THE PARIS LETTER: Getting "Bonjoured"

Montmartre Stairs

France and America - we have such a long history together, both of fascination and irritation. We love each other but we hate each other. Its very complicated - like, goes back to the Revolutionary War complicated. 

Lots of Americans feel the French are rude -they come to Paris and they try to be nice, and the French won't give them the time of day. What gives? As you get a little more deeply into the culture here, you realize that many French people find AMERICANS rude - they come here in droves, crowding into subway cars shouting in English and bumping people with their fanny packs, demanding hamburgers at 4PM and wondering why things aren't open on Sunday. 

Clearly, this is a very complex issue, too complex to really handle in a blog post. But there's one word at the center of so much of this, and that word is: Bonjour.

Yes, Bonjour, the simplest French word, the first one you learn - Hello. 

Allow me to explain, after the jump:


The French are really into Bonjour. Much more so than we are in the US with Hello. I swear it's like something genetic - in France, when you enter a store or begin a conversation with an employee, or a stranger, you MUST say Bonjour first. There's no just walking up to the counter and asking a question - you have to start by saying Bonjour, Monsieur/Madame, THEN ask your question.

Now, if you're American and say, you lived in New York for many years before moving to France (like me), you're gonna forget this from time to time, and this will lead to the experience I like to call 'Getting Bonjoured". It goes like this:

You're at a coffee bar ordering a cappucino, and you get the guy's attention and say, in French "Pourriez vous me faire un cappucino, s'il vous plait?" (Could you make me a cappucino, please?). And the barista stares at you for a minute and then says, perhaps with a sarcastic smile "BONJOUR, Madame". 

Or, as happened to me this week, I was trying to go through the turnstile at the metro and none of my tickets were working, so I went up to the ticket counter and said, again in French "J'ai essaye ces deux billets mais ils ne marchent pas, je ne sais pas pourquoi" (I tried these two tickets but they're not working, i don't know why." And the subway employee looked at me for a beat and then said, very formally "BONJOUR, Madame." 

Sigh. I get it, I get it. This is their way of saying, "I'm an individual, I'm not here just to be ordered about." Fine. Usually what I do is say something like "Sorry about that, I'm American" , to which they inevitably reply, with false French incredulity "People don't say HELLO in America?", and then I say something like, "No, we're very direct there, especially in New York, where I moved from'. And I say all this in French so they know I'm not a tourist and I get it. And then usually they laugh and say something like "I'm teasing you you know". 

I can't imagine what people who are actually tourists do. 

Or actually, wait I CAN. Because watch this Daily Show clip where CHRISTINE LAGARDE, then France's finance minister, Bonjours Jon Stewart on The Daily Show, (click on this phrase and it should take you to the clip) who has no idea what the hell is going on.

Did you see that? He thinks he's already said hello to her while she's walking on, and once she sits down he starts right in with the questions - but then Christine Lagarde is like "No, no - we will begin this properly with BONJOUR". And Jon Stewart is like, "Why is she acting so weird?"

And here it is, the root of one of the things the French get annoyed about - we are TOTALLY OBLIVIOUS to their codes of politesse, even when they try to communicate them to us. They try to civilize us and we don't even notice!


Oh well. Just another way I'll never be truly French, I guess - but I'm not too upset about it. Now, could you make me a cappucino?

39 weeks pregnant, Montmartre

So if you saw the pic of me up there at the top of this post, you can see that 1. I'm 40 weeks pregnant and 2. Montmartre has a lot of stairs, kind of like parts of San Francisco. These pics are from a walk that Matt and I took last week - And here is me, having successfully made it up those stairs without collapsing. But also without starting my labor either - 

So, no baby yet, but soon! Until then - A bientot a tous!