Kissing and Cranes
Bad news has hit France. The bird flu that has reached our country could threaten the very fabric of French society, changing it forever.
The newspapers have suggested that, since the vaccine won’t be ready for several months, the best way to avoid catching bird flu if an epidemic starts, is to avoid all personal contact. Now in the UK, for example, this is not a big problem. You shake hands with someone the first time you meet them and then draw a line under the whole embarrasing matter. And as for kissing, well that is best kept behind closed doors.
As you will probably realise, France and southern Europe are different. Everyone kisses everyone, everyone shakes hands with everyone. School children all kiss each other in the morning, parents kiss each other in the school playground, if the postman arrives or a stranger asks for directions, you shake their hand.
It is difficult to adjust to when you first arrive in France, but once you have adjusted it seems completely unnatural to talk to someone without either kissing them or shaking hands first. The whole conversation is blighted by concerns about whether you have been rude.
So back to bird flu. The advice is that kissing will need to stop, shaking hands will ned to stop, and both will be replaced by either a friendly smile or, if you are brave enough, squeezing the person on the shoulder.
Since it is clear that neither of these measures will work – it’s a bit like announcing to someone that you think they are trying to deliberately infect you with a terrible malady – I am concerned that if and when the human-transmitted version of the virus does reach our shores it will cross the whole country in a matter of hours.
On a similar note I was watching the crane migration a few days ago. Thousands of these large birds make their way back to Scandinavia for the summer, in magnificent V formations. Usually people rush to admire the sight, but this year people stared with horror, locking themselves in their homes, in terrible fear that one of the passing birds might tire himself too early and stop off for a drink of water and a couple of grasshoppers en route, spreading disease all about.
Oh the terrible risks of living in the countryside.