As I was going home, I walked by the square between the Louvre and the Conseil d'État. It was full of demonstrators preparing to march. It wasn't clear what they were protesting against. The banners were full of acronyms like FSU and CGT and CNU. A strange personage carrying a little dog in a sling walked around picturesquely, occasionally sounding a police siren. The Venus de Milo and a huge nude boy looked down at the group from the side of the Louvre.
"Can you tell me what the protest is for?" I asked a fat man from the provinces.
"It's against the new proposed law of Sarkozy's," he said. "Teachers and social workers would be forced to denounce people." [The proposed legislation is called "Law for the prevention of delinquency."]
So that's what the big banner "Educators not délateurs" meant, I thought. A délateur is a sneak or informer.
The demonstration got underway, with the banner carried first, toward avenue de l'Opéra. A woman in a white van, with a shrill, ineffectual voice, chanted slogans into a microphone, but they were all too long, and nobody picked them up. She went on chanting into an embarrassing silence as the van worked its way north. It was too cold for me to stick around, so after getting a last few photos of the relaxed riot police, and the honking traffic that continued to pour heartlessly past the marchers ("Je travaille, moi!"), I went on home to my warm apartment.
It looks like a normal day in Paris...By the way, a good book to read to improve your french : "Un bon cru" de Peter Mayle. Je sais il est anglais, but i'm to leazy...
Posted by: JOUJOU DE PARIS | 24 January 2007 at 10:33
It's terrible, Joujou, mais en ce moment je n'ai absolument aucune envie d'ameliorer mon francais....Moi chuis paresseuse aussi.
Posted by: Sedulia | 24 January 2007 at 15:26
I strongly object to the horn blowing within inches of the little dog! That's animal abuse! Where can I manifest?
Posted by: isabella | 25 January 2007 at 01:12
That poor little dog is probably deaf already-- it attended another demonstration Saturday. [http://www.flickr.com/photos/daaram/366309143/] It's very cute though.
Posted by: Sedulia | 25 January 2007 at 01:31