Have you noticed that villagers here in the SW of France seem to have more affinity with the Spanish than with Parisians. Maybe because a lot of them moved over the border at the time of the Spanish civil war or maybe it is because we are very close to the Spanish borders, closer than we are to Paris. We think it strange that a French neighbour down the road who has lived here for more than forty years is still called " the Parisien" by all the natives. We have been to places where being a called a "Parisien" caused lips to curl. We once visited a farm to see how foie gras was produced and watch the gavage. A French lady in the group voiced out loud that she thought it a cruel practice. The farmer showing us around, pointed a finger at her saying " Madame you must be from Paris " then spat out of the side of his mouth.
When we had problems with our joiner a few years ago now he ended up taking us to a small claims court as we refused to pay him till he put the many faults right. We had a barrister from Toulouse but Malc went to court to also support our case. He had to smile at the case in front of ours which the Judge deferred but could not restrain himself from saying ..." and the barrister is from Paris". Malc said he said it with a real lip curl., and got a ripple of laughter from other complainants.
One has to remember though in the pecking order status we are even lower than Parisians !
Oh! and by the way Malc was not smiling for our case ... but that is another interesting story waiting to be told, it is a bit like a serial, second instalment at a later time!
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