Saturday, August 24, 2013

No vacation for bread!


Congés annuels means "Annual leave" in French and as you can guess I took this photo in front of a store - a boulangerie, more precisely. Nothing extraordinary as most shopkeepers close in August except that this one mentions the Paris Prefecture de Police (Paris Police Department), which is quite unusual. I investigated... and found out that in Paris, boulangers (bakers) cannot choose freely when and how long they can close! Why? For a historical reason... Before, bread used to be the main type of food that people could afford. On October 21, 1789, a Paris quarter became short of bread and the only open baker did not have enough bread to feed everyone. He ended up... hanged but the angry - and hungry! - Parisians. Since then the organisation of bread supply (including annual leaves) is ruled by the Paris police department.   

8 comments:

  1. Love your title because it is a bit the opposite of what you wrote in the caption but I'm happy you posted like that...! Pas de vacances pour le pain. I kinda wish it like that... selfishly...

    ReplyDelete
  2. I told my husband this and he said, "Bakers can't be choosers."

    ReplyDelete
  3. I think most Americans could never fathom the idea of the government telling when you can go on holiday, and for how long! But I can see why this came about in France, way back when. I always love your little history lessons, Eric.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Petrea- your husband wins the Internet! Tamera- I can think of one very large profession in America who is very used to the idea of the government [the local government, in our case, unlike, in la Belle France, the national one] telling us when we can take vacation and for how long: teachers and school staff! Also, Americans are certainly used to being told HOW LONG their vacations can be, but they are told by their employers! Even employees who are lucky enough to have accumulated 3 or 4 weeks [about the maximum possible, and only in a few occupations] of vacation, the employer can limit when it is taken and for how long at at a time. Le sigh.

    ReplyDelete
  5. My first thought: Why would they hang the baker? That would equal no more bread! I love the choice of when I can go on vacation, that freedom is a nice thing. I just know there are so many who don't have the ability to take a vacation because then they won't have any money coming in.

    ReplyDelete
  6. For once I knew something you didn't - which is really funny because I'm sure I read about this the first time on an American's blog.... :)

    @Petrea's hubby :))))))))

    I'm so fond of your little daily stories and just wd like to take this opportunity to THANK YOU - merci beaucoup cher Eric - for the daily bread you share with us!

    bisous, Kiki

    ReplyDelete