Going for the Gold!

A WOMAN IN THE WHITEHOUSE

Pray. It’s even likely to happen. I’ve seen a couple of different polls—one suggests Kamala Harris is ahead of Donald Trump by 2%, while others show she is behind by 3%.

This is all good news to me, as it shows she has a real chance to put him away, perhaps forever. Meanwhile, we’re all waiting with baited breath to hear who she’ll pick as a running mate as that might make a big difference to her success…which is also ours, as Americans!

While Donald Trump in the Whitehouse means more Americans moving the France making us busier than we already are, we do not vote with our pocketbooks, much like the Right who see money as their god. There are way more important things than money to having a high quality of life—money does not buy you everything, especially happiness! This is something we learned early on in France.

Would I welcome a woman in the Whitehouse? You bet your sweet patootie I will! She’s not only a woman, but a woman of color and ethnic origin. Women give life, not take it away. And that means a whole different point of view on life in the U.S. We need more women in government. We need more women to balance the power.

As a result of the political situation in the U.S., the fallout to other countries, and in particular to France, is huge—so huge that the New York Times is doing a survey of its readers:

“Are You Planning to Leave the U.S. if the Election Doesn’t Go Your Way? We’d Like to Hear From You. As the 2024 election season heats up, some Americans are considering leaving the country. We want to hear about their plans and perspective.”

Have fun and answer their survey.

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HOW TO PLAN YOUR SUCCESSION IN FRANCE

Our Notaire in Nice, Carole Vangioni, spoke at Après-Midi upstairs at Oscar last Thursday on the subject of inheritance: “How to Plan Your Succession in France.”

The key points:

• The importance as a foreigner of understanding legal processes to make informed decisions
• Estate planning in France should not be overlooked
• There is no one one-size-fits-all solution
• Each individual’s circumstances are unique
• Your estate plan must be tailored to meet your specific needs and goals
• Anticipating your succession means planning for the transfer of your assets to your heirs in a way that minimizes legal complications and taxes

Carole went through this very important information in great detail, with questions asked along the way. If you own property in France or live in France more than six months a year, I’d recommend taking the time to watch her presentation on our YouTube channel.

Maître Vangioni is the primary Notaire in Nice in which the Adrian Leeds Group puts its trust. She has extensive experience in handling real estate transactions, sales and purchases, is skilled in creating tailored succession plans to safeguard assets and ensure smooth wealth transfer to future generations. She also has expertise in drafting notarial acts, contracts, wills, and other legal documents. Fluent in both French and English enables her to have effective communication and documentation. She provides sound legal advice and guidance to our clients, ensuring compliance with relevant laws and regulations.

While we’ve worked with other Notaires in Nice, they couldn’t compete for more than one reason. But, the main advantage Carole has over the others, besides her sparkling personality, is her experience living 10 years in New York, where she became partly American herself. For our clients, this is key—not only her fluency in English, but more importantly, culturally understanding what the clients are experiencing as they go through this arduous process of making a purchase, or selling a property they own, is a huge benefit.

To see the entire presentation and the photos of attendees, see our report and/or visit our YouTube.

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GAGA OVER GAGA AND THE ENTIRE OPENING CEREMONY ON THE SEINE

I was not the only Parisian to leave Paris for the Olympics. When I was there last week, the city had already emptied out of Parisians, leaving room for the Olympic-goers, and rendering the local merchants, cafés and restaurants suffering for lack of business. It was sad to see Café Charlot with just one lunching patron—me! While it seems that a lot of money pours into the city as a result of the games, the money goes to a select few (hotels, etc.) and not to the city as a whole.

To view the Opening Ceremonies of the Olympics on the Seine, I hosted a watch party in Nice that coincided with a big birthday of a close friend, so we were able to celebrate both. I tuned into France 2 on the big TV, but I had also subscribed to Peacock in order to watch in on NBC and had that going on the computer. It was fascinating to watch the differences in the presentation and found the French version much more exciting and entertaining…and without commercials!

I suppose the whole world was as blown away by the four-hour extravaganza as much as we were. It was so “French!”: beautiful, inventive, intellectual, ambitious, historic, spectacular, audacious, chic, hyper-sexualized, corny…there aren’t enough words. And especially open-minded, fully including all genders, all races, all nationalities, all sexual affiliations, all everything…sparking outrage from the right! The backlash from foreign observers, and in particular American media, has us baffled. We’re sure the French didn’t see it as anything but fun, frivolous and “inclusive.” I can remember when Johnny Hallyday performed live at the Eiffel Tower in 2000 and had the topless dancers from the Crazy Horse Saloon perform first. No one thought anything of it, for kids and adults of all ages…but I was thinking at the time how that would never have gone over well in America!

The setting in Paris, on the Seine, at the Eiffel Tower and Trocadero, was breathtaking…even for me, a resident of the city for 30 years. I can remember the first time I saw the Tower and was awe-struck. While I’m a whole lot more jaded now, it still ranks at the top of my list of magnificent monuments and love that it makes the perfect letter A…the initial of my first name! What they can do to it and from it in lights and fireworks is astounding. And to think it almost got torn down!

I do hope that you had a chance to tune in to the entire broadcast, or you watch it again by clicking here (this requires a VPN set to France!).

ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS

I trained back to Paris Saturday in time to attend one event yesterday: the Artistic Gymnastics. It was the one event I’d go to the trouble of attending, and as luck had it, a friend with tickets invited me to join her. How could I say no?

The train arrived in Paris without a hitch, unlike what had taken place the day before when France’s high-speed rail network was hit by “malicious acts,” including arson attacks that disrupted the transport system just hours before the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics. As is the habit with the taxi and Uber drivers in Paris these days, my driver complained bitterly that he had waited two hours before my fare had come along, there was no business since Parisians had all gotten the hell out of Dodge, the usual onslaught of tourists weren’t around (they were all at the Olympics), plus the traffic patterns in the city were impossible to deal with. When he stopped at the corner to let me out, a car pulled over next to him to complain about him stopping, sending him into more of an overload. Either Parisians haven’t changed their angry attitude thanks to the Olympics, or they are exacerbated by them…tough to know the difference. People don’t behave this way in the sunny south…it’s more a Parisian thing to just be “angry” about whatever they want to be angry about.

We got to the stadium early enough to get something to eat before working our way to our seats along with the massive crowd. The stadium was set up like a four-ring circus with the four events taking place at one time. It was tough to watch them all at once!

The event we watched was Women’s Qualification – Vault, Uneven Bars, Balance Beam, and the Floor Exercise. The countries represented were Japan, New Zealand, Portugal, Philippines, Netherlands, Colombia, Korea, and Panama. Japan took the highest scores and won the unofficial prize for the tiniest and youngest athletes. I would love to have seen Simone Biles do her thing, but that was in the morning. It was reported that she “did not let an injury scare slow her down on her long-awaited return to Olympic competition, posting a superb all-around total of 59.566 during Paris 2024 qualifying on Sunday in front of a star-studded crowd at the Bercy Arena.” (nytimes.com) Sorry to have missed it…maybe next time!

To watch the events, in France you can watch them on Eurosport, App Max and France.tv. In the US, it’s on NBC/Peacock.

Enjoy!

A la prochaine…