A 47-year-old woman from Western France has been speaking with a distinctively English accent ever since she had her tonsils removed 14 years ago. Laetitia, a cashier from Montval-sur-Loir, in France’s Sarthe Department, doesn’t speak English. She only knows some basic words that she learned in school decades ago, but hearing her speak in her native tongue would have you believe she was born in England. For 14 years, Laetitia has been speaking with an English accent that makes most people think she is Anglo-Saxon. But the truth is much stranger – the 47-year-old woman has been stuck with her English accent ever since she woke up from a tonsil removal surgery. Her children had gone through the same procedure before, and they talked in a nasal voice, but it went away after a few days, so she wasn’t too worried in the beginning, but as the weeks passed, her weird accent remained just as strong. Read More »

A French motorist may have broken the record for the longest time driving a vehicle without a valid license, insurance, or technical inspection – over 28 years. Last week, a routine traffic stop turned out to be a memorable bust for a motorized police unit in Rhone, France. After checking the license plates, the traffic cops pulled the vehicle over for an expired technical inspection. But this turned out to be the least important offense the driver was guilty of. Upon checking his papers, the policeman realized that the vehicle didn’t have insurance either, and worst of all, the driver’s license had been revoked in 1997. The man casually told the officer that his driver’s license had been revoked over 28 years ago after being caught driving under the influence of alcohol, and he simply hadn’t bothered to reapply for it, comparing his old license to “an expired but still edible yogurt”. Read More »

A 48-year-old man and his son, 18, were recently arrested for reportedly defrauding around 100 restaurants in France’s Toulon region in the last 3 years, using a very well thought-out tactic. Skipping out on the bill at a restaurant isn’t exactly unusual, but doing so about 100 times in a span of 3 years definitely is. On April 3rd, police in Toulon, France, arrested a 48-year-old man and his son on suspicion of defrauding dozens of eateries in the region by leaving without paying the bill. According to a recent investigation, the father-son duo had been using the same tactic successfully for three years, posing as average patrons who simply didn’t have any cash on them and whose credit card didn’t work. The father would apologize for the inconvenience and leave his ID or social security card as collateral until he returned to settle the bill. Only he never came back, opting instead to declare his card stolen and have it reissued. Read More »

A small delicatessen shop in Cannes, France, has been making international news headlines because of its controversial name – ‘Ma femme est une cochonne’ (My Wife Is a Sow). Ever since it opened in mid-January, Ma femme est une cochonne, a delicatessen shop in Cannes, has been getting a lot of attention because of its unusual name. Founded by a couple of “bon-vivants who love good food,” the shop sells all kinds of treats, from cold cuts to spirits, and while we’re sure their products are all excellent, many people are drawn by the name. “My wife is a sow” sounds more like an insult, but the two male co-founders swear they have nothing against their spouses; in fact, both of theirs find the name funny. They wanted a name that attracted attention, and they definitely hit the mark with their choice, but it managed to attract some unwanted attention as well. Read More »

A Frenchman appealed to the homeless thieves who stole his credit card to buy a jackpot-winning scratch lottery ticket, offering to split the €500,000 jackpot with them. They say every misfortune can be a blessing in disguise, and that certainly seems to hold true for a Toulouse man who had his credit card stolen earlier this month and now stands to pocket over $250,000 because of it. On February 3rd, Jean David discovered that the backpack containing his wallet had been stolen from his car, but before he could contact the bank to block all his credit cards, someone used one of them to make a €52.50 ($55) purchase at a local convenience store. Upon visiting the store, the man learned that the two men who had used his credit card appeared to be homeless and attracted the cashier’s attention because they didn’t seem to know the PIN code of one of the cards they attempted to use. Jean David was also shocked to learn that one of the scratch lottery tickets the two thieves had purchased was worth €500,000 ($525,000). Read More »

For over a month now, the Gaîté Lyrique Theater in Paris, France, has been taken over by a group of homeless migrants who needed a roof over their heads during winter. The occupation of Gaîté Lyrique began on 10 December when the cultural venue hosted a free conference titled “Reinventing the Welcome for Refugees in France”. Ironically, the 250 African migrants who attended the event refused to leave after it was over, and they were later joined by another 50 or so migrants who didn’t have anywhere else to hide from the cold Paris weather. It’s been over a month since the Gaîté Lyrique was occupied, and management admits that it was forced to cancel all performances until at least January 24, which threatens to bankrupt it, as the institution relies on such performances for 70% of its income, with the other 30% coming from the state as subsidies. Read More »

A 53-year-old woman was scammed into paying hundreds of thousands of euros to a person posing as Hollywood megastar Brad Pitt as payment for hefty medical bills he couldn’t cover due to his divorce. For more than a year, Anne, a French interior decorator, thought she was in a long-distance romantic relationship with Brad Pitt. This bizarre tale started in February 2023, when the middle-aged woman joined Instagram to share photos from a recent skiing vacation in the Alps. She was immediately approached on the social network by someone claiming to be Jane Pitt, the mother of legendary actor Brad Pitt, who started chatting with Anne and telling her what a good match she was for her son. It wasn’t long before someone posing as Brad Pitt approached Anne on Instagram. They chatted online every day, and before long, Anne fell in love which made her an easy target for a surprisingly effective scam.

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A landlord in northern France is trying to force his tenants to leave in the middle of winter by removing the doors and windows on his property. In France, as in many European countries, it’s illegal to evict tenants in wintertime, even if they are behind on rent. However, one landlord in Pas-de-Calais, a department in northern France, is trying to skirt around the law by forcing his tenants to vacate the property without actually asking them to leave. On December 20, a team of workers arrived at the property and started disassembling the doors and windows under the pretext of replacing them. However, the tenants claim that they just loaded up the old doors and windows in a car and drove away, leaving them to brave the cold and face potential intrusion at all hours of the day and night. Read More »

The owners Ricco, a Bantam rooster from Bourgoin-Jallieu in France’s Isère department, are scheduled to show up in Court following a neighbor’s complaint regarding the bird’s loud crowing. “Difficulty concentrating, sleep deprivation, hearing fatigue,” these are just some of the symptoms cited by the plaintiff who summoned Ricco’s owners to Court in January of next year. The person, who prefers to remain anonymous, is one of the owners’ neighbors and they claim that the rooster’s crowing is unbearable both at night and during the day. However, the owners of the 5-year-old bird have always disputed these claims, insisting that the door to Ricco’s chicken coup is operated by an automated system programmed to open the door only at 8:30 am during the winter and at 9:00 am in summer. They insist that the rooster crows about fifteen times in a quarter of an hour in the morning, and then a few more times during the day. Read More »

Enzo, a 4-year-old boy from Aubervilliers, France, miraculously survived a 43-meter fall from his 16th-floor apartment with only a scratch and no fractures, and no one understands how. The unusual incident took place on May 26, in a high-rise apartment complex in Aubervilliers, central France. Enzo, a 4-year-old boy diagnosed with autism was in his room when his father, Ji, heard him crying. As usual, he hurried to check on his son and calm him down, but as he tried to enter Enzo’s room, he realized that the door was locked. This had never happened before, and the parents suspect that the boy accidentally locked himself inside which caused him to panic. By the time Ji managed to break down the door, Enzo’s crying had stopped and the room seemed empty. Seeing the window open, the man horrifyingly realized that he was too late. Read More »

Durandal, a mythical sword that had been lodged in a rock wall in the French village of Rocamadour for the last 1,300 years, has suddenly disappeared, presumably stolen. Durandal was often described as the French equivalent of the much more famous Excalibur, King Arthur’s legendary sword. Legend has it that an angel gave Durandal to the Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne, who in turn entrusted it to his faithful knight, Roland. It is mentioned in the 11th-century poem The Song of Roland, which claims that its magical power came from containing the tooth of St Peter, the blood of St Basil, and the hair of St Denis. Roland is said to have tried to break his trusty sword after being wounded at the battle of Roncevaux Pass, to keep it from falling into the hands of the Saracens. However, Durandal was indestructible, so instead he hurled it towards the sky, and the sword landed in a giant rock, where it allegedly remained ever since. Until recently, anyway… Read More »

A French man is being accused of painting his Porsche sports car another color to avoid hefty penalties after being caught speeding and failing to stop despite being signaled to do so by police. On June 2nd, French police used a speed radar to catch a motorist driving at a speed of 188 km/h on a road limited to 80 km/h near Cournonsec, southwest of Montpellier. They notified a gendarmerie unit near the Poussan motorway to stop the offender, but when they signaled the car to pull over, it just flew past them with no intention of stopping. Surprised by the car’s vehicle, the gendarmes were unable to chase down the offender or even get its license plate. However, they wrote down in their report that the car was a bright green Porsche 911 sports car, which made it relatively easy to identify. However, when the only person in the area known to drive a green Porsche turned up at the police station, officers were shocked to find that his sports car was now grey. Read More »

A French woman is taking telecom giant Orange to court for “moral harassment and discrimination at work,” accusing the company of paying her for 20 years without giving her any tasks. Laurence Van Wassenhove was recruited as a civil servant by France Telecom in 1993 before the company was taken over by Orange. Her original employer knew that she was hemiplegic – partial paralysis of the face and limbs – from birth and suffered from epilepsy, and offered her a position adapted to her medical conditions. She worked as a secretary and in the HR department until 2002 when she asked to be transferred to another region of France. Her request was approved, but her new workplace was not adapted to her needs, and an occupational medicine report confirmed that the position was not suited for her. Despite this, Orange allegedly failed to make any adjustments to her job, preferring to pay her full salary for the next 20 years, without giving her anything to do. Read More »

A 68-year-old French woman diagnosed with Noah’s Syndrome has been given a one-year suspended sentence for keeping 159 cats and 7 dogs in her 80sqm (861sqft) apartment. The unnamed woman and her 52-year-old male partner got into a dispute with neighbors in their Nice apartment building because of the mess and filth caused by their dozens of pets. Police were eventually called and the state of the woman’s apartment shocked them. There was animal excrement everywhere, over 150 cats and seven dogs, as well as at least two dead cats and two dogs in the bathroom. Many of the animals were dehydrated, suffering from malnutrition, or infected with parasites, and some of them subsequently died because of their health problems. The elderly woman admitted that she had “screwed up” while trying to take care of her many pets, but described the animals as “the love of her life”. Read More »

This is the heartbreaking story of a 9-year-old boy forced to live by himself in a cold apartment for two years after his mother moved in with her boyfriend 3 miles away. French newspapers recently reported the sad and shocking story of a boy who lived alone in a low-income housing unit in Nersac for two long years after being abandoned by his mother who went to live with her boyfriend in a nearby town. Between 2020 and 2022, the unnamed boy survived mainly on sweets, canned food, and handouts from neighbors, while his mother lived comfortably at her boyfriend’s house, just 5 kilometers away, in Sireuil. She only came by once in a blue moon to check up on him and bring him some food, but she never stayed long and she never once took him to her place. It was because of these sporadic visits that neighbors took so long to realize that the boy was living by himself and finally call the police about it. Read More »