7.9.05

Metz, in La Belle France




Then, on Wednesday I took a train to Metz, in Lorraine (which is in France). The most amazing about traveling from Germany to France, is that when you cross the border, even though there are no signs on the train tracks, you know that you're not in Germany anymore. This is before you see the French on the sides of the all the buildings- everything about France is different from Germany. In fact, before you've even seen any French people, it's really not that hard to see why the Germans and the French can't get along. This feeling only grows once you talk to French people. Don't get me wrong- there's absolutely nothing wrong about the national character of either the French or the Germans- they're just so different.
My first impressions of France:
  • The French people don't wash enough. In Canada, you're a gross person if you take more than 1 or 2 days between showers. In Germany, it's the same. In France, I think, it's more like a week before you even start to compare to some of these people. Most French people are clean- but there's a very sizeable minority that seem to believe that they've got something in common with the wicked witch of the West.
  • French people don't clean up after their dogs. There's dog poo everywhere.
  • French people like statues. No French park is complete without a 4-metre statue of someone. Or someone's horse. Or someone's dog. Or something completely inane. They don't seem to care what the statue is of, but ze park is not ze park wit' no statue.
  • French people can't concieve of leaving any section of anything undecorated. The French aesthetic is the polar opposite of the Japanese. The Japanese aesthetic values simplicity- the French values endless decoration and embellishment of even the most insignificant part of a wall.
  • The French put too much effort into their churches. The cathedral in Metz was most impressive. I spent about 2-3 hours in there- it beat Salibury all to heck. This friendly Frenchman told me all about the 'three suns' (trois soliel) in a stained glass window. He spoke slowly for me, but I still didn't understand most of it, but he inspired me to look more deeply into the iconography in that particular stained glass window. Metz literally has a church on every street, and every single one is unique and invariably grand.
Seriously, though, even the fields are different in France. And, while dirty, the French are much more friendly than people often make you think (maybe it's because I didn't 'mock' their language). When they say that France is the land of love, I think they weren't kidding. I was walking along the river causeway, and there were benches interspersed with trees about every 6 metres, and every single bench had a couple necking on it. Not just teenagers, too. The very air in France is different from Germany. Germans always look busy (and they usually are), and everything in Germany is streamlined. France is practically the opposite. French workers don't even try to look busy. They'll be leaning back against a wall, very calmy enjoying their smoke, or strolling at ridiculously slow pace through the park, completely indifferent to the passage of time. All in all, French != German.

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