Manifestation contre le racisme

I felt very française yesterday: I took part in my first French demonstration... a big thing in French society! I got back from Germany (more on that soon) late the night before so I was planning on taking it easy but ended up going to a demonstration. It turns out that a couple weeks ago a minister of justice was in Angers and a group of protestors were there. Kids were throwing banana peels at her, saying something like bananas for a monkey, and they were chanting casse-toi" which could mean "get lost" or something worse, but anyway you wouldn't use toi with an adult if you wanted to show any respect. So Angevins were of course offended that the kids were calling the black politician a monkey while their parents looked on. So a demonstration was organized for last night and somewhere between 1,000-3,000 people attended. A few people spoke and couple of songs were sung including a sad, pretty song called "Lily" by Pierre Perret.

And here are a couple of images of Armistice Day that is recognized in France as a national holiday. I was disappointed to miss Angers' memorial service in the morning, I heard it was impressive.

 

Posted with Blogsy