A national strike has been called for this Thursday, January 29. Organizers are hoping it will be even more successful than the strike in 1995. This strike even has its own website: 29janvier2009.fr
Most public transportation as well as educational institutions will be on strike, so many assistants will probably be able to stay home and enjoy a day off.
By now you've probably heard about the severe windstorm in southwestern France and northern Spain. Early Saturday morning, January 24, winds reached speeds up to 184 km/h (114 mph) which cut electricity to over a million homes and closed airports, railways and highways. The death toll reached 15 people. This was the worst storm France has seen in 10 years, since the December 26 windstorm of 1999, which killed 88 people and caused destruction across large parts of France, as well as Switzerland and Germany.
The power grids are still being repaired, but the wind and rain have stopped and the clean up has begun. Our thoughts go out to the assistants and everyone else affected by this storm.
I have been working to upgrade the Assistants in France website gradually over time. With relatively little downtime (there was a three-day span where the home page wasn't available), all of the applications that run this site are now in their current and upgraded versions, without any losses to the database. So - yay!
Meanwhile, I reverted to default skins because I hadn't upgraded in awhile, and I thought it would be a good time to start everything with a clean slate. So I realize things are a little drab around here for the moment, but that will change - and the basic blue look of both this page and the forum pages doesn't affect the overall content. So keep on chatting in the forums and don't mind the occasional font change, missing header, whatever... there may be some turbulence in the coming weeks but our engines are still in tact.
Thanks in advance for your patience.
Many assistants feel a little down and depressed in January, thanks to winter and the holidays having gone by so quickly. But winter break is coming (in as early as 3 weeks for a lot of assistants!), so take advantage of your paid vacation and the low-cost airlines to go somewhere warm and sunny. Malta? Tunisia? Morocco? Egypt? Or if you do like the cold, why not try skiing in the Alps?
Winter depression is normal, especially for those who are not used to the cold and lack of sun - and even for those of us who are, so don't let it get you down. There are only two months left of "official" winter! You will be surprised at how quickly it is over.
P.S. Some nationalities are no longer accepting applications for the 2009-10 year, but if you are Canadian, Irish, Northern Irish, Scottish, or a New Zealander, you are in luck!
