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The France List is bigger this time around! I figured that it was only fitting for me to put in a few more of my opinions on what is good, bad, and different in France for the very last issue I will write while being an exchange student here.
France List!
The Good
*Beautiful Country*
The United States is world renowned for having every natural wonder you could possibly want within its borders. We have mountains, the biggest lakes in the world, two oceans, the Grand Canyon, deserts, forests, tropics, you name it and it�s in the US. What I didn�t know until recently, however, is that France is almost the same way. Granted, it doesn�t have everything in it, but on the France tour I discovered that France is just a gorgeous country, and it has things that the US doesn�t. It has the Mediterranean Sea that�s as clear and blue as the waters around Hawaii. It has the Alps, huge canyons in the South West, and the Loire Valley. The Loire valley is the coolest; it�s basically just a huge flat expanse of land with massive old castles all over it. France has history.
I used to think that France is ugly, but now I know better. France is not only cultured, it�s gorgeous.
*Dogs*
Mistreated dogs don�t exist in France. If you have a dog, you take care of it. Not only that, but almost everyone has a dog too. And because their dogs are all super well behaved, everyone takes their dogs everywhere. You can bring a dog into stores or even into restaurants. In grocery stores you can always find women with their little dogs in cute bags tucked under their arms. It�s awesome! I love seeing dogs being treated with respect!
*Bakeries*
Le Boulangerie is a French marvel. No kidding. It�s just a small shop. You walk in, and it smells wonderful. Along the walls are all different kinds of freshly baked breads. Underneath large glass counters are rows upon rows of delicious chocolate or cream filled pastries. It costs almost nothing to buy anything in the shop, and it all tastes like heaven. These bakeries can be found everywhere. There are probably about twenty in the city that I live in.
Are you still curious as to why exchange students gain weight?
*Environmental Acts*
French people may have the bad habit of throwing their trash everywhere, but that�s about for the things that they do that are bad for the environment. In France everybody drives super-small gas efficient cars, which is great for the environment, and everybody, without exception, recycles. I think it�s about time that the US adopted a little more European perspective on how to handle the environment.
The Bad
*The Treatment of Women*
Sometimes I wonder if the women�s rights movement truly happened here. Sure, the women can vote, but they better stay home, clean the house, and have kids damn it! That�s the way it�s been in every single family I�ve seen here. Without exception, the wife is the one that makes dinner every night, cleans the house, does the laundry, and everything else house wife-ish. Even at huge dinner parties, which happen often here, between the courses it ridiculous to watch. Every single woman at the table gets up to wash the dishes and every single man just sits there in conversation with all the other men. It makes me want to puke. Something�s got to change.
*Fashion*
The American movies that describe French people as being highly fashionable chic people are accurate. I can�t help but think that French people have gone a little over the top when it comes to fashion. Even their kids are covered from head to toe in all the latest trends. No lie. I mean, when I was a kid I ran around in sweatpants and old t-shirts everyday, but not here. Here the little girls where skirts all the time, or flared jeans. Their shirts look just like smaller versions of the shirts I wear. It�s ridiculous.
Don�t even get me started on the boys. I�ve seen boys here, straight ones, wearing purses and stylish headbands. The boys in my school are, without a doubt, way more fashion conscious that I am. And I�m sick of it. Washed out, styled up, patterned jeans just don�t look good on boys. Neither do trendy shirts or purses or brand new shoes. Guys are supposed to look a little grungy. A little like they just don�t care, which they shouldn�t!
When I wear sweatshirts to school people look at me like I�m nuts. That right there is the final straw for me. This has gotten way out of hand.
*Expenses*
Sure the euro is cool. It comes in different colors, and you can find both one and two euro coins. I mean, I like the euro for that. But for Christ�s sake! If it could just stop being so damned powerful! To get one euro you have to pay one dollar and thirty cents, which adds up after a while, as you can imagine. This would be ok, except the price of whatever you�re buying just stays the same. A shirt that would be fifteen dollars in the US is still fifteen euros here, even though that is not at all the same price. And speaking of clothes, I�d just like to know when exactly it was when French clothing manufacturers decided to start ripping of their customers. Everything is so expensive here! A shirt can cost around twenty euros on average. That�s twenty-five dollars for a tank top! Come on!
*Lines*
Maybe this is because I�m a good American person, or maybe it�s just because I can be a freak about keeping things in order sometimes, but I can�t stand the fact that French people don�t know how to form lines. No kidding, anywhere where a line should be I always find just a huge mass of people pushing and shoving to get to the front. There is no order. No manners. Everyday at lunch the same thing happens, a huge blob of people knocking each other around trying to be the first into the cafeteria. It�s like this everywhere. Do French people just not understand the concept of lines? All I can think is that I�m going to Euro Disney in two days, and I think the �lines� to get on the rides could get just a little scary.
The Different
*Shutters*
I don�t know about you, but where I lived in America there were no shutters on any of the windows. Every window had a screen, but the shutters were just nonexistent. In France, however, that�s just about the opposite. In fact, I�ve never seen a window here with a screen on it. They don�t have the bug problems that we do in the states. But on the other hand, every window, without exception, has shutters. It�s going to be so weird to go back to the US and wake up in a room where the sun is actually shinning in. Here I have to close my shutters every night and re-open them when I get up in the morning. My host sister once asked me how I keep the sun from shinning in my room in the morning if I have no shutters on my windows. I just replied that I liked to have the sun shinning in when I wake up. She almost freaked out. Like most French people, the though of having the sun actually shinning into your room when you wake up makes them all want to scream. Weird, huh?
*Flirting*
I miss the shy discrete guys in the US! Never would an American guy come up to me in the middle of a park while I�m reading and just start talking to me, even when I�m not looking at them! The French guys that I�ve met are what we like to call lourd here. That�s the French word for heavy, and that�s exactly what they are. A French guy is going to talk to you no matter what you are doing. They�ll flirt with you, and be so obvious about it that it makes you want to puke. I�ve been in the library in the middle of writing something very important and had guys come up and start flirting with me. We all know that that�s a very dangerous thing to do, distract me from writing, but they do it anyway. I�m convinced that this is how Americans got the idea that French people are romantic. Personally, I find it flattering, but also highly obnoxious.
*Making Out*
I have to admit, I find it odd that in a place where couples make out freely and openly on the street they have no word for it, and they also have no word for French kiss. It�s true though, that wherever you go you find couples just making out without discretion. I go running on a path by the river that runs through my town, and one day I saw a good four couples making out in about three seconds while just running along. It�s just the norm here, people kiss anywhere. I used to have to stand behind the same couple everyday in the lunch �line� at school and they wouldn�t stop making out the entire way into the cafeteria. I�m not even sure how they ate, because their faces really are never found less than three millimeters apart.
Maybe it�s just because I�m a prudish American, but I still get uncomfortable seeing people just getting it on out in front of everyone else. In reality though, if I push past my cultural instincts, I have to admit that it�s kind of a good thing that physical affection is such and open free thing.
*Flip-Flops*
I�m not sure why this is, but French people never wear flip-flops. They wear them around the house, actually, but that�s it. I, being the American and sandal-lover that I am, wear my flip-flops to school all the time, and its hilarious the reaction that I get. Everyone always asks me if my feet are cold, staring at them in amazement. When I walk down halls its funny, everyone looks at my feet before they look at my face. Somehow it makes me feel just all warm and fuzzy inside to know that I can freak so many people out at the same time just by wearing my flip-flops out in public. God, life is fun.
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