Paris

We're going to Paris!!!

Scott gets to go to France for 10 days with his MBA program this spring. He'll be visiting different businesses and writing his FINAL papers as a student, as well as enjoying his first visit to Europe.

Spouses are invited on the business trip, but I thought it would be a little bit more fun meeting him after his school trip to have our own adventure. We keep trying to squeeze in as many trips as we can before we have kids and have ended up getting a few more than we've bargained for. This opportunity was too perfect to pass up. Who knows if we'll ever make it back to France or Europe? I'm obsessed! It's hard to think about anything else.

Scott is always begging or half teasing me to help write his papers or read his text books. His requests are shut down quickly. It wasn't until his monthly France class that one of his books caught my eye. I've started reading the book "Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong" written by Jean-Benoit Nadeau & Julie Barlow. I'm just getting started on the book, but have already discovered some interesting things about France...

*One French custom is their habit of saying bonjour and au revoir every time you come in and out of a store. These are the magic words to getting good service. You have to say bonjour when entering a store (looking at the owner in the eyes) and au revoir when you leave, even if the owner isn't there -- in which case, if it's a neighborhood store, another customer may answer for him. If you enter without uttering the password, the owner or other regulars will frown at you.

*I've always heard how the French are rude and don't like Americans. Apparently, if you begin speaking to them in French they're much for sympathetic. An important phrase to begin conversations for us will be "i'm sorry i don't speak French well". I'm feeling a little guilty for the times I've been to Italy and never tried to learn any Italian phrases.

*Waitressing is considered a career in France. They are paid a salary. They won't ask you throughout the meal how you're enjoying your food or refill your water like we're use to. nothing is rushed. when you're finished YOU have to alert your waiter for the check. and no tipping because it is already included.

*The French don't snack or eat on the run, which is perhaps why they are so thin for eating such delicious food. The authors received odd looks when eating an apple on the elevator.

*Names are considered too personal to give out to strangers.

*The police decide the two times a year stores can have sales on their merchandise called Les Soldes. Unfortunately those times are in Mid January to Mid February and Mid June to Mid July.

If you have any ideas for us let us know.