PARIS—“Every man has two countries, his own andFrance,” says a character in a play by the 19th- century poet and playwright Henri de Bornier. In five and a half years living in Paris as an American correspondent, I have tried to make the country my own, knowing that I never will completely fit in, but always will be fascinated. So as I finish my stint as Paris bureau chief and move on to a new beat here, it seems a good moment to offer eight lessons learned.
1: Look in the Rear-View Mirror
To begin to understand France, you have to look back. The French are obsessed with history. Part of this feeling is a genuine affinity for the past, part a desire to cling to lost glory, part an insecurity that comes with a tepid economy and the struggle to integrate a growing Arab and African population.
Marie-Antoinette regularly makes the covers of magazines. So does Napoleon Bonaparte.
No anniversary is too minor to celebrate. In my time here, France has marked the 20th anniversary of France’s sinking ofGreenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior, the 200th anniversary of the high school baccalaureate diploma, the 60th anniversary of the bikini and the 100th anniversary of the brassiere.
For the 100th anniversary of her birth in January, Simone de Beauvoir was celebrated with half a dozen biographies, a DVD series, a three-day scholarly symposium and a cover of the magazine Le Nouvel Observateur with a nude photo of her from the back.
2: An Interview Is Sometimes Not an Interview
Their love of history doesn’t mean the French always render it accurately. It has long been common practice for journalists in France to allow their interview subjects to edit their words. “Read and corrected,” the system is called.
I once took part in an interview withJacques Chirac, when he was president, in which he said it would not be all that dangerous for Iran to have a nuclear weapon or two. That certainly was not French policy. So the official Élysée Palace transcript left out the line and replaced it with this: “I do not see what type of scenario could justify Iran’s recourse to an atomic bomb.”
The practice of doctoring the transcript has continued under PresidentNicolas Sarkozy.
Last month, the president lost his temper when a bystander refused to shake his hand at the annual agricultural fair. (A polite translation of what he said would be, “Get lost, you stupid jerk!”) The incident, captured on video, was seen by millions on the Internet.
According to the daily Le Parisien the next day, Mr. Sarkozy later expressed regret in an interview, saying, “It would have been better if I had not responded to him.” But the paper’s editor soon confessed that the words of regret were “never uttered.” They had been edited into the transcript by the Élysée Palace.
3: The Customer Is Always Wrong
It is hard for French merchants to admit they are wrong, and seemingly impossible for them to apologize. Instead, the trick is to somehow get the offended party to feel the mistake was his or her own. I’m convinced the practice was learned in the strict French educational system, in which teachers are allowed to tell pupils they are “zeros” in front of the entire class.
A doctor I know told me he once bought a coat at a small men’s boutique only to discover that it had a rip in the fabric. When he tried to return it, the shopkeeper gave him the address of a tailor who could repair it — for a large fee. They argued, and the doctor reminded the shopkeeper of the French saying, “The customer is king.”
“Sir,” the shopkeeper replied, “We no longer have a king in France.”
4: Make Friends With a Good Butcher
With food as important as it is here, one of the most important men in your life should be your butcher. Mine, Monsieur Yvon, is more than a cutter of meat. He is a playful spirit in a rather sober neighborhood — and the exception to the customer-is-always-wrong rule.
In his tiny shop on the Rue de Varenne, between the Luxembourg Gardens and Les Invalides in the Seventh Arrondissement, Monsieur Yvon has donned a necklace of his homemade sausages to get a conversation going. At Christmas, he and his team of butchers put on elves’ hats with blinking lights. He offers passers-by free charcuterie and glasses of Beaujolais nouveau every fall. He is so deeply trusted that when avian flu struck France, his poultry sales went up, not down.
