When in France...

France is a really great country, tons to offer, great food, beautiful sights, and a really different culture. Actually, we were surprised how different and may now argue that the French are, in fact, the most civilized in the world. Here are some things we observed (but that don't necessarily argue for the best lifestyle)....and may be totally wrong (sorry Cecile!!).

• Everyone dresses really nicely, keeps themselves well groomed and poised. Everyone wore black in the colder months (making Marc easy to find wearing his big red winter jacket) and they continued to wear lots of clothing long after we were in our tshirts.
• There really is doggy doodoo (keepin' it family friendly on here...) everywhere. It is cleaned early in the mornings before people start their day by gushing tons of water down the streets.
  
• There is always someone walking down the street carrying a baguette. Always.
• The vast majority smokes.
• 99.999% of the French look fantastic! Not too skinny and definitely not overweight and not one man has a beard (again making Marc easy to find).
• ...there are 5 pastry shops on every street (which we still haven't figured out how the French stay so fit).
• They only drink wine with meals and rose seems to be the current choice (and tastes so good! Especially the local one's we had from Provence, highly recommended!).
• They really enjoy their cafes and drinking them outside. Every little cafe/shop and all restaurants have outdoor seating (with heaters for the cooler months), it's fantastic. They drink coffee with milk (ie. cafe au lait or latte type) only in the morning and espressos through the day. It took me awhile to figure out the proper lingo for a good coffee. As soon as they know you're English speaking, they seemed to send the biggest (and worst) cup of coffee.
• The double cheek kiss actually happens ...and was really awkward for us.
  
• They are not all snobs, especially in the smaller cities and towns, like Gonfaron, where one man offered us his baguette when we found out all the shops were closed for the day. But don't expect many smiles in bigger cities, especially Paris and Nice, even if you speak fluent French Canadian.
  
• You can gauge an area by the price of a Nutella crepe...a great strategy for getting out of a tourist trap type of area.
• There is a huge North African population throughout France, which was great for us as there was then tons of kebab shops to choose from at any time of day. Besides the pastry shops and McDonalds (or Quick burger the French equivalent), there wasn't anywhere to grab a cheap meal/snack throughout the day. The French take an hour or two to enjoy their lunch. We found it odd that many shops were closed just after noon for any amount of time, depending on how lunch is going I guess...who wouldn't love a leisurely lunch with wine every day!