Even without considering cheese villages (somebody mentioned Roquefort, I was thinking of Gruyere, France clocking in at about 100 inhabitants), I believe Verdun would be just as known and is smaller at a population of around 17000.

I’m sure your boss/manager would proactively increase your wage relatively to the extra work you asked for

Correct, no comma before the last element if it is preceded by a conjunction (e.g. “et”, that is “and” in English) in French

For a group our size (we regularly have over 800 people on our mumble, peak is somewhere around the 1.3k mark if I remember correctly), it would also be very cost prohibitive to use TS

Not that I particularly care to defend the french government, but there was 3 referendums, with voting restrictions in favor of the kanak, as per an agreement between the government and the kanaks. The first 2 went against independence and the kanaks decided to boycott the third (the polling was going against independence, again)

Does that mean all is fine and dandy? Obviously not, but I don’t think the story is as one sided as “classic french colonialism”

Is Belgium also a surprising exception?

I find it an excellent scout as long as you were not planning on being quiet anyway. Can even cast some kind of crowd control spell through it before ever being in danger, if the situation allows.