Paris - Big Farmers' Protest Tomorrow/Thursday September 3

Are they marching herds of piggies down the aisles of Paris, like they did in Sarlat?

a bit off topic, but we ran into a huge student protest in Rome. Every street was blocked off. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as we didn't have to dodge Rome traffic. We also had nice chat with the protestors - college kids from all over who were protesting cuts to education. They were kind of enjoying themselves for a good cause. Very peaceful and good-natured protestors. Can you imagine American students marching to protest education cuts?

I'm sure it's a real pain for some, but I do admire the French-and Europeans in general-for the willingness to get out there and protest. Hopefully, they won't be dumping manure at city hall like in that one Bruno, Chief of Police book.

They dumped manure in front of the National Assembly within the last 3-4 years.

The VP of the leading farmers' union (the one that called for the strike) is doing a live interview in which she just put the # of tractors at over 1,500.

And Nigel -- they did take some little piggies to the supermarket and let them roam around, I just saw the footage!

One of the reasons food is so good in France is that farmers have some clout and agriculture tends to be kinder to animals and vegetables are grown nearer to where they are eaten. Drive around Burgundy or other nearby districts to see what farming looks like in France.

They're trying to avoid what happened to independent American farmers when they had their farms auctioned off from under their feet in the 1980s because they couldn't pay back the bank loans for their supplies and equipment. Food prices were too low due to factory farms competition. Same problem here; they're competing against giant factory farms in Germany that are lowering the prices and quality. The EU wants France to "modernize" whatever that means for individual farms and the quality of the product. The family farm and the farmers are sacred in France.