Florida break

I am back after a great break in Tampa. I was visiting David and Cristina in their new installation. Great city, Tampa is located on the Gulf of Mexico in Florida. The city was founded as a resort for wealthy Northeasterners. A train, the Plant System, brought rich customers to a Victorian hotel from which they could dip their feet in the Gulf. I do not know how they survived without air-conditioning. Last week-end, with the approach of Hurricane Ernesto,the humidity was close to 100%.
I visited the "Bodies" exhibition which I warmly recommend : "opened" real human bodies in various poses....
I was lucky enough to be invited at Donatello's, a restaurant to die for.

Back to reality. Washington DC is slowly waking up from the dog days of August. Nicolas Sarkozy, French minister and candidate to the presidency, is coming to town. I will miss him because I will be on my way to Asia. Le Figaro says he was learning English while at the beach. Without me, he will need it!
It seems that France is sending a "robust" contingent of troops to UNIFIL in Lebanon. Earlier hesitations were due to assurances that the French brass requested before they committed their soldiers to that tragic land. They have not forgotten the "Drakkar" bombing where 58 French paratroopers were blown up by Hezbollah in 1983.
And, if France seems at times to pursue a pro-arab policy, because of its proximity to the region and the composition of its population, the military has a few accounts to settle.
Half the troops killed in UNPROFOR in Bosnia were French. French officers actually leaked intelligence to the Serbs and called the Bosnian moslems "Bosniouls", in reference to the racist French term for moslems: "bougnouls".
None of the brass has forgotten the bloody Algerian war. Chirac himself served in that war for two years as a captain.
David Galula's book on urban guerilla in Arab countries, and the classic film "The battle of Algiers" are now in the packs of all US officers in Iraq.
Armed with Leclerc tanks and surface to surface missiles, the 2,000 French troops in Lebanon might have to disarm Hezbollah.
France, which exercised a protectorate over Syria and Lebanon, also has accounts to settle with Damascus. President Hariri, killed on orders from Assad, was a personal friend of Chirac. The French president's rage led him to fight Syria at the UN, impose a humiliating retreat from Lebanon, and now, might position the French Foreign Legion on the approaches to Syria.
Lebanon, a French speaking country, still has descendants from French Crusaders. And Arab children learn at school that the said Crusaders, under Godefroi de Bouillon, in the early Middle Ages, used to eat moslem babies to the cry of "Deus le volt".
No wonder it took a while before deciding on the sending of troops.
Besides, France already has troops in Kossovo, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Congo, Ivory Coast, Central African Republic, Chad, as well as in a dozen other less warring regions.