French stereotypes

FRENCH STEREOTYPES 

Cyprien's video

Watching Cyprien’s video about the stereotypes of Spain, I‘ve decided to write about the stereotypes of France. I’ve been in France so many times that I could say that I know more about French people than from any other people with a different nationality. It’s for this reason that I’m going to write about their stereotypes from a very close point of view.

In relation with food the first stereotype that I realise when I’m in France is that all mornings, even if it rains, they go to the nearest bakery of their neighbourhood to buy a baguette for their breakfast, wearing a kind of beret and usually smoking. Another funny stereotype that I realise when I’m travelling by car in France is that every midday, especially during the holidays, they all park their cars in a service area to have what they call “le midi” (a very relaxing picnic that all the family use to have). And I think that the best known stereotype of French people related with food is that in all their dinners they must eat cheese with a glass of wine before dessert.

Apart from this type of stereotypes, there some others, for instance those which are related to their personality. Friends of mine say that the typical French man or woman is really arrogant, not very sociable and even apathetic, but it’s only because when they “travel to France” they only visit one place… Paris, and I agree with them in this point, because Parisian people can be arrogant and sometimes a bit self-centred, believing to be the centre of the world. However, in fact, the rest of France is extremely different from them, they are usually quite helpful, polite and quite happy, although I find they are not as open-minded as Spanish people are and they use to say that everything is okay when in fact, it’s not. Moreover, another aspect that I notice is that they use to idolatrise their sport players, even if they finish the second or third position (fact that Spanish people don’t do and I really appreciate it).

In conclusion, I think that I have a very different point of view from most of my friends that think they “have visited France”, but I find quite interesting what other people from other nationalities think about France when I’m in “l’Alliance française”, because they have truly visited France. And I reckon that these are the main stereotypes that I’ve confirmed during my stays in France.

Paris COP21 What is it? Are our gouvernements going to do something for the climate change?

Paris COP21 What is it? Are our gouvernements  going to do something for the climate change?

For two weeks, from 30th November to 11th December, representatives of 195 countries will meet in Paris for the COP21, and what is the COP21? The COP21 is the 21st Conference of the Parties, the annual meeting of all countries which want to take action for the climate. And the most important matter, what are the main goals? Their main goal is that they want to reduce their emissions of CO2 so that Earth doesn’t get warmer than 2ºC. 

One of the problems that they are having is that the attacks of Paris were so recent that they can't give lectures in public and they have to be at every moment with a lot of security. As a result of the attacks all the presidents are giving their condolences to the victims. Another big problem in relation with this conference is that emerging countries don’t want to take part in this meeting, because most of them still use too much non-renewable energy, and that can be determinant in the end, because they are the most polluting countries.

In addition, this conference is more important than others, because now rich countries like the USA or China, which haven't wanted to respect the limits of pollution in the past, have now realized that renewable energies are more economic in the long term, so they are now in favour to reduce their pollution in their countries. Moreover, they want to promote this to poor countries, setting their renewable factories there (and for not paying taxes).

From my point of view, it’s good that we have this type of conferences, but we need to take practical measures, because if we don’t do something fast, we will finish with our planet. In Spain, we have had two alerts because of pollution and in two cities (Madrid and Oviedo) people couldn’t use their cars for a couple of days. I don’t know you, but I want to breathe fresh air.

A terrorist attack. Maintenan, on est tous Paris.

A TERRORIST ATTACK. MAINTENANT, ON EST TOUS PARIS.

Last Friday, 13^th November France suffered one of the worst episodes of the 21st century. I didn’t write about this before, because the event was too recent and I wanted to see what was going to happen next, the reaction of France, how much this has affected us, and obviously how this was going to affect Spain, because I remind you that Granada is one of the most menaced cities by these fanatical terrorists, because they still think that the south Spain is Al-Andalus, as it was called when they invaded the Iberian peninsula in 711 AD, and they still think that is part of their “empire”.

First of all, I’m going to talk a bit about the incident. It began in the northern suburb, Saint-Denis, on the night of 13th November 2015. The attackers killed 130 people, including 89 at the Bataclan theatre, where they took hostages. In total 368 people were injured. Afterwards, three suicide bombers struck near the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, followed by suicide bombings and mass shootings at cafés, restaurants and a music venue in Paris. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying it was in retaliation for the French airstrikes on ISIL targets in Syria and Iraq. The President of France, François Hollande, said the attacks were planned in Syria, organised in Belgium, and perpetrated with French complicity.

In response, a state of emergency was declared, and temporary border checks were introduced. On 15^th November, France launched the biggest air raid, striking ISIL targets in Al-Raqqah. On 18^th November, the suspected lead operative of the attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, was killed in a police raid in Saint-Denis, along with at least two other people.

 
France had been on high alert since the January 2015 attacks in Paris that killed 17 people, including civilians and police officers. The November attacks have been the deadliest on France since World War II, and the deadliest in the European Union since the Madrid train bombings in 2004. 

But, why hasn’t Europe reacted now to this problem and not before? That’s because things only affect us when they are near us. There have been many attacks in other countries like Tunisia, Kuwait…, but it’s now when Europe is doing something against these terrorists. People think that this could be the beginning of the 3rd World War with a new type of fighting in which there won’t be a war between two factions, instead of that, we will have attacks like this one in Paris, where we could see that the terrorist hadn’t fear to die and kill themselves with bombs. 

And regarding the response of France, I reckon that it’s not the best way to solve this problem, because I think that they are killing too many civil people that maybe couldn’t have escaped from these places, even if now there isn’t another solution, because they are recruiting more and more children so that they can train them to do this type of things, which is inhuman. 

I only hope that this war will finish as soon as possible, so that these episodes won’t happen again in France, in Tunisia and in any part of the world. Even if experts say that it will take several years. Nevertheless, I only want our governments to stay together against these terrorists and not be hypocrites just putting a French flag in their Facebook profiles, because I didn’t see anybody with other flags when the terrorists attacked other countries, and please don’t say hypocrites to the people that observe a minute of silence, because nobody has observed a minute of silence in other terrorist attacks.