The woman who followed us up the street was in Sarlat, the Dordogne region. Somewhere else in the Dordogne, we were looking at a magazine prominently displayed at a news stand. It looked just like our TIME magazine, with a very sinister looking Bush on the cover under the headline: "Is this man dangereux?". (The obvious answer was YES!) We were chuckling at it when a total stranger came up and started arguing with us that the headline WAS TRUE! She was waving her hands and shouting...we just walked away.
Another was a woman on a train near Limoges. I also recall a woman in a restaurant in the Loire...maybe Saumur. She and her husband were at an adjoining table. She asked if we were American and then brought up President Bush.
We didn't support him, did we? Well, yes, we told her. She went on shaking her head and asking didn't we see how stupid and unsophisitcated he is? His poor understanding of the world is dangerous...well, you know the rest.
Now that I think about it, it's interesting that they were all women...I can't remember that a man ever brought up politics. Anyway, we had never encountered anything like it. Determined not to let it spoil our fun, we just brushed it off. I'll add that we are not "touristy" Americans. We both speak (poor) French and we never ask for ketchup with our frites. :)
hmmmm
I remember that "is this man dangerous" cover from the Nouvel Observateur ! How bizarre to think people would get so worked up (is that the correct US expression ?) by it !
Well, this kind of reaction really is a new one to me, I don't think even Reagan provoked such reactions. Wow. I hoped it didn't cast too much a shadow over your vacation - people should be intelligent (and good-mannered) enough to know that you're trying to enjoy some holidays here, and not working to ensure the nation's demise or something like that.
I am FRENCH FOR BUSH and I do agree with you!
I don't trust at all CHIRAC whose government and specialy the new Foreign minister is trying to come back in the diplomatic game after BUSH reelection and as elections are coming next in IRAK.
They don't want to recognize that they were wrong but hope to make business with the new irakian government...
I was on the Champs Elysée in Paris at the finish of "Tour de France"(a great bicycle race)for the victory of Lance Armstrong for the sixth time and i was holding a USA flag.A young man i didn't know asked me if i saw the film of propaganda by M.Moore.I answered it was only propaganda,that
i heard and red about it and didn't want to see it...