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Re: Gipsies / Travellers in France


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I think there is a law that every village or town above a certain size has to set aside some land and facilities for gipsies. In french called gitans, or tziganes.

Don't know if the french are as sensitive about the name as in UK.

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Yes there is. For quite a few years now we have been obliged to take five families for upto three weeks at a time due to the number of inhabitants in our commune, neighbouring communes that are larger take more families. However, here we only had the municipal camp site which for many years bought in revenue with lots of campers but since the manouche arrived, the tourists stopped coming and now we are going to build a small lotissement on said camp site for the benefit of the commune especially the school. We did have problems with the manouche as they wrecked the washing block and made off without paying for their water etc so the maire had to porte plainte at the gendarmerie but they were never caught.
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A lot of tziganes come to this area for seasonal work. There are some very nice sites set aside for them. I don't know how big a commune has to be to provide space but there is a small site in a neighbouring commune which is always extremely well kept and there is never any trouble.

Incidentally, when approached by a woman selling baskets, I smiled at her and the first thing she said was "vous n'êtes pas française". I didn't buy a basket, but she was no more pushy than some of the shop assistants I have come across !

In any community, there are troublemakers, and I have often felt sorry that the gypsies are all tarred with the same brush.
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I'm not sure they're generally any more respected than in the UK, I think most people just don't care, that's all. 

They have a reputation for living by criminal means (no offence, but it makes sense, because it's pretty certain that no-one will employ them!).   They certainly don't mingle/integrate, although it's not clear whether they don't want to or whether they're not encouraged to.   Probably both.  

They also don't all travel.   The chap who was shot dead by the gendarmes last week in Provence for evading arrest, his camp have been there for 10 years.

There's a camp about a mile down the road from us, also been there for at least 10 years if not more, right next to the déchetterie.  They hang around seeing what they can grab before it goes into the déchetterie, because there's no access to the skips.   And good luck to them too.  [:)]

 

 

 

 

 

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We have a camp near us and if they moved on the local school would have to close as they have 5 attending, one more will start next year and there is another one on the way..

They have never caused any problem in the village..

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[quote user="Callie"]

Incidentally, when approached by a woman selling baskets, I smiled at her and the first thing she said was "vous n'êtes pas française". [/quote]

It'll be the smile that gave you away. [:)]

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[quote user="Quarmby"]I wish I could experience some of your pushy shop assistants, Callie.[/quote]

They tend to be the older shop assistants, and if you show any interest in anything - even just touch the fabric - they pounce. I bought a pair of trousers the other day from a store in Saumur, and the wretched woman kept trying to push me to buy another pair. Do I look that much of a pushover??? No, don't answer that.

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[quote user="Callie"]It's happened AGAIN - I just can't get the hang of doing a quote.

Can someone please explain ! ! ! ! ![/quote]

Press "quote" instead of "reply" in the message that you want to quote, then wait until the quote is shown in the message pane. Highlight  any words in the quote that you want to delete or change to bold / underlined / italics but dont touch the squared bracket sections. Works for me.

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there was some gypsys staying in the big car park where castorama and the geant retail park is in niort a couple of years ago, one of the children ask me for money, he may have seen my uk numberplate, I dont know if they are still there these days 
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[quote user="powerdesal"][quote user="Callie"]It's happened AGAIN - I just can't get the hang of doing a quote. Can someone please explain ! ! ! ! ![/quote]

Press "quote" instead of "reply" in the message that you want to quote, then wait until the quote is shown in the message pane. Highlight  any words in the quote that you want to delete or change to bold / underlined / italics but dont touch the squared bracket sections. Works for me.
[/quote]

And if you want to add anything of your own, make sure that you do so before or after the bracketed quoted section, and not in the middle.

[quote user="Callie"]It's happened AGAIN - I just can't get the hang of doing a quote. Can someone please explain ! ! ! ! !

Callie didn't write... If you put any text in the middle of the quote it will look like this, rather than as above, and will appear to have been written by the person you are trying to quote [8-)]

[/quote]



 

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