Why It’s So Hard To Make Friends With Parisians | Making In Paris

Tutorial Transcript

Salut YouTube today I've got a special guest with me - Candice from the blog Paris is just not that into you. This is gonna be a double video for you because firstly we're gonna tackle a really interesting topic which is why it's so hard to make friends with Parisians and the reason I actually got Candice in is because she has an awesome article about this which I found on her blog and I was like we have to bring that to life in a video but the second bonus is that you get to play a game which is: 'can you tell the difference between the Australian and the New Zealand accent?'. So I'm curious about this name Paris is just not that into you what does it mean? yeah so I mean Paris is just not that into you is a blog that I set up to talk about my expat experience in Paris and when I arrived in Paris I found that you know there's a lot of blogs talking about how beautiful Paris is like how amazing the Eiffel Tower is etcetera and you know I find that Paris is all of that but it's also a really random place and so I guess I created the blog to kind of tackle those topics and to sort of explain why it is that I decide to stay in Paris despite the fact that it would appear that Paris is just not that into me. I'm also active on Instagram and recently on Twitter as well I've also got a podcast of the same name Paris is just not that into you on iTunes. Cool so we'll link all of those down below in the description box so you can go and find out why Paris seems to just not be completely into her so without further ado let's get stuck into the reasons why we think it's so hard to make friends with Parisians. So the first reason why I think that it's a little bit difficult to make friends with Parisians is that they do not like to make friends with people at work in my first job in Paris my very first week I sat down to lunch with my colleagues and they said to me so I hear that where you come from people actually make friends with their colleagues and I was like yeah I mean it's a great source to meet people. Exactly. I figured that that was kind of normal, apparently not, so then and she turns around and says to me well just so that you know, we don't do that here. At least she warned you, I guess! Exactly, that's the thing. I originally thought was maybe a little bit direct especially for my first week at work actually turned out to be pretty solid advice because it was true I find that people in Paris they really like to keep their their working like and their private life separate I've heard some French people explain it to me as you know when we go to work we don't want to be thinking about home and then we go home we don't want to be thinking about work which is why they try and keep the two worlds super separate yeah but at the same time I think it's so nice to be able to make friends at work with your colleagues and stuff I mean I don't know about you but the way that I figure if you're gonna be like spending at least 35 hours a week I mean you may as well get along with these guys right yeah exactly I thought that when I started working I'd definitely be able to make a lot more friends and kind of expand my group because the friends I had here were from University which is cool, love my friends from university, but they were also like international characters like they came into this international program so a lot of them left I was like it doesn't matter I'll make lots of new friends at work...but, no. So reason number two for why we think that it's super difficult to make friends with Parisians is that they actually already have their friends and I remember you know like getting really upset one night with my boyfriend and saying you know what's wrong with me what is it that's making Parisians and especially Parisian women not really warm to me like why don't they like me? And he was like they just don't need you you know it's not about you, have you ever just thought to yourself they don't want new friends? I could totally relate to that I find that a lot of people here in Paris they've kind of you know they already have their friends from high school or from university and they just kind of figured like I don't actually need anymore friends so they're just kind of not open to making new friends yeah it's a different rhythm isn't it because I think you can have friends, well what we say is you have a friend for a reason a season or a lifetime you know and sometimes you have friends and they will be university friends or sometimes you'll have friends and they'll be work friends while you're at that job and here I kind of feel like yeah they lock their friends in especially if they go to like prépa, university together this kind of thing friends for life yeah but you're just kind of stuck with them yeah and it's like actually when we moved to Paris, with Niels being from the South of France he doesn't really know anyone here no and I was like it's cool it's an opportunity to meet so many new friends and the first thing he did is contact people he went to kindergarten with or to primary school with or high school with and saying hey it's been 10 15 20 years but would you be interested in reconnecting. Like there needs to be some sort of prior relationship.Exactly. This next point I kind of understand because we're so busy, apartments are so small so you're often like you know you're not really inviting people into your intimate space your home and stuff like that so when you have new connections you're always just meeting up in a bar and that kind of thing so there's a lifestyle factor and also I feel like life is so busy here I don't know why but time just seems to disappear so even just managing a network of five friends yeah is enough and because it takes so long to make new friends here, I think even French to French, like correct me if I'm wrong but I think even French person to French person it takes a lot of time a lot and effort..I don't know how you feel but I feel like when I've made or tried to make new friends here I have to put in so much work I'm chasing, I'm the one setting the appointment, I'm the one texting a lot and sometimes I think like the reason I don't have more French friends than I do is because I give up because I just I don't really feel like I'm chasing yes but like in Australia or New Zealand I'm guessing where you know you just go out with a bunch of people or you meet like someone at a bar and then basically like after one night out together you're friends it doesn't work that way here it's kind of like I don't know at least like a three-month investment I guess before yeah before you see like an ROI (return on investment) we sort of don't understand the fact that French people aren't interested in making new friends but I guess they probably don't understand the fact that with us like sometimes friendships kind of mean a lot while they're happening but ythey do sort of come and go. Yeah they don't understand we're not interested in keeping them for life. Exactly like for them it's like a friend is for life you are never getting rid of me, we are locked in! So another thing that I find is that French people are a little bit less interested in other cultures and my sort of evidence for that is that before coming to France I actually lived in Germany for a couple years and I found that there like German people were really really interested in Australia they asked me like loads of questions about what life is like in Australia and I find that in Paris it's not exactly like that like people yeah that people are curious like oh how interesting that you're from this place but um they they focus a really rational questions I find. So the token questions I get there how long does it take you to get there what's the land area of the country what's the population like really factual information and my favorite of all - so French - But what's your national dish?! Yes! I get that all the time! They're so disappointed when you have to admit that you don't really have one! We have really good food, it's super organic and stuff but we kind of stole the recipes from the rest of the world! So yeah it doesn't really go further than that. Almost like from a factual, documentary level they're interested but they don't really want to know what our lifestyle's like, what we value, that we find different here, what we've struggled with here, it doesn't really get to that level (often). The next point we wanted to touch on is the fact that when you arrive and you're not a French person you've got an added layer of difficulty when it comes to integrating because you don't necessarily speak French or at least not fluently yet and we all know that the French language is at the heart and soul of French people and completely understand so I understand how they think oh we can't possibly be friends if we're not really speaking the same language but even just on a like basic level it's a big problem so for example when you arrive in France and you'll have your French colleagues or even you know contacts, acquaintances for example they'll switch to French and they'll start speaking French and they know that you don't understand yet and so that they basically keep chatting between each other and their strategy is that they just don't make eye contact with you to avoid having to switch so they almost like you're just sitting there like hey guys and you are in silence you're just sitting there in silence and they don't really mind that you're not in the conversation and they'll just keep chatting between themselves and just not looking at you whereas for us that's such a no-no sometimes I'm not sure if I've come to kind of romanticize what like social interactions are like in Australia but I really do feel that yeah when you're in a group of people you kind of make an effort to make sure that everyone is included in the conversation and in France I feel that it's just like every man for himself yes the conversation and yeah so people will speak in like really fast French with like loads of slang about like really specific topics that you couldn't really you know about like their second cousin or like that party that they went to like two years ago almost kind of have to like aggressively insert yourself into the conversation. Another point that I just wanted to mention quickly is that I think as well we may have just different concepts of what a friendship is so I was explaining to someone the other day like a French person like I find it really hard sometimes because I don't have that French friend who's so close that I could ring them up crying in the middle of the night and say something major's happened can I come around and see you kind of thing and they said to me like I would never do that to my friends like to my girlfriends and it's like well actually if my measure of what a real friend is is like up here and for French people that's more here then maybe I'm being too tough of a judge about how many friends I have. And another thing I've noticed about friendships here is that there's definitely something around having a network that you can leverage and use if you need it so I've had French people contact me like two years since we've last spoke now saying Rosie my brother's moving to New Zealand can you recommend a good insurance provider and I'm like what who are you? Like for us that means the friendship has moved on, you parted ways that's fine like you know. So you didn't read the terms and conditions of the friendship? Whereas here I feel like you contact people all the time to like get advice and you leverage your network almost in a business kind of way like oh this person has that information they could be useful or this person I can go to them about that I completely agree I feel that yeah Parisians are all over networking, they are really great networkers! So that's all we had to talk about today in this video about why it's so hard to make friends with Parisians. Maybe we've missed something or if you guys have any reactions, comments please leave them down below we'd love to read them and see what you've got to say. Is that the same for you as French people does it take a long time to make a real friend? Does it take one year or two years like it does for us or is it just a problem of being an expat? Tell me down below did you figure out the difference between the Aussie and the New Zealand accent or is it impossible? Until the next video guys see you next time. à bientôt !