French Word of the Day: l’air (lair)-  the air of, semblance of

Théo and I went to a party last night at his cousin’s.  One of her friends began talking to us and said, “Wait Meghan, you have a slight accent.  Where are you from?”  And when I told him, he said, “You have the air of a Frenchwoman.  Coming from a Frenchman, this is a compliment.”

Yessssssssssssssssssssssss.  Life’s mission accomplished.  Got a real compliment from a Frenchman.

He’s not kidding.  In French eyes, anything French is automatically the best.  Food?  France is best.  Fashion?  The best.  Soccer?  Not so much, but we can pretend.

We then met some of Théo’s friends at a bar.  They were all intensely fascinated with my Americanism.  I’ve never been drilled so thoroughly on my culture.  (I take that back.  Arnaud, you are the all-time, undisputed most-questions-about-America champion.)

At one point, they had me pick a song.  When I asked what kind of song, they said, “Something that’s popular in American now that will be popular in France in a month.”  I haven’t been in America for a month, so it stood to reason that they would know whatever I chose.  I told them to look on the American section of iTunes.  We did break out into some “Barbie Girl” and “Cotton-Eyed Joe.”  Neither was my influence.  They chose that on their own.  The music choices degenerated towards the end of the night when more alcohol had been consumed.

It’s Sunday, so everything’s closed, but Théo and I attempted to find pain au chocolat.  All the bakeries were closed.  We went to many different neighborhoods in search of a pain au chocolat.  The only ones we could find looked like they would taste awful (Théo is also a pain au chocolat guru).  We decided to go with “the best crepe place in Paris” (which also equates to the most expensive).  I can settle for a crepe with nutella.  It was a pretty darn good crepe.  I don’t know if it was worth 5 euro, but it was pretty darn good.

To top off the day, we saw this:

It’s blurred, but yes, that is Batman next to the girl in the white coat.  Why was Batman hanging outside a French movie theatre when he doesn’t have any movies coming out?

I don’t know.  Gotham is boring right now?  If I was a billionaire like Bruce Wayne, I’d go to Paris all the time.

Pain au chocolat count: Still 20 (not for lack of trying)