Dear Boris (Johnson) Mayor of London
During this weekend 27th and 28th Sept 08. And it's all free!
The annual Festival of Paris Gardens opens up the green spaces of Paris for two spectacular days. It features hundreds of free events in gardens throughout the French capital - from guided tours and walks to concerts and exhibitions.
Gardens that are usually closed to the public (such as the cloistered grounds of monasteries) also open during the festival. There is a special children's programme as well as tours for blind and deaf visitors. What's more, it's all free! Among the many lovely gardens in Paris, particularly recommended are the Parc de la Villette, Jardins du Luxembourg, Jardins des Tuileries and Jardin des Plantes.
During the event, the area around Notre Dame is transformed into a Garden Festival Village, where visitors can meet landscape gardeners, environmentalists and the managers of the parks and gardens of the city. Advice flows freely and there are gardening workshops and demonstrations. The full programme is available from the Paris Tourist Office from September.
Friday, 26 September 2008
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
Dear Boris JOhnson mayor of London - Paris London
See comment below:
News Source: NY Times
Paris, France - The fashion is more Brooklyn than Paris, with young Muslims and blacks in low jeans, sunglasses and hoodies, often with a kaffiyeh knotted carefully around the neck, and sometimes, now, with guns. There is a large Jewish community, too, many of them Lubavitcher, with kosher butchers and delicatessens, a large religious school and synagogue, close to the Medina Hammam Center and African grill restaurants like Le Marcory.
The 19th Arrondissement is one of the most fascinating and complicated districts of Paris - one of the largest, youngest, poorest, most racially diverse - and the most criminal.
With nearly 190,000 people, the district, on the northeast edge of Paris, is split into at least three territories, with at least two large mini-ghettos, or cités, run by their own gangs of youths, who spar along the borders and sometimes clash with the Jews. And it borders some of Paris’s poorest suburbs.
This has been a bad month for the 19th, with a surge in violence that has brought anxious responses from community leaders, the mayor of Paris and the police. Six young men have been wounded, another shot to death.
And there are new accusations of anti-Semitism, with an attack on three young men wearing skullcaps after an exchange of insults, and the police are adding patrols.
Mendel Shapira, 24, who works in the Eshel Glatt Kosher butcher shop on the Rue Petit, said, “These Arabs and blacks come here because they know Jewish people live here, and it’s worse when there are things going on in Israel.”
Nathalie Ben Simon, 45, is the aunt of Daniel, one of the three young Jews hurt this month, his nose broken in a fight along the Rue Petit. “Three black guys bumped into them for no reason and demanded, ‘Why are you looking at us this way?’ ” she said. “It’s always been a neighborhood that’s a little hot.”
It is also deeply divided, with turf carefully demarcated and monitored by different gangs, some involved in petty theft and drugs.
On Saturdays, during the Jewish Sabbath, youth gangs, including gangs of young Jews, migrate to the park of Buttes Chaumont and squabble over territory. Sometimes the insults and battles that begin there are finished later on the Rue Petit, said Morad Chahrine, who directs the J2P social and cultural center.
“It’s less about anti-Semitism than fights among gangs of youths, who create alliances of one district against another,” Mr. Chahrine said, noting the influence of American movies on the styles and habits of the gangs. “This idea of identity of territory starts with economic reasons. This is the youngest and poorest arrondissement in Paris, with a lot of unemployment, and that explains a lot.”
Dominique Sopo, president of the group SOS-Racisme, which works against discrimination, said, “When you live only with your own kind, you build yourself in opposition to the territory next door, in opposition to those who do not have the same origin,” he said. “It’s a caldron that gives rise to high tension, and it’s in this framework that anti-Semitic attacks can be explained.”
The atmosphere is especially delicate because of the beating in June of a young Jew, Rudy Haddad, 17, who was put into a coma by a gang of black and Arab youths. President Nicolas Sarkozy expressed shock that a boy could be attacked for wearing a skullcap, and there has been continuing debate about what Rabbi Haim Nisenbaum, of the Beth Hanna synagogue and religious school, calls “diffuse anti-Semitism.”
“We have a new problem,” he said. “It’s not anti-Semitism like before World War II. No one says, ‘Kill all the Jews’ or even ‘We’re against the Jews.’
“The problem is first social and cultural,” he said, with the resentment of poor Arabs from northern Africa and blacks from Mali and Congo who have not been integrated into the French state, aimed at better-off Jews, many also originating from northern Africa, who consider themselves integrated.
The police investigated this month’s beating of the young Jews and found no connection to anti-Semitism. Mrs. Ben Simon calls that ridiculous, but Fatma Ajimi, 22, who lives near the synagogue and was wearing a lavender head scarf, said that the police were correct - that youths insulted one another and got into a fight. “If it were really religious it would have started a long time ago,” she said.
Youssef, 33, who cuts hair in a salon on the Rue de Crimée, in the Arab sector, confirms tension between Arabs and Jews. “All the communities are separated here,” he said, speaking on condition that his last name not be used. “But it’s not a question of religion so much as territory.”
But there is anomie and restlessness and lack of opportunity. A 22-year-old woman who grew up in the large apartment blocks of the black and Arab district said, “It was quiet here until a few years ago, and now it grows,” with more guns, more drugs and more gang violence.“The police are very aggressive with us, but they solve nothing,” she said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Even 10 years ago, her mother told her to call the fire department, not the police, in an emergency because the firefighters would at least show up.
News Source: NY Times
Dear Boris,
At least Sarkosy (and all countries ) should decriminalise drugs as the money to be made from drugs is astranomical causing these territories to form! Addicts should get what they need from a doctor or a special non judgemental service! It makes no sense to leave the distribution of drugs in the hands of scum bags. It is the main problem and cause of violence and crime in London too! The police there admit it but the politicians just sit on their hands! The Drug trade distorts every other possible opportunity - opportunities for 'poor' kids do exist in Paris (in London too) but the pull of drugs and associated crime profits is too great to compete with. So decriminalise and take the trade away from these guys. Also, look at coutries which have already done this with success. Yours...
09-24-2008 - 2:08 PM
News Source: NY Times
Paris, France - The fashion is more Brooklyn than Paris, with young Muslims and blacks in low jeans, sunglasses and hoodies, often with a kaffiyeh knotted carefully around the neck, and sometimes, now, with guns. There is a large Jewish community, too, many of them Lubavitcher, with kosher butchers and delicatessens, a large religious school and synagogue, close to the Medina Hammam Center and African grill restaurants like Le Marcory.
The 19th Arrondissement is one of the most fascinating and complicated districts of Paris - one of the largest, youngest, poorest, most racially diverse - and the most criminal.
With nearly 190,000 people, the district, on the northeast edge of Paris, is split into at least three territories, with at least two large mini-ghettos, or cités, run by their own gangs of youths, who spar along the borders and sometimes clash with the Jews. And it borders some of Paris’s poorest suburbs.
This has been a bad month for the 19th, with a surge in violence that has brought anxious responses from community leaders, the mayor of Paris and the police. Six young men have been wounded, another shot to death.
And there are new accusations of anti-Semitism, with an attack on three young men wearing skullcaps after an exchange of insults, and the police are adding patrols.
Mendel Shapira, 24, who works in the Eshel Glatt Kosher butcher shop on the Rue Petit, said, “These Arabs and blacks come here because they know Jewish people live here, and it’s worse when there are things going on in Israel.”
Nathalie Ben Simon, 45, is the aunt of Daniel, one of the three young Jews hurt this month, his nose broken in a fight along the Rue Petit. “Three black guys bumped into them for no reason and demanded, ‘Why are you looking at us this way?’ ” she said. “It’s always been a neighborhood that’s a little hot.”
It is also deeply divided, with turf carefully demarcated and monitored by different gangs, some involved in petty theft and drugs.
On Saturdays, during the Jewish Sabbath, youth gangs, including gangs of young Jews, migrate to the park of Buttes Chaumont and squabble over territory. Sometimes the insults and battles that begin there are finished later on the Rue Petit, said Morad Chahrine, who directs the J2P social and cultural center.
“It’s less about anti-Semitism than fights among gangs of youths, who create alliances of one district against another,” Mr. Chahrine said, noting the influence of American movies on the styles and habits of the gangs. “This idea of identity of territory starts with economic reasons. This is the youngest and poorest arrondissement in Paris, with a lot of unemployment, and that explains a lot.”
Dominique Sopo, president of the group SOS-Racisme, which works against discrimination, said, “When you live only with your own kind, you build yourself in opposition to the territory next door, in opposition to those who do not have the same origin,” he said. “It’s a caldron that gives rise to high tension, and it’s in this framework that anti-Semitic attacks can be explained.”
The atmosphere is especially delicate because of the beating in June of a young Jew, Rudy Haddad, 17, who was put into a coma by a gang of black and Arab youths. President Nicolas Sarkozy expressed shock that a boy could be attacked for wearing a skullcap, and there has been continuing debate about what Rabbi Haim Nisenbaum, of the Beth Hanna synagogue and religious school, calls “diffuse anti-Semitism.”
“We have a new problem,” he said. “It’s not anti-Semitism like before World War II. No one says, ‘Kill all the Jews’ or even ‘We’re against the Jews.’
“The problem is first social and cultural,” he said, with the resentment of poor Arabs from northern Africa and blacks from Mali and Congo who have not been integrated into the French state, aimed at better-off Jews, many also originating from northern Africa, who consider themselves integrated.
The police investigated this month’s beating of the young Jews and found no connection to anti-Semitism. Mrs. Ben Simon calls that ridiculous, but Fatma Ajimi, 22, who lives near the synagogue and was wearing a lavender head scarf, said that the police were correct - that youths insulted one another and got into a fight. “If it were really religious it would have started a long time ago,” she said.
Youssef, 33, who cuts hair in a salon on the Rue de Crimée, in the Arab sector, confirms tension between Arabs and Jews. “All the communities are separated here,” he said, speaking on condition that his last name not be used. “But it’s not a question of religion so much as territory.”
But there is anomie and restlessness and lack of opportunity. A 22-year-old woman who grew up in the large apartment blocks of the black and Arab district said, “It was quiet here until a few years ago, and now it grows,” with more guns, more drugs and more gang violence.“The police are very aggressive with us, but they solve nothing,” she said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Even 10 years ago, her mother told her to call the fire department, not the police, in an emergency because the firefighters would at least show up.
News Source: NY Times
Dear Boris,
At least Sarkosy (and all countries ) should decriminalise drugs as the money to be made from drugs is astranomical causing these territories to form! Addicts should get what they need from a doctor or a special non judgemental service! It makes no sense to leave the distribution of drugs in the hands of scum bags. It is the main problem and cause of violence and crime in London too! The police there admit it but the politicians just sit on their hands! The Drug trade distorts every other possible opportunity - opportunities for 'poor' kids do exist in Paris (in London too) but the pull of drugs and associated crime profits is too great to compete with. So decriminalise and take the trade away from these guys. Also, look at coutries which have already done this with success. Yours...
09-24-2008 - 2:08 PM
wifi in city parks
Dear Boris Johnson, Mayor of London,
Paris' Mayor of 10 years, Bertrund Delanoe (out Gay) has already put wifi in every park here in Paris.
The real benefit is that one can go out to the parc on a lovely day to work on computer instead of sitting inside. But, you must find a shady place to see the screen.
I just wish Boris, you would model yourself on this Mayor. London could do with copying exactly (no half measures) The fab Paris Plages - ALL FREE OF CHARGE - there are three now - which last a whole month and are so well organised, (including the portable loo blocks whose cleaniliness impressed me) giving something of quality (nightly guingettes for example - that's open air dance halls - which the otherwise lonely elderly especially enjoy .
And the Velib bike hire scheme, which also has been done properly WITH BIKES FULLY MAINTAINED and is extremely well used. Also, Mayor Bertrund Delanoe puts on a month of entirely free open air cinemas - at a different location around the city every night - just amazing!
Come to think of it, why aren't LOndon and Paris i a 'twinning' arrangement? now that the Eurostar link is door to door (as in my case) and so fast. London has so much to learn from Europe - so that ordinary folk in London might be able to enjoy their city more. At present London is left to the tourists - who tell me that they are rarely meet English people in our City - including the fact that it is rare to find English people working in bars and restaurants NOTWITHSTANDING THE FACT THAT THERE ARE AROUND A MILLION UNEMPLOYED IN LONDON! IT IS A CRAZY MISMATCH!
Paris' Mayor of 10 years, Bertrund Delanoe (out Gay) has already put wifi in every park here in Paris.
The real benefit is that one can go out to the parc on a lovely day to work on computer instead of sitting inside. But, you must find a shady place to see the screen.
I just wish Boris, you would model yourself on this Mayor. London could do with copying exactly (no half measures) The fab Paris Plages - ALL FREE OF CHARGE - there are three now - which last a whole month and are so well organised, (including the portable loo blocks whose cleaniliness impressed me) giving something of quality (nightly guingettes for example - that's open air dance halls - which the otherwise lonely elderly especially enjoy .
And the Velib bike hire scheme, which also has been done properly WITH BIKES FULLY MAINTAINED and is extremely well used. Also, Mayor Bertrund Delanoe puts on a month of entirely free open air cinemas - at a different location around the city every night - just amazing!
Come to think of it, why aren't LOndon and Paris i a 'twinning' arrangement? now that the Eurostar link is door to door (as in my case) and so fast. London has so much to learn from Europe - so that ordinary folk in London might be able to enjoy their city more. At present London is left to the tourists - who tell me that they are rarely meet English people in our City - including the fact that it is rare to find English people working in bars and restaurants NOTWITHSTANDING THE FACT THAT THERE ARE AROUND A MILLION UNEMPLOYED IN LONDON! IT IS A CRAZY MISMATCH!
Dear Boris, War on Terror ? discuss this then...Fire in the tunnel - Euro trains stopped.
I was in Paris booked on the first train out that Friday morning. I was returning to London for last night of the Proms. So, I went down to Gare du Nord at 5 am as planned to see what they can do for me... Everything was closed. I managed to go by bus and ferry instead.
There seems to be a news black out about implications:
What is the point of all us passengers going through airport luggage style checks for bombs (presumably)at the railway stations yet Lorries go through this tunnel willy nilly it seems. Would a bomb be detected on a lorry?????? - and with toxic cargos too according to the report- there being such a vehicle next to the lorry on fire!!!!!!!! Where's the integrity/safety in that?
Are Eurostar trains separated from dodgy lorry's and their chemical cargos? I don't think so!
Also, I understand that cars fuelled with LPG cannot go through - yet lorries with chemical loads can!
The big question is this: Could a load of suicide bombers get into the tunnel hidden in a tanker or something similar? Well, Yes if a tankers of chemicals can!!!! If it can happen it will happen!
I am told that a meeting of Kent County Council to discuss te situation barred the public - I wonder why? I welcome comments
I was in Paris booked on the first train out that Friday morning. I was returning to London for last night of the Proms. So, I went down to Gare du Nord at 5 am as planned to see what they can do for me... Everything was closed. I managed to go by bus and ferry instead.
There seems to be a news black out about implications:
What is the point of all us passengers going through airport luggage style checks for bombs (presumably)at the railway stations yet Lorries go through this tunnel willy nilly it seems. Would a bomb be detected on a lorry?????? - and with toxic cargos too according to the report- there being such a vehicle next to the lorry on fire!!!!!!!! Where's the integrity/safety in that?
Are Eurostar trains separated from dodgy lorry's and their chemical cargos? I don't think so!
Also, I understand that cars fuelled with LPG cannot go through - yet lorries with chemical loads can!
The big question is this: Could a load of suicide bombers get into the tunnel hidden in a tanker or something similar? Well, Yes if a tankers of chemicals can!!!! If it can happen it will happen!
I am told that a meeting of Kent County Council to discuss te situation barred the public - I wonder why? I welcome comments
Thursday, 11 September 2008
The Knife crime and drugs industry, as seen alive and doing very well in Camden Town on BBC 2 Newsnight this week.
Dear Boris Mayor of London,
Here is a copy of my email sent to the BBC Newsnight team recently.
I bear in mind that now the BBC has to be careful of what it says (since WMD, Gilligan Labour Government censorship, license fee etc) but couldn't you do a report on the good news story about those countries who have dealt with the drugs problem by DECRIMINALISING (not legalising) drug use..
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