France, let's face it, is lovely. In lots of ways, but we don't need to count them all here, and anyway you know most of them.

On the other hand, there is the other side of France, the underbelly, the downside, the derriere bit. We're talking street people here. Beggars, pickpockets and Greenpeace. They're all after your money.

It's unfortunate that beggars are on the increase in New Zealand, when just a few years ago there were none, but in France they've been around as long as, well, people had cents. Usually they sit alone outside a popular store, such as Monoprix or Carrefours, with a hat or piece of cloth on the ground in front of them to catch your loose change. Some of them bid you good day, and a bonne journee even if you walk on by.

In railway stations they are less passive and less polite, and will trawl the coffee bars asking for money. We saw a customer in one coffree bar reluctantly give a beggar some money, telling him that it was for 'manger' amd 'pas pour alcool'. The beggar nodded agreement and understanding, but once out of sight he probably headed for the nearest bar.

Our understanding is that in Paris, organised pickpocket rings operate in abundance, and in particular at the main stations, though luckily we have no first-hand experience of this. Unless of course they were so good that we've been relieved of some cash and haven't yet realised it.

But back on the streets, another common sight is someone begging who is accompanied by a dog, or two, or three. This disinclines us even more to hand over any money, since some of it is likely to go on dog food, when a dog is the last thjng someone who's hungry and unemployed needs. Except... we've been told that the French government gives you a handout if you're unemployed and have a hungry mouth - or jaws - to feed, which explains why so many beggars have dogs. And, by and large, the dogs do all look well-fed, though we did see one homeless character on the canalside who we thought was pushing his luck, with 12 canines in tow. He's probably a millionaire.

And then there's Greenpeace, the Green Gang, the Braided Bunch. Just as in NZ, and presumably the world over, they are here in France, in a tight-knit group on the main street or pedestrian mall, with their green T-shirts and clipboards, waiting vulture-like to harangue anybody and everybody who tries to filter past them.

They are identical to the Greenpeace beggars in NZ - sandals, beards (mainly the men, but...), an air of Outdoor-Adventure Hippy-Lifestyle hanging around them like the flies on the Nevers Bridge that attach themselves to you at one end and orbit your head all the way across till you reach the other side, at which point they let you go. Seriously. These Greenpeace ambassadors look so like the ones on Lambton Quay in Wellington that we wonder whether they are mass-produced in some secret GP headquarters. They are like green peas in a pod. Greenpeas. Geddit? Never mind.

As in NZ they are full of bonhomie as they approach with their ubiquitous clipboards, but Liz and I regard them as terrorists. Greenpace is quite happy to break international laws to make their points, which makes them no better than the people they target. That's not to say we endorse whaling for 'scientific research' or any other reason, but these pirates are also extremists, and are very good at massaging their messages to best effect, while ignoring cogent scientific thinking. Hence they don't get any commitment from us, any more than most of the canine cap-waving beggars do.

What's ironical is that here we have French Greenpeace activists who probably weren't even born when their own French security service authorised the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, a Greenpeace ship that was targeted by French agents in Auckland in July 1985.

Oh, and France gets around 75 percent of its energy from nuclear power. Hmm.

Interestingly, Greenpeace NZ's not-for-profit charitable status has been revoked by the government. Hmm, again. Ok, enough.

Actually we're not as mean-spirited as it sounds. Liz does occasionally donate to one of the street beggars, and I always donate to the NZ Cancer Society each year, because cancer has taken more than its fair toll on my family in the past. None of them have been hurt by nuclear power, by genetic engineering, or by whales.