Segment 11: Game of Shopkeepers
With the arrival of my dear friend Shaked to Paris for a few days this week, so arrived a certain gain in confidence for me to go out into Paris and interact with people without so much reservation. I would say that in general friends help me have more confidence in public settings because I can walk away from an interaction with a shopkeeper or waiter without replaying the scenario over and over in my head, whether good or, more usually, bad. The distraction of having someone with me who knows me and cares about me helps me not take on the weight of a disastrous interaction, or even one where I just felt like I couldn’t keep up (this happens ALL of the time… I hate it because, much like my father, I love to have cute little interactions with these working people as they go about their work and me my business). Though my spoken French is really developing swimmingly, it remains a challenge to understand what is being said to me in French. It is a language of vowels, of subtle shifts in the flow of sound that denote this or that. Understanding exact intention is difficult.
Knowing that Shaked was coming this week, I decided I would take advantage of our history of shopping for undergarments together and recruit her assistance to encourage me into a lingerie shop*. For context, when we were at Juilliard together, Shaked made a pointed suggestion that I should upgrade my underwear and since we had been wanting to venture down to Chinatown for dim sum anyway, we created an inclusive event for all interested parties of the vocal arts department to join us on a Saturday for “Dumplings and Panties.” Someone should really concoct a series for Netflix with that title. We repeated this event on a second occasion thanks to semi-annual sales. We are currently in the season of semi-annual sales in France, so the timing was perfect. As we were walking home after a delicious, though heavy, formule lunch (basically the best deal for getting a good meal in Paris: go for lunch and order that day’s lunch formula: appetizer/main dish/dessert/wine or some combination of those options), and we happened across a French chain lingerie store.
*I write all of this not to share with the world my underwear habits, rather to underline an example of shopping. Please stay with me and I promise it won’t be graphic…
With the confidence I gained from having my dear friend with me, I navigated the questions from the sales ladies and finally ended up with what I needed. I think it probably helped my courage, too, knowing that I could help my friend with my French skills. Together we traversed a complicated menu change at our lunch restaurant, a pharmacist who was engaged with an old woman describing what seemed like every maladie of her lifetime (we decided to leave, but when we said “Au revoir!”, the pharmacist said, “Mais pourquoi?/But why?” I told her it was taking a long time. “Et qu’est-ce que ça veut dire?/And what’s that supposed to mean?” I said that we had been waiting a long time. But anywhere you go you will have to wait in a queue. And then she got us what we needed while the old woman continued her memoir.), an clerk at a paper store who was very excited to find us exactly what we were looking for and give us advice on precisely how to fix it up (which included a basic instruction for Shaked in English and then asking me in French if she understood… men!), a friendly young shopkeeper at a tea shop (while checking out, she asked me something about a bag. I assumed she was asking if I wanted one, because that would be usual, so I replied no, before actually comprehending that the question was if I would use my own bag, so I quickly back-tracked to correct myself. At this point, I usually get strange looks, but the woman was very friendly, laughed and was unbothered. Thus I even had the courage to add that non is my go to response and she said she does the same thing sometimes. *contented sigh* I am not alone!), and finally a chocolatier who served us a sumptuous little cake (see the photo below!) quietly, but with a smile (when I asked him if it was a good choice, he smiled with a sparkle in his eye and said, “Non”). I think I had hardly had that many interactions with strangers in France in the past three months, although, when I went and bought boots, that probably counted for several because that woman had a lot to say and I did a lot of nodding…
Today I skipped class because we have had a sub teacher for the last few weeks who is driving me crazy. It would be one thing if she was driving me crazy AND we were learning everyday, but after a couple days when the lessons lacked any direction or focus, and a mounting level of anxiety each day, I decided to give myself the luxury of skipping class. I hope our regular teacher will return next week or before the end of the semester, but there is a possibility that she won’t… I will return next week, whoever the teacher is, but I hope the actual teaching/learning picks up and the haranguing/tangents/uncomfortable joking winds down…
In lieu of class, I decided to take advantage of the season of sales and do some shopping that I have been apt to put off for… too long. I had more confidence after the shopping adventures with Shaked, but admittedly, less success. In the first shop, I made eye contact with the male cashier, who was young and very good-looking, before getting in line to check-out (to buy the items, that is ;-). I bashfully looked away because I am a 28-year-old scaredy-cat, but had to confront his perfect dark curls and smiling eyes when I went to check-out (again, the items). I thought the interaction started out just fine, but as is usual in these circumstances, as soon as the cashier hears something in my grammar that suggests that I am not perfectly fluent, they cut any extra questions or small talk. Usually I am kind of glad for this, because I don’t feel as self-conscious when I didn’t understand what they said. But admittedly, I also feel like a bit of a failure, like I let my “‘Murica” show. Alas, dreamy eyes (thanks to COVID, I have no idea if the same can be said about the bottom half of his face), after asking some simple question with those sparkling eyes, that I subsequently fumbled the answer for, seemed less interested in dealing with my bafouillage (this word is so good in French, I can’t bring myself to write a translation for it). However, when my card didn’t read the first time, he was forced to. I will say, as much as I fought his switching to English by replying “Oui” to the question “Do you speak English?” (in English) and replying in French to his subsequent questions in English, he seemed awfully keen to use his cutely tentative English skills, and those eyes kept smiling as I handed him my ID and finally made some charming quip in English as I left. Ha!
Slightly less charming, but just as much of a fail for me, in the next shop, I was closely looking at cosmetic products, when a shopkeeper, a woman in her 50s, came my way to restock some shelves and read me like a book. Those who know me know that my eyes generally communicate quite well whatever is going on in my noggin’, which is great on the stage, but not always the best when I don’t have a positive reaction to something (like reacting to criticism in real time…). She playfully commented that she had scared me. She didn’t know that my fear was that she would try to help me. A minute or so later, she was singing along to the music playing in the shop, so I smiled at her and asked if they always played the same music. She replied that she just really liked that song and asked if I knew it. I did not and she said in jest (in French), that it must because she was so old. I said, “Non!” and she said who-knows-what, and not knowing how to respond- bafouillage. Despite all of my success up to that point, ENGLISH. Aww man!
Nevertheless, I recognize that my success today is that I went out and did it! I went into those stores by myself after weeks of walking past them and thinking, “Hmm, maybe I should go in there to look for this thing I need… Nah, I’ll go some other time.” It’s growth!
Bon weekend, mes amies :-)
Marie in Paris
Pics from left to right: with my cousin Susanna on New Year’s Day; Invalides on my walk to church; Galettes with Shaked; that little cake that was “not” a good choice ;-)