Festive demonstrating

Parisian demonstrations are often exuberant events. 

Should you come upon one, follow it!

As I did here. 

Police cars reveal a demonstration.

Some visitors are afraid of Parisian demonstrations.

They shouldn't be!

 The green trucks are from City Hall, for cleaning up.

Everyone knows how to behave and what to expect. No one gets arrested. The organization is excellent. 

I followed the men with the flag.

This demonstration accompanied a teachers' strike...

to protest cuts in teaching jobs. Teachers say the class sizes that result from such cuts make their work impossible. They also feel that the government neither consults nor respects them.

Traditional epicenter of protest,

the Latin Quarter's Boulevard Saint-Michel

Getting started. 

A teachers' union

 Sunshine, color and music... 

Another union

More.

 This boy turned his banner around so it would show up on the photo.

High-school students and parents with children joined in.

"Sarko's bac" (President Sarkozy's high-school exam)

"La honte!" ("Shame!)

Context --

 presidential elections will take place in May

"Sarko" (Nicolas Sarkozy, the right-of-center President), is unpopular. Students and teachers have disliked him from the start, partly because he is perceived as contemptuous of culture.

"Saint Francis of Assisi"is written on the green shirts.

"CGT" (in the background): the Communist-leaning union.

Opposition between private (usually Catholic) and public schools dates back to 1905, when Church and State were separated. By and large, teacher at the  private schools are right-leaning, at public schools, left-leaning.

For private-school teachers to march with those from public schools, particularly against policies of a right-wing government, is unprecedented.

Recent opposition to Sarkozy has come from other normally conservative groups, including magistrates, former diplomats and even police. Plus, the day before the demonstration, the Right lost control of the Senate -- for the first time in 50 years.

Chileans

Demonstrators from elsewhere

Paris has been a center for non-French protests since the 1830's, when it welcomed such Polish patriots as Chopin.

"We are all Greeks!"

This sign indicates French sympathy for Greek opponents of the bank-imposed austerity measures there.

I counted six Blacks and no North Africans or Asians.

Absent --

French people from elsewhere

 

Almost no representatives of the new populations took part in the demonstration, though many live in low-income neighborhoods where the consequences of cuts in teaching positions are particularly serious.

I asked a teacher about this absence. She said that it was mainly a teachers' demonstration and that the new minorities usually don't enter that field (why not?) She didn't explain why there were no parents or students.

I did not see this absence mentioned in the media.

End of the event

Should you come to Paris when a demonstration takes place, enjoy it.

Whether or not you understand what it's about, you will be experiencing a  spirited reality -- in a way that conventional tourism can never offer.