Comments on: One Person’s Trash is Another Person’s Tumor – 21 Tips to Take Action Against the Problem in France

By: brook boatwright

brook boatwright — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:02:45 +0000

i hate people when they dont recycl??????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

By: brook boatwright

brook boatwright — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:02:01 +0000

i dont like it when people dont recycle!!!!????

By: ptinfrance

ptinfrance — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 18:16:45 +0000

thanks, frog!!

By: Frog in L.A.

Frog in L.A. — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 22:12:58 +0000

From time to time, I include L.A. vignettes in my family newsletter. I’ll email them to you, so check for some FroginLA yahoo.fr posts!

By: ptinfrance

ptinfrance — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 12:28:21 +0000

well, i hope you restart your blog. i’m sort of dying to know your thoughts about l.a. i mean it’s so huge and there are so many different communities and personalities and places. but i understand your feelings about being exposed. (that’s why i mainly write about my observations of FRANCE, and not really too much about me. france is way more interesting, in any case

By: Frog in L.A.

Frog in L.A. — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 03:01:00 +0000

Frog but no blog. I started one, but I was not posting anything worthy, somehow I felt too “exposed” (I’ve been toying with the idea of restarting it though). I already write a weekly newsletter about my Tintin en Amérique life, which I send to family and friends, and right now it seems enough. But who knows…

By: ptinfrance

ptinfrance — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 06:45:15 +0000

frog, do you have a blog? hey, that rhymes! it’s funny that you live in l.a., where i grew up. i’d love to hear the observations of the wild, wild weird and wonderful world of l.a. from a french person.

By: Frog in L.A.

Frog in L.A. — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 00:08:41 +0000

Your comment is very interesting. Europe is often accused by America of being too feminine, ie. “holistic”, vs. America which is often perceived in Europe as being too masculine, ie. “macho” (I’m obviously caricaturing here). I think it’s historical as much as cultural: Europe has been living with, and fighting each other, for centuries… that creates bounds! America has the culture of the next frontier, my plot, my land, my rifle, get off my turf. None is better than the other, though it helps to acknowledge the difference.

Please don’t get me wrong: I love my life in the States, where you can truly reinvent yourself (incredibly difficult if not possible in psycho-rigid France). But one cannot be an expat without developing a critical view, including on one’ sown country

Btw… I love your blog, discovered through the Paris Blog. Merci de me donner des vignettes intelligentes de ma chère France!

By: ptinfrance

ptinfrance — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 19:17:44 +0000

that’s so true and you can observe that with many cultural differences because of the space issue. it’s interesting but usually makes me realize that the cultural difference on the american side is way more selfish, just like a commenter was saying about a post i did about the b&b owners saying that americans were slobs. the french commenter said that she thought that was because of how americans see hotels/b&b rooms as “their” space so they don’t feel the need to be tidy, unlike europeans, who feel that they are in someone else’s space and should take that into consideration. i don’t think i’m inconsiderate at hotels (i usually try to leave rooms clean and neat) but i CAN be a slob at home

By: Frog in L.A.

Frog in L.A. — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 15:53:58 +0000

It’s true that Europe is so much smaller comparatively that there’s more “interconnection”: people are more aware of how they affect others, or are affected by them.

By: ptinfrance

ptinfrance — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 06:30:51 +0000

yeah, scary weird things like that are happening everywhere. people who were previously sterile, will move to a place, say like LAS VEGAS, then get pregnant. and have a kid with congenital problems. (i personally know who that happened to) oh man, pb, that is sad if you well water was contaminated but your instincts may be correct: where DID that guy put his old motor oil? and where DID the leaked gas go? many people do not take that to be properly disposed of.

oh yes, the americans i think are the biggest trash makers on earth. i know! i used to be one of them though, they do sort in many of the communities in l.a. and northern california has been very earth-friendly for decades now. i suppose it’s not a priority because there’s some more space in the u.s. to put trash; it’s bigger. but in france, they’re running out of the little space they had to begin with – the problem is more immediate. you’re right frog, the trash issue is becoming more and more important here. i mean, when they start airing commercials about trying to get people to reduce the amount of trash, that’s getting serious.

By: Frog in L.A.

Frog in L.A. — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 03:34:00 +0000

Great post, thanks! Yes, the French generate trash, like any country. But certainly not as much as the Americans, I can tell you that for living here. At least there is an awareness about the problem in France/Europe, and you’re not treated like a tree-hugging liberal goofball for raising it — there’s in fact a political commitment against it.

By: PretzelBug

PretzelBug — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 02:29:28 +0000

Very scary, especially considering the Chernobyl connection.
The state where I used to live – Massachusetts – had a couple of clusters where cancers were above the norm. The movie “A Civil Action” is about one of those, and I work with a woman who lived in another, and everyone in her family has had a cancer of some sort. I don’t know what to blame my leukemia on, but we had our water well in the front yard, and the teenaged boy next door was always taking apart his car in one manner or another. My instinct tells me it might’ve been from a gas additive known to be toxic leaching into the well water when any of the gas leaked out of his car.