Just back from a nice mini-vacation in France, and must say that every time I go I am amazed at the difference in cultures! And I should add, since last time I blogged it was a downer, this one is not.
So here is the first big difference I notice: people in France go and wander around town just to hang out and watch people and say hello. People in Sweden only go somewhere if they have a specific purpose, function or errand to complete. This is the first thing that I am amazed at every time - just the simple civility of the French, and the real feeling you get in any town in France of a real community, where people gather in the center, just to drink a cup of coffee and play some boule!
OK, and number two, I really do think that weather makes a difference. People in France smile at you and come up and ask how old your children are and tell you they are beautiful. Even if they don't know you from a stone in the road! Or it could just be all the good food and wine that makes them smile...
Here's a third one. I ALWAYS get my hair cut whenever I am in France. It does not matter where you go there, a teenager or an elder stylist, and I don't speak a word of French, but you always walk out of the salon with a chic appropriate haircut that exactly fits what you described (even if you are only describing in sign language, as I do, because your French is at the level of a 6 month old).
Finally, for some reason, I can eat like a pig in France and still I never gain a pound - ice cream (gelato) 3 times a day and baguettes and cookies and Orangina and Moule frites, and still no weight gain. I saw the most CRAZY thing I have ever seen this time on the village street: a baguette, filled with fried chicken and topped with french fries! Can you imagine!!??!! Yet not one of the poeple ordering that sandwich (and there was quite a que) was remotely overweight.
Seriously, I am going to start pretending I am French soon....
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