Day 9 (bis) Oh là là, C’est la Police!

Day 9 (bis) Thurs. Oct 23, 2008

We just made another U turn to return Halette to the selected route.

There standing in the middle of the road were two men with glow-in-the-dark chartreuse stripes on black uniforms. One had a flashlight and waved us off the street trying to get us to drive into an alley.

At first I was shocked. When I came to my senses, I was reluctant to following their insistent flash lit directed way. Then I spied their van. It said <Gendarmes> which is another term for police. So, I pulled in where they indicated.

In French, the non-flashing man snorted “Please, Hand over your driver’s license and car registration.”


I had to find my purse and sift through my credit cards while Ted fumbled through the papers in the glove compartment. We finally procured the required documents and I handed them to the waiting hand.

“Have you been drinking, Madame? Did you enjoy alcohol today?, he asked in pretty darned good English after flipping my Florida driver’s license over and over a few spins.

“No.” I responded “ I have not. ( I only have one Magarita on Fridays whether I need it or not. As this was neither Friday nor do the French make Margaritas, I had not enjoyed any alcohol that day.)


Okay, I’ll admit it when in France I do (somewhat) like the French. So I do imbibe in white wine to wash down any of 365 varieties of French cheese. But since I had no French cheese today, I had no wine.

The breathalyzer disclosed exactly that result – 0.

We were "dismissed" and started for the restaurant down that block. They saw us coming and switched off their “Open” sign as we were reaching for the handle of their door. We settled for a pizzeria.


In France, I need to have four things to eat in order to say I have truly been there.
1) Oh you know what I am going to list first - Cheese.
2) French Onion Soup and
3) Salade Niçoise
4) Crepes


Since this was a Pizzeria in la Provence, it was possible, just possible, that they had pizza AND salade niçoise on their menu.

And dagnabbit they did. It was very good. Ted had their specialty – Une Pizza Provinçale, which he wouldn’t even share it was so tasty. Add to this two cokes and un pichet d’eau and you get 29 Euros (about $37).










One thing I have not researched for a very long time, since I have stayed with friends and/or stocked the frigo, was whether Service compris and Service non-compris were still an issue. In the old days, at the bottom of a menu, it was declared whether the service (we call a tip here in America) of 15 to 20% was already included in the price of the meal. I knew it was a mistake to ask. You should always look at the bottom of the menu to find out. But I asked anyway. “Est-ce que c’est service compris ou service non-compris?”

The haughty, thin, black clothed beauty said (in French) "The bill includes what you ate". Like she never heard of service-compris et non-compris (yeah, right). So to err on the safe side we left the service too.

Since then, I have found out that service has been compris for quite some time now, and considering blacky's age, maybe she never did hear of it. We left her more than we should have, but I guess that is not so bad.

So let this be a lesson to you, tipping in France is not a 15 or 20% affair.
A Tip is a small amount extra you leave if you really liked the service; a couple of Euros at the most should do the trick, or the tip.

I wish I had Google or my cell phone.


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