How can I be more "French"?

I laughed at the "courant d'air" comment :) it made me think of my parents : Bernard ferme donc la porte, ça fait des courants d'air !!!!

As above, plus be overly affectionate with any men you know, no matter how slight the acquaintance. Ignore the reactions of their women, the frumpy dollops.

loving this
I'm French btw
chuckling at work at some of the posts.... checking the clock, I have raw grated carrots and cold ratatouille in the work fridge for lunch.

keep the posts coming, this made my day

Mamanofthree

I totally agree with you about Civil Servants having different kind of behaviour. I was really pissed off by some of my colleagues who didn't seem to realise that they're in the Service of the Public as the name "Service public" implies. However, I think Civil Servants on the whole suffer from a lack of recognition (poor wages) and as they don't neither feel challenged/appreciated by their hierarchy, they easily head down the wrong path... And true also for the lack of concertation when taking holidays : it's actually one of the conflict you happen to resolve quite often as a manager.

MyfriendscallmeOh,

There's a huge difference between working in a office and being in charge of the public. I would never on my life dream of becoming a teacher, a nurse, a social worker, etc... Besides, everybody knows that EDF "sont des planqués" -just pulling your leg ;-)

LadyGlen,

I just love Brighton and don't find it a dirty place : maybe your husband's cousin had been there during the Pride Festival or the Fringe?

Great thread!
Also eat beaucoup de raw grated carrot, it seems to be obligatory.

Though if you want to stay slim Ifonly4 You'd cutout right down on the patisserie,have seen the amount of butter that goes into croissants and brioche ?.

Dh and I don't eat wheat which as you can imagine is a bit difficult in France !!!

Get on Frenchclick and order some Petit Marseillais!

Tartiflette!

Eat more crossiants for me, and drink more French wine. Having a blank moment here, other than crusty bread, crossiants and cheese, what other foods are the French famous for?

Myosotisbleu
I'm French and I would agree with you re the civil servants.
It IS a regular point of discussion between french people and whether the 'fonctionnaires' actually work that much or not.
A bit like here teachers are slatted by some people because they have so much hols etc...
The reality is that probably half of the fonctionnaires work like hell, never stop until 6.00~6.30pm and the other half does much less.
I found it's the same in big companies. Leaving on time if you are at any level above a technician is a NO-NO and unlike the UK, you aren't paid for any 'heures sup'.
But if you have any RTT to take, then everyone will do it at a time that suits them (unless very strict company policy) and bugger the important meeting planned on a wednesday (Actually I know a lot of companies where all importamnt meetings are on a tuesday or thursday to be sure most people will be there)

ppeatfruit the nicotinoid manufacturers are most likely not French :grin:

On the rubbish thing - my husband's cousins went on holiday to Brighton and found it filthy - degueulasse in fact - and told me about it in an accusatory way as if I was responsible. And I did feel as if I was, a bit. But it's true that French towns are much cleaner looking.

And I was amazed at my first Christmas Day in France when the camion poubelle arrived, as normal, and the bins were emptied.

What we love about the french society is it's actually about the people NOT big business. Hence the proper lunch breaks.

They just banned spraying the nicotinoids. Didn't wait for more research etc. because the bees are more important than the companies who manufacture the sprays

Re the smoking. We were in Paris many years ago when the ban came into force about smoking in public places. It changed at midnight, 31 dec. everyone still smoking, 1 jan. none. Very compliant.

They are cutting down on smoking though a friend of mine ( who helps me with my conversational french) smokes and said she wouldn't use the 'vaps' because they have too many chemicals

What a great thread. I love the draft obsession and the work-to-rule attitude.

Strangely Lilian I have often noticed how clean and rubbish free the local towns are ,you see everyone putting rubbish in the bins. On the motorways it's get more dirty the nearer to Paris you get!

Though the graffiti has to be seen to be believed in Montpellier.

Read Les Fleurs Du Mal
Never eat between meals and learn to tolerate hunger
Deliberately drive without seat belts
Smoke
Be slightly out of date with the current music scene
Know how to wear a scarf
Obsessive grooming in private/ insouciance in public
Drink vin ordinaire which is as rough as old arseholes

Ooh I forgot that when you go to the beach you must always wear a matelot. It was very funny when we were at a seaside town near La Rochelle (which is a fab town to holiday in btw). The stripey sweaters had just come back into fashion and I thought, how come they're nearly ALL in them and then I realised that's because only the daft anglaise would wear one away from the beach.

To those who say all frenchwomen are thin, come down here ,they ain't here In our whole village there are maybe 3 thin ones and 1 of those women comes from Paris to her maison secondaire next door to us, she is amazing, she doesn't smoke though she has 7 kids maybe that's why ! The other 2 are ill.

This thread has made me laugh so much. Greythorne your description of French people outlining their holiday plans made me MDR. Most things are covered, but I'd like to add: complain there is a courant d'air every time someone opens a window or there is the slightest refreshing breeze. Wear a scarf in all months apart from August (men) - and wear in bed if you think you are getting a cold (a friend's husband does this!), drop rubbish in the street because you know someone will be along to hose everything down in the morning, always eat at regulation hours - even if this means standing a queue for an hour at the school fete when if you waited until 2 there would be noone in the queue at all (until 4pm obviously when the gouter queue would form!)

I worked as a fonctionnaire in Paris for several years (at EDF) and by 17h01, the lights were out and the doors locked. We weren't a customer facing department but it's wasn't exactly a pressured environment. So many comments in this thread are true.....

Buy this book, and put the kettle on before you've taken your coat off when you get home!
www.amazon.co.uk/French-Cooking-Ten-Minutes-Adapting/dp/086547480X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1435714312&sr=8-1&keywords=french+cooking+in+ten+minutes

This
www.theguardian.com/world/2015/may/22/france-to-force-big-supermarkets-to-give-away-unsold-food-to-charity

Obviously as an individual you can't do this, but I thought how fab the French are when I read it.

Well, I'm a French living here and some things in this thread made me laugh as positively true -the apericubes, the black outfits, the Nutella, the narrow-mindedness about food, the love of "discussion", the "apéro", the bored and blasé look even if more a Parisian trait indeed. On the other hand, I must confess that, yes, we may seem a little bit too repressive with our kids but to make a balance, "sadly, some English parents allow their kids to scream A LOT" as to copycat one poster ;-)

Also, the short days at work is a pure myth : yes, the administration has awkward open times but I found out our normal work hours are actually much longer than here. We take one-hour break at noon but rarely leave the ofice before 18/18h30 and the shops close at 19h, not 18h like here! ;-) Actually, it is so common to work late hours that schools offer an after-school "centre / garderie" which sometimes run up to 19h15 so as to allow working parents to have time to pick up kids... Real experience as I used to work as a librarian and would usually finish at 19h. Because even if French like to bash their "fonctionnaires", yes, a lot of civil servants work late ;-)

And definitively no : never put ice in your wine -the only persons I've seen doing so are actually my English in-laws :-)

Double cheek kiss everyone when arriving / leaving a social gathering. Even people you dislike but are in the same wider gathering...
Not read whole thread - will tomorrow - so maybe already mentioned!