A few days after the New Year, we were hit with a freezing cold front on the French Riviera. It having been twelve years since I lived in Finland and last had to deal with ice on a day-to-day basis, I had essentially forgotten about the slippery phenomenon.

That is, until my foot slid on the sidewalk and I thought to myself, “these soles are really wearing out,” put down my second boot, thinking it would stabilize me, then, as both slipped out from under me, I promptly found myself seated on my now-freezing rear end. “What??” I put my hand on the sidewalk. What should have been gummy, rough asphalt was instead icy smooth. I ran my hand over it inquisitively, and finally the memory returned: “oh, ice! What?! Here?!”

I picked myself up and paid more attention while I finished walking from the bus station to our offices. Fifteen minutes after settling in at my desk, my lower back began to ache. I soon realized I wouldn’t make it through the day without painkillers, and so called up a doctor. I was able to get an appointment an hour later. By then I was nearly unable to walk from the pain, much less stay seated for very long. The doctor prescribed x-rays of my lower back, an anti-inflammatory (ketoprofen) and painkiller (paracetamol), and sent me home for two days of rest. Since the accident had been on my way to work, our office assistant filled out an accident de travail form, which is the first time I’d ever seen one. It’s roughly equivalent to workers’ compensation in the US.

It turns out that having an accident de travail makes everything even simpler than health care already is in France. I don’t have to pay for anything that is prescribed as a result of my accident. Not even the usually-mandatory base fees that, otherwise, would later be reimbursed. As a result, the five x-rays of my back (only two are shown there) were free, and my regular physician prescribed 15 physical therapy sessions, which are also entirely free. My spine, sacrum and coccyx are fine; the doctor who did my x-rays even pointed out that I have “particularly well-spaced vertebrae”. Way to go, vertebrae. The muscles, however, are a different story; it’s only today that I’ve been able to go without using much pain medication.

I was able to find a great physical therapist with offices five minutes from where I work. Few things are better than a deep, full-back massage right after a long day.

While at my local supermarket this morning, I noticed they’d put escargots at the end of an aisle. Some French people — not all, many wouldn’t touch them if their lives depended on it — eat snails, more specifically the Burgundy snail, escargot de Bourgogne. They’re usually served in a fragrant butter-based sauce called beurre à la bourguignonne (Burgundy butter), seasoned with garlic, shallots and parsley. I happen to love snails, but have never cooked them at home; they’re for very special occasions. I didn’t buy any today, although I will admit to being tempted. That said, there are better places to buy snails than canned from a supermarket.

Also tempting were the rows and rows of bottles of champagne. This year, however, I’m eschewing my usual bottle of holiday champagne for other wines: Sauternes to go with foie gras (and because I love Sauternes), Blanquette de Limoux brute, Crémant de Loire rosé (pink), and a Côtes du Rhône red. I’ve already had the blanquette, which was delicious. I found it to be smoother and with a better body than champagnes, which are more ethereal.

Living in France, it’s hard to avoid getting to know wines. Over the years I’ve discovered that I like fuller-bodied, earthier wines, which is interesting since my home state of Oregon produces one of the best examples of that taste: Willamette Valley wineries make gorgeous pinot noirs! As for French wines, my favorites are from Burgundy, Rhône, and Patrimonio (in Corsica). While there are Bordeaux wines that I enjoy, generally I like them less; there are several Bordeaux I dislike that other people find very good. As a result, when TV shows or movies have a scene where someone orders a Bordeaux to admiring oohs and aahs, I’m left cold! (Give me a Châteauneuf-du-Pape any day. Or an Eyrie Vineyards or Domaine Drouhin Oregon pinot noir. Help, I’ve become a wine nerd.)

I’ve been busy lately, and today was no exception — I went to Paris for a business meeting. Once it ended, I hopped on a metro to the Eiffel Tower, hoping to see it in the sunset. I didn’t have time to visit anything else in Paris, which meant that I could devote what little time I did have, to photographing more of the Eiffel Tower than I would otherwise. It was a beautiful evening, and as always, my breath was taken away by Eiffel’s gorgeous conjunction of imposing mass and fine grace. You can see more of the “Iron Lady” in my photoset from today.

A few weeks ago I became one of the many “lucky” folk to catch the H1N1 flu (“swine flu”). For the first time in my adult life, I understood how someone could die from the flu. Not to sound alarming, mind, just that on the fifth day of a high fever, bad cough, and exhaustion, I was so sore and tired that I barely had the strength to cough well enough to clear my throat to breathe. And that was with medication, and I was in pretty good physical shape before that. Flu vaccinations. It hurts less to get one than to get this flu.

While I was ill, the French national police knocked on my door. At first I wondered if I were in a movie, seeing the plain-clothed gentleman present himself with blue-white-red-striped official ID in hand and firm look on his face: “Bonjour madame, police nationale.” He was looking for one of my upstairs neighbors (the eldest son of his parents, who also live there, along with their two younger sons and the eldest son’s daughter), who has a warrant out for his arrest. Delightful. I swear my apartment is in a nice neighborhood overall. It would seem I’m just in a bad micro-part of it.

I finally recovered to the point where I was able to get back on my mountain bike yesterday at noon. Taking in the fresh autumn forest air on the rocky hills was wonderful, and raised my spirits. Then, this morning (on foot, not on my bike), a car driver decided that she would rather risk killing or handicapping me than lose ten seconds at a stop sign, which also had a clearly-marked pedestrian crossing. She accelerated — yes, accelerated, to my horror as I kept trying to signal “stop” with my hand and even shouted at her — then swerved to the side of the road to go around me, missing me by a few centimeters. I spent the rest of the day taking short breaks to pull back from my desk, wiggle my legs and look at them, happy they’re still attached and in good working order. Before that, however, I called the police. Again. It’s to the point where I recognize the dispatchers’ voices now. Good to know in this part of the world where there is no shortage of drivers who have a sense of entitlement the size of their hurtling metal narcissism machines: if a driver runs you down in a pedestrian crossing, you can write down/memorize their license plate, then go to the gendarmerie and file a complaint (porter plainte), also giving a description of the car as possible. The police will then contact them and handle it from there.

I could write a book on interactions with the police and gendarmes in France. I’ve now dealt with pickpockets, a drunken upstairs neighbor who would tip over his furniture at 2 in the morning while watching football, a mentally ill East German woman who’s hit her children, husband and niece, insults everyone in French and threatens to poison my cats, an upstairs neighbor who threatens his own mother (yes, I had called the police on him a couple of times — the national policeman’s visit didn’t entirely surprise me), and dangerously irresponsible drivers. Have a complaint? I probably know how to file it. In French!

Besides that, though, I found some beautiful chrysanthemums at a florist. They reminded me of Chinese and Japanese paintings. Earlier I had potted daffodil and iris bulbs I’d dug up and stored this summer, and am pleased that all of them are starting to sprout. From the two daffodils and three irises I had originally, I now have four daffodil and seven iris plants. Work on my apartment is also coming along, although very slowly.

A year and a half ago, I fell in love with an antique oak dining table in a secondhand store. Originally it was too expensive, but a month later, the price had fallen to one I could afford — no one wanted its black patina and slight damage. When I cheerily told the secondhand store owner I wanted to buy it, he sighed and said he was sorry about the damage, but that I could always paint over it. I said “oh non, jamais je la peindrais ! Ce n’est pas profond, je vais la poncer.” (“Oh no, I’d never paint it! It’s not deep, I’ll sand it.”) The owner looked at me and smiled, “c’est bien, c’est mieux comme ça.” (“That’s good, it’s better that way.”)

Thanks to a short visit by building management yesterday that required me to take the day off (to document the water damage from two months ago), I had plenty of extra time to do a project. Off to the home improvement store I went, to buy sandpaper and beeswax to redo my dining table. I’d long been ruminating how to restore it, and decided that sanding it by hand would be better than mechanically, since I only wanted to take the patina off and keep some of the table’s history, rather than erase all trace of previous usage. I’d settled on a beeswax finish for several reasons, mainly that oils don’t age well — indeed, linseed oil, which was used often in France (and still is), turns black with age, so it’s quite possible my oak table had been treated with it. Beeswax brings out the natural color of wood, doesn’t cause a patina, and still protects well. Paint and colored varnish were entirely out of the question, since I wanted to keep the table’s character.

Once home I started sanding with nothing more than sandpaper and my hands. The oak’s natural coloring, as shown above, was beautiful, and I was delighted at how the artisan had chosen the different grains for the border and Versailles-style top. It made me feel much better about taking off the patina, since once sanded, it was clear that this was a table whose woodwork was a work of art in and of itself, meant to be seen.

I applied two coats of beeswax (waiting two hours between them), let the table sit all night, then photographed it the next morning. The finished table: from the damaged end (showing how I didn’t sand out damage entirely), a photo with better lighting, and finally, with both extensions out. The beeswax really brought out the oak’s gorgeous coloring.

In a stroke of synchronicity, on my way home from work this evening, I passed an antique store with old books on sale. One of them was a 1967 home improvement book that I picked up as soon as I saw its instructions for reupholstering Louis XIV chairs. It also described some French furniture styles, which finally helped me ID my table, thanks in large part to the very typical legs for its style: it’s a Louis XV, also known as rococo. At home, I made my usual visit to the ApartmentTherapy site, where they had… a retrospect on Louis XV / rococo! I see rococo-style couches all the time in secondhand stores here, and now that I realize they’re from the same period as my dining table, I may well get one!

As I approached the Casino de Monte Carlo, which also contains the Monte Carlo opera house, passing the Maseratis, Jaguars, Lamborghinis, Rolls Royces, Bugattis and Bentleys, I stopped in my tracks, wowed by a beauty I hadn’t expected to see much of: kimono. Not just one or two, but dozens upon dozens of Japanese women wearing gorgeous silk kimono with shibori, yuzen, embroidery, tsuzure weave and other designs, all wearing their obi (wide sashes/belts) tied in the traditional taiko style. I was delighted to be able to see what kind of kimono were worn to a kabuki performance: the formality ranged from irotomesode, the most formal I saw there, to iromuji, houmongi and tsukesage, which are usually worn to such performances, to tsukesage komon. (The least formal of kimono is the komon; women’s kimono types are described here.) There was even one woman wearing a cream tsukesage made of translucent ro, with a matching light blue ro obi woven with metallic threads. It was also interesting to see how the women wore their kimono: indeed, as I’d always read and seen in kimono books and magazines, older women wore their obi and obijime (cord tied around the obi) lower than younger women, some with it only an inch above the bottom edge. One older woman had a beautiful light grey iromuji with a black-ground obi, woven with metallic blue, green, silver and gold lozenges; a middle-aged woman had a forest green irotomesode with metallic embroidered flower rondels along the bottom hem and a silver obi; a younger woman had a bold yellow houmongi with yuzen flowers and an orange and gold obi. As for men, I only saw one man in the audience wearing hakama, entirely done in a beautiful deep grey. At the end of the performance, Ichikawa Ebizo XI was wearing a formal hakama outfit with five mon.

Then there was the opera house itself. It seats only 520; at least a fifth of the audience was Japanese. I had a seat in the second row on the middle left: this was my view, and the only photo I took since I wanted to enjoy the performance. At one point I remembered I should look at the opera house ceiling, since I’d heard it was richly decorated. As I looked up, I had to catch my breath — I’ve never seen anything so beautiful in my life, and yet I’ve visited Versailles, Florence, Venice, the Loire Valley castles, the Forbidden City… I think the difference was that for the first time, I was actually participating in an event that a particularly gorgeous edifice was meant for, rather than being a simple tourist. The ceiling and walls were gilded, sculpted, painted, with an enormous gold and crystal chandelier hanging in the center; there were tall windows onto the Mediterranean with immense burgundy velvet curtains that closed when the performances started.

Kagami Jishi was danced first. Seated so close to the stage, and on the side where Ichikawa Ebizo did most of his acting, I was able to see his delicate and subtle facial expressions, hand movements, and changes in body position. Videos you can find online come nowhere near conveying all the delicacies in a kabuki performance. I was also able to hear the quiet vocal cues given by both Ebizo and the musicians: the almost-whispered calls and pianissimo shamisen plucks that gave the time, tunings, stage cues and more. I could even hear the cords on the ko-tsuzumi being tightened and loosened by the first drummer. The musicians were exceptional, with precise timing and tuning. I was very happy to experience such a wonderful live Japanese music performance, because it greatly contributed to my appreciation of it. Listening to a recording, no matter how good, is simply not the same as witnessing the expert interplay between a flutist, shamisen and ko-tsuzumi on opposite sides of a stage, not facing each other, with no conductor and no cue other than a sub-vocal “oh”, and yet making their entrances in precise unison. Having been a musician myself, I know how much trust, skill and knowledge go into a simple entrance, especially when there are so few musicians — if just one is even slightly off, it’s obvious. They were always “on”, and it was breathtaking.

Narukami was done next, with Ichikawa Danjuro XII as Narukami, and Nakamura Tokizo V as Princess Taema, just as in the examples on that Narukami page. To my surprise, Narukami was a humorous play, and done with real artistry by the two men and their supporting cast. It made all the difference that they were older men playing the parts of younger people — their depth, composure and maturity threw the characters’ inexperience and immaturity into stark relief, making it even funnier. Ichikawa Danjuro honestly seemed to be having the time of his life; his performance was inspired. If he always performs like that, he’s an incredible artist indeed. For a play that was first premiered in 1684, Narita-ya has kept all its vivacity; it does not “feel” 325 years old at all.

Online you can read that kabuki pursues “on-stage expression that goes beyond mere realism.” In an era of digital special effects and never knowing what’s real and what’s not, I was amazed at how kabuki truly does evoke sensations and feelings in its audience. In Narukami, after Princess Taema has cut the cord imprisoning the dragon gods of rain, a thunderstorm begins. And you know it’s a thunderstorm, because the enormous, roaring o-daiko is the thunder, and the deafening, scintillating shamisen are the rain. It took me several minutes of childlike wonder before I finally figured out that the rain was, in fact, the musicians plucking their shamisen backstage, and not a digital effect. In short, an unforgettable experience. I hope to be able to attend kabuki again someday; it also reminded me of the better ballets and operas I’ve seen in my life, and how wonderful those can be too.

Yesterday evening, while walking to the bus stop to go home for the weekend, I noticed that the advertisement had changed, and had a Kabuki actor. To my great delight, on approaching close enough to read it, it was indeed for Kabuki, in Monaco! I could hardly believe my eyes. As long-time readers may remember, I’ve always loved Japanese culture and the Japanese language, and five years ago, nearly went to teach English in Japan, having been accepted by an elementary school on the outskirts of Kyoto. Kabuki is a popular form of Japanese theatre that was founded some 400 years ago. Invitation to Kabuki is an excellent site with information about its particularities.

Once at home, I went straight to the “Kabuki in Monaco” website to reserve tickets, and was overjoyed that I could get a spot for next Saturday evening’s performance. The first two kabuki actors are the most prestigious in Japan: Ichikawa Danjuro XII and his son Ebizo XI, of the Narita-ya kabuki guild. From their site: “Narita-ya is the yago, or guild name, of the Ichikawa family, the best known acting family in Edo kabuki. Narita-ya is also the earliest known yago in all kabuki.” As for the third, Nakamura Tokizo V is a well-known onnagata actor, meaning he plays female roles. The play they’ll be performing, “Narukami“, likely means that Nakamura will play Princess Taema, one of his best roles, and one of the Ichikawas will play the priest Narukami — indeed, the “Narukami” link has video of Nakamura Tokizo V and Ichikawa Danjuro XII playing those very roles.

As for the dance “Kagami Jishi” (The Mirror Lion, 鏡狮子 in Japanese), I was able to find it on YouTube, in several parts. It’s played by a different actor (Bando Tamasaburo V), and has nice commentary in English:
- Kagami Jishi, part I
- Kagami Jishi, part II
- Kagami Jishi, part III
- Kagami Jishi, part IV
- Kagami Jishi, part V
- Kagami Jishi, part VI
- Kagami Jishi, part VII

I’ve had a gurgly stomach and painful abdominal cramps since Monday. Since my stomach is generally able to withstand pretty much anything I throw at it (the only exceptions being gluten and casein), I figured it would get better, but instead it’s worsened gradually. I could barely sleep last night for the pain, and was unable to move due to cramping after eating breakfast.

So, this morning I emailed our offices to let them know I was ill, then called my general practitioner at 9:20 am. My regular doctor wasn’t available until tomorrow morning, so I asked if another was. (I’m grateful to have found an office with three doctors, all of whom are good, upon my arrival in Nice nine years ago.) Another was indeed able to take me at 10 am — 40 minutes later. I took a quick shower, then walked to the doctors’ office, which takes 10 minutes.

I waited a half an hour, reading a couple issues of L’Observateur. Then the doctor examined me, diagnosing a bad case of indigestion, and prescribed me a proton pump inhibitor to take for a month (pantoprazole for anyone curious), an antispasmodic, and rest. He gave me an arrêt maladie (permission for work absence due to illness) for today, ran my carte vitale through his reader, and I wrote him a check for 22 euros, all of which will be reimbursed by the sécu and my supplementary insurance.

Then I went to a nearby pharmacy to fill the prescriptions. I presented my carte vitale; they already have my supplementary insurance on file. The pharmacist replaced the branded medications with generics, wrote the correspondences on the boxes so I’d know which was which, put them in a bag, and said “bonne journée, au revoir !” The medications are fully reimbursed, so I didn’t have to pay anything.

I was home by 11 am. It took less than two hours for me to make a doctor’s appointment, take a shower, go to the appointment, get diagnosed, pick up medication, and walk home. Total cost, once the 22 euros are reimbursed (tomorrow): Zero. Although I will admit the walk wasn’t much fun considering how tired and weak I am, but still, it was free monetarily speaking. It’s taking all the self-restraint I have not to make a scathing remark comparing this French experience to the US. And in my ten years in France, this experience is the norm — I usually get an appointment on the same day, within a couple hours of calling.

Related post explaining more about France’s sécu, the carte vitale, supplementary insurance, and why I paid at the doctor but not the pharmacy: Health care in France – Basics

For about a year now I’ve been toying with the idea of continuing my studies, having always wanted to get a Masters degree. After my BA in French, I was actually accepted to a Masters program in the same subject, but decided instead to stay in Europe. It’s a decision I’m glad I made, because in the years since then I’ve come to know myself much better. Ten years ago I thought teaching would be great, but after experience teaching privately, I discovered it’s not something I enjoy as much as I’d imagined. While I would like to teach children in public schools, you have to be a French or EU citizen to even apply for the degree programs. Meanwhile, in the time I’ve been working as a translator and in IT, it’s become increasingly clear that my dream career would be something that combines my loves of literature, languages and computing. This was what I kept in mind over the last year.

Lo and behold, such a dream career does indeed exist: librarian. With today’s information systems, being a librarian now entails having IT knowledge, and a common degree is the Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS). While public librarians may be the first to come to mind, there are other related careers as well: information retrieval specialist / reference librarian, archivist, information subject specialist, knowledge manager, manager of library and information organizations, technical services librarian, Web librarian, and so forth.

I looked at various programs in the US and in France, hoping to stay in France since leaving for more than 3 months would mean losing my long-term resident status and having to start over from zero if I ever returned to the country. But how to finance my studies in France? A friend answered for me: in France, there’s a program funded by the Fongecif for the Congé Individuel de Formation (CIF), or Individual Continuing Education Sabbatical. For continuing education programs of at least 6 months to a maximum of 6 years, on approval of your proposal, the Fongecif can reimburse your employer for your salary, while you do your studies. In other words: you continue to receive your full salary, if it’s less than twice French minimum wage (which is about 1300 euros gross a month), or if it’s more, you get 80 to 90% of your salary. On agreement with your employer, you can return to your company after finishing, or find work elsewhere. There are differing requirements to qualify for the Fongecif depending on your situation; in my case, as a permanent employee (I have a CDI), I need 2 years as an employee, which recently became the case.

As for the program I hope to follow, I jumped out of my chair and started bouncing around my apartment when I discovered that one of the best MLIS programs in France is not only in Lyon, a city I love and miss dearly, but it also offers an option called Systèmes d’Information Multilingues et Ingénierie de la Langue (SIMIL), which translates to Multilingual Information Systems and Language Engineering, with courses in French and English. The school is the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Sciences de l’Information et des Bibliothèques (ENSSIB), the degree I’m interested in is the MSIB (an MLIS), and they have other programs as well.

The first step is a Fongecif introductory meeting, which I’m going to attend this Thursday. If all goes well, the application process then begins.

In my previous post on French health care, I went over the basics of how things are done here. In this post I’ll compare some statistics, citing Canada and the UK as well since those two countries have often been the focus of recent debate in the US.

The last time the World Health Organisation (WHO) ranked world health systems was in 2000 — they no longer produce rankings since it’s so complex a task. Here are how the four countries fared:
1. France
18. United Kingdom
30. Canada
37. United States
Countries such as Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Chile also ranked higher than the US.

Life expectancy has become part of the debate in the US currently. These rankings were taken from the list of countries by life expectancy:
8. France, with an overall life expectancy of 80.87 years
14. Canada, overall life expectancy 80.34 years
37. United Kingdom, overall life expectancy 78.7 years
45. United States, overall life expectancy 78.06 years
The French live nearly 3 years longer than Americans, on average.

Another key issue is pregnancy and childbirth. Here are a few stats taken from Wikipedia’s list of countries by infant mortality rate. The first number is the infant mortality rate per 1,000 live births, and the second is the under-five mortality rate per 1,000 live births:
Iceland: 2.9 and 3.9 (they have the best numbers)
France: 4.2 and 5.2
Canada and the UK: 4.8 and 6.0
USA: 6.3 and 7.8

In France, pregnant women have 3 sonograms and blood tests (one per trimester), with a three-hour blood test around the 4-month mark. All covered at 100%. Anything beyond that’s deemed necessary is also covered 100%. Mothers-to-be get 6 weeks of paid vacation legal minimum before their birth date — it can be extended, for instance if the pregnant woman lives more than an hour’s commute from her offices. They then get 10 weeks after giving birth. Fathers get 11 days of paid vacation (18 days if they’re father to twins or more). Postpartum exams are covered. Parents are given allocations familiales depending on their need; all get a basic “starter” minimum of several hundred euros. There are also allocations to help cover childcare if/when the mother returns to work. Mothers have the option of working 4 days a week instead of 5; fathers can now do this too (but only one member of the couple can do this, and there is a sort of “salary cut” in that a few — less than 10 — vacation days are removed if they choose the “4/5 work week” as it’s called).

All this and per capita, in France we pay half what Americans do: Health Care Spending in the United States and OECD Countries (2007).

From another scientific study, Americans Spend More on Health Care But Are Not Healthier:

The study is the first to use a universal set of standards to compare the quality of health care in the five countries surveyed. The researchers found that no country scored the best or worst overall and that each country was the best and worst in at least one area. The study is published in the May/June 2004 issue of the journal Health Affairs.

Peter S. Hussey, lead author of the study and a doctoral candidate in the Department of Health Policy and Management, said, ”It is well known that the United States spends much more on health care per capita than other countries, and it is commonly assumed that we have the best health care system in the world. However, the results of our study show that the United States performs better than other countries in only a few areas, while performing worse in others. This raises the question of what Americans receive for all of the money devoted to health care.”