#55 - Very French Things – Whacky & whimsical ways of life France!

In this episode we explore some of the things that are unique in French culture, charming, funny or perhaps just a little odd. A chicken beauty contest, people making pig noises, dogs in restaurants and dipping bread in coffee, plus more weird and wonderful very French things!  

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• 0:00 Intro
• 2:11 Very French Things
• 13:45 Where to find us

Transcript

Podcast 55 : Very French Things – Whacky & whimsical ways of life France!

Janine: Bonjour and welcome to the Good Life France podcast – everything you want to know about France and more. I’m your host Janine Marsh, I’m an author and travel writer and though I was born in London, UK, I now live in a tiny village in the far north of France with dozens and dozens of animals including 6 cats plus one new kitten, Smudge, who turned up a couple of weeks ago and decided our house is where he wants to live. I also have 4 ducks, umpteen chickens no one else wants, mad ducks and mean geese, plus a dove called Doris who has a broken wing and can’t fly, and a hedgehog called Charlie who lives on our terrace. Just call me Dr. Doolittle! I travel round France, exploring every nook and cranny to share with you and when I do, my husband Mark stays home to look after all the animals. And when I’m not travelling, writing or looking after animals, I love to chat to you on this podcast with my podcast partner Olivier. 

Olivier: Bonjour, I’m Olivier, Oli for short. You may not be able to tell but I am from France, though I lived in the UK for 20 years so I think I sound almost British. When I am not at work presenting the drive time slot on a big radio station in lovely Lyon where I live, or playing fabulous French chansons on my own radio station called Paris Chanson, or looking after my one cat… yes just one, it’s enough for me… I love chatting to you on this podcast too! 

But that’s enough about us and our animals! Let’s get stuck into today’s topic. Janine, tell us what we are going to be talking about in this episode.  

Janine: Today we are going to talk about Very French Things. I was being interviewed last week for a US newspaper about my life in France and the interviewer said to me “is there anything you find culturally different about living in France” and I thought – are you kidding missus? How long have you got?! So today we’re going to talk about things that are unique in French culture, charming, funny or perhaps just a little odd… 

Olivier: That sounds fun, though it may be that your idea of odd and mine are different!  So let’s get started and talk “Very French Things”.

Olivier: Even though I’m French, after living in the UK for two decades, there are definitely some things I noticed when I came back that seem very French to me now. Like pharmacies. In the UK, you will get a pharmacy in the bigger towns or in shopping centres. In France it feels like every village has a pharmacy. I think that it may be entirely possible that we have the world's highest concentration of pharmacies per square mile in France.

Janine: So true! We don’t have any shops at all in my village but the nearest village with shops is a few miles away and has one small supermarket, one restaurant, one bar, two florists – opposite each other, and a pharmacy. There is always a little old lady sitting on a chair in the pharmacy waiting for her pills and listening to everything you say when you speak to the pharmacist – and then sharing the juicy details with everyone she knows. And I mentioned two florists in a village of a few hundred people – well alongside having the world’s highest concentration of pharmacies, I think it’s possible France also holds the record for florists!  

Olivier: It’s true French people love to give bunches of flowers for birthdays, anniversaries, as dinner party gifts, at Christmas. It’s a tradition to do this and so there’s a lot of need for florists. 

Janine: There’s a whole culture around choosing the right flowers and creating a bouquet in France. There’s even a big France wide contest for the best florist in France, called the Coupe de France. Which leads me to another very French thing. MOFs. Not the flying winged creatures but Meilleur Ouvrier de France, commonly called MOF, means “best craftsman of France” and it is a title that is awarded to the best of the best.

Olivier: Ah yes, this is very French – we love a competition here. The concept was created in 1924. It’s a way of preserving and promoting traditional crafts. There are about 200 categories of awards for more than 180 professions including pastry making and cheese making, stained glass and violin making, book binding and boot making, hairdressing and denture making, even spectacles and boiler making. It’s sort of like the Olympics for manual trades, with medals awarded to winners.

Janine: Winners are allowed to wear the coveted red, white, and blue collar on their shirts, aprons etc. It’s an honour so revered that it is illegal, an imprisonable offence, to wear it if you aren’t entitled to.

Oli: A contest is held every three or four years and each competitor must produce “one or more masterpieces” or participate in live tests. They train for months, sometimes years, spending hundreds and hundreds of hours perfecting their skills. Each candidate is given a certain amount of time and basic materials in order to create a few masterpieces. 

Janine: Juries consisting of 3000 volunteers are involved in judging the demanding and sometimes fiendishly complex tasks that competitors must fulfil to prove their mastery of their profession. They are judged not just on the end result, but on their techniques, speed and savoir faire – their know how. Thousands of applicants are whittled down to a handful of winners who are presented with a medal go to a party hosted by the French President at the Elysée Palace.

Oli: The MOF title is granted for life and those who hold it are considered caretakers, keepers of their craft. They must uphold standards of excellence, and pass their knowledge on.

Janine: If you visit France you might spot the blue, white and red collars that MOFs wear, especially in boulangeries and patisseries, or you’ll see it on the awning of the shops or in shop windows – then you know that here you will find those who have been judged the best of the best. Very French and yes the French are very competitive which leads me to our next very French thing. The number of contests the French hold. It’s not just for skills – it’s for the best bread, best croissants, favourite markets, favourite villages, favourite monuments, best baguette, best speller, best cake or tart best baker and - even chickens. 

Oli: We grow up learning that competition is good in France I think. For instance at school we get given little cards if we do well, they’re called bon points, good points, and parents can buy them to give to kids at home too, it’s about merit, a reward system for doing well, being good, working hard. We are encouraged to join debating societies and win contests for talking. It’s true we are very competitive but it’s always about quality over quantity. Wait a minute did you just say chicken contests? 

Janine: Yes! My neighbour introduced me to the Mademoiselle Poule and Monsieur Coq, Miss Chicken and Mr Cockerel contest – a beauty pageant for chickens in France! You can post a photo of your chicken online and a bit about their personality, like one I read was: “My name is Flora. I had an accident, I broke my leg. Instead of eating me, my owner took me to the vet and now I am a pet with one leg! I’m good, I eat, lay eggs and I hop! I love tomatoes and sunbathing!” And people vote for their favourite chicken! 

Oli: Ok that’s a little odd. How about though a pig squealing contest for humans?! Ever August enthusiastic competitors imitate the noises pigs make in front of crowds of fans. Happy pigs, sad pigs, sleeping pigs – all sorts of noises. Do you want to try Janine, you might have a secret skill. 

Janine: How do you know it’s secret? Lol. Ok here is my happy pig noise but it’s in a joke. A man goes to the doctor and he says Doctor, doctor, I’m not feeling very well. And the doctor says, what’s wrong, how do you feel. And the man says I feel like a pig. And the doctor says, how long have you been feeling like that. And the man says about a “weeeeek”. 

Oli: I’m not sure what to say. But I don’t think the pig squealing champion needs to worry too much that you will take away his medals! Ok let’s talk about another Very French Thing that I have noticed coming back to France. Dogs. Or more precisely dogs in restaurants and shops. I had forgotten about this French habit when I was in England and coming back to France, I really notice how much French people love to take their dogs to the restaurant with them. I’m not talking doggy diners, I mean normal restaurants.  Do you take your dogs Janine? 

Janine: That’s never ever going to happen, Ronnie and Reggie Kray the labradors would be going mad trying to eat everything in sight, Lady and Nina the Australian Shepherds would run amok grinning at everyone and barking hello to them, I can’t even imagine the horror of my four going to a place where there is food in their sights. But my friend Annette takes her little bichon frise dog everywhere, it sits on her lap in the restaurant –it’s very well behaved. 

Oli: Generally speaking many restaurants allow dogs if they are well behaved, but they’re not allowed to sit on the furniture, at your feet, or on your lap. Dogs aren’t allowed anywhere near where food is being prepared or stored so some restaurants that have open kitchens will not allow dogs. But it’s been quite a surprise for me to see dogs sitting in restaurants! And queuing up in bakeries and even in shops and supermarkets! 

Janine: Talking of bakeries here is an odd cultural thing in France – dipping your croissant in your coffee, or your tartine, which sounds posh but is really a bit of yesterday’s baguette with butter and or jam on. Who dips bread in their coffee apart from French people. No one I suspect because that’s just weird.

Oli: Have you tried it? 

Janine: No, I find the idea horrible. Soggy bread. Just no. And melted butter floating on the top of the coffee. Eugh. The first time I saw someone in France do that, I nearly fell off my chair in shock. This is the land of haute cuisine, of cordon bleu, Michelin starred restaurants, superstar chefs. Dipping buttered bread in coffee. Just no. 

Oli: You should try it – it’s delicious! And another thing I have noticed is how important our social customs are. For instance, if I was lost in the UK I would just say: excuse me, could you please tell me the way to somewhere and I would either be told the way or told I don’t know. But in France we find it intolerable, impossible, incomprehensible not to acknowledge someone before we interact with them before we ask them a question. 

Janine: That’s so true – I have got used to it now and I always say Bonjour – please could you tell me the way to somewhere – because if I don’t the person might not answer out of shock that I didn’t say bonjour first! 

Oli: Bonjour is possibly the most important word in France. It is NOT acceptable to walk into a shop, browse, then ask a question about the merchandise. As soon as you walk in, you should say “Bonjour!” to the staff, then you may browse. If you need to ask a question, it’s best to start with “Pardon,” to get their attention. 

Janine: Ah yes, shopping in France leads me to another Very French Thing. You might be American, British, Australian, Japanese or from one of the other more than 150 countries listening in to this podcast. And you might be used to going to shops where the customer is king or have a job where you need to bend over backwards to please the client because otherwise you might get fired, and then how will you pay the mortgage, the bills, access healthcare. In France – this is not a problem. The French work to live not live to work. The customer is not always king! 

Olivier: Indeed in France everyone is equal in the eyes of the law, though of course some may be more equal than others, and everyone has universal healthcare and it’s not easy to fire someone. 

Janine: I think it actually might be impossible to fire someone in France! Sacre Bleu.

Oli: No one says sacre bleu anymore!

Janine: I do. Lol! And I am going to end on one more Very French Thing to love. Amazing cakes, bread and pastries – nowhere else in the world does baking like the French. But also nowhere else has a war on the pronunciation of a popular pastry. Pain au chocolat or chocolatine? 

Oli: Well here in the south we say chocolatine.

Janine: And in the north we say pain au chocolat. 

Oli: You say potato

Janine: I say potarto. And before we go further with the whole tomato/tomarto thing and call the whole thing off – we hope you’ve enjoyed this look at some of the unique, charming and fun cultural differences that France is proud of! 

We just want to say a huge thank you to all of you listening to our podcast and to everyone for sharing it too. We really love sharing the France we know and love with you, the authentic and real France with its wonderful history, culture, gastronomy, wine and more. It always amazes us that people are listening in about 150 countries around the world!

Janine: Yes thank you so much everyone, wherever you are, we really appreciate it. You’ve been listening to me Janine Marsh and Olivier Jauffrit. You can find Oli at parischanson.fr playing heaps of great music, and you can find me and a ton of information about France – where to visit, culture, history, recipes – everything France - at thegoodlifefrance.com where you can subscribe to the podcast, a weekly newsletter about France and my totally brilliant, completely free magazine which you can read at magazine.thegoodlifefrance.com.

But for now, it’s au revoir from me.

Olivier: And goodbye from me.

Janine: Speak to you soon!