Just Totally Clueless

Posted by Isabel Dexter at 13:35 on 10 Feb 2010

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It's been a year now and still I don't know the best place to buy Isabel Marant-alike vintage  in Paris or where the Parisians go to stock up on new season 3.1 Phillip Lim. Last Friday I even came out with the classic corker: "This foie gras tastes just like chicken!". Someone send the girl back to the Midlands. While it might look like I've been in Paris for ages, actually I could have been anywhere. I've spent pretty much the entire year living in my head, and believe me, it's more akin to a tiny 10 metre-squared, rat-infested studio in the 19th than the honeymoon suite at the Lutetia in there, underneath the Jo Hansford-styled hair.  Mixing my metaphors? Hey, I just can't bare for things to be too simple. Which must be why I adore it here, despite the fact that I have come to the conclusion, just like Alicia Silverstone, that in Paris I am completely and utterly clueless.

La Artiste was sweet enough to point out that it is not my personality that is wrong for Paris necessarily, just 'ma maniere' (my actions - I'm not sure how to translate that actually, but basically she was just being nice. It is my personality). I am under the much deluded belief that everyone will love me once they get to know me, despite the fact that this is blatantly not true. Parisians generally think that everyone dislikes and distrusts them and they feel the same about other people. I like to smile in the street. Parisians think people who smile in the street are either A: insane, B: fake, C: a push-over or D: American. I don't really care about what 'the done thing' is, in fact  if the general consensus is that something is 'not done' then I like to do it. Parisians think that this is not only incredibly rude but also quite inexplicable. Why would you alienate everyone else? Having possibly lost a good friend due to dancing on his table at a party, I think they have a point. In Paris if I don't buckle up and start attending to what is appropriate I am likely to die alone, with only bottles of Clarins Beauty Flash Balm and the odd pain au chocolate for comfort.

I have also come to the conclusion that despite a lifetime of eyelash fluttering, hair flicking and playful banter that I can't flirt here. It's not just the language thing, although it is difficult to do 'do-I-don't-I? Will-I-won't-I?' chat when you have to run through the entire verb forms for a word before pronouncing it like you have just had collagen injected into your face to make for a bigger pout. The obsessive 'I'm staring at you like I'm a stalker' eye contact, which is mandatory even if you just happen to have a fleeting thought that someone is cute, scares the life out of me. In England we don't look at someone like that until we're well into the throes of exchanging rings and baby names.

At a party last night a boy I really really really fancy (and this happens for me about once every two years, honestly) tried to talk to me about... ok I have no idea what we were talking about. Anyway, afterwards I asked my friend Princesse L (I was forced to give her this pseudonym, I wanted to call her La Franglaise) if I was overly flirtatious or bordering on desperado status, which is how I always feel when I fancy someone, as though there is a big flashing light above my head that alternates between saying 'I love you' and 'I'm a loser' in shades of neon yellow and electric blue.  "What?" she said. "You liked him? I thought you thought he was a pleb." I wasn't sure which was worse, the fact that my Revlon Double Twist mascara -ed lashes were exercised for nothing or that someone who isn't my Dad still uses the word 'pleb'.  "Well" I reflected, "He does dress better than I do. What would I bring to the relationship anyway?"

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