Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

My E.U. Vacation: What I learned reading the European constitution on a beach in the Caribbean.
The Weekly Standard ^ | June 13, 2005 | P.J. O'Rourke

Posted on 06/03/2005 9:51:53 PM PDT by quidnunc

Guadeloupe – The French referendum on the E.U. constitution was a story that demanded to be viewed and understood from a thoroughly European perspective, so I went on vacation. Guadeloupe, in the Caribbean, is a full-fledged département of France. Here the European Union could be contemplated as the socio-politico-economic masterwork of a civilization, an edifice of human hope. And never mind that previous attempts to unify Europe by Hitler, Napoleon, and Attila the Hun didn't work out, it had been a cold, rainy spring in New England.

At passport control there were two lines. One official sat complacently in a booth doing nothing until all the E.U. citizens had been processed at another booth by a second official who, in turn, sat complacently doing nothing until the first official had finished. When, at last, the first official examined a non-E.U. passport he walked across the aisle to the second official's booth, borrowed the visa stamp, walked back, stamped the passport, and returned the stamp to his colleague. He did the same thing for each subsequent passport. At Customs, on the other hand, there were no officials.

All around the island billboards read "OUI" or "NON." They were equal in number and identical in color and typography. The fairness doctrine debates of America must have hit home in the E.U. Obviously rigorous, uniform rules on campaign media had been instituted. I mentally composed several indignant paragraphs about how John McCain will be advocating this soon in the United States before I noticed the billboards were advertising a cell phone company. Say "NON" to service charges, "OUI" to free minutes.

-snip-

(Excerpt) Read more at weeklystandard.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: euconstitution; pjorourke

1 posted on 06/03/2005 9:51:53 PM PDT by quidnunc
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: quidnunc

bump


2 posted on 06/03/2005 10:01:11 PM PDT by NonValueAdded (NEWSWEEK LIED, PEOPLE DIED)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: quidnunc

There is an amazing amount of things to do in Guadeloupe, but you have to know what they are, and it is impenetrable to someone who does not speak French.


3 posted on 06/03/2005 10:03:04 PM PDT by Vicomte13 (Et alors?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: quidnunc
Perhaps the benign and comfortable atmosphere is a result of French culture and values, such as those the French imparted to Haiti.

heh heh heh

4 posted on 06/03/2005 10:05:46 PM PDT by SmithL (Proud Submariner)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Vicomte13
There is an amazing amount of things to do in Guadeloupe, but you have to know what they are, and it is impenetrable to someone who does not speak French.

P.J O'Rourke is a humor columnist--this is impenetrable to anyone who does not understand the American genre. The proper response to your comment is a polite smile.

5 posted on 06/03/2005 10:37:50 PM PDT by stripes1776
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: stripes1776
I believe its an Overseas French Department. And no, the French don't joke. Its beneath their Gallic haughtiness.

(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
6 posted on 06/03/2005 10:42:05 PM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: BigB

ping


7 posted on 06/03/2005 10:46:10 PM PDT by perfect stranger (I need new glasses.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: goldstategop
And no, the French don't joke. Its beneath their Gallic haughtiness.

If your only knew what I had first typed in as my response. But upon reflection I toned it down. But I think you are exactly right. It's amazing. For all the supposed sophistication of the French, they can be incredibly naive.

8 posted on 06/03/2005 10:46:50 PM PDT by stripes1776
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: stripes1776

I love the bitabout standng in line for an hour. Reminds me of banking at the Credit Lyonnaise.


9 posted on 06/04/2005 1:18:46 AM PDT by ClaireSolt (.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: ClaireSolt
As a humorist P.J O'Rourke scores where you least expect it. The funniest line in the entire article was his caricature of the EU's institutions as being built on a "system of bounced checks and balances." No wonder French and Dutch voters bounced the EU Constitution in the past week!

(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
10 posted on 06/04/2005 1:24:24 AM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: quidnunc

A "Constitution" that endorses subsidiarity in one clause and then sets rules for "offal" and "lard" in another is a bigger joke than anything P.J. has ever written (as good as he is.)


11 posted on 06/04/2005 5:37:11 AM PDT by Malesherbes
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: stripes1776

"P.J O'Rourke is a humor columnist--this is impenetrable to anyone who does not understand the American genre. The proper response to your comment is a polite smile."

I did laugh at the Joyeux Noel reference.
It is true that things move at a different pace in the islands.

It is also true that laic secularism does not exclude Christmas, and Toussaint (All Saints Day) and the Ascension as national holidays, and their celebrations in schools, etc.


12 posted on 06/04/2005 6:05:07 AM PDT by Vicomte13 (Et alors?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

marking


13 posted on 06/04/2005 6:52:33 AM PDT by eureka! (It will not be safe to vote Democrat for a long, long, time...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: goldstategop
Maybe the French joke when they get away from France. My next door neighbor jokingly calls herself 'your froggie neighbor' when she calls me. Maybe her humor was able to get out when she got her American citizenship and became a Texan.
14 posted on 06/04/2005 6:59:02 AM PDT by Ditter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Ditter

French humor is a very different from American.

Recall the movie "Three Men and a Baby", the American film version of it starring Tom Selleck and Ted Danson. This was an American remake of a French film "Trois Hommes et un Couffin". The premise was identical.

You may recall that, in the American film, when the Ted Danson character came home to his two room-mates who had be stuck taking care of his baby, they went nuts, yelled, screamed, ranted and raved. It was very loud and very amusing.

In the original French movie, when the equivalent of the Ted Danson character arrived home at the appartement, his other two roomates ignored him. They sat stiffly in straight chairs and refused to acknowledge his presence or his existence, in spite of his best efforts to get them to acknowledge him. This was also, of course, very funny.

But very different.

An example of French humor from real politics.
In the early 1960's, an aide to President de Gaulle was attempting to get some action on some item became very frustrated when his interlocutor evidently did not understand what he was being asked. Unaware that the President had entered the room and was standing behind him, the exasperated aide slammed down the telephone and declaimed "Death to all fools!"
At which point de Gaulle spoke up and said dryly "But, my friend, that would be a massive program."

This is really very funny.
Well, alright, I think it is very funny.

A third example from a few weeks ago.
It is night, on a Paris bus that is moving too slowly in traffic. Everyone is silent and drawn, with tired eyes, all going home. A young businessman, perhaps in his early thirties, is talking too loudly on his portable telephone (as people who use portables in public are wont to do). He evidently runs a construction business, and we are all treated to all of the details of all of his difficulties on his projects. He drones on for quite some time about how some worker at some construction site drank a glass of alcohol at lunch and become so drunk he cannot work for the rest of the afternoon. Hellish irritation is rising in the eyes and clenched jaws of everyone on the bus, as this fellow goes on, and on, and on and on and on, stop after stop.
Finally a grandfather seated in the back, who by appearance could have been the brother of Mitterand, speaks up.
Looking gravely at another passenger, he shrugs his shoulders and declaims "He was drunk!"
He looks up at the heavens "He was drunk at the job!"
Now, of course, everyone in the bus is looking at him, with wry amusement playing around the corners of their mouths. The talking young man on his portable is suddenly silent, and shows signs of alarm.
Grandfather continues:
"Drunk!"
He shakes his head with gravity.
The businessman ends his call, goes pale and wilts in his seat.
"On just one glass! How shameful!"
The young man stands up and bolts to the exit, getting out on the street at once.
"On just one glass!" grandfather says quite loudly (hand cupped to his mouth), as the man descends.
All of the tired eyes are very merry.
There is a sniffle of stifled laughter.
There are suppressed smiles and twinkling eyes all around, as everyone rides on towards home in blessed SILENCE.
And when people descend from the bus, they start laughing aloud in the street.

This is the sort of thing that makes French people laugh.


15 posted on 06/04/2005 8:19:28 AM PDT by Vicomte13 (Et alors?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: Vicomte13

So you are saying the French are nuanced, eh? Where have we heard that one before?


16 posted on 06/04/2005 8:39:07 AM PDT by Ditter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: Ditter

"So you are saying the French are nuanced, eh? Where have we heard that one before?"

I am?
Oh dear!


17 posted on 06/04/2005 8:54:09 AM PDT by Vicomte13 (Et alors?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson