Someone just told me France is on strike.

Is this so??

The WHOLE country????

the entire country? or the government? Countries don't go on strike, but strikes are called by particular unions or companies or societes or syndicats of workers. There is often a strike going on somewhere in France by some segment of workers, that is true. Today is a rather big strike day across the country (not just in one city) by many employees, especially in the public sector (eg, SNCF/RATP/Air France/ and schools, hospitals, post office, telecommunications) about retirement benefits. It is only scheduled for today.

Again?

For information on current and planned strikes you can always refer to www.lesgreves.com

Only France would have such a website.

The lesgreves site is only in French, unfortunately...the strike for today (May 13th) was as is stated by Christina above and rail?metro/RER traffic is expected to resume by tomorrow. Another post elsewhere on this board implies that the strikes may continue into next week but that is unsubstantiated.

The site is of course only in French - there would be no reason for it to be otherwise. Anyway, it's easy enough to get the gist of it - check for dates to begin with, along with things most people here looking for that kind of information would recognize such as SNCF, RATP, etc.

Just remember that whenever you take your trip to France someone will be on strike.

Of course, if you need to find a more literal meaning to the web site or any french text, simply paste the text or url into a translation machine on the net and voila! Use Babelfish, or Voila or Google's. Easy and the interpretations are not too far off. Of course they can be in part laughable due to the programming which uses the first definition of a word, and makes for very hilarious reading sometimes. But the main body is very understandable in its translated form.

The pertinent fact is that the strike is OVER.

For an accurate update and if you read French, check Le Figaro's front page which says:
RATP et SNCF: Les perturbations continuent!

http://www.lefigaro.fr/france/20030514.FIG0210.html

Live from Paris - May 14th...
the transportation strike is not over!!!
Metro and buses lines are still heavily
"disturbed"...

Joelle (after a nice walk of an hour and half through Paris...)

Next target date is now listed as May 25th..soooooo sorry you had to walk off all those meals....

For very current information on Paris try the http://ratp.fr/ site. It's in French, but it's not too hard to see which Metro/RER lines are still "perturbed"

Cnn has an article stating the next date for disruptions is the 19th. I also heard this from my uncle who lives in France. It also disrupts flights. Yesterday Bristish Airways canceled 90% of their flights into France.

Where is the article on CNN..I cannot find it.

I'd be happy to have to walk after nice meals but when it means walking to the office, and then walking back home... All together 3 hours...

Yes, May 19th is the next date announced...

Yes, I found the article..talking about stoppages on both the 19th and 20th now...groan....

Strikes in France are pervasive.

For example, some years ago we went to visit the Roman ruins site at Glanum, near St. Remy. The French have been leisurely puttering away at this site since 1922. The gate entrance to the ruins was chained. A sign announced "Ferme-Le Greve". Not familiar with the term I assumed there had been a death in one of the worker's families. No, the sign announced that the closure was due to the ruins' workers "hitting the pavement".

"Someone" is always on strike in France. Inconvenient, but not insurmountable. The first time we went to France, the farmers were on strike and had blocked all the motorway access locations with trucks, tractors, wheelbarrows, etc. On the hood of a truck in the center of the accumulation, the farmers had a large map spread out and would show you how to get to your destination using back-roads. So, we got to see a little of rural Franche; we were on the way to Beaune from Lyon. As I recall, it took us about four hours for what is normally an hour and a half trip. But, it was interesting with some neat stops. The farmers couldn't have been more accomodating, under the circumstances.