Observations

Well you haven't heard from me in a while so I thought I would do a little post about observations I have made while working/living here and things I have learned. Sorry it will probably be long so be warned. Now of course this may not be completely accurate and may only reflect my very small sphere of experience here in Paris so just bear in mind that I don't claim to understand everything :-).

1. It serves no purpose to be rude. People will not like you more, they will not work harder to help you succeed, they will not respect you more etc. It's respectable to be strict, honest and to expect the best from people around you but there is just no reason to be rude. At work I have been blown away by how rude people are. I thought it was maybe just to me but it's not, it's to everyone. Of course not EVERYONE here is rude but many of them are. And I just wonder what they think they have to gain from such rudeness. I have also seen that rudeness is contagious so I am working hard to fight against the disease.
2. When you become friends with a French person, they will be your friend for life...whether you want them or not :-). The French really value friendship. They are not as open as Americans though so they don't have as many friends. Typical Americans have hundreds of people they casually call "friends" but they don't really keep up with them. Like friends from high school. There are very few people that keep up with their high school friends after high school. However in France, once you are friends, you always are friends and you will do anything for each other. Example: Thomas and Christine often drive across France for like 8+ hours just to go to a friend's birthday party. That would pretty much be unheard of in the States.
3. Not everyone wants the same things in life. Some people don't want a nice house if they can live in a dump without doing any work. Some people don't care about injustice. Some employers are not impressed when their employees work harder than is required. Some people don't want to advance in their job if it means more responsibility etc... I think sometimes I am ignorant and think that everybody wants what's important to me or what's important to Americans but it's just not true.
4. French lives are just like American lives...except about 4 times slower. Really Americans are always in a rush and it's really in our blood, we can't get over it. We can try, but we will never have the patience of a French person. For example, a very fast meal here would be 40 minutes long but normally, meals take at least 2 hours. If you are eating at a restaurant at night, you need to allow yourself 3 hours before your next activity if you want to be on time. That's one thing Reed and I really struggle with.
5. Not everybody wants to be American. I already knew this but it's a funny myth that seems to be very popular among Americans.
6. When people don't have a personal interest in doing something, they either won't do it well or they won't do it at all. The perfect example can be found in restaurants in Paris. Tips are included in the bill (because it would not be fair for one waiter to earn more than another) so the result is thus a bunch of waiters who ignore you through your entire meal and couldn't care less if you enjoy your time there. People need motivation.
7. For many (if not most) Americans, (from my observation) work is life. For most the French, work is some causal annoyance they have to do in order to live their real lives. I really like this about the French and I hope that like them I will remember where my priorities should lie. However, they do take this a little far. Everything is higher on the priority list for the French that their work. From what I have seen, in an 8 hour work day, they will generally take at least 3 hours worth of breaks between their lunch break and their coffee breaks. That's a little extensive people.
8. Americans really are so loud. I know you have heard this but it's so true. Reed and I can pick out Americans from a mile away because we know they are the people we can't see yet but we can hear.
9. Wanting a welfare state does not necessarily stem from actually caring about the welfare of people in the country. I have often heard people joke in politics that the liberals are the heart of the nation and the conservatives are the brain. This obviously stems from the fact that liberals are hardliners behind most welfare state policies. But after my experiences here in France (one of the most liberal countries in the world) I can't help but wonder if compassion and "heart" are not really the motivation for many liberals behind their policies. I witnessed a perfect example of this the other day when one of my very liberal friends quite rudely turned down an older woman who asked for a slice of the large pizza we were eating in the park. This friend continuously spouts strong ideals about equality and caring about our fellow men yet couldn't spare a slice of pizza for a very hungry stranger. And afterwards said if they want food they should go over to "blah blah blah" (I don't remember where but it's some gov't run shelter). In that moment I felt something I have observed a bit which is that people seem to use their support for a welfare state as a way of shifting the responsibility of charity to someone else and being able to live with themselves when they don't personally excersize any type of charity. As I said, these observations of course reflect my very small amount of experience and obviously can't be applied universally but it's something to think about. Though I have only given one example, this is not a rare occurence. It's no surprise that the poor and the homeless tend to spend their times in tourist areas because the average French person will surely not show them compassion. Now I, of all people, am not one to encourage free hand-outs for every person who chooses not to work but we should all still excersize charity in our lives...and charity does not mean pushing the poor off into the hands of someone else like some pest.
10. In America we must avoid the mistake of Europe, we cannot let our fight against child abuse lead us to preventing parents from raising their children. Children need to be disciplined and they need parents who will teach them. Whether it's spanking, grounding, working or other punishments, something needs to be done to mold them into respectable, hard working citizens.
11. The nature of mankind may not be as good as I thought. There is a movie I saw a long time ago called "War of the Worlds". I don't know if you have seen it or not but there are a couple scenes depicting people fighting brutally with each other for necessities they all want like cars and food etc. It depicts them as acting like animals where it truly is every man for himself with absolutely no regard to the immorality of his/her actions. I have always believed that if there ever was such a world crisis, people would not really act like this. However, when I see how people act under just some small crisis such as overcrowding on the metro, I wonder if I have placed too much faith in the good nature of mankind. Occassionally one of the metro lines will have a problem in the mornings resulting in all of the lines beind overcrowded. This means everyone will be late to work and will be sardined in the metro if they can even get in. I was shocked though at how inconsiderate people are. There are people trying to get off the metro and unable to because no one will risk moving out of the way in fear that they will lose their place on the metro. And even worse, when someone does step out to let someone off, they often DO lose their place because everyone else waiting to get on will push them out of the way. When I see pregnant women and 87 year old ladies tossed aside by teenage boys as they shove their way onto the metro, it's disheartening to witness where society has gone.
12. When people don't have to pay for healthcare as they get it, they will be in to see the doctor for everything from fatigue to a canker sore.
13. Ok that's all I wanted to say for now so if you made it through this post I guess I will let you in on another little secret: I got accepted into University of Utah law school. It was not my first choice obviously but it's a very good school. It's ranked 42nd in the U.S. (tied with BYU) and has the 3rd lowest professor to student ratio behind Yale and Stanford. So I guess it's a good thing I've gotten used to commuting everyday to Paris.