French lifestyle

Recently I finished reading "A year in the Merde", which reveals some tricky and funny moments of the life in France. However, it's not really too much applicable to the Southern part of the country where I am recentrly dislocated. Maybe because of the tourists, but let's say that still 2/3 or 1/2 is true in any case. The coolest part was sarcastic style of the author :) After such inspiration the real interest to the history is wakening up. Strange enough, while living here you want to know more about the history of the country, Europe, it may explain some facts.

One more similar thing: as an author of another blog on topic of Southern France mentions the strange habit of sending a number of letters (not e-mails!) from most of the companies or instritutions you are dealing with - it's a waste of money - still for most of the new countries that joined EU is much more easier to build new and better infrastructure then for old ones to change their old and together change people. I believe this is a real advantage of young countries, however still having a good list of 'other side' :)