Esmeralda
Diamond Member
Yes. It's my experience that some of the people who have to deal with tourists all day long, especially in summer when the season is high, they can be rude, but I believe it is that they have to deal with tourists, masses of them, and often the tourists are thoughtless and rude themselves. Those in the service industry, especially in places with a high amount of tourist, who never get grouchy must be saints.
I have also often experiened someone, in their own country, apologizing to me for not having better English. I will often complement people on their good English, and they will say they're sorry it isn't better, which is embarrassing for me because their English is so very much better than when I try to speak their langauge.
I have found the French people to be very pleasant and helpful, no different than anywhere else. You generally get back what you give...if you are friendly and respectful, that is usually what you get in return. Not always, but mostly.
In general, people in any one countr are pretty much the same as anywhere else and range in demeanor and attitude from one end of the spectrum to the other. Perhaps people in some places are less outgoing or more abrupt, but that is just surface stuff. Americans are steretyped as being loud and brash, but that is a stereotype based on the fact they are the ones who get noticed. It's probably the same in any culture: the behavior that attracts notice is the one that creates the stereotype, while the reality is that people are individuals, not flocks of sheep, thinking and behaving in one way, no matter what their culture.
I work every day with large groups of people of one culture or another, and, believe me, each one is an individual and as different from each other, though they are the same culture, as any human being is different from another human being anywhere on the planet.
