French Windows

Did you know that you can visit the Bank Of England for free? Did you know you can try to lift a real gold ingot?

That’s what we did as the Bank has a museum just behind it.

Two factors had led to the successful establishment of a national bank, firstly the stability of having William and Mary come to the throne in 1688 and money being  spent on a war with France that started in the same year. Louis XIV had kept trying to expand his territories eastward but was blocked by the united provinces of the Netherlands and the Austrians.  King William’s annual expenditure totalled £2 million, but he was needing to spend £2 and a half million each year on the army alone.The war lasted 9 years. To finance the war the bank ran a lottery with prizes.

During the 18th century the bank became a bank for the government to manage the national debt. Again money was needed for wars when Louis XIV proclaimed his grandson as King of Spain and invaded the Spanish Netherlands. The Duke of Marlborough (John Churchill) won the Battle of Blenheim (among others) and Queen Anne awarded him a palace.

The bank also managed the £850 million necessary to defeat Napoleon.  Leading up to the battle of Waterloo in 1815. No wonder there is a statue to the Duke of Wellington outside the bank.

Up until then paper money could be exchanged for its equivalent in gold coins. I didn’t know that revolutionary France had declared war on Britain in 1797. A small force landed at Fishguard. A panic ensued and everyone wanted their gold. The bank’s gold reserves diminished from £16 million to £2 million. Prime Minister William Pitt ordered a temporary stop on cash payments that actually lasted for 24 years.

The First World war increased the national debt to £7 billion and we were spending £5 million pounds a day. The bank launched a 5% war loan and £2 billion was raised in just one month in January 1917.

How prosperous our countries might have been if it had not been for all these wars?

I was able to lift a gold bar (firmly enclosed in casing) and won a pen by being able to crack a safe – with Graham’s help!

A while back I got in contact with a guy called Mark Hendley who does tours of the British Museum called ‘The Stones Cry Out…’ showing that the Bible is backed by archeology. We booked a tour that started at 11am and finished at 4pm. Starting with the Sumerian civilisation  of Abraham, Sarah and Lot then the Egypt of Joseph and the Hebrew slaves, Babylonian gates of bronze, Assyrian artefacts, Jericho and its fall,  Persia and the drinking dishes used by the king in the time of Daniel and Nehemiah, through to the Persians and Greeks. The highlight for Graham was the many well preserved clay tablets with tiny, neat  cuniform writing. The library of a Babylonian king was destroyed by a fire so intense that these were all baked solid and have survived the centuries. I wanted to know about Canaanite pagan gods and  how they were worshipped. When large clay pots are found that contain the burnt bones of many small children and babies, we can understand that these people made their children ‘pass thorough fire’ as sacrifices.

Have you ever seen ‘The Longest Day’ about the Normandy landings in June 1944. One of the characters was the meteorologist James Stagg. He had to hold firm and defy the Americans whose meteorologist said that the weather would be good on the Monday. Stagg predicted storms and poor visibility. There is now a West End play called ‘Pressure’ that tells the story. Apparently, Stagg’s wife was expecting their second child and had had serious complications with the first delivery due to high blood pressure. The two themes were intertwined. There were humorous moments too and it is well worth seeing.

Next door is the Saint Martin’s Theatre showing the longest running piece of theatre ever – Agatha Christie’s ‘The Mousetrap’ which has been playing for  65 years since 1952. We saw it 30 years ago and it shows no sign of coming to and end.

We are in London for a while playing at being tourists. Our students often ask what they can do and see in London. We are on a fact-finding mission.  Read more

I am constantly amazed at the lack of colour and the predominance of black in France. There is no school uniform. Nevertheless, outside any upper school, nearly every student is dressed in black. A brochure came through our door from a clothes shop. ‘K…. puts colour into your life’ it proclaimed. Opening it, I could see nothing but black clothes! When we went to buy a car we chose the only red one in the compound. It was an inspired choice. Not only has it served us faithfully for 12 years, but it can be spotted immediately in any car park, as it stands out amongst the sea of grey and black vehicles. When we went to a car show room to buy a newer model there were only grey and black models available. We waited a month and found we had the choice between a deep, dull cinnamon red and a bright shiny blue one. I think you can guess which one we bought!

Before our son’s marriage I searched every shop in the town for an outfit. In one shop, I was offered a black dress. ‘Le noir, c’est très tendance cette année’, said the assistant. ‘Black is very fashionable this year’ was the message. I explained that I was certainly not going to be wearing black for my son’s wedding! Mind you, one Autumn in the UK, I was looking for new clothes and it seemed that ‘dull’ was that year’s colour scheme.

BEEF. It might be a matter of personal opinion that British beef is best, however when a famous French chef and restaurant owner, who specializes in selling top quality beef says it, you have to sit up and take notice. This man won the Best Hamburger prize awarded by the New York Times. Yves-Marie le Bourdonnec makes some good points. He says that traditional French races like Limousins and Charolaises have been breed for working and milk production but not for meat. They are tough animals. On the other hand, the inhabitants of Loughborough should be proud of Robert Bakewell, who was born in 1725. He travelled widely, studying farming methods helping to found the 17^thcentury agricultural revolution. Part of his work was breeding cattle for particular purposes. Thomas Coke, 1^stEarl of Leicester, followed Bakewell’s example. His is a name I remember from school history lessons as a pioneer in agricultural progress. As a result, in Britain we have breeds especially for meat production. Our Aberdeen Angus, Galloway, Hereford and Longhorn, when grass-fed, make perfect steaks due to the fat marbling which produces tender and flavoursome beef. Yves-Marie points out that grilling and boiling require different types of meat. French meat is fine for boiling as it has plenty of collagen. Historically in France meat has been boiled in Bourguignons and ‘pots au feu’ (pots on the fire). In the UK we have been grilling and roasting meat for much longer than in France hence our nickname ‘les rosbifs’. He provoked anger when his book on beef was published, revealing that half of French beef is really old cow at the end of her life in the dairy industry. It’s true that traditionally in France the male calves go to veal production rather than being raised for beef. I loved this quote about him from a famous food critic. ‘A Frenchman against the French in the name of meat? That’s like Asterix against the Gauls. In France we say you should be brave, but not foolhardy!’

An artist friend says she loves the bay windows on British houses, that you just don’t see in France. Isn’t it interesting what people notice!

Bank accounts are not free. An account costs about 120€ a year. If you want to change currency, the service is independent and not found in your local branch.

When our daughter decided to study in the UK, she needed to close her French bank account.

She walked the 500 metres to the branch where our accounts are held and told them what she wanted to do. ’Pas de problème Mademoiselle”.

The next month a ‘relevé de compte’ arrived in the post for her because there were quelques centimes in her account from the interest on a savings account. I walked down the road and asked if the few cents could be transferred to our account. ‘No, that is not possible without a letter from your daughter to authorise the transaction.’

Said daughter wrote an email giving her consent for her parents to benefit from the small gift. I returned to the bank with a copy of the mail. “Pas de problème, Madame”.

However, to our surprise, another statement came in the post the following month.

This time, a little irritated, we descended again to ask why the money had not been transferred. The woman behind the computer was always the same one. ‘I will need a RIB’ was her response this time. A RIB is a Relevé d’identité Bancaire.  These little slips of paper are generously provided at the back of a cheque book so that anyone who needs your bank details has all the information they need. ‘Why do you need one?’ I asked. ‘So that I know which bank account to send the money to’, she replied.

‘But we are with your bank, our accounts are here, can’t you look on your computer for the information?’ I was getting even more annoyed. ‘Oh, if your account is here, there is no problem’.

Next month another relevé de compte’came in the post. This time I was not so patient.

‘Excusé moi, madame, pourquoi vous ne pouvez pas, transférer les centimes d’un compte à l’autre ? C’est n’est pas difficile !’ ‘

‘I can’t. You need to make an appointment with the manager’.

‘You only have to click on a few buttons and this could be done!!’

‘Non, je ne peux pas, vous devrez avoir un rendez-vous avec mon responsable.’

And she gave me a telephone number to ring to make an appointment. I was fuming. As I left the building I expressed my exasperation like a small child would do, stamping my feet and waving my hands dramatically in the air, much to the bewilderment of a client arriving at the door.

That afternoon, I picked up the phone to make the necessary appointment. The manager answered. ‘There is no need to make an appointment, Madame Brodier, I have your dossier open in front of me, and I am transferring the money as we speak. ‘Merci, madame. Merci, madame.  Merci, Madame.’ I think that if she had been in front of me, I would have kissed her.

This is the service you tend to get in a bank, even if banking is not free and they charge you 9.50€ a month for being unhelpful, slow, and extremely inefficient.

I have used this example during lessons with business students. I make it into a role play. One student is trying to close their bank account and another student plays the role of the unhelpful employee. It is usually very funny, as the excuses the ‘unhelpful’ person invents become more and more preposterous. I ask if they have experienced service like it and they nearly always say, yes. When I ask, ‘But, why?’ They reply that banks don’t like to lose customers and so they make it as difficult as possible for the customer to close their account. Also, the employment laws make it very difficult to sack anyone, so even if the employee is next to useless, she knows that she is safe in her job.

I was telling this story to a friend quite recently. He had recently sold a piece of land, but when he checked his account, the sum in the bank was less than it should have been. When he enquired about it, he was told that the bank had taken part of it for their fees! He was not at all happy and was ready to make a fuss. The clerk, relented by saying that as he was a good customer they would give him a goodwill gesture and gave him his own money back!

Moral of the story. Persevere. It’s not your French, nor your level of understanding that is the problem.

The aristocrats of France used to make up only 1% of the population, but owned 1/5^thof the land. They paid no taxes, but taxed the peasants around them for using salt, using the Lord’s ovens to bake their bread, and his mill for grinding corn. During the revolution many of the privileged were brutally killed. So, does France have many aristocrats today? The surprising answer is ‘yes’, because more were created after the revolution by the Pope, Napoleon and the the kings that followed him. It is estimated that there are 50-100,000 nobles today in France almost the same number as before ‘les miserables’ took back control. The UK has 1,200 aristocrats with 36,000 family members. But ours have always been kind and benevolent – I’ve just finished watching Downton Abbey!