Over the years, we’ve been asked time and again for advice on reserving, understanding menus and ordering if friends, relatives, posters, etc., think their French is limited, and I’ll tell you, no one is more deficient than I, just ask my French friends.
But despite my horrible French, deplorable accent (I consider it a compliment to be asked if I’m Belgian or Swiss) and dumb façade, I have testicles of - would it be zinc or tin? - and I just keep soldiering on. A revered professor of Psychiatry of mine once said near the end of my training – “just keep listening, John, eventually the patient will tell you what’s going on.” Thank you – Dr. Kolb.
So, despite my Eurotrash clothes, my crummy Greek medical giveaway briefcase and Navigo pass; my height and demean give me away every time, but my rule is – just play dumb, just hang in there.
So, the day I wrote this I went to a place in the deepest 12th (annoyed reader(s), please don’t write saying it’s really near 4 Metros and very accessible) and thought I was relatively incognito (ha); after all, until 4 Bulgarians showed up, no English was heard, the place was full of Bobo’s and Branchéistes and I was sitting minding my own business, ready to order.
Except that the table wobbled. So I made my dumb-sign and the terrifically nice chief lady (I’d call her a girl but that would get me in a heap of hurt with the feminist side of my family) came over to fix it. She said in French – “shall I fix it?” I said in French “Sure.” Then she repeated “may I fix it?” but this time in English. Oy.
Previously, on my morning run/jog/walk/limpies I came a different way than usual (I was taking pix of some North African places for a friend) and came by an Indian resto that said “English Speak here.” OK.
“Have you finally gone off the edge here, John,”
“Dad, get to the point.”
The point is that Anglophonic people are worried waitfolk in France won’t understand them ; when making reservations, when looking at the menu, when ordering. But it’s not true.
Since every French person has 12 years of English at a minimum, they can and do understand you. 55% are petrified that the nun will rap their knuckles if they pronounce “that” - “zat.” 35% want to help you, they believe service is a service industry, they just need encouragement, and the other 10% desperately want to speak English so they can, what? “Work at Air France?” I dunno.
Footnote : Don’t look for places with menus (cartes) in English, for all sorts of reasons, (mis- or robo-translations, sitting next to people who are, godforbid, American, not to mention eating dumbed-down food) ; look, you know the words, that is, presuming you cook or read cook books – sautéed, melange, tartare, terrine, mi-cuit and so forth.
It’s not Bulgarian.
Someone once asked me why, if I lived in France I didn’t speak French, and I was stunned – because……..
The resto discussed here was :
Les Temps Modernes
91, rue de Charenton in the 12th (Metro: Gare de Lyon)
T: 01.43.46.81.94
Open 7/7
Weekday menu = 13.50, a la carte 30-40 €.
Hello,
I think you mean "rap their knuckles", after rapping, the knuckles may need to be wrapped[covered] ,depending how violent the nun!
Posted by: rpc | October 12, 2010 at 11:40 PM
wrap after rap. thanks
Posted by: John Talbott | October 13, 2010 at 01:58 AM