Prefects

When I was a youth at high school in Grafton, I disliked the concept of so-called prefects. They were a group of elected senior students charged with minimal duties such as making sure that pupils marched into their classrooms in straight lines. The thing I disliked about the prefects concept was that most of us got elected to this silly position, which meant that the few outsiders who weren't sufficiently popular to be chosen as prefects were automatically looked upon as social outcasts. I think, for example, of my classmate Tom Mogan, whose father was the governor of Grafton's notorious jail. Tom was a quiet introspective individual. I got to know him a little through the fact that we were among the few members of a Latin class run by a great teacher named Robert Sinclair [with whom I met up a year ago, when I was out in Sydney]. Tom was not the sort of person who would get elected as a prefect, because he didn't seem to be concerned with all the trivial aspects of school life [such as sport, for example] that provide a context for becoming a popular student. I learned recently that Tom became a Catholic priest, and spent the final years of his life working with destitute Aborigines over in Western Australia.

Here in France, the term préfet [prefect, from the Latin praefectus] is a Napoleonic title bestowed upon individuals who are placed in charge of a region or a département. French prefects are distinguished individuals who have generally been educated in the finest schools of France. Their job consists of representing the authorities of the French republic at a tangible local level, a little like the role of a governor in an imperial colony. It's a fact that French prefects wear exotic old-fashioned military-style uniforms that give them a very serious look. Although their role appears at times to be largely honorific, the work of a French prefect can be difficult and hazardous in certain situations, particularly in the case of local catastrophes, when they have the personal responsibility of managing events. In a nutshell, if something goes hugely wrong [such as a local officially-approved garbage-disposal facility giving out lethal fumes, for example], the entire blame can fall upon the poor prefect.

Funnily enough, soon after my arrival here in the Dauphiné, I discovered that the Isère prefect was a second cousin of my ex-wife, and that the prefect of a neighboring département was a fellow I used to know back at the Lycée Henri IV in Paris, when I was an English assistant. In both cases, these former acquaintances had risen to such a superior social status that it was quite out of the question—if ever I had wished to do so—of simply dropping in on them to say hello. [There might be some kind of Shakespearean philosophical implication in that last statement, but I don't know what it is.]

Talking of French prefects, one of the very first fellows to get such a job, here in the Isère département where I live, was a certain Joseph Fourier. From a modest background, this scientist caught the attention of Napoléon within the context of the Emperor's exploratory mission in Egypt. Then, in 1801, Napoléon put him in charge of the tumultuous region around Grenoble in which the flames of the French Revolution had been kindled just fourteen years previously, at the castle of Vizille. At that time, a Grenoble librarian named Jacques-Joseph Champollion [who did a lot of work in cataloging the confiscated library of the Chartreux monks] succeeded in becoming a close acquaintance of the prefect Fourier. This Champollion fellow had a young brother who went on to crack the code of Egyptian hieroglyphics... but that's another fabulous story, to which I shall certainly return, one of these days, in my blog. Getting back to Fourier, I would suppose that he led a rather hectic life, representing the authorities of the newly-created French Republic in the headstrong Alpine city of Grenoble. We might imagine that this arduous and no doubt messy administrative job left the young prefect [33 years old when he arrived in Grenoble] little time for personal activities.

Well, that was not quite the case. The prefect of whom I am talking was of course none other than the celebrated mathematician Joseph Fourier, whose work still remains the daily sustenance of scientists all over the planet. At Sydney University, I was brought up on a basic mathematical diet of Fourier series. Soon, I learned to manipulate the famous Fourier transform, which might be described superficially as a mathematical method for investigating all kinds of marvelous phenomena. For example, back in the early '70s, when I became interested in the themes of music and machines, in an article by a certain James Beauchamp [University of Illinois], I came upon the following exciting assertion: We may now be at the threshold of the discovery of mathematical descriptions for beautiful tones, as they are commonly termed in conventional music. The rest of the article might be described as a celebration of the power of the Fourier transform, executed on a computer, as a means of putting some order into audio data. In his prefectoral offices in Grenoble, Fourier actually carried out physics experiments concerning the propagation of heat that resulted in his formulation of a theory of thermodynamics.

Since the epoch of the prefect Fourier, the world has heard of the clerk named Einstein in a patents office who invented the theory of relativity. Today, we still have cases of extraordinary individuals who exploit their time in mundane jobs to invent marvelous theories [more about that later on]. Meanwhile, a silly speculation: If Joseph Fourier had been a student in my high school in Grafton, like my quiet mate Tom Mogan, would he have been popular enough to get elected as a prefect? Yes, certainly, for one of Fourier's major gifts was his eloquence. The Champollion brothers gave him a nickname, Chrysostom, recalling the illustrious 4th-century Greek saint whose name evokes his legendary golden mouth.

Tour talk

Yesterday's stage of the Tour de France—which moved through the magnificent region of Provence, around Arles, where I spent a few days not so long ago—was won by a South African rider, Robert Hunter. This was the first time a South African had ever won a Tour stage.

I thought it might be amusing to give my readers a few specimens of Tour talk. This information might be of help if you wish to sound well-informed and intelligent when conversing about the Tour de France. First of all, there's an all-purpose formula that has been exceptionally popular among cycling journalists this year. It consists of saying something along the following lines: In a stage such as this, it's impossible for a rider to win the Tour de France, but it's perfectly possible to lose it. You can serve that formula up with all kinds of sauces. For example, instead of talking about a stage, you might apply variations of the formula to other kinds of situations. For example: In joining that breakaway group, Cadel Evans is unlikely to increase his chances of winning the Tour, but he could easily run the risk of losing it. Or maybe: Using that special kind of bicycle in a time trial is unlikely to help him win the Tour but, if something were to go wrong, it could cause him to lose it. Etc, etc.

If you want to sound serious when talking about the Tour, never refer to the main group of riders as the bunch. Use the French term, peloton. But make sure you pronounce it correctly, not pay-loh-ton, but peuh-loh-ton, almost ploh-ton.

There's a funny cycling expression in French that can be learned easily and thrown into your comments when watching TV. Consider the common situation of a breakaway group some two minutes in front of the peleton. Often, a rider leaves the peloton and attempts to join the breakaway group, except that he gets stuck halfway. Stranded in this no-man's-land between the breakaway group and the peloton, should he continue to wear himself out, hoping that he'll finally catch up with the breakaway group? Or should he accept the idea that this task is too difficult for him, and wait for the peloton to catch up with him [to devour him, as cycling journalists often put it]? A rider who finds himself in this situation is said to be in a state of chasse-patates [literally, chasing potatoes], but nobody seems to know the origin of this expression.

In yesterday's stage, there was a crucial moment when Astana riders [the team of Alexander Vinokourov] suddenly produced an unexpected and violent burst of speed that broke the peloton into fragments within less than a minute. All the expert journalists such as Laurent Fignon and Laurent Jalabert started to use a technical expression, coup de bordure, to designate what had happened. By the end of the day, scores of journalists everywhere had borrowed this expression, but it's not certain they really knew what it meant. I'll therefore attempt to explain what it means. The following diagram represents a typical situation in which the peloton [moving towards the left] is riding directly into the wind:

Here, the red rider is momentarily doing all the hard work, plowing into the wind, whereas each of the green riders is protected from the wind by the fellow in front of him. You might even say that all the green riders are getting sucked along, to a certain extent, by the momentum of the peloton. I call this the snake effect because, when the leaders of the peloton decide to increase the speed, the riders are soon strung out in a serpentine form. You inevitably see striking demonstrations of this snake effect during the final stage on the Champs-Elysées in Paris.

The following diagram represents the situation that existed yesterday, during the stage from Marseille to Montpellier, where a strong southerly wind was blowing in constantly from the Mediterranean and striking the riders from the side:

In this kind of situation, almost everybody [shown in red] is in direct contact with the wind. Even though it doesn't hit the peloton head-on, but merely at a right angle, the wind still hinders the riders considerably. A tiny group of four or five riders can take advantage of this situation by creating what French cycling specialists refer to as a coup de bordure, which I have translated as an edge effect. They collaborate by alternating rapidly their roles in a circular anti-clockwise sense, so that the rider who is about to take the lead is momentarily protected from the sidewind by the fellow he will replace. Behind these revolving lead riders, the peloton will tend to string itself out in a line along the leeward edge of the road (whence the name, edge effect), with each rider hoping vainly to have an opportunity of moving to the leeward side of the fellow in front of him. In this kind of unstable and tense formation, breaks can arise rapidly, whenever a rider cannot keep up with the fellow in front of him. And, unless riders behind the weak cyclist realize immediately what's happening, overtake him and catch up with the front riders, the mass of the peloton can quickly start to disintegrate... as it did yesterday, condemning the French champion Christophe Moreau to a disastrous delay.

Meanwhile, the main Tour talk, once again, has returned to the sad question of doping. If ever the entire block of German sponsors and media [not to mention the Danish compatriots of Michael Rasmussen] were to leave in disgust, it's certain that the Tour would have a hard time trying to get back onto its feet once again. So, let's hope that no major doping crisis occurs.

Digging up the past at Gamone

Walking around my house at the present moment, you might imagine that the place has endured an attack by moles during the night. There are tiny mounds of freshly-upturned earth everywhere. No, it wasn't moles, but rather a friend of my neighbor Bob: a bright young guy from a nearby village whose hobby consists of using a metal detector to find ancient objects.

After the usual assortment of old-time toothpaste tubes and caps of oil cans, he soon found a fragment of an ancient pure silver spoon. Then he made an interesting discovery at the northern edge of my house, about six inches underground: a coin from the Ancien Régime, when France still had kings. It's a copper coin, 28 millimeters in diameter, called a sou, produced in France throughout the 15-year period from 1777 up until 1791, during the reign of Louis XVI, who was guillotined on 21 January 1793 on the vast square in Paris that is known today as the Place de la Concorde. Having remained in the earth for over two centuries, the Gamone sou is not in a pretty state, but its features can still be detected fairly easily. Here's the heads side:

Starting to the lower left of the monarch's neck, the Latin legend reads LUDOV XVI D GRATIA [Louis XVI by the grace of God]. The king's long hair is tied in a bow at the back of his neck. Notice in particular the curve of his large nose. The ten-year-old elder son of the executed king and his wife Marie-Antoinette, sometimes referred to as Louis XVII, was alleged to have died in prison in 1795. For decades, however, many people believed that he had been stealthily abducted from the tower of the Temple in Paris, and that he continued to live in clandestinity, awaiting a chance to regain the French throne. In this spirit, during a period of several decades, at least two hundred large-nosed Frenchmen have claimed to be this mythical survivor.

Here's the tails side, which is barely decipherable:

You can make out the vague traces of a shield with three fleur-de-lis symbols, surmounted by a crown. Here, for comparison, are images [found on the Internet] of a sou in a perfect state:

On the second side of the coin, the Latin legend reads FRANCIAE ET NAVARRAE REX, meaning "King of France and Navarre".

In the context of my research and reflections concerning the history of Gamone, what does it mean to have found this coin here? Well, it merely confirms what I've always believed, namely that the original owners [Chartreux monks] disappeared from the Royans shortly after the French Revolution, and that their properties were immediately purchased by local people. The main Carthusian monastery at Bouvante, called Val Sainte-Marie, was sold on 31 March 1791. I would imagine that the Gamone sou belonged, not to a monk, but to a local farmer who purchased the Choranche vineyards. In view of the spot where this coin was found this morning [just in front of the northern door into the house, rather than in the vicinity of the vaulted tufa cellar where the monks made wine], I would guess that the fellow who lost it was probably constructing, shortly after 1791, the simple stone dwelling in which I now live.

Dog's life

Talking jokingly about a Tour de France cyclist running into a dog is even less politically correct than making disparaging remarks about the Pope's spooky eyes. But, since neither Marcus Burghardt nor the beige Labrador were injured in their spectacular collision yesterday, I take the liberty of saying that I find this sequence amusing:



Everything happened in the best possible way, as if the rider and the dog had rehearsed this crash as a stunt for a film. First, the dog moves slowly into a location where a collision with Burghardt is unavoidable. The cyclist, seeing that he can't avoid hitting the dog, brakes violently and turns his handle bars abruptly through an angle of nearly 90 degrees. At that same instant, the dog prepares itself for the impact by simply lying down flat on the road, whereby its heavy body becomes, as it were, an unmovable object, ready to absorb the considerable momentum of the moving cyclist, like a stationary rugby player about to tackle a running opponent. In such a collision, according to the physical laws of mechanics, something had to give. Fortunately, it was neither the cyclist nor the Labrador, but rather the front wheel of Burghardt's bike, which folded up like a sat-on pizza.

What I really like in this video is the way the dog gets up calmly and walks slowly away from the scene of the crash. It seems to be saying to itself, with disgust: "These days, a dog can't even cross a quiet country road without having to battle with bloody bike wheels."

Free wi-fi in Paris

I've been trying to invent a shortcut term for the expression "free wi-fi". The French pronounce "wi-fi" as wee-fee. So, the term free-fi is almost acceptable here, except that there's already a French ISP [Internet service provider] named Free, who's not involved in the Parisian project. Besides, free-fi doesn't sound too good in English. In any case, free wi-fi is about to become a reality in Paris, under the auspices of the left-wing mayor, Bertrand Delanoë [pronounced deu-lah-no-way], and the municipality. Starting in September, there will be 400 hotspots, located in public parks, municipal premises, libraries, museums and employment bureaux.

That's a nice promotional image of a fellow seated (I think) in the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris, using free-fi, but it doesn't look too realistic. Balancing a portable computer on your outstretched leg is not exactly an ideal ergonomic position. The user probably wouldn't be able to read much on his screen, because of the sunlight. And I don't see the carrying case in which he brought his computer to the park.

Talking of hotspots, I'll never forget my first visit to a McDonald's in Sydney, last year. They seemed to be employing a team of recently-trained school kids as staff. I ordered an apple pie and Coke from a young guy who had most likely just started his McDonald's career that very morning. Then, since it was the first time I had ever set out to use wi-fi in a McDonald's, I asked him: "If I understand correctly, there's a hotspot in this restaurant." He froze, speechless, as if I had just told him that there was a rat in my apple pie, or a snake in the toilets. Or maybe he thought I was using exotic language to request some kind of rare McDonald's dish that the employee-training program had neglected to mention. All he could do, still without saying a word, was to call over the adult female in charge of the restaurant, who confirmed immediately that all I had to do was to sit down, anywhere, and turn on my MacBook. It did, in fact, work perfectly.

So, you might say that using the Parisian free-fi system will be exactly like a McDonald's hotspot, but without the apple pie and Coke.

Naked house

Since I cut away the wisteria and rose bushes in front of the house [in preparation for the replacement of the mortar between the stones], the façade looks naked.

Above the wide glass door on the left, at the upper floor level, there's an entire section of reddish brick, which seems to have replaced a former window. Beneath it, you can see that a former owner has inserted a U-shaped steel girder. I would imagine that, originally, there was a massive wooden beam in this position. It probably rotted away and broke, allowing the stones beneath the original window to fall. The owner, probably a poor and unskilled farmer [nothing to do with the wealthy monks who made wine here up until they were dispersed by the French Revolution], no doubt decided, after the girder was in place, that there was no point in trying to reconstruct a window. So he simply blocked up the hole with red bricks. Maybe, when the façade has been restored, I'll install an old-fashioned sundial at that place. [In the Royans, there are sundials everywhere.]

I also intend to find a solution to conceal the steel girder... and another smaller one down to the right, above the spot where Sophia's basket is located. It should be fairly simple to hide the steel behind slabs of oak. It would be vain, though, to try to make the house look like a refined old residence. It will always remain a rough and ready farmer's dwelling.

Talking about the appearance of houses, I'm often dismayed by the way in which young French couples, having moved into a new pastel-hued house in a rural setting, immediately purchase a pile of parrot-colored plastic junk for their kids.

Is it a fact that children would feel unhappy if they were asked to play with toys made out of discreet dark-green, grey or brown plastic? Do the little brats really refuse to accept anything that's not bright green, red or yellow? Or is it rather the manufacturers of this junk who imagine that kids adore parrot colors? Or would it be the parents who use these aggressive colors as a way of announcing publicly that they're raising a family, and that they're sufficiently well-off to be able to buy plastic junk for their lovable offspring?

French road sign

I wonder how foreign drivers in France react when they see this sign:

Accotement meuble. What on earth might that mean? To obtain a satisfactory translation, I think you would need a good and rather big French/English dictionary... unless, of course, your automobile guide book provides you immediately with the meaning. The noun accotement is a technical term, used by road builders, that designates the earth and gravel "shoulder" between the macadam and the adjoining land. But it's an unusual term. In French, if a driver wanted to say, for example, that he parked his vehicle on the edge of the road, it is rather unlikely that he would use the term accotement. Normally he would speak of the bord de la route: literally, the edge of the road.

Beginners in French will recognize the common noun meuble, meaning "furniture". For example, a furnished flat, in French, is an appartement meublé. So, is the road sign telling drivers to watch out for discarded furniture on the roadside? No, meuble is also an adjective meaning "moving", in the sense of "unstable". That explains why meuble is used for "furniture", that's to say, the mobile part of your residence, as distinct from an immeuble, which is the immobile building in which a residence is located.

So, this complicated road sign is simply warning drivers that the edge of the road was probably laid down recently, and hasn't had time to settle down yet. That's to say, it's unstable. If drivers were to park there, their vehicle might sink down into the earth and get bogged.

Instead of expecting foreign drivers to carry a dictionary with them, I think it would be more reasonable to invent some kind of a graphic sign. Here's a suggestion:


It could surely be improved by specialists, but I think it's already more easy to understand than the expression accotement meuble.

It's interesting, I think, to compare the two approaches from a sociological viewpoint. The verbal road sign is in fact very French, in an intellectual way. The roadbuilders are talking to the motorist as if he were an old fellow-student of their civil engineering school, and explaining the current situation in technical language: "You have to understand, my dear friend, that we've only recently laid down this macadam, and reinforced the shoulders of the embankments on either side. You'll appreciate therefore that the earth and gravel mix we've used as fill is not yet totally stabilized." My graphic approach is more down-to-earth, in a pragmatic New World style, and I don't seek to explain anything whatsoever: "If you don't want to get hurt, get your arse out of here." To be perfectly honest, I adore that old-fashioned expression: Accotement meuble.

Pair of giants

The summit of Australia's highest peak, Mount Kosciuszko, is 2,228 meters above sea level. In today's stage of the Tour de France, the riders will tackle two giants, both of which are considerably higher than Kosciuszko: the Col de l'Iseran [2,770 meters] and the Col du Galibier [2,645 meters]. For Tour aficionados, the vision of these two Alpine passes is awesome. In the course of stages like the one that is about to start this morning, the concept of the Tour is elevated to mythical summits. Everybody knows already that there will be glory for a small elite—whose identities are still unknown—and suffering for many others. Here's a photo of the approach of the Iseran:

And here's a chart indicating the slopes from Val d'Isère up along the 17 kilometers leading to the summit of the Iseran:

In Tour de France terminology, slopes are classified into numerical categories, indicating their severity. But summits such as the Iseran and the Galibier are indicated as HC, hors catégorie (outside the categories): that's to say, so steep that they're well beyond the upper limits of the existing categories. That terminology reminds me of the alleged system of counting employed by Australian Aborigines: one, two, three, many.

Concept shock

Travelers who visit the Antipodes, in one or the other direction, are familiar with the feeling of disorientation known as culture shock, brought about by the simple fact that people do many things differently at the opposite extremities of the globe. However, once you're accustomed to visiting foreign lands, there's usually no longer any real shock, merely a mild bewilderment upon discovering that familiar activities—such as eating, for example, or talking to strangers—are not performed in the same way as back home.

Concept shock, on the other hand, is a far more serious rupture, since it concerns, not so much the way that Antipodeans act, but the way they think. Let me give you an authentic personal example of concept shock that affected me when I was out in Australia for a few weeks, a year ago. One evening, on television, I saw an Australian news documentary concerning a young woman [let's call her Mary] who had become the victim of an allegedly wicked female cousin [Betty, say], who appeared to be a fraudster. The gist of the story was that Betty had apparently stolen [or at least acquired illicitly] certain identity documents and banking data that belonged to Mary, and the evil woman was now exploiting this stuff to steal money from her innocent cousin.

Now, my first reaction to this tale was that it sounded complicated and far-fetched, if not dubious. As they say metaphorically in French, the affair seemed to be tied together crudely with string that was simply too thick to be kept out of sight, but too coarse to hold. Much more would need to be known about the relationship between Mary and Betty before we outsiders could be certain that one was definitely a goody and the other a baddy. Fair enough, I said to myself. It's obviously an affair that needs to be handled by society's competent authorities: police, lawyers and finally judges. But I was in for a shock: a concept shock! Instead of culminating in an appeal to such authorities, the TV producers decided that they would take the case into their own hands. And, to maximize the reality of the show, they called upon Mary, Betty and their respective friends to participate in the performance, playing what they thought of as their authentic personal roles... but not necessarily with adequate acting skills.

Watching this fiasco with relatives, I complained that the notion of a TV channel taking justice into its own hands was utterly shocking. I tried to point out that a concept was at stake here: the time-honored concept of old-fashioned Justice with a capital J. But I had the impression that my relatives didn't understand what I was raving on about. They seemed to think that it was bloody good reality TV. And it was, too. But it was hardly an instance of the concept of Justice.

Today, I find myself confronted with a jolting case of concept shock when I discover the way in which the Australian minister of Immigration, Kevin Andrews, has just overturned a court order to free the Indian doctor Mohamed Haneef. The most ridiculous aspect of the minister's disregard for the basic legal principles of the nation (in this case, the respect of a court decision) is the antiquated concept brought forward to justify his outrageous decision: Haneef's failure to pass a so-called "character test"...

I'm profoundly shocked. That's all I can say. Concept shocked.

Hecatomb for Aussie cyclists

Yesterday was a particularly nasty day for three Australian cyclists in the eighth stage of the Tour de France, between Le Grand-Bornand and Tignes.

— Stuart O'Grady, winner of this year's strenuous Paris-Roubaix classic, suffered terrible injuries—five broken ribs and fractures to three vertebrae and a shoulder blade—when he crashed on the descent of Cormet de Roselend, between Beaufort and Bourg-Saint-Maurice.

— Michael Rogers was racing downhill splendidly when he crashed. At that instant, he was what the commentators call the virtual yellow-jersey holder, which means that his theoretical lead, timewise, put him in front of all the other riders, including the real yellow-jersey holder. Then, in a split second, Rogers was hurtled, as it were, from heaven to hell. There was a tragic TV sequence that showed Rogers lying on the road while a fellow-rider crawled back up out of the dense greenery on the slopes of the curve where he and the Australian had crashed. Later, viewers witnessed a sad event: Rogers weeping profusely as he stopped on the roadside, his right shoulder and arm in pain, and let himself be guided into the automobile of his team manager. [For a moment, I was tempted to take a photo of this event, as seen on TV, to include it in my blog. But there's no point in retaining such negative images.]

— As for the sprinter Robbie McEwan, who fascinated spectators by appearing out of the blue to win an earlier stage, he simply couldn't make it to the finishing line in the maximum allowed duration for the stage, so he was formally eliminated.

Meanwhile, the Danish rider Rasmussen won the stage and picked up both the yellow and red-dotted jerseys.

Talking of Australian cyclists, I'm always amused by the way in which French commentators speak of Cadel Evans, who is now well-placed as a forthcoming yellow-jersey candidate. His unusual first name [he's the only Cadel I've ever heard of] has the merit of being perfectly pronounceable by the French, with no risk of error, but things are not nearly so easy in the case of his surname. The French know how to pronounce the English words "even" and "heaven". Well, they figure that the Evans surname looks more like "even" than "heaven". So, they call him Cadel Ee-vahnz. Personally, I find this pronunciation as quaint as his first name.

Spooky regard

I know it's not nice to make disparaging remarks about people's physical aspects. On the other hand, it's hypocritical to refrain from doing so merely in order to be politically correct. Besides, we should be free to consider public figures as exceptions, since making fun of their appearance is the everyday stuff of caricaturists almost everywhere.

If you read the Dilbert blog by Scott Adams (as I do, daily), you will have seen his recent remarks on this disturbing portrait of the Pope. The eyes are frightening, to say the least. Nothing in that lopsided regard is harmonious, let alone reassuring in a friendly way. Personally, I would feel ill at ease trying to look into the eyes of such an individual and talk with him on honest terms. Fortunately, he never asks me to do so.

Apparently, many fans of Star Wars have drawn attention to the physical resemblance between the Pope and a character in the Star Wars universe named Senator Palpatine.

In this juxtaposition of their portraits, Benedict and Palpatine appear to be sharing the same terrible joke. Maybe its punch line has something to do with Protestants or other aliens roasting in Hell...

Talking about Star Wars, as the son of parents named Skyvington and Walker, I've often felt ripped off—in an illogical sense—by the guy called Skywalker. If he had been politically correct, Anakin would have at least sent me an email to let me know, and maybe even request my authorization, before he started throwing my family names all around the cosmos.

Video clip of Dédé

I'm pursuing my experimentation with the Sony camera and the Macintosh editing software called iMovie. Click the following photo to see a tiny clip of my neighbor Dédé Repellin, who wanders up along the Gamone road most mornings, early, and drops in for a chat:

As I say to Dédé in this clip, I'm thinking of starting a documentary project on the village of Pont-en-Royans, as an exercise enabling me to get used to working in video.

Food talk between males

Yesterday evening, my Bastille Day ended on a friendly European note. A pair of young Swiss guys stopped at Gamone in a massive silver automobile and asked me in broken English [I don't speak a word of German, and they knew no French] if there was some place where they might pitch their tent for the night. I invited them to settle in under the big linden tree alongside the road. They were well-equipped, with an elegant high-tech tent and folding chairs. After congratulating me on my having found such a splendid place to spend my holidays, they were a little surprised to learn that I actually lived here all year round. This morning, they told me their night was peaceful, apart from a visit by a giant toad. Before driving off, they even wanted to pay me, but I told them I wasn't a professional camping operator.

During my morning walk with Sophia up towards Bob's place, I noticed that their white mare was leaning through the strands of the electric fence and eating grass on the roadside, which simply meant that the current wasn't turned on. Later on, Bob himself dropped in. He now stays with his girlfriend in a neighboring village. As for his daughter, she has gone away to the south of France to look into finding a school enabling her to become a horse-training professional.

Bob: It's lucky I dropped in, because my daughter forgot to turn on the electric fence, and the white mare was outside the paddock.

Me: Bob, let me be frank with you concerning your daughter. In my opinion, there's no way in the world she'll ever become a competent horse-trainer, because she doesn't pay attention to simple things such as turning on the current to an electric fence.

Bob: It's true that she often forgets to lock the house. But she's young: only eighteen.

Me: I have a "theory" that somebody who doesn't pay attention to details cannot usually be looked upon as a practical person. Among other things, I wonder how such a person could possibly prepare a meal. Is your daughter a competent cook?

I won't quote Bob's hilarious reply, but it suffices to say that he provided me with excellent evidence to support my theory. Now, you might say that the question of whether or not my neighbor's lovely daughter is a practical person, who knows how to cook, is none of my business. On the contrary. I've already inherited their stray donkey, but I don't want to find their two huge mares prancing—once again—over my lawn.

As far as food preparation is concerned, Bob assured me that he himself is a competent cook. That's how he has remained fit and happy. I've sensed for ages that my neighbor, who's a big solid former rugby-player, didn't find it comfortable to live in a vegetarian environment. This morning, our friendly conversation culminated in an interesting rhetorical question (introduced spontaneously and unexpectedly by Bob, not me): Is it an easy matter for an attractive young girl to find a future husband when young men discover that she survives basically on vegetables? I must admit that, when I was a young man, I never thought much about this kind of question, because I was delighted to have discovered a wife with a fine sense of basic French cooking. I guess you could say I was lucky.

God save the court

A court of law in Timisoara has just thrown out a case against God filed by a 40-year-old Romanian citizen named Mircea Pavel. Insofar as the plaintiff himself just happens to be doing a spell of twenty years in jail for murder, an observer might conclude that Pavel is attacking God because (a) he feels that the Lord has not taken adequate care of him, and (b) he has nothing better to do with his time. Be that as it may, the Romanian court apparently examined the affair seriously before throwing it out. Pavel's lawyers gave the identity of the accused as God, residing at present in the Heavens, and represented in Romania by the Orthodox church. The divine defendant was charged with "fraud, breach of faith, corruption and bribery". In particular, the plaintiff insisted upon the fact that the accused had failed to answer his prayers. "At the time of my baptism," explained Pavel, "I drew up a formal contract with the accused whereby I would be delivered from evil. Well, for the moment, the defendant has failed to honor our contract, in spite of the fact that I have sent him numerous contributions and countless prayers." In throwing out the case, the Romanian court explained: "God is not subject to law... and, in any case, we don't have his full address."

European show on the Champs Elysées

Most observers of this morning's 14 July parade on the Champs-Elysées will award top marks, I'm sure, to the new producer and director: Nicolas Sarkozy. He had the excellent idea of transforming this French event into an unforgettable and spectacular show dedicated to Europe. While there is not yet any such entity as a united European army, we certainly had a chance of admiring colorful specimens of the various armies of Europe. No less than 27 different European nations had representatives of their forces participating in today's grand parade.

Perhaps the most striking aspect of the super show was its music and its military choreography. It was amazing to discover the variety of different ways in which soldiers can march! A naive observer might imagine that marching is simply a matter of, well, striding along in a stately style. Not at all! There would appear to be countless different ways in which soldiers can move their legs and arms. Marching, for imaginative military choreographers, is much more than simply... marching. In Monty Python talk, you might say it's a matter of doing your particular kind of funny walking. The weirdest thing of all was that everybody, from gallopers to goose-steppers, appeared to be marching to the same music, and advancing at roughly the same rate, even though they seemed to have a whole range of different styles of locomotion. For me, there's some kind of a mathematical enigma there, which I haven't yet solved.

There were three fabulous songs, performed by military choirs assisted by the Little Singers of Paris: the Marseillaise, of course; the haunting Chant des partisans (hymn of the Résistance), which inevitably causes me to burst into tears of emotion every time I hear it performed in such solemn circumstances; and finally Europe's anthem, Beethoven's Ode to Joy, exceptionally with French lyrics.

After such a morning TV show, I was worn out emotionally when the Tour de France came around, later on in the day. At times, living daily in a land such as France can be a really exhausting experience.

PS In France today, even Google got on the Bastille bandwagon:

Poisoned gifts

I don't know whether there's an expression in colloquial English for the French notion of a so-called poisoned gift. In a nutshell, it's a gift with unexpected negative consequences for the receiver. For example, suppose you intend to purchase an iPhone. Then, in a spirit of pure kindness, you decide to give your old portable phone to your cousin, who is most grateful for your generosity. But alas, its battery heats up, catches fire and burns down your cousin's house. [I hasten to admit that I'm so totally ignorant in the portable phone field that I don't know whether such a thing could really happen.] In such a situation, it could be said that you gave your cousin a poisoned gift.

The Australian legal system has just invented the concept of a novel kind of poisoned gift whose dire consequences affect, not the receiver, but the giver. After days and days of police interrogation, the Gold Coast doctor Mohammed Haneef has been charged with "recklessness" as a consequence of having once given a portable telephone to his cousin over in the UK, because this distant cousin has since been arrested on a charge of terrorism. Media reports concerning the accusation brought against the kind cousin in Australia include the following fuzzy comment: "Prosecutors conceded the offense was perhaps at the margins but by no means insignificant, with a maximum penalty of 15 years' jail." I like the elegant expression "at the margins", but they don't say at the margins of what. Injustice? Stupidity? Confusion?

Today, when I heard a French TV journalist introducing this subject, I pricked up my ears, because I was intrigued by the challenge of translating into meaningful French the expression "reckless support of terrorism". In fact, I had underestimated the journalist's linguistic skills. Without blinking an eyelid, he used the adjective inconsidéré, which means "inconsiderate". The dictionary tells me that this means "thoughtlessly causing hurt or inconvenience to others". So, we have a third kind of poisoned gift. It's neither the receiver nor the giver who gets hurt as a consequence of the gift, but... others!

In an earlier post entitled Destruction of computer files [display], I gave advice concerning ways of getting rid of an old computer. Most of those methods would work, too, for destroying an old phone, to avoid the risk of being tempted to give it to your cousin. Ideally, we should hope that manufacturers will soon get around to offering us some kind of high-tech device—let's call it a device terminator—that can instantly destroy things such as old computers and phones. They would get transformed instantly into a tiny invisible puff of dust, which not even the smartest Aussie detectives could ever detect and exploit. The only problem is that this gadget might work just as well on automobiles. Imagine that it got turned on inadvertently when you were driving along the highway. You might suddenly find yourself sliding along the macadam on your buttocks.

Once upon a time in Paris

In the popular image, on 14 July 1789, the people of Paris stormed the huge fortress jail of the wicked Ancien Régime, called the Bastille, and released hordes of innocent political prisoners... who then went on to set in action the celebrated French Revolution.

The reality was somewhat different. When the rioters finally reached the interior of the decrepit prison, they found seven bewildered inmates who were no doubt thrilled to be offered this unexpected opportunity of stepping into planetary history.

Just for the record, I take this opportunity of pointing out that one of the first prisoners to escape from a Parisian jail during that tumultuous week was an Englishman, Clotworthy Skeffington [1743-1805], 2nd Earl of Massereene, head of the Irish branch of our ancestral family. Some twenty years earlier, during a voyage to the European continent, the eccentric lord had been swindled in a crazy project that was supposed to import salt from the Barbary coast into France and Switzerland. Unable to pay his debts, Skeffington was imprisoned for some eighteen years in several nasty Parisian jails, including the notorious Conciergerie and the Grand Châtelet. By the summer of 1789, Skeffington had spent seven years in a jail known as the Grande-Force (since it used to be the Parisian mansion of a nobleman named Force), located just a stone's throw from the Bastille.

On Monday, 13 July 1789 (the eve of Bastille Day), Clotworthy Skeffington and two dozen fellow inmates escaped from this prison, apparently without any assistance whatsoever from the throngs of Parisian rioters who were taking control of the city.

In 1972, Ulster archivist Dr A Malcomson described "the extraordinary career" of Clotworthy Skeffington in a biography published by the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland. Although I don't belong to the same branch of the family as the Earl of Massereene [my early ancestors remained in England], I was sufficiently intrigued by the case of this eccentric aristocrat to research his history in the French national archives and the police museum in Paris, where I obtained a lot of interesting information that had not been available to Malcomson.

I take this opportunity of quoting a couple of documents on the interesting anecdote of Skeffington's escape from jail on the eve of Bastille Day, which does not seem to appear in French history books.

The book Englishmen of the French Revolution by John Alger [London, 1889] quotes a dispatch from the Duke of Dorset [British ambassador to France] sent from Paris on 16 July 1789, three days after Skeffington's liberation:

His Lordship, with twenty-four others in the Hôtel de la Force, forced their way out of prison last Monday morning without the loss of a single life. His Lordship, who has always expressed a great sense of gratitude for the small services I have occasionally rendered him since I first came to Paris in my present character, came directly to my hotel with six or seven of his companions, the rest having gone their different ways. I, however, soon prevailed upon Lord Massereene and the others to go to the Temple, which is a privileged place, and where he may therefore be able to treat with his creditors to some advantage. His Lordship told me that it was his intention to go thither, but that he thought it right to pay me the first visit.

A detailed account of the happenings of 13 July 1789 is supplied in the autobiography of François Richard-Lenoir, a famous Frenchman whose name is now attached to a boulevard at the Place de la Bastille. At the age of 24, Richard-Lenoir was a fellow inmate of Skeffington at the Grande-Force. Later on, Richard-Lenoir became immensely rich as a cotton merchant. Decorated personally by Napoléon Bonaparte, he has often been described as the richest individual of the entire 19th century. In his Mémoires [published in Paris in 1837], Richard-Lenoir speaks of Skeffington as follows:

We had for companion in misfortune an English lord, Massereene, eighteen years a prisoner. He had married in prison the sister of another prisoner, who had since recovered his liberty. Every morning his wife and brother-in-law arrived as soon as the gates were opened, and did not leave till evening. There was something touching in the felicity of this strange household. Through them we knew of everything that was going on in Paris, and could follow, step by step, the Revolution which was beginning. Lord Massereene especially, who had no hope except in a general overturn, was quite absorbed by it, and almost electrified us for liberty, which, indeed, for us poor prisoners, was only natural. We were not ignorant of what had happened at Réveillon's [evening meal] when, on 13 July 1789, just as we were about to assemble after the opening of the doors in a kind of garden or gravelled court, Lord Massereene suggested to us the forcing of our way out. Whether he was beforehand certain of the impassiveness of the jailers and soldiers, or whether he counted much on our daring, he assured us that nothing was easier, and that a resolute will was sufficient for success. We promptly decided. Arms had to be procured. Lord Massereene pointed out the staircase railings, the bars of which could serve as pikes. We immediately set to work; the railings yielded to our efforts, and all of us were soon armed. The commandant, however, was speedily informed of the revolt; but fear was then gradually gaining on officials, and instead of taking strong measures, he contented himself with ordering us to carry the outbreak no further, otherwise he warned us he should be obliged to use force against us. "So much the better," we exclaimed on all sides. "Kill us, and then you will have to pay our creditors." This reply frightening him, we took advantage of his perplexity to attack the first gate, and passed through without much trouble. There were still three others to force. All the turnkeys had joined the soldiers, but several officers and privates seemed to fight with reluctance. One of them on ordering fire had tears in his eyes. However, we seized on the three gates, part of the outer wall was demolished, and we at last issued, victors, from La Force.

There's a funny ending to this story. After being led by Lord Massereene to the British embassy in the Rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré, where the escapees were served refreshments, Richard-Lenoir says that he decided to make a return trip to the prison to pick up his belongings. Once he got back to the Grande-Force, the prison guards informed him that a Parisian mob had seen the gaps in the outer walls [made, as explained above, by Massereene and his fleeing companions], and members of this mob had simply strolled into the prison and stolen everything they could lay their hands on, including the clothes and other belongings of poor Richard-Lenoir!

Personally, even if Skeffington weren't a vague ancestor, I would still consider this delightful description of his escape from a Parisian prison on the eve of Bastille Day as a more authentic and human tale than the official story about the storming of the great fortress.

PS Genealogical information on the Massereene lineage can be found in chapter 4 of my monograph entitled Skeffington — Patronymic research [access].

No need for religious wars in sport

I ignore the circumstances in which the Australian cyclist Robbie McEwan might or might not have said to football folk: "You chase a ball around for 80 minutes. We chase the yellow jersey for 3 weeks." In any case, I think it's a pity that these facetious words are used to promote TV viewing of the Tour de France in Australia.

There's no need to attack great sports such as rugby and soccer in order to boost cycling. It's idiotic to ignite religious wars in the sporting domain. Besides, the silly expression "proper tough guys" evokes the ancient epoch when soccer players were thought of, in Australia, as poofters. The worst idea of all would consist of encouraging soccer fans, if not players, to behave as "tough guys".

Talking about soccer, it's time to take action—maybe through some serious firing and hiring—if the Socceroos team is to survive. The 3-1 defeat by Iraq was truly ignominious. After the Tour de France, in cycling's off season, maybe they might be able to employ Robbie McEwan as a coach.

French cultural heritage

Besides its purely sporting dimensions in the domain of competitive cycling, an aspect of the Tour de France that thrills TV viewers is the opportunity of viewing helicopter footage of the fabulous architectural patrimony and landscapes of provincial France. Yesterday, for example, we saw splendid images of the ancient sanctuary on the hill of Vézelay, which was a departure point for pilgrims setting out for Santiago de Compostela in northwestern Spain.

The density and beauty of these treasures, seen from the sky, leave the viewer speechless. They remind us, if need be, that France is indeed a jewel of civilization. There is no doubt that this TV presentation of the splendors of the land is an essential ingredient in the mythical charm of the Tour de France.

Sophia becomes a video star

This is post #333 in my Antipodes blog, it's Friday 13 [a lucky number for the French cineaste Claude Lelouch... so why not for me too?], and this is my first video [of a simple kind], starring Sophia in a mystery movie. What's the mystery? Simply the fact that neither you nor I nor even Sophia will ever know the nature of the "something" that Sophia has sensed, causing her to look around her and bark. You can hear the birds of Gamone. You can also hear me asking Sophia [with my dog-talk accent]: "Qu'est-ce qu'il y a ?” Click here to see the movie.

Myths

Exactly half a century ago [when I had just started science and philosophy studies at Sydney University, and was about to meet up with computers for the first time], the Parisian intellectual Roland Barthes wrote a book, entitled Mythologies, that made him famous overnight. In it, he analyzed various phenomena that had acquired the status of myths in French society. At that time, a typical example of a mythical object in France was the new Citroën automobile with stylish lines and hydraulic suspension:

It was referred to by a pair of letters, DS, that looked like a trivial codename. But, when these two letters were pronounced in French, they produced the word déesse, meaning "goddess". And that was exactly how French people looked upon this divine automobile. Barthes wrote: "I believe that the automobile, today, is a rather exact equivalent of the great Gothic cathedrals." Barthes spoke too, in his book, of a less mechanical goddess who, at that same time, was being transformed into a myth in France: Brigitte Bardot.

In Mythologies, Barthes described the Tour de France as a cultural event that had attained mythical proportions, whose stars were like heroes in ancient legends, often moving through fairy-tale landscapes with quaint villages, green fields, mountains and castles.

As a longtime Tour de France fanatic, I've often been intrigued by the fact that we are constantly so fascinated by the stage of the race that is actually taking place at the present moment that we often tend to forget that this historical event has always had a legendary allure. Today's Tour makes us forget about yesterday's. To put it bluntly, each time we witness the Tour, it is as if we are seeing its magic for the first time.

Back in Paris, in a different domain, I used to have a personal "theory" to explain why I was capable, from one day to the next, of setting my eyes [no more than my eyes] upon such-and-such a female, encountered in the street or maybe in the métro, whom I would instantly think of as the most magnificent creature in the universe. I got around to believing that I surely had a deficient visual memory. The image of a new goddess would dominate my sensations simply because all the images of previous angels had been erased. Now, this was really a very bad explanation of what was happening: a little like saying that new sexual encounters are significant simply because we've forgotten all the previous ones. An analysis in terms of myths is more to the point. If I see the Tour de France constantly with new eyes, as if I'm gazing for the first time ever at a superb nymph, this is simply because I'm dealing with mythical phenomena. I'm no longer observing reality. I'm seeing extraordinary things that are happening, primarily, in my imagination. And—to borrow a Gaelic utterance—I never think that its like will ever be there again.

New MySpace account

You can click on my name to visit my new MySpace site: William. But there's nothing there yet. However, since everybody seems to have an account at MySpace these days [including the Australian opposition leader Kevin Rudd], I decided to be like everybody else. One of these days, I promise, I'll get around to learning how to use my portable phone. Incidentally, I've been wondering whether the current Aussie PM [God, I can't remember his name] is also, like Rudd, a cyber wiz.

Talking of those folk, the latest Nicholson animation has just come out. It's brilliant, as usual. It features a sad old guy singing Paul McCartney's Yesterday while thinking nostalgically about all the nice things that used to happen to him.

Click on the image to see it.

Catholics v. Protestants

In the part of south-east France where I'm settled, people are still aware of, and indeed sensitive to, bloody conflicts that took place here over four centuries ago. I'm referring to the so-called Wars of Religion between Catholics and Protestants [often referred to as Huguenots].

They lasted on and off for 36 years, from 1562 up until the salutary Edict of Nantes in 1598. Records indicate that the vineyards at Choranche, run by Catholic monks, were totally devastated by Protestant vandals in 1593. Besides, that date enables me to infer that the splendid stone cellar in my house dates from the beginning of the 17th century, when all the monastic installations in the region had to be rebuilt. It is said that, towards the end of the Wars of Religion, the Catholic lord of Pont-en-Royans, Antoine de Sassenage, slaughtered all the Calvinist troops in the village, and that the Bourne (so the story goes) "ran red with their blood".

I'm amazed to learn that Pope Benedict XVI has just approved a document that is likely to revive conflicts between Catholics and Protestants by reasserting naively the universal primacy of the church of Rome. The document affirms that Jesus established only one church on earth. This is total rubbish. Everybody knows today that Jesus, during his brief life, never established anything whatsoever that might be referred to as a church. After the crucifixion of their master, and up until the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, some 40 years later, the followers of Jesus remained Jews [referred to, these days, as Judeo-Christians], and played no part in the foundation of anything that might be thought of as a primitive Christian church. That did not start to happen until Gentiles led by Paul got into action. As far as early links with Rome are concerned, there is no proof whatsoever that the apostle Simon Peter went to Italy, and is buried at the Vatican. It's far more likely that he died in Jerusalem and was buried beneath the chapel of Dominus Flevit on the Mount of Olives, at the place where Jesus wept while contemplating the temple and its future destruction.

As a relatively unconcerned observer, I have the impression that some of the reactionary decisions and declarations of the headstrong former cardinal Joseph Ratzinger will end up annihilating little by little the failing credibility of christianity, and hastening its doom.

The less said, the better

A year ago, I went along to a major store in Valence [the Fnac] to obtain information on a digital camera, and then I actually bought it through the Internet, at a price far below that of the store. I've just behaved in the same way for the purchase of a camcorder. I'm sure that many consumers must be using this same approach. It's a funny situation. It's reassuring to go along to the store, where you can meet up with real human beings and receive their expert evaluations of various products. But, once they've helped you to choose the product you need, you don't actually purchase it from the store. Instead, you return home and order it, at a much lower price, through the Internet. So, I conclude that the store only sells equipment to customers who haven't yet discovered the phenomenon of Internet shopping. In other words, these customers are in fact financing the expert assistance that people like me are receiving from the store. I often wonder how long this kind of situation can last. Maybe, one of these days, the store will decide to refuse to talk to would-be customers who in fact make purchases through the Internet. But how would they enforce such a rule?

Meanwhile, I'm amazed by the improved quality of Internet shopping. I only ordered the Sony camcorder and a Macintosh video software product a few days ago, and they were both delivered this morning.

Inevitably, when the morning silence is broken by two delivery trucks visiting Gamone, I have to reassure my neighbor Madeleine on the phone that no major upheaval is occurring at my place. She hears the vehicles moving up and down the steep road behind her house, and she's justified in imagining that it might be a gang of international bandits who are stealing my kitchen table and chairs, or maybe even my donkey and billy goat. Here in the Bourne valley between Choranche and Châtelus, the people in each house are reasonably well aware of any movements of vehicles [and animals, too] in the vicinity of neighboring houses, and the telephone is often used on such occasions to verify that all is in order.

Madeleine and I are capable of gossiping on the phone for half an hour. Well, jumping from one thing to another, and knowing that my neighbor is a fervent churchgoer, I took this opportunity of asking Madeleine what she thought of the pope's decision to authorize the Latin mass. Her reply was delightfully unexpected: "When I was a girl, I used to sing in the choir at Pont-en-Royans, and all the words of our chants were in Latin. Those are beautiful memories. After Vatican II, we were all shocked to hear the priest talking in everyday language. At first, it sounded silly, and it made us laugh, because we weren't used to hearing ordinary French in the church. But, since then, I've forgotten all my teenage Latin." In other words, it's an upside-down [Antipodean] situation. For Madeleine [and, no doubt, for countless other Catholics of her generation], the move from French back to Latin could never be as upsetting as the initial move from mysterious celestial Latin to everyday French.

Madeleine's explanations remind me of one of my favorite [true] anecdotes, which dates from the time that Christine and I were students in Paris. We had a group of French student friends who were musicians, and one of the girls told us this story: "We first met up with this American guy when he was playing the saxophone in front of a café in the Latin Quarter. He didn't speak a word of French, but we managed to communicate with him, and we ended up inviting him back to our place to play music together. We called him Big Joe. He became a member of our group, and we got on wonderfully well together. I think we communicated mainly through our music, because Big Joe still didn't understand a word of French, and none of us were very fluent in English. Sometimes we would ask him a question, and Big Joe would simply laugh and shrug his shoulders. So, we didn't really know whether he had understood us, or what he was replying. But that didn't really matter, because we were all convinced that Big Joe was a fabulous guy, a great friend. We didn't need words. Then the summer vacation arrived, and Big Joe went back to America for a couple of months. When he returned to Paris in September, Big Joe informed us that he had spent all his time in the States doing intensive French courses at the Alliance Française in Chicago. Sure, there was no doubt about it: we were all amazed to find that Big Joe was now speaking a primitive but acceptable kind of French. But the greatest shock of all, now that Big Joe could speak to us, concerned the things he started to tell us. It was pitiful. We discovered that he was a total asshole, not at all on the same wavelength as the people in our group. Everything he had to say—and Big Joe liked talking a lot—was pure uninteresting bullshit. At times, he would even get around to talking of politics as if he were a fascist bastard. Within a few weeks, we all started to dislike Big Joe intensely, and we ended up throwing him out of our group."

That brings me back to what I was saying, at the beginning of this post, about going along to a store in Valence for expert assistance and then making my purchases through the Internet. Maybe, like Big Joe, I should simply keep my mouth shut.

The man who called God by his right name

A great Franco-Israeli intellectual has just died in the Holy City: 89-year-old André Chouraqui, counselor of David Ben-Gurion, friend of Moshe Dayan, author, translator of the Bible and the Koran, former vice-mayor of Jerusalem.



Born in Algeria and educated at the law school in Paris, Chouraqui was a profound Jew with an ecumenical regard for all the great religious faiths of the planet, including Buddhism. Intrigued, if not irritated, by the countless names that have been invented to designate the divine entity with whom Abraham, Moses and Jesus communicated, Chouraqui proposed a novel typographical solution designed to replace the term "God". In fact, Chouraqui decided to use the two names provided literally in the Pentateuch: on the one hand, the so-called Tetragrammaton composed of four Hebrew letters, often written in English as YHVH (or similar variants), whose pronunciation remains a mystery; on the other hand, the strange plural word Elohim. Chouraqui suggested that, instead of the letters "God", it would be better to use the following formula:

Finally, he has inserted the term adonaï, in small letters, above the Tetragrammaton. This is not a proper name, but merely an easily-pronounceable Hebrew term (which might be translated into English as "master"), used as a substitute for the unpronounceable term YHVH. Simple, no?

In Hebrew today, there is in fact an easy way out of this naming problem. Instead of trying vainly to pronounce or even write the name of God, it's perfectly correct to refer to it simply as HaShem: literally, the Name. In computer programming, naming things is a fundamental task. Maybe my longtime preoccupations in this field have made me sensitive—in a superficial way—to the Jewish question of naming the entity that others call God.

Woman who has paid the price

Cindy Sheehan's 24-year-old son Casey died in Iraq over three years ago. Since then, this lady has become known as an anti-war activist both in the USA and overseas. Her most-publicized action consisted of setting up a protest base, known as Camp Casey, near George Bush's famous ranch in Texas. Two months ago, Cindy Sheehan gave the impression that she was throwing in the sponge, and returning to her ordinary life as a mother. But her pause from militancy did not last long, since she has just announced a challenge to the Democratic speaker Nancy Pelosi. Basically, if Pelosi does not launch impeachment proceedings against Bush within the next fortnight, 50-year-old Sheehan threatens to move into the political arena by attempting to unseat Pelosi in next year's elections.

Cindy Sheehan considered that Bush should be impeached for two major reasons:

— He misled Americans with false justifications for attacking Iraq.

— He condoned the use of torture: a violation of the Geneva Convention.

The incident that brought Sheehan back into the activist arena was Bush's decision to commute the jail sentence imposed upon "Scooter" Libby, whose conviction had been linked to a mediocre affair resulting in the identity of a female CIA agent being leaked deliberately by the Bush administration to the press.

Retrospectively, we cannot compare the pain of a mother who lost her son in a senseless war with the professional harm endured by a woman who has lost her job as a spy. But there's a common denominator in many of the acts perpetrated by Bush and his men. To put it bluntly, they've hurt many people. Does the president himself realize this? Maybe. Be that as it may, Bush doesn't like the idea of his buddy Libby getting hurt by time in the pen. Whatever else we might say about the US president, we have to admit that he's kind to his friends.

Big idiotic events

I can't make up my mind about which of the two big events was the more idiotic: the Live Earth concerts around the world that are supposed to have something to do with protecting the environment, or the new list of Seven Wonders that are supposed to represent the most extraordinary constructions in the world. One moment, I consider that the first event was totally stupid, whereas the second was even stupider still. Then, the next moment, I invert my evaluations. In any case, one thing is certain: Judging big idiotic events is a quite difficult task. I'm glad I don't have to do it too often.

Magic date

I don't know whether or not the world in general has been behaving similarly, but many people here in France are somewhat bewitched by today's date: July 7, 2007. They see 7-7-07 as a magic date. Apparently hordes of couples have planned their marriages for today. Others have simply bought lottery tickets.

Not to be outdone, Pope Benedict XVI chose today to announce the restoration of an ancient and magic ritual referred to as the Latin mass, which is the epitome of ecclesiastic obscurantism, because ordinary parishioners simply don't understand this language any more (if ever they did). In other words, a priest could say anything he liked in Latin, even to the extent of reciting Ovid's Art of Love, and the congregation would still carry on believing that the reverend gentleman was praising God. Moreover, the Latin ritual is performed by a priest who turns his back to the congregation, which means that they wouldn't even see if he happened to be yawning or grinning. Maybe it's preferable that people don't understand the words of the Latin mass, because certain folk might not appreciate the presence of the prayer that implores God to convert Jews to Christianity.

Many Christians in France still have the habit of referring to their nation—without necessarily knowing why—as "the eldest daughter of the Church". [As was often the case in ecclesiastic matters, it was a story, not of peace and love, but of bloodshed. An 8th-century French king fought a battle and gave the spoil to the pope, who promptly thanked the king by inventing the daughter tribute.] Well, the most that can be said today is that the eldest daughter doesn't appear to be particularly concerned by the Holy Father's encouragement of a return to Latin. It wasn't mentioned in the French Google news, whereas US media seemed to handle the subject as a major story. This lack of attention to the papal decision is all the more unusual in that the French Church was even brought to the brink of schism not so long ago because of a renegade ultra-traditionalist archbishop in Paris.

The Pope's decision might be a tempest in a chalice, because the truth of the matter is that few priests today know enough Latin to conjugate the verb amo, amare, amavi, amatum... let alone speak it for an hour.

I must ask my neighbor Madeleine what she thinks of this decision. Not long ago, I happened to tell her that I was unable to find a Latin specialist who was capable of deciphering the 14th-century parchment in medieval Latin that describes the agricultural properties at Choranche. Madeleine advised me to see a priest. I replied laughingly: "Madeleine, village priests don't know medieval Latin." She didn't agree: "Of course they do, William. Everybody knows that every priest speaks Latin." Maybe, on this magic seventh day of the seventh month of the year 2007, Benedict XVI will urge the Holy Spirit to descend upon the heads of village priests, bestowing upon them the magic gift of tongues, so that Madeleine's presumption becomes a reality.

Sarkozy's surprises

In a country such as France, where the political cleavage between the Left and the Right is ancient and profound, Nicolas Sarkozy's ouvertures [openings] towards Opposition personalities have surprised and disturbed many observers. His minister of Foreign Affairs, Bernard Kouchner, has even been labeled a traitor by some of his former Socialist friends. This merely means that the concept of a nonpartisan dimension in politics is not yet easily digestible in France.

A striking new case of Sarkozy's behavior has just emerged, since the president intends to propose and endorse the candidacy of the Socialist personality Dominique Strauss-Kahn for the post of president of the IMF [International Monetary Fund].

It will be difficult for the French Left to criticize either Sarkozy's decision or Strauss-Kahn's acceptance of the arrangement, since it's a matter of a prestigious international role, which is not linked to the everyday political situation in France.

The big loop

That's the nickname in French of the Tour de France: la grande boucle. It's weird but wonderful to think that it'll be starting tomorrow in the streets of London. It's reassuring, too, to know that all 189 riders have signed the famous anti-doping chart imagined by the UCI [Union cycliste internationale]. In signing this draconian chart, a cyclist agrees to provide a DNA sample to the authorities investigating the so-called Puerto scandal. Furthermore, he declares that he's not involved in any ongoing doping affair, and that he doesn't intend to take dope. Finally, if ever he were to be caught cheating, he agrees to pay a fine to the UCI that would represent his total earnings for 2007.

The eyes of French spectators will be turned towards an amazing cyclist named Christophe Moreau, who recently won the prestigious Dauphiné Libéré and went on to become the 2007 road champion of France. He's amazing, above all, because of his age: 36. Many observers are convinced that Christophe's major motivation, which has pushed him to victory, is his first child, born on 23 April 2007. If so, that's certainly a far more healthier stimulus than dope.

Large male deer

An hour ago, Sophia started to bark furiously in the direction of the slopes on the other side of Gamone Creek. Once outside, I could hear this roe deer calling out spasmodically almost as loudly as my dog:

He was using his eerie cry—between a bark and a cough—to let his females know that he was in the vicinity, but he didn't seem to be in a hurry to plunge into the thickets and start searching for them.

Although the animal was quite big, I could hardly see him in the tall weeds, but I managed to get this shot of the hind quarters of the deer with my 300 mm lens.

Destruction of computer files

Clearly, the only efficient tool for trashing computer files is a hammer. The destruction process should of course encompass, not only the computer's internal memory and hard disks, but all the CDs that might have been used for backup. Then, to make doubly sure that nothing whatsoever remains to be read, I would recommend pouring hydrochloric acid over all the smashed-up stuff. Finally, it wouldn't be a bad idea to conclude with petroleum fuel, but be careful not to get burned when you set fire to the debris. Last but not least, you might put all the charred remains in a hessian sack and drop it discreetly into a deep and swiftly-flowing river.

The French general Philippe Rondot did not take these elementary precautions, and that's why a police laboratory has just recovered the data in 39 supposedly-trashed files, still lurking in his computer, containing some thirty thousand pages of notes. Wow, that intelligence specialist was a prolific writer! Meanwhile, we naive outsiders imagined that spies kept most things in their heads, and only rarely resorted to the use of techniques such as invisible ink.

In any case, the outcome of this massive data recovery is that things don't look nice for the former prime minister Dominique de Villepin nor, for that matter, for Jacques Chirac... who has already made it clear that, in keeping with French law, he refuses to be interrogated concerning affairs that took place during his presidency. As I pointed out in my post of 26 May 2007 entitled Chirac has some explaining to do [display], the affair is complicated, but it all boils down to determining whether or not these gentlemen attempted to frame Nicolas Sarkozy with the help of fake documents suggesting that Sarkozy had stashed away money in a foreign bank. Stand by for future installments...