Encore Le Sommet de la Francophonie ....

Allo,

Last night walked into old town, first to a conférence publique given at the Museum of Civilization/Le Musée de la Civilisation and then to Le Musée de L'Amérique française for a second free event, this one called "Les FrancOFFonies", which was performance poetry with drums and dancers.

I'd attended two previous events at Le Musée de la Civilisation, so knew how to find it, on rue Dalhousie, the street that goes along the St. Lawrence riverside. I thought I'd stay less than an hour and make it to the beginning of the second event, only several blocks back (uphill) into higher old town.

But it was too interesting to leave early, and I didn't get away until nearly 9 (21 heures). It was actually sponsored by Amnesty International/Amnesti Internationale Canada Francophone, which has its Quebec headquarters in Montreal. The speakers and their subjects were Doumbia Bakary, from Mali; Kafui Adjamagbo-Johnson, a woman from Women in Law and Development in Africa speaking for West Africa; and Brian Barton, an official delegate to the Forum d'Accra. (I don't quite know what that is but will continue to try to find out.)

I don't understand all the French, you know. That's why I'm here. But I get the gist of these lectures I've been attending, and this one was in the context of development of human rights, especially in Africa. I'm a member of Amnesty International, so I've read their reports, understand the context of their address to the problems of human rights, ... and that helps. The billing for this was Le développement, les droits humains et l'efficacité de l'aide/Development, Human rights, and the Efficiency of Aid.

I understood the woman the best. She spoke slowly, clearly, softly. She spoke of how very hard it is for women, how little has actually been accomplished for them, how this new food crisis (le crisis alimentaire) is very hard. The lack of protection from sexual violation, the lack of enough safe water, the timidity that comes from being a poor woman struggling to provide for your children .... I understood her the best.

But I listened to all three, so I got to the second event well more than an hour after it started. Still, I'm glad I went. I saw the best belly-dancer I ever hoped to see and saw/heard some fine performance poetry. As the younger folk say, it rocked.

The young woman there on behalf of the museum(s), as I was leaving, gave me the Déclaration poétique du 5 avril 2008 à Bruxelles de reconnaissance des génocides amérindiens.* She already knows I'm here to practice French, from my having asked her at another event, when I signed in (the events are free but you're asked to register ahead of time, a kind of RSVP), if she would please speak to me in French.
(* Poetic Declaration of April 5, 2008, at Brussels in recognition of the genocide against Amerindians. Perhaps I'll find time to translate it.)

"Quelque chose pour practiquer le lecture de français," she said when she handed me the document. With a smile.

So that's another reason for loving Quebec City and choosing it as a place to develop your French. It's small, and the young people smile. And there's the underlayment of security in knowing that if you really had to communicate, people can speak English or quickly find someone who does.

This morning I stop at Café Faux Bourgeois, at the bottom of the free elevator between upper town (Le Faubourg St. Jean Baptiste) and lower town (Bas Ville or St. Roch. (By the way, isn't Café Faux Bourgeois a great name for a little coffee shop?) I've used the elevator before but haven't stopped in the little café. Anyway, in Le Journal de Québec I read the article about Sarcozy speaking to the National Assembly yesterday. He pleased Stephen Harper, who was standing next to him, by saying that France should never have to choose between Québec and Canada, as Canada was a friend and Québec, part of the French family, would never ask France to reject a friend. Here's a paragraph I copied in my journal while having that cup of coffee:

"Dans un discours d'une grande émotivité prononcé à l'Assemblée nationale, Nicolas Sarkozy a redéfini, hier, la relation de France avec le Québec, précisant qu'elle sera dorénavant basée sur un rapport de fraternité et d'égalité, où il n'aura plus à choisir entre le Canada et la Belle Province." (le Journal de Québec, le samedi 18 octobre 2008, vol. XLII No. 225 p. 4)

Well. So much for cleverness. But I did in fact like something else he said, about capitalism — because of course the palaver is all about the financial crisis:


"Il faut réintroduire dans l'économie une éthique, des principes de justice, une responsabilité morale et sociale." We must reintroduce ethics into the economy, principles of justice, a moral and social responsibility.

...and then that Quebec and France have, he thinks, a shared hope to develop a world where true wealth is in diversity.

All of this almost makes it worth it, this surplus of police and all their police machines around my little pied-a-terre a half block from the entrance to the Lowes Concorde hotel. And, like I thought, Nicolas Sarcozy goes on to Camp David tomorrow, the sommet will be over, and Quebec City can become itself again. Still, I think it's been insulted by all this show of fearfulness. There is no safer city in the world. Don't these bigwhigs spending undue millions on security that should be going to alleviate such as le crisis alimentaire or the poverty in Haiti or .... Do they really not know that it's a waste to spend millions on unneeded so-called "security" in the safest city, among the most courteous of people, in the world?

The surveillance helicopters! Another sentence from Le Journal:

...Un hélicoptàre sillonnait constamment le ciel pour assurer la sécurité des invités.

The security of the invited, indeed. They'd be far more secure if they were doing the right thing by their people, I think.

Tomorrow I go to Vermont. While there I'll post earlier entries, all of them, I hope, to form a collage of proof that Québec is the best place now for people of the Americas to come to improve their French.




Labels: Amnistie Internationale Canada Francophone, Belgian Poetic Declaration in Recognition of Genocide of American Indians, Sarcozy's hope to reform capitalism draft 11:06:00 by Sylvia Manning Delete

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