It’s been a shamefully long time since my last instalment of French Fail. This has nothing to do with the fact that my ‘vie en France’ has become less embarrassing, but more likely due to an increase in my intake of ‘vin rouge’ and (therefore) napping. So it’s about time I got the blog up to speed again, helped along greatly by the fact that I have nothing to play with because both mobile phones and my camera are currently submerged in a bowl of rice in a desperate attempt to dry them out after the ‘Juice Explosion of 9th December 2011’ hit my handbag hard.
Lille’s recently been invaded by a few of Southampton’s finest, who exploited the fact that French nightclubs haven’t quite cottoned on to the fact that any decorations that aren’t nailed down will be pilfered fairly casually by the average drunken English student. We learnt it’s definitely not acceptable to be carrying a pineapple around with you like a baby at 4am but it did make a cheeky fruit salad in the morning.
In more fruit and veg related issues, never ever jump around with a broccoli in your hand if you don’t have a firm grip. Harrie hasn’t quite got the hang of taking big enough bags to the supermarket yet, so broc was riding solo in Tom’s care for approximately 30 seconds before his excitement for the Lille Christmas Ferris wheel got too much, and one leap sent it flying not only into the face of the woman behind us in the queue, but then rebounding onto her nice expensive camera. Turns out this woman’s festive sense of humour had escaped her, especially when she was asked ‘err sorry but where is my broccoli, I have now lost it?’
As if the Ferris wheel wasn’t enough excitement for one week, my favourite SDF has started dressing up as Santa – it’s probably not acceptable to have asked to have a photo with him, but I went there. I went there.
That said, my general festive spirit was killed off by a nice bout of flu which meant I had to brave the French doctors, and immediately having walked through the door, had already made myself the most unpopular person in the waiting room. After walking in and sitting down, like a normal person, I realised afterwards that you never enter a waiting room without greeting EVERYONE in there and waiting for their amen-like chorus of hello’s back before you sit down. Technically, as ever, it was me that made a fool out of myself, but this is definitely far too retro a custom to be OK in 2011.
Another area where the French are stuck in the 1930s is their choice of names. I will never ever get a French boyfriend if I can’t keep a straight face when they tell me their name. I know it’s not personally their fault, but there are only so many ‘Wesleys’ and ‘Cyrils’ I can take. Sort it out.
Aside from accidentally being fairly offensive here and there, the biggest embarrassing incident of the last week has been my and Harrie’s trip to buy a Christmas tree (or a ‘sapin’ en France). I don’t know if the issue is that the French aren’t big on the needle-dropping little things (considering this is a country that employs an entire workforce to hand-wash the pavements every day) but it was near-on impossible to find anywhere to buy one. In a final impulsive moment of desperation, we hopped on the metro for half an hour to go out to a trading estate, and never has a plan been so poorly thought through. Also, never have I had to run to catch a metro with a Christmas tree under my arm, and never have I missed said metro, but just caught everyone on it applauding as it moved away. And when the wrapping snapped and the little thing broke free, I vowed never to catch the metro with a ‘sapin’ in tow again; a decision probably supported by the bloke sat next to me with a branch in between his face and his newspaper.
All this considered, the moral of this blog can only be: keep a close eye on your fruit and veg, and you haven’t lived till you’ve taken a ‘sapin’ on the metro. Joyeux noël à tous!
