Welcome to France

[rabbit]

Some American friends on their first visit to Paris. Rescheduled several times due to Covid. They had been in the city for an hour yesterday and were taking a photo of Notre Dame when someone snatched their phone. Then 2 hours with the policier to report the theft.

[Bayleaf]

Nice start to their first taste of France.

Although, I was just having a conversation with my son this morning - Paris isn't considered as a proper French experience. You have to visit rural France to do it properly. We'd been working next to a holiday home occupied by Parisiens this morning.

Some say the French dislike Parisiens more than foreigners - I can see why!

[Lori]

A year and a half of living in Paris was more than enough for me to see why Parisiens are disliked.

[exile]

WE have Parisian* owners of a second home next to us. They are a bit insular but not so bad. However when we bought our house and were travelling back and forth in German registered cars and half the village assumed therefore we were German, we were already more popular than our neighbours.

* strictly Ile de Francilliens or whatever they should be called.

[DominicBest]

When I bought my French house I was living and working in Germany and used to turn up in my German registered car. I was surprised when my elderly neighbour started speaking to me in perfect German. However much it surprised me it surprised his friends and the other neighbours even more. Most of them knew that he had been a forced labourer during WW2 but since arriving in our hamlet in the mid 60s nobody had heard him speak anything but his native French.