Two Words collide in 'Intouchables"

Published: December 25, 2011

The Christmas holidays in Paris are synonymous with gray skies, damp and rain. To brighten the short, gloomy days, garlands of lights decorate the main shopping streets of the city. In my neighborhood, the colors that dominate are sapphire blue and sparkling white.

Although the French varieties are as puny as ever, the price of Christmas trees is up over last year, but they are selling like hotcakes and despite bad weather, Christmas shoppers are out in force. It may well be "la crise," as the French call the worldwide financial crisis, but Christmas is Christmas and 'tis the season to spend.

It's also the season to go to the movies with family or friends and the major movie studios are well aware of this.

Americans have Spielberg's "The Adventures of Tintin," released just in time for the Christmas weekend. The French are going to see Martin Scorsese's 3D film "Hugo." They also have the choice of another movie, a record-breaking box office hit that Americans may never get a chance to see.

"Untouchable" is its name in English - in French "Intouchables" - and it has been likened to a fairy tale or a Christmas story.

Released in November, the film, starring Francois Cluzet and Omar Sy - definitely not household names to Americans - recounts a true story of the improbable encounter of two men who saved each other's life.

In the film, one of these men is a multimillionaire. He lives in an elegant townhouse in one of the most exclusive neighborhoods of Paris. A Maserati worth $200,000 sits in his driveway and when he gets the whim, he has the means to rent a private jet.

The other is a black man from the Parisian suburbs, the French equivalent of the projects or a ghetto. Just released from six months in prison for petty theft, he has no saleable skills. Out of work, he is also out of a home because his overworked and underpaid mother, who cleans office buildings at night, has just put him out in the street.

At first glance, there's no doubt about who is on top in this relationship, but at the end of the film's first sequence, the tables are turned. Pulled over after a car chase through the streets of Paris with the Maserati hitting speeds of nearly 180 mph, the hired driver Driss explains to a police officer that his boss is a quadriplegic who can move only his head.

Welcome to the world of "Intouchables," the fictionalized account of the true story of Philippe Pozzo di Borgo, the wealthy aristocratic director of Pommery, the producer of a famous French champagne, and Abdel Sellou - represented by the character of Driss in the film - his caregiver for a 10-year period during which "they needed each other," said Pozzo di Borgo, victim of a hang-gliding accident.

An important detail absent from the film is that the millionaire hired Sellou to take care of him at a time when his wife was dying of cancer so that he could devote more time to her. Today, Pozzo di Borgo, 60, lives in Morocco with his second wife and their two daughters. Sellou, married and the 40-year-old father of three, runs a business in Algeria, his native country. They remain close and the final image of the film shows the real-life "intouchables" together.

So far, more than 12 million Frenchmen have seen the film, which represents about one fifth of the entire population. Audiences love it and French organizations representing the handicapped praise its honest take on living with a handicap in a country which all too often ignores the needs and talents of its handicapped citizens.

Five cents of every ticket goes to Simon de Cyrene, an association named after the man who, according to the Gospel of Mark, carried the cross of Christ to Calvary. It works to build special residences where people with and without disabilities live together in a spirit of mutual aid and sharing.

But, as I've already mentioned, Americans may never get a chance to see this film in part because of fears American audiences may find it racist.

Film critic Jay Weissberg writing for the weekly entertainment trade magazine Variety, accuses the film of "Uncle Tom racism," claiming that starring actor Omar Sy, who plays the role of the caregiver, is treated like a "performing monkey." The Hollywood Reporter, while praising Sy's charm and energy, regrets that the racial angle is "clumsily dramatized," concluding that "Untouchable" is little more than a "shamelessly manipulative French crowd-pleaser."

On that last point, many French critics agree. They accuse the film's two directors, Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, of using every cliche in the book to bring audiences to tears as they witness two "untouchables," a quadriplegic and a black man from the projects, connect in what looks a lot like love.

In fact, without being a "love story," "Untouchable" is a movie where love conquers all: racial, economic and cultural differences disappear in a working relationship transformed into friendship. And in the process, claim the critics, viewers lose sight of the highly exceptional nature of the story and of the reality of millions of other "untouchables," be they the handicapped or the poor and downtrodden of France.

As for me, I'm one of the 12 million who have already seen the film. I enjoyed it and at times it brought tears to my eyes. Above all, I consider "Untouchable" a very entertaining movie, thanks in large part to the chemistry at work between its two stars, Francois Cluzet, vibrant with life although confined to a wheelchair, and Omar Sy, who combines the charm and good looks of George Clooney with the energy and humor of Eddie Murphy. And I did not find the film racist. Nor do viewers in those African countries where the film has been released.

However, I do have one criticism to make in the form of a question: What if Driss, the caregiver, had been a woman? Would such a film ever have been made? One source of the film's humor arises from a man doing "woman's work," cleaning up after his boss in the bathroom, getting him into clean clothes each day. Almost as exceptional as the two men having ever met is Driss's incursion into the overwhelmingly feminine profession of home healthcare. Many of Driss's qualities, exceptional in a man, are, in the case of a woman, simply what is expected of her if she works as an aid in a private home, a nursing home, or an assisted-living residence.

I have seen these women at work and they've impressed me just as much, or more, than the movie. I have observed firsthand their patience, their kindness and their physical, mental and moral strength, and this year, as I wish a merry Christmas to all my readers, I would also like to address warm greetings to Deb, Mary Margaret, Nancy, April, Bridget, Lauren, Joann, Dominique, Eleanor and the many other women working at Providence Place in Pottsville, making life better for my mother, putting the "Christmas spirit" into practice all year round.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republican herald@gmail.com)

Hard Times on Both Sides of the Atlantic

1850 photo by Charles Negre of young chimney sweeps walking along the Seine River

Published: November 27, 2011


In France, times are hard and getting harder: unemployment continues to climb, especially among the young, and the French government, with Moody's on its back, has run out of money and ideas to get the economy back on track.

As for the middle class, as their salaries stagnate, all around them prices rise. To give just a few examples, in the past decade, the price of that French staple, the baguette, has risen by 85 percent, whereas gas prices are up 65 percent and the price of a liter of milk, 182 percent.

The United States, with its $14.3 trillion national debt and unemployment hovering around 9 percent, has its own share of problems. Some Americans believe things would naturally get better if only the government would get off their backs. The French, deeply attached to their national health insurance and retirement plans, would certainly disagree.

As for me, I thought it might be interesting to wander back into the past, to those days when governments mingled very little in citizens' lives, to see what life was like back then. It just so happens, an exhibit at the Musee Carnavalet, the Museum of the History of Paris, gave me the perfect opportunity.

Located in the neighborhood of Paris known as the Marais, in what was once the home of Madame de Sevigne, a French aristocrat and important writer of the 17th century, the Musee Carnavalet is presenting until Feb. 26, 2012, an exhibit devoted to "the people of Paris in the 19th century."

At mid-century, "the people" in the sense of "the masses" or the working class and not "we the people," the citizens of a state, made up a third of the population of Paris. They were the workers of the city, cleaning it, building it, taking care of its children and working in its new industries.

The exhibit looks at how they lived, how they dressed, what they ate and what they did for a good time. In doing so, it shows us people who knew love and joy, but whose lives, from birth to death, were characterized by a lack of stability. The only security nets that existed were charity and the family, for those lucky enough to have one nearby.

The people of 19th century Paris were, for the most part, from somewhere else, from the French provinces or from bordering countries. Certain regions had their specialties. For example, young boys from the Alps came to the city to work as chimney sweeps, crawling up and down chimneys, experiencing burns, often losing their hair, in order to get the job done. This was a job a boy could begin when he was 5 or 6 years old. By the time he reached adolescence, an age when he became too big for his craft, his body was often too deformed for him to find other work.

Young girls worked as domestics, laundresses or seamstresses, and those who suddenly lost their jobs often fell into prostitution. Robust women from the countryside hired themselves out as wet nurses, some boarding in special institutions where they ate and slept better than they could ever dream of in their country homes. Men worked in the building trade or as porters, capable of carrying up to 400 pounds. Men and women both worked in factories in and around Paris as the region industrialized.

There were also the water carriers, a pole slung over their shoulders with a bucket attached at each end, who brought water from the Seine River to people's homes (running water began to arrive in Paris apartments at the beginning of the 20th century). Others served hot coffee or soup on street corners, some delivered hot meals to families who, at a time when lodging was scarce, lived in one room, often without a fireplace. Many families worked in their lodgings, sewing or handcrafting objects such as funeral wreaths. Even the smallest children began to participate as soon as they could learn the craft.

At a time when there was no official "day of rest," the workday depended on the seasons and the hours of natural light. Many workers were laid off during the winter months and in summer, they worked as long as it was light. Free time was scarce, money even scarcer, and most of the family budget was reserved for food. When there was time for a outing, it often consisted in a walk along the Seine, a picnic on the outskirts of the city or an evening in a guinguette, an open-air cafe where there was dancing and cheap wine. There was also street theater, with clowns, acrobats and mimes.

But overnight, life could change. An accident or illness put a worker out of a job, and without money to pay the rent, an entire family found themselves in the street. Begging was against the law and beggars were sent to the poor house. Those with a few pennies could enter a flop house for the night. The poorest of the poor became rag pickers, setting up shop on street corners, recycling and reselling everything they found.

By now, I think readers have got the picture. For the people, life in 19th century Paris was hard, and only toward the century's end, did things begin to improve when laws were passed to permit trade unions and protect workers. In 1892, a law made it illegal for children under age 13 to work while limiting the workday to 10 hours for those between the ages of 13 and 16. A woman's workday was limited to 11 hours, that of a man to 12.

At about the same time, in 1885 it became illegal in Pennsylvania to employ boys under 14 in the mines, and those under 12 on the surface. In 1903, those limits were raised to 16 and 14. Surely, life in a 19th-century mining patch or coal town was just as hard or harder. There, too, boys as young as 6 began work as mule drivers or breaker boys. In the breakers, perched over chutes of coal, in thick clouds of black dust, old men joined them at a time when men and women alike worked until they simply keeled over and died.

I recently had the opportunity to see one of those young workers in another exhibit in Paris devoted to the American photographer Lewis Hine, who spent more than 30 years photographing Americans at work. In the exhibit, there was a photo of Angelo Rossi, a breaker boy in Pittston, in 1911. He looks to be about 10 years old.

Much of the 20th century was good to the working and the middle classes, but the 21st is teaching us that past gains can be lost. Let's hope that in France and in the USA, "we the people" can learn to work together in a spirit of shared responsibility.

For photos of Pennsylvania mine workers by Lewis Hine see http://contentdm.ad.umbc.edu/hine.php. There are also hundreds of photos of miners taken by Pottsville photographer George Bretz at http://contentdm.ad.umbc.edu/bretz.php.

For details on a report by the IRS and the U.S. Census Bureau on the gains of the rich and the losses of the middle class in the past 30 years, visit www.nytimes.com/2011/10/26/us/politics/top-earners-doubled-share-of-nations-income-cbo-says.html?_r=2.

(Honicker can be reached
at honicker.republicanherald @gmail.com)

Got My Licence! Republican Herald, October 2011

Obtaining driver's license in France takes time, money
BY NANCY HONICKER
Published: October 30, 2011

http://republicanherald.com/news/obtaining-driver-s-license-in-france-takes-time-money-1.1224163

On Oct. 16, I was heading north, travelling by my favorite means of transport, the TGV, France's high-speed train, that has almost turned Paris and Provence into neighbors. I had spent the weekend near Nimes, the region where the bull runs I wrote about last July take place. At this time of year, after the late-September grape harvest, the vineyards are golden against a sky of brilliant blue, and in the surrounding woodlands, wild strawberry trees, members of the arbutus family, look like they belong in a game of Candy Land. The trees are heavy with hundreds of edible fruits that resemble gumdrops. Red on the outside, yellow at the center, they are as sweet as candy when you bite into them.

In the train, I was relaxing, looking out the window, watching the South with its dry fields and mountains, vineyards and olive groves fade away, making way for night and the greener, less dramatic landscapes of the North. I was not thinking about the week to come and the challenges awaiting me in Paris, but while I savored the last three hours of my trip, the time required to travel between Nîmes and Paris, let's say the week was "thinking about me."

While I drifted in and out of sleep, millions of Frenchmen were in front of their TVs, watching the national eight o'clock evening news. The big news of the day: as of Oct. 17, all over France, the examiners in driving centers, where candidates for a driver's license begin their road test, were beginning an unlimited strike. My driving test, whose result I hope to give to readers at the end of this article, was scheduled for the end of that week.

By now, regular readers know the French love strikes and the examiners at the driving centers are no exception. Since a 2007 reform of the rules of the road and the requirements for obtaining a license, they have regularly gone on strike, although until the beginning of Monday's strike, there had been no long-term movements, as was the case in 2002, when examiners went on strike for 47 days straight.

This time, they are protesting against their working conditions and low salaries in a profession where, after nearly 40 years on the job, an employee, who also happens to be a civil servant of the French government, rarely earns more than $3,000 a month (starting salaries are around $1,500 a month). Since the 2007 reform, the 1,500 examiners have seen their workload increase. In that year, the driving exam was extended from 20 to 35 minutes and a new, more complex system of evaluation was imposed. Also, secretaries were replaced by computers and it was up to the examiners to enter the results themselves. More work, the same salary, and, last but not least, no respect.

The result: as of Wednesday, Oct. 19, more than 78 percent of the profession was out on strike, and in certain regions, that figure climbed to 100 percent. It just so happened that my exam was scheduled to take place in Bobigny, one of the towns where agents were protesting loudest.

A few miles from Paris, in the heart of the "dangerous suburbs," the Bobigny exam center has not escaped suburban violence, another reason for examiners to strike. They have been beaten up by candidates whom they have failed and have even had their life threatened. Some unsuccessful candidates, turning their violence against themselves, have stretched out on the ground, challenging the examiner to run them over because they prefer death to having failed the exam! For the above reasons, examiners no longer give results the day of the test and candidates have to depend on the French post to find out how they did, which means at least 48 hours of high anxiety, because first time round, only about 50 percent of candidates pass!

But what about me? Am I still as angry as I was a month ago? Am I driving any better? To both those questions, I'd answer yes and no.

Two weeks ago, I felt ready and said this to the director of my driving school, at which time she announced that I first had to do nine hours of intensive training, at 52 euros ($71) an hour. That was how they did things and without that, she assured me, I would not be ready the day of the exam. I asked why I had not been informed before hand, why this was written nowhere on paper. The answer (and remember, driving schools in France have an almost total monopoly on teaching driving and presenting candidates for the test) was "my way, or NOT the highway." In other words, I had no choice, especially as the director insinuated I would not pass otherwise.

Thus, in the days leading up to my exam I did the intensive training in three-hour sessions. Three hours in heavy, rush-hour traffic, three hours of gruelling driving, all beyond my powers of concentration at the end of a long workday. Having been a teacher myself for more than 30 years, I can attest that such methods are ineffective and may do little more than reinforce the bad reputation driving schools already have among the French. During each session we drove by the Bobigny exam center and each time it was closed. All week long, I followed the strike online, reading every article and report I could find, reading readers' comments as well, further proof, if I needed it, that I'm not the only one who is angry.

Finally, Friday arrived. With a teacher from my driving school and two other candidates, each 18 years old, I made the trip to Bobigny, just in case. And it is a good thing we did. The gate to the center was open. A car was parked in the parking lot. Once we parked, an examiner approached us. Our driving test was going forward as scheduled, and my name was first on the alphabetical list!

I'd heard all kinds of stories about examiners, describing them as cruel, even sadistic, whereas I found myself seated next to a calm and courteous young man who happened to not be on strike. We did the test and I did fine, until I really messed up at the end when, wanting to shift from second to third gear on a standard transmission, I accidentally slipped into first. My two young companions made what is called "une erreur eliminatoire," a disqualifying mistake (after their parents had invested more than $2,500 in driving lessons, they confessed to me), whereas my case remains up in the air. I may have passed, I may have not, depending on the number of points earned: 20 out of 30 and I pass, 19 and I fail. The gear-shifting incident may have knocked me out of the race….

Monday, Oct. 24 - More than 72 hours have gone by since I took the exam. I return home from work, I open my mailbox, and there it is, the envelope with the results: favorable.

Readers, I've earned the right to get into a car, turn the key and drive in France!

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

Getting a license to drive, Republican Herald, September 2011

Getting a license to drive
Published: September 25, 2011
http://republicanherald.com/news/getting-a-license-to-drive-1.1207606

First I was angry, then I was scared, now I'm simply exhausted. It was my decision, so I can't blame anyone else. I'm the one who decided on July 29 to enroll in auto-ecole - a driving school, an experience, an investment, a rite of passage and a necessity for any Frenchman who aspires to drive in France.

No parents taking Johnny out on the weekend for a lesson in the family car, no practicing with a licensed driver in an empty parking lot, no driver's ed in high school, auto-ecole is a requirement and pretty much the only way to get a driver's licence in France. Not a bad idea, some might say, but wait until I tell you the price tag. That's where the anger comes in.

In July, I handed over a check for 1,000 euros, the going price for a standard driving course, which equals about $1,365, and that does not include enrollment fees for the official state exams - a theoretical and a practical test. Many jobs in France require a driver's licence, but many Frenchmen cannot afford to go to driving school, which makes the entire process exclusionary and undemocratic.

In my case, I carry in my wallet a driver's licence issued by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, but it is not valid in France. Had I known, I would have exchanged it for a French license, a simple formality, when I arrived in France 24 years ago. There is in fact a treaty between France and Pennsylvania allowing drivers to drive for one year with their respective licenses before making the exchange.

Had I known, I might have felt less intrepid, foolhardy might be a better word, when, for three years, between 1987 and 1990, I crisscrossed the routes of southern France in one of the least powerful cars in the world, a "2 chevaux" - a "two-horsepower" - car, a sort of tin can with the rounded angles of a Volkswagen Bug, but without the solidity. For two of those three years, although I was not aware of it at the time, I was driving illegally.

When I arrived in Paris in 1991, I no longer needed to drive. In this city, public transportation is excellent and at rush hour pedestrians move faster than cars. As for parking, without a rented space in a private garage, a driver can spend up to an hour each day looking for a parking place, which he will pay for, and where he can leave his car for no more than 24 hours.

So what got into me? What made me cough up 1,000 euros to be able to participate in a perpetual traffic jam, which is pretty much what driving in Paris is like? I suppose like everybody else, I wanted the freedom a driver's licence brings. I wanted to be able to rent a car for the weekend and explore the back roads of France. I wanted to be able to legally sit behind the wheel in the country where I reside.

Six weeks later, I'm no longer so sure. Auto-école has done me in. More than a learning experience, it has become an obstacle course. French friends warned me, some even predicted I would fail (the French are not the encouraging kind). And when I sat down and began to learn by heart "le code," a 250-page book which includes all the rules of the road in France, I began to think they might be right.

Besides studying at home, I also had to go to my driving school, where, in a dark stuffy room with a flat screen TV, I took a series of practice tests, simulations of the official exam, 40 multiple-choice questions based on the voluminous code. Once we proved we could make five mistakes or less, we were ready for the real thing. For many students, it takes months to get to this point!

A week ago, my driving school (and not me, I had absolutely no say in the matter) decided my time had come, and a date was set for me to take the official exam. Unfortunately, that's also when the school discovered it had lost my file, which included a paper bearing a government seal, permitting me to sit for the exam. Without it, I could go no further and would have to wait weeks for another copy of the document.

Twenty-four hours before the scheduled exam date, my file was still missing. On the eve of the exam, around 8 p.m., I got a call telling me, miraculously, it had been found (and don't think my school is particularly incompetent. Nearly all veterans of auto-ecole have a tale of woe to tell). To make amends, the school proposed to drive me and another candidate to the exam center the next day. Less than one hour before exam time, I received another call telling me the ride had fallen through and it was up to me to pick up the paperwork at the school and guide myself and a young candidate, afraid to go alone, to the test center.

Our progress was like a high-speed chase in an action film. We raced into the Parisian metro, up and down stairs, on and off platforms, changing trains twice, to arrive at the outskirts of Paris, where, at street level, we made a wrong turn. Once I realized "my" mistake (the other candidate followed me like a puppy), we began to run along a heavily travelled boulevard until, just in the nick of time, we entered the official test center, after having undergone a thorough security check.

By that time my heart was beating fast and my mind felt empty. The very last to arrive, we waited while every other candidate, about 100 of them, was called into the exam room. When we entered, only two front row seats remained. The examiner gave us each a remote control which we would use to take the test. The test began. The room was cold and I was clammy after our run. Listless, somehow convinced I would be one of the many who don't "make it" on the first try, I answered the 40 questions about safety, speeding, the dangers of alcohol, etc.

Then we waited again, while each candidate handed in his remote and received his score: pass or fail. There were cries of joy and moans. The pressure to succeed is enormous, because failing not only means taking the exam again, but forking out more money to do so. Once more, we were last. The now empty room had become frigid. The examiner called us to his desk and was about to give us our results …. when the device that "reads" the remote controls broke down. More waiting. More suspense. More tension. I wonder what my blood pressure was that day.

And finally, the words we were hoping for, "C'est bon," it's good, you've passed.

That was three days ago, and I still can't believe it's for real. I have passed the theoretical test. Now the practical test awaits me, and I have a feeling it's not going to be easy. I'll fill you in on that one - and French drivers - next month.

(Honicker can be reached

at honicker.republican herald @gmail.com)

This French beauty gets better with age
Published: August 28, 2011


http://republicanherald.com/news/this-french-beauty-gets-better-with-age-1.1193539



Yesterday I paid a visit to one of the most beautiful women in France.
She is not young, nor is she fashionably dressed, but her eyes remain bright and her skin glowing, despite her age. True, she has benefited from some cosmetic surgery, but her beauty is timeless and many would consider her one of the true icons of France.

If some readers imagine I dropped in on Catherine Deneuve, born in 1943, they're wrong. Nor was I able to get behind the walls of "la Madrague," the Saint-Tropez hideaway of Brigitte Bardot, born in 1934. Which leaves Jeanne Moreau, born in 1928, one of the most talented French actresses and singers of the past century, best known for her role in the 1961 movie "Jules and Jim," where, after having invited her two lovers to join her for a ride, she drives them off a bridge and all three of them drown.

Those three women are youngsters compared to the woman I was with. Not yet as old as Methuselah, who lived to the ripe old age of 969, she has nonetheless entered her ninth century. Her name is Mary, and her title is Notre Dame de la Belle Verrière, Our Lady of the Beautiful Window. Her home is the cathedral of Chartres, the most important shrine to the Virgin Mary in all of France.

I am writing this on Aug. 15, the Feast of the Assumption, the beginning of Mary's heavenly life, and a public holiday in France. For many, like Labor Day in the United States, it marks the end of summer vacation. For the city of Chartres, dominated by its cathedral which can be seen for miles around, it is one of the most important days of the year. Last evening, a prayer vigil held in the cathedral began at sunset and continued throughout the night, followed by an early morning Gregorian Mass and High Mass later in the morning.

After lunch - no matter what the event, the French always take time to sit down for a meal - which will be more like Sunday dinner, begins what may be the most important event of the day. Throughout the town, there will be a procession dedicated to the Virgin Mary, which will end inside the cathedral with the veneration of the Virgin's veil, a gift of the Frankish Emperor Charles the Bald in the ninth century.

In 1927, it was determined the fabric was probably woven in Syria some time in the eighth century, but that knowledge has in no way dampened the fervor of the many pilgrims who travel to Chartres to worship in its presence, as the faithful have been doing for more than 1,000 years.

Already in 743, there was a church dedicated to the Virgin on the site of the cathedral. In 911, during a siege of the city by the Normans, enemies of the Franks, the bishop solemnly carried the Virgin's veil to the ramparts and, according to legend, the Norman warriors turned on their heels and ran. Since those early days, deep in the church's crypt, a chapel was reserved for another relic, a wooden statue of the Virgin known as Our Lady of the Underworld (Notre Dame de sous-terre). Believed to possess magical powers rooted in druidic mysteries of pre-Christian times, she survived three devastating fires and after each, inspired the people of Chartres to build bigger and higher than before. In 1793, during the Terror of the French Revolution, a period when many churches were sacked, Our Lady of the Underworld met her end.

Our Lady of the Beautiful Window has also encountered many dangers in her life and she, too, is the survivor of a major conflagration which, in 1194, destroyed all but the cathedral's crypt, its western facade and her image in stained glass, most likely located near the altar where the Virgin's veil was kept. Created around 1180, she is, along with the stained windows of the western facade, devoted to the life of the Virgin and of Christ and is among the oldest existing stained glass windows of France. These works of art in dominant tones of red and the famous "blue of Chartres," which has never been equalled in beauty, have earned for the cathedral a place on the prestigious list of UNESCO's world heritage sites.

During the rebuilding of the cathedral at the beginning of the 13th century, its nave was raised to a height of 120 feet (the nave of Notre Dame de Paris is 102 feet) and, thanks to the use of flying buttresses, the upper walls were opened to the light. Stained glass windows filled the upper reaches of the church, and as light poured through the colored glass, it was as if the supernatural presence of God had become visible. Those windows, together with the sculpture that covered the church's exterior, created a Bible in luminous, vibrant pictures at a time when very few people could read.

Today, seen from afar, Notre Dame de Chartres, the queen of the Gothic cathedrals of France, is an imposing and austere monument in stone. In 1260, the year of its dedication, the church shimmered with all the colors of the rainbow, for each of its statues was painted in the greatest detail, with gold leaf used for highlights. And when the faithful crossed the threshold, they truly imagined they were entering paradise. Sparkling, multicolored light showered down from above, and the cathedral's 176 stained-glass windows glowed. Bible stories, told in colored images, preached louder than words.

Reigning over them all, seated on a throne, the Virgin looks down. On her lap, she holds the Christ child, who blesses with his right hand, and in his left holds an open book with the words of a hymn to the Virgin sung at Chartres in the 12th century. Dressed in heavenly blue, with a pearled blue halo encircling her head, she is the crowned sovereign of Notre Dame de Chartres.

Regal, kind, gently smiling, yet sad, The Virgin of the Beautiful Window is a French beauty worth getting to know. Created from sand and ash, iron and lead, she is more than the materials that made her, thanks to the artisans who created her with love.

If you would like to learn more about this beautiful lady and the cathedral she inspired, read Universe in Stone, a "biography" of the cathedral of Notre Dames de Chartres by Philip Ball, published in 2008, available through PA Access at the Pottsville Free Public Library.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald @gmail.com)

Bull Run, Bastille Day Tradition, Republican Herald, July 2011

Bull run Bastille Day tradition
Published: July 31, 2011






http://republicanherald.com/news/bull-run-bastille-day-tradition-1.1181449

I'm back from a Bastille Day celebration on July 14 that got my heart beating so hard I was afraid it was going to crack my ribs.

I've been to a "bandido," a bull run - including some hand-to-tail-to-horn wrestling between foolhardy young men and black long-horned bulls - and I'm part of the "collateral damage" because I've had my foot rammed by a bull's horn!

I went because it is the thing to do on Bastille Day in Languedoc, the part of southern France where I spent the holiday. I went to see bulls running wild through the usually sleepy streets of the village of Congenies, where the festivities are taking place. I went because I had a hard time imagining such a thing.

Hurrying to the village center, anxious to find a safe perch from which to observe bulls on the rampage, I looked around me and observed families with small children, groups of teenagers dressed in matching jerseys, villagers old and young, relaxed, happy, what you might call a typical "block-party crowd." The only person who seemed worried and nervous was me.

Following the instructions of the dear English friend who had invited me to her home for the long weekend, I headed for high ground, a raised garden around the village church, surrounded by protective metal bars put in place especially for the occasion - a cage for humans, while the bulls had the run of the streets. Similar bars were in place around City Hall, and from a loudspeaker attached to its facade, rousing music of the kind associated with bull fights was being broadcast throughout town.

I quickly found a place behind the bars, only to realize I was pretty much alone. The happy families, the grandparents, the young children were either sitting on the raised wall of the church garden, outside the protective metal bars or standing right out in the street at the level of the bulls!

I scolded myself for being overly cautious, slipped through the bars and sat down on the wall between a father holding his toddler son and two boys, 7- or 8-year-olds, who kept calling out "torro" and "olé" as they impatiently awaited the bandido's start (the word "bandido" has its root in the verbs "to chase" or "to hunt" in Occitan, once the dominant language in this part of France).

Then came an explosion and at the far end of the street the pounding of hooves. Nine riders, five women and four men, astride white horses, galloped toward us, each holding a staff topped by a small silver trident, guiding their mounts to form a tight pack around the bulls.

The riders' task was to contain the bulls while that of the reckless crowd in the street was to distract them, extract them from the pack by grasping at their horns or tails and attempt to wrestle them to the ground. Most often, the bulls broke away and ran, careening through the streets pretty much like a bat out of hell - on hooves.

That's when it happened. A bull swerved toward the wall. The locals jumped up or pulled up their dangling feet, but I lacked their practice or their reflexes and its horn hooked my right foot.

As I sat with an ice pack on my big toe, my heart was still beating fast because I realized things could have been much worse. Luckily for me, the bulls's horns were capped with protective foam and cork. Otherwise the horn would have penetrated my flesh and dragged me to the ground!

For the inhabitants of Congenies, what happened to me is all part of the fun. Next to City Hall, an ambulance is waiting and most of the injured drag themselves to it on their own.

And what I've discovered, despite my mishap, is that bull running it is indeed great fun. More than fun, it is an art, and in this part of southern France, a deeply rooted tradition going back 500 years.

At that time, the "gardians," as the riders are called in Occitan, organized themselves into a brotherhood whose patron was St. George the Dragon Killer. Their symbol was a staff mounted with a trident and their steeds - the native white wild horses, sturdy beasts, difficult to break in, but able to travel on all terrains, from the salt marshes of the Rhone Delta to the region's rocky foothills. The "gardians" herded the native wild bulls with their lyre-shaped horns, a smaller and faster breed of cattle than the Spanish bull. They also developed games and contests between bull, horse and man, distinctive of this region and markedly different from the bull-fighting tradition of nearby Spain.

Those traditions and games are alive and well today, with one important change. The brotherhood of "gardians" includes many fine horsewomen who participate in bandidos, where they demonstrate their skills. As for those on the ground, each village or town has its own team of bull-runners, composed of young men and women, who dress in the local colors and band together in the streets, working together to tackle a bull to the ground. What might seem the most macho of sports has welcomed women at its heart.

Perhaps the most important local tradition, of which the region's inhabitants are rightly proud, is that the bull is never harmed. After a bandido or a "course camarguaise" (the region's version of the corrida or rodeo), the bull returns to its pasture to peacefully graze. When in the ring with a bull for a "course," the "raseteur," an unarmed man on foot dressed in white, attempts to snatch from between the bull's horn a red ribbon or a white pompom.

I've never been a fan of Bastille Day, a holiday I've always associated with Parisian crowds and noise, but I think that is going to change. Next year, I hope I'll be back in Congenies, and who knows, I might even join the natives in the street for a run with the bulls.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

Fracking, a universal issue, Republican Herald, May 2011

Fracking a universal issue
Published: May 29, 2011

http://republicanherald.com/news/fracking-a-universal-issue-1.1152847

As I write at my desk on May 10, the French National Assembly sits in an emergency session to vote on a bill that will determine the future of shale oil drilling in France. Outside the parliament building, Palais Bourbon, on the Left Bank of the Seine and across the river from Place de la Concorde, protesters have been gathering since early morning, many having travelled all night from southern France, where drilling permits have already been issued to gas and oil companies.

Among the protesters, the "stars" of France's environmental protection movement stand out: Jose Bove, France's most famous paysan or peasant, known for his droopy mustache and his strong stands on all environmental issues; Nicolas Hulot, a television personality whose programs on nature conservation have earned him nationwide fame, and Eva Joly, a former judge and a presidential hopeful vying for the top spot on the Green Party ticket in the 2012 elections. They are surrounded and supported by the members of more than 100 anti-shale gas collectifs, associations of concerned citizens from every region of France, highly mobilized and highly vocal in their criticism of high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing, better known to Pennsylvanians as fracking.

Those outside the parliament building are calling for a total ban on such drilling; those inside know things are not quite so simple.

On April 13, Prime Minister Francois Fillon promised to revoke all fracking permits in what seemed a clear victory for anti-drilling forces. However, since that time, a Catch-22 situation has come to light. Many drilling permits have already been granted by the Minister of the Environment, and they are what the French call silent permits. In other words, they grant permission to drill but specify neither the nature of the drilling nor the methods that can legally be used. Revoking such permits would require the French state to pay large indemnities to the holders, and one gas company already has its legal team working on the constitutionality of such a move.

Article 1 of the bill up for vote does indeed propose to ban fracking and limit drilling for shale gas to only those methods which protect the environment and do not endanger water supplies. As of this date, no such method exists, but gas companies have two months after the date the bill is voted into law to propose other methods, such as vertical boring.

In such cases, their permits will not be revoked. In fact, nothing forbids them from exploring for oil in anticipation of safer drilling methods. The giant French oil company Total is poised to begin drilling in southern France, near Montelimar, a city located a few miles from a nuclear power plant on the Rhone River. If drilling begins, local residents have vowed to use their bodies to stop trucks from getting through to drilling sites.

By now regular readers of my column know the French are passionate protesters and they love nothing better than a good demonstration. The anti-shale gas movement, however, has spread to corners of France where political activism most often takes the form of participation and cooperation with local government. Regarding shale gas drilling, many usually staid French citizens are up in arms simply because no one ever asked them their opinion. They learned about the drilling permits only after the Ministry of the Environment had handed them out, and some of the areas concerned are among the most picturesque of all of France, including large chunks of what Americans know as Provence.

Civic uproar has also been fuelled by ample coverage in the French media of the situation in the United States, and based on my own estimates, I'd say never before has the state of Pennsylvania been so talked about in France. Unfortunately, it is being held up as a prime example of what can happen when fracking goes wrong. In the week following the Bradford County fracking spill in April, major French dailies, such as Le Figaro, news magazines, such as l'Express, reported the accident. Countless blogs of the anti-shale gas movement took the time to inform their readers of the dangers of wastewater from fracking, a mixture of corrosive salts and known carcinogens.

Thanks to the commitment of anti-shale gas activists, the French also have access to the excellent in-depth reporting on fracking in the series "Drilling Down" by New York Times reporter Ian Urbina, which appeared between February and April and can be found at http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/us/series/drilling_down/index.html. All the articles have been translated into French and are available online. Reading about the current situation in Pennsylvania and western states such as Colorado and Texas, the French come away with a very scary picture of what the future could hold if fracking became widespread in France, a country covering an area equivalent to that of the state of Texas, but whose population is nearly three times as great (65 million as opposed to 23 million).

Much of what the French are learning based on reports from the United States, Pennsylvanians already know: that the dangers of fracking to environment and health are greater than previously understood, that their drinking water is threatened by the millions of gallons of wastewater every single shale gas well produces and that sewage treatment plants are rarely equipped to remove dangerous drilling wastes from water, seeping dangerous carcinogens and radioactive material into rivers, as is already the case with the Susquehanna.

As for those who are pro-shale gas, in the USA or in France, they argue for energy independence, vaunt the low carbon footprint of shale gas when compared to coal (debatable when drilling and production methods are taken into account) and remind consumers of the ever-present threat of war and acts of terror and their potential impact on the energy supply. Shale gas, however, constitutes at best a short-term solution - 15 years is one estimate for the life of Pennsylvania's shale gas reserves, a drop in the energy bucket when compared to the destruction excavation is wreaking on the state.

In the early hours of May 11, the bill against shale gas drilling passed the French Parliament. It will move on to the Senate in early June. Good news? Not exactly, because the silent permits are still out there, and the bill includes a loophole that will allow shale gas exploration to begin.

Yet, the anti-shale gas movement has politicians running scared. Parliamentary elections are scheduled for June 2012, one month after France's next presidential election. Those who don't want to lose their job are ready to listen to constituents crying out, "No shale gas drilling in our backyard." Gov. Corbett and Pennsylvania lawmakers should take note. The drilling companies may make the biggest campaign contributions; it is Pennsylvania's citizens who vote.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

Hunt for legendary Dracula, Republican Herald June 2011

Hunt for legendary Dracula reveals Pennsylvania-Transylvania connection
Published: June 26, 2011


This month my subject is neither Pottsville nor Paris, but it rhymes with Pennsylvania. I'm just back from Transylvania, where I paid a visit to Dracula. Well, I didn't actually meet him because the real Dracula has been dead for more than 500 years, but I traveled to the Carpathian Mountains in the heart of Transylvania. There, atop a solid rock promontory sits the mountain fortress legend has long associated with his name. Just like Jonathan Harker, the hero of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel "Dracula," the model for all vampire films and novels that have come afterward, I was on a mission to Romania.

My university sent me to a conference in Bucharest, and as fate would have it the day after the conference's end, I was crowded into a minibus traveling into the Carpathian Mountains, whose foothills, beyond which granite peaks rise, look disturbingly like the mountains of Pennsylvania. In fact, the town of Brasov, about 15 miles from the castle, reminded me a lot of Jim Thorpe, and I got to wondering if somewhere in between the banks of the Lehigh and the Susquehanna there might not be an abandoned mine or two where a relative of Dracula has taken up residence.

More than once - and this is fact, not fiction - on hot summer nights, while I lie in bed in the attic of my mother's Pottsville home, a bat has entered the room, casting the shadow of its outspread wings on the ceiling as it flies back and forth over my body, although, to my knowledge, none has ever fastened itself to my neck.

To give us courage, to offer protection, our driver paused in his upward climb at the gates of Sinaia Monastery, an Orthodox monastery founded in 1695 by Prince Mihail Cantacuzino, upon his return from a trip to St. Catherine's Monastery on Mount Sinai in the Holy Land. Nestled in a secluded hollow in a forest of tall pine trees, the walled monastery is a peaceful place, and except for the church bells, the only other sound is the wind rustling in the pines.

Yet, like its model in the Sinai desert, this monastery honors St. Catherine of Alexandria, a fourth-century martyr saint who died a violent death rather than give up her faith. She was attached to the "breaking wheel," an instrument of torture in the shape of a big wooden wagon wheel mounted on a pole, to which victims were strapped and then beaten with a club. In St. Catherine's case, the wheel did not break her, but she broke it, her touch causing it to fall to pieces, upon which the Roman emperor of the time ordered her head to be chopped off.

In other cases, throughout the Middle Ages and beyond, the breaking wheel was very successfully used in Europe to execute murderers and those accused of particularly heinous crimes. Once dead, the victims' heads were cut off and placed on a spike while their bodies remained splayed on the wheel, food for carrion birds.

Back on the minibus, climbing higher into a heavy mist, with visions of St. Catherine's martyrdom still floating in my brain, I fear we may simply be heading toward greater violence. After all, Dracula, also known as "Vlad the Impaler," lived from 1431 to 1476 and earned that title by impaling hundreds, if not thousands, of victims directly upon stakes.

No one would deny he was bloodthirsty, but his methods were in keeping with those of his times. No gas chambers, no electric chair, no lethal injections - he and his contemporaries preferred torture by the wheel, by the stake or by immersion in boiling water and they performed their executions in public, not behind closed doors.

As I reflect upon methods of torture past and present, the minibus emerges into sunlight at the crest of a forested mountain, which overlooks a delightful valley of fields and orchards, grazing sheep and cows. We begin our descent into a landscape of green valleys and low, rolling hills (Pennsylvania again!), and make our way towards a strategic mountain pass.

To the east lie the Black Sea and, in the day of Vlad the Impaler, the threat of the Ottoman Turks. To the west, Hungary, whose leaders covet Transylvania. In charge of the mountain top fortress that overlooks the pass is Vlad III the Impaler, member of the Order of the Dragon, in other words, Dracula. For a few years in the mid-15th century, he was able to keep both enemies at bay. For that reason, Romanians tend to see him more as a hero than a bloody predator.

For them, the real culprit is a woman, a "Countess Dracula," who lived in western Transylvania at the end of the 16th century. Her name was Elizabeth Bathory, she was a Hungarian noblewoman, and she was brought to trial for killing young virgins in order to bathe in their blood. So goes the legend, much as for Count Dracula.

Vlad the Impaler occupied Bran Castle, the true name of Dracula's home, for perhaps only a decade, but it is his story, his legend that draws visitors from all over the world to this remote corner of Romania.

Once inside, much to their surprise, they discover a beautiful, welcoming home. Until 1947, the royal family of Romania often resided here, and Queen Marie, the English daughter of the Duke of Edinburgh, a son of Queen Victoria, took it upon herself to remodel the fortress, in keeping with all the traditions of Romanian folk art. There are cozy corners heated by tiled stoves, terraces overlooking the mountains, reading rooms that make you want to sit down and stay.

Romania became a Communist state in 1947 and the royal family fled the country. By that time, Queen Marie had died, but Ileana, one of her daughters, settled in the United States. In 1967, in Ellwood City, Pa., not far from the Ohio border, she founded the first Romanian Orthodox monastery for women in the United States.

Traveling in the Carpathian Mountains, searching for Dracula, much to my surprise, I found instead a "Pennsylvania connection," and at this very time, the nuns of the Orthodox Monastery of the Transfiguration are offering for sale a cookbook, which may include, I suspect, some of the very dishes served in the castle once inhabited by Dracula.

(Honicker can be reached

at honicker.republican herald@gmail.com)

Easter Chocolates a Shared Tradition, Republican Herald, April 2011

Easter chocolates a shared tradition
Published: April 24, 2011


This year I'm spending Easter in Pottsville, where I'll be joining my family for what has been our traditional Easter dinner ever since I was a child, and I'm wondering how many other families in Schuylkill County will be sitting down to a meal similar to ours.

We'll be having baked ham, along with a variety of salads, and everyone will eat a pickled egg that has been marinating in spiced red beet juice for the past few days.

When in France for Easter, I've taken to making pickled eggs for my friends, and the French always look at them suspiciously when I put one on their plates. Needless to say, in France, no one except my guests has ever tasted this Pennsylvania delicacy.

The typical French Easter menu is a celebration of spring, and the meal begins with the very first asparagus of the season, seasoned with vinaigrette dressing and bits of grated hard-boiled egg. For the main course, the French prefer a leg of roasted spring lamb, accompanied by fresh peas or flageolet beans, which look like tiny pale-green kidney beans. And for dessert, there's a special Easter cake, sponge cake baked in the form of a nest, iced with a chocolate glaze and then sprinkled with homemade chocolate vermicelli, a tasty substitute for straw. Nestled in the center is an assortment of chocolate chicks and eggs, jelly beans and even a few sprigs of spring flowers.

This Easter I'll be eating ham, my Parisian friends will be eating lamb, but there is one Easter tradition we definitely share, and that's chocolate. Before sitting down for their Easter feast, French children, just like those in the USA, set out on an Easter egg hunt. Hanging from branches, hidden in flower beds or in the hollow of a tree, they'll find chocolate eggs, chocolate hens and chicks, chocolate rabbits and even chocolate bells filled with what the French call "friture" - small chocolate fish. And those bells, believe it or not, are the French version of the Easter Bunny.

In France, Peter Cottontail does not come hopping down the bunny trail to deliver chocolates to good little girls and boys. It's the church bells that do his job. At the end of Maundy Thursday, church bells all over France stop ringing and they will not ring again until after Easter Saturday's midnight Mass. During that period of mournful silence, little children are told the bells have flown off to Rome, taking with them a supply of Easter chocolates, to be blessed by the pope. That done, they head back to France, each bell to its respective belfry, dropping chocolates in gardens and on balconies along the way.

A few lucky children may find chocolates made by some of the finest chocolate makers of France, such as Francois Pralus, recognized in 2009 as the best chocolate maker of all of Paris (visitors to the city can sample his products at his shop located at 35 rue Rambuteau, a few steps from the Pompidou Center, on the Right Bank of the Seine).

What makes Pralus unique among French chocolate makers is that he owns a plantation on a small island off the coast of Madagascar, where he produces his own cocoa beans, and where his chocolate production begins. After the harvest, cocoa pods are cleaned and cracked to extract the cocoa beans, which are then sorted and shipped to Paris. There the beans are roasted and ground to a liquid paste, which will be further refined into either cocoa butter, chocolate paste or cocoa powder. To make dark chocolate, the French favorite, Pralus uses chocolate paste, cocoa butter, pure cane sugar, natural vanilla - and nothing else.

Pralus may be unique in owning his own cocoa plantation, but in the area of fine chocolates, he has lots of competition. On the Left Bank, at 132 boulevard Saint-Germain, Georges Larnicol, considered one of the best "chocolate craftsmen" of all of France, has recently arrived from his native Brittany to set up shop. His specialty is chocolate sculptures in the form of dolls, champagne bottles, the Eiffel Tower, cars, giant Easter eggs and even boats.

In fact, in September 2010, he produced a 15-foot sail boat made completely of chocolate and weighing 1.2 tons, which he launched into Concarneau harbor on the coast of southern Brittany. The boat floated for more than an hour and only began to sink when spectators turned participants began eating the seaworthy chocolate vessel.

Of course, the French are not the only ones to take chocolate making seriously. The state of Pennsylvania can claim as its own two of America's original chocolate makers, both who got their start in Philadelphia. Henry Oscar Wilbur, a candy maker in that city since 1865, began producing chocolates in 1884, and in 1894, he turned them into "Wilbur Buds." In 1928, his company moved to the town of Lititz, Lancaster County, still home to the Wilbur Chocolate Co. today.

Milton S. Hershey also started in Philadelphia, opening a candy shop there in 1876, when he was 18 years old. Business was not good, however, and he moved on, travelling all the way to Colorado, before he finally headed back East to settle in his native Lancaster County, where he began making chocolate in 1894 and the rest is history.

Not only did this man give us the "nickel bar" and the Hershey kiss with its trademarked "plume," he left a lasting mark as a philanthropist on the town that bears his name.

Thus the state of Pennsylvania has played an important role in the history of chocolate, but few may know that thanks to a researcher at Penn State University, it may play an even bigger role in chocolate's future. In 2010, Dr. Mark Guiltinan and his research team were credited with the complete sequencing of the cacao genome of the finest of all chocolate trees, the obroma cacao, first domesticated by the Mayan people of Central America 3,000 years ago.

If this DNA sequencing can lead to increased breeding and cultivation of these trees, it means more superior quality chocolate for chocolate lovers around the world, a happy thought for those of us biting into Easter chocolates today.

And for the true chocolate lover who might also be planning a trip to Paris, keep these dates in mind: from Oct. 20-24, Paris will be hosting France's biggest chocolate fair, the "Salon du chocolat" - 40,000 square feet of chocolate, with free samples galore!

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

John O'Hara, Gustave Flaubert, Writers 'trained' in medecine, Republican Herald

Writers 'trained' in medicine
Published: March 27, 2011


Good doctors and good writers have a lot in common. They share keen powers of observation, the ability to size up a person on the spot, and the knowledge that suffering and death are ingredients of everyday life. Some good writers are actually doctors. This was the case of the great Russian writer Anton Chekhov, who, in hundreds of short stories, described life as he observed it while making his medical rounds in late 19th century Russia.

Others learn the writer's craft not only in the classroom or in books, but in the sickroom, if they have a father who is a doctor eager to introduce his child to the medical field.

Pottsville's John O'Hara was such a writer, and by the time he was 12, he was already riding at his father's side to medical emergencies which often resulted in loss of life. At a coal train wreck he held a dying man's hand and comforted another who had just had his legs cut off. All in a day's work for the father, and soon a natural part of the life of the son. O'Hara used this material to write one of his finest short stories, "The Doctor's Son," created from firsthand experience of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.

Whenever I walk by the O'Hara home at 606 Mahantongo St., I look up at the three stories and try to imagine life inside when O'Hara was a boy, the eldest of eight children. His father's office was closer to Centre Street, at 125 Mahantongo St., but the doctor was often called out in the night to all parts of the county, back in the days when house calls were a regular part of a doctor's routine. In "The Doctor's Son," O'Hara describes an exhausted father returning home at 4 a.m. after three days of nonstop emergency calls at the height of the influenza epidemic. He plops down on the sofa and falls asleep till the rest of the family get up for breakfast. In such a household, based on O'Hara's own, there is no separation between work and home.

Recently, I was able to enter the childhood home of one of France's greatest writers, the novelist Gustave Flaubert, author of "Madame Bovary." His father, like O'Hara's, was a doctor, the surgeon general of the main hospital of the city of Rouen in Normandy, and he and his family inhabited a large brick house attached to the medical complex. His father was also a professor of medicine, and the medical school was part of the same hospital.

Dissections or surgical operations took place in large amphitheatres while row after row of students looked on. In his 1889 painting "The Agnew Clinic," on display at University of Pennsylvania and on the Internet, Philadelphia artist Thomas Eakins created a vivid picture of what this was like. Students wearing suit and tie lean forward to get a better view of a woman undergoing a public mastectomy while a doctor administers anesthesia, not yet available in Flaubert's father's day.

Flaubert himself was born at home on Dec. 12, 1821, right next door to the hospital. Of his early years he writes, "I grew up among every form of human misery, separated from it by a wall. My playground was the amphitheatre where my father taught." For "a quarter of a century," the hospital was a part of his daily life, leaving an indelible mark on the man and his work.

In what is his best known novel, "Madame Bovary," the story of a tragically unhappy marriage, Emma Bovary's husband is a health officer, a member of an intermediary medical corps created by Napoleon in 1808 and dissolved in 1892. Not quite a doctor, restricted to practicing medicine in the region where he is trained, the health officer sets up shop in the countryside or a small village, whereas doctors and surgeons have their practice near hospitals in the city. Charles, Emma's husband, knows how to set a broken bone or bleed a patient, but when faced with a complicated surgery that goes wrong, he is required by law to call for help from a city surgeon. In Charles' case, he is publicly shamed.

Besides being a great novel, "Madame Bovary" is a compendium of 19th century medical lore. This includes Charles' medical studies in Rouen, in the same medical school where Flaubert's father taught, country medicine as practiced by Charles and the cures and concoctions of the local pharmacist for whom the health officer was a rival. There is also a place for quack cures and their very dangerous consequences.

Flaubert's childhood home, which today is a museum devoted to the writer and his medicine, allows visitors to see how the family of an important doctor and surgeon lived during the first half of the 19th century. Flaubert's father died in 1846, the same year as Flaubert's beloved sister, Caroline. Her death, caused by puerperal fever, was directly linked to the poor hygiene of the doctor who delivered her child. At about the same time, in the United States, Oliver Wendell Holmes was advancing the theory that the fever was spread by doctors and nurses who did not wash their hands, an outrageous statement to many of his contemporaries.

After working long hours in the hospital, Flaubert's father liked to relax by playing a game of billiards and the house had a large billiard room. Today it holds a collection of objects that speak much louder than words about a hospital stay in the early 19th century.

For example, there is a wide hospital bed covered with a down comforter. It actually looked pretty comfortable to me until I discovered it was meant to hold six patients at a time! And each one had his own chamber pot stowed underneath. For those considered "mad," there were heavy iron cuffs for hands and ankles, attached to chains fastened to the walls.

Yet, there was also progress, as this museum attests. In its collections, there is the only remaining mannequin, known as "la Machine," created by an 18th century midwife, Madame du Coudray, to teach other midwives and doctors how to deliver a baby. "La Machine" looks more like a life-sized rag doll, except it can be taken apart to reveal a womb and a rag-doll fetus connected to an umbilical chord. Remarkable for its anatomical accuracy, Madame du Coudray's "machine" traveled with her all over France, where almost single-handedly she trained an entire generation of midwives in the art of childbirth.

Neither O'Hara nor Flaubert followed his father's calling, but without a doubt, their early experiences of medicine played an important role in making them the world-class writers we read and love today.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

Parisians Throng to Cultural Event of the Year, RP, February 2011

Parisians throng to cultural event of year
Published: February 27, 2011

http://republicanherald.com/news/parisians-throng-to-cultural-event-of-year-1.1109961

I am not one in a million, I am one of almost a million visitors, who, in a period of 125 days, flocked to see an exhibit devoted to the French Impressionist painter Claude Monet (1840-1926).

Held in the Grand Palais (palace), a glass-roofed exhibition hall on the Champs Elysees, it brought together paintings from all over the world, some never before exhibited in France. Only one exhibit in French history ever did better, and that was in 1967, when the treasures of the Egyptian King Tutankhamen were brought to Paris, attracting 1.2 million visitors, over a period of seven months. To see Monet, we had only four, and I got in just under the gun, with less than 48 hours remaining to visit one of the most popular exhibits France has ever known.

To be sure of getting inside the fine arts gallery of the Grand Palais, on Jan. 23, I was up at 5 a.m. Before 6 a.m., I headed out the door, walking up the hill towards the metro in a fine, freezing rain. At the top of the hill, the vendors at my local outdoor market were already setting up their stands, unloading fresh fish, vegetables, meat and much more, from trucks double-parked in the street. I hurried underground and hopped in a train, after a few stops, changed to another and then emerged above ground at the station "Champs-Elysées-Clemenceau." Not yet 6:30 a.m., and already the waiting time - outside in the freezing rain in the dark Parisian night with dawn still far away - is two hours before we can even hope to get inside. Later in the day, waiting time will increase to five.

Beginning 9 a.m. Jan. 21, the doors of the Grand Palais remained open through 9 p.m. Jan. 24, when the Monet exhibit closed. Publicity stunt, marketing ploy or simply a response to overwhelming demand? Suffice it to say crowds have been filing in 24/7, and at 6 a.m. Sunday, entire families, many with sleeping children in strollers or parents' arms wait in the rain, wait quietly and patiently, to pass from darkness into the glistening light of the world of Impressionist painter Claude Monet.

My first reaction, once I'm finally inside, is one of disappointment because I can hardly see a thing. The crowd is five or six deep around Monet's early works, landscapes painted in the forests around Paris by a very young painter influenced by the Barbizon school. Its members were a group of French artists who carried their easels outside to paint directly from nature. The young Monet joined them, painting forests and fields in a style similar to that of his elders, painters such as Corot or Courbet.

In the next two rooms, the crowd continues to shuffle along. After hours of waiting in the cold and rain, many of us are feeling irritable, wondering if the wait was worth it, but we certainly don't feel cold. The gallery is stifling and we're wearing winter coats. I'm asking myself if, at this pace, I'll be able to make it through to the end without collapsing in a dead faint.

Then, for some strange reason, much like when a traffic snarl suddenly dissolves, in the next room, awash in Impressionist light, the crowd thins out. Finally, we can breathe easy, we can even stop and contemplate a favorite painting, as we follow Monet on his lifetime "tour de France." Like many Impressionist painters, he embarked on a journey to see, not the beauties of his country, but the beauty of light on land and water in every corner of France. Be it on the beaches of Normandy or Brittany or on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in the heart of Paris or deep in the French countryside, Monet's quest was always the same, to capture the fleeting movement of light using a painting technique worthy of its splendor.

By 1870, while living north of Paris in a village on the banks of the Seine, Monet had worked out the rudiments of that technique, short brush strokes used to apply thick dabs of paint, the juxtaposition, rather than the mixing, of colors and the fragmentation of form under the effect of light and atmospheric conditions. The winter of 1871 is particularly harsh and the fast-flowing Seine freezes over, its surface broken up into bobbing chunks of ice. Despite the cold, Monet visits the river at all hours of the day, instituting an essential Impressionist practice, as he returns to the same scene several times each day, and several days in succession, in pursuit of a fleeting atmosphere.

All his life, until his dying day, Monet continued his quest to capture light on canvas. When he retired from his travels, but not from painting, he set up his easel at his home in Giverny, painting over and over again the water lilies floating on a pond in his beloved garden. Today both home and garden are open to visitors, and many tourists from around the world take the train from St. Lazare Station in Paris to travel to Giverny.

But that is not the only way to discover Monet's home. Another option is to push open the doors of the Pottsville Free Public Library. Inside you'll find a children's book which appeals to the child in all of us - "Linnea in Monet's Garden" by Cristina Bjork. Also available is the 1992 award-winning animated film based on the story. Next to the real thing, there's no better way to visit Monet's garden and get better acquainted with his work.

And instead of standing for hours in the rain and cold, like us Parisians, residents of Schuylkill County can hop in their car and drive to the Reading Public Museum, which has its own collection of French Impressionist paintings. That's where I discovered them when I was a child. For those ready to drive a little farther, there's also the James A. Michener Museum in Doylestown, where the homegrown variety of Impressionism is on display. Its Lenfest Collection is devoted to the Pennsylvania Impressionists, who painted the Bucks County countryside and industrial sites, such as the furnaces of Bethlehem Steel. I'll add that many of the Monet paintings in the Paris exhibit were borrowed from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and will soon be returning home.

So was it worth it, my two hours in the dark and in the rain? Yes, definitely, and I thank the French for Monet-and for the crazy idea of keeping a museum open 24/7.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)

Article from The Republican Herald of Pottsville, PA, January 2011

http://republicanherald.com/news/a-happy-new-year-from-the-biggest-pessimists-in-the-world-1.1097960

Happy New Year from the biggest pessimists in the world !

As the first decade of the 21st century came to an end and a new decade began on Jan. 1, 500,000 revellers, guzzling from bottles of champagne, celebrated on the Champs Elysees of Paris, known as the most beautiful avenue in the world. Six hours later, on the other side of the Atlantic, a crowd of more than a million cheered and embraced as the ball dropped in Times Square. I rang in the new year somewhere in between, cramped in an economy class seat somewhere over the Atlantic, travelling from the United States to France. In the plane, there was no champagne, no party, just faint applause when the captain announced the arrival of 2011 on the European continent.

In contrast to the outpourings of joy on both sides of the Atlantic, my "celebration" seemed somehow the most appropriate in light of a BVA-Gallup International poll released on Jan. 3 by the French daily "Le Parisien." Its purpose was to gauge the morale of 53 countries around the globe, and France ranked the most pessimistic in the world. The Vietnamese came in first for optimism, and among the top 10 runners in the race for a better future were China, India and Brazil, with Afghanistan in 10th place. For information, the United States held a median position, just behind our neighbor Canada, a sign that perennial American optimism may be flagging. Among the top 10 pessimists, all belong to old-world European countries such as Great Britain, Iceland and Rumania.

On the afternoon of Jan. 1, I returned to my apartment and indeed things did look bleak. The streets were deserted and the sky, dark and oppressively low. The Christmas holidays here were not the merriest, in large part because of exceptionally heavy snowfall, which wreaked havoc on the ground and in the air, forcing many Frenchmen to postpone their winter holidays; and, as my regular readers know, for the French vacation time is sacre (sacred). A single day shaved off at either end literally becomes an affair of state, and the transport minister must answer for it, as she did on the most listened to national radio station, France Inter, on Jan. 2.

Are a few too many snowflakes really enough to make the French the biggest pessimists in the world? To tell the truth, the French naturally lean in that direction, and where Americans might see the glass half-full, the French definitely see it half-empty. Their country retains its fifth-place rank among world powers, and their system of health care and social protection should rightly be a source of national pride. The country is beautiful, the infrastructures and banking system sound, and the food …. well, the food is great. Is the pessimism then unfounded, or might it have it roots in the very same phenomenon that is making Americans look towards the future with a worried eye?

To sum up the source of French pessimism in three words, it's all about jobs, housing and youth, which, until recent times, was France's greatest source of hope. Since 1985, mass unemployment has been an endemic presence in the French economic landscape. For the past decade, its burden has fallen mostly on the young, better qualified than ever, yet all too often forced to accept low-paying jobs, far below the level of their skills - if they can find a job at all. Many stay in school, the crumbling, but basically free, public university system where I work, accumulating diplomas while holding on to a respectable status, that of a university student, and certain benefits, such as subsidized housing and scholarships based on need. Why step outside into the real world when it means stepping down the economic and social ladder to a rung inferior to their parents', in a society that does not, or cannot, make a place for them.

A decade ago, when the new millennium began, optimistic predictions promised young people jobs. Baby boomers were leaving the workplace in droves, and would continue to do so for the first two decades of the new century. Ten years later, these predictions have not panned out, and economic growth has slowed almost to a trickle in a society where the haves - those with jobs and social protection - hold tight to their gains, whereas the have-nots - many of them young college graduates - remain on the outside, neglected by politicians, few of whom are under 50, and employers, who consider 50 the beginning of old age.

Once young people leave school, these members of the boomerang generation, loaded down with diplomas but earning minimum wage, have no other option but to move back in with mom and dad. Nor can they easily marry, have children, establish a credit rating or simply get on with life. Those lucky enough to achieve independence through good jobs and a decent salary see their income eaten up by hefty rents or mortgage payments and heavy transportation costs ($3 for a gallon of gas is a bargain-basement price for the French). Other countries are experiencing the boomerang effect, but in France, it is particularly serious, as anyone who has reached age 40 knows. That's when employers start reminding workers they're getting old.

For their children, all parents want a life better than their own, but French parents are starting to believe that things will only get worse for their offsprings. This is the root of their pessimism, and, many American parents, facing similar perspectives, would agree their fears are legitimate.

To transform the ominous fate of the young into a promising destiny, much in France would have to change, beginning with labor and tax law, according to specialists. Low-cost housing, especially in urban centers, is also sorely needed. But such change would require investment, and France, like the United States, is saddled by public and private debt. Like the United States as well, there is little consensus about how these problems should be solved among citizens fed up with the unfulfilled promises of political leaders. In such circumstances, it is difficult to move forward, but in this revolution-loving country, if France does not, it may explode.

I'm tempted to conclude by saying "Happy New Year" anyway. And my new year's wish is that Americans, despite hard economic times, not lose their gift for walking on the "sunny side of the street," one of their greatest strengths.

(Honicker can be reached at honicker.republicanherald@gmail.com)