Holidays and Firemen

The first weekend in August is upon us and pretty much every French person I know is under starters orders for the mass exodus. It is French holiday time and heaven help anyone who strays onto an autoroute tomorrow in the belief that driving in France is a doddle - for 95% of the year it is, but tomorrow is officially a red day on the roads as everyone dashes for their nearest bit of coastline.

I do wonder how France functions during August (obviously I could have stopped that sentence after the word functions!). Three of my four French neighbours are on holiday from this weekend - so 75% of my immediate sample group - and I haven't spoken to the fourth so am not sure about him. If 75% of every business and government office goes away on holiday then not much is going to get done, is it? I guess the police and the firemen will be the only ones stretched as they pick through the inevitable carnage on the autoroutes.

In fact people are still talking about the 'pompiers' turning up here the other day. I forgot to mention it yesterday but it has been raised in conversation by passing neighbours three times today. In fact they raised the subject in almost reverential tones - 'C'est vrai, les pompiers arrivent' - yes well they did arrive to do a fairly mundane job, so what's the big deal?

We, the proprietors of 42rvh, had noticed that a pair of shutters on the second floor were broken and swinging a bit dangerously in the wind. Now these shutters are pretty solid wooden affairs and any bit falling off could have done some serious damage to any passing car or fatal consequences to a passing pedestrian. As such, we had urged Madame La Presidente of our newly independent self-governing society (i.e. Brigitte) to write to the owner and ask them to sort it out - which to his credit he did immediately.

He got someone round to have a look from the inside and they declined the job and when he tried to get someone to sort it from the outside it appears that the only people qualified and with the right equipment, so to speak, were the fire brigade.

Sadly, I was in the middle of a very tortuous conversation with France Telecom whilst all the drama unfolded but I did at least manage a quick look out of my window to see what was going on. An enormous fire truck with a big extendable hoist was parked outside and two firemen complete with immaculately polished silver helmets were atop said hoist and wrestling with the shutters in question. They received a round of applause (pur-lease!) for taking the shutters off their fixings and lowering them down to the ground without dropping them and it seems that everyone is still talking about it.

Why were the firemen here this morning?
Did you see the firemen outside your building?
Weren't the firemen wonderful?

I guess that I forget that this is a small town and little local incidents like that provide the daily chit-chat that keeps everyone talking to each other. Maybe there is still a lot of London in me yet - as far as I could see no-one was in danger and it wasn't a particularly difficult or dangerous job, when you turn up with the best and most appropriate equipment on offer in France, so what was the big deal?

Perhaps I would have taken more interest without the speed talking helpline assistant shrieking in my ear.

Just in case anyone thinks I'm having a go at the firemen (heaven forbid - they can only do what they are asked to do) - I will say that they did the job with utmost professionalism as I am sure they do at all times.

Vive les pompiers