United with Paris
Dear Jean-Claude, Fay, Pascale, Andre, and all Granville friends,
I write this with tears in my eyes but steel in my heart. I hope you understand the depth of feeling and brotherhood which we feel towards our French friends. I have returned home late this evening after visiting Sherborne friends.
On a night when England are playing France in a sporting fixture, I would normally search the web to discover if we have won or lost against our great rivals. But tonight, as soon as I returned home, I wanted to know whether the crowd at Wembley had honoured our friendship with a public display of solidarity with the French people. And so I read reports on several sites about the outpouring of emotion in support of Paris and the determination to defeat terrorism. It was only much later that I read about the result on the football field which is so trivial in the context of the atrocity Paris has suffered.
It is people in Paris who are mourning the loss of their loved ones, and our thoughts are with them; but the attacks were aimed at democracy and the liberties which we all hold dear. We are with you in a determination to resist the evil which promoted such hatred, and we are with you in maintaining hope for a better future for our children and grandchildren.
I send love from Margaret and me,
Mike Balfour.
Granville Douzelage 