How can I be more "French"?

[hangingoutattheendofmywick]

So this morning I did an Ocado shop and stumbled across the world foods department. There is a French section and I was immediately transported to my holidays when I was young at Keycamp in France. I basically ordered a shed load of French delights and as I'm currently really down in the dumps and life is a bit shite I've decided to BE more French.

Other than learning the language again (I've lost it since GCSE) and eating / drinking all my French delights I'm wondering what I can do to make my life a bit more French. Any ideas?

I'm looking for :
Music
Literature
Recipes
Drinks
General ways of living.

Ta!

I hate snippiness on threads so all I will say is that we can all use cliches about everything and I certainly did not suggest that only the english use them. But you started it. I'm off

BY the way, OP, if you want to read more about people's experience of living in France, there is a great link-up of expat and France lovers and bloggers here. it happens every month and should help you with more tips on how to Frenchify your life.

I was reminded of something that happens a lot in my large French family: psychobabble. Basically, my relatives will happily psychoanalyse each other to death, usually with massive assumptions and judgement about the whys and hows of the way people behave, and of course zero actual professional education on the subject. I sat with an aunt who basically dismantled my mum's entire existence over an evening using cliches and pseudo-psychology. My DH stayed for a bit and had to leave he couldn't cope with the rubbish that was being spewed out, and that despite that he finds my mum hard work!

Badger, my English mum does that! So do I but I, of course, am right

We have apericubes in the fridge. Basil, ham, blue and olive.

Wear very well cut beige and grey clothes, occasionally a bit of white if you are feeling daring. Perhaps a bottle green jumper now and then if you are very BCBG (Sloaney).

Get your clothes altered after purchase so they actually fit you properly.

Spend about £80 on a bra and always wear the matching pants with it.

Wear Dim tights (which are quite fabulous, actually)

Spend a lot of time sniffing food at the market before you buy it.

Eschew milk in coffee unless it's breakfast time.

Eat about 3 times as many fruits and vegetables as the British, in both variety and type. Sniff and savour them a lot. Know which market stall to buy them at to get the best flavour.

Never snack or walk down the street eating. Non, non, non!

Again, if you are BCBG make sure your children wear Start Rite shoes and Le Petit Bateau pants and vests at all times (about £20 per pair of pants).

Increase the frequency of hairdresser visits by about 4x and never have split ends or grown out highlights.

Fret less about your home decor.

Give your kids watered down wine with Sunday lunch.

Oh yes, forgot the main one. Greet everyone profusely all the time, even strangers, but only on first sight that day. Difficult if you forget you have seen the person previously on the same day.

If you are a teenager, have artfully scruffy hair, wear lots of makeup, smoke. Have impeccable manners.

Sigh, having booked our first non-France holiday for 6 years, am missing the fact that I will not be there this summer. Had a lovely time last 2 years at a rented gîte where we got on with the English owners, who invited us to the local mechoui (piss-up with a very non-health-and-safety hog roast, cooked over an open fire on a contraption made from what looked like odd cogs and bicycle parts). Kids made friends with bi-lingual local kids and disappeared for a couple of hours while we made conversation via shrugs and exclamations.

Feeling the need to re-watch Amélie...

go on strike

yy, Boffinmum, see one of my previous posts 're greeting and 're-greeting in the same day. So important.

Serve your kids fizzy apple juice in a champagne shaped bottle when you have your (champagne) apero. Whoever said french kids are given a hard time?

Never thank people for things after the event (dinner, presents etc) in any form, only at the time. I find this very difficult .

Expect every kids birthday party to be the same: 3 hours of playing in hosts house, always in the afternoon, bowl of sweets, flat chocolate cake with no candles at 16h sharp, optional creme anglaise, followed by present opening (no cards), no labels and all the papers the same because gifts all been bought and wrapped in same shop so make sure your child knows which one is theirs. My kids stopped wanting to go after 2 years of these.

Of course this could just be a rural thing and even a regional one, and for whoever is interested no we don't live in an area with any expats and my whole family speaks french because we have to .

Love all mournful, tuneless songs, preferably those which express the sentiment: "ma vie est dans la toilette"
Adore tuneless, loud Johnny Halliday "songs"
Pretend to have a knowledge of Althusser, Proust and Lévy
Hold as an article of faith that customers in your place of work only come there to annoy you
Believe that France won the Second World War, with possibly a bit of help from the Americans
Know that one can only be chic if one is dressed head to toe in black

Castleintheair,

The birthday parties are a bit like that everywhere, true, except I've always seen candles on the cakes. However, I don't see why that should be a problem not to organise a lavish party for small kids. On the other hand, the fact that English kids don't seem to share the birthday cake together has always astonished me. Same thing for not opening the gifts in front of guests, even if I can understand the logic in this one. I also live with non expats and my whole family speaks english because we have to and because language is the best way to embrace the culture of the country we chose to live in.

Eleanorann,

C'est "les toilettes" and Johnny Halliday is Belgian although sadly it's true he's still popular in France.

Lévy like Levy Strauss or BHL? ;-)

I've really enjoyed this thread . Even the actual French are asking the same question by the way OP - this is this week's front cover of Le Point (the equivalent of Newsweek in France)

I am surprised about the comments re compôte. I have always found it quite readily in English supermarkets, though tbh, I just make my own; it's so easy to make.

Does no-one listen to Renaud then?
Or Alizée?

castle I like your description of the b'day parties! I have the same problem than you but in reverse. I still can't get my head around the idea of sending a card when you have already thanked the giver, why on earth should you have a cake just for the candle but not for eating etc...

But then who am I to say? Growing up in France, I've never had a b'day party such as the ones in the UK, even the one you describe would have been lavish. Actually I can not remember having anything special for my b'day at home either (apart from a small gift) after I was about 10yo....

Oh no one else was doing b'day parties either btw...
But I know that my friends, who now have children, do so. I've even heard of a party at McDonalds (much sneering at the idea of MacDonalds but applause for the little sof any area that they had)

That's something else you cant find in France. Soft play areas.

Re Compotes - My French babysitter was horrified when she saw that I was just puréeing the fruits. She tried to convince me that the fruits had to be cooked first. Still not sure what that was about

MamanofThree,

MacDonal birthday parties are indeed very popular nowadays : a shame, true, but very convenient -for selfish autofocused me-time French parents;-)

However, soft play aeras slowly begin to make their appearence in France.

CôteDazur, of course you have to cook the fruits before! :-) That's actually the meaning of the verb "compoter" : slowly cook fruits or vegetables at very low heat.

I understand what the verb means, but WHY?

Fruits are perfectly fine uncooked. Just purée and feed it to the baby. Why waste time, energy, and nutrients by cooking the fruits?

Compote is cooked fruit, enjoyed by people of all ages. Cote is referring to puréed baby food, which is something else altogether. Yay to keeping the fruit as natural as possible for a baby, otherwise they'll miss out on nutrition and develop overly sweet tastes

True, it's more nutritional, specially for babies but I think icompote is all about the different saviour -it's more caramelized, if you want. A bit like Chutney, I guess. If you feed your baby with it, you're right to stick to purées, though, as these are good for transit as opposed to compote which has a tendency to constipate them...

Aah not if you make poo compote, as eldest christened the dried and fresh fruit concoction I used to make youngest to get things moving!

we have compote on Hungary too. very very popular stuff there, so definitely eat lots should you ever wish to be more Hungarian!