Exp. – killing time
Entrepreneur
n. - from the words "entre" or under and "prendre" to take
Nearly four months after our kitchen ceiling collapsed, I’m sitting here waiting for the entrepreneur or as we would call him, handyman, to come and finish repairing the hole. He began on Friday, today is Monday and as long as he continues to show up, it should be fixed by the end of the week.
Nothing happens quickly in France – nothing. People don’t rush here because there’s no point. We had brunch yesterday with friends, leaving the apartment at noon to return at 5pm. Getting back to the kitchen ceiling, it took six weeks just to get our insurance expert to come and take a look at it. Of course it was during August when everyone is on vacation. The process then had to be repeated two months later since there was some dispute over how much the repairs would cost.
Disputes or discussions are a way of life here. And both take time. The unions are still disputing and discussing the retirement reform. To explain it simply, the reform would raise the retirement age by two years in order to keep the pension coffers from running out. I think it’s already been passed into law, but that doesn’t stop the unions from holding their manifestations or protests. Even the lyceens or high school students got into the act, protesting in a show of solidarity while their representatives made the talk show rounds to discuss the topic even further. It’s difficult sometimes to understand anyone’s points of view though since another French habit is talking over one another.
When I was on the bus the other day I started up a conversation with a lovely French woman. A young lyceen got on the bus without paying. Apparently he didn’t have his metro card for some reason, but he did have a healthy sense of entitlement. He and the bus driver started to dispute and the woman rolled her eyes and said “ah we French love to discuss things – you see how much they discuss this and all it’s doing is wasting time.”
Time here is not a luxury, but a right. People deserve their time and they will take it and yours. This is why vacation time is not a privilege, but an expectation. When discussing the strikes one day with a Nigerian taxi driver, he said, “In my country, we work to get ahead, to buy a home, to make our lives. In France, people work to get to their vacation.” That’s why adding another two years to the retirement age feels like a life sentence.
The French have a reputation for being tardy, which while not true for all of them, does play into their relationship with time. Even television timing can be off as we have witnessed when trying to tape French shows. For some reason and especially with films, we have to remember to build in some extra time in order to risk missing the end since they don’t seem to start when the guide says they will.
An hour and a half after expected, the handyman has shown up. When it comes to repairs, I’m happy for him to take his time and in fairness, he does a very good job. Traffic and bad weather got in the way of punctuality this morning and because I had nothing else planned, “ca me derange pas,” it doesn’t bother me. He tells me he still has another three days of work to do – further patching tomorrow followed by first and second coats of paint the following two days. But we just realized in talking that Thursday is a holiday, Friday a “pont” or bridge for those who can take it allowing for a nice long four-day weekend. So the job will actually finish next week, which is a good thing too because he tells me that after that he will be on vacation.
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