Most stores in France are closed on Saturday and Sunday. Monday is also a common day to be closed. What's up with that?
Knowing at least a little French is helpful, but most communication difficulties can be overcome by yelling, "I have many Euros and I'm not afraid to use them!"
Despite my miniscule French vocabulary, I was still able to feel linguistically superior to the man who looked at the statue labelled Hugues Capet and pronounced it "Huge-s Cap-et."
Large groups of teenagers are annoying in any language.
Large tour groups are annoying, especially when they trap you in the Catacombs, or carry stupid little wavy pompom things around in Versailles.
There are many millions of people in Paris, most of whom walk slower than Jackie and I. This is also annoying. Apparently, I am easily annoyed.
I have also come to agree that you should never ever drive in Paris if you are not a Parisian. Half the time, I couldn't even see where they'd hidden the traffic lights. They don't really have lanes on most places, and most of the time, they seem to regard the lanes as 'suggestions' more than actual rules. The cars just pass around each other in all directions, with pedestrians constantly crossing whenever they feel it's safe, and motor skooters zipping in and out in the smallest places.
And, of course, if you're from Saskatoon, traffic circles are inherently terrifying.
If you have the right of way at a crosswalk, you have to step out into traffic. If you don't go, they're not going to wait for you. They will stop, however, when you walk in front of them. (You could always tell who was a new tourist by the way they stood waiting for the "Walk" signal to appear.)
The streets are very narrow and winding, which can make map-reading a challenge. Also, our map didn't have all the streets on it, which made it doubly challenging.
Some sidewalks are so narrow that you can only walk single-file, and when trying to pass people, I twice banged my hand into car mirrors.
There are no back alleys, so at the end of the day, the merchants would move all the recycling and garbage bags out onto the sidewalks for the city workers to pick up overnight. Every morning, you'd find the city workers hosing down the streets. Their outfits and their trucks were all "radioactive green". Definitely high-visibility!
I had promised my mom that I would buy her a tacky Eiffel Tower with a clock in it. Big mistake. There are no cheap Eiffel Towers with clocks in them - only expensive ceramic Limoges versions, or expensive crystal versions. Doh!
McDonald's paper cups are the collection container of choice for most of the beggars in Paris.
1.60€ to ride the metro to almost anywhere in zone 1 of Paris is a very good deal. And the metros come almost every three minutes. Why can't we get public transportation like that?
We saw some of those real estate advertisements in windows. The cheapest flat we saw was one in Pigalle for 50,000€, and it was only about 10 metres squared. The most expensive apartment listed rang in at 675,000€.
I get a kick out of going to Notre Dame (or the Louvre, or the Mona Lisa, or the Eiffel Tower, etc) and seeing the hundreds of digital cameras being held high overhead. Yes, I know I do it too, but it still looks funny when you see a great crowd of upraised cameras.
Do people routinely tip in Europe? I'm not quite sure. At one restaurant, our bill was 35€ - I gave the server 40€ and let him keep the change, and he was deliriously happy.
Travel tip: It's much much much cheaper to avoid the tour companies and use the do-it-yourself route, if possible. While surfing the net before coming to Paris, I noted that you could book river cruises for US$75 - whereas our boat ride at Bateaux-Mouche was 7€. Ouch! Crazy! If you spend that much money on a boat ride, you're not going to be able to afford your Coke!
Knowing at least a little French is helpful, but most communication difficulties can be overcome by yelling, "I have many Euros and I'm not afraid to use them!"
Despite my miniscule French vocabulary, I was still able to feel linguistically superior to the man who looked at the statue labelled Hugues Capet and pronounced it "Huge-s Cap-et."
 |
| AKA Huge-s Cap-et |
Large groups of teenagers are annoying in any language.
Large tour groups are annoying, especially when they trap you in the Catacombs, or carry stupid little wavy pompom things around in Versailles.
There are many millions of people in Paris, most of whom walk slower than Jackie and I. This is also annoying. Apparently, I am easily annoyed.
I have also come to agree that you should never ever drive in Paris if you are not a Parisian. Half the time, I couldn't even see where they'd hidden the traffic lights. They don't really have lanes on most places, and most of the time, they seem to regard the lanes as 'suggestions' more than actual rules. The cars just pass around each other in all directions, with pedestrians constantly crossing whenever they feel it's safe, and motor skooters zipping in and out in the smallest places.
And, of course, if you're from Saskatoon, traffic circles are inherently terrifying.
If you have the right of way at a crosswalk, you have to step out into traffic. If you don't go, they're not going to wait for you. They will stop, however, when you walk in front of them. (You could always tell who was a new tourist by the way they stood waiting for the "Walk" signal to appear.)
The streets are very narrow and winding, which can make map-reading a challenge. Also, our map didn't have all the streets on it, which made it doubly challenging.
Some sidewalks are so narrow that you can only walk single-file, and when trying to pass people, I twice banged my hand into car mirrors.
There are no back alleys, so at the end of the day, the merchants would move all the recycling and garbage bags out onto the sidewalks for the city workers to pick up overnight. Every morning, you'd find the city workers hosing down the streets. Their outfits and their trucks were all "radioactive green". Definitely high-visibility!
I had promised my mom that I would buy her a tacky Eiffel Tower with a clock in it. Big mistake. There are no cheap Eiffel Towers with clocks in them - only expensive ceramic Limoges versions, or expensive crystal versions. Doh!
McDonald's paper cups are the collection container of choice for most of the beggars in Paris.
1.60€ to ride the metro to almost anywhere in zone 1 of Paris is a very good deal. And the metros come almost every three minutes. Why can't we get public transportation like that?
We saw some of those real estate advertisements in windows. The cheapest flat we saw was one in Pigalle for 50,000€, and it was only about 10 metres squared. The most expensive apartment listed rang in at 675,000€.
I get a kick out of going to Notre Dame (or the Louvre, or the Mona Lisa, or the Eiffel Tower, etc) and seeing the hundreds of digital cameras being held high overhead. Yes, I know I do it too, but it still looks funny when you see a great crowd of upraised cameras.
 |
| My beloved Notre Dame |
Do people routinely tip in Europe? I'm not quite sure. At one restaurant, our bill was 35€ - I gave the server 40€ and let him keep the change, and he was deliriously happy.
Travel tip: It's much much much cheaper to avoid the tour companies and use the do-it-yourself route, if possible. While surfing the net before coming to Paris, I noted that you could book river cruises for US$75 - whereas our boat ride at Bateaux-Mouche was 7€. Ouch! Crazy! If you spend that much money on a boat ride, you're not going to be able to afford your Coke!
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