It’s still a foreign place is France. No matter that you can buy President butter in British supermarkets and celeriac is no longer an exotic import France remains wonderfully different. No longer does one pick up the whiff of the Gauloise on entering the country but the nose still says that you are in a very different place; walking through a busy open-air market or even a supermarket you will, from time to time, detect that distinctive bouquet de la France profonde, the fermenting armpit, which can be eye-wateringly powerful - it doesn’t bother me though, it’s just France being what France is. British armpits just don’t compete, even on a stalled tube train in London in the middle of July.
What I like is the politeness of the French. British people who don’t catch on to the way politeness is in the DNA of the French are the ones who complain of French indifference and even rudeness. A quick rule of tongue for the uninitiated; never attempt any contact with a French person without offering them a Bonjour. This is where the formal politeness begins. You say Bonjour and they say Bonjour. If you really want to impress then add a Madame or Monsieur to the Bonjour as appropriate. If you don’t and, in a shop for example, you simply ask if they have something you want, there will be a certain coolness, the implication in the way they treat you that you are just one more impolite English person, so you’ll get what you want but that’s it. Observe the code and all will go most pleasantly. When you leave you Au Revoir and if you like add a Bonne Journée or Bonne Soirée.
What one experiences in the transit from England to France is the very different tribal natures of the two peoples. All tribes (for this is what defines a tribe) state implicitly to everyone including themselves, ‘This is who we are and this is what we do’. Show that you respect this aspect of the code concerned with greeting and farewell and the formal politeness of the French will make you feel very welcome. It is one-sided, of course, I really don’t believe that the French could ever accept or understand, much less emulate, our relatively brusque English way of relating one to another. No, you have to do things the French way.
As you get to know French people you will come face-to-face, literally, with the kissing custom. It doesn’t take many encounters, often as few as one, for French people to move into the two cheek kiss the next time you meet. Men shake hands with men and do the two cheek kiss with women (men who are very close friends also kiss, particularly if they haven’t seen each other for a long time or if the occasion is an emotional one). Example: male and female couple meet male and female couple on the street; they have already met socially - that is they have been introduced. First the Bonjours. Then the men shake hands while the women do the two cheek kiss, then the men each do the two cheek kiss on the other man’s partner. The meeting may not last long. Then it’s Au Revoir, the kissing ritual again, the handshake again, and the Bonne Journée or Soirée depending on the time of day of course.
Last week, in France, Heather and I went to an evening gathering to celebrate the birthday of a French woman, a friend of ours for about three decades, and her grandson whose birthday was the same day. There about twelve children present, all under ten, and about sixteen adults. Everything took place in the garden. On our arrival we were greeted by a small girl who simply stood before us with her arms in the air, waiting to do the bonjouring and the kissing. In the course of the next fifteen minutes every child found his or her way to us to do the same thing. All the adults did the same with handshakes for the chaps, of course. Then, as the party reached its close, the kissing and handshaking was repeated. No-one was omitted.
I admit that this may seem a little potty to us reserved Brits but consider the beneficial effect this kissing culture has on children. All the children present that evening were completely relaxed in the company of adults. They played their own games, of course, but the children also behaved as though they were part of one big family. And we were part of that family. This must be a great way for a child to grow up.
Leaving the party, well after nightfall, I saw another reason for me to love my little part of France. Outside the house in the grass and brambles on the roadside there was a very small, incredibly bright, green light. This light could be seen from a distance of, say, twenty feet. Yes. A glow-worm! When did I last see a glow-worm in England?
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A few holiday snapshots:
Heather and I walked to the port where a sponsored sailing event was taking place. The sponsor was a French medical insurance company. A young lady from the company was dishing out rather attractive bags that bore the company logo. Inside each bag was a leaflet on sexual health that had attached to it a condom. We both had a bag pressed upon us. Should we take this as a compliment?
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A young man seen wearing a T shirt carrying the words
SAVE THE WORLD
EAT A BANKER
This reminds me of one of my first posts where I proposed a T shirt saying
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY
INVADE SWITZERLAND
Both exhortations have their merit, don’t you agree?
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At Huisnes sur Mer , near Mont St. Michel, there is a cemetery holding the remains of some 12,000 German soldiers. It’s an ossuary – a place where bones are kept. We visited it but having parked the car outside realised that we didn’t want to go inside. It couldn’t have been out of squeamishness because the notice outside stated clearly that the skeletal vestiges were all stored in vaults and hence out of sight. I think it was the very fact that this evidence of the presence of this foreign army, the history of which is heavily strewn with accounts of vile acts, an army that occupied France and had to be driven out of Normandy and Brittany and then the rest of France at the cost of many thousands of lives, should be tolerated by the French presumably at the wish of the German government, that stuck in my craw. Wouldn’t Germany be a more appropriate place?
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Have you ever encountered a ‘rebus’? It’s a sort of puzzle where sounds of words and letters are punned. The French like a good rebus. There’s a restaurant near where we stay that is build at the top of an old water tower. It is called Chateau d’Ho. The d’Ho is a rebus; d’Ho - d’eau. Easy isn’t it? Our place in Brittany is called St. Cast. T shirts are on sale bearing the big red heart that means ‘I love’, followed by St.K. K – pronounced Kah – replaces Cast, that is also pronounced Kah.
Now here’s a tough one. Ja. How does it come to mean ‘I’m very hungry’? Look at the letters.
You have a capital J, you might say a big J or, in French a Grand J or putting the adjective where the French normally do, after the J – you have J Grand. In French J is pronounced ‘Jay’ or ‘Jai’. J'ai is French for 'I have' - as you all well know.
You then have a small a, or a petit a - putting the adjective where the French normally do, you have a petit with a being pronounced ‘ah’.
So we may then read J’ai grand appétit which means I’m very hungry.
Are you not delighted by that?
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I have just discovered that I share my birthday with Edith Piaf, 19 December. She was born in 1915. I just a little later. Je ne regrette rien, Baby!
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