For about two weeks, from the end of May to the beginning of June, we travelled in France as tourists. The days were getting longer, the weather increasingly picked up, and we greatly enjoyed our journey. Here are some of our impressions and experiences.
1. Trains We travelled by trains, i.e. by their TGVs and Intercities. They were mostly on time. They were clean, no doubt. But were they comfortable to the tourists? From the artistic point of view they were not as beautiful as we had thought. Moreover, there were no restaurant cars/buffet cars as we had expected to find. Of course selling of drinks, sandwiches and so on by wagons moving up and down the trains was much better than nothing, but are they pleasant to see in the several hours' monotonous journeys?
To our surprise, even in the TGVs, more often than not there was no announcement in English. It was only in French. We thought it was deliberate. When an inspector came around to check our tickets, I told him that they had been examined by his colleague earlier in the day on the same journey, and he said, in perfect English, 'I don't speak English.' So it was some new language that was similar to English. To pretend not to understand English and to answer in French was what we had heard. But seeing is believing. Our thought went over to the inhabitants of the former French colonies who had absolutely no means but to learn French, at their cost, in order to be a living cog in that colony.
One more thing is the large number of passengers everywhere waiting for the platform their trains were coming to to be announced only shortly before their arrival and departure. I wonder how they manage it in our country, Japan, or in other countries. Is it not a huge loss of time and energy?I do not think it is like this.
2. Food Most of the food, not only what we took out but what we ate at the respectable-looking restaurants, let me be frank, were not good. They were surprisingly not good. The material was simple, but it was all right once you put sufficient attention and labour on the preparation. They were conspicuous by absence. What they called 'salads' were just green leaves. Those dishes served at the central parts of Paris, for example, won't pass as such in most of our humble restaurants. They are tasteless, and hard to eat. Sweets, of course, are an exception.
3. Museums Naturally we spent more time at the museums than anywhere else. I would not talk about the Louvre here. Though it was on a much grander scale than the British Museum, partly due to the grandness of the building, the Orsay was more systematic and easier to see. The ships arranged at the Maritime Museum could have been brought into a more intimate relation with the French history. I was astonished at the collection at the Guimet Museum. I wonder if they could have been chronologically arranged neatly, with more comments/explanations.
Outside Paris, we were impressed by the History Museum at Strasbourg. The Maritime Museum at Marseille is a total disappointment. For a city like this its rearrangement is a must. We regret to miss a visit to the Island of If. At Toulouse we came across a tiny Occitania Museum and enjoy it.
A final word. Like so many other European countries France is suffering high unemployment. I have seen, however, that, in spite of this, labour-saving measures have been rather widely adopted at hotels, at the Metro, in the trains, and so on. Would not the creation of jobs be far more urgent?
1. Trains We travelled by trains, i.e. by their TGVs and Intercities. They were mostly on time. They were clean, no doubt. But were they comfortable to the tourists? From the artistic point of view they were not as beautiful as we had thought. Moreover, there were no restaurant cars/buffet cars as we had expected to find. Of course selling of drinks, sandwiches and so on by wagons moving up and down the trains was much better than nothing, but are they pleasant to see in the several hours' monotonous journeys?
To our surprise, even in the TGVs, more often than not there was no announcement in English. It was only in French. We thought it was deliberate. When an inspector came around to check our tickets, I told him that they had been examined by his colleague earlier in the day on the same journey, and he said, in perfect English, 'I don't speak English.' So it was some new language that was similar to English. To pretend not to understand English and to answer in French was what we had heard. But seeing is believing. Our thought went over to the inhabitants of the former French colonies who had absolutely no means but to learn French, at their cost, in order to be a living cog in that colony.
One more thing is the large number of passengers everywhere waiting for the platform their trains were coming to to be announced only shortly before their arrival and departure. I wonder how they manage it in our country, Japan, or in other countries. Is it not a huge loss of time and energy?I do not think it is like this.
2. Food Most of the food, not only what we took out but what we ate at the respectable-looking restaurants, let me be frank, were not good. They were surprisingly not good. The material was simple, but it was all right once you put sufficient attention and labour on the preparation. They were conspicuous by absence. What they called 'salads' were just green leaves. Those dishes served at the central parts of Paris, for example, won't pass as such in most of our humble restaurants. They are tasteless, and hard to eat. Sweets, of course, are an exception.
3. Museums Naturally we spent more time at the museums than anywhere else. I would not talk about the Louvre here. Though it was on a much grander scale than the British Museum, partly due to the grandness of the building, the Orsay was more systematic and easier to see. The ships arranged at the Maritime Museum could have been brought into a more intimate relation with the French history. I was astonished at the collection at the Guimet Museum. I wonder if they could have been chronologically arranged neatly, with more comments/explanations.
Outside Paris, we were impressed by the History Museum at Strasbourg. The Maritime Museum at Marseille is a total disappointment. For a city like this its rearrangement is a must. We regret to miss a visit to the Island of If. At Toulouse we came across a tiny Occitania Museum and enjoy it.
A final word. Like so many other European countries France is suffering high unemployment. I have seen, however, that, in spite of this, labour-saving measures have been rather widely adopted at hotels, at the Metro, in the trains, and so on. Would not the creation of jobs be far more urgent?
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