Update: Number change for France Telecom’s English language helpline
A COUPLE of comments have been left on a story from the archive about contacting the English language helpline from France Telecom.
For quite some time people have been struggling to get through, although others have been successful, but it has now received some additional support staff.
WHEN I moved to a small house in sight of the church tower at Loubejac in the south of the Dordogne, one of the first people I met was Roger Clifford-Banks.
He first arrived in the Périgord region in 1972, and over the years has lived on and off in Loubejac with his wife and three children.
WORK has started on the new cemetery at Fromelles, in northern France, which will provide a final resting place for around 400 British and Australian soldiers.
A DOG’S life in France can very often be spent at the end of a chain in a dusty courtyard, with their owner seeing them more as a guard dog than a pet.
But James Conroy sees such dogs as an opportunity to help them have a better life, as long as their owners are willing to understand the psychology of owning a dog.
James has completed a course in Avignon, overseen by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, which aims to help people with dangerous dogs control their animal so that both the dog and others are safe.
I HAVE already had to make my apologies a couple of times for completely misjudging the distances involved and dropping in on friends 15 to 20 minutes late.
If there is one thing I had forgotten about driving around the twisting, turning roads of the Dordogne it’s that what looks a short hop on a map, turns into quite a drive once en route.
HAVE you checked if your holiday home is insured should guests from the UK cause damage, or worse the building comes up in smoke?
That is the question being asked by Boris on his France This Way site after going through the process of renewing the insurance on the gites he has.
A casual remark about feeling safe in the knowledge that he is covered should anything nasty happen to the property, was soon brought to a halt when he was told that the insurance of guests covered the building not the cover he had just bought.
A CAMPAIGN has been launched to raise the funds to buy the treasures of Marcel Marceau, as his estate is set to be sold at bargain prices to pay off his debts.
The master of mime, who died in September 2007 aged 84, spent much of his earnings on helping theatrical productions and left debts behind which will be paid off through the sale of items such as costumes, photographs and texts.
But this means that much of Marcel Marceau’s affairs will just be sold at the going rate, something that has annoyed many in French theatre who believe a place should be found for many of his items so that people can see them.
CHARITABLE group Cancer Support France offer English-language help and support to both people with cancer and their carers.
Their website offers information on their work as well as advice for those people who want to offer their time or raise money to help the group.
There is also a very useful page of downloadable documents providing .pdf files on subjects such as the French health system and vocabulary guides to medical words and phrases.
The documents are free to download, but I am sure they would appreciate any form of support should you find them helpful.
ONLY a handful of American artists have appeared in the Louvre, one of them was Joe Downing. Although he passed away in 2007, film maker Chistopher Strong met him whilst filming his Treasures of France tour, here he writes about their meeting.
You don’t get to have tea with Picasso by being an ordinary Joe, and Joe Downing is far from being ordinary.
He’s an exceptional artist with an incredible story. An honest to goodness country gentleman from Horsecave, Kentucky. Joe’s love affair with France began more than fifty years ago, when he stood on the banks of the Seine, gazing at Notre Dame.
A HANDY little feature has been launched within Google Mail labs that allows you to translate messages into English and a number of other languages.