doing, so I found myself eating more, but I quickly burned the calories off, given the increased exercise.

As mentioned, although Douentza is the town Bilal is most associated with, he does not have an overwhelming association with one town, given that he is a Touareg and the Touareg people often live a nomadic lifestyle.  Douentza is at the edge of the zone inhabited by the Touareg peoples.  Douentza is on the edge of the Pays Dogon (Dogon Country), which is primarily inhabited by, yes you guessed it, the Dogon people.  The Pays Dogon is an absolutely beautiful mountainous and historic area.  There are lots of historic Tellem granary buildings everywhere and I am told the environment is a lush and green one (Bilal and I were there towards the end of the dry season).

Timbuktu was also another region we visited.  The mosques there were the main architectural attraction in terms of their historic value.  They are completely devoid of spiritual beauty, being mosques, but they abounded in architectural and historical beauty, particular the Djinguereber Masjid.  Bilal took me to see some relatives there and again, they asked me if my father was starving me and again, I had to explain that being slim is a sign of sophistication and being fat is a sign of stupidity.

One thing that was noticeably different was Bilal's temperament.  He often has a facial expression (often obscured by a hooded top or a chèche) that looks rather wistful, as if he is homesick.  I have never visited his home in La Savine, so I don't know if it is absent there, but it was noticeably absent in Mali.  Granted, believers should not feel entirely at home anywhere on earth, as they are looking towards the future in their celestial abode and Bilal is delighted to be in church on Sundays, but he still seems to feel as though he is out-of-place when he is in middle-class areas of Marseille.  He is normally painfully shy, but during the trip, he was noticeably different.  He was unusually inclined to start conversations with others and he was not avoiding conversations with monosyllabic answers as he normally does.  Whatever is most normal for him, I adore him, I was glad to see part of the other country that has gone into making him the man he is today and I can't wait till he makes a proposal of marriage.