France

McDonald's and Wi-Fi

Anyway, I'm just scribbling all this stuff down as I go along. Good-old McDonald's - free wi-fi in a world of grab-yer-dough at the first op. There are McDonald's restaurants all over the place, millions of 'em. I'm grateful for them cos I am in contact with things back home. Wi-fi whilst travelling was going to be a problem for me; I did all the research to find the most economical way of getting online and it all seemed pricey. There exists something called Wi-Fly that'll apparently get you online in the middle of nowhere, but they want, like, £50 - £60 for the device and then you have to buy the Gbs of time - I felt that was a monumental rip-off. And, they plug it like they're doing you a favour; '3Gb will give you x time online!' but their x-time amounts to something that can be used-up in a few sessions - your hand would never be out of your pocket. Anyway, whilst doing this research, I stumbled-upon information that suggested that as a BT customer I would qualify for their 'FON' service in participating countries (FON amounts to free wi-fi in hotspots that are populated by other FON users) Hmmm? - this sounded very promising indeed, I looked into it further.

Sure enough, it entitled me to free wi-fi in France and Spain in FON hotspots - I could now beat-it and not have to worry about how I would get online. I just stop the van, check my little 'Internet access' icon on the bottom right of the taskbar, scan the list of possible wi-fi users in that area and look down the list to find the one with 'FON' beside it and use it to log on. Fine. No. It was duff. Duff and useless. For a start, the signal was always either 'Fair' or 'Poor' and I was lucky to even be able to access my mail, let-alone Google stuff. Slow-slow-slow. I found myself driving from one road to another just to get a better signal. And, if I happened to be fortunate enough to get a decent connection it would time me out after about 30 minutes and demand - in French - payment for further usage... What!??? C'est Merde!

So, I discovered McDonald's have free wi-fi and that was the answer. I will buy a tea from them and get online indefinitely. Ha. 'Tea' - the French spell it; 'thé' and pronounce it 'tay'. Their 'tea' is generally Lipton's Earl Grey and it's nothing-like 'real' tea. The tea-bag is the size of a postage stamp and you have to leave it in the cup for about 37 minutes for it to start to taste like tea; by which time the hot water is getting cold - Gagh! So, one place gave me a nice 'Liptons Fruit Flavoured Tea' and that was disgusting. When I went back the following day I discovered that the 'Fruit' was the only one they had... On another occasion I asked for 'du lait' (milk) to go with the tea and the dude gave me a small cup with hot milk in it.. I wouldn't have minded but he charged me 2 Euro for the hot milk. On another occasion I was back to the Liptons Earl Grey but they had no milk - aw, c'mon!

Earlier today I thought I'd had my fill of their gash tea and asked this; 'Un cafe creme, s'il vous plait' (a white coffee, please) and the guy gave me a little paper cup of black coffee. It's hard enough getting my order in without telling the guy he got it wrong, and with a queue waiting, so I generally put-up with whatever concoction they present me with. Having said all that, and as was the case on this trip, much is lost in translation, or in my case, pronunciation; it's possible that when I asked the guy for a white coffee that it sounded to him like 'We English hate you French'.. I don't make a habit of frequenting McDonald's restaurants back home, but I have to say those ones in France - from north to south - are pretty badly organised and have the longest wait in queues I have known. I can't say I enjoy waiting in queues, no.

Anyway, apart from that, the French are really cool and are very easy to have a natter with. Ha - I'm just joking. Once a committed and enthusiastic Francophile, this trip made me look back and regard that person with a degree of quaint nostalgie.

One more observation about McDonald's; they will play really terrible, dreadful, meaningless 'music' on their sound system whilst you drink your tea. This is the stuff we all hate, and.... Okay, I'm not going to rant about it, but, suffice to say!

Had to laugh and ruefully shake head in one McD's when the dreadful music (no escape) had a rap-thing with a chorus that had a repetitive use of the fuck word. All these French families with their little kids, bopping over their Big Macs, French fries and 'Effing' chorus...That's entertainment! The world gone mad, where is the French Minister for Culture when you fucking need him?.

Good song

Now, I'm about to contradict myself. I do a bit of my journal whilst sitting in McDonald's restaurants and I find myself stopping for the lack of inspiration due to the noise from the music. I've almost gotten to the stage where I can ignore the piped-music system, but not quite. So, there was one occasion when the song distracted me for all the right reasons. I liked this song. What was it? I quickly dug-out a pen (a pen - haha) and scribbled some of what I believed was the chorus onto a serviette. I got a couple of words just as the song faded. What is that? So as I was about to leave anyway, I approached the young kid behind the serve counter and, finger prodding towards one of the ceiling speakers, I asked; 'Eh, who is this music?' The young lassie hadn't a clue what I just said. She alerted another staff member, who must've had a little English, and I repeated the question. By this time all McDonald's staff were attentive and curious; What ez ze English saying?'. Hell, I was trying to ask discretely. Anyway, nobody knew what the song was and I felt a little daft. But - I had the few lyrics on the recycled-papier serviette.

The song is 'Forsaken Savior' by a band called 'Gov't Mule with Dave Matthews'. Never heard of any of 'em but I liked it as soon as I heard it.

Impressions

of the French; here's a wee list of things I've observed about the folk on the other side of La Manche.

They're terrible drivers; many of them, much more than back home, will cut you up after they've overtaken you. They will tailgate you for miles instead of simply overtaking you - this one irritates me.

The guys, old and young, will pee anywhere and at every opportunity. Some public toilets are so al fresco as to be obscenity.

They have a poor sense of humour, except the ones who appear not to be the full-shilling, the only problem with those ones is they can't understand English.

No sense of 'right'; earlier today, an older guy was walking around with a long, unfolded paper serviette stuck to the heel of his shoe. Nobody gave it a second glance. I noticed the dude beside me looking at this, so I looked at him as much as to say; 'Hey, check him out dragging a serviette'... But the solemn-looking dude didn't acknowledge, nothing. I thought; 'C'mon, man - you MUST have an opinion?'... Anyway, there was a young girl appeared beside the old guy, probably his grand daughter, and I motioned to her, bringing her attention to the serviette. She half-smiled before telling her granddad about the paper-trail. So, there was no one for a thousand miles willing to inform that old guy about the stuff sticking to his shoe; it was a miracle of circumstance that a guy from Glasgow happened to be there, in France at that time, to preserve the old guy's dignity. Just a thought...

Here's another item from France to be aware of that will defo visit us in the near future. When you go into a supermarket and take your bought items to the checkout you won't get a plastic carrier bag, so if you're planning on doing a 'big shop' you better take your own, or take all your pals with you to help you carry all your beer and stuff. I know it'll come to the UK soon enough, only a matter of time, and I happen to agree with that idea. The French are much more 'eco' than we in the Yuk.

Big cities and Polish crew

About as far west as I could go, I learned a lesson today when I drove to Brest – steer-clear of the big towns and cities, positively don't go near them during rush hour. Unless you have an important rendezvous with someone who's about to gift you a load of no-longer required money, or you have a tourist attraction that simply can't be missed, don't burden yourself with these places. They never, ever welcome you with open-arms and are nothing more than an uninterested entity, existing only to churn and grunt. I switched off the GPS when it became irate and barked orders at me, then took me down a skinny little street that happened to be blocked-off at the far-end due to some essential works. Heck. I did my ten-point turn and found another, wider street where I switched-off and gazed at the area in my van directly above my head. I relaxed for a couple of minutes then got out to stretch legs and do a quick recce of the monster that was eating-up my patience. Truth be told, I'd stopped my van in a restricted parking area, warning lines and red circles with French writing and exclamation marks "Attention!" I wasn't about to wander far, I didn't like the idea of coming back to the van perched on top of a tow-truck, surly officials issuing me a 'billet' with more French writing and exclamation marks "Attention!".

A guy approached me, tall dude in his 30s. He started to ask me something and I dismissed him with a waving palm and 'J'ai ne comprends pas' (I don't understand). He said to me; 'You speak English?' I replied that I did. In broad daylight in an obviously safe part of town, rush hour passers-by, I wasn't concerned that the guy was a bandit, about to rob me of my stash of muesli or my tea-bags. He was a Polish guy and he was looking for a McDonald's.. Hey; a common language – 'McDonald's' isn't 'English'. Anyway, I told him I wasn't familiar with the area and we struck-up a conversation. Turns-out, his buddy had hired a 38-foot yacht and they were sailing it over to Dublin, the Polish guy being part of the 4-man crew.

The Pole had been walking around for ages looking for a McDonald's and he happened to ask the wrong Scot in Brest, the equivalent of a Scot asking a Pole for the location of a 'Kowalski'. He moved on and I saw him ask another guy, the other guy directing him upwards and onwards. I started-out again, deciding to stop at a McDonald's myself, see if there was any mail I had to attend to. I punched 'MCDONALDS' into my GPS and it ordered me; "GO – THREE HUNDRED FEET – AND TURN LEFT". I did as I was instructed and continued to follow the robot's guidance. The McDonald's it was trying to take me to seemed to be buried in the most inaccessible part of Brest, within a pedestrian area, surrounded by the worst traffic and the biggest population of commuters in the world at that moment in time. I aborted the mission and got the hell out of Brest. Phew!

Drove south and stopped at a fishing port called Dournenez.

Communicating

You know, I think I do a fair-job of asking for tea and other stuff in French. I've watched all those early BBC2 French imports with English subtitles, the cool ones starring Gerard Depardieu and the like, and I've heard how they say stuff and I reckon I can copy that dialect (ask me to say, in French, 'I hate fish' for a perfect example!). Furthermore, I'm not bad at voices and accents. So, why is it when I ask, in French, for a tea, I always get the answer back in *English*? Here's an example;

Me; “Bonjour, Madame – un the, s'il vous plait” (Hello, missus – a tea, please)

Assistant - using English to answer my perfect French; “Yes, what would you like – Earl Grey, Lipton's, English Breakfast?”...

D'ahh.. I mean, it wasn't bad? - what did I do wrong?

From here on I will do the full Maurice Chevalier bit; I will don a beret, a Breton shirt and drape a stack of onions around my neck, park my bike outside, then I will march into that McDonald's and assume the French 'look' – the upside-down mouth with 'pettit-lip', the head sinking into my neck and the hunched shoulders, the palms of my hands facing the sky with only the thumb of each hand splayed out. The minute I burst-forth with 'Zank heaven, for little gerlz' they will treat me as local. "Oui, monsieur - un cafe blanc !"..

I urge you to try this, as you read – sink your head into your neck, hunch your shoulders and face palms upwards (don't forget the thumbs), make your mouth upside-down and assume a pettit-lip; now say the following words; 'Zank heaven for little gerlz'. Do this whilst looking in the mirror.