Believe it or not, France is not the peaceful land of beret-wearing, garlic-crunching, -baguette-wielding, honey-tongued, mega-lovers it has the reputation of being. One day's visit to the country of Jacques Chirac, alias Mr Bizarre, delivers ample experience.

1) President sounds as if he is permanently telling a bedtime story. A sure sign of a tissue of whoppers - he attempts to send nation to sleep so we don't notice things like 'we are on the brink of financial collapse' as it sounds just like ' Goldilocks tried the Maman Bear's bowl and it was too hot'.

2) Finding a good piece of cheddar or Wensleydale is like trying to find a Frenchman who knows that the Crown jewels does not refer to the contents of Prince Charles' trousers.

3) A decent cup of tea is near impossible.. My grandmother (20 cups a day lady - respect) would not be impressed. Is it the water? Milk that doesn't come from real cows? What do they do to the teabags (individually wrapped, to do as much environmental damage as possible).

4) The French are good lovers. Hmm. Judging by my man, I'd have to say yes. No other experience.  However. French arrogance extends over all domains...

5)My Masters from Oxford is considered of a lower standard than a French Masters. 'Nough said. Likewise work experience gained in another country doesn't count as much as work experience in France.

Also, priority is given to French English teachers over native English teachers at universities and even in schools.

6) Aah, French is the language of lurrve...ok, it sounds very nice and you can say 'mon amour, ton visage est une poubelle' and sound romantic, but hey, English is a rich language as well, as people here often forget...we have our own symbolism, we have Chaucer, Shakespeare, the Brontes, Pepys and Johnson, not forgetting Terry Pratchett and JK Rowling. As a translator, I often have clients phone who say things like 'Are you sure about this word? We didn't learn it at school', or 'It's not in my pocket dictionary'. Oh, and if you make mistakes in your French, or can't speak it at all (horrors of horrors) you obviously haven't as many brain-cells as you should have...being quadrilingual or more in other languages just doesn't count, you see.

7) The Sect

Oh yes. You can't escape it here. Everything, and I mean everything, that doesn't go along the government line is officially classed as a sect.

You don't use your Carte Vitale? You've been brain-washed by a sect.

Birth at home? Irresponsible and definitely sectarian.

Natural remedies? Oooh, sect alert (unless government issued).

You think Chirac is an alien? Oh, maybe you see clearer than we thought...

(To Be Continued...)

By the way, before any French people start feeling offended, I prefer France to England and the French to the English in general. But there are some things that are ennervant des fois. Happens when in England too...

One thing that is important for any self-respecting Brit living in Rennes (or France for that matter) is to cheat the Metro. For months, I used the *foolproof* system of buying one ticket that I didn't stamp, and then would tell any eventual controllers that I was English and didn't know you had to stamp your ticket before the journey rather than after. After all, we're English! Even if I've lived here for 7 years, I'm foreign and can't be expected to know better... this worked fine for ages for the sole reason that I never met a single controller. The entire time I had my unstamped ticket, thatt is.

Then a few weeks ago, accompanied by my 3 sproglets, in tearing hurry to get last coach home (we live 40km from Rennes), would you believe there they are, like flies in suits, waiting for unsuspecting prey at the exit of the lift. I didn't have my lucky ticket, and hadn't a single centime of change to buy one, so, naively, I thought, 'Just this once, it'll be alright'...Oh but no. So with slightly sick feeling in stomach, and praying that bilingual children will not utter a word of French during attempt to weedle out of non-ticket state with sadistic controller. Amazingly they didn't, but Mr. Sadist didn't care that I was in  a foreign country in a foreign country and didn't speak a word of the lingo, and fined my 26 Euros. A whole day's pay.

Having learnt from this, I buy a ticket for my journey of two stops on Friday (non-stamped, of course). I don't even see them until I get to the top of the escalator, and then they pounce.  

'Yes I have a ticket', I tell them, and wave said miniscule paper proudly.

'Is no good ticket, Madame. No stamp'.

'Fine, fine, I stamp now, ok?'(I am standing 30 cm from machine).

'No, no, is too late, Madame. You travel no ticket'.

Huh?

'But I have a ticket, I buy ticket, look!'

I had forgotten the complete autism of French bureaucrats and officials.

'No, Madame, is no good ticket. You pay.'

I get cross.

'I buy ticket AND I pay? I have ticket!'

I decide to play trump card.

'In England we stamp after travel!'

I feel triumphant in glory. Get around that one without looking sadistic and bloodyminded... oh yes, I forgot. French officials like to be sadistic and bloodyminded.

'No, no, is same for everybody, you pay'.

My face falls.

'What?'

'Yes, yes, you pay!'

I start shouting. I've never shouted at a complete stranger in my life.

'But that's robbery!'

He doesn't care, does he? He knows.

So I pay.

'Have you got a pen? If you're going to rob me you can at least do it with your own pen!'

My hands tremble so much I can hardly write. Another day's pay gone in a flash.

But the upshot of this is that, even if they're inhuman bastards, that's their job. And if I want to move forward in my evolution, I've got to be straight. I can't manipulate like that any more. I'm not foreign, my English deteriorates a une vitesse incroyable to be filled by French words, I can cook galettes and crepes that my mother-in-law would be proud of and I only found out last week what a chav is. From now on, I'll pay for my tickets. Not because I don't want to be fined, but because I want to be honest. A big difference.

Merci, M. Le Controlleur.

In the beginning, there was the word. And the word was...What? Didn't catch that, sorry. Anyway, there was a word, but we weren't paying enough attention, and so the whole of humanity had to spend their lifetime trying to work out what the word was. It seems pretty obvious we haven't found it yet.