I was crossing some small side street in my search for the cafe that I now write from. Like I had hundreds of times before, I saw the car coming and could tell that it was turning, but I kept on walking. Meanwhile, the
car kept turning. The car slid on the wet street toward my legs and, while I braced for impact, I shouted to the heavens that this evil car should be sent to the depths below. Next I asked the driver, or really no one in particular, what the reproduction act was going on.
The middle-aged woman driver just kind of made a disgusted look and nodded her head up and down at me.
Before walking away in a huff I bid her a fond farewell using just one of my fingers.
Luckily, I thought a few paces later, I was near a hospital had I been hit. It's a habit of mine to find the silver lining on every car bumper.
Luckily, that incident was the most exciting thing that happened to me since the last dispatch. That's not to say that I have been bored.
The first week of work went well at the paper and I moved out of the hotel yesterday and into an apartment that's about a ten minute walk south of the
I have been struggling to improve my French when I'm not at work. But even with my limited knowledge I have been able to get by, mainly because nearly all the French people I've met have spoken English. Ironically, the restaurant where the staff was completely unable to speak English was an English pub near my work called "Big Ben Pub.'' Yes, this city makes very little sense.
Some say that the French are smarter than the tourists because most of them are bilingual. I have to disagree. I think the fact that they hear English constantly plays a huge part. For example, all the radio stations and even MTV are dominated by English artists. (The cabbie from the airport into the city said he was a big Phil Collins fan - "the early stuff" and both Michael Bolton and Stevie Wonder songs have played over the radio while I have been writing this.)
On top of the radio, American movies play here in English with French subtitles.
Given those two examples alone, it's not hard to believe that most teenagers and people below 30 in
This linguistic trend toward English for the French became especially apparent in today's IHT which reported that President Chirac stormed out of a EU meeting after seeing one his French peers speaking English because, the peer told Chirac, "English is the language of business." Yet despite the instances above, I still would like to learn the native language because non-French speakers are more likely to get ripped off, they are treated like dumb children in restaurants and because the next time I almost get hit by a car while crossing the street I want to be able to cuss out the driver in French.
Look both ways and don't assume you've got the right-of-way,
Brett
