Lots of French people in the service sector – all sectors, in fact – are virtually impossible to fire or reprimand, and a 15 per cent service charge is automatically added to all restaurant and café bills, so if push comes to shove, they don’t give a damn whether you get good service or not. The essential thing is not to lose your temper, however strong the temptation may be. As long as you view the whole French service experience as a game, it will become a learning process. If it ended in merde this time, next time you’ll do better.
The Waiter Can’t Wait
The French waiter is a much misunderstood creature. A bit like the hyena. The hyena isn’t really laughing at you – it just naturally makes a smug-sounding noise. French waiters are sometimes the same. They can also be incredibly charming, helpful and efficient. As can the hyena, when feeding hunks of dismembered antelope to its young.
The trick is not to present yourself as a potential antelope. If the waiter is in a rush or a bad mood, or both, you may get mauled. You must always remember that you are a lion, and give the impression that you know the savannah as well as the waiter, even if you don’t. This doesn’t mean that you have to be a wine buff (though knowing the difference between champagne and Chablis can help) – that’s where the waiter can be legitimately asked for advice, and will be glad to give it. What it means is that as you sit there in your café or restaurant seat, you should feel as at ease as anyone else in the place.
If for any reason you don’t feel at ease – if you’re being pointedly ignored by the waiting staff, which can happen – just do what a lion does if it decides that its resting place isn’t shady enough – cheerfully and calmly get up and leave. As long, of course, as this isn’t the only eating place you’ve seen open for the last twenty kilometres, in which case you just have to tell yourself ‘C’est la vie’ and get on with it.
And rest assured, if you do bite the bullet and pull off the whole ordering trick, then you will gain the respect of all but the most awkward of French waiters or waitresses, and get as good service as they are capable of giving.
How to Get Good Service in France
What I’ve learnt in twelve years of living in France is that getting good service here is anything but a divine right. It’s like a computer game. You’ve got to press the right buttons or it’ll be game over before you’ve had a chance to buy a single croissant.
And before play even starts, you’ve got to realize that your opponent, the French person offering service, is not your friend. I’ve been served in California by people who seemed to be offering me their body when all I’d ordered was a glass of seaweed and echinacea juice. You won’t get that in France, unless of course you happen to stumble into a massage parlour that also offers health drinks. But then again, you probably don’t want the French waiter as your friend, so what do you care whether he likes you or not? The important thing is that he should respect you as a worthy adversary, not want you as a pétanque partner.
If you bear this in mind, you won’t be put off as you try to progress through the three levels of the French service game.
Level One
IGNORE THE CUSTOMER
My worst experience of this was when I tried to get a cup of coffee at a certain trendy café near the Centre Pompidou. The décor was designed by Philippe Starck and the prices suggested that they were still trying to pay off the furnishings. The round metal tables were welded to the floor, which really ought to have warned me that the basic attitude to the customers here was that they were potential furniture thieves.
The place wasn’t very busy, and there were only three occupied tables up on the mezzanine. I sat in a steel armchair and waited to be served. Sure enough, after ten minutes or so, a waiter ambled up the stairs, a very tall male-model type in a black suit.
As you should always do with a French waiter, I looked him straight in the eye. As soon as he blinks in your direction, you have to blurt out your order before he can get away. In this case, though, he met my gaze, pouted moodily as if I was a Vogue photographer snapping him on the catwalk, and turned his back on me. He took the orders at the other tables, ambled back towards me, and, avoiding eye contact this time, went downstairs.
What did I do wrong?, I wondered. Had I forgotten that I was wearing my invisibility cloak?
In fact, I think I made two fatal errors.
First, I hesitated for that millisecond when I had his attention. I let myself be beaten into submission by his withering look. I ought to have got out my ‘Bonjour, un café, s’il vous plaît’ in that minuscule window of opportunity between stare and pout.
Second, I now suspect that I was on the wrong side of an invisible border. I wasn’t at one of ‘his’ tables. If this was the case, the other waiter was obviously excused stairs that day (fell off a catwalk, maybe?), because no one else made any attempt to serve on the mezzanine. And my waiter certainly couldn’t be bothered to explain the situation to me.
Whatever. This kind of thing will happen to Parisians and visitors alike. It’s a trendy jungle out there sometimes. It’s
