I wanted to name my blog "I Married a French Woman and Other Horror Stories", but that would have made the blog name too long. But, you must understand: the "horror stories" part is not an exaggeration.
Before I begin, let me tell you what this blog is NOT about: it is not about the fantastic amount of paperwork and bureaucratic rigmarole one has to go through to get married in France, especially when you are a foreigner marrying a French national; it is NOT about learning a confoundedly difficult language which the French, for reasons that I will discuss later, mistakenly believe to be the most beautiful in the world; and, lastly, it is NOT about mastering the innumerable permutations that can result from combining nearly 300 types of cheeses, three or four dozen regional cuisines, each with dozens of dishes, and a seemingly endless list of chateaux specific wines from a myriad of regions.
It is more about trying to cope with two of the most intractable traits of the French character: Gallic price (read boneheaded stubbornness) and the other world form of logic, which seems a product imported from Bizarro World, that rules everyday life in France.
To illustrate the first point, let me transcribe a recent conversation with my wife:
My wife: (Sounds of glass breaking) Ah, zut, alors!
Me: (Interrupting my perusing of Le Monde): What's the matter, darling?
My wife: I cut my finger with this broken glass:
Me: (Getting up from my comfortable chair to inspect the wound) Darling, what happened?
My wife: I was taking these glasses to the table outside and they broke.
Me: Darling, you have to stop rushing around and be more careful.
My wife: It was not my rushing around; it was that I was in a hurry.
Me: Dear, that's my point: you rush around or hurry, if you will, when there is no need. You have to be more careful and do things in a calm...
My wife: (Interrupting) I was not rushing around; I was hurrying and running because I wanted to get this done quickly.
Me: Yes, well that's my point: you were rushing, or hurrying as you call it and...
My wife: Please do not insist that I was rushing around! It was that I WAS IN A HURRY, can't you understand that? I was doing things fast, quickly, as I usually do, because I like to do things quickly, not rushing around...
Me: Well, it might be a difference of semantics but the point is that you should try to do things calmly: this is the third thing you break, not this week, just this day!
My wife: You must stop accusing me of this rushing around! I work quickly, and in a hurry, and per'aps, too fast but I never rush around!
SECOND EXAMPLE
My wife: (Trying to pick up a crepe with her fingers from a hot skillet) Aye!
Me: Dear, use a palette to pick up the...
My wife: I do not need anything; I have fireproof fingers (burning herself again) Aye!
Me: Dear, you are burning your fingers every time you...
My wife: I am not burning my fingers; the problem is that the skillet is too hot.
Me: Of course the skillet is hot, we are making crepes and the skillet is on the burner. If you used a...
My wife: I do not need anything. My grandmother never used anything, my mother never used anything, I do not use anything...the French never use anything to turn over a crepe.
Me: So, you are telling me that the French are smart enough to build the world's largest airplane, not not smart enough to use something to turnover a crepe instead of burning their bare fingers.
My wife: We do not burn our fingers; the problem is that the skilled is hot!
As you can see, Gallic pride shares a common border with Bizarro Logic. You have to live with a French person to begin to understand how this strange mixture operates in the real world.
I am Mexican, and I have learned Mexican cooking from my mother and grandmother; my wife and I have traveled in Mexico extensively and she has loved the Mexican dishes she has had there; she has watched Mexican women in the markets prepare Mexican dishes in the traditional way, with traditional ingredients. YET, when we decide to make Mexican food in France she argues that I am not preparing Mexican dishes correctly, NOT because I am not following the traditional Mexican way of preparing Mexican dishes using authentic Mexican ingredients, but rather because I am not following the FRENCH idea of what Mexican dishes should be. Example:
Me: Ok, so now we beat the egg white until it is fluffy and coat the stuffed peppers with it and...
My wife: We do not need to beat the egg white. We will use it as is and also use the yolk...
Me: But, you know that the egg has to be beaten to a stiff foam; you saw Mexican women prepare the stuffed peppers in the market!
My wife: Yes, but WE French never beat the egg white; we prefer it just like that...liquid.
Me: But, but, this is a Mexican dish, and Mexican dishes are NOT French cooking, you know...
My wife: Nevertheless, in France one never beats the egg whites...
Of course, the dish was a disaster. The stuffed peppers instead of being coated with egg looked like they had fallen into scrambled eggs. She, nevertheless, proclaimed the Mexican stuffed peppers a success because the French know more about Mexican cooking than the Mexicans!
In the next posting I will share an example of the incomparable French sense of logic.
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