YeinJee's Asian blog

Asian Culture, Lifestyle and Entertainment

French Republic

Cannes Film Festival 2009 winners

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Winners of the 62nd Cannes Film Festival. Not a bad outing for Asian films… Filipino director Brillante Mendoza won best director, Chinese director Lou Ye won best screenplay, while Korean director Park Chan-wook won a jury prize.

Feature films

Golden Palm – “The White Ribbon”, directed by Michael Haneke
Grand Prix – “A Prophet”, directed by Jacques Audiard
Best director – Brillante Mendoza, “Kinatay”
Best screenplay – Lou Ye, “Spring Fever”

Best actress – Charlotte Gainsbourg, “Antichrist”
Best actor – Christoph Waltz, “Inglorious Basterds”
Jury prize – “Fish Tank”, by Andrea Arnold / “Thirst”, by Park Chan-wook
Lifetime achievement award – “Wild Grass”, directed by Alain Resnais

Short films

Golden Palm – “Arena”, directed by João Salaviza
Special distinction – “The Six Dollar Fifty Man”, by Louis Sutherland, Mark Albiston

Panda parade in France

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WWF-France, in celebration of its 35th anniversary, is running a campaign to raise awareness for natural environment preservation by parading 1,600 paper made panda models across the country.

The parade started in July 2008 at Paris City Hall; followed by a few other locations across France; the most recent exhibition was at Paris’ Trocadero Esplanade on October 15… while the next stop would be at Grenoble on October 25.

The panda (giant panda to be precise) is the symbol of the World Wildlife Fund; it’s estimated that there’s 1,600 pandas in the wild according to a 2004 statistic.

Picture of panda models parade at Trocadero Esplanade in Paris, France
The panda parade at Paris’ Trocadero Esplanade (Image from WWF-France)

The Large Hadron Collider begins action

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The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest and highest-energy particle accelerator complex, has started its first test on September 10, 2008.

The LHC was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) and lies underneath the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, Switzerland. It is funded by and built in collaboration with more than 8000 physicists from over 85 countries as well as hundreds of universities and laboratories.

Picture of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) by European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)

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French Sports Minister wore pink Crocs to work

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French Health, Youth and Sports Minister Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin wore a pair of pink Crocs sandals to a cabinet meeting last week (Aug 27) after losing a bet to the French Olympic athletes.

Picture of French minister Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin wears pink croc sandals to cabinet meetingPicture of French minister Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin wears pink croc sandals to cabinet meeting
Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin in her pink croc sandals (Image via Xinhuanet)

Roselyne made a promise that she would wear the shoes if the French Olympic squad could bring home 40 medals from the Beijing Olympic Games as a way to boost their morale… and the French athletes did just enough (7G,16S,17B) to claim the wager.