Quebec

MONTREAL - These are desperate days for Quebec's separatists, beset by internal bickering and, worse, the increasing tendency of French Quebecers, especially younger ones, to view the movement as irrelevant and doddering. The Parti Quebecois, dedicated to seceding from Canada, still governs the province that calls itself a nation. But support for independence - the cause that is the party's raison d'etre - is at its lowest ebb in years. A majority of Quebecers, opinion surveys show, are either more or less content to remain Canadians, or are so sick of the decades-old debate over sovereignty that they're tuning it out. And separatism's most eloquent champion, Premier Lucien Bouchard, abruptly announced his resignation earlier this year, stunning observers with his emotional mea culpa for Quebec's failure to win independence.

Bookham Technology PLC, a British fiber-optics company that is opening its North American headquarters in Howard County, said yesterday that it has acquired Measurement Microsystems A-Z Inc. of Trois-Rivieres, Quebec. Bookham agreed to buy privately held Measurement Microsystems for no more than $47.5 million, of which $10 million will be paid in cash and the rest in stock. Giorgio Anania, Bookham Technology's president, said Measurement Microsystems would play a key role in the development of his company's equipment.

MONTREAL - Quebec Premier Lucien Bouchard, the passionate champion of Quebec independence for the past decade, resigned yesterday in a surprise move that left the separatist movement in tatters and transformed the political dynamics of the nation. In an emotional address from Quebec City, he cited love for his American wife - who desperately wants him out of public life - and remorse for his inability to gain independence from Canada as the main reasons for his resignation. But he also lashed out at separatist hard-liners, whose obsessions with French ethnic purity have given Quebec a reputation as racist and anti-Semitic.

Baseball Marlins: Announced P Brian Edmondson has elected to exercise his right of free agency. Basketball Clippers: Waived F Rocky Walls and C Joe Vogel. Nets: Waived G Adrian Autry. College Salisbury State: Reggie Boyce (Dunbar) was named Atlantic Central Football Conference's Offensive Player of the Week. Football Patriots: Waived TE Chris Fontenot from practice squad. Hockey Blackhawks: Signed LW Kris King. Bruins: Recalled G Kay Whitmore from AHL Providence. Canadiens: Recalled G Jose Theodore from AHL Quebec.

If you find Paris impossibly romantic, don't miss Quebec. Street mimes and caricaturists cluster around the cobbled squares at the center of Old Quebec -- much like the Montmartre district of Paris. Boutiques brimming with charming knick-knacks line the winding streets -- reminiscent of the Mouffetard district. Hundreds-year-old tables, sea chests and porcelains fill the windows along a row of antiques shops -- recalling the Left Bank. Add the lilt of French accents and menus filled with promises of moules frites and escargots, and you may think you simply slept through the body-wrenching six-hour time change between here and France.

THE CANADA that we see from south of the border is bilingual and multicultural coast-to-coast. It has its own constitution with its version of a bill of rights. It goes its own way in foreign policy, often as United Nations peace-keepers. Canada was not always that way. Pierre Elliott Trudeau introduced all this while prime minister from 1968 to 1979 and 1980 to 1984. It was not easy to achieve. Many English-and French-speaking Canadians were dragged along kicking and screaming. But his vision of Canada was the only alternative in Quebec to a language-, heritage- and religion- based provincialism, rebelling against second-class citizenship, which would have destroyed Canada for something else that, even now, is difficult to imagine.

MY BEST SHOT Gokyo Valley, Nepal Andrea Kelly Berlin While trekking into the Gokyo Valley of Nepal in November, I came upon this yak posed in front of peaks near Mount Everest. Yaks are very temperamental, so I gave him a wide berth as I passed. A MEMORABLE PLACE Back to Old World roots By Barbara Anderson SPECIAL TO THE SUN One hundred years ago, my maternal grandparents left Budapest, Hungary, to start a new life in the United States. One hundred years later, I spent four wonderful days in Budapest, ushering in the new century with a fantastic New Year's Eve party in the five-star Budapest Hilton.

VALCOURT, Quebec -- Nestled in the Riviere Noire valley, 30 miles north of Vermont, is a shrine to the man who revolutionized winter recreation with his machine. "When it comes to history, I'm like, `Ugh, boring.' But I really wanted to come here," said Annette Turgeon, 32, of Bangor, Maine. Turgeon, her husband and their two sons roared into the parking lot of the J. Armand Bombardier Museum the other day astride four gleaming sleds, as snowmobiles are called by the 2.1 million North Americans for whom they are a high-powered passion.

After a historic -- and at times rancorous -- week, Canada's Parliament has just left Ottawa for a seven-week recess. Despite the rancor, the week was historic because it might have found the way to solve the constitutional puzzle over Quebec.For more than two decades, the nation's future has been wrapped up in the hardest question yet to arise under its constitution: Can Quebec break away to become a separate nation, and will it?When the Parliament reassembles Feb. 7, the lawmakers likely will begin to work seriously toward a final answer.

OTTAWA -- Canadians on both sides of the nation's deep linguistic divide say they were stunned by President Clinton's unexpectedly passionate appeal here for national unity and federalism.Clinton traveled to the flash point of separatism in North America and, without mentioning Quebec nationalism, argued Friday that "the United States and Canada are among the most fortunate countries in the world because we have such diversity."If every major "racial and ethnic and religious group" won independence, "we might have 800 countries in the world and have a very difficult time having a functioning economy," Clinton said, addressing a forum on federalism that earlier in the week had become a platform for complaints by Quebec separatists.