Today I took advantage of being in a friendly small town to have my costume jewelry repaired, a job that jewelers in Paris decline with a sniff ("Mais ce n'est même pas du vrai!"). The guy next to me was changing his watch battery, and we got into a conversation, as Americans, but not the French, do to make the time pass while they are waiting. "Leaving tomorrow? Where are you going back to?"
"Paris," I said.
"Which arrondissement?"
Usually people say, "Paris, France?" so I asked in surprise,"Have you lived there?" This is not a cosmopolitan town.
"Yes, I spent two summers in Europe as a student. I was in Paris for three weeks in August."
"Bad time to go!"
Yes, he had almost entirely unhappy memories of Paris. The oppressive sweaty heat with no air-conditioning-- this strikes Southerners as third-world. The rude waiters. The haughty professors. The people who answered in English when he spoke French. He was broke and Paris was expensive. The shops were closed. All the other people in the program were foreign girls, so he felt left out. There were no French young people in town because it was August.
I felt apologetic, as if Paris were my home town. Then I realized, it is my home town. I've never lived anywhere else half as long.
Luckily he liked the South of France. He had had a wonderful time in Nîmes (inevitably followed, in French, by "la Romaine") with French friends. But the place he really missed was England.
"Sometimes I am homesick for Oxford just as if it were my own home."
The haughty Parisians make me laugh the way they feel like they can cut down your person by answering in English when you have made an effort to speak French! I sympathise with him; I used to live in Geneva and there, it was the same thing and normally, if they overheard you speaking English in a shop, they'd just speak to you in English.
Really love the look of this blog btw; I am going to Martinique in about a month's time to start a university course there to learn French as an exchange student so feel free to check out my blog. Good to see some French travel blogs !
Posted by: Aulelia | 06 August 2006 at 16:30
That must have been a freshing change to discover someone like that after all the condescending "Why Paris?" types.
Posted by: The Bold Soul | 06 August 2006 at 19:13
Hmm, my gut feel is that you have two cultures that are too stiffnecked & angry to learn about the other. The Americans feel like the French don't respect who they are, and that the Frenchc are too paralyzed to *do* when action is required. The French seem to feel like the Americans are uncultured and uncaring cowboys with no respect for the centuries of French culture. (for their elders maybe?). It's not the kind of situation that leads to warm and easy relations.
Posted by: camay | 07 August 2006 at 21:59
I usually explain to people who ask that Northern and Southern France are best thought of and experienced as two separate countries.
Posted by: ZF | 08 August 2006 at 17:35