Paris

France, notoriously cranky people, supposedly brilliant cooking, and even better cheese. The people have so far lived up to their reputation as cranky, standoffish, and somewhat assholes. And you know what, I think I like it.

Its hard for me to say whether they really don't speak English, or simply refuse to do so for a lousy American such as myself. But no one, and I mean no one, speaks English (besides the billions of British tourists on holiday at the moment).

While we are on the topic of languages, to me French is extremely difficult to read, understand, and would be excruciating to learn. All of the le-this and les-those, with extra letters in every word, while some are never pronounced. French, to me is not an eloquent language, nor is english. Nothing is phonetic (fonetik), much like English. Compared to Czech, where it seemed like they tried to eliminate any extra letter in a word if it didn't serve a purpose (thus, you get the crazy symbols over all of their words, that are cues for pronunciation).

The French people: seemingly unhappy, and quite cranky that swarms of tourists have decended upon their beloved, and quite beautiful, city. If there are two things they hate, those would be Americans and Tourists. Considering that I fit into both categories, it may have a negative reflection on my view of the French people. They may look at you strange, or be unpleasant. Some are not even afraid to tell you how you are messing up the world (Iraq) with your "greatest export of democracy" while feeling the urge to "police the world."

While this may be true, I felt the need to remind the anti-americans that although we are in Iraq, not everyone supports (nor has ever supported) the war. Secondly, it is always fun to remind them of the world wars, where the French surrendered with absolutely no fight and how we saved their asses. Without us, I reminded them, they would be speaking German -- or even worse, Russian.

Laughs were to be had, a pat on the shoulder, and a glass of wine later, we kept a civil and light-hearted conversation about the (somewhat less fine) aspects of life in general. Needless to say, it was a strangely amazing experience to be had. Sure they gave us one of the greatest symbols in American culture, the Statue of Liberty, as well as some of the best art and music around.

Not all is bad in France, only some of the people.