If only "Hung Up" rang true in Paris. Alas, time does not go by so slowly, and I find myself feeling mournful that it's almost week five, almost May, especially because I'll be traveling three weekends next month. Even though I'm excited to see more of Europe it means time in Paris is growing precious. Quel dommage! To console myself I have gotten a delicious (though 5-euro! Oh, the price of happiness...) double-café and, as the French would say, "installed myself" at a lovely café with wireless. We discovered it a few nights ago. Anyhow, to console myself further, and to make Paris seem less wonderful in my head, let me indulge in a list of Things The French Simply Don't Understand.

:: Scarves are no longer appropriate attire when the weather's in the eighties. I don't care how eurotrashy you want to be. No.

:: I thought the Age of Rollerblades was happily behind us, but not in France; everyone's always rolling down the rues on skates. I've even seen people wearing them on the métro and rolling between trains, as ludicrous as that sounds.

:: Cold coffee drinks can be delicious. But no, coffee is always hot in France (well, never quite hot; closer to lukewarm). I can't even tell you how much I'm craving a Frappuccino as the temperatures climb higher and higher! But I've sworn I won't go to Starbuck's more than once, and that the one time will be sometime after week six, and only if I really need it. Considering how unbearably hot it already is I probably will, though.

:: If I want to do my laundry at three in the morning I should be able to, dammit! What's the point of having laundry machines sit idle and useless for ten hours a day? What's the point, indeed, of pretending that France goes to sleep at 12:30 when the amount of people around each night clearly shows otherwise?

:: I am capable of buying eyedrops. I do not need to have a long, involved conversation (broken French on my end and broken English on his) with the Pharmacien about the dryness of my eyes. Seriously, France. Similarly, I don't need help picking out medicine. Maybe if I'm really sick. But I should be able to breeze into the store and get some Day-Quil if I want it.

:: Littering is not cool. Seriously. What a strange contrast! Here the lights and showers are on timers and the people supposedly care about the environment, but French people leave litter behind like Hansel and Gretl leave bread crumbs. They also seem to think that the space between the subway platform and the subway is an appropriate place for their garbage.

That's just the beginning. They can be a puzzling people! I am still shocked by how different France feels. I just assumed rich Western cultures were fairly homogeneous, but being here feels much more foreign than I ever thought it would.

All that aside, I'm obviously still having a wonderful time. Paris has many good qualities, and I still think its physical beauty is enough to make me forgive all its sins. The French, too, are more good than bad. There are many things I think they do better than any other country, and I've had enough nice interactions with French people. For example, my friends and I went on Wednesday to the train station to buy tickets for our upcoming trip through France (more on that later! Get excited for that blog entry :D) and the man at the ticket counter sat with us for literally forty minutes helping us plan. He was incredibly nice, even though it was obvious we were complete fools; he played with the tickets and stops to make it much cheaper for us (doing things like booking one segment as a long trip with a layover instead of two separate trips) and spoke French, even though his name tag said he spoke English, too. I think he found us amusing, and a little ridiculous. But better than finding us annoying! We all laughed a lot. It was more fun than buying train tickets should be.

Dammit, now look at me, making the French look good again! I need to console myself more. Time for some gelato.

À bientôt, beloved readers!