Category: Uncategorized

Vivre avec le parkinson

                            

La maladie s’est manifestée il y a 3 ans. Au début on pensait qu’elle était due aux médicaments et que ça passerait si j’arrêtais d’en prendre. Malgré l’arrêt des médicaments, la rigidité de la jambe droite a gagné la jambe gauche aussi et plus tard les genoux. Après un choc émotionnel en 2017, ma mobilité s’est restreinte plus et avec l’arrivée de l’hiver la situation a empiré. Je quittais rarement mon fauteuil, mes jambes étaient enflées, mes pieds rongés par la saleté et le manque d’activité et mes bras faibles. Après un court séjour à l’hôpital, j’ai retrouvé un peu plus de mobilité et peu à peu j’ai retrouvé mes forces pour faire le ménage, la cuisine, du tricot et de la marche à pied. Mon corps est devenu plus souple et l’œdème et la déformation au niveau des jambes ont régressé. Ce qui est intriguant dans ce genre de pathologie cependant est que le cerveau semble subir le même sort que les jambes et les pieds. La pensée serait liée au mouvement!

De mon côté, je me force à maintenir une activité physique, mais aussi intellectuelle, satisfaisantes pour ralentir la progression de la maladie qui ne fait que se compliquer avec des tremblements, des pertes d’équilibre, des pertes urinaires, des troubles visuels mais aussi des problèmes d’élocution, intellectuels, et évidemment le chagrin et la difficulté de vivre à l’écart de la société à cause de mon handicap physique, intellectuel et mental.

Passer de l’état de personne valide et normale à l’état de personne invalide et anormale n’est facile pour personne, certes. Le sort et l’hérédité choisissent le premier et la société, la famille, ou les docteurs le second, pour, des fois malheureusement, nous condamner. Le Parkinson touche 1,5% de la population mondiale et se manifeste d’habitude après l’âge de 50 ans. Les traitements médicamenteux sont efficaces, mais pas jusque au bout de la vie du patient, et l’activité physique, intellectuelle et sociale sont primordiales pour maintenir une qualité de vie satisfaisante.

French Right’s primary elections

Vive le conservatisme

By Vassiliki Leredde

For the first time in French history the French right and centre right held the first round of primary elections for choosing their candidate for next April’s presidential elections. Four million people from every political side went to the polls last Sunday, signed a declaration of faith to the right and payed 2 euros each for voting mainly for Francois Fillon, a former prime minister. The polls outcome was surprising. No one had predicted Mr Fillon’s victory by 43.3% of votes, instead it was that of Mr Juppé that everyone waited for. As for Mr Sarkozy, the former president who was one of the contenders got 23,7% of votes. Shortly after Mr Sarkozy, accused the journalists of have been unjust with him. Without Mr Sarkozy there was more place for the winner Mr Fillon and his main rival Mr Juppé, another former prime minister under Mr Chirac’s administration that got 26,2% of votes.

Mr Fillon’s program is very conservative suggesting  namely “the reinforcement of France’s catholic identity and the French state’s authority”, a close alliance with Mr Putin and Mr Bassar el Assad, but also the suppression of the 35 hours week, the layoff of 500.000 civil servants and the liberalization of the economy.

The French are not very enthusiastic about Mr Fillon’s program because they see it as not only very conservative but also too liberal, recalling that of Mr Sarkozy. But time goes on and after the Brexit and the Donald Trump votes, Mr Fillon’s candidacy will be either the extreme right’s rival or the reason why the extreme right will gain power.

 

 

The end results of the French right’s primaries  

By Vassiliki Leredde

 François Fillon won the French right’s primaries by an astonishing 66.5% over 33.5% for his rival Alain Juppé. The majority of Mr Fillon’s votes comes from the bourgeoisie and the catholic conservatives. Given that Mr Fillon plans to lay off 500.000 civil servants if elected president next April, strikes have already started. Mr Fillon has been accused over the past of embracing Mr Sarkozy’s ideas but this time his program is only a light reminder of Mr Sarkozy’s one, whom Mr Fillon served as prime minister from 2007 to 2012.The current exceptionality of Mr Fillon lies to the fact that he talks about religion and Frenchness but also about free market and free enterprise. He wants for France big reforms and tough measures in order to avoid state bankruptcy. Finally, the victory of the conservative candidate marks a big change in global trend. If Brexit and Donald Trump votes have been the popular votes, François Fillon vote is the elites’ vote.

 

 

Not everyone in Europe agrees on Donald Trump

A   very controversial new leader

By Vassiliki Leredde

Starting from France where being a politician is not a question of personal charisma but of education, the election of Mr. Trump is an unwanted event. For most of Europeans Mr. Trump is a risk prone and tough business man who has nothing to do with the so much needed stability and flexibility of political institutions. Officially, no one in the old continent could vote for him, except maybe from the desperate Greeks who would be very happy to see a new figure in their political scene. In Germany there are people happy to see him elected and others that are afraid of him, including Mrs. Merkel. The UK is more practical minded and sees in Mr.Trump a threat to old alliances and strategic positions. The Italians fed up with Mr. Renzi’s austerity politics would like to see someone as Mr. Trump in power in order to escape from the old establishment and have a more relaxed approach to political matters. For Eastern Europeans Mr. Trump is an exceptional political leader with a very sympathetic wife who loves very much her home country Slovenia. For Spaniards Mr. Trump is so unpredictable that he can’t be a good global figure while Portuguese prefer dealing with Mr. Obama. In Northern Europe, the Swedes are very much angry about the newly elected president because of a bad joke that Mr. Trump made during his campaign involving the shape of Sweden. At the opposite, the Norwegians are ready to work with him.

Would Europeans be ready to listen or not to Mr.Trump, no one could ever doubt of the new leader’s willingness to concentrate on American matters first.

 

 

A sad story

By Vassiliki Leredde

Greece has been the first European victim of the international financial crisis of 2007-2008 which came to be in Greece an immense government-debt crisis. When ex-prime minister Andreas Papandreou first declared in 2011 that the Greek debt wasn’t sustainable, he opened the doors to angry creditors who imposed the solution of extreme austerity measures in exchange for a bail out. Since then there have been bank closure, capital controls and 12 rounds of pension cuts, tax increases, layoffs and cuts in the health care and education systems. As a consequence of all this many Greeks lost their jobs or their revenue, great number of shops have been closed, and many people left abroad. The truth though is that not all of the new measures that the Greek authorities adopted under the pressure of the IMF, the European Central Bank and the European Union (the main creditors) have been bad. The Greek state has had the opportunity to modernize itself and to acquire the foundations of any other western country. Nonetheless the human cost of this is tremendous with many lives lost or thrown into poverty, firms that disappeared and young brains that fled abroad. If the tourist industry wasn’t so well developed and with great returns, the Greek state would had defaulted.  Mr. Tsipras, the anti-establishment candidate of the far left that became prime minister in in 2015 didn’t change much in the whole picture. Despite all his personal comments, while only candidate, on the cruelty of the austerity measures imposed by the creditors, he voted for all of them and used excessive police force against angry pensioners. Pensioners and working people have lost 40% of their income since the beginning of austerity measures while self-employed people like lawyers and doctors are the first to be squeezed by heavy taxation. There have been numerous reports that there is little heating in schools and no cotton or medicines in hospitals. The situation is really bad and the problem is that no one can be sure that it would be an end to it. Except maybe from Greek folk songs where a bad situation is always followed by good luck and happiness.

 

Words for mental illness

By Vassiliki Leredde

Mental illness is the result of one or many emotional shocks that come after that an overwhelming truth or reality strikes the individual and cuts him/her out of her usual perception of reality built by language, education, and society. In some cases though mental disease is induced by street drugs, deficiencies, maternal infections while in the womb, heart, blood sugar or blood problems, allergies, neurological issues or any other health problem that seriously stresses or deprives the body from nutrients.  The consequent state is what the French medicine calls ‘décompensation’, literally meaning broken compensation.

Looking into the Ancient Greek language we find that the word for “soul” is “ψυχη” ­(psychi) and that the word for “freezing” is “ψυχος” (psychos), something that might suggest that “soul” and “freezing” have the same verbal structure, something that probably means that for Ancient Greeks the soul was probably something in low temperature.

In modern Greek, there are expressions such as “παγωσε το αιμα μου”, literally “my blood has frozen”, used for describing what happens after an emotional shock. When this happens there is a freezing sensation throughout the blood circuit, given that the only emotion that give us a cold sensation is fear. So, when one is shocked by the view or the sound of something, the body produces fear and then a freezing sensation so that the body can cool down and not feel the pain that will usually follow the shock which, for the body, resembles a physical ‘punch’. In the meantime, while the whole process is going on and the blood flow slows down due to freezing, cells are starting to run out of glucose and oxygen and stress is produced.

Going back to the reaction of the body to the fact that it has suffered an emotional shock that will turn to be felt like a physical one, this will bring a sensation of tide node somewhere in the most tender part of the abdomen – the lower stomach or the belly, as well as at the bones. The process of breathing too will be hindered. The Greek language confirms the previous claims, stating that when something is not easy to accept what happens is that “δεν μπορω να το χωνεψω αυτο”, literally “my stomach can’t break down that” and “μου κοπηκε η ανασα”, literally “by breath has been cut off”. Moreover, in case of hard truth to deal with, one can say in Greek “δεν μπορει να το χωρεσει το μυαλο μου αυτο” literally “my brain hasn’t enough space for that”, or even “η αληθεια σπαει κοκκαλα”, literally “truth can smash one’s bones”. The last expressions suggest that there is a smashing effect on bones and indeed for the French language who tends to be more descriptive, when someone is having a hard time because of someone else, the consequence is that his/her feet, especially the bone structure of them, get “broken” in a sort. The right expression then in French is “tu me casses les pieds”, literally “you are breaking my feet”. The effect of the emotional shock on the bones seems to be known from ancient times as the ordinary word to talk about a mentally ill person is “ανισορροπος” in Greek, “unbalanced” in English and “déséquilibré” in French, knowing that the part of the body that mostly can or cannot be unbalanced is the skeleton.  

Looking on the other hand at what was thought to prevent or cure mental illness in ancient times, this was only time and rest. Nowadays, new advances in psychiatry and the use of holistic, orthomolecular and oriental therapies tend to improve the life of millions of sufferers but in all those methods the common tool that tends to be cultivated is the need for love and kindness of the sufferer. Indeed, what is important in the healing process is that the sufferer starts to care for himself/herself or for someone or something else and that he or she gives every proof to the Self that he/she cares for it, by doing physical exercise for instance, meeting friends, eating healthy foods, avoiding allergens, not having addictions and so on.  

Mental illness is an old problem that no civilization has ever solved. It may simply be patience, effort and love that could do it.

Not so loud s’il-vous-plaît

 

By V. Leredde

Love and hate between different communities of immigrants in France depend on money and personality characteristics.

Immigration in France in ten stats that matter

France is home to millions of immigrants, the Local France

 Every day after work Anna takes her dog and her friend Maria out for a walk. Anna is a young woman of Italian origin who lives in a small flat next to Maria, an old lady from Spain who looks after Anna’s dog when the latter is at work. Life is peaceful in their HLM neighborhood (meaning Low Rent Housing) at the heart of Gardanne, Southeastern France. When Salim gets a flat next to the two women things start to change. Salim likes to challenge others and to trigger anger because as he confesses he wants to punish people who dislike his religion and who make him feel unwelcome. He often listens to traditional Algerian music and religious chants loudly. Anna gets angry especially when she wants to rest after work. Maria shakes her head with sadness and asks Anna to ask calmly Salim to keep the music down. Salim turns down his music but starts to protest. Sylvia, a Polish neighbor, comes out and tries to make Salim agree that he has to respect his neighbors. Issa a young woman of Tunisian origin, tries to make everyone think how important is to not hate each other. Maria who is too old to have any disputes reminds her friends that Salim likes to challenge them and that the best thing to do is to let him do until he gets tired. Anna is desperate. She finally gets close to the local National Front committee and starts to listen carefully to their narrative.

Two years later and following the advice of a Portuguese friend, Anna moves into another suburb. Everything then goes back to normal and Anna stops to listen to the National Front’s speeches. In her new, peaceful neighborhood there is one family of Italian origin, two couples of French, a family of Syrian origin, a single Algerian mother of two and a Spanish couple. Anna gets closer to the couple of Italian origin and to one couple of French. She keeps visiting though her old friends and little by little she goes back to her old narrative about the need of tolerance and avoidance of conflicts. Anna gives English lessons during her spare time. She finds two students among her new neighbors, Samia an Algerian teenager and Miguel a Spanish man. In exchange Samia looks after Anna’s dog when she is at work while Miguel gives Anna Spanish lessons.

“Everyone lives in peace with others here” says Roger a French retiree married to an Italian woman, “everyone except those who want to impose on us their way of life”. Jean-Paul, a French factory manager, confirms that there are many other clichés and prejudices of the same kind and that those who are different or want to be different are not “welcome” by the majority of people. He insists though that this kind of attitude is not only a French issue even if, in his factory, it is mostly French workers that argue with their counterparts of Arab origin, as he confesses.

4 familles sur 10 à Paris vivraient dans un logement étriqué.

A poor HLM neighborhood

France is home to millions of Italians, Spaniards, Poles, Jews, Portuguese, Armenians, Algerians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Black Africans, Chinese, Vietnamese and their descendants. They all faced discrimination when they came, some more than others. Things have changed since for the luckiest of their descendants, especially the Europeans ones, who managed to get more educated and wealthier and to be part of the intellectual or economic elites. But the whole transformation of social condition brought change of habits and decrease in the degree of tolerance. The new elites got closer to the French ones and adopted the same attitudes.  According to the national newspaper Libération, those attitudes spread from person to person until racial, religious or social strata conflicts erupted. The Europeans against the Arabs, the Africans and the Asians, the Muslims against the Christians and the Jews, the rich against the poor.

Whoever are those who hate and discriminate, in all cases it is anger against the poor, folklore, or envied people, be it Muslims with their street prayers, Roma with their begging tradition, Jews who are heirs of a part of the middle-east troubled history and so on. Anger, fear, jealousy, fatigue and a bit of racism from all the conflicting sides led to an embarrassing situation that comes before us when there are cars that go on fire in poor banlieues or when one listens to the numerous clichés fueled by arrogance and misconception. But why?

The answer comes out when one considers every aspect of the French identity, namely a strong attachment to sophistication in being, speaking, eating, dressing and the refusal to show one’s beliefs which trigger anger and disapproval when at the other side there is simplicity, folklore or strong characters and vice versa says a local philosopher. According to him it would be wrong to suggest though that the French identity is about being opposed to everything that is authentic. The same kind of attitudes around Europe and within immigrants in France show that there are many other identities that clash with their opposites. He suggests then to consider the middle-class identity, the bourgeois identity, or simply the case of singular personalities.

Anna agrees that it is rather circumstances and special cases that trigger conflicts, that those that reject and those who are rejected are special kinds of personalities and that they shouldn’t be considered as the norm. “There are people who like to hate and people who don’t” she says with great relief as she managed to rid herself of the extreme right’s preaching. “I’m a daughter of immigrants myself and I don’t have the right to reject other immigrants” she says thoughtfully. But why in some cases and for some people it is conflict that comes out and not compromise?  “French identity is so much sophisticated” she says “but no one here rejects rich people”. No one nowhere seems to reject rich people. Money is a key factor.

The French society seems unable to absorb any more poor people in need of shelter and jobs as since the ‘80s the country suffers high unemployment and very strict urban planning rules that condemn all attempts to extend the cities further. There are currently in France 8 million poor people and 4 million people living in bad housing, in a total of 66 million inhabitants. Tackling poverty and building new housing are very popular themes for next April’s presidential elections.