|
|
|
|
FRANCE
- COMMUNICATIONS AND
THE MEDIA |
|
|
|
You should have no problem
keeping in contact with
people at home while you
are in France. The country
has an efficient postal
system and you can have
letters and packages sent
general delivery to any of
the official branches. The
Internet is widely
accessible, and is
gradually displacing the
now-primitive Minitel
telnet system which France
pioneered. Should you need
to use the phone, you can
use cheap pre-paid phone
cards or access
home-country operators via
free numbers.
French newspapers
(not to mention radio
and television )
will be of less interest
if you are not a reader
(or speaker) of French.
There are some local
English-language
magazines, but you will
probably find yourself
reaching for an
international edition of a
British or American
newspaper or an
international news
magazine to keep up on
current events. These are
available in major cities
and tourist centres,
though they can get to be
an expensive habit.
Mail
French post offices
( bureaux de poste
or PTT s) - look
for bright yellow La
Poste signs - are
generally open 9am to
7pm Monday to Friday,
and 9am to noon on
Saturday. However, don't
depend on these hours:
in smaller towns and
villages offices may
close earlier and for
lunch, while in Paris
the main post office is
open 24 hours.
You can receive mail
at the central post
offices of most towns.
It should be addressed
(preferably with the
surname first and in
capitals) " Poste
Restante , Poste
Centrale", followed
by the name of the town
and its postcode. To
collect your mail you
need a passport or other
convincing ID and there
may be a charge of
around a couple of
francs. You should ask
for all your names to be
checked, as filing
systems are not
brilliant.
For sending letters,
remember that you can
buy stamps ( timbres
) with less queuing from
tabacs . Standard
letters (20g or less)
and postcards within
France and to European
Union countries cost
3F/?0.46, to North
America 4.40F/?0.67 and
to Australia and New
Zealand 5.20F/?0.79.
Inside many post offices
you will find a row of
yellow-coloured guichet
automatiques -
automatic ticket
machines with
instructions available
in English with which
you can weigh packages
and buy the appropriate
stamps; sticky labels
and tape are also
dispensed. A machine can
change notes into
change, so there is no
need to queue for
counter service. If
you're sending parcels
abroad, you can try to
check prices on the guichet
if available or in
various leaflets
available: small post
offices don't often send
foreign mail and may
need reminding, for
example, of the
reductions for printed
papers and books.
You can also use
Minitel
at post offices, change
money, make photocopies,
send faxes and make
phone calls. To post
your letter on the
street, look for the
bright yellow postboxes
.
Phone, fax, and minitel
You can make domestic
and international phone
calls from any
telephone box ( cabine
) and can receive calls
where there's a blue
logo of a ringing bell.
A 50-unit (40.60F/?6.19)
and 120-unit
(97.50F/?14.87) phone
card (called a télécarte
) is essential, since
coin boxes are being
phased out. Phone
cards are available
from tabacs and
newsagents as well as
post offices, tourist
offices and some train
station ticket offices.
You can also use credit
cards in many call
boxes. Coin-only boxes
still exist in cafés,
bars, hotel foyers and
rural areas; they take
50 centimes, 1F, 5F or
10F pieces; put the
money in after lifting
up the receiver and
before dialling. You can
keep adding more coins
once you are connected.
Local calls are costed
in France at
0.813F/?0.123 for three
minutes (1F/?0.15
minimum); long-distance
calls within France cost
up to 2.44F/?0.37 for
three minutes depending
on the distance.
Off-peak charges apply
on weekdays between 7pm
and 8am and after noon
on Saturday until 8am
Monday.
For calls within
France - local or
long-distance - simply
dial all ten digits of
the number. Numbers
beginning with tel 08.00
are free numbers; those
beginning with tel 08.36
are premium-rate (from
2.23F/?0.34 per minute),
and those beginning with
06 are mobile and
therefore also expensive
to call. The major
international calling
codes are given in the
section, "Phone
numbers and dialing
codes"; remember to
omit the initial zero of
the local area code from
the subscriber's number.
Cheap rates
operate between 7pm and
8am Monday to Friday,
from midnight to 8am and
noon to midnight on
Saturday, and all day
Sunday. From a private
phone, a call to the UK
( Royaume-Uni )
will cost between
1.64F/?0.25 and
2.47F/?0.38 per minute,
from a public phone
2.17-2.57F/?0.33-0.39;
to Ireland
1.95-2.97F/?0.30-0.45
per minute or
2.85-3.52F/?0.45-0.54;
to the US ( États-Unis
) and Canada
1.95-2.97F/?0.30-0.45
per minute or
2.85-3.52F/?0.45-0.54;
to Australia and New
Zealand
4.31-6.55F/?0.66-1 per
minute or
7.99-10.16F/?1.23-1.55.
By far the most
convenient way of making
international calls is
to use a calling card
, opening an account
before you leave home;
calls will be billed
monthly to your credit
card, to your phone bill
if you are already a
customer or to your home
address. However, the
rates per minute of
these cards are many
times higher than the
cost of calling from a
public phone in France,
with flat rates only.
The best value is
offered by Interglobe (tel
020/7972 0800; 50p/min
to the UK), followed by
AT&T (tel
0500/626262; $US1.50/min
to the UK), then Cable
and Wireless Calling
Card (tel 0500/100505;
68p/min to the UK), and
Swiftcall Global Card (tel
0800/7691444; 70p/min to
the UK). British
Telecom's BT Charge Card
(tel 0800/345600 or
0800/345144) offers the
worst value with calls
from France to the UK
charged at 90p per
minute. But since all of
these cards are free to
obtain, it's certainly
worth getting one at
least for emergencies.
You dial a free number
(make sure you have with
you the relevant number
for France), your
account number and then
the number you wish to
call. The drawback is
that the free number is
often engaged and you
have to dial a great
many digits. If you need
to make many foreign
calls from France,
several companies offer
cheap-rated phone cards,
such as the
bargain-basement store
Tati who sell a
50F/?7.62 or 100F/?15.24
Intercall Carte Téléphone
(tel 08.00.51.79.43) for
calling overseas which
you can use in a public
or private telephone; a
50F/?7.62 card gives
you, for example, 15
minutes to Australia, 32
minutes to Canada or the
US and 49 minutes to the
UK. These rates work out
much cheaper than using
France Telecom from a
public phone.
To avoid payment
altogether, you can, of
course, make a reverse
charge or collect
call - known in
French as téléphoner
en PCV - by
contacting the
international operator
. You can also do this
through the operator in
the UK, by dialling the
Home Direct number tel
08.00.89.00.33; to get
an English-speaking
operator for North
America, dial 00.00.11.
Some British mobile
phones , as long as
they're digital, will
work in France. Getting
a mobile phone in France
is - in principle -
simply a matter of
visiting a phone
boutique (for instance,
a France Telecom store)
with identification,
proof of address and
proof of ability to pay.
This involves setting up
a French bank account,
which will entitle you
to the bona fide
certificate known as an
RIB ( Relève
d'Identité Bancaire
); to obtain this you
will need to provide a
copy of a utility bill
with your name on it,
not necessarily a
problem since banks are
prepared to accept
foreign utility bills.
Faxes can be
sent from all main post
offices and many
photocopy stores: the
official French word is télécopie
, but people use the
word fax. A typical rate
for sending a fax within
France is 25F/?3.81 for
the first and 6F/?0.92
for subsequent pages.
Many French phone
subscribers have Minitel
, a dinosaurial online
computer that's been
around since the early
1980s, which allows
access through the phone
lines to directories,
databases, chat lines,
etc. You will also find
it in post offices. Most
organizations, from
sports federations to
government institutions
to gay groups, have a
code consisting of
numbers and letters,
which you can call up
for information, to
leave messages, make
reservations, etc. You
dial the number on the
phone, wait for a
fax-type tone, then type
the letters on the
keyboard, and finally
press Connexion Fin
(the same key ends the
connection). If you're
at all computer-literate
and can understand basic
keyboard terms in French
( retour -
return, envoi -
enter, etc), you
shouldn't find them hard
to use. Be warned that
most services cost more
than phone rates.
Directory enquiries (tel
12) are free.
Email and the internet
Email is the
cheapest and most
hassle-free way of
staying in touch with
home while in France.
Practically every
reasonable-sized town
has a cyber café
or connection point of
some sort, and in less
populated areas, the
need is being filled by
post offices, many of
which now have rather
expensive public
Internet terminals,
which are operated with
a prepaid card
(50F/?7.63 for the first
hour). In addition
France Telecom has
street-side Internet
kiosks in major cities.
Prices range from
15F/?2.29 to 60F/?9.15
per hour, so it can be
worth shopping around.
It's easy to open a free
email account to use
while you're away with
Hotmail or Yahoo: head
for www.hotmail.com
or www.yahoo.com
to find out how.
The existence of
Minitel and the
relatively low level of
personal computer
ownership in France
contributed to the
rather slow adoption of
the Internet
here, but in recent
years the situation has
changed and France as a
nation has come fully
on-line. Information
about practically every
aspect of French culture
and travel can now be
picked up on the
Internet: government
agencies are now
on-line, including even
some of the smallest
local tourist offices;
in the cultural sphere
even the most obscure
and esoteric
associations have
discovered the
importance of getting
their message out over
the Web; and the hotel
and restaurant
businesses have come to
realize that the Net is
a key to foreign
markets. On the down
side, many or most of
these pages do not have English-language
versions, although they
are gradually coming to
be seen as indispensible
in all but the most
locally focused sites.
As anywhere on the Net,
persistent combing of
links pages and use of
search engines (among
the best are www.google.com
and www.dogpile.com
, and the French www.enfin.com
) will almost certainly
get you the information
you are looking for.
Newspapers and
magazines
English-language
newspapers , such as
the European ,
the Washington Post,
New York Times and
the International
Herald Tribune , are
on sale the same day in
Paris, and in most large
cities and resorts the
day after publication.
Of the French daily
papers , Le Monde
is the most
intellectual; it is
widely respected, but
somewhat austere, making
no concessions to such
frivolities as
photographs. Libération
, founded by Jean-Paul
Sartre in the 1960s, is
moderately left-wing,
independent and more
colloquial, with good,
if choosy, coverage,
while rigorous left-wing
criticism of the French
government comes from L'Humanité
, the Communist Party
paper. The other
nationals are all firmly
right-wing in their
politics: Le Figaro
is the most respected.
The top-selling national
is L'Équipe ,
which is dedicated to
sports coverage, while Paris-Turf
focuses on horse-racing.
The widest circulations
are enjoyed by the regional
dailies . The most
important of these is
the Rennes-based Ouest-France
- though for travellers,
this, like the rest of
the regionals, is mainly
of interest for its
listings.
Weeklies of
the Newsweek/Time
model include the
wide-ranging and
socialist-inclined Le
Nouvel Observateur ,
its right-wing
counterpoint L'Express
and the boringly
centrist L'Évenement
de Jeudi and the
newcomer with a bite, Marianne
. The best investigative
journalism is to be
found in the weekly
satirical paper Le
Canard Enchainé.
Charlie Hebdo is a
sort of Private Eye
or Spy Magazine
equivalent. There is
also Paris-Match
for gossip about stars
and the royal families. Monthlies
include the young and
trendy - and cheap - Nova
, which has excellent
listings of cultural
events, and Actue!
, which is good for
current events. There
are, of course, the
French versions of Vogue,
Elle (weekly) and Marie-Claire
, and the relentlessly
urban Biba , for
women's fashion and
lifestyle.
Moral censorship
of the press is rare. On
the newsstands you'll
find pornography of
every shade, as well as
covers featuring drugs,
sex, blasphemy and
bizarre forms of
grossness alongside
knitting patterns and
DIY. You'll also find
French comics ( bandes
dessinées ), which
often indulge such adult
interests: wildly and
wonderfully illustrated,
they are considered to
be quite an artform and
whole museums are
devoted to them.
Some of the huge
numbers of homeless
people in France ( les
sans-logement ) make
a bit of money by
selling magazines on the
streets which combine
culture, humour and
self-help with social
and political issues.
Costing 10F/?1.53, the
most well-known of these
is L'Itinérant .
TV and radio
French TV has six
channels: three public
(France 2, Arte/La
Cinquième and FR3); one
subscription (Canal Plus
- with some unencrypted
programmes); and two
commercial open
broadcasts (TF1 and M6).
In addition there are
the cable
networks, which include
France Infos, CNN, the
BBC World Service, BBC
Prime, MTV, Planète,
which specializes in
documentaries, Paris
Première (lots of
French-dubbed films),
and Canal Jimmy ( Friends
and the like in French).
There are two music
channels: the American
MTV and the French-run
MCM, where you can get a
real education on French
rap.
Arte/La Cinquième
is a joint Franco-German
cultural venture that
transmits simultaneously
in French and German:
offerings include
highbrow programmes,
daily documentaries, art
criticism, serious
French and German movies
and complete operas.
During the day
(6am-7pm), La Cinquième
uses the frequency to
broadcast educational
programmes. Canal
Plus is the main movie
channel (and funder
of the French film
industry), with repeats
of foreign films usually
shown at least once in
the original language. FR3
screens a fair selection
of serious movies, with
its Cinéma de Minuit
slot late on Sunday
nights good for foreign,
undubbed films. The main
French news
broadcasts are at
8.30pm on Arte and at
8pm on F2 and TF1.
If you've got a radio
, you can tune into
English-language news on
the BBC World Service on
648kHz AM or 198kHz long
wave from midnight to
5am (and Radio 4 during
the day). The Voice of
America transmits on
90.5, 98.8 and 102.4 FM.
If you're in the Paris
area, you can listen to
the news in English
on Radio France
International (RFI) for
an hour (3-4pm) on 738
kHz AM. For radio news
in French , there's
the state-run France
Inter (87.8 FM), Europe
1 (104.7 FM) or
round-the-clock news on
France Infos (105.5 FM).
|
