Usa
What They Want, What He Says
France's student protests now have two competing explanations: an education crisis, say the students and the French left; a warning about immigration and disorder, says Donald Trump and the right on both sides of the Atlantic.
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Service Included
In France the tip is already in the bill — by law. In America the tip is the wages. An expat on the strange relief of never doing math at the table, and the strange guilt of it.
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The Mène France Isn't In
The Pentagon's number two convened five NATO allies in Poland to talk about the alliance's future. France, Britain and the Baltic states weren't invited. Critics call it a toxic precedent; nobody on the outside has said a word.
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Club Night
Every Saturday, in towns all over France, the boulodrome fills up for the concours — the weekly club tournament that is half competition, half neighborhood reunion. In America, the equivalent ritual is the ladder night. Same hunger, different scoreboard.
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The Lunch Hour
In France, lunch is a sit-down meal with a beginning, a middle, and no apology; in America, it is fuel consumed between obligations. Both cultures eat at noon — they simply disagree about whether noon is a pause or a checkpoint.
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The Piggy Bank
France's Europe minister went on television and said the 4.6-billion-euro fine extracted from Google should count as a 'new revenue stream' for the EU budget. The White House called it extortion. The digital-services tax fight has entered a new round.
Read →Bon Appétit: The Two Words Americans Never Say
In France, everyone says it before eating. In America, nobody says anything. Dana investigates the quietest culture clash at the table.
Read →Two Speeches, One Podium: Macron and Trump's UN Split Screen
Hours apart at the UN, Trump claimed victory in Gaza and Macron called it a spectacle. Julien on what each man needed the week to mean.
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The American Paddle in the French Gym
Pickleball crossed the Atlantic in a tennis bag and landed in the French salle polyvalente: the French Tennis Federation took charge of the sport in January, licensees number in the thousands, and village tennis clubs from Châtillon to Aucamville are converting courts. France is learning the dink — reluctantly, then all at once.
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The Boulangerie and the Drive-Thru
In France, the morning bread run is a pilgrimage performed on foot, sometimes twice a day; in America, the morning food run happens at speed with the engine idling. Both are about the first meal of the day — they just disagree about whether it should require leaving the car.
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The Diesel Mène
Washington threatened to shut off diesel exports unless Europe opened its emergency reserves; on October 2, after a call with Trump and a G7 videoconference chaired by Macron, the allies agreed to release 100 million barrels. A mène played with fuel instead of boules — and the shooter holding the biggest threat.
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A Boycott in Orbit
Four American space companies pulled out of Emmanuel Macron's Paris space summit under pressure from Washington — and France answered by drawing its own circle in the sky.
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