This is how, in the approach to this trip, I worried all my Paris encounters would be as I had read that Parisians are impatient with people who don\u2019t speak French AND annoyed when tourists try to speak French but have a very limited vocabulary. However, most of our encounters have been delightful and they have appreciated our attempts to communicate in French.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After being banished from Monoprix, I went to a pharmacy where I was in search of elderberry syrup for immunity. Mary wasn\u2019t able to wear her mask on either of the planes or in the airport, and she has a tendency to get sick when we travel, so I wanted to keep us both healthy. I had tried to find it in the mall pharmacy on Friday and nobody seemed to know what I was talking about when I pointed to the word in my Google Translate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The pharmacy on Avenue des Ternes was very small and looked like it might specialize in natural remedies. There was one woman working there and when I explained what I wanted she turned and called to what I thought was the back of the store, but then another, very stylish, woman came down some stairs I hadn\u2019t seen. They had a brief discussion in French, and then the stylish woman turned to me and said, in English, \u201cYou want what?\u201d I pointed to my Google Translate. She laughed and said, \u201cAh! In France that is only for children,\u201d and then began picking up various bottles and discussing them with her colleague. This took a long time and I considered asking if they carried the elderberry for children, but eventually, the stylish woman handed me a bottle labeled Immun, explained the ingredients to me, which included Reishi and Cordyceps and sounded good to me, so I bought it. At the counter I noticed a book for sale and on the cover was a picture of Stylish Woman, so who knows, maybe she is a famous natural remedy person in Paris. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Back at the room we had cheese and bread and crackers and carrots for dinner, and then we watched the Portland Fire game from Friday. Actually I slept through the first three quarters since I seem to have developed narcolepsy since we got here, but being awake for the fourth quarter was enough. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was extremely irritable and pretty bitchy to my wife yesterday, which I felt very bad about and apologized for profusely. I think I was frustrated because it seems like we\u2019re not doing much. But Paris is not the centerpiece of this trip. Paris is how we get to Aix-Les-Bains, and as Mary pointed out we are having all sorts of interesting encounters with people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This morning we went to a new boulangerie and had croissants and un cafe cr\u00e8me for Mary, which was slightly bigger than yesterday\u2019s cafe noisette. Mary ordered by saying, \u201cBonjour. Un cafe cr\u00e8me and deux croissants, s\u2019il vous plait.\u201d The young woman asked her a question in French and Mary turned around and looked at me wildly. I asked the woman to repeat and she said, in English, \u201cDo you want this for here?\u201d I said, \u201cOui,\u201d and laughed and Mary and the woman laughed, and it was a nice encounter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Edit from Mary: Most of the time, people hear our American-accented French and respond to us in English – often a simple \u201cBonjour\u201d is all it takes to elicit l\u2019anglais in response. I have come to rely on this, so the woman at the bolangerie responding to my bad French in French threw me into a panic. Thank God Lis was there to save me!<\/p>\n\n\n\n![](\"https:\/\/travelwithus.us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/markup_1000007834-779x1024.png\")
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