SPARE TIME
Youth Centres - Léo Lagrange Clubs
- Local Cultural Centres
- Reading
- For Computer Fans
- Cinema and Films
- Sciences et technology
- Human Rights
- Greenpeace
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If you have come to France for a few months, it is certainly not to stay in your shell.
While you are in France, you will undoubtedly want to participate in some form of cultural
or sporting activity: an excellent way of meeting people and of making friends. There are
a whole host of social and cultural organisations. They are just waiting for you to come
along…
These Maisons des Jeunes et de la Culture (MJCs) are meeting and leisure centres which
are open to everyone. They offer cultural, artistic, sporting and practical activities.
There are 1,400 MJCs throughout the whole of France and, for example, they provide a
cinema club, a photographic club, computer club, amateur dramatics, chess, martial arts,
dance or yoga, and so you are sure to be able to do what you want! You will have to pay an
annual fee.
MJCs are managed by two federations:
15, rue la Condamine,
75017 Paris.
Tél : 01 44 69 82 25
Léo Lagrange Clubs
These centres broadly offer the same types of activity as MJCs, the only difference
being that they are run by the Léo Lagrange Federation named after a Socialist minister
at the time of the Front Populaire who instigated many reforms in education and sport for
all.
Whether they are called Maisons pour Tous or Maisons de Quartier belonging to some
particular district, Centres Culturels or Centres Socio-Culturels, these centres located
in different parts of cities are the focal point for associations of all kinds. These
“tribes” which bring people with common interests or activities together, do not
hesitate to go to their local centre which offers numerous facilities for the
“leisure consumer”. So don't hesitate either.
Contact your local town hall (mairie) or the recreational department (Service Culturel)
if there is one, for a complete list of these centres. This information is also available
through the Centres d'Information Jeunesse (CIJs) but the lists at your CIJ will give all
cultural, artistic, sporting, recreational and manual skills activities available, by
administrative area and region. To take part in the activity of your choice, you should
also remember that there are a considerable number of private classes, music
conservatoires and plastic arts studios available. Ask for details from the CIJ.
Reading
So, you are a bookworm and want to spend all your free time with your nose in a book
while you are in France. Get going then, because France is an absolute delight as far as
you are concerned. There are libraries in nearly every single place in the country, and
they lend out books free of charge after you have paid your annual subscription of just a
few Francs. Some works (the usual ones) are not allowed out on loan and have to be
consulted on the spot. In municipalities with fewer than 2,000 inhabitants the library is
a mobile one and takes the form of a Bibliobus. Books are lent out free.
In Paris and in most large cities, enormous reference libraries house incomparable
riches from the documentary point of view. Any lover of fine books should do the rounds of
the libraries while in Paris. This is the route to follow:
Bibliothèque Publique d'Information du Centre
Georges-Pompidou (Beaubourg).
Seating space for 1,300 bookworms, and 400,000 books on all subjects, as well as slides, video films, records and cassettes to look at or listen to while you are in the library. There are projection rooms and a language lab. All the daily newspapers and an unbelievable number of specialist journals and periodicals. Open to all free of charge.
Métro : Châtelet-Les-Halles.
Bibliothèque Nationale.
Almost all the newspapers printed since the reign of François I are housed here. There is a priceless collection of first editions, manuscripts and prints. The sound archives include all soundtracks. Unfortunately, access to this library is restricted to doctorate students.
SPECIALIST LIBRARIES
See as well :
For Computer Fans
Caxton has of course long since had his day and your idea of deprivation is to be away from your VDU - it's chips with everything as far as you are concerned! Well, there's a mouse waiting for all you cats at computer clubs just about everywhere. Which language do you dream in by the way?
Contact the CIJs for details.
There was once a young German who at the beginning of the 1970s used to spend all his afternoons in the Palais de Chaillot film club in Paris. He marvelled at the films of Ozu, Rocha, Fritz Lang and all the Italian directors.
This young man was Wim Wenders, who became one of the most brilliant film-makers of his
generation. “It was in that Chaillot film theatre I learned my job,” says
Wenders today.
If like Wim Wenders you too are haunted by the “seventh art”, take yourself
off to the Palais de Chaillot at the corner of Avenue Albert de Mun and Avenue du
Président Wilson Tél : 01 47 04 24 24
Three other film theatres have opened up since then, however, and screen great
masterpieces you will not want to miss. Films are shown every afternoon and the addresses
are as follows:
Propose des actualités anciennes et des films ayant tous en commun d'avoir un lieu de Paris pour décor.
Film fans outside Paris will have to comb through the programmes in the art cinemas or hunt out a local film club.
You can always get details from the following federation:
Science and Technology
Perhaps evenings out and discos aren't so much your scene (or only some of the time
anyway) and you feel you're more of a budding Einstein. If you're out to hunt down the
science and technology of tomorrow here are a few addresses that might help you in your
quest:
This Association offers financial and material assistance for experimental projects submitted by people from 10 to 20 years old. It organises training courses and study days in astronomy, energy, environmental studies, rocketry, geology, microcomputers and remote sensing matters.
is waiting for you if you want to build mini-rockets or get involved in probe balloons.
The Ligue Française de l'Enseignement et de l'Education Permanente (LFEEP) offers a host of activities from aviation, modelling, electronics and computers, aerial photography and astronomy to ecology. Addresses of the clubs run by the League can be obtained from the:
This science and technology museum provides experiments which are fun for budding scientists visiting Paris, and it's quite interesting to see the technology which has now become outdated as well.
Open from 10am to 6pm except on Mondays.
The Mecque des Sciences et Techniques at La Villette. Don't miss this whatever
you do: this museum really is a Mecca for science and technology. The metro station you
need is Porte de Pantin.
Human Rights
If during your stay in France you want to contact organisations fighting for human
rights or the development of the Third World, here are a few addresses that might interst
you:
Amnesty of course fights for decent treatment for and liberation of political prisoners the world over.
Human rights and citizens' rights league.
International league to fight racism and anti-semitism.
Movement against racism and for friendship between peoples.
Anti-racism movement.
This committee, just like Frères des Hommes, is active in development in Third World countries.
Greenpeace This organisation's ships sail the oceans wherever baby seals need rescuing or whales need protecting, and fights against dumping of industrial waste and nuclear testing. Its aim is to have bluer, freer and cleaner seas
 Design by : Marc ELOY - Em@ze
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 Last update : 01/12/96
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