Saint Tropez

Have you heard something about St.Tropez? 


Well, is a famous place visited for a lot of people each year.


 Is a town in the east of Marseille, located on the French Riviera. 

As I said its famous and extremely wealthy summetime guests. 


It has been dubbed the "playground to fashion models and millionaries".


The main economic resource is tourism. 


St. Tropez has a lot of beaches, many of them offer windsurfing, sailing and canoeing equipment for rent, while others offer motorized water sports, such as power boats, jet bikes and water skiing, scuba diving.

Some of the private beaches are naturist beaches

Every year there are parties with celebrities and famous people.

Joan of Arc: The Maid of Orléans

This peasant girl was born in what is now eastern France during the year 1412, and she is now considered a folk heroine of France.  Her family was poor and her birthplace experienced the consequences of the conflict between England and France. From an early age Joan of Arc displayed a sensitive and religious temperament.  At a very young age (12 years old) it is said that she began to have mystical visions where she felt the voice of God telling her to renew the French Nation. These visions were often accompanied by the presence of light and saints such as St Michael and St Catherine

 Initially Joan did not tell others about her visions and inner commandments but in May 1428 the divine messages urged her to seek an audience with Charles de Ponthieu currently an ineffective and relatively weak leader of the French. When Joan of Arc came to the court she overwhelmed Charles with her passion and conviction. It is quite remarkable that this 17 year old peasant girl was, thanks to this , she was given control over an army and allowed to lead them into battle. Within a year Joan of Arc had led the French army to victories at Orleans, Patay and Troyes. Many other towns were also liberated from English control and it allowed a triumphal entry into Dauphin for the coronation of King Charles VII on 17 July 1429

Joan of Arc was accused of witchcraft by the English and she attended to a trial in order to be judged.  She was canonized a saint in 1920 and remains the patron saint of France. She was executed at age 19 on  May 30 1431.  

Basic French Words and Phrases

English	Pronunciation	French
Do you speak English?	par-lay voo zon-glay	Parlez-vous anglais?
Excuse me/sorry	ex-koo-zay mwah	Excusez-moi
Fine thanks and you?	bee-ehn mer-see ay voo?	Merci et vous?
Glad to meet you	on-shohn-tay	Enchanté
Good-by	oh ruh-vwar	Au revoir
Good evening	bon-swar	Bon soir
Good morning/good day	bon-zhoor	Bon jour
Hello	sah-loo	Salut
Here	ee-see	Ici
How are you?	kom-mohn tah-lay voo	Comment allez-vous?
I don't understand	jhuhn kom-prohn pah	Je ne comprends pas
I'm sorry	day-zoh-lay/pahr-dohn	Desolé/Pardon
My name is	juh mah-pell	Je m'appelle
No	nohn	Non
Ok	dah-core	d'accord
Pardon me	pahr-dohn	Pardon
Please	seel voo play	S'il vous plaît
Pleased to meet you	ohn--shahn-tay	Enchanté(e)
Please speak slowly	par-lay lehn-ta-mohn	Parlez lentement
So-so	kum-see, kum-sah	Comme ci, comme ça
Thank you	mare-see	Merci
That's ok	dah ree-ehn	De rien
There	lah	Là
Very well	treh bee-ehn	Très bien
What?	kom-mohn	Comment?
What is your name?	kom-mohn voo-za-peh-lay voo	Comment vous appellez-vous?
When	kohn	Quand
Where	oo	Où
You' re welcome	dah ree-ehn	De rien

France in the Olympic Games:

Now that we are about 16 days away from the Olympic Games which will take place in London, we think it was convenient to tell you France´s place in the past Olympic Games. France has been host of the Summer Olympic Games about two times in history:

• Paris 1900:
• Opening date: May 14, 1900
• Closing date: October 28, 1900

These games were really important because women participated for the first time! The star of these Games was American Alvin Kraenzlein who won 60, 110 and 200m hurdles ant the long jump. There were also many French champions at these Games which was not surprising given several events were entered only by French competitors. In total there were 997 athletes (22 women and 975 men)

 

• Paris 1924:
• Opening date: May 4, 1924
• Closing date: July 27, 1924

These games were known as the Olympic Games of Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell, the Chariots of Fire Games, immortalizes on the silver screen by Hugh Hudson. In these games the French athlete George André pronounced the Olympic oath, president Gaston Doumerge carried out the official opening ceremony. There were 3089 athletes in total (135 women and 2954 men).  

In the past Summer Olympic Games (Beijing 2008) France occupied the 10^th place in the list of countries with the biggest amount of medals obtained.  France obtained a total of 40 medals: golden: 10, Silver: 16 and bronze: 17.

Á la mode

When we talk about mode also we are talking about France and the different brands like Chanel,Christian Dior, Lacoste o Du pareil .

France made a big difference during all this centuries in the world of the fashion : make up, perfum,clothes,shoes and all you can imagine.

We are going to give you a summary of different french companies.

Chanel, the women who marked the best period of mode in France and Europe .
Established in 1908 ny Gabrielle Bonheur (Coco Chanel) . In XX she become a monster in the world of mode.She made from perfums to make up , from clothes to skin treatments products.Her style combine luxury with elegance and compete with other companies like Louis Vuitton, Hermés and Christian Dior.

Christian Dior , master of masters.

Influential designer , one of his students was Yves Saint Lauren . The brand has his name and design from watches, glasses, clothes, perfums and all kind of luxury goods.

Lacoste, tennis player brand.
This company was established in 1933 by the celebrity tennis player René Lacoste, called "the cocodrile", because he made a bet and won a bag made with that animal. And this animal help to represent the brand.

Louis Vuitton, france empire.
Is considered the luxury paradigm.This company made a merge whit Moet and Henessy to create the LVMH group. Like the others this company has a worldwide market of stuffs to children,women,men and also to pets.

French Science: Louis Pasteur

Louis Pasteur Born was born in Dole, France on December 27, 1822 but he grew up in a town named Arbois. In his early years he was an average student, but he was gifted in drawing and painting. In 1848, he became professor of chemistry at the University of Strasbourg. In 1849 he was married to Marie Laurent, daughter of the university's rector.

His work was oriented to demonstrate the process of fermentation by microorganisms; he was against the spontaneous generation. Through his research he showed that the growth of micro-organisms was responsible for spoiling beverages, such as beer, wine and milk. He invented a process in which liquids such as milk were heated to kill most bacteria already present within them; this process was soon afterwards known as pasteurization. Pasteur started to link the presence of microorganisms with the growth of diseases, this Lead Dr. Joseph Lister to develop antiseptic methods in surgery. Pasteur also discovered anaerobiosis, which explains why certain microorganisms can develop and live without air or oxygen.

 Later on Pasteur focused his work on chicken cholera. He started his experiments by inducing the disease in some chickens that later died. In a second experiment he inoculated a new group of chicken with the poisonous substance that contained an old sample of the germs that caused the chicken cholera, to his great surprise these chickens didn’t died, they just showed some symptoms of the disease.  What Pasteur didn´t knew was that the weakened bacteria had caused the chickens to become immune to the disease. Pasteur inoculated again these same chickens with a higher dose of the germs that caused the chicken cholera, he thought that they would be dead the next morning, however he was wrong;  the next morning, those chickens were living happily and healthy.   With these experiments Pasteur initiated a large race on the immunization field and the creation of vaccines.

Another disease that he investigated was the rabid, a diseased that killed lots of French at that time.  Pasteur was able to develop a vaccine for this disease, and it was tested only on 11 dogs before its first human trial. The vaccine was first applied to Joseph Meister, a 9 year old kid, on July 6, 1885, after the boy bitten by a rabid dog.

He died in 1895, near Paris, from complications of a series of strokes that had started in 1868. Nowadays

His legacy:

• Avenue Louis Pasteur in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area in Boston, Massachusetts is named in his honor in the French manner with "Avenue" preceding the name of the dedicatee.[24]
• The Lycée Pasteur in Neuilly-sur-Seine is named after him.
• The Avenue Pasteur in Saigon, Vietnam, is one of the few streets in that city to retain its French name.
• Institute Pasteur

Marianne

Marianne is a national emblem of France and an allegory  of Liberty and Reason.

She represents the state and values of France;liberty, equality and fraternity.                 

She symbolises the Triumph of the Republic.

Her profile stands out on the official seal of the country, is engraved on french euro coins and appears on french postage stamps.

Exist two version about the origins of Marianne,depicted by artist Honoré Daumier,in 1848 or by the sculptor Francois Rude.

The origin of the name : well some believe that the name came from the contraction of Marie and Anne,two names used between the female poblation in that year. Others say that came from the name of the Jesuit Juan de Mariana, the 16th century monarchomach  and Others think it was the image of the wife of the politician Jean Reubell.

The official busts of Marianne initially had anonymous features, appearing as women of the people. From 1969, however, they began to take on the features of famous women, starting with the actress Brigitte Bardot. She was followed by Mireille Mathieu(1978)m Catherine Deneuve (1985), Inés de la Fressange (1989),Laetitia Casta (2000) and Evelyne Thomas (2003).