Sign our “Petition for the USA to become a member state of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.” There’s a francophile treat waiting for you after you sign!
French stores won’t open on Sundays any time soon
When the First Lady went shopping in Paris, France last year, several boutiques stayed open on Sunday specifically for her.
(It’s not a religious thing. It’s to guarantee that workers are not exploited and have time off to be with their families.)
via Huffington Post, image NYDailyNews
Paris tourism hotspots (of the non-wifi kind)
Geotagged Flickr photos used to determine where in several major cities the locals take their pics and where the tourists do. Paris above (of course).
via Boing Boing.
Québecois director, 21, makes an impression at Cannes – again
Xavier Dolan’s career erupted out of nowhere last year in Cannes with the triumph of his award-winning first feature, I Killed My Mother, which premiered in the Directors’ Fortnight sidebar. Now, just a year later, he is back with a second feature, Les Amours imaginaires…
via Macleans.ca
Hexadecimal colors of the French flag
The official HTML colors for the French flag are #0055A4 (bleu), #FFFFFF (blanc) and #EF4135 (rouge). More flag trivia.
The unique feminist protests of “La Barbe”
Visit the site of La Barbe to see more videos of their silent, bearded protests in male-dominated settings. Pretty powerful.
via BusinessWeek
For sale by owner (France)
The properties in question include chateaux, such as one in Thonon-les-Bains built in 1800 and perched on the shore of Lake Geneva at the foot of the Alps. Another is a royal hunting lodge and guest house built the century before in the Saint-Germain-en-Laye forest west of Paris. “Buildings unoccupied for many years. Needs restoration,” reads the government’s listing for that property.
Hip Hop in francophone Africa podcast
We explore the current pop music of Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire, two countries where elements of hip-hop and international pop music have grafted themselves onto local styles to create whole new genres…
Quebec’s “depanneur” a different kind of fixer
I’d never heard the term depanneur before my first visit to Quebec nearly a decade ago. Called dep for short, it’s simply a convenience store that sells cigarettes, beer, wine, lotto tickets and groceries.
via Closet Canuck : O Canada!, image lalyphotos in Flickr group depanneurs
“Scholars” didn’t know they had a Descartes letter in their library
A letter by 17th century French philosopher Rene Descartes that languished unnoticed in a U.S. college library for more than a century has been restored to France.
Louis XX (what?) gets an heir and a spare…
Their father, the Duc d’Anjou, is Head of the House of Bourbon and senior male heir of Louis XIV and of the ancient Capetian dynasty. These new-born Sons of France, the Dukes of Burgundy and Berry, are the 33rd generation from Hugh Capet, King of France from 987 to 996.
(There really are some français who still buy into this nonsense.) Vive la République !
via Telegraph Blogs
There was a lot more to Josephine Baker than a banana skirt
…Baker served as a dedicated member of the French resistance during World War II: her undercover work apparently included smuggling secret messages written on her music sheets. The French government eventually awarded her the prestigious Chevalier of the Legion of Honor award for her hard work and dedication.
via Huffington Post
Frenchman building a château replica in Arkansas
For $12 a pop, visitors can stroll the grounds of the Ozark Medieval Fortress and see a stone castle being built using only tools, materials and techniques that existed in the Middle Ages.
It’s a replica of a 13th-century château in the Massif Central.
via NPR, image France-Amérique