In the last 24 hours, 3 strangers have stopped C and me to ask for directions. My favourite request came from an elderly woman early this morning as we were walking to the Louvre (two hours later than we had planned, thanks to jet lag and over-sleeping). She asked, “excusez-moi, vous êtes du quartier? Je cherche la rue…”. She was so lovely and eloquent, asking us if we lived in the neighbourhood because she was searching for a particular street. I think it might have been fun to throw our plans to the wind and instead pull out our map to lead that woman to her destination.

Later in the evening in another neighbourhood, a young man stopped us and said, “je cherche la Gare St Lazare” to which we had to again admit that we had no idea how to help him find that train station as we were mere tourists.

There is a stereotype that Parisians are rude and inhospitable to tourists, but so far this trip, we haven’t seen evidence of this. We apologized (in French, admittedly) to all 3 people who asked us for directions, explaining that we were tourists and really had no idea how to give them concise directions. In every case, the person smiled broadly, thanked us profusely, and carried on. I should mention that there is nothing close to “Parisian” about either C or me, with our earth-toned clothes and tall, black boots, so it’s even more of a mystery why anyone would think we knew where we were going! But, we’ll take those requests as compliments.

C and I spent the better part of the day at the Louvre, enjoying the sculptures and paintings and trying desperately not to become overwhelmed by the vast array of priceless art. At one point, I saw a tourist slouched on a small sofa in the middle of a room filled with Italian paintings, staring blankly into the distance at nothing in particular, looking like she had just lost her will to live. Clearly a victim of culture overload.

In the evening, we rode Paris’ spectacular metro to the shops along Boulevard Haussmann, to enjoy all the Christmas lights and window displays. As C precisely stated, we are terribly amused by “twinkly, sparkly things”.

Indeed.

* “Are you from the neighbourhood?”