Month after month went by for Sarah in Paris and she became increasingly aware that the "real" France is far away from her romantic dreams.
While she once had believed that the French were passionate and progressive, she knew now that they were, actually, much more socially inhibited. It was through a series of "to put one's foot in one's mouth" accidents that she came to this realisation.
It was a mix of being ill at ease at French parties and going stir-crazy sitting at home all day that made her look out for English-speaking people in Paris. Before long she met Alicia who was also an unemployed freelance writer and they hit it off immediately. After all, you know the saying- A problem shared is a problem halved.
After feeling apathetic for what seemed like forever, Sarah finally sees an opportunity coming her way. It is the course "Journalists in Europe" she is desperate to enroll for. The only difficulty- Such is the cost of the course that she feels dizzy whenever she reads the numbers aloud.
Just as the problem of cost is snowballing a most peculiar thing happens that helps her come up with the money necessary. The newly elected French president Jacques Chirac makes a decision which shocks the world yet aids Sarah not to be in a jam anymore.
On June 13, 1995 the French president decides to resume nuclear tests in French Polynesia (a French overseas collectivity in the southern Pacific Ocean).
WHY?Chirac sites three reasons for this step which made France at that time the most unpopular country in the world namely the security of their nuclear deterrent, the life in an uncertain world (!) and the test of the reliability of existing French weapons of mass destruction. Although 60% of the French population, the South Pacific, the Commonwealth countries and the UN opposed the tests, their opposition fell on deaf ears as France carried out six tests before calling a truce.
THE CONSEQUENCES
A 2007 report confirms what is common knowledge amongst scientists around the world- there is no such thing as safe nuclear testing. The report goes on to say that the the Maruroa and Fangatanfa atolls in French Polynesia have witnessed an increase in cancer.
If you wish to find out more about the French nuclear tests in the Pacific, visit:http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c10400&no=339393&rel_no=1
The consequences for Sarah weren't at all that horrendous. On the contrary, as Australia was one of the fiercest opponents of this French project, six French companies decided to cover the costs of her course wanting in return nothing more than objective journalism on the issue of nuclear tests.
Anyway, just as Sarah thought nothing could backfire anymore, she was proven wrong. Days before her course was due to start, the French went on the allegedly largest general strike in France since May 1968, opposing the PM Juppé's decision to implement an extensive programme of welfare cutbacks. To read more, visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1995_strikes_in_France
Vocabulary quiz:
1. be ill at ease
a) be anxious
b)tired
c)ill
2. despondent
a) tired
b)unhappy
c)broke
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