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INSIDE FRANCE

Inside France: Communist cooking tips, scheming politicians and famous pharmacies

From ambitious politicians to unsung town planners, via some very excited Americans in French pharmacies, our weekly newsletter Inside France looks at what we have been talking about in France this week.

Published: 19 August 2023 10:28 CEST
Inside France: Communist cooking tips, scheming politicians and famous pharmacies
Photo by RODGER BOSCH / AFP

Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

Manoeuvres en vacances 

Most of France’s politicians are now on holiday, and many of them are posting ‘holiday snaps’ on their social media intended to reinforce their political image. My favourite is Communist leader Fabien Roussel posting cooking videos from his camping holiday.

 
 
 
 
 
View this post on Instagram
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Fabien Roussel (@fabien_roussel)

But one politician who appears not to need a break is Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, who used the quiet period to give an interview to Le Figaro that many saw as declaring his intention to stand for president in 2027.

The question of who will be the centrist candidate at the next presidential election – since Emmanuel Macron cannot stand again – is increasingly preoccupying the political classes, especially the question of picking someone who can defeat Marine Le Pen.

A hardliner who is definitely to the right of Macron’s party, Darmanin is increasingly trying to play Le Pen at her own game on topics such as immigration and crime. He’s also secured the backing of interior-minister-turned-president Nicolas Sarkozy.

Profile: France’s tough-talking interior minister with an eye on the top job

Town planning

As an out-and-proud francophile, I always enjoy watching visitors fall in love with France, but one trend that has become apparent in recent years is tourists (especially Brits and Americans) discovering how much nicer cities are when cars are not allowed to take over.

Traffic management and town planning are not sexy subjects, but they make an enormous difference to the everyday lives of visitors and locals alike – as witnessed by Paris’ bike revolution and excited predictions that it is ‘the new Amsterdam’ (not quite, but it’s moving in that direction).

The other thing that visitors to France apparently love is pharmacies, if the latest TikTok craze is anything to go by. There are some truly adorable videos of Americans getting very excited by the range on offer in pharmacies in Paris.

@elizabethvictoriaclark come to the iconic french pharmacy CityPharma in Paris with me – aka heaven on earth. Will do a haul next. #frenchpharmacy #a313 #biafine #frenchbeauty ♬ Shooting Stars – Bag Raiders

I’ve found myself spending a lot more time browsing in pharmacies since moving to France – although I just assumed that was because I’m now middle-aged!

A vos marques, prêt . . .

Water quality monitoring is also not a sexy subject – but thanks to the work of some of these unsung heroes, Paris hosted its first open-water swimming event in the Seine on Thursday.

The race was part of the test events in the river ahead of next year’s Olympics when the plan is to hold the open-water swimming events in the city-centre parts of the Seine. After that, river swimming will be opened up to the general public for the first time in more than 100 years.

Swimming in the river has been banned since 1923 because the levels of pollution made it unsafe.

Quiz of the week 

In most countries if you want to become a citizen, you need to take a written test on the history, geography and politics of the country.

France, however, eschews a written test in favour of an in-person interview at your local préfecture in which you are grilled about France and its values.

READ ALSO Cheese to philosophy: What you are likely to be asked in the French citizenship interview

That doesn’t stop news organisations from putting together ‘citizenship quizzes’ based on what interviewers are likely to ask – this week there’s a new (and hard) one from French newspaper Le Parisien, which obviously is in French. The Local has its own version in English here. 

Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

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INSIDE FRANCE

Inside France: French lose the plot, sports stars speak out and Paris prices fall

From the latest on the increasingly crazy French elections to the powers of a president, the influence of sports stars and the lustre of the Olympics, our weekly newsletter Inside France looks at what we have been talking about in France this week.

Published: 22 June 2024 10:54 CEST
Inside France: French lose the plot, sports stars speak out and Paris prices fall

Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

Losing the plot?

Welcome to another crazy week in French politics – I’m not saying that this election is getting to me, but the other night I dreamed I was having an argument with far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon. I think I need a holiday.

France might need a holiday too – the political discourse is getting increasingly wild, leading to our columnist John Lichfield to declare that the country has “taken leave of its senses”. 

Latest polling suggests that Marine Le Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National party would take the biggest vote share at 33 percent, followed by the increasingly fragile leftist coalition Nouveau Front Populaire with 29 percent and then Emmanuel Macron’s centrist group with 22 percent. Those figures would give none of the blocks an overall majority, instead leading to a total parliamentary deadlock.

French election breakdown: All the latest from the campaign trail

Earlier this week ‘Article 16 of the constitution’ was trending on French Twitter; this is the one that lays out the powers afforded to the president versus the prime minister, as people tried to work out what – if any – decisions Macron would be able to take in the final three years of his mandate.

READ ALSO: What does a French prime minister actually do

The satirical magazine Le Canard Enchâiné perhaps sums it up best in its cartoon, showing a man about to shoot himself in the head with a gun labelled ‘Rassemblement National’ and saying “We never tried this before”.

The Canard Enchainé’s cartoon as posted on Instagram

Sports stars engaged

On a more positive note, it’s been nice to see France’s biggest sports stars use their platforms to encourage people to vote, and speaking out against hatred and intolerance and in favour of diversity and inclusion.

I could not disagree more with the Spain goalkeeper Unai Simon, who criticised Kylian Mbappé’s call for people to vote against the far right, saying that footballers should “leave politics to other people”.

The whole point of living in a democracy is that politics belongs to everybody. As Mbappé said: “The Euros are very important in our careers, but first and foremost we are citizens and I don’t think we can be disconnected from the world around us.”

And I admit I’m biased about this – I’ve been a fan ever since I saw him make his professional debut at the age of 18 in my then-hometown of Castres – but I was also pleased to see French rugby legend Antoine Dupont taking a stand on another social issue, appearing on the front cover of LGBTQ magazine Têtu to decry homophobia (although the cover photo did rather make him look like he had forgotten his shades and was squinting into bright sunlight).

Talking France

We of course discuss all the election latest with John Lichfield in the latest episode of the Talking France podcast – and in what was perhaps linked to my need for a holiday we’re also discussing places to visit in France this summer.

Amid warnings of over-tourism we’re taking a look at the places predicted to be most crowded this summer – and suggesting some alternatives. Listen here or on the link below.

Fun and Games

It was thought that people might avoid Paris this summer – but the combination of good deals on the Olympic ticket resale site plus travel and accommodation costs dropping back to seasonal norms has seen a flurry of people booking a last-minute trip to the Games.

Personally I always thought the ‘everyone fleeing the capital’ narrative was a little over-played, but it’s been interesting to see that attempted price-gouging has also largely failed – at the start of the year there were Airbnb listings for frankly insane prices (I saw one that was €7,000 for two weeks), while now costs are largely at the summer average.

Paris travel deals to take advantage of as prices fall ahead of Olympics

Wrestling 

If you’re a Games fan I highly recommend the temporary exhibition at Paris’ Musée de l’histoire de l’immigration (a strong contender for the capital’s best museum, in my opinion) on the history of Olympics and their politics.

It also includes this statue which we’re told depicts ‘wrestling’ at the Olympics in antiquity. If you say so . . .

Photo: The Local

Inside France is our weekly look at some of the news, talking points and gossip in France that you might not have heard about. It’s published each Saturday and members can receive it directly to their inbox, by going to their newsletter preferences or adding their email to the sign-up box in this article.

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