Polluted, dreadful or revolting, most people have their own judgment about France and the French people: If you think France you think: fashionable, stylish, sexy, impolite, bureaucratic, bitchy as hell, pavements studded with dog excrements, French baguettes that dry out before you get a chance to eat it and a habit of torching cars is some of the talk on the street. Spice up the cauldron with the regular metropolitan riots, political gossip and a 35-hour working week – not to forget The Da Vinci Code, a gigantic box-office hit taking over Paris as well as celebrity Angelina Jolie supposedly plumping for a castle in Normandy to raise her children – and the worldwide press is all over too. Continue reading →