Interesting Facts About France

1.     Too many people smoke here. Even young adults. It’s awful. There are some girls on my team who do and I’m shocked every time I hear/see them smoking! I might die of second hand smoke…

2.     American music is very popular here. Take today’s top 40 hits along with the past decade’s top ten for every year, mix in some French songs and you have what plays on the radio.

3.     People eat dinner a lot later in the evening than in America. I have seen this in Argentina as well, but when I’m at a café at night usually, families will come in around 8:30 or 9:00pm to eat dinner. I’m usually starving after practice which is around 6 or 6:30 so that’s when I eat.

4.     They drive on the right side of the road! I was kind of surprised at this actually. All of the road signs are different but the concept is the same.

5.     Everybody drives a hatchback car. And there are no SUV’s or Trucks. I miss American made trucks! The brands of cars here are Citroen, Renault, Peugeot, Audi, some Toyota or Mazda, Mercedes, and BMW. I think I saw one Ford car the other day as well. And all of them are manual stick shift.

6.     Water bottles come in 1, or 1.5 liters. Seriously. This was the same in Argentina and Brazil, for those of you who have experiences drinking only the bottled water before, it’s precious. I wasn’t sure if I could drink from my faucet here. But I asked one of the girls on my team if it’s ok and she said yes. I haven’t gotten sick so far!

7.     The people are really nice. I wasn’t sure what to expect in terms of how the French would be towards Americans. But they are very respectful and I haven’t had a problem with any of them.

8.     Beds are in two sizes; one person or two person. I found this out at the store when I was looking for pillows. The sheets were in packs and there weren’t any other sizes of beds. I thought that was peculiar. Also, pillows are square, not rectangular like they are in the USA.

9.     You must bring your own grocery bags to the store or they will charge you for new ones! This one is going to be hard to get used to! I’ve already forgotten them once. And it’s like ,15 Euros for one bag!!! I already miss Costco so much…

10. The plugs are different. This one is obvious. I bought adapters and they are working for my mac/apple products. But my blowdryer didn’t want to work and I didn’t want to break it so I’m without for a while or until I give in and buy one here… which I’m close to doing because my hair around my ears gets curly when I don’t blowdry it.

11. In Quimper I have seen a subway, Sephora, Levi’s, and Volcom store.

12. French women do shave. It’s a complete myth that they don’t.

13. Nobody has a large family. The most children I have seen and heard of in a family is two. And if one is too much, then they have a pet. Usually a dog. I haven’t seen any cats, but then again I don’t know how I would. The fact that I’m from a large family is odd to most of them. A couple of the girls on my team attribute it to Mormonism. I don’t seen a problem with it!

14. Apple products are rare. In the USA I felt like there was maybe 60% of more of the people I knew had iPhones or Macs. Here it’s less than 20%.

15. Nobody is overweight. I have met one woman who I would consider “large.” Other than that, people keep a healthy physique and eat just the right amount.

16. Men have purses or what some people call a “murse.” It’s a small, flat over the shoulder bag. Very interesting. And I usually giggle to myself when I see EVERY man wearing one of these.