[...] > The worst example of refusal to even try was the English > family I encountered who had been in Paris for a week, only > ever shouted at the French in English, and complained that > they hadn't eaten any decent food since they had been there:
One of my non-francophone friends complains that he can never find anywhere in France that serves decent food. It's probably because he doesn't know how to ask for it or read the menu properly. > hardly surprising, what they did eat probably contained > significant amounts of sputum too after they had abused the > staff..they were also seated in what I discovered later was > in fact one of the worst restaurants on the Champs-Elysée. > I suspect that's a crowded field. I've never eaten on the Champs Elysees - in fact, I think I've only ever had coffee there once, it's such a rip-off, and I haven't even been there for about 25 years. My father took us all to Paris for a weekend about 20 years ago. My girlfriend and I, as 'old Paris hands', went off on our own itinerary for the first day, leaving the rest of the (not-very-francophone) family to explore 'les incontournables de Paris'. When we met up later we discovered they'd paid about 450FF (about £45-) on the Champs Elysees for 2 coffees, and later been served with some fairly disgusting food because they didn't know what they were asking for - eg ordering rognons de veau thinking it would be a veal cutlet. I've felt guilty ever since that we didn't look after them a bit better. My guess is that people who've taken against the French may have done so because they've fallen into some spectacular tourist trap and extrapolated from that, as if horrible tourist traps don't exist in every popular destination. > Faut être sympa, je crois! > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
