Sad eyes. With round spectacles. He was perhaps six feet tall, with a slight smile. And, about 35 years old with fine brown hair and a trace of gray. He asked me if I wanted to speak in English or French.
I started in French, as I always do in France, in hopes that, out of courtesy, or pity, they don’t try to change the language to English. Sometimes it is very difficult. Either they decide that I am so completely hopeless in French that they must use English or they decide that time is of the essence and humoring this strange French-speaking-wannabe would be too time consuming. Either way, we move to English.
Sometimes however they speak French and we have a conversation about family, life, their dogs the problems with taxes in France or baguettes. This time, we chatted in both languages trying to find the best fit.
There was a time earlier in the day that we actually had to speak French. On the road to Caen, after traveling through miles of green canopies and pastures and roads barely wide enough for two cars, we stopped at the small town of Hérouvillette to buy a ‘Parisian’ baguette sandwich . . ham stuffed into a baguette. I saw a sign that read ‘Los Angeles’ on the wall, so I asked in English, ‘Did you go to Los Angeles?’ She looked at me, stumbled over a few words and then smiled. I recognized this, having used this strategy often. As it turned out ‘yes’ was the only English word she knew. And, it stood to reason, we were in a small boulangerie in a part of Normandy which was way off the unbeaten path. We did like the Parisian baguette, though. We ate it on the way to Caen.
We found our hotel for the night after arriving in Caen. It was completely torn up by construction work around the train station. We dropped off our rental car at the Dollar dealership, walked to the Rue de la Gare and looked for our hotel.
That’s when we ran into the bespectacled gentleman at La Consigne Hôtel et Cafe. He told us how to buy good food by avoiding the restaurants next to the Gare du Caen, and he made Nancy two of the best cups of coffee in France.
That’s when he asked me if I wanted to speak English or French.