Something for the Summer

Molly Guinness, a journalist at Radio France International, has produced a great guide to the best events of the summer in Paris. With such a prestigious and festive name, it may seem completely normal that she should have her finger on the pulse of the city, but her article is also the result of a lot of research - and is amusing too! She has kindly given me permission to publish some extracts here.

At the beginning of this year, more than 14,000 people signed a petition urging the mayor of Paris to save the city from becoming “the European capital of boredom"....In a city that’s holding a National Qigong Day, several festivals and nearly a thousand brocantes and flea markets, not to mention creating beaches on the banks of the river and a farm on the Champs Elysées, an anti-boredom petition is little short of slander.

If the petitioners are determined to make boredom political, we have to fight back by making fun mathematical. In the chart (above), we’ve pitted a hip hop festival against a gospel festival. They’ve both scored highly on the life-changing stakes. Gospel’s famous for it, while the hip hop festival, La Quinzaine du Hip Hop (22 June-4 July), is going so far as to offer workshops and discussion forums. Gospel had to win on the convenience, because you might not be able to avoid some of the acts, who will be performing in the streets, as well as at several venues. As for the all-important je ne sais quoi element, in the end Gospel had the edge. I don't know why; the maths breaks down a bit when scoring this category.

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Firemen's balls. Beyond your wildest dreams? Bastille Day on the 14 July provides not onlyfirecrackers but also firemen. It commerates the storming of the Bastille, but most people see it as an opportunity to launch firecrackers and go to their local firemen's ball. It's not clear who puts out the fires on this night; maybe the people who run the nightclubs.

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See the full article and list of events here. I will post a longer article on the secret world of Radio France International soon!