Etiquette part 2

What is perceived to be rude in one culture is not a big issue in another. One year I worked in the lost luggage department of Nice airport. There were two things that would annoy my French colleagues more than anything else. A passenger would come to the desk obviously distressed and worried that their luggage hadn’t appeared on the belt. ‘My luggage didn’t arrive’ the mostly northern European would start, losing them all goodwill with my colleague. After saying ‘Bonjour monsieur’ demonstrative my colleague would curtly take their details while muttering under their breath ‘it doesn’t hurt to be polite.’  It doesn’t bother me so much, we northern Europeans like to get to the point quickly, but if you want to get good friendly service here in France you have to start with a bonjour.

The other thing that got my colleagues riled up was the comment after some waiting on luggage, whether we were on strike. After about 5 occasions that started to annoy me too. Mostly those remarks resulted in us closing the desk and going for a quick coffee, rather than suffer the snide remarks. The Passenger meanwhile thought we might be going behind the scenes to speed up the delivery of luggage. I knew the baggage handlers would probably have 2 arrivals at the same time and would get to it once the other plane was unloaded and there was nothing else we could do.

This leads me to finish with bizarre things people forget to take of the belt or get delivered by mistake. It is beyond me why you would forget to uplift your lawnmower or riffle. I don’t think the customer who ordered eight boxes of meat from the USA would have been very happy that his boxes got put with the passenger’s baggage on the belt instead of going to freight and their refrigeration unit. It spend the whole morning in the hot baggage hall before some customs and security could be found to take it to freight. I would just advise all passengers on airlines to label their luggage and please avoid putting perishables in your suitcase.

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Here are some other great blogs to check out:
http://imagineerebooks.wordpress.com/2013/10/19/blog-browser-day-19th-october-2013

Etiquette

Language in the blood is all about blending in; to live amongst humans as a vampire without being detected. Cameron also successfully pretends to be French on occasion. I’m doing very badly at pretending to be French; I’m too tall, too blond and too pale to be passed off as a local. If anyone had any doubts still, they are soon put to rights by hearing me speak.

Local etiquette can be tricky; one of the things I dreaded most about moving here was the ‘Bisou’; the polite peck on the cheeks that the French greet each other with. Having lived in Scotland for many years, I’d grown quite accustomed to greeting without physical contact, or at worst a handshake. In the Netherlands we greet friends and family with 3 kisses, but here complete strangers plant their lips on my face!

The custom varies from region to region. In and around Monaco it is two kisses, but if you go north it can be three or even four kisses. Not knowing of forgetting can lead to some awkward moments. I have learned over time that people here are aware that the Anglo-Saxons are uncomfortable with the ’Bisou’ and if I stick my hand out and keep my distance, they are not insulted. If you get introduced to a colleague or mutual acquaintance you have to be quick though in holding out your hand otherwise you receive two kisses before you know it. (Must find dark room to rock back and forwards in to hug myself out of that traumatic experience!)

At work, thankfully, we have done away with any physical contact. The greeting includes a bonjour, a privet or a ni hau and that’s it; ready to start the day in a friendly way without making anyone feel uncomfortable. At my husband’s work however, the ‘Bisou’ has been taken to a whole other level. Once you arrive in the office, you go around all your colleagues and either shake their hand or kiss them. A fabulous way to waste a good portion of the workday!  

I will say this for the custom, especially with flu season approaching. Viruses are easier transmitted by handshakes than by a kiss on the cheek, so maybe they are on to something after all.

Trains

I wasn’t going to moan about the French being on strike. It is an unfair stereo type. Most people here on the Côte d’Azur work very hard for not much money. If you are lucky enough to work for the government, then I’m sure you don’t want to see your wages and conditions being cut. Like Cameron I’m not very interested in politics and I’m not going to start now so I took very little note of what the dispute was actually about. But the second train strike in as many months is a bloody pain in the backside!

I live in one of the most congested stretches of land in France; the Côte d’Azur is just a small strip of land squeezed between the hills and the sea. When I came to live here I thought local public transport was wonderful; clean, frequent and cheap, until I got my first job. I soon had to buy a scooter as the bus to my local place of work stopped driving at 7.30pm and we had to work till 8pm. I was surprised everyone has a car here as the train and the bus are just so cheap. Now I know, you do need a plan B. 

I hate taking the car to Monaco, with toll roads and parking it works out at about 8X the price of my rail card and as there was a strike, the roads were very congested. Mind you it is hard to stay annoyed long on the Côte d’Azur; the sun is shining, I’m able to sit and write my blog outside, surrounded by palm trees and tonight I won’t have to run down that hill to catch the 20.13 train home, instead I get to drive around the Monaco circuit like a formula one driver.

Needless to say, that book two is going to be influenced by commuting and Cameron will at some point take a train. A large part of the second book is being written on the train and in Monaco station, and I hope tomorrow we will be back to normal.

Planet money, not  a bad place to be writing your book:

Language

The world is becoming a global village. No more so than on planet money where aliens of many continents visit every day. Coming from a small country like the Netherlands you learn very early on that people within an hour’s car drive speak a different language. If you want to play with the other children on the French or German camping site, you have to learn. English and German came to me easier than French though. I do struggle daily with communication and it was a huge influence in the story line of Language in the blood. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I could just bite someone like Cameron does and absorb the language of that person perfectly?

Wishful thinking and I don’t think I’m the only one. At work we speak combined; English, Russian, Chinese, Arabic, German, Dutch, Italian, Japanese and some very bad French. My French colleagues, who are in the minority, must cringe sometimes at the weird language we concoct to communicate with each other. The other day my colleague described a bird as an aggressive pigeon as she couldn’t think of the word for eagle. This makes Planet money a fun place too, you have a giggle and you absorb each others cultures and languages by struggling on together. It might take a bit longer than Cameron’s method but slowly, very slowly, I’m absorbing. I do now know some pleasantries in the all the above languages.

The reason it took me so long to write my first book (I’m in my 40’s) is partly due to my teachers. Like Cameron I wasn’t particularly academically gifted and I found it hard to concentrate. I did like to write stories, but my humorless teachers never gave me any feedback on my writings, I just got handed back a paper covered in red correction marks and a concerned look; why can’t this child spell? I just gave up on writing. I chose to go into vocational training at 16 and everyone agreed that making jewellery was a better outlet for my creativity.

Now with the help of a computer with a spell checker, thicker skin and a very helpful editor, I had another stab at writing. Feedback has been great so far and I just received a four star review, but I know my book isn’t a work of literature; it wasn’t meant to be, If I raise a smile I’ll be happy. Language is a way to communicate; if it does more it’s a bonus. To teachers I would like to say: don’t get your knickers in a twist, there is more to language than spelling and grammar and never let any one stop you from expressing yourself.

Different boat people

This week Cameron’s acquaintances have been in town as the Monaco yacht show was on. A small flotilla of luxury yachts have been moored outside the port, which itself was filled to capacity. This is the week when the great and the good come to planet money to pick their next boat. I have been enjoying my lunches overlooking the bay, as I’m picking out my first boat. The difference is that I’m only working on planet money and owning a yacht will probably remain a dream.

This is the problem with this place; all of a sudden your dreams become bigger. I never imagined having a boat, especially not anything over 30 meters. Now I’m having the following conversations with my colleagues:

‘Mr X just got a new yacht, he paid 5 million euro’s for it’

‘Oh, he won’t get much for that’

The other night I was walking to the station, when I spotted a Bugatti Veyron (it’s a very expensive and rare car and a petrol head’s wet dream) with the obligatory group of tourists circling around it with their cameras. I was tempted to tell them that there was another one parked around the corner in a different colour. I was in a hurry and I’m trying to stay nice. I do understand how Cameron got corrupted by planet money. It is easy to get your head turned and start seeing this world as normal. Luckily there is always the pauper train home, which now has standing room only as I have to share it with equally tired yacht show sales people on their way home to planet reality. My sore feet are still firmly on the ground. The weather has not been great and the views overlooking the port are mostly prettier, but I'd thought I better take a picture of the port being filled to capacity.