In August this year my travel itinerary included plans to take my children and young grandchildren to a holiday cottage in Northern France.
I like Northern France, I have been there many times but today I have been forced to reconsider my plans and to cancel the proposed holiday.
Thank you France…
Thank you for allowing any rag tag trade union organisation to call a wildcat strike and close down the cross channel ferries and the Eurostar service. How absurd is it for a western European country to allow militant strikers to close roads and railway lines by lighting toxic bonfires of tyres and hay bales.
The French are unbelievable, they think that rules of modern European society do not apply to them and they can do pretty much anything they please.
Thank you to the French police who are clearly strike sympathisers and stand by and take no action against this transportation vandalism.
Thank you again to the idle French police who slide off for a gauloise and a MacDonalds and turn a blind eye to economic migrants who daily attempt to cross the channel to get to England.
Thank you also to the French public who seem by some twisted logic to think this is the fault of the UK Government. These law breakers are in France but the authorities there want the UK to pay for dealing with the problems.
So my decision is made. My holiday is cancelled. With three young children I simply will not take the risk of wildcat strikes, ferry cancellations and scenes of unpleasantness that the French authorities refuse to deal with.
I have always liked France but right at this moment – NEVER AGAIN, I will not spend another Euro in France, I am off to Wales instead.
Next time, you shouldn’t hold back your true feelings. Recently, my nephew was in China with a friend who spoke the language. While dining, his friend could understand the bad things that surrounding diners were saying about them. I guess some people do not like collecting tourist money.
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I’ve always thought of the French as snobbish. You’ve just confirmed it.
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My sister went to France recently and was shocked at how badly things have changed. She will not go there again. She said she didn’t feel safe there any more.
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Let’s hope you have good weather Andrew, I’ve read your past blogs about our climate!
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I am very optimistic! We will be going to Lake Bala.
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Bala is just beautiful.
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So sorry you’ve had to cancel your holiday Andrew. I guess some things don’t change I got caught up in a ferry strike as a teenager on an exchange trip and that wasn’t very pleasant. Impromptu rail strikes etc are one reason we haven’t been to France so much in recent years when we’ve been over in Europe (last time was 2010 when we went via Paris to get to Switzerland because of the erupting Icelandic volcano and then the French railway workers went on strike too!). We had been thinking of going to south eastern France and Lyon next year but am not so keen at the moment. Having said that I have always loved France in spite of the obvious imperfections! Our daughter is going down to the Toulouse area (in the countryside) at the end of next week to stay with some friends and the old country property they’ll be staying in looks quite idyllic from the photos I’ve seen!
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The French seem to be able to go on strike at the drop of a hat! The world is getting smaller, France is out so too is Greece and who in their right mind would go to North Africa?
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I remember watching Michael Palin’s guide to Sahara a few years ago and Tunisia was considered relatively safe – times have certainly changed since then doubt if he could do many of his travel shows now. Very sad for the local people whose livelihoods depend on tourism. Certainly security is becoming major factor in holiday planning!
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Yes, I’ve heard all you’ve said about the France and their people.
People in Montreal and Quebec are just as snobby and acted as your waiter did: wouldn’t help with the menu items and if he could have, I don’t believe he’d have waited on us at all.
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Bosh darn it. What a shame because France can be so great at times!
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France is great, just a shame about the French!
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Lol. I am lucky. I have had really good luck visiting there three times. I would go back for sure. But you are not the first person who has had a problem traveling there…
A friend of mine was spit on because she spoke French and her French wasn’t good enough! Gosh, she was trying at least!
I don’t speak any French and have thankfully not had a problem!
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Once in a hotel in Castres and knowing how precious the French can be about their language, I attempted some simple communication with the receptionist about the arrangements for petit dejeuner.
I am fairly certain that I selected the right words but graciously concede that I may not have had them in the correct order and this is an annoying thing about the French because they like you to try and speak their language, which is fair, but then ridicule you if you don’t get everything absolutely grammatically correct, which isn’t very encouraging. This woman looked at me as though I was from the very bottom of the evolutionary chain and asked with a large dollop of sarcasm if I would prefer it if she spoke English?
Most Europeans are really pleased if you attempt a few words but the French really don’t like anything that they perceive as a corruption of their ‘beautiful language’ and I nodded meekly and although I wanted to say qui merci I said yes please.
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One impression I did get from the French during my lifetime so far is that they think the whole world must speak French! I like the Mark Twain quote here, too. Ah, Wales – I’ll take it any time 😀
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They are very precious about their language for sure!
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There are nasty people everywhere, as we just can see at worldpress-supportforums. But no need to make a campaign of hatred out of it. I apologize for my bad english.
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A friend of mine from the UK told me that Wales is lovely! I hope that you and your grandchildren have a great time and I can’t wait to read about it 🙂
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Wales is fine, it just rains a lot. I went to University in Wales (Cardiff) 1972-5.
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