The Battle of the Limes of Yonne
In the Yonne département (Burgundy region, 89), an epic three year battle pitting a scarabée of protected habitat against officialdom, ecologists, a 300-year-old avenue of tottering limes, and the exasperated châtelaine of the Tanlay heritage site, has ended in victory for… a species of hermit beetle that may not actually be there. The tale caused [...]
Manga Makes Château Le Puy a Bestseller
Bordeaux winemaker Jean-Pierre Amoreau, 72 , the unassuming owner of Château Le Puy, an estate run by his family for 400 years, has become a manga hero and a celebrity in Japan despite himself. Still heading the business at the family’s 25 hectare vineyard, with its Côtes de Francs appellation, he has, without warning found [...]
Satellite Tracks Toulouse Dog Poop
You thought GPS was for mis-guiding you down dusty byways to the wrong gite in rural France, well think again. In Toulouse GPS is for tracking unscooped dog poop – all 455,000 shovels full! Pierre Cohen, the Socialist mayor of Toulouse – leader of high-tech cities in France – has unveiled his latest weapon for [...]
Languedoc Opposes 180 Wind Turbines
The State and EDF-Energies Nouvelles (a subsidiary of the national energy utility) want to plant 180 wind turbines in the sea between Cap d’Agde and Gruissan off the Languedoc-Roussillon coast and the locals are up in arms. Why you may ask is France — world leader in nuclear energy — so keen on hugely expensive [...]
Might France be Right on the Roma?
“Sarkoleon Bonapartheid” is what his detractors now call the French president, even though in a recent poll, 69% of those asked, support his policy of expelling illegal immigrants who just happen to be Roma gipsies. Unpleasant and outrageous insults are flying around the chancelleries of Europe, the European bien pensant are furious, President Sarkozy and [...]
Ban on full face veils passes Senate
The upper house (senate) of the Assemblée Nationale has approved a bill “prohibiting the concealment of the face in public space” a measure which, while avoiding the terms, is clearly aimed at foreign forms of dress such as burqas or niqabs. The law comes into force from Spring 2011, after a period of reflection and [...]
Chabrol – giant of the New Wave – dies at 80
“Bon vivant”, “mainstream”, “Nouvelle Vague” the praise singers were in full flow as France mourned the passing, September 12, of Claude Chabrol, a giant of national cinema and a man, who even at 80, had to be prised from his producer’s chair at the end. “Claude Chabrol died yesterday aged 80, after giving French cinema [...]
Halal – France’s Future Nouvelle Cuisine?
France’s new self-styled “beurgeois, (from slang for Arab) — or halal gourmets, as the New York Times recently described them — are entrepreneurs changing the image of halal food from its earlier associations with grubby immigrant street markets, into a multi-million-euro business. But Halal is not brand neutral. It carries a health warning and as [...]
In France e-Bay is in the Streets – all Summer
Vide-greniers and Brocantes mushroom all summer long in towns, villages and hamlets across France, and are so-well organised, a national guide is published a year in advance. Long before the internet and e-Bay’s electronic alternatives, flea markets, car boot, jumble and bric-a-brac sales were and remain, a source of pin money for students and pensioners, [...]
Rentrée hot on Pensions, Burqas and Roma
Will the streets bring down France’s reformist president? Unlikely, but Nicholas Sarkozy’s plan for a burqa ban might not survive a rentrée piquante. The latest menu of popular discontent resembles an expensive restaurant’s overdone wine list, led by teachers on a two-day strike only hours after regaining their classrooms post-summer, and SNCF staff determined to [...]
Germ ‘warfare’ hits CRS Riot Police
Forty-eight anti-riot CRS police have thrown a sickie and declared themselves to be unfit for work, after an ‘epidemic outbreak of deep malaise’ in the Carcassonne barracks. The southern–based CRS 57 Compagnie Républicaine se Sécurité complains about massive performance-related pressures, unresponsive and insensitive management by the Company’s commanders and la bâtonite or “batonitis” – an [...]
Deauville Debut Films Dominate
Debut Films Dominate Competition Of the 100 films being showcased at the 36th Deauville American Film Festival, 12 will be in competition. Of the films in competition, no fewer than seven will be first time features. The Festival is an event open to all, film professionals or film fans alike. If you would like to [...]
