Hot Times in Javerlhac!

Love those pompiers et sapeurs!

Right now across North American you’re probably seeing calendars featuring scantily clad, overly muscled firefighters. Here’s what we had delivered to our door today in lieu of that soft-core porn.

Yes, two polite members of the Javerlhac fire crew knocked on our door, and we dutifully handed over a donation to buy this year’s calendar. It is, quite simply, one of the things that you do to be part of your community.

Here’s another page from the calendar.

The last two weeks we travelled the length and breadth of France, over 3000 kilometers. We’ve visited Normandy, Chartres, Burgundy, Provence, and spent a week in Tarn et Garonne where we’re planning a new music project this summer.

After all of this travel I’ve learned some things: there are very few parts of the French countryside that aren’t incredibly beautiful. It’s a green country, a lush country, and one that still feels like it’s populated by small family farms instead of giant mega grain operators. And for some reason the French have managed to avoid the North American love of bulldozing anything old to build something new and ugly.

And, for that matter, the love of bulldozing anything and everything that might get in the way of cars. The traffic calming in every small French village would terrify the good burghers of North Vancouver! I mean, 30kmh in every town center, traffic circles to slow people down and avoid sitting at traffic lights spewing exhaust fumes, and speed bumps that are positively medieval.

Right now we’ve narrowed our house hunting down to two regions: Normandy especially the part just outside of the overpriced and overly Brit-populated Perche, and the parts of the Tarn et Garonne in and around Lauzerte where our festival will take place.

Next week we’re both travelling to Angouleme for our third COVID-19 vaccination. Like the rest of Europe France is seeing rising numbers, but honestly everyone is pretty relaxed about the pandemic. If you believe the news you would think that much of the population is marching in the streets to protest masks, but the reality is that it’s a handful of right-wing gilet-jaune who leave spray painted bedsheet banners draped on traffic circles in small towns.

Everyone else wears a mask in stores, flashes their Passe Sanitaire for scanning in restaurants, and in general just practices basic health safety. In some ways it feels more relaxed than in Vancouver, but somehow it also feels safe. And if you’re the only person in a gym class with a mask it’s no big deal. It’s respected.

There’s one more thing that we learned in our travels: people in France are genuinely nice. Store clerks, officials, even the Gendarmes are just friendly and helpful. and even if every task takes much longer, and requires more steps, you still come away feeling like your time and presence is genuinely appreciated.

Those behaviours tell me one thing: people are generally happy in France, generally feel secure in their jobs and their lives, and unlike much of North America don’t seem to feel as if they’re always one step away from having the rug yanked out from under their feet. These things, along with Sunday closings and long vacations, have created a nation where people take care of each other.

I like that a lot.