My daughter, Mary, is in France for the summer. One of her professors in the French department at Brigham Young University has developed a relationship with Les petits frères des Pauvres, a benevolent charity founded by Armand Marquiset in 1946. She has spent the last 2 months in Toulon, a navy town in Provence near Marseilles, hosted by this organization. When Marquiset was a young aristocrat, partying the weekends away in his Normandy villa, his grandmother came to visit him and disapproved of his behavior saying, "Mais mon pauvre Armand, si tu continues comme ça, tu vas mourir dans la misère". (But my poor Armand, if you continue living this way, you will die in misery.) Later, she established her own charity for parents whose sons died during World War 1, setting an example for her grandson who dedicated his life to the less fortunate.
An advertisement for Les petits frères des Pauvres
Today, the charity functions mostly to help the elderly who may be without family or friends during periods of extreme heat or cold or at Christmas time. Mary has also helped provide opportunites to take day trips, go to concerts, play games and learn new hobbies like knitting and photography. It's been an immensely rewarding opportunity for her. She's documented some of her experiences here.