Today is Victoire, I know this now

[nomoss]

A couple of years ago we were in our local wine co-op and remarked that we had come into town the day before, forgetting it was a holiday.

The lady there replied "Oh yes, France had a war with Germany a few years ago, and this is the day we won"

So now I know.

 

 

[Pierre ZFP]

Thats funny

I thought John Wayne won the war..........all by himself [6]

 

[idun]

And I thought it was Audie Murphy[:-))]

[nomoss]

You're both wrong. It was le grand Charles!

 

 

[NormanH]

And typically the war ended the day the French lost (self) interest ...

[Rabbie]

Wasn't it Churchill who said the heaviest cross he had to bear during the war was the Cross of Lorraine[:)]

[PaulT]

Of course the French won by superior tactics - they put their hands up so that the Germans thought they had won.

[Lou]

I saw a report on Fr3 news last night, interviewing a number of young people and asking them why the 8th May was a holiday........a large number didn't have a clue at all (lots of Gallic shrugs and the french equivalent of "dunno, it's just a holiday innit")

There followed a report about (at least) one school trying to teach the children about WW2 by taking them on a trip round local monuments and museums (think it was in Lyon).

I suppose I thought that in France everyone would know what 8th May stood for BECAUSE it was a holiday.....does that make me naive?

Next question I suppose is should it still be a holiday??

Lou

[NormanH]

Strange you should ask that as this article is in MidiLibre today

http://www.midilibre.fr/2013/05/09/economie-pour-ou-contre-supprimer-des-jours-feries-en-france,693514.php

[Russethouse]

 I was told that the 11th of November is to remember the War dead and May 8th to celebrate the living......

[Lou]

[quote user="NormanH"]Strange you should ask that as this article is in MidiLibre today

http://www.midilibre.fr/2013/05/09/economie-pour-ou-contre-supprimer-des-jours-feries-en-france,693514.php

[/quote]

Interesting....though what's not often clear to the "there's too many holidays" brigade is that there's no system (as far as I know anyway, certainly wasn't where I used to work) for having days in-lieu if the holiday falls on a weekend or a day when you don't normally work. So in other words the days not worked will vary from year to year. If I recall correctly my "jours fériés" varied from 7 to 11 days each year, depending on what day of the week they fell - and I never benefited from Easter Monday for example as I never worked on a Monday.

I can't help feeling that in order to make the economy more productive there's lots of other things they could/should look at before worrying about jours fériés!! The thing that drives me absolutely wild is the opposition in so many companies/govt offices to pass on queries or dossiers to another person if that person is on holiday or off sick - I wish I had a euro for every time I've been told on the phone "oh it's Mme Machin-truc dealing with that, she's not here til next Monday can you ring back then?"

Lou

[allanb]

I suppose quite a lot could be gained economically – even if all the holidays continue to be observed – by arranging for them all to fall on either Monday or Friday, thus removing the excuse to "faire le pont."

I wonder if anyone knows how many days in the year are lost because of the 'bridge' days, as opposed to the holidays themselves.

(In the interests of full disclosure, I took a good few bridge days myself while I was working for a living.)

[YCCMB]

Or, to paraphrase Norman from elsewhere, it's perhaps one of the things that could be standardised across the EU. AFAIK, having asked the question of my students the other day, the "pont" is not a uniquely French phenomenon.  They (my students) OTOH, were at a bit of a loss as to why - this year, at least - we celebrated the 1st of May on the 6th. My Greek students were more understanding. Mind you, they've only just had Easter.

Mind you, it's hard to align productivity or economic stability with bank holidays. Japan's just had its annual week off for Golden Week, and a couple of my Japanese students have shocked me this last few days by explaining that working in the UK in Summer is strange for them because they would never normally contemplate leaving the office before dark.