April 2010

Hello everyone,

Strange meetings occur in everyday's life...
The other night, I had gone out for dinner in a small restaurant in Boulogne; when we came out, we stumbled upon... 1600 pandas, scattered all over the town's main square; after gathering information, we found out they were very lovely papier-mâché pandas scattered all over the place by the WWF, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the adoption by that organization of the panda as its symbol, ant to attract the public's attention to the fact that there are only 1600 pandas left in the world and that more than 15000 of the 41500 animal species known are threatened of extinction.

After the square at the foot of the Eifel Tower and many other places, these pandas will invade many other cities in the world, as this is an important year for the environment. You can fin on the WWF's website www.worldwildlife.org many suggestions for ways in which you can take part in the protection of our planet.

At the same time as these 1600 Pandas were having fun under our eyes, the lights of more than 240 monuments of Paris, as well as those of more than 2000 cities in the world went out for Earth Hour, to show that each of us can do something to slow the degradation of our environment and of the Nature that surrounds us.

I would like to thank warmly the nearly 10 000 people that have traveled with me to New Caledonia during the tour of talks I have just completed for "Connaissance du Monde" (Knowledge of the World), a French organization. What a fascinating thing to be on the road again with all those beautiful images and to feel the audience's passion for such beauty.
Next November, I will sing on board a cruise ship from Savona in Italia to Roma, for a cruise dedicated to the Sixties; it will be fun to mix two very different periods of my life: the time when I used to be a pop singer and the Sea (albeit seen from the decks of a big cruise ship).
And before that, journeys and travel: at the beginning of April, I will fly to Madagascar to complete the shooting of a new film about my native island. Then I will go back to my sailboat, in the Gambier, for a few more months of cruising through Polynesian archipelagoes.

See ya !
Antoine