Grève!

This week is grève week in all of France. It's rather a unique thing, actually. It's the first time in forever that all the unions went on strike simultaneously. Well, ok. Forever in French time. The last one was actually just 3 or 4 years ago, in 2005.

I was in Paris this weekend for a grantee meeting. On Thursday, I noticed the grève: the trains weren't running very well.

And then I forgot about it. So, today I went to this new French class I'm taking. And I get there a nice five minutes late, walk in, and not all the students are there yet. But more than that, the teacher isn't there, yet, either. But perhaps this is the language practice section of the class. At any rate, the last time, she was also half an hour late . . .

Then, someone realizes that university students are, in fact, on strike. Actually, it turns out that professors are on strike, too. But it's weird, because while students are on strike all week long, the profs must choose one day of this week to not work.

At any rate, when we realized this, we decided that as part of our French cultural education, we foreign students would go on strike, as well.

Meaning that, I'm on strike now! It's rather fun, and involves eating cookies. Although I suppose that if there are any manifs (i.e. manifestations, or protests), I should probably join in and show my support.

Honestly, I should have figured out the strike thing before I got to the university building. There was a huge École en grève!, that is, School on Strike, sign out front that I noticed as I left.

I seriously believe that Strike Day is a very important French holiday. The only difference from real holidays is that it doesn't have a specific day (any time's good for a strike!) and it's more respected. People will talk about how, man, those people go on strike a lot, but it's for a good cause, so it ought to be supported. I love this country.