Here's the thing: I'm not French. French people know I'm not French. I don't dress the right way or talk the right way or have the right mannerisms. I smile too much and look people in the eye when I pass them on the street. Foreign tourists, however, overwhelmingly believe that I AM French. I get asked for directions (generally in broken English) on a daily basis. This could be because I'm young and a girl and look relatively innocuous, but I usually don't know what I'm doing or where I'm going (I'm wandering just as much as the tourists)--I just go.

Before I left the States, almost everyone told me that French people would hate me simply because I'm an American. Quite the contrary. From grocery store cashiers to restaurant cooks, when people (okay, men) hear me speaking English with my friends, they all say "Ooh. You speak English? You are American?" It's flattering for about five seconds, until I realize that they just think I'm easy, which is, to say the least, not so flattering. These men are also ridiculously assertive. I was ordering some food with a couple of other girls last night and we were talking with the cashier/waiter. At the end of our (short) conversation, he said "so you give me your phone number or I give you mine?" to which we replied "we're not allowed" and walked away. It makes it difficult to talk to anyone without feeling like you're being taken advantage of. Love really is a way of life here, not just an added bonus, and I'm not really sure how I feel about that.