Les Saints de Glace...

Et voilà... je suis à Paris!!!

And what a cold weather (quite rare this time around) was waiting for me in Europe: 6°C minimum - 11°C maximum... this in spite of being in the middle of Spring for the northern hemisphere!

Anyway, there's plenty of trees in blossom everywhere: lilacs, roses, jasmines, and lots of very green leaves in my beloved Parc Monceau... so weird to see this with grey skies and people dressed as if it was February!

In the south of France, near Marseille, today they had 40 cm of snow...

Does this mean that the end of the World, so many times described by authors as Corman McCarthy or Ray Bradbury, has finally caught up with us?

"Not at all!," an old aunt of mine told me when she visited me yesterday, "it's Les Saints de Glace..."

What does that mean?

Les Saints de Glace are an old French legend according to which, every year, in May, it is common to have cold weather till after the three days of the Saints: that is, after the 11, 12 and 13th, when we remember Saint Mamert, Saint Pancrace and Saint Servais. Since remote pagan eras, it is believed that around these three days an odd phenomenon takes place, replacing the heat of Spring and producing great damages in crops, plants and trees already with flowers and in bloom. Farm people pray to the three Saints for mercy and ask for milder colds...

In all the years I've been spending May in Paris, I do not remember a time when we have not suffered the cold of Les Saints de Glace...

Anyway, apart from the weather, people in Paris are busy discussing the new book by philosopher Michel Onfray, "Crépuscule d'une idole," where he analyses the worst aspects and facts of Sigmund Freud's life... quite a controversy has he caused!

They are also into the unorthodox conduct of many football players of France's National Team... many of who could be left out of the World Cup in punishment...

We'll see what happens quite soon...