This French Life

Author: Craig McGinty

  • French language crossword challenge

    French-language-crossword

    TAKE five minutes out of your day for a quick crossword challenge that will help boost your French vocabulary on travel and airlines.

    Beverley Dinerstein has created another crossword for you to enjoy with the clues offered up in English, and the answers in French.

    You can download a two page .pdf file offering up the quiz itself on page one, and the answers on page two.

    Plus if you have a little more time on your hands then explore many more online French language crosswords created by Beverley.

  • The inside scoop from a French table

    Foie-gras

    EXITING the pigpen, and entering the pasture, we find the goose, writes Christopher Strong. Source of the delicacy that generates resounding bravos from foodies of all nations ā€“ foie gras, literally fat liver.

    It comes from a, supposedly, free range bird, whose only function in life appears to be organ donation.

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  • Autumn morning in the Dordogne

    Autumn-dordogne

    SEPTEMBER and October really are beautiful months to be in France, with the morning mists in the valley adding a magical touch to the day.

    The rolling hillsides here in the south of the Dordogne (map), with their deep forests, produce glorious muted colours, with splashes of early morning sunshine in between.

    The forests are busy with wildlife, many deer, a couple of foxes and rattling woodpeckers have been ticked off the list, whilst spider’s webs are heavy with dew.

    This morning was another of sunlight slowly breaking down the mists, while the horse in the field strode up the hill to meet the others. Click on the thumbnail right to see the full size image.

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  • Brits head back to UK, leaving their animals behind

    Lynn-stoneIT must take a particularly cold heart to leave your animals behind and return to the UK, hoping that someone else will pick up the pieces.

    But that was the reason why Lynn Stone, of the charity Les Amis des Chats, took a call from a French family looking for a home for the animals.

    “We took a couple of cats in the other day through some French people whose English neighbours had just upped and left their horses, their dogs and their cats behind,” Lynn said.

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  • Le Grand Meaulnes, by Alain-Fournier

    Grand-meaulnesJUST before I set off for my return to France a friend said I should read Le Grand Meaulnes, by Alain-Fournier.

    He gave me his copy to pack away in one of the boxes I loaded up into the car and once Iā€™d arrived in the Dordogne countryside I started reading it.

    It is a simple story about the transition into adulthood, first love, leaving behind youthful promises, but also captures French village life in the early 1900s.

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  • Take a French crossword challenge

    French-crosswordHERE is your chance to take a few minutes out of your day to ponder the latest French language crossword.

    Titled The Bottle it is a two page .pdf that you can download and print off.

    Beverley has already created two other crosswords, The Man and The Apple, so feel free to hand them out at a get-together or similar event.

  • Tales from the bicycling gourmet’s table

    French-village
    WHAT are the French really like? A fair question to ask someone who has experience of their likes and dislikes, writes Christopher Strong.

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  • Take a virtual tour through the Lascaux caves

    Lascaux-caves

    YOU can take a virtual tour of the Grotte de Lascaux in a great 3D representation of the famous caves.

    Travel through the Hall of the Bulls, and see the deer, bison and men painted on the walls thousands of years ago.

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  • Artefacts found in Fromelles graves

    Gas-mask-fromelles

    The remains of a First World War gas mask recovered during the dig.

    THE work on recovering the bodies of British and Australian soldiers buried in mass graves during World War One near Fromelles in northern France has turned up some intriguing objects.

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  • Getting down to business in Eymet

    Angel-traders-eymet

    Melanie Chipperfield and Amanda Smith hope to help smaller businesses in France

    IT is not often you get to see a yoga teacher in the same room as a carpet fitter, or staff members from a national bank rubbing shoulders with the chef of an Indian restaurant.

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