My kids’ school (Lycée français de Madrid) has notified us that a strike has been called by various unions for this Thursday and Friday (the first two days of school).

À  Mmes, MM. les Parents d'élèves du Lycée français de Madrid

Mesdames, Messieurs,

Un mouvement de grève des personnels est annoncé pour le jeudi 2
septembre et vendredi 3 septembre 2010  à l'appel de plusieurs
syndicats. Des perturbations sont à prévoir dans le déroulement de
ces journées.

Si vous souhaitez que votre enfant puisse quitter l'établissement en
cas d'absence de professeur, il devra être muni d'une autorisation
écrite signée par les responsables légaux, et déposée à la Vie
Scolaire. Aucune sortie ne pourra être autorisée sur simple appel
téléphonique.

A l'école primaire, un service minimum d'accueil sera assuré.

En vous remerciant de votre compréhension.
Avec mes meilleures salutations,

Pierre MONDOLONI
Proviseur

Not that this is anything new. Last year, it seemed there were two or three strikes every month.

It’s funny how one hears of the French regarding striking as a national past-time. It is sad when one realizes this is actually true.

Sofia’s brother (whose kids go to the Lycée in Peru), warned her that frequent strikes were called at the Lycée. From my understanding, the Lycée are French run and operated schools, consequently they maintain solidarity with the Fatherland (la patrie).

Last year, we didn’t notice any disturbance of the children’s studies, though a mother I spoke with (who had children in high school) complained that her kids had days when they had no teachers.

Lagos has a lot of tourists from the UK and Germany and a smattering of tourists from France and Spain. I was surprised to hear what I thought was Russian being spoken – quite a lot of it, actually. Sofia told me it was Portuguese. After listening quite carefully, she was right.

I am amazed at how much Portuguese “sounds” like Russian. See (or, rather, hear) for yourself:

Portuguese news clip

Russian news clip