France is often imagined as elegant cafés, art, and romance, but its real history is far stranger and far more unpredictable. 25 Weird and Wonderful France Facts uncovers unusual traditions, political standoffs, scientific curiosities, and bizarre moments that shaped the country in unexpected ways. From decimal timekeeping to guillotines in the age of arcade games, these facts reveal a France that is as quirky as it is influential.
When Travel Dreams Go Wrong
1. The Japanese Embassy in Paris, France, operates a 24-hour hotline for Japanese tourists who develop debilitating psychological problems because the city is not as nice as they had imagined.
2. The US helped France improve its nuclear weapons. Because US law forbids sharing atomic-bomb information, France and the US used a method called “negative guidance” or “Twenty Questions”: French scientists described their research to Americans and were told whether they were correct.
3. France was still carrying out executions by guillotine when Pac-Man was introduced.
4. After winning the Tour de France in 2006, Oscar Pereiro announced that his real dream was to play professional soccer; he said he would quit cycling, join a Spanish team, and score twice in his first season.
5. When de Gaulle withdrew France from NATO and ordered all US troops out, Secretary of State Dean Rusk asked him for clarification, “Does your order include the bodies of American soldiers in France’s cemeteries?”
6. Maurice Garin, the first winner of the Tour de France, was disqualified for cheating by taking a train.
7. Over the past 800 years France fought in 185 military battles and won 132 of them, giving the French military the best record of any European country.
8. In France and Belgium there is a folk character called “The Whipping Father” who accompanies St. Nicholas; he beats naughty children with sticks and carries them away in a bag.
9. When George Washington died in 1799, Napoleon ordered ten days of nationwide mourning in France.
10. A chemist in France reversed the boiling process of an egg.
France’s Ten Hour Experiment
11. France once attempted to simplify time by adopting a decimal clock that divided the day into only ten hours.
12. After researchers realized that American gay men and Africans in France were suffering from the same disease (AIDS), French scientists sent a sample for testing. However, a scientist with a grudge against the French Institute switched out the sample, setting research back by years.
13. In 1966, French President Charles de Gaulle demanded that all American military personnel leave France. American President Lyndon Johnson asked whether that order applied to American soldiers buried in French cemeteries.
14. Andre the Giant died in his sleep while in Paris for his father’s funeral; his father had died twelve days earlier.
15. In 1835, Giuseppe Mario Fieschi attempted to assassinate the King of France, Louis Philippe I, with a handmade 25-barrel rifle. The discharge killed 18 people and wounded 22. The king was only grazed by a bullet.
16. A woman in France was sent an enormous phone bill totaling 11,721,000,000,000,000€ (6,000 times the GDP of France). The phone company suggested she repay it in several installments and only admitted their mistake after she pressed them further.
17. France outlaws child beauty pageants, and participation can be punished with up to two years in prison.
18. In 1956 Britain, France, and Israel invaded Egypt to regain control of the Suez Canal. Although it was a military success with relatively light losses, the political fallout was so great that most historians regard it as marking the end of Britain as a superpower.
19. In Ancient Egypt and in 18th century France, women would place a scented pouch inside their vagina for a time before presenting it to a prospective lover.
20. During the Nazi occupation of France, the occupiers did not remove the American flag that was flying over the Marquis de Lafayette’s grave.
Clean Riders’ Best Result
21. Between 1998 and 2006, the highest placing in the Tour de France by a rider not implicated in doping was fourth.
22. During the May 1968 general strike in France, around 10 million people, or nearly two-thirds of the French workforce, went on strike. The movement paralyzed the entire country for weeks and nearly overthrew the government.
23. France banned mentioning Twitter and Facebook on TV and radio, such as ‘Follow us on Twitter’ or ‘Like us on Facebook’, because these were deemed promotional and unfair to other sites.
24. Even though World War I ended over 100 years ago, France still recovers 900 tons of unexploded munitions every year, mostly dating from that war.
25. France used its own calendar for only 12 years beginning in 1792; each week contained 10 days, each day had 10 hours, each hour contained 100 minutes, and each minute contained 100 seconds.
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