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apprieciate you doing this.
my experience with the french:
Went to Paris alone and met my french friend there and went out with her for 4 days or so (she studied abroad at my university) All her friends were really cool and she was really cool. People that we met on the street in Paris were really cool. Most people I met while hanging out with her were really cool.
90% of the French people I've met while traveling besides that have come off as rude and arrogant. Am i missing some kinda secret?
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I have some stupid theory about this.
France is a great country to take some vacation. That's not so common for the typical french to go aboard and travel. Only the richest part of the population go outside france, therefore the probability of meeting french [censored] increases a lot outside france.
Also it seems that french "cool" people do not like mass tourism so much. For example, on thailand beaches, you will find loads of young swede, germans, english, but only a few french, and those french will frequently be douchebags. On the contrary, in the north of thailand, in the middle of the jungle, around temple or other [censored] like that, half the foreigner you will see will be french. You will still meet french douchebags but also cool frenchs there...
But I think it's like anywhere in the world, you only notice the loud or stupid people whereas the quieter and surely more interesting ones tend to be more invisible. Englishmen seem to be always piss drunk, American tourists seem to be always loud fat and stupid, but that's only because the cool and intersting english or americans don't like to make a show of themselves...
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two of my favorite musicians/bands right now are a French band called Kaolin (though I wish I could understand the lyrics) and Yann Tierson. Can you recommend any other similar music?
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I don't know very much Kaolin, but it did not seem to be very original compared to english/american poprock bands.
Anyway one of the most typical french band (popular songs, folk, rock, even punk) is "Les Tetes Raides", which is imo quite original with its own sound.
http://www.amazon.fr/10-ans-T%C3%AAtes-R...2574&sr=1-3 (it's a best of, they have made many albums)
Yann Tiersen is really great, but it's quite hard to find a similar band or artist.
In France I would say "Les Enfants des Autres" has a bit of Yann Tiersen's touch. But the CD is very hard to find [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]
http://www.priceminister.com/offer/b...-CD-Album.html
Another Yann Tiersen look alike is Rachel's (but they are not french at all)
This album is awesome :
http://www.amazon.com/Selenography-R.../dp/B00000IR6T