From wired:

“So you’ve decided to leave the comfort of your nerd-friendly lair and head out to explore the larger world. Perhaps a conference in Bangkok beckons, or maybe a Linux gathering in Europe. Even a trip with the family to some deserted isle?

Whatever the case, no self respecting geek goes globetrotting without preparation, research and a serious stash of appropriate gadgets. To save you from having to scour the net, here’s Wired’s guide to mastering the art of high tech travel.

Inspector Gadget

Here’s the first question: what gear should you bring? Furthermore, how do you keep it powered up and safe from harm and/or theft?

For full details on what you need to make sure all your gadgets have plenty (and the right kind) of electricity, check out our Stay Plugged In While Traveling guide. Once you have your power adapters in order, it’s worth asking which devices you should bring and which ones you can get by without.

Laptops

The laptop is tempting, and in many cases a must-have, especially if your destination is a conference or meet-up. But if you’re just traveling for pleasure, a good internet cafe is all you need. Going “topless” also spares you the added weight and hassle of lugging a computer around.

If you do have to bring your beloved portable, PACK A CABLE LOCK. This gives quite a piece of mind if you want to leave your hotel room for a dinner without having to worry that your hardware is gonna be missing when you get back.

The availability of internet cafes abroad varies, but generally speaking, they are not hard to come by unless you get well off the beaten tourist path. Do some searching and see what those who have already been to where you are going have found.

Tip: Mac users take note, you will almost always find Windows PCs in internet cafes.

Tip: A number of internet cafes have started banning USB sticks, which ruins your ability to Carry Your Desktop Anywhere with Portable Apps. The practice isn’t widespread enough to preclude carrying a USB stick, but you may encounter a few spots where your thumb drive is frowned upon. On the plus side, more and more have Firefox installed.

Tip: Bring a USB stick that is…”

Read more

From the guardian:

“Authorities in southern France fear a possible mosquito invasion in tourist resorts this summer and blame EU regulations which prevent them from using the most efficient insecticide.

For the first time since the early 1960s they cannot use temephos - a pesticide now banned by the European Union. Instead the EID says it is obliged to turn to a bacterium considered to be more environment-friendly, but which experts argue leaves little margin for error….”

Read more

From the guardian:

“Britain’s assault on French cookery has been stepped up by a Yorkshire bakery which has started exporting lorry-loads of baguettes across the Channel.
Fosters of Barnsley has used a legal loophole to beat local boulangers to a contract supplying the narrow loaves to the whole of the French railway system.

The order follows a double whammy for North of England butchers who stole Grand Prix d’Excellence awards earlier this year at Europe’s biggest black pudding contest in France. The Real Lancashire Pudding company went on to take two gold medals in the usually French and Belgian-dominated tasting organised by the Compagnons de la Gastronomie Porcine.

The baguette triumph, which has earned Fosters managing director, John Foster, the French media title of “most hated man in France”, is down to the firm’s expertise in making long-life loaves.
French local law forbids the use of fat which is key to the long-life process, Foster said yesterday, but competitors from elsewhere in the European Union can sidestep the ban, under European legislation. Building on the “rolling stock” order, the Barnsley bakery is now challenging the brioche market in France, using the same method.

“Their own bakers could give them a good product, but it didn’t fit the railway’s needs,” said Foster. “In Yorkshire we’ve a tradition of giving customers what they want. They asked for baguettes which don’t go stale and we said yes, we can do you them. We’re shipping the stuff out by the wagon-load.”

Foster said he had been surprised by the “cheek” of the mismatch between French and EU law but recognised a good sales opportunity.”

From yahoo:

“The French government will “suspend” the use of new software for recording the personal habits and affiliations of its citizens in a police database, following an outcry by civil rights groups.

But Synergie-Officiers supported storage of information about the race and religion of suspects and victims. In France some violent crimes attract tougher sentences if motivated by racial or religious hatred, and the union warned that if campaign groups want such hate crimes pursued more vigorously, then police need a way to identify the relevant information about attackers and victims during investigations.”

Tags: france, big+brother, privacy+threatened, software, civil+liberties

Michel Fournier is at it again. Remember two years ago? He dropped out of the stratosphere from an altitude of about 130,000 feet (40 kilometers, nearly 25 miles) above the plains of Saskatchewan, Canada. This year he hopes to do the same while breaking the sound barrier and breaking some more world records.

From AFP:

“64-year-old retired French army parachutist said Monday he hopes to smash through the sound barrier with a record-breaking 40,000-metre (130,000-foot) freefall jump over Canada next month.

Michel Fournier hopes to set four new world records at once: for highest freefall parachute speed, at 1,500 kilometres (2,400 miles) per hour, 1.3 times the speed of sound, along with fastest and highest jump and highest air balloon flight.

The Russian Evgeny Andreyev made the highest recorded parachute jump with a 24,483-metre plunge in 1960, while the American Joseph Kittinger claimed an unverified jump of 31,000 metres in 1960.

The veteran French parachutist will take off from May 25 from the Canadian province of Saskatchewan in a pressurised capsule, harnessed to a 161-metre helium-powered balloon, rising to almost four times the height of an airline flight.

Pressure will be let off gradually to allow him to exit and make his jump, wearing a specially-developed protective suit with two oxygen bottles, in conditions similar to an astronaut leaving his spacecraft.

Fournier told a press conference in Paris his jump would have “considerable repercussions for aeronautics and space, for medicine and high-technology.”

French astronaut Jean-Francois Clervoy, who is sponsoring the project, said it could help shed new light on the behaviour of the human body at the speed of sound, with potential applications for future rescue operations in space.

The French army piloted a similar project in the 1980s, aimed at developing an ejector capsule for European spacecraft, in which Fournier was due to take part before it was finally aborted.

With more than 8,600 jumps to his name, Fournier holds the French height record at 12,000 metres.

His project, which drew teams of specialists in high-altitude and underwater conditions, spacesuits and extreme condition health experts, cost 11.8 million euros (19 million dollars).”

From electronista:

“France-based Carrefour Group will launch a movie download service, the world’s second biggest retailer announced at the PEVE Digital Entertainment conference in Paris on Friday. The service will allow customers to buy movies or rent movies and rent TV programs. The Group already operates supermarkets, grocery stores and convenience stores that carry DVDs in Europe, and wants to expand its focus on entertainment, bringing it closer to customers.
Carrefour’s international non-food chief, Christophe Geoffroy, said the shopping experience would be simple and fast, with downloads taking about 3 minutes, suggesting a possible streaming experience. He went on to say video-on-demand market in Europe isn’t great, but is expected to grow. Some analysts predict Europe’s movie download market will be worth over about 690 Euros (over $1 billion) by 2011.

Carrefour isn’t the only or the first major retailer to seize the opportunity, as earlier this week, British retailer and grocer Tesco opened its own music and video site, with a larger focus on MP3 album and singles sales.

The group would continue to sell DVD videos at its current stores throughout France, Spain, Belgium and Italy, of which it has a 13.3% market share. Pricing for its downloads, nor a launch date, have yet been announced.”

Tags: france,, carrefour,, download+movies

From Michael Ruhlman:

“Eduardo Sousa, a farmer in the Extremadura region of Spain is, according to chef Dan Barber, raising geese that bear the best foie gras the chef’s tasted. The critical part of the story, though, is that Sousa does not force feed the geese. He apparently lets their inclination to gorge themselves, once required for migration, take care of the fattening and simply makes sure they have all they want—nuts, olives, etc., but no corn. This suggests of course that farmers who force feed their geese and ducks are simply controlling what the ducks would do naturally and that the folks who want to prohibit the production and sale of foie gras on the grounds of animal cruelty have one less leg to stand on.

I never thought they had any leg to stand on if they …”

Read the article

[via]

Tags: spain, best, foie+gras, food

From iht:

“Nearly a year into his term, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France has hardly mentioned the arts or culture. In late February, he said that French cuisine should be added to the Unesco World Heritage list.

Every French president since the Liberation has cooked up some such pharaonic new museum or opera house or library or initiated some legacy-minded cultural program, until now.

Sarkozy’s taste is said to be for…”

Full article

Tags: france, sarkozy, embarrassing, french+politics

From wwd:

“Make no mistake — Louis Vuitton is well-equipped for combat against counterfeiters.

Tonight, Vuitton is celebrating Takashi Murakami’s “© Murakami” exhibition with a “Brooklyn Ball” at the Brooklyn Museum featuring a special performance by Kanye West, the unveiling of a new camouflage print developed by Murakami and Marc Jacobs called Monogramouflage and a special installation designed to bring attention to one of the industry’s biggest travails — counterfeits.

But rather than simply hand out leaflets to alert guests about the importance of protecting original designs, the French luxury goods house will be taking a novel, somewhat intriguing route. Outside the museum, Vuitton is setting up 10 New York-style street vendors — not to sell fakes, but rather authentic Louis Vuitton product and special Monogramouflage canvases that Murakami has created specifically for the exhibition.

While it may seem lighthearted on the surface, the presentation is meant to underscore just how serious Vuitton executives are taking the counterfeit trade, and how diligently they are working to stop copycats from getting their merchandise to consumers.

“We always thought that counterfeit requires zero tolerance for several reasons,” Yves Carcelle, chairman and chief executive officer of Louis Vuitton, told WWD in an exclusive interview. “It’s a gray economy that escapes all rules of normal labor and normal economic rules and taxations, so it’s a bad thing for every state in the world. Secondly, it’s bad for any kind of creativity, research and development, because if you don’t protect intellectual property, why should people dedicate time and energy to create?”

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From counterpunch:

“Nicolas Sarkozy, allegedly the most Anglophile (or rather Americanophile) president of the 5th Republic failed his Science Po degree in the late 70s because his English was so poor that he was barred from sitting the politics exams. In the run up to the war in Iraq, the allegedly “Anti-American” Chirac was able to explain the French position in English before the US media, a small feat totally out of reach for the monolingual Sarkozy.

Sarkozy did not have to make small talk in English when he recently met the Queen in Windsor Castle since the British Monarch is fluent in French. On this occasion, some may have warned the Queen that Sarkozy’s French is generally most unceremonial: his crude crack at a person who refused to shake hands with him at a Paris farm show or the derogatory use of the “tu” form to address strangers (in the French context, not a cool way to behave, but rather a condescending or bossy one) have become Internet hits. Meeting youngsters from the banlieues a few months before his election, Sarko boasted to the kids: “I speak like you, I could be one of you”. “Bling-Bling Sarko” confuses familiarity with vulgarity. As one of his critics in the French media cruelly put it: Sarkozy is not small, but low.

Before Sarko, the Gaullist right was not quintessentially vulgar and anti-intellectual. Charles de Gaulle was a well-read man who had the good taste to choose André Malraux as Minister of Culture. Georges Pompidou was an Agrégé de lettres and a student at the Ecole Normale Supérieure. The apparently less highbrow Jacques Chirac is a great connoisseur of Japanese civilization (and, some cynics might like to add, of his banking system) [and leaves the splendid Branly museum as a monument, Editors]. Sarkozy breaks with the Gaullist tradition on that count: he is a self-professed idiot. To one of his advisers who suggested that he visit a museum during a trip in Madrid, Sarko replied: “The idiot thanks you!” (Le con te dit merci!). The ironic jibe fails to conceal Sarkozy’s deep insecurity with regard to the world of knowledge in general and to intellectuals in particular. Sarkozy admitted hating school and underachieved as a student. Recently, he was heard fuming in public against “those researchers who find nothing”.

(more…)

Those opposing the new Eiffel Tower “hat” can breathe a sigh of relief. The new hat for the Eiffel Tower is a No-Go. Not only that, it was never a GO, nor part of a design competition; it was never approved for restructuring the famous landmark. WHO invented THAT story??

From nyt:

“David Serero, principal of Serero Architects, said in a telephone interview that his firm’s proposal was merely a spontaneous design it had submitted to the Eiffel Tower management group in view of the tower’s approaching 120th anniversary and, he said, was neither a response to a design competition nor solicited by the tower’s management.

The Guardian’s Web site reported Monday that the Eiffel Tower’s management group, the Société d’Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel, had approved a temporary restructuring of the observation platform, which would alter the tower’s overall shape. After the report was picked up by other news organizations, the management group said that it had never solicited a redesign and that it envisaged no changes to the tower’s appearance.

Mr. Serero said his firm submitted unsolicited designs and put them on the Web, where they were later seen by news organizations.”

From AP:

“SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — At first listen, the grainy high-pitched warble doesn’t sound like much, but scientists say the French recording from 1860 is the oldest known recorded human voice.
The 10-second clip of a woman singing “Au Clair de la Lune,” taken from a so-called phonautogram, was recently discovered by audio historian David Giovannoni. The recording predates Thomas Edison’s “Mary had a little lamb” — previously credited as the oldest recorded voice — by 17 years.

The tune was captured using a phonautograph, a device created by Parisian inventor Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville that created visual recordings of sound waves.

Using a needle that moved in response to sound, the phonautograph etched sound waves into paper coated with soot from an oil lamp.

(more…)

From decanter:

“For the first time in their history, Paris pawn shops have agreed to take bottles of wine in exchange for cash.

More than 350 bottles with a total value of €60,000 (£45,000) have been pawned – inlcuding a €5,000 Domaine de la Romanee Conti.

The initiative was launched by Crédit Municipal de Paris, the local authority pawnshop - which usually deals in family heirlooms and pieces of jewellery - last week.

The wine is to be stored in the 18th-century cellars under the Crédit Municipal building…”

Read the whole article

[via]

From IHT:

“Bernard Kouchner, the foreign minister of France and a longtime humanitarian, diplomatic and political activist on the international scene, says that whoever succeeds President George W. Bush in the White House may restore something of America’s battered image and standing overseas, but “the magic is over.”

In a wide-ranging conversation Tuesday with Roger Cohen of the International Herald Tribune at the Forum for New Diplomacy in Paris, Kouchner also held out the eventual hope of talking with Hamas, the Palestinian movement that controls the Gaza Strip but has been ostracized by the West and by its Palestinian rival, Fatah.

Asked whether the United States could repair the damage it has suffered to its reputation during the Bush presidency and especially since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Kouchner replied, “It will never be as…”

Read the full article

From the belfasttelegraph:

“Saint Céneri could hardly be more French and yet its rich history has been shaped, for good and ill, by foreign missionaries and invaders. The small settlement, just within lower Normandy, was created in the seventh century by an Italian saint and hermit – Saint Céneri himself – who conjured up springs and parted the waters of rivers by pointing his stick. During the Hundred Years’ War, in 1434, the village castle was besieged for months and then demolished by 15,000 obstinate Englishmen.

After 561 uneventful years, the village fell, willingly this time, into the clutches of another foreigner – a Yorkshireman. For the past 13 years, Ken Tatham has been the mayor of Saint Céneri-le-Gérei, the only British mayor in France.

On Sunday week, 9 March, he is up for election for the third time. There are no opinion polls in Saint Céneri but Mr Tatham, 62, is likely to win by a miniature landslide.

How many voters would that mean exactly? Mr Tatham considers for a moment. “We have a population of 140, of whom 160 can vote,” he said. “This is just like Corsica, although you’d better not quote me saying that.”

Mr Tatham has lived in Saint Céneri for 38 years. He is married to a…”

Read the full article

From UPI:

“PELLEVOISIN, France, Jan. 20 (UPI) — Residents of a French village may turn down a $2 million bequest because they find conditions attached to it are unreasonable.

Helene Louart, who many village residents did not even realize was wealthy, left the money to the 900-person village of Pellevoisin in her will, The Sunday Observer reported. But before the local government can get a single franc, it would have to rename the Avenue de la Republique after Louart, hang her favorite paintings in the mayor’s office and sell her house only to people from Paris.

Perhaps the most controversial requirement is that a chunk of the money be spent on a housing project for the poor — a prospect many residents say would change the character of the town.

The long list of conditions led one resident to say the gift is really a form of revenge on the village, but more sympathetic townspeople said they believe Louart really intended to help the poor.”

From ENN:

It’s widely known that lead poisoning poses a threat to public health. The metal’s negative effect on the nervous system as well as its propensity to cause renal and cardiovascular diseases has promoted the FDA to continually lower the legal limit of lead content in paint, children’s toys, and playground substrate since the late 70’s.

In October ‘07, the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics released an alarming report, “A Poison Kiss,” on the lead content of lipstick. They found that more than half of the name brand lipsticks tested contained detectable levels of lead. France’s Largest Cosmetic company’s L’Oreal Colour Riche “True Red” topped the list at .65 ppm lead. Even Burt’s Bees Lip Shimmer Merlot contains lead (less than .1 ppm.) However, with a little bit of research and awareness, you can find safer (and environmentally friendly) lipsticks.

A French court ruled that Amazon.fr must stop its free delivery.

The court gave Amazon 10 days to start charging for the delivery of books, which should at least allow the company to maintain the offer through the end-of-year gift-giving season. After that, it must pay a fine of €1,000 (US$1,470) per day that it continues to offer free delivery. It must also pay €100,000 in compensation to the booksellers’ union.

Retail prices, particularly of books, are tightly regulated in France. (read the article from MacWorld)

A Sidenote: Amazon France offers books in English!

From IHT:

As one of eight children born to parents who came to France from a mining area in the south-east of Morocco, I grew up in a housing project near Valence, in the kind of high-rise blocks that everyone saw in the scenes of torched cars and street battles on television in the rioting in 2005 and again a few weeks ago. In both instances, the unrest was sparked by allegations of police harassment but exclusion and joblessness were also key factors.

The paradox is that the rioters, for all their alienation, behaved in a very French way. Like farmers and union members who go readily into the streets, they wanted to be listened to.

What is dangerous is that people have reached a point where they see violence as the sole way of calling attention to their misery and, while I am horrified at the violence, I understand the hopelessness and anger behind the riots.

You need to look at the realities of life in the tower blocks of the urban periphery. Here there are three basic sources of income: what was known in my family as “the fruit of your labor,” i.e. staying in school to get the education that would lead to earning a good living; relying on welfare benefits; or getting into the underground economy of drugs and crime.

There will always be people who slide into the last two alternatives. The real problem comes when working hard and getting qualifications doesn’t lead to being able to earn a decent living.

In the high-rise districts around Paris and other cities the figure for unemployed youth can be as high as 60 per cent, and it’s not just school-leavers with few or no qualifications who can’t land jobs. Moreover, many of the jobs that are available to young people, even highly skilled ones, tend to be short-term and poorly paid.

My family saw education as the path out of the ghetto. My father always said, “You are the needle and your brothers and sisters are the thread. If you succeed, your siblings will follow through, so get every qualification you can.”

My parents gave me the motivation and the discipline to work hard, and taught me to believe in the system. It was only when I graduated with three degrees in economics, and was turned down for every job I applied for, that I started having doubts. When I applied for graduate work, I was turned down. I was told that while I was well qualified for the course, I would never get a job afterwards as …..

Continue reading

From Cleantech:

“A prominent researcher shared a nuclear secret today that he said not even everyone in the U.S. Department of Energy knows.

Is the U.S., in fact, storing a large amount of nuclear waste produced by France’s nuclear reactors?

That was the suggestion in a keynote today at the ThinkEquity ThinkGreen conference in San Francisco by Dr. Yogi Goswami, former President of the International Solar Energy Society, and prolific author and University of Florida professor.

“One small bit of information that most people don’t know, even in our Department of Energy: a large majority of the nuclear waste from France is actually shipped to the U.S.,” Goswami said.

“It’s stored in…”

Continue reading

Interesting take on Sarkozy and the European Leaders as they relate to “handling” the U.S.

“…when people in Paris talk about ambitious kids going to study abroad, they talk about London. (Americans have little idea of the damage done by the ordeal that a routine run through immigration at J.F.K. has become for Europeans, or by the suspicion and hostility that greet the most anodyne foreigners who come to study or teach at our scientific and educational institutions.) When people in Paris talk about manufacturing might, they talk about China; when they talk about tall buildings, they talk about Dubai; when they talk about troubling foreign takeovers, they talk about Gazprom. The Sarkozy-Gordon Brown-Merkel generation is not unsympathetic to America, but America is not so much the primary issue for them, as it was for Blair and Chirac, in the nineties, when America was powerful beyond words. To a new leadership class, it sometimes seems that America is no longer the human bomb you have to defuse but the nut you walk away from…”

[Excerpt from Adam Gopnik at the New Yorker - read the full article]

[Disclosure: This is a sponsored post.]

Every now and again, I receive email from people asking me to suggest moving / removal companies to France or from France, and unfortunately, I haven’t been able to offer much help previously. That has changed recently after being contacted by Schumacher Cargo.

If you’re looking for a company to help you ship your belongings to or from France (from practically any destination in the world), you might want to consider using Schumacher Cargo. They’ve been in business for 30 years, have a long list of client testimonials and have a multitude of options to fit your specific needs. You can get a free quote on their website, too.

They’re a one-stop moving company so-to-speak, meaning: they do everything from moving household goods and furniture, to moving cars and container cargo by your choice of sea or air. You can have your goods go door-to-door, airport-to-airport or port-to-port, or any combination therein. Flexibility seems to be a standard service.

Lastly, it looks as if you don’t need to worry too much about where your cargo is at a given moment in time, because you can track it every step of the way via their online tracking service.

Important Information you might want to know from their site:

“Schumacher Cargo Logistics utilizes insured, secured and bonded facilities. We provide warehousing, packing, crating, trucking and loading services out of our own warehouses here in the USA. * Los Angeles * Houston * Chicago * Miami * New York. We also own and operate our own companies in the UK, The Netherlands, Denmark & Norway, all other worldwide destinations are covered by our affiliated organization member companies.”

For more information:

Schumacher Cargo
Website: Moving Service to France
Email: Contact Schumacher Cargo

[Photo courtesy of Chris Schauflinger]

~ ~ ~
“The biggest truth to face now – what is probably making me unfunny
for the remainder of my life – is that I don‘t think people give a damn whether the planet goes on or not…I know of very few people
who are dreaming of a world for their grandchildren.“
~Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country (2005)

Each time I’ve driven along a nearby national route, I’ve passed by this sign and have been wanting to look further into the subject. The sign has been there for several months now. Here’s a translation of what it says, “I grow rapeseed for Diester here, and I fight against the greenhouse effect. Diester with diesel is greener.” The logo with FDSEA represents the national union for rural agriculture. I did some further digging into Diester.

What is Diester? (In France, pronounced DEE-eh-stair)

Originally, diester, also known as colza methyl ester, comes from the contraction of the words “diesel” and “ester” and in a generic sense, pure diester is made up of 90% vegetable oil extracted usually from rapeseed (colza) which is the predominant source in France, but flaxseed, sunflower seed or peanuts can be used. The remaining 10% of diester is composed of methanol. Methanol is a type of alcohol and is said to be (sometimes) necessary to break up the viscosity of the colza oil, important particularly during colder weather where the fuel without methanol is vulnerable to freezing. These two compounds then go through a process called “esterification” that essentially creates the final liquid product of biodiesel.

However, today in France, “Diester” is a registered and trademarked product by the company Sofiproteol (Prolea is their parent company). It is made up of the compounds as is described above, but is only used as an additive to diesel in France.

For the purposes of this post, I am making a distinction between biodiesel and Diester, the branded product.

Diester vs. Biodiesel

Diester should not be confused with biodiesel but I’m afraid that the words “Biodiesel” and “Diester” are now used interchangeably in France. Diester, the branded product, is currently not sold as pure biofuel in France. It is mixed with diesel in a tiny amount. In addition, the methanol used within Diester is of petrochemical origin, whereby, other biodiesel sellers can opt to use methanol from a more clean source like wood, for example. Some biodiesel makers also do not use any methanol whatsoever, and simply provide filtered extracted oil, which apparently works on older model diesel engines without the necessity of modification, or very insignificant modification⁽¹⁾. The practice of independently selling pure biodiesel is illegal in France, however, it is nevertheless sold “unofficially” to consumers.

Biodiesel is a renewable energy source and a clean burning fuel that does not use any petroleum-based or fossil fuel products and emits less CO2 emissions, sulfur, aromatics and particulate matter into the environment than diesel and other petroleum-based fuels. Diester, on the other hand, is only used as an additive to diesel, so, in effect, still pollutes because of the diesel content.

How much Diester is Mixed with Diesel in France?

Although cars with diesel engines do not need major modifications in order to run on 100% Diester fuel, in France, Diester is sadly only available as an additive to regular diesel fuel in the following proportions: For captive fleets (buses, waste collection trucks and utility vehicles) 30%⁽²⁾ Diester is added to diesel, and a mere 1.5%⁽³⁾ of diester on average is mixed with the consumer diesel. By comparison, Germany is already using 100% biodiesel like Diester in their car engines and it is readily available at pumps. Additionally, no blends are admitted in Germany. Why is France still using just a miniscule amount of Diester in their blend?

(more…)

The French (ok, and expat residents of France) produce approximately 880 million tons of trash every year. Wow and yes it’s a problem. During the last 20 years in France, cancers have increased by 35%. (pdf in French). Any relationship there? Yes. According to French studies, 80% to 90% of cancers are caused by the degradation of the environment. There have been commercials on television reminding the citizens of France how much trash they make. I think France was slow to react to the issue but at least now they are taking steps to confront a growing problem. Still, better late than never. It was only in 2002 that France even STARTED sorting and recycling! And even though “recycling” in France (like in other countries) has a slippery, sliding definition, it’s start.

Now I realize why there are so many incinerators in France (at least 133!); they just burned everything (plastics/household trash, the kitchen sink, etc.) releasing its toxic fumes into the air for everyone to breath. They still incinerate but the reduction has turned into a tangential problem (I’ll try to post about that at a later date.) Trash is a problem of colossal proportion that should be a priority in the media but isn’t. Maybe because they’d rather focus on more positive news? It is, afterall, a dirty subject.

I recently met an ex-Parisian woman ordered by her doctor to leave Paris and live in the countryside. She is suffering from thyroid cancer and now lives in a small village in Burgundy. Her granddaughter in Paris, who is 14 years old, also has thyroid cancer and her Parisian sister has died from….thyroid cancer. I asked her how that happened, and she said, “We all lived in Paris where there are too many incinerators and landfills that must be emitting toxic substances.”

Sidenote here: the fallout from the Chernobyl explosion in the ’80s migrated to France (and beyond) and had significant levels of contamination - though in France the seriousness of it was concealed from the public. Millions of people were exposed to radioactive fallout and today there is a tremendous number of French people with thyroid cancer and congenital diseases particularly in Corsica and other parts of eastern France.

Sadly, this kind of story is not an isolated case; it’s becoming increasingly prevalent, but no one really wants to talk about it. Not many are willing to chat you up with some dioxin*, leachate, mercury, and PVC poisoning news. Honestly, I’d never in my wildest dreams imagine we’d be having this conversation but I’m finding myself with little options and alternatives. I have to talk about it: The environment and how we take care of it, has a direct impact on our health. Do you think landfills are simply harmless holes filled with trash? Do you think incinerated plastic does nothing to your health? Next to the strange things in food now, dumps and incinerators, by the mere fact that they are near you, will affect your health as well as the health of the people close to you. [Remember there are 19 incinerators around Paris.]

We went to hear Dany Dietmann, a speaker for environmental activism based in the Alsace area and he’d mentioned that there are so many incinerators in France releasing high amounts of dioxin*, that it diffuses and settles on all of the farms, exposing animals and plants to the cancer-causing toxicity. As a result, they’ve found rising levels of dioxins in France’s coveted wines as well as many, many other foods including meats and produce.

I’m a member of an environmental organization in Burgundy and a few of us took a private tour of a Classe 2** landfill in the Allier region. [I will write a separate post about that later.] After the nauseating tour and observations that they did NOT recycle or even sort the trash, we had a Q&A with the executives of the dump company sent from their Paris headquarters. One of the things said was, “We have NO idea about what people are putting in the trash.” Um. That’s not very comforting particularly when batteries get thrown into the trash, which, gets absorbed into the ground and if it migrates to ground water (this is a common occurence), can potentially pollute an entire body of water. Just one battery alone can contaminate 600,000 liters (158,503 gallons) of water. - and, not to mention the long list of other substances that shouldn’t be there. Some dumps leach poisonous materials that work their way from the ground to a large body of water, like a major river. But get this: This particular dump company also owns a company responsible for cleaning out contaminated waters. Anyone having a light switch on in their head?

Please, try to fight the urge to ignore this subject. This is too important. Because just as with global warming, if you ignore it, it WON’T go away - and like global warming, is getting worse because it’s being ignored. Frankly, I realize that most people don’t want to know anything about it let alone deal with it. I seriously don’t blame them; no one wants to think about it. Give me waste managment talk or talking about watching paint dry, and I’d happily ponder shades of mauve as it dries.

That said, apathy will get you nowhere.

21 Things You Can Do

1. Be informed - Do research about materials (plastics, pesticides, carcinogens, etc) and their effects on the environment; (Try to avoid choosing PVC for home improvement projects!) Find out about dumps and waste management and learn all you can about what is in the trash, where it’s going and what’s in it. This can come in handy especially for people considering looking for property to buy in France (or where ever you are). You obviously don’t want to live close to any kind of landfill or incinerator and always ask your notaire (the property lawyer/agent) to warn you if there are any projects being planned for future dumps or other nasty pollution makers near the area of your prospective property. (They might lie, though.)

2. Become a member of an environmental group in your area - You can search for your regional French Greenpeace group or a smaller, more local effort. There are more and more of these groups being established as France tries to figure out where to put all the trash. If you do not have time to actively participate in a group, consider making a donation to the group. People in these types of organizations do not get paid and monies donated can go a long way in much needed supplies and support.

3. Buy products with minimum packaging and/or leave packaging at store (yes, you can do this!) - I know. Some of your favorite products have humungous packaging and you do not want to give them up. If that’s the case, (if possible) remove the packaging and leave it at the store. You can do this and it will perhaps start a dialogue between distributors/vendors and producers. In France, you can remove the packaging and simply leave it at the counter. Otherwise, you can put the packaging in recycling bins usually located in the parking lots of supermarkets.

4. Buy products made with packaging that is easily recyclable - This is a bit difficult as more and more items have a unrecyclable plastic packaging. Glass, metal and paper packaging are the most renewable kind of material. Note: Most of the plastic, even the piles of plastic in the recycling bins, are incinerated. A good example of this is to buy meat from the butcher directly instead of packaged meats in the markets. Not only is it more fresh that way, it also avoids having to get styrofoam packaging.

5. Write about it - Many environmental issues are swept under the carpet, so if you know about anything, write about it on your blogs, websites, newspapers, books. Submit articles and essays for possible publishing to journals, magazines and newspapers.

6. Contact Government Officials - the power of the public influences politicians to a great degree. They do, afterall, want to 1) stay in government; and/or 2) get re-elected. Sometimes 3) they want to serve the public in a positive way What should you say to them? If you have a specific concern that needs immediate action (hormones in milk, chemicals in food, pesticides, packaging, pollution, radioactive water in cattle’s drinking water, etc.), write about that. Otherwise, point out that environmental priorities will play a crucial role in the health of their public (therefore, the business of public health), the economy, jobs, etc. Track down the physical address to actually send a snail mail and make sure to cc: journalists, and relevant government officials around him/her. You can also meet with officials in-person and bring someone with you who is also very informed, perhaps a scientist, economist, doctor, business people, etc. Note: Make sure you contact the correct government official; the person that will be directly capable of making the change you are requesting. Example, in France, it is the Prefet who is in charge of giving a greenlight to future dumps. If you talk to your mayor, that can help if he goes to the Prefet but it’s just more efficient for you to go to the Prefet directly.

7. Talk about it - Much like #5, this goes one step beyond and is a call for people to try to tell people about it via media other than written media. Get on radio shows and TV talk shows. Team up with experts to spread awareness at schools and universities or conferences.

8. Get other people to write or talk about it - Telephone or contact journalists, bloggers, radio, TV and TV news producers and executives to offer twists and different angles on certain subjects. Get them to spread information.

9. Recycle old clothing, kitchenware, toys etc. - by donating it to homeless shelters, thrift stores, and other community organizations such as Emmaus, L’Armee du Salut, St. Vincent de Paul. Check your local listings in the Pages jaunes. (Please add more that I’ve left out in the comments section or by emailing me. Thank you.)

10. Try not to use cleaning products with harmful chemicals (dangerous to you as well as for the environment. [link: Common Contaminants]

11. Think about the environment when you purchase products - Can it be reused? What kind of material is is made of? Can it be recycled? Does it have a lot of packaging?

12. Use biodegradable bags to clean up after your dogs and for your trash.

13. Advocate and encourage bulk buying programs - so you can purchase larger quantities with less packaging - just like they’ve started in the Auchan in the north of France. Talk to your local grocers. Read this post.

14. Before discarding camera equipment, old tools and other items, ask friends, relatives, neighbors, or community groups if they can use them.

15. Share magazines and newspapers with other people to extend the lives of these items and reduce the amount of waste paper.

16. Place an order through the mail with a group of people in order to save money and reduce packaging waste.

17. If you do absolutely need to use products with hazardous materials (varnishes, removers, glues, etc), use only the amounts needed. Excess amounts can be shared with neighbors or donated to a charity, not-for-profit organization, business, or NGO. Never put leftover products containing hazardous substances in food or beverage containers.

18. Bring a washable mug for water or coffee to work rather than using paper or plastic cups. Try to encourage others to do the same. If there’s a coffee machine that dispenses the coffee one (plastic) cup at a time, consider bringing your own coffee to work or making your own coffee at work.

19. Sort Your Trash - and dispose of it properly. Some cities in France do not offer a pick up for recyclable materials. Please learn where you can take it yourself and make the effort to go there. This hopefully reduces the volume of landfill waste by getting recycled (metals and glass). Some of that (plastics), however (and sadly), will be incinerated or dumped.

20. Compost your kitchen scraps and garden waste - I know, I didn’t want to do this either but I now have a homemade composter in my yard (and regret not having done it years ago), which produces a rich soil packed with nutrients for the garden. If you don’t have a garden because you live in an apartment, you can still have a composter to maybe keep on a balcony, and can later be used as soil for your potted plants. If none of those are possible, still try to separate out your compostables to give to a friend that has a yard with a compost bin or pile. If more people did this small gesture, that would greatly reduce the amount being put in landfills. Some towns in France actually give away free composters so check with your city hall. If they don’t do that, encourage them to do so.

21. Take your old mobile/cellular phones to France Telecom/Orange offices. See this post about it: Recycle your old mobile phones in France.