Foreign Perspectives

The last time I flew on Aer Lingus it was way, way back in the mid 1980s and we only went with them because the alternative was actually going bust at the time.

Now, 20 odd years on and I book with them for next Wednesday and, guess what?, yup, that’s the very day that they might be going on strike!

Bit of a peculiar strike though. I gather that the Irish pilots are planning the strike because Aer Lingus is intending to start recruiting pilots from Northern Ireland. Now, that leaves them with an interesting dilema because they can’t back down from recruiting in NI as those pilots in NI would have quite a strong legal case for taking them to court for discrimination on the basis of nationality which is illegal under European law.

Oh well, perhaps I’ll try them again in another 20 odd years…

The French, by and large, take all their holidays between July 14th and August 18th (ie the penultimate Saturday in August).

This causes endless hassles for everyone in the accommodation industry in France. For one thing, just about everywhere is running at full capacity right up to August 18th and then all of a sudden they can be virtually empty. Stocking up is consequently a nightmare as on one hand you don’t want to run out of stuff, on the other hand you don’t want to be left with loads of perishables on August 19th.

The effect on the cash & carry is peculiar. Metro locally have truly awful stock control so now that the bulk of the holiday season is out of the way they now have the little soaps in stock which haven’t been on the shelves anytime since early July. You can tell that we’re not quite at the end of the main holiday season though because they still haven’t got any of the little bottles of shampoo and instead are still sitting with the same 20 boxes of body lotion (I was very tempted to mark the boxes to confirm that they are the same ones that have been there since June).

Anyway, one useful side-effect of this peculiar behaviour of the French is that a lot of places like ourselves can actually close for the final week of August and lose virtually no business.

Where’s everyone else though? Who knows? The English do keep coming during that final week in August and by the first week in September things are getting back to normal with the usual blip locally caused by the Visa pour L’Image photojournalism festival in Perpignan and various other events around the country designed to sort things out.

However, by mid-September the bulk of beach resorts are starting to close down for the Winter, despite there being high numbers of tourists (but few French ones) around locally until well into October.

One of the best things about the paid posts is that there are a fair number of them that I’d be writing anyway in due course. ‘Tis easy enough to pick these ones out as they’re a lot longer, more complete and get a photo or two.

I’ve even had someone offer to pay for one after I’d written it!

Now, the big question is how I can get people to sponsor the other websites directly….

Although our Whole Earth Guide is only two days old, we’ve already pulled in some cash from adsense on the site which is a good start seeing as it has very little content at the moment.

We’re aiming to add several new articles to the site a week over the Summer and hoping to step that up over the coming Winter not to mention site improvements that will be ongoing over that period. At the moment, it’s limited to articles on specific places or attractions such as our piece on the Rambla area of Barcelona but we’ll be adding the facility to hold articles on regions and countries in due course.

In parallel with this, we’re enhancing the new versions of our B&B and self-catering listings sites and will be cross-linking those with the Whole Earth Guide in due course (and indeed with our other listings sites).

If you’re very keen, you can even add your own article (about 300-400 words plus a photo) via the link at Our Inns (just select “Whole Earth Guide” as the property type) you can add a link to your own site from an article, but put it in the comments as I’ll need to edit it in for you.

Schooling in France starts from age 2 or 3 (depending on the local area) with education being compulsory from age 6 to 16.

Schools generally run Monday to Friday but on Wednesday some close or only operate in the morning and in some areas schools operate on Saturday morning. The hours are generally 9am to noon, 2pm to 5pm at all ages although the 2 and 3 year olds often only go in the mornings.

There is no “supply teacher” arrangement in France so if a teacher is off sick you will frequently get a phone call to come and collect your children.

From age 2 or 3 up to 6 you can enrol your children in nursery school (ecole maternelle) although this is not compulsory. This is more of a schooling environment than the equivalent in the UK and aims to prepare the children for entry to the next level of schooling.

For enrollment you will need to bring along ID for the child (passport or full birth certificate is equivalent to the “livret de famille” that they will ask for), proof of address (sometimes), proof that the child is insured (about EUR 10 per year) and, if the school is not in your commun, a letter from the mayor. In some cases you may be asked for proof of vaccinations. Even if your children speak no French you should have no difficulty in enrolling them in the local school at this level.

The age used is based on the calendar year so in the year in which your child is 6 they start primary school (ecole primaire) in September. The documentation required is as for the nursery school and if you want to go to a school outside your area then you’ll need a letter from your mayor too. There is usually no difficulty in getting non-French speaking children into primary school.

The secondary and high schools (college and lycee) are not tied to the local comun and operate over a wider region. Consequently you don’t need a letter from the mayor if you are going to a school out of your area. Other documentation remains the same with the additional requirement of a report from the primary school or alternatively your child will have to sit a test (UK school reports usually aren’t accepted).

For the college (age 11 to 16) you may be limited to the college in your local area as others can sometimes refuse to accept non-French speakers. Generally speaking, you shouldn’t have a problem if your child has previously attended primary school in France (ie they can speak French).

At age 17 pupils enter the lycee. These come in three varieties: general, management and technical which roughly correspond to UK high schools, business schools and technical colleges. This is the point at which children need to choose subjects though pupils in the French system study a much wider of subjects than they would at A level in the UK. As at entry to college, a report from the previous French school will help.

If your child does not speak French at this point, you may find that they need to attend a different school. What happens seems to vary widely across France with most areas accepting non-French speaking children at both college and lycee level whilst others refuse to do so at lycee level (see our post here).