It was my first weekend in Paris, and I was nervously pacing around my tiny chambre de bonne, trying to gather up some courage. It was hard to actually pace, considering the miniscule floor space, but I tried. Living in a former maid's quarters isn't exactly luxurious, even if it is in a place as beautiful as Paris.
My host family was having a party in the apartment next door, and I was invited. I knew I was here to perfect my French, but a roomful of actual French people seemed pretty intimidating. After half an hour of fretting, I finally entered.
I shouldn't have worried. Right upon entering, I was offered copious amounts of champagne, food, and a cigarette by my host sister, an 18-year-old named Agathe (pronounced Uh-got). I accepted all but the cigarette.
If you want to know the major difference between an American party and a French f??te, it all comes down to the smoke. At almost any American party, if one wishes to enjoy a cigarette, one steps outside for a few minutes, so as not to upset any non-smoking guests. In France, this is rarely if ever a problem, as there are no non-smoking guests to upset - or if there are, they keep their mouths shut.
I expected the rampant smoking to be another unfilled stereotype, along with the supposed French rudeness - a stereotype I have not yet seen manifested. But I'm not exaggerating when I say that the apartment was filled with around fifty Frenchmen, all furiously smoking their Gauloises.
"We all start around [age] 13," Agathe told me, puffing away. This, despite huge labels on all cigarette cartons which literally read "SMOKING KILLS," sometimes with skull and crossbones. And somehow they still all live longer than us.
Parting the smoke cloud with my hands, I attempted conversation with some of the guests. It's an election year here and the presidential race is just heating up. I attempted to divine the major differences between the two candidates, one of whom is a woman.
The man I was talking to told me that it didn't matter much, it was still a "choice between one piece of merde or another piece of merde." I laughed. We say the same thing about our own candidates.
Then he asked me if I liked George Bush. Of course, I said, "Not at all. I hate him, everybody does now," to which he replied, "If everyone hates him, why was he reelected?" with a mischievous smile.
It would have been difficult to answer the question in English, let alone in French. After uttering something about John Kerry's lack of charisma, I petered out. He seemed dissatisfied with the answer. It was hard being the sole spokesman for my country.
Later, attempting the politics conversation again with a guy who seemed around my age, I was surprised to hear that he "admired" Jean Marie Le Pen, the xenophobic extremist candidate who won nearly 20 percent of the vote in France's 2002 elections. This was a candidate who openly wants to remove all immigrants from the country to purify France.
I was surprised to see someone so young have such an extreme and conservative political stance. France has had a lot of problems integrating its sizable Muslim immigrant communities, who often rebel violently. There seems to be a lot of racism against these "maghr?©bins" and none of it too subtle.
Obviously, racism is still a problem in the States, and yet it would be impossible to have a presidential candidate legitimately run for office while expounding racist views. The blatant racism of Le Pen is a little scary.
Steering myself clear of the political extremist, I rejoined my host sister who had become extremely inebriated. I saw her popping bottles across the room all night, and now it was clear she wasn't just being a good host.
Suddenly, she started speaking English to me. This was a surprise, as she told me she was currently taking German and had forgotten most of the English she had learned when she was young.
I told her that she knew more English than she let on, to which she replied, "Of course. When I'm drunk, I'm bilingual!" It certainly was true that it was easier for me to speak French after a few glasses of champagne.
And so, more than a little tipsy myself, I said my "au revoirs" and retreated to my cubby. Wine, cheese, cigarettes, political arguments, xenophobia - it was all so typically French. Peeling off my smoke-perfumed clothes I thought: Sometimes stereotypes really do come true.
-Adam Winograd is a junior majoring in international relations. He can be reached at Adam.Winograd@Tufts.edu
