Paul from Paris

Steeped in cynicism, Old World merchants craftily defrauded a family-owned New World business. Alerted by the odor of turpitude, investigators exposed the foul play and brought those responsible to justice.

This dramatic story happens to be true.

From 2008 to 2008, a group of cooperatives in the Languedoc-Roussillon region (in the south of France, the westernmost territory that faces the Mediterranean) sold wine to Ducasse, an intermediary working for Aimery Sieur d’Arques, a large French wine conglomerate. This French group then sold the wine to a family-owed business based in the United States, E&J Gallo Winery, which sold it under the Red Bicyclette label.

Gallo and its customers were enchanted with the “warmth and charm” of wine from the “sun-drenched” Languedoc-Roussillon. Indeed, the Languedoc-Roussillon region calls itself the “world’s biggest vineyard”.

The problem: the French producers claimed the wine was pinot noir. As investigators found, it was not; the wine was actually merlot or syrah (shiraz).

The fraud was perpetrated over 135,000 hectoliters of wine. That’s more than 3 1/2 million US gallons. Put differently, that’s enough wine to fill 18 million bottles.

That’s a lot of wine. Especially when the Languedoc-Roussillon region produces, in total, 50,000 hectoliters of pinot noir annually.

Carcassonne court

Money provided both a motivation and an important clue for investigators. The wine passed off as pinot noir sold for €58 per hectoliter. That’s more than the €45 local varietals command. But it’s significantly discounted from the lofty €97 price that genuine pinot noir commands.

The Carcassonne court imposed fines up to €180,000, and a six-month jail term (suspended) for a ringleader.

When I was a young boy in America, every school room had an American flag, and every morning the class recited the pledge of allegiance. An American flag also flew outdoors, and I recall being part of the flag brigade that had the honor, at the end of every afternoon, of lowering and folding the flag, in accordance with a strict protocol.

Flags are everywhere in America, but almost nowhere in France. Only public buildings fly the flag, which tends to be weathered. When I tried to find a French flag, many years ago, the only place I could find one was a boating supply store.

Last October, Eric Besson, the French minister of Immigration and National Identity, opened a “great debate on the values of national identity” (with a web site). Maybe the debate was intended to focus public opinion, in the months leading to regional elections, on law-and-order and patriotic issues thought to favor conservatives. In other words, president Sarkozy wanted to claim the flag as his.

Prominent conservatives questioned the wisdom of holding such a debate at all. Opposition politicians uniformly and vocally criticized the proceedings. After a series of gaffes, the debate seemed to become a political liability for conservatives, and a drain on other initiatives. Prime minister François Fillon stepped in, congratulated participants, declared victory, and announced a few, very modest initiatives.

One of the initiatives involved putting flags in schools. Immigration and National Identity minister Eric Besson had proposed a flag in every classroom. This was scaled down to proposing a flag in every school.

This barren debate did shine some light on one of the oddest figures in French politics today: Immigration and National Identity minister Eric Besson. Born in Marrakech, Besson grew up in Morocco. Legend has it that, when he failed to win admission to the prestigious école nationale d’administration (ENA), Besson borrowed money from his grandmother, published an ad reading “I didn’t get into ENA!” in Le Monde, and landed a job with Renault. Drawn to politics, Besson rose to prominence in the labor party. After a messy argument with presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, Besson became a turncoat. He noisily left the labor party and teamed up with Nicolas Sarkozy. For this, Besson was rewarded with a ministerial portfolio. In addition to this public change, Besson made private changes too: he also divorced Sylvie Brunel, his wife of many years and mother of his children, and began a relationship with Yasmine Torjeman, a 22-year-old Tunisian.

The Comédie Française, Paris

On 17 February 1673, Jean-Baptiste Poquelin died. He was better known under his stage name, Molière, and he was 51.

It doesn’t have a happy ending, but this is one of my favorite Molière stories.

Molière was a playwright and an actor: he starred in the plays he wrote.

The last play Molière wrote was Le Malade imaginaire (in English: The Imaginary Invalid). It’s a serious play, about love and marriage and choosing a partner wisely. It’s also a funny comedy about a miserly hypochondriac, Argan. Molière interpreted this role.

Molière died on the job. During a performance, the imaginary invalid, Molière, was struck by a very real coughing fit. He collapsed. But then he continued with the performance. Backstage, Molière was again struck by a coughing fit. He was taken home, where he died.

By all accounts, Molière suffered from tuberculosis, for which treatment options in 1673 were limited. I think that Molière’s death was heroic: suffered while acting in a play he wrote, with the irony that the imaginary invalid actually was deathly ill.

One of the legacies of Molière is the Comédie Française, started a few years after Molière’s death, in 1680.

Censorship is alive and well and living in Paris.

The Ecole nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris, together with the Royal College of Arts in London and the LASALLE College of the Arts in Singapore, put together an exhibition of student work. Entitled Seven Day Week End / Week End de Sept Jours, the show questions Utopian perspectives of art and a society dedicated to the unhindered pursuit of pleasure. It is open to the public in the afternoon through 21 February, free of charge.

One of the works, by Ko Siu Lan, gently satirized a slogan that Nicolas Sarkozy used in his 2007 presidential campaign: travailler plus pour gagner plus (work more to earn more). The artist prepared two banners, each with one word printed on each side, and had the banners displayed at the school’s entry. Depending on the direction a passerby approaches the school, he will read: “gagner plus” (earn more, visible when looking westward) or “travailler moins” (work less, visible when looking eastward).

The art school promptly removed the display. School officials provided the media with many explanations for this action:

• the school administration had not been notified;
• the school administration permitted only an indoors display of the work;
• the work did not display the artist’s name or the title of the work;
• by “spectacularly using a State building dedicated to education to mediate her message”, the artist could “jeopardize the neutrality of public services”.

Exhibit curator Clare Carolin, a senior tutor at the Royal College of Arts, saw this move for what it was and declared: “This is unambiguous censorship.”

By Saturday, the silliness of the official response led French culture minister Frédéric Mitterrand to ask that the work be reinstalled at its outdoor display point. I assume it will remain there through 21 February. As the photos above show, a public works project apparently had to be carried out immediately in front of the school and the artwork, during the exhibition.

Ko Siu Lan will present a solo show at Galerie Paris-Beijing on June 10.

Official alarms have sounded: the café is in danger. Their number is in decline, and many operators are having trouble making a living from their enterprise.

I can point to four trends that would pressure cafés:

1. Desertification. This is the word used to describe the emptying of rural France. It’s the same thing as urbanization, viewed from the countryside. This trend has been ongoing since 1945. Thinly populated towns cannot support businesses. This seems to be official policy, because authorities have also closed post offices and other public services in rural areas.
2. Decoration. French life today centers on the home more than it used to. In the space of a generation, giant do-it-yourself, gardening, and home-improvement stores have grown and thrived in France. Many French households attach great importance to having and enjoying a comfortable home.
3. Demographics. In the collective memory, French cafés appeal to youth culture, with pinball machines and baby-foot games. The culture has changed. Cafés know this, because the pinball machines and baby-foot games have disappeared (although they do fetch steep prices to decorate homes). Nothing has taken their place. In particular, café operators seem not to have given thought to adult customers, particularly those over 60 who make up a growing share of the population, and hence of the potential café market.
4. Disinvestment. Too many cafés milked cash cows –especially mediocre coffee– for too long, without investing in furnishings or décor.

The four points all are quantifiable, and I imagine their impact on the café could be studied.

Alarmist reports cast blame. Principal targets are legislation to reduce smoking and drinking. This can’t be a winning strategy to argue: the economic health of cafés is jeopardized by improvements in public health. The argument isn’t just silly; it’s wrong:

• When France banned smoking in public places –including restaurants, bars, and cafés– a new market opened: the smoking terrace. Although smoking is strictly forbidden indoors, it is tolerated outdoors. Cafés in Paris, where I live, put chairs and awnings in any outdoor space available to them. They also installed outdoor heaters, either electric or gas-fired.
• A café in my neighborhood is so popular that people wait to get in. It’s indoor-only, so it’s completely non-smoking. And it mostly serves tea; no alcohol is on sale. As best I can figure, it owes its success to quality products, comfy chairs, and repeat business.

Café-tobacconist with outdoor heaters

Café with gas-powered outdoor heaters