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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 1, 2019 18:14:18 GMT
Today is the 20th anniversary of the euro currency, although we had to wait 3 years more for the coins and banknotes to appear. But I started writing cheques in euros immediately, which annoyed so many people.
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Post by Kimby on Jan 1, 2019 18:33:57 GMT
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 1, 2019 19:33:05 GMT
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Post by questa on Jan 1, 2019 23:08:34 GMT
Don't get too excited, there is still plenty of slavery going on. Bonded labour keeps families and children owned by masters for generations, women and boys are traded for sex slavery with little hope of escape. In my own country there are incidents of illegal migrants being kept in locked sheds to work on farms. Even if they are legal workers they are treated like slaves with no access to their passports or consulates.
The fight for freedom is not over just because names have been inscribed on papers. Slavery has just gone underground.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 2, 2019 4:56:55 GMT
Yes, even in France there are enslaved Chinese women, often forced into prostitution by their "handlers."
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Post by Kimby on Jan 2, 2019 5:42:58 GMT
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Post by patricklondon on Jan 2, 2019 6:33:15 GMT
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Post by questa on Jan 2, 2019 8:33:58 GMT
Not our Mossie! As Mae West remarked, he is "As pure as the driven slush."
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Post by questa on Jan 2, 2019 8:39:06 GMT
Belated thank you to Questa, both for noticing my greeting and for her always generous wishes to a And thank you for the 'hopes and dreams' wishes. I just hope that K2's dreams don't come true...at least his sleeping ones.
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Post by mossie on Jan 2, 2019 12:12:27 GMT
Patrick, Questa has it right. My list is empty
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Post by casimira on Jan 6, 2019 19:57:01 GMT
TWELFTH NIGHT !!!!!!!!!!!!
Celebrations all over the city and beyond.
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Post by lagatta on Jan 6, 2019 20:41:20 GMT
Joyeuse Fête des rois, casimira! On our radio in-depth news programme, we got a jazz-filled report from New Orleans celebrating how you party down there - and more serious issues such as the impact of Jim Crow on Creole society... and its musical culture.
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Post by casimira on Jan 6, 2019 22:33:45 GMT
Merci beaucoup Lagatta!
The radio program sounds cool. Good to know that NOLA culture is being disseminated abroad so to speak but no surprise from Montreal as we are "sister" cities of sorts.
One of the celebrations is the "Krewe D'Jeanne D'Arc" whose birthday falls on January 6th. Lots of medieval costumery and very cool papier mache decorations, riders on horseback and the like. It's their 10 or 11th year and is held in the French Quarter. It commences at the foot of a huge bronze gold gilt statue of the heroine/martyr in her pose on horseback rearing that was a gift to NOLA from France.
Every year or so since it's inception I say I'm going to go but we have our annual neighborhood celebration and I have noblesse oblige here.
We personally won't be celebrating as actively because my husband is still "under the weather" and unable to endure the degree of excess we normally would. So, it will be an early night for us unfortunately. (I have not contracted this awful cold with throat and cough and could/might stay out longer but feel a tad guilty if I do).
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Post by lagatta on Jan 6, 2019 23:18:26 GMT
Yes, it is a very good broadcast that usually manages to go beyond the stereotypes that are far too frequent in international press reports. I know the fellow on the left in the photo ici.radio-canada.ca/premiere/emissions/desautels-le-dimanche/segments/entrevue/88057/30-annees-service-emission-actualite-dimanche-leo-kalinda Léo Kalinda, who is from Rwanda, quite well (sort of friendship of the 2nd degree, through mutual close friends). Now Mtl has a significant Haitian population, which ups our Créole quotient, and of course many other people from the Caribbean, French, Spanish and English speaking (not many Dutch, who go to the Netherlands). Yes, I was thinking of you and indeed thought that y'all wouldn't be up to your usual production. In Québec French there is a form - vous autres - that is similar to y'all and obviously to the Spanish vosotros. I don't know if that form is used anywhere in France. Vous autres is specifically plural and more familiar than formal. Formal French here uses the metropolitan forms, with some idiosyncrancies.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 7, 2019 4:05:25 GMT
Happy Reyes, y'all! I went to a king cake -- rosca de reyes -- party & got the baby. Well, one of the babies, as there were more in that cake than in a Romanian orphanage. Had to reach into a bag of folded pieces of paper to see what my "fine" would be. I got off lightly, as I only have to bring soft drinks to the Candelaria party.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 7, 2019 5:07:06 GMT
Fourth anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo killings.
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Post by lagatta on Jan 10, 2019 15:23:35 GMT
Yes, that was a lead news item here too. I'm only sorry that there weren't at least photos of the non-Charlie staff people who were murdered.
And how about Hyper-Cacher?
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Post by bjd on Jan 10, 2019 15:27:39 GMT
There was a small Hypercacher ceremony on the 7th and another more specific one in front of the supermarket yesterday, which was the anniversary of the killings there.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 10, 2019 17:07:57 GMT
And also a ceremony for the policewoman who was killed in Montrouge. Nobody was forgotten.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 21, 2019 8:16:35 GMT
On 21 January 1793, King Louis XVI lost his head.
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Post by bjd on Jan 21, 2019 10:21:50 GMT
I was wondering whether French monarchists still hold a rememberance ceremony on January 21st.
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Post by questa on Jan 21, 2019 12:50:21 GMT
It is always a good opportunity to catch up on my knitting...
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 21, 2019 15:22:55 GMT
I was wondering whether French monarchists still hold a rememberance ceremony on January 21st. Well, they will be able to hold a more personal one now, since Henri d'Orléans, the Count of Paris, one of the pretenders (excellent term) to the French throne, died today at age 85. This is the Orléans branch, obviously. The legitimist Bourbon branch will probably find reason to rejoice. Louis de Bourbon is polishing his crown and would become Louis XX. Let's not mention Jean-Christophe Napoléon, who is only 31 and would like to trump these other people by becoming emperor. He only comes to France once a year for the commemoration of the emperor's death. Meanwhile, Henri was born in Belgium and Louis was born in Spain, which kind of goes to show how welcome royalty is in France.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 21, 2019 18:05:58 GMT
It is always a good opportunity to catch up on my knitting.. Thanks for bringing up this question, Bjd, & to you, Kerouac, for answering. Ever since Spain reinstituted its monarchy -- someone I at least would have assumed impossible -- I've wondered how citizens of formerly monarchist countries feel about the institution.
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Post by bjd on Jan 21, 2019 19:47:54 GMT
Frankly, Bixa, I don't think most French people ever think about the monarchy. It certainly doesn't come up much in any conversations I have heard over the many years I have lived here. The yellow vests are not asking for a king to replace Macron.
And a French king would certainly not be as innocuous as the various bicycle-riding Scandinavians.
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Post by Kimby on Jan 29, 2019 2:33:43 GMT
“Go to throttle up!” And we all watched in horror as Space Shuttle Challenger blew up into little pieces, taking 7 lives including Schoolteacher in Space Christa McAuliffe. 1986. How time flies!
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Post by kerouac2 on Feb 4, 2019 7:17:39 GMT
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Post by questa on Feb 5, 2019 13:12:28 GMT
TV in Australia is full of news from Paris of a large fire in a Paris apartment block. So far there have been 10 people killed and 39 injured trying to jump to adjoining roof tops. 8 firefighters have been injured as well. 40 year old woman arrested being caught lighting more fires behind the building. The news here did not say where in Paris this was. Are you safe, kerouac, and any other Anyporters?
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Post by kerouac2 on Feb 5, 2019 14:16:12 GMT
Opposite corner of Paris.
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Post by bjd on Feb 5, 2019 15:40:52 GMT
Yes, the fire was in the 16th arrondissement, one of the fancy areas of Paris.
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