Winter has arrived here in the Dordogne. Suddenly it happened.

While it looks pretty, like frosting on a cake, it is lethal with car accidents and even electricity power cuts.

It’s even worse I believe in Northern France. I keep telling them here we are used to it in Scotland! The start of a New Year brings its own challenges. From constant roadworks on my road outside to the local Marie gearing up to the Elections. Salignac is the head village called a Canton of smaller surrounding ones each with a Mayor but ours seems very unsettled. Discussions and heated arguments are the norm but it trickles down to local village life and gossip.

Then we have the problems in France with the Health Service and farmers’ strikes. In Paris recently there were blockades of tractors  around roundabouts at protests and even by historic monuments like the Eiffel tower. Major cities in France were also targeted as was the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

The Health Service is suffering and there is anger that patients might lose their right to choose their doctor. Sixty percent of French people now go privately because the clinics work hand in hand with the hospitals. However the local rural practices will suffer.  Already thereis a  a lack of doctors in the “desert medicale ” and this will have a greater impact on the whole system.

“Vlam,Splatch, Whiz and Chtuck ” (This song depicts a period of time when she was with Gainsbourg and it is humorous and fun.)

A wonderful title isn’t it ? A song by Serge Gainsbourg and sung by him and Brigitte Bardot.Called Comic Strip and was released in 1967. Brigitte Bardot died recently at the age of 91. She had a career that  spanned many years – firstly as a ballet dancer then continuing as an actress, singer and lastly a pioneer with her Fondation Bardot for protection of animals. Her love of animals replaced the life of a spell binding actress in films such as Et Dieu crea Femme. This was her early debut with her then husband / director Roger Vadim. She had appeared in a couple of films before that but this one shot her to stardom.

She had a son, Nicolas, to her second husband Jacques Charrier but she wasn’t very maternal and he grew up with his father living in Switzerland and then Norway.

She lived up until her death at her house La Madrague in St Tropez which she had had for 50 years; surrounded by her beloved animals.

The funeral took place in St Tropez on the 6th January.Quietly sitting in the front row of the church a man paid homage to his mother. Nicholas Charrier. Dignified, no speeches, just a huge bouquet of yellow mimosa with the words,  A Maman.

I wish you all a very happy New Year

Fifi’s stories from rural France

January 2026