MPS is lucky enough to be travelling in Provence at the moment.
As a visitor to France it is hard to get a reading of the pulse of the country, but certainly comment is made about the economy and employment difficulties.
Roger Cohen, op-ed writer for the IHT, writes about the French malaise in his latest column:
"Nothing surprises, nothing shocks (especially in the realm of marriage and sex), and nothing, really, disappoints. Far from morose, the French attitude has a bracing frankness. No nation has a more emphatic shrug. No nation is the object of so much romanticism yet so unromantic itself. No nation internalizes as completely the notion that in the end we are all dead.
Now, it is true that France lives with high unemployment in a depressed euro zone; that it is more vassal than partner to Germany these days; that it is chronically divided between a world-class private sector and a vast state sector of grumpy functionaries; that its universalist illusions have faded as its power diminishes; and that its welfare state is unaffordable.
Still, moroseness is a foible in a country with superb medicine, good education, immense beauty, the only wine worth drinking, an army that does the business in Mali, strong families and the earthy wisdom of “la France profonde.”
Malaise and ennui are to France what can-do is to America: A badge of honor.
My daughter Jessica married into a French family, many of whom live in that region of strange, blustery beauty, the Camargue. Emile Trazic, my son-in-law’s uncle, has a farm here where he raises bulls and horses. Having lived near Nîmes, in an area “where even snakes die of thirst,” he was drawn to the watery flatlands of the Camargue.
I went to see Trazic recently for a long lunch. He lives alone, his wife 50 miles away: simpler like that. He has little time for ecologists — “All these people who love nature and know nothing about nature.” He says, “I love the land, I hate folklore.” His advice: “If you want to ruin somebody’s life, give him a bull.” Further counsel: “A leant horse is a sold horse.” His deepest conviction, “Dans la vie il ne faut pas s’emmerder” — roughly (and slightly less crudely) “In life, don’t take any crap.” His father always told him, “The make of the bicycle does not matter, just pedal.” And he has.
Trazic served a vile fermented cheese called “Cachat.” To make it, take all your leftover cheese, crush it, add olive oil, cognac, bay leaves, thyme, and seal it in a jar for about a year. The stench is staggering, the secret of eating it to take very little. “It’s stronger than any antibiotic, cures anything,” he said.
Even malaise? No, that is incurable, too dear to the French to be given up. Voltaire, on his deathbed, was asked to renounce Satan and embrace God. He declined, saying this was “no time to be making new enemies.”
Better to be miserable than a hypocrite, nauseated than naive — and far better to be morose than a fool."
As a visitor to France it is hard to get a reading of the pulse of the country, but certainly comment is made about the economy and employment difficulties.
Roger Cohen, op-ed writer for the IHT, writes about the French malaise in his latest column:
"Nothing surprises, nothing shocks (especially in the realm of marriage and sex), and nothing, really, disappoints. Far from morose, the French attitude has a bracing frankness. No nation has a more emphatic shrug. No nation is the object of so much romanticism yet so unromantic itself. No nation internalizes as completely the notion that in the end we are all dead.
Now, it is true that France lives with high unemployment in a depressed euro zone; that it is more vassal than partner to Germany these days; that it is chronically divided between a world-class private sector and a vast state sector of grumpy functionaries; that its universalist illusions have faded as its power diminishes; and that its welfare state is unaffordable.
Still, moroseness is a foible in a country with superb medicine, good education, immense beauty, the only wine worth drinking, an army that does the business in Mali, strong families and the earthy wisdom of “la France profonde.”
Malaise and ennui are to France what can-do is to America: A badge of honor.
My daughter Jessica married into a French family, many of whom live in that region of strange, blustery beauty, the Camargue. Emile Trazic, my son-in-law’s uncle, has a farm here where he raises bulls and horses. Having lived near Nîmes, in an area “where even snakes die of thirst,” he was drawn to the watery flatlands of the Camargue.
I went to see Trazic recently for a long lunch. He lives alone, his wife 50 miles away: simpler like that. He has little time for ecologists — “All these people who love nature and know nothing about nature.” He says, “I love the land, I hate folklore.” His advice: “If you want to ruin somebody’s life, give him a bull.” Further counsel: “A leant horse is a sold horse.” His deepest conviction, “Dans la vie il ne faut pas s’emmerder” — roughly (and slightly less crudely) “In life, don’t take any crap.” His father always told him, “The make of the bicycle does not matter, just pedal.” And he has.
Trazic served a vile fermented cheese called “Cachat.” To make it, take all your leftover cheese, crush it, add olive oil, cognac, bay leaves, thyme, and seal it in a jar for about a year. The stench is staggering, the secret of eating it to take very little. “It’s stronger than any antibiotic, cures anything,” he said.
Even malaise? No, that is incurable, too dear to the French to be given up. Voltaire, on his deathbed, was asked to renounce Satan and embrace God. He declined, saying this was “no time to be making new enemies.”
Better to be miserable than a hypocrite, nauseated than naive — and far better to be morose than a fool."
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