True Story

In the past year or so, many women at the forefront of the fat acceptance movement opted for bariatric surgery and/or major weight-loss. More recently, Roxane Gay, feminist and body activist author I admire, went under the knife to get the weight-loss surgery. ►►►

I spent the weekend of May 4-6 at the Fairmount Château Frontenac in Québec City to attend the 2018 Women In Travel Summit (WITS). Picture that: over 400 women evolving in the travel sphere gathered in the most photographed hotel in the world! ►►►

Fat-shaming is one of the buzzwords in the plus-size / fat-acceptance / size-positive blogosphere. Because it’s an everyday reality of the big folk’s universe. ►►►

until quite recently, Canada had nothing to envy to France when it comes to how they treat their fat people. Plus-size people in France have it quite hard. Not easy to be a fatty in the Camembert country! ►►►

After reading an article on “inspiring plus-size models from Montreal”, in a newspaper, last February, I noticed that we still have a looong way to go to reach “fat tolerance”. ►►►

Maybe you saw my post on Facebook about on collecting testimonials about the blog, back in August…
Well… mission accomplished! ►►►

Last Sunday, The Plus-Size Backpacker turned FOUR! At that age, a blog is a bit like a late teenager/young adult: it knows relatively well where it’s heading but remains open to change if opportunity knocks (or necessity requires it). On the other hand, it still has this desire to please and simultaneously wants to prove its purpose to the whole world, possibly in a flashy, rebellious, non-traditional way! ►►►

This open letter was sent to the 3 major French newspapers in the Montreal area – La Presse, Le Devoir & Le Journal de Montréal – in January-February 2017. It was never published, though it was written according to the requirements of each publication. So here it is, for your “pleasure”, and hopefully, for you to share around, so it can get the visibility it deserves. ►►►