TOURISTS

© cultivate

I played tourist this week-end since two lovely friends were over from Paris to explore London. I can tell you without exaggeration that we had a great day, wandering far and wide across London and finally ending up at Tate Modern. However, going back to an earlier debate about national stereotypes, another thing the French are famous for is their arrogance and their complete inability to recognise a queue, let alone stand patiently in one. Anyway, on arriving at the restaurant on the top floor of the Tate, off strode Pascal to the reception desk only to find that the restaurant would not open for another minute (and not a moment earlier – this is England after all). Imagine our horror when, after following him to the desk and quietly enjoying the view while we waited, we turned around to realise that the 20 or so people at the bar were not actually also ‘just’ enjoying the view with some drinks but were, in fact, waiting in a queue (like good English people) for the restaurant! All we could do was laugh out loud at his audacity, and anyway I'm sure people were saying to themselves “Well, what do you expect, he’s French!” In any case, it worked, we were second in the restaurant and had impeccable service!