Travelers' Tales Paris (8 page)

Against all odds, even against the march of history, it still is.

Night after night I pored over my
Philosophical Dictionary
and my other books. What seemed obscure or unintelligible I attributed to my ignorance and stupidity, and I persisted. I recall how I suffered over certain passages of Sartre's
Being and Nothingness
, unable to make head or tail of them. My confidence was further shaken by the fact that other sections were clear and easy to comprehend, as were the same ideas expressed in his plays, essays, pamphlets. Recently I returned to that book, and reading it again in the light of experience realized that I was not entirely to blame, that certain sentences and paragraphs are indeed cloudy to the point of meaninglessness (perhaps written under the influence of drugs). I then understood why Heidegger, whose philosophy had been a powerful influence on Sartre's development, had described the book as “muck”—not that
he
was a model of clarity!

—Shusha Guppy,
A Girl in Paris

LYNN SCHNURNBERGER

“N
O
, I
CANNOT SELL
M
ADAME A STRAPLESS BRA,” THE PERFECTLY
coiffed French saleswoman said haughtily, looking at me somewhat lower than in the eye. “Your breasts are too large.” (Actually, what she really said was, “
Votre poitrine est trop grosse
.”)

At the time, I was living in a small town in the French countryside and was married to a Frenchman, and until that day I had never shopped in Paris. Now I stood in an elegant lingerie shop on the rue de Rivoli, opposite the Louvre museum and the Tuileries Gardens. The windows of the shop were filled with delicate Dior camisoles and saucy Saint Laurent panties. I was embarrassed. Did she mean that they didn't have bras in my size (which I had not yet disclosed)? Or that she had them, but wouldn't sell one to me?

The
vendeuse
rolled her eyes in exasperation. “
Non, non
, Madame does not understand. It's simply that you have, well, American breasts.... It just would not be right,” she sniffed. Ah, the perils of shopping in Paris.

Now, I'm no shopping slouch. In fact, as a TV reporter in New York, I'm known as a shopping expert. I studied shopping at the hem of a master—my mother, a redheaded fashion plate who used
her first Depression-era paycheck as a down payment on monogrammed silk underwear.

During my formative years, it was my mother who tooled around town in a two-toned turquoise-and-white Ford Fairlaine convertible and matching leather jacket. It was she who taught me to elbow my way through Filene's Basement and emerge un-bruised with an under $20 Norma Kamali pantsuit. And it was she who showed me how to walk into Henri Bendel (when Buster, the doorman, still tipped his hat and scrutinized all those who dared enter) with a certain
élan and
drop $400 on a sweater that “we understood.”

But shopping in Paris, where dressing is an art form, requires a whole different set of instincts. Whether one is stalking the
atelier
of some trendy new designer, perusing the Courreges boutique, or combing the racks at Tati (a K Mart with style), one finds oneself shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the most chic women in the world. They may live in a city with cobblestone streets, but they're wearing spike heels or four-inch-high platforms. From the art student with multi-looped earrings bracketing her Mohawk haircut to the “Madame Figaro” turned out in exquisitely accessorized pastel suits, these women are together.
Put
together.

I wanted to put myself together, too, but the obstacles seemed daunting. There was the intimidating process of buying things in a foreign language, the unfamiliar terrain and clothing sizes, the thought of stepping into a community changing room with an impeccably turned out Frenchwoman who probably looked more chic in her underwear than I did in the I-can't-afford-it-anyway $750 designer dress I was trying on. (I'm convinced that all Frenchwomen are born completely crease-free, with a unique and mystical scarf-tying gene.)

Slowly, though, I began to overcome the intimidation and the fear. I learned about the Paris that is all
haute couture
and little gold chairs, and the trendy Les Halles boutiques where gamine salesgirls sport purple lipstick and black, boxy dresses. I learned the latest slang: for instance, it used to be chic to say that some new idea or style was “brancher-wired,” plugged in. Now, the hip French simply
exclaim “Decker!” (pronounced deck-AIR)—trendy shorthand for Black & Decker, contemporary provider of all things plugged in.

I also learned about browsing. The French expression for this,
faire les vitrines
, sounded to me suspiciously like “make the latrines.” Anyway, as it turns out, this is mostly an American pastime. Just try entering the house of Chanel to “look around.” Even in the local Benetton shop, a salesgirl will immediately appear behind you.
“Voulez-vous quelque chose, Madame?”
the voice inquires, its tone an implied question about your lineage, your taste, your credit line.

“Non, je regarde.”

You walk over to a stack of blouses. She walks over to the stack of blouses. You finger the gray chiffon. She eyes you suspiciously.

“Would you like to try on the gray chiffon?”

“No, thank you. I'm still just looking.”

You move to the right. She moves to the right. You to the left, she to the left. Suddenly you feel like the prey of Inspector Clouseau.

Perhaps French salespeople are more attentive (just try to round up a salesperson in Bloomingdale's when you need help). Or maybe they're more persistent (personally, I'd rather be left alone). Perhaps the French consumer is less frivolous (and actually goes to a store to buy something). Or less curious. I'm not sure. All I know is that it's a difference that took some
getting used to. Standing in front of a mirror at home and practicing a scowl, a firm
je regarde
, and an arch of the eyebrow helped immeasurably.

And when you actually find something you wish to buy (that you'll be
allowed
to buy—witness my encounter with the lady in the lingerie shop), there's the embarrassment of not understanding what it costs. Do you want to stand there counting on your fingers (in front of the impeccably dressed, crease-free, perfectly scarf-tied salesperson) or juggling your pocket calculator? It lacks a certain
je ne sais quoi
, if you know what I mean. A friend remembers saying “I'll take it!” and then quickly handing over every franc in her pocketbook in exchange for a thin, flat box containing one thin, flat (albeit elegant) Hermès scarf. How many Eiffel Tower bracelets, pink mesh stockings, berets, or bottles of Chanel No. 5 could she have gotten if only she'd correctly calculated the exchange rate?

People have asked me if I've noticed that at least the French are nicer to the Americans these days. “Is it because of the favorable exchange rate?” they want to know. “Not exactly,” I answer sagely. “The Japanese have had the most money to spend lately, so the French now treat the Japanese even worse than they did the Americans.”

Living in France, I soon found that just like Frenchwomen I gradually bought fewer pieces of clothing, but more carefully selected ones. I found that I relished the opportunity to try on new personalities: after all, I could play out my fantasy of strutting into a bistro wearing patterned black stockings and a graffiti-covered micromini, absolutely confident that no one I know would recognize me. I even prevailed upon my French tutor to devote one of our lessons to teaching me how to tie a scarf
à la française
. And eventually I came to think of shopping in Paris as a great adventure—almost as if the
FBI
had relocated me to a new life, with a new name, language, identity, and size. But it took time, and it wasn't easy.

As for bras, I never did understand the imperious declaration of the lingerie saleswoman: were my breasts really too large, or was
her remark just an example of Gallic snobbery? After that encounter, I called New York and had my bras sent from Ezra Cohen on the Lower East Side. I wore them under my latest Claude Montana and Agnes B sundresses. And if that's not a cross-cultural experience, then I don't know what is.

After dinner we felt like seeing such Parisian specialties as we might see without distressing exertion, and so we sauntered through the brilliant streets and looked at the dainty trifles in variety stores and jewelry shops. Occasionally, merely for the pleasure of being cruel, we put unoffending Frenchmen on the rack with questions framed in the incomprehensible jargon of their native language, and while they writhed, we impaled them, we peppered them, we scarified them, with their own vile verbs and participles.

—Mark Twain (1869)

JACK E. BRONSTON