Les Vacances

Fortunately for everyone's sanity, the reward for living through June comes almost immediately -- the beginning of the lovely two month period known as "les vacances" when everything slows down to a gentle relaxing pace, even in the city. During the second part of June, you can sense it starting. The classical radio station I listen to has changed the names of its programs to "On the road to vacation", "A Classical summer" and "Summer afternoon". TV programs, particularly live ones, wish their viewers a happy summer and disappear, leaving not even reruns behind them, to be replaced by more lighthearted summer fare, often with a vacation theme. Magazine cover stories tend either to "Where to relax this summer" articles or "Great Philosophers" or "Great Moments in History" articles, assuming correctly or incorrectly, that their subscribers have more time to read and reflect during "les vacances". Gradually conversations at work and with friends drift to "So, when do you leave?" and "Where are you going?"
Because, even though "les vacances" lasts much longer than most people's summer vacation, getting away from it all is an important part of it, especially to Parisians and other urban dwellers.
Contrary to popular belief, all France does not shut down for the month of August. I'm not sure it ever did. The proof I always offer when asked about this is that there exist two nouns describing vacation-goers. "Juillettistes" are people who take their vacation in July or "juillet". "Aôutiens" are people who take their vacation in August ("aôut") Of course, some people take their vacation between July 14th (a public holiday) and August 15th (another public holiday). No special word for them except, perhaps, "clever" as it saves them two paid vacation days for the same amount of time away.
This said, fewer people are going away for an entire month now than when I first came to France. Two or three weeks seems to be the norm in summer. So although the first weekend in July, the July 14th weekend and the first weekend in August are known as "les grands départs", people come and go all summer. Despite public service announcements, most people leave between Friday afternoon and Saturday morning because weekly rentals start on Saturday afternoon and no one wants to miss a minute of their time, even if it means being stuck in traffic for hours.
And where are they going? The pictures at the top of this post should give you a clue. The favorite destination is the beach, with the mountains coming in second and the country a distant third -- although, of course, each destination has its passionate fans. Only about 10% of French people go abroad though that also, is more than when I first arrived.
So much more I'd like to tell you but the Tour de France is about to start -- another sure sign of "les vacances" . And when today's stage is over, I have to pack. The next post will be from Charlottesville.

hh