Safety Last

Joe is standing in front of a knee-high wooden barricade that runs the length of the bluffs at Gold Beach in Normandy. Beyond the narrow patch of grass there is a very steep 400 foot drop to the ocean. The family beside Joe are returning from standing at the edge of the grass and were even leaning over to see how far down the sand was. Safety last!


In Canada, we are extremely safety conscious. We have tall barricades, and helmet laws, and signage, and caged overpass walkways, and battery-operated flameless candles. Compared to North American standards, France is one big accident waiting to happen.

Our family jokes that one of France's mottos should be "Safety Last"!

Here are a few 'safety last' things I've seen lately....

• The long, ground floor corridor between our apartment building and the carriage doors to the street is quite dark. Even in the daytime. There are a couple of light switches that turn on some dim lights, but they are in very inconvenient places. Hence my groping of the walls to feel my way along so that I don't trip. Again.
  

• No one wears a helmet while riding their bikes. The other day I saw a father (no helmet) riding a bike with his baby (no helmet) in a seat on the back. AND THE DAD RAN A RED LIGHT IN BUSY TRAFFIC! That one took my breath away.
  

• Cars do stop when the crossing light turns green for pedestrians. But please pay attention. The drivers will take advantage of your inattentiveness and drive through the cross-walk if you are looking the other way.

• I swear the hot water in this apartment is only 1 or 2 degrees below the boiling point. You only have to turn the tap to the cold setting to get really hot water.

• The sink tap in the bathroom is plumbed backwards. (Hot is cold; and vice versa.) I keep forgetting this fact and have almost scalded my tongue a few times while brushing my teeth!