Le Franco Phoney

My recent trip to the north of France highlighted a law which I never knew about. According to some sources, it’s illegal to feed pigeons in Paris. I’m not convinced this is a specific law — and I continued to feed a single pigeon beside me with churros from a nearby fair while the guy sitting next to me explained that the law was passed for health reasons and that although he had no objections, the police might fine me. Just as an aside, he then chatted for about twenty minutes about his background and asked about mine and my travel partner’s, then handed me a bracelet as a gift. I’m pretty skeptical of people being this genuine, but he really was happy that I accepted his gift and explained that in his culture, it’s offensive to refuse a gift.

I’ve done a bit of a web search (because if it’s not on the internet, it doesn’t exist, right?) and I’ve found differing views about this pigeon feeding ban. One website says there’s a €35 fine, while another website quotes one section of a law which is a bit hazy about the whole thing, but does suggest it might be illegal. Local councils apparently have some say in the matter, but an outright ban on pigeon feeding in Paris is something I could not locate. It may well exist: my French language skills simply are not up to the task of inquiring wholeheartedly into this, and nor is my motivation since I don’t live in Paris. However, for anyone planning a trip to Paris, it might be illegal to feed the pigeons, and that’s as helpful as I can be on the matter. On a far more helpful note, don’t waste your money on the dodgy churros at the fair at the Louvre end of the big park between the Louvre and the Champs-Elysées — you’re likely to reject their dryness and feed them to the pigeons instead.

As I mentioned in one of my last blog entries, I’ve moved house. I now live in St Jean de Sixt, which is the next village down from La Clusaz, so it’s not a very big move. A friend visited the new house on the weekend, and as we walked towards the bakery, just a few minutes away, we obviously looked local enough for not one, but two cars to stop and ask for directions.

The first car asked for directions to Aravis. My French friend explained that the entire region is the Aravis, so they were already there. They weren’t convinced and wanted to know where the football stadium in the town of Aravis was. She explained again that the Aravis is a region and that it could be one of any number of football stadiums. They still seemed confused by this, but then mentioned they had been told to head towards Le Grand Bornand. It seemed odd to us (because why would such a small village where snow sports rule be the home of the football stadium for this region?), but we pointed them in the right direction and they thanked us.

The next car was less polite. A man  in a white van tooted and stopped. I presumed it was someone I knew, so I stopped and looked. His passenger was then yelled at to ask us for directions. She asked us where Avoriaz is. Avoriaz about an hour and a half’s drive from St Jean de Sixt, and we explained that they were going the wrong way. The driver took over and demanded to know where straight ahead would lead, while holding up a stream of traffic behind him (he hadn’t actually pulled over, so all the cars behind were glaring at my friend and I, presuming also that we knew this guy). We explained that the road ahead would lead to La Clusaz, and then south over the Col des Aravis. We suggested he turn back to the roundabout and go towards Geneva, which is North, and the correct direction. Without as much as a thanks — and we were unaware the conversation had even finished — he drove off and headed towards La Clusaz.

If this is how tourists treat people who they think are locals, I’m really happy to be considered a foreigner for ever. And to the rude man in the white van, I hope you’re still lost and that your passenger took the train home instead.

I was chatting with some friends the other day who said they were in the supermarket when an English song started playing on the overhead radio. It wasn’t just any song: it was Lilly Allen’s F*ck you very much. French families and teenagers were wandering around the supermarket while Lilly was singing expletives. Nobody batted an eyelid apart from my English friends who chuckled at the situation. I understand from living here that not all French people speak English, but many do — and very well too, and surely someone at the supermarket’s head office — where the songs are, I presume, chosen and approved — must have seen the song title and realised that even though the swearing is not in French, it’s still not something customers would expect to hear when picking up their cheese and bread.

It reminded me of the time I was in the waiting room of a medical centre in La Clusaz. Music was playing and I listened to various French singers crooning on the radio about l’amour and les oiseaux (because the French always sing about birds). Then a Nirvana song came on. There I was, sitting with little French kids, listening to “Rape Me”. I shouldn’t be surprised, as this seems to be the most popular Nirvana song on that particular radio station and it was inevitable that it came on, but I when I thought about hearing that song in a waiting room in England or Australia, I also imagined the station quickly being switched by the receptionist. Meanwhile, here in La Clusaz, the song was only interrupted by a doctor calling my name.

Yes, this is France and French is the national language. No wonder nobody changed the radio station! But when I try to speak the language, I’m often greeted with frowns or shrugs from those who don’t have any tolerance for my bad French. When I visited the local vet the other day and tried to describe a tube of liquid that my itchy-eared cat, Bruno, needs, the receptionist frowned upon hearing my accent and my inability to remember the name of the product. I guess she figured this was going to be hard work. Her expression seemed to say (in French, of course): “Find another vet.” But before I’d said more than ten words, a kitten ran over her desk and I found myself gushing at how cute it was. She too started gushing like a proud mum, explaining that the cat had been dumped in a bag at the front door and that she thought he colleague would adopt the kitten when she came back from holidays. We had a ten minute chat about the kitten before I finally explained Bruno’s needs. She came back with the right medication and we wished each other a good afternoon before I left.

So, it seems that kittens build bridges between locals and strangers. Thanks Herisson (the kitten’s name — Hedgehog because his fur was spiky). I’m not sure Bruno is all that grateful when he feels the gush of yellow liquid in his ears, but I am at least.

As promised, here are some photos from le Tour de France during the stage at Le Grand Bornand and the time trial in Annecy the following day. As you can see, Le Grand Bornand was far less crowded than Annecy, which hasn’t seen the tour for fifty years. Apart from the photos below of the floats, a bed drove past, along with some fire engines branded as a bottles of water, spraying people along the way. There was also a giant washing machine, giant sweets bags, giant race horses and various other giant things. The same grappling for cheap freebies continued in Annecy where a lycra cycling t-shirt freebie that landed on my friend’s camera was swiftly nabbed by the woman in front of us who showed no guilt despite my gasp of disbelief. Neither of us wanted it, but I’m not sure she did either — apart from it being a freebie and therefore worth A Lot Of Money.

The atmosphere in Annecy seemed far more electric than in Le Grand Bornand; I guess that was from the bigger crowds and the knowledge that the competitors would be zooming past all day long instead of within twenty minutes. Most people were sporting a freebie hat (including myself) or some other free object, along with some way of identifying their nationality. Me, I wore my Australian flag like a cape, as did many other Aussies. Us Aussies are a friendly bunch even when we don’t know each other. In Le Grand Bornand, a family of travelling Aussies saw my flag (dangling over a road sign) and sought me out for a chat. Then later in Annecy, I heard: “Oi Aussie!” When I looked around, a woman in green and gold (Australian sport colours) was waving madly to me. I waved back. We then had the following conversation — from opposite sides of a very wide road:

Her: “Are you on the bus trip?”

Me: “Um, no. I live here.”

Her: “You live here? Wow you’re lucky!”

Me: “Yep.” (Now trying to catch up to my friends who had kept walking.)

Her: “So, how’s it going anyway?” (That’s Australian for how are you.)

Now, I’m pretty sure that only a fellow Aussie would yell to a complete stranger from across a road to ask how that stranger is. Having not lived in Australia for almost ten years, I was at first surprised by the question which I answered and smiled. But within a few minutes, I was feeling that lovely glow of camaraderie that Australians so often offer each other. While the tangible me caught up with my friends, the Aussie me imagined crossing the road to join the Aussie, buying her a beer, introducing her to all my friends, having a long chat about sport, and chanting “Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi Oi Oi!” with her. Maybe at the next Tour de France.

Yesterday, I was lucky enough to watch le Tour de France simply by driving five minutes down the road to le Grand Bornand. I could have watched from the end, but I’ll be doing that today in Annecy. Instead, I joined some friends on a little rise next to the track which gave us a great view of the race. This photo is one of the many floats that drove past before the cyclists came through. I’ll post more photos on my next entry, once I’ve checked out Annecy.

Watching the floats go past is actually, for me, more interesting than the race. I know some people reading this have just lost all respect for me, but please let me explain. I do have the utmost respect for the cyclists: I can’t imagine riding even 5km of the course they rode today. However, they whizz past so quickly that it’s all over very quickly. The floats last for at least forty minutes and involve cheesy dancing to cheesy music, lots of freebies chucked at the expectant crowd, an obligatory fire truck spraying the hot crowd with water, and, most importantly, bizarre behaviour from the onlookers. Today, I watched a little kid wrestling with an adult for a plastic inflatable baton. The adult had no qualms about using all her strength against the little boy who gave in quickly. A little girl was also involved in a scrap with another woman, and the woman won. What did she win? A plastic device with a branded balloon attached. I think the plastic device is meant to help kids blow up balloons. The woman also had no problem wrestling it off the litle girl, and seconds later, she walked past me and back to her husband grinning about her new children’s toy. Amongst my five friends, two were going for the freebies, and both came out with scraped skin during scrambles to pick freebies up from the ground. Other freebies included: spotty red hat with supermarket logo; washing powder sachet; sweets; hat for sleeping in; and fridge magnets. Obviously wrestle-worthy items.

I’d also love to rattle on about the influx of cyclists on the roads matching the influx of tennis court usage in England during Wimbledon, or a French friend saying that he wonders if this bike race is really worth it because of the local road closures it causes (insert image of my jaw dropping to the floor as I reflect on all those friends back in Australia who set their alarm at stupid hours just to watch the stages in comparison to a few road closures putting out the locals who are so lucky to have this tour on their doorstep). I could rattle on about these things, but I have to go and watch the next stage of le Tour de France now. I’m making the most of it even if my French friend would rather not.

A friend and I were chatting about becoming a local in La Clusaz. She’s from further North, but she corrected me when I said I believed it took three generations before a family is considered a local in La Clusaz. “No,” she said, “that’s three generations in the cemetery.” Based on this, and previous experiences which I’ve written about, I do not expect to be known by name or face around town. So imagine my surprise when a local who I have never met knew who I was and where I lived.

Okay, perhaps it’s not surprising that she knows where I live: she’s a real estate agent in La Clusaz. However, I’ve never walked into her agency before and as it’s not on the main road, nor even at ground level, so I’ve never even walked past. I was merely accompanying a friend to the agency, but I took the opportunity to ask about the availability of any apartments slightly bigger than my tiny apartment. As I started to explain where I lived to give her an idea of the size I was after, she smiled, interrupted me how tiny my bedroom is. She went on to tell me who my landlord was and roughly how long I had lived in my apartment.

So, do the locals talk about the foreigners who live in their town even though they don’t know them? Have I been gossiped about? Or is she just a very good real estate agent who knows her geography and potential clients very well? I don’t think I’ll ever really know. Probably best that way.

Ahh, the French: stereotyped as driving too close to the car in front (true), speaking with a funny accent (true) and liking a good strike (also true - as seen earlier just this week). However, they’re also stereotyped as being rude and a bit arrogant about their language. I guess it’s a case of a few bad eggs spoiling all the rest, because I’ve honestly found the French, at least where I live, to be far more polite than the people in other places I’ve lived, and proud of their language, yes, but always willing to help me learn new words or graciously try to understand my terrible, accent-ridden French.

And it’s not just me. An English visitor last week asked for some bread in a restaurant, except she asked for it in Franglais: “Je voudrais le pain”. The problem is that in French, “some bread” is actually “du pain”, and by asking for “le pain” the waiter probably thought she was asking for rabbit (”lapin)”. He looked confused, then spoke in perfect English to my now embarrassed friend. It’s not his native language, but he was happy to speak English to figure out what my friend wanted. Two French friends of mine are learning English from me because they want to be able to serve clients in the customer-facing roles better. It’s not a requirement of their job, but they are eager to learn and speak a foreign language in their own country. Top points to them.

The politeness of the French extends in other ways. On a chairlift the other day (once I was through the scramble of the queue, as I’ve discussed here and here), the guy sitting next to me asked me if I minded if he and his girlfriend smoked. There’s another stereotype: all French smoke. Well, yes, lots do, but lots don’t. The indoor public ban on smoking was accepted without the expected protests in 2008, and these two smokers checking if it was okay with me for them to smoke is just one example of how the French can really be surprising. Of course, I felt obliged to say it was fine, then had to find discrete ways of avoiding the smoke that seemed to waft in my direction despite their best efforts to stop it.

And then there’s politeness out of necessity. I was working from home yesterday when I heard a knock on my door. It was the neighbour from upstairs who had never said hello to me. She explained she had an IT need and can I please help. My wifi is open for others to use (the wifi connection in French translates to “pay me in cake” in English and it has worked: I’ve received numerous cakes and sweet things from grateful holiday-makers), so I presumed she was checking if it was okay. I was wrong. She had received a message on her phone about a photo sent to her phone and she needed to type in a web address on a computer to see it. So, we used my computer to access the photo — a baby with a bottle. She cooed and ahhed at the photo as if the baby was in the room with us, then thanked me a number of times. Her husband soon arrived and we all spent some time staring at this baby. They were cooing and I was trying to figure out if it was a boy or a girl. I’m still not sure. Their politeness extended to kisses goodbye and more thanks before they left my place. Their display of gratitude made me realise I’m finally getting the hang of the French language: I understood the nuances of politeness that previously I’ve only understood in English. Yay!

Each year, Annecy holds a procession of Venetian carnival costumes, run by an association that links the two cities. I found a place in the sun to watch the people in their beautiful costumes slowly and silently meander past. This also gave me an insight into how French people tell each other off, and how those being told off tend to ignore it. More than one person tried to stand in front of me and the small family next to me. The entire family verbally harassed each person until the left. One guy was more persistent, but he too gave up and gave up once the father in the family beside me changed his tone to be more aggressive. I think he actually threatened the guy. Meanwhile, up the corridor of people a little, a woman was shrieking at the top of her voice, telling another woman who had parked herself in front of everyone to move away. An argument followed before the woman left. Towards the end of the parade, some people blocked the route entirely, causing the costumed-up people to find a different route. When an official (a young girl) tried to get people to move aside to open the route—and there was plenty of room for everyone to have a great view of the parade—not only did they stay still, but they told her off! She gave up and went for help. The correct route was eventually reinstated, but only briefly before being blocked once more. The photos below are just a tiny subset of all the costumes.

Many years ago, I recall a supermarket visit that involved a woman telling my mum and I about her son in a mental institution who was being allowed to visit for Christmas. We didn’t know her: we were just checking out frozen turkeys for the festive meal when she walked up and said she would need a bigger turkey this year because her son was visiting. Instead of ignoring her, my mum said “Really?” and smiled, and that prompted the woman to talk at us for a good ten minutes (hey, it might not sound like long, but when you’re in a frozen turkey aisle, it really is) about her son, the dogs in the sky (!?) and various other topics that actually made no sense. My mum just attracts people like that. It’s what she’s good at.

It looks like it might be genetic. Just last week when trying on a pair of boots, a little old lady informed me that she is old and sick and “look at my feet.” I looked at her feet and they were indeed as old and sick as she had explained. I didn’t understand much of her French, but I was left pretty speechless after burning my eyes with the image of her twisted, dry, bruised and lumpy feet with yellow toe nails. I escaped, feeling just a bit ill.

I’d hoped it was a one-off, but it was not. Today started with a man who saw I was buying three plates. Yes, today, I bought three plates. I will use them to sit my gingerbread houses on, as my friends never give my my own plates back. I’ve learnt to buy the cheapest I can find, and I was in the cheapest shop with all the world’s crazy people. The man in front of me at the checkout turned to his, erm, I can only assume it was his minder, and said in French, “Looks, she’s buying three plates. Three plates. That’s what she is buying. Three.” She pulled him away while I did exactly what my mum does - I smiled as if it was normal. These people are not normal. Later today, a woman came running up to me. Now, I had baggy jeans on and a blue hoody, complete with dreadlocks loose almost to my behind, yet she seemed to think I had a red supermarket apron on and was an ideal worker to ask directions from. “Where are the detergents?” she demanded, impatiently. Eager to help (will I never learn?), I said I wasn’t sure but I thought they were over- Too late! She heard I wasn’t a native French speaker and dismissed me as a BAD store worker who was probably taking a local French person’s job. “Oh,” she said as she walked off in a huff. I felt like yelling out in English: “No worries, any time, glad to help such friendly people as yourself. And have a great day, sunshine.” Instead, I carried on and was grateful I was not in the frozen turkey aisle.

I dropped a friend off home ten minutes ago, and a car pulled up next to us, right by a roundabout. The passenger jumped out of the car, ran towards my window and handed me a pink geranium. He said: ‘Here, this is for you,’ then sprouted some Italian in my direction followed by a little French, then ran back to his friend’s car and they drove off smiling. I can’t figure out if I know him or not but it bemused and amused my friend and I greatly.

Other strange stranger behaviour I’ve experienced over the years:

• a man in a street in Annecy stopping me and pulling out a bottle of white wine from under his coat and a glass in his other hand and offering me a drink;
• a crazy lady at the supermarket warning my mum and I about her son or Christmas turkeys or maybe it was both: whatever it was, it took us half an hour to escape the freezer aisle;
• a man-sized donut in a Melbourne shopping centre asking me if I would consider dating a donut;
• a man on a bus telling me I was a bad person because I was Australian and the Australian prime minister was making asylum seekers stay on their ship at sea so clearly I deserved the abuse for his actions; and,
• an Irishman in London tearing his £5 note in half and giving me one half so I’d remember him (I still have it in my purse!).

It’s late and I can’t think of any more of the top of my head. Please feel free to add your own strange stranger experience(s) as comments below!