A Letter To The French Minister of Culture
Dear Monsiuer de Vabres:
This letter is addressed to you in your capacity as the Minister of French Culture. I see that you have recently visited New Orleans to encourage the victims of Hurricane Katrina, and that you have many encouraging words for the people rebuilding their lives in the wake of the hurricane.
It is a sad fact that many of the people displaced from the Gulf Coast of the United States do not face good prospects of returning to livable homes any time in the near future. Accordingly, many American communities are asking how they can assist these people who have been cast out of their homes to remake their lives in a new place.
Here in the City of Ashland, Oregon, we are by and large very fortunate in having relative abundance in our lifestyle and a rich cultural environment. The City has the University of Southern Oregon and is growing the humanities and liberal arts faculties. The City is also blessed with a traditional English-style theatre where Shakespeare, and the works of other great dramatists like Moliere, and the works of modern playwrights, are produced before large audiences. The City is known for having good restaurants, pleasant accommodations, and a wholesome climate. Ashland has also been an enclave for writers and artists, noted for its political tolerance and liberality, since the latter part of the nineteenth century.
As people from New Orleans, in particular, seek other places to live in the United States, those people who are artists, writers, musicians, teachers and chefs will need to find fertile fields in which to ply their efforts. It is not every community in the United States that can extend a welcoming hand to those who seek a diverse cultural environment. Ashland, however, can rise to that occasion.
Accordingly, the purpose of this letter is to establish connections with the Republic of France, and your Ministry, in order to direct French cultural and economic resources to the Ashland area to benefit people from Louisiana who are seeking a new home in a city that can welcome them and give them scope to practice their arts and skills. Among other things that we would propose would be the establishment of a Sister City program through Southern Oregon University with the City of Orleans, which according to my brief research, appears to be a mountain town surrounded by orchards and vineyards. This description fits Ashland as well.
As international relations become frayed by governments acting on agendas inimical to the welfare of their own citizens, individuals must extend themselves beyond their national boundaries and reach out to the citizens of other nations to build understanding. I would like to thank the French people for the generosity they showed to our nation in its revolutionary days, and for the beautiful gift of the Statue of Liberty, with its inspiring promise to receive the poor and suffering people from every place in the world, here to enfold them in the protecting arms of freedom. I would personally reassure the French people that many US citizens maintain a deep love for the principles that bound our peoples together in revolt against tyranny, and seek to reestablish that bond.
I respectfully request a reply from your Ministry to establish fraternal relations between the citizens of Ashland, Oregon and the French people, to initiate cultural exchange, and to develop a French-influenced culture zone in the City of Ashland for the relocation of Louisiana residents displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
Sincerely,
Tara Lyn Carreon
This letter is addressed to you in your capacity as the Minister of French Culture. I see that you have recently visited New Orleans to encourage the victims of Hurricane Katrina, and that you have many encouraging words for the people rebuilding their lives in the wake of the hurricane.
It is a sad fact that many of the people displaced from the Gulf Coast of the United States do not face good prospects of returning to livable homes any time in the near future. Accordingly, many American communities are asking how they can assist these people who have been cast out of their homes to remake their lives in a new place.
Here in the City of Ashland, Oregon, we are by and large very fortunate in having relative abundance in our lifestyle and a rich cultural environment. The City has the University of Southern Oregon and is growing the humanities and liberal arts faculties. The City is also blessed with a traditional English-style theatre where Shakespeare, and the works of other great dramatists like Moliere, and the works of modern playwrights, are produced before large audiences. The City is known for having good restaurants, pleasant accommodations, and a wholesome climate. Ashland has also been an enclave for writers and artists, noted for its political tolerance and liberality, since the latter part of the nineteenth century.
As people from New Orleans, in particular, seek other places to live in the United States, those people who are artists, writers, musicians, teachers and chefs will need to find fertile fields in which to ply their efforts. It is not every community in the United States that can extend a welcoming hand to those who seek a diverse cultural environment. Ashland, however, can rise to that occasion.
Accordingly, the purpose of this letter is to establish connections with the Republic of France, and your Ministry, in order to direct French cultural and economic resources to the Ashland area to benefit people from Louisiana who are seeking a new home in a city that can welcome them and give them scope to practice their arts and skills. Among other things that we would propose would be the establishment of a Sister City program through Southern Oregon University with the City of Orleans, which according to my brief research, appears to be a mountain town surrounded by orchards and vineyards. This description fits Ashland as well.
As international relations become frayed by governments acting on agendas inimical to the welfare of their own citizens, individuals must extend themselves beyond their national boundaries and reach out to the citizens of other nations to build understanding. I would like to thank the French people for the generosity they showed to our nation in its revolutionary days, and for the beautiful gift of the Statue of Liberty, with its inspiring promise to receive the poor and suffering people from every place in the world, here to enfold them in the protecting arms of freedom. I would personally reassure the French people that many US citizens maintain a deep love for the principles that bound our peoples together in revolt against tyranny, and seek to reestablish that bond.
I respectfully request a reply from your Ministry to establish fraternal relations between the citizens of Ashland, Oregon and the French people, to initiate cultural exchange, and to develop a French-influenced culture zone in the City of Ashland for the relocation of Louisiana residents displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
Sincerely,
Tara Lyn Carreon