Wishing I was in France.  Here's a layout I made.

Understanding French Signs

While I was in France, and since I’ve returned to the U.S., I’ve received many inquiries about how much French I learned or how I well I understood things, etc.  I’ve tried many ways to assess how much I learned. 

One thing that I noticed while I was in France was that I could understand all the words used in signs.  Now admittedly, usually you can understand the meaning of signs without much understanding of the language.  For example, the signs showing a closed road and a detour could be understood with no knowledge of French.  

And you can probably figure out that a sign with a picture of a dog and small plastic bags is for those walking their dogs.  During the time I was in France, however, I actually learned the actual words used.  So, for example, the dog sign actually says, “Sacks are distributed for your use.  Together, preserve our living space.” 

Of course, just because you understand all the words, doesn’t mean you understand.   I am still perplexed by the sign on the below.  The words mean “all directions.”  But of course, you can’t really go all directions by going one way.  I saw these signs in more than one place and usually you could actually go more than one direction where the sign stood. 

One of my professors commented on how funny it was that people approached this sign and would all turn the way it pointed.  Isn’t that what you should expect where a sign says “all directions” and points one way. 

Unfortunately, I couldn’t ask for more clarification at that time so I still don’t know what this signs means.  The good news is that my lack of understanding is not due to my failure to understand French.  Now that is progress.

I'm Home

After 8 weeks in France, I am back in the United States.  I did not suffer the same remorse at leaving Paris that I did when leaving Sancerre.  While I enjoyed my time in Paris – museums and good food – there were no personal connections.  So unlike my departure from Sancerre, my anguish in leaving Paris all centered on arrangements.  Would my shuttle show up on time?  Would it come to my door or was I going to have to go to the corner?  Was I going to get priority boarding on Continental as a United customer?  Would my bags weigh too much?

I do have to say all of my concerns were needless.   My shuttle showed up three minutes before it was scheduled.  It came right to the door (even though  when arriving the taxi driver claimed he wasn’t allowed to drive down the street).  The shuttle driver was courteous and helpful.  Not only was I allowed priority check in for the Continental flight, but I was given access to the lounge.  Even better the card to get into the lounge, gave me access to priority customs line.  It was the easiest check in ever. 

Instead, they found a new way to frustrate me.  There were high North Atlantic winds so the plane could not hold enough fuel to go non-stop to Dulles.   We stopped at Gander in Newfoundland to re-fuel and thus were an hour and a half late in landing at Dulles.  Whether you are ready to come home or not, once you get on a plane you want to be home so I was disappointed by the delay. 

After getting through customs and in a cab headed to my house, I realized that my day was ending just as it started -- in a cab, stuck in traffic in the pouring rain.    Another situation tha reinforces my long held belief that Washington, DC is similar to Paris in many ways.  Okay having rain, traffic and taxis is not unique to DC and Paris.

So what was it like to get home after eight weeks?   Upon entering my house, I was happy to be home.  Then I realized that in my rush to leave, I had left things in a mess.  And I was really disappointed when I discovered that I had left without a single diet coke anywhere in the house.   It was good to realize that I could buy what I wanted.  I was near a supermarket and numerous restaurants with long hours and lots of choices.  On the other hand, I couldn’t walk to the butcher, the bakery or the market.   I really miss the baguettes.  The bottom line is that there is much about Sancerre and France that I loved and am sorry to give up.  On the other hand, there are many good things here that are good to have. 

In subsequent emails, I will provide some final assessments and tips for others considering lanugage schools or extended foreign trips.  And I do have a few more tales about some interesting things in France.

Is the Service in French Restaurants As Good as In the U.S.?

Vertical Garden on Front of Store

Yesterday, I ended up sitting with two Parisian women at a cafe.  When they had difficulty getting the waiter to respond to their need for the check, one of them inquired of me what I thought about service in French restaurants. It was clear from her tone she expected me to be critical and given my experience at this restaurant so far – I had been at the table at least 20 minutes and my order had not yet been taken – I could have easily dumped on the service.  

I had come to the area to look at a vertical garden at the Musee du Quai Branly. For those not aware of vertical gardens, they are exactly what it sounds like – gardens that grow on a vertical surface rather than a horizontal one.  This might at first seem similar to ivy growing on the side of your house, but is different in that it is actually planted all on the vertical surface.  In other words it is not plants growing up from the ground, it is plants that are planted on a vertical surface.  Relatively few vertical gardens exist but one of the pioneers in vertical gardens is from Paris so there are more here than other places.  I’ve included a couple of pictures so you can get the idea.  If you’d like more, go to this link. http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/ecology/15-living-walls-vertical-gardens-sky-farms/1202

Back to the restaurant, after a day at the museum of modern art and walking around looking for  photographing vertical gardens, I decided it was time for a diet coke.  It was 3:15pm and I hadn’t had anything to drink since 10:10am.  It was definitely time for a break and a drink. 

Vertical Garden on Wall at Museum

The Musee du Quai Branly had an outdoor café that allowed you to view their lovely garden so I went to get a table and discovered a line.  After waiting in line patiently, I told the hostess in French that I preferred a table outside, but the first one available would be good.  She looked outside and saw some people living and went running out.  She cleared a table and put three menus on it.  When I was explaining I was alone, she told me then I couldn’t sit there.  I am not sure if I could sit somewhere else or if she was saying I couldn’t sit anywhere.  I was trying to explain in French that I was fine with others joining me.  (This is the problem with my French.  I can get out what I want but when there are complications it is difficult for me to respond quickly.)  In any case a woman from a table nearby overheard the conversation and explained in English that I could sit with them, adding that they would be leaving soon. I rapidly took this option.  So this is how I happened to have a French woman I didn’t know ask for my evaluation of French service.

I told her, and I believe it is true, that we have a very different concept of customer service in the U.S.  In the U.S. we believe that the customer should get what they want as long as they are willing to pay for it. We say the customer is always right. A fast food restaurant chain even had an advertising campaign claiming that you could have it your way.  It should be noted that despite this widely held belief about customer service we often fail miserably in delivering great customer service.

Back to France, the first difference is quite simply they do not believe the customer is always right.  In their view, it is a relationship between two people – a customer and a server – and no one is assumed to be correct. Each person is believed to have needs and obligations. The server is offering a product and the customer either wants it or he or she doesn’t.  This sounds like they don’t care, but I believe they care just as much about giving good service.  The difference is who defines good service and the balance of rights between the customer and the server.

In France, the person offering the service wants to offer a good product, including service, and strives to do the best they can.  A French restaurant owner would say I only offer four choices because that is all I can prepare freshly and well 0in one evening.  It is widely believed that a French person would prefer the best possible meal, even if that means they can’t have the item they personally would have chosen that night.  Similarly, the customer is not given a lot of choices in how it is prepared – it is prepared the best way.  You see this in some fine restaurants in the U.S., you can’t have your meat well done because the chef believes cooking it so much ruins it, for example. 

Back to my seating, the hostess’ job was not to make me, one individual customer, happy but to offer good service overall and that meant seating the most possible people in a good location.  Giving a single person a prime outdoor seat would not accomplish this goal.  

I also observed the focus on serving the most the best rather than one particular customer at the outdoor café in Sancerre.  The servers were friendly and eager to make you happy.  One server learned quickly I would want a diet coke and he would give the order to the bartender when I arrived, before he even waited on our table.  That didn’t always mean I got it quickly.  In order to serve all efficiently, when a server came outside he or she did all there was to do outside before they went back inside. I mean they took orders, delivered checks and took dirty dishes with them when they returned inside.  Thus, if they took your order at the beginning of the loop around the restaurant it could be a while before your order was even given to the kitchen.  For the French this was normal, they simply chatted or if alone watched the people and enjoyed the weather.

Need a Picture of Eiffel Tower if in Paris

This brings me to another underlying difference in how we approach things and that is the French don’t rush the same way we do.  When they go to a restaurant, they have time to enjoy it and the company they are with.  If you go to a restaurant in a hurry, it is perceived as your problem not theirs.  If you didn’t have at least an hour for lunch, you politely told the server, that you were in a hurry today, why and you needed to be back at school at x time.  They would then tell you if that would work or not. If it would work, they told you which selections you could get in that window.  They wanted to help you, but it was definitely you who were asking a favor because you were in a hurry.

In Sancerre, where as I’ve already described, I had phenomenal service at all kinds of places they expected that when you came to a restaurant or a store you had time to do what you came to do.  One day at the butcher’s, I waited while he finished a call with a company he was ordering from.  It was more than five minutes – I’d guess 10.  To him this seemed normal, to me not so much.  When he finished, he was happy to see me and devoted his time to me while the next person waited. Again, he assumed that when I came to the store I had time to do so.

In a book I was reading, they made this same observation about parking. If someone double parks you in and you’re upset when they come back, their response is what are you in a hurry?  The implication being that if you’re in a hurry, you haven’t managed your life very well.  I am not saying the French don’t have a lot to do, I am saying they value organizing your life so you can enjoy what you are doing.  If you are so busy, you can’t enjoy a coffee with your friends or a friendly conversation with the butcher you are not living so well. There is much to appreciate in this attitude.

While in France, I have done much better at just enjoying what I’m doing rather than planning so much that I have to rush off to do the next thing.  I can honestly say I enjoyed making omelets for breakfast in France.  In the U.S., I would never enjoy this as taking time to cook my breakfast would take away from other things I’d have to do.  Generally, when I went to a restaurant in France I was okay if it took a long time.  I understood that I was only one person in the restaurant and it was not a problem if the server did not immediately address my needs.  The real question is will I be able to keep this perspective when I return to the U.S., which by the way is in only two days.

Villages of Flowers -- A Good Idea?

One of the things I immediately noticed about Sancerre was the flowers.  Blooming flowers seemed to be everywhere.    Not just in big areas but everywhere you could fit a flower planter there seemed to be one.  And each planter seemed to be filled with blooming flowers. Private properties, like the hotels, were not landscaped better than the public places.  The city’s one round-about was filled wth flowers.  The fire station alone had about 10 hanging planters.   

Saint Satur City Hall

Knowing how costly it is to maintain such plants, I was surprised that such a little town was able to have so many and such large displays.  Then one day when I took a little walk outside the city, I came upon a sign the said Sancerre was a village of flowers.  From what I had observed, I would definitely agree with this characterization but the fact that there was a sign seemed to suggest more was involved than just having a bunch of flowers.

Sure enough, when I checked into  I found that there was a system for determining which cities qualified and there had been since the 50s.  Cities apply and are evaluated by a committee, including representatives of tourism, horticulture, and the environment.  The committee decides, based upon critiria, which cities get the designation.  Depending on how good your city is, you are awarded up to four stars.  Cities achieving the designation get a sign and apparently some honor.  People in Sancerre seemed to be proud of their flowers.  Saint Satur, a nearby city,  is also a village of flowers.  It even has flowers planted along the river.



Sancerre Roundabout



I love this idea and think the U.S. should come up with a city of flowers system.  Or maybe if not the government, an association could set up a system and sponsor participation.  We need more flowers and quite frankly many cities need more to be proud of.  Seeing flowers as you go about your daily activities puts a smile on your face.  The French seem to understand this. Their house may need painting but they’ll probably have a flower in the windowbox.  And whenever I mentioned how many flowers there were or how pretty they were, the locals seemed to take a little pride in this.   No one ever said the city spends too much money on flowers.  Perhaps this is an area where we can learn something from the French. 

Montmartre

I spent a lovely day walking around the Montmatre area of Paris.  Montmartre is the area made famous by the Moulin Rouge, Le Chat Noir and the Lapin Agile.  It is also home of the beautiful Sacre Coeur cathedral.  Artists frequently made their homes here in the 19^th century.    I had not visited this area before and decided it was time.  

The Eyewitness Travel Guide of Paris laid out a 90-minute walk.  (For those not familiar with these guides, you should check them out.  They have really good pictures of buildings, statutes or whatever you are looking at, which can help you to find things. They do a really good job of describing major art and culture items. However, they have a few limitations – they are heavy, do not tell you anything about shopping and little about popular culture type things.)  I grabbed the book, took my camera and headed for the metro. 

Since exiting the metro, I had gone this way and that to see the homes or studios of several famous artists, the original Chat Noir and a beautiful, new church (built at the end of the 1800s. In this way, I gradually climbed to the top of the butte while seeing many beautiful sights. 

Amazingly to me the prescribed walk did not include visitng Sacre Coeur.  Since I wanted to see the church, I took a slight detour, which took me directly to the bottom of the church.  I was a little surprised that I had climbed clear to the top of the butte. 

Getting to the dome was easy – well except for the 300 steps.  I had been mislead by the Internet to expect 100 steps.  Since the signs said that if you bought your ticket from a machine, you would not need to wait in line to climb to the top of the dome, I immediately put my credit card in the machine.   I don’t know why but French machines ask you to validate the purchase and then whether you want to go forward with the purchase.  I keep trying to use my French rather than selecting English and everytime it takes me a minute to figure out what I am doing.  But other than that, the machine worked beautifully.

When they said you didn’t have to wait in line to go up, they were serious.  I walked inside and it was empty.  I mean really empty – no tourists, no employees.   There was a electronic machine, but no personnel.  I assume it was the right place and put my ticket I and I was on my way.  I started up some stairs. I was so alone it was actually a little eerie.   After a lot of steps, I was suddenly outside.  I was not all the way at the top so I needed to find more steps.  After walking across a walkway and I found a few steps and then some more.  Again, I was inside and had to mount another circular stairwell. Eventually, I was at the top. 360 degree views of Paris.   You are able to walk all around the dome on the outside. There is a marble or some kind of stone railing but you have plenty of space between to look.  There are also marble benches to sit – however, I still did not see any employees.  In fact from the time I got at the cathedral until I had left the building after the tour I did not see an employee.  A few fellow tourists joined me at the top. 

I also visited the Montmartre Museum, which documents the history of the area.  It is located in a building that Renoir lived in while he painted his famous Boating Party picture.  They also have a swing to demonstrate what it looked like when he painted the woman in the white dress with the swing.  Its great view of the Montmartre vineyard was another highlight as was the original Lapin Agile picture and several original French poster/promotions for performances in the many nightclubs that were in the area. 

Afterwords, I headed to see the Lapin Agile, windmills and the Moulin Rouge.  The only trouble with the day was I didn’t plan for lunch well.   I had planned on stopping somewhere along the way for lunch, such as one of Picasso’s hangouts, but I kept thinking it was going to rain. Since I wanted to see everything, I figured I’d take a break when it rained.  It never rained.   When I tried to eat after completing all the items on the walk, I had missed the lunch window.  In France, many restaurants open for lunch and at 2:00pm stop serving food until evening.  The restaurant I stoped at did this and I got there at 3:15pm.  Since, I had been walking since about 10:20am and my feet hurt, I decided I would have a coca cola light where I was and worry about food later.    

After reading on the Internet that those trying to rip off tourists were incredibly aggressive in this area, it was smelly and there was nothing special aobut the church, I almost didn’t go to Montmartre.  I didn’t find any of these things true.  Perhaps because I followed the path laid out in the guidebook I wound through the neighbhorhood rather than heading straight up the main tourist paths and thus avoided those after tourists.  But even when I was in the square that was allegedly the worse, no one came near me.  I clearly looked like a tourist; I had a camera and was wearing tennis shoes, which no French woman wears except when participating in an athletic event.     Or perhaps because it was so late in the year, those normally trying to scam the tourists had in Rob Stewart’s words, “grabbed their books and headed back to school.”

The bottom line is Montmatre is still a charming area.  It is now preserved as a historic area so the small little streets with the charming houses will be there to admire for decades to come.  If you’re in Paris, definitely spend a few hours in this neighborhood. 

Somethings Are Better at Home

I’ve talked a lot about what I love here, so I thought it was maybe time to acknowledge not everything is great here.  I much prefer U.S. washers and dryers.  I am not alone.  Without a doubt the thing most complained about by students is the washing machine and dryer.  Although Australian and U.S. students have many differences they agree on that these machines are problematic.   

Now I should say at the outset having an apartment with both a washer and dryer is a big plus.  Most of the apartments rented by the school are equipped with a washer and dryer.  There are, however, some limitations.  The machine and dryer are very small compared to what is standard in the U.S. (and I believe in Australia.)  In addition, the washer loads from the top but the tub rotates sideways to what they do in the U.S. In other words it rotates similar to a front loader, but loads from the top. (See the photo if what I am saying is not clear.)  In order for you to put your clothes in you must open the actaul spinner. Because of this design if you fail to re-latch the metal spinner before you start the washer, someething awful happens.  I am not sure exactly what happens if you don’t, but it is not good. 

My washer has a warning on it that I wil be charged a minimum of 80 euros if I start the washer without this latch being securely fastened.  On my way to France, I read a book about an American who brought a house in Brittany.  He had quite a problem when a guest used his washer without the latch being fastened.  Major repairs were needed and the guest couldn’t get her clothes out.    I can’t get out of my mind why isn’t there a sensor that prevents the washer from operating if it isn’t fastened?  You know like how your microwave doesn’t work if the door isn’t latched.  Microwaves in France work that way also so the French are familiar with the approach.

I freaked out the first couple of times I washed something fearing that I had fastened it well enough. When I attempted to stop the washer to confirm the inside latch was shut,  I discovered another weakness – you can’t stop or open the washer once you hit start.  Now the freaking out part goes away (okay I’m not the only student that has had this reaction to the warning) after you wash a few loads, but I’ve wanted to add an additional item after the washer started, but you cannot do so.  Once you push the start button, there is no turning back. 

Which leads to the next issue, it takes about 90 minutes for a load of wash to process.  (There is only one size of loads.)

Now on the good side, you have lots of choices about tempature and the speed of the spin.  The tempature is spelled out in degrees.  Of course there are in Cellsius so they mean nothing to me but you can choose from 30 to 90 degrees.  This clearly allows you greater control over the actual tempature of the water.  I think this is possible because the washer actually heats the water rather than using water straight from the tap.

It also gives you a choice of exaclty how fast it spins the clothes.  You can choose 100 to 900 something.  I have no idea what this means except the higher the number the less water in the clothes when the washer finishes.  And mine did fine, there are lots of complaints about the spin not wringing the clothes out enough so it takes forever for clothes to dry.

 The dryer too has its challenges.  To dry think clothes like jeans takes forever.  By forever, I mean longer than anyone I know has been willing to operate a dryer.  Last week, a collegue used my washer and dryer to do a load of wash.  He started around 5:00pm and when he came back a little after 8:00pm the clothes were still not dry. 

Interestingly the dryer collects water in a reservoir that you have to empty every in a once a while.  I was rather surprised the first time the dryer would not work.  A light indicated that reservoir was full.  (When hearing reservoir, my immediate thought was a place to swim.)  But I recalled seeing a green plastic thing that I thought was the lint filter.  Sure enough the green thing was full of water so I concluded it was indeed a reservoir.   A quick emptying of it and the dryer was back to operating. 

I later found the lint filter just inside the door.  It was much easier to empty than the ones in U.S. dryers.  It also seemed that it would avoid the problem of lint getting stuck inside the dryer and causing fires. This seems to be one way in which the French dryers are superior.

After a few weeks of using this equipment to launder my clothes, I still have several questions.  Do these models save energy over the ones that we have in the U.S.?  If not, what are the advantages of these types?  Where does the water go when removed from clothes by U.S. dryers if there is not a reservoir to empty?  And most important of all, why does someone not design a solution for what is apparently a longstanding design flaw that results in major damage to the machine so easily?   If you have answers to these questions, please let me know.  Or better yet, if you know how to fix the design flaw, perhaps we can go into business together.