Pave: 谢谢, 法国!*

All Chinese know Montargis. It's here that many of the revolutionaries got their ideas.

Wang Yi,
first secretary of the Chinese embassy in France
identifying where China got the idea to go Commie
MONTARGIS July 2, 2007 (AFP)

A grateful Communist China acknowledges its roots in France.

MONTARGIS, WHERE CHINESE COMMUNISM BEGAN

MONTARGIS July 2, 2007 (AFP) - Smiling broadly, 85-year-old Cai Ni strolled into a tree-shaded park in the French town of Montargis where her father proclaimed communism to be the path to a bright future for China.

She approached a plaque at Durzy gardens almost reverentially and there found a photograph of a group of Chinese men and women gathered at that very spot in July 1920 to agree on a manifesto "to save China and the world."

... In France, the town of 60,000 people located about 100 kilometers (60 miles) south of Paris is better known for its many bridges straddling a network of canals and its local production of caramelised almonds and honey than as the birthplace of the Chinese Communist Party.

But Montargis figures prominently in Chinese schoolbooks as a seedbed of intellectuals who helped shape communist ideology and create the People's Republic in 1949.

Without France, China might've missed out on this (or this or this, and probably this). Imagine what a different place China would be without France. It certainly is a different place according to France.

Then-Jack, Now Ex-Jack could not imagine a France without China.** Of course, his imaginings have proved embarrassingly limited.

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* Thanks, France!

** A cautionary fable.

PFFT (What is this?): Great idea from France 0 | Rayonnement français 0