Who's Better?

I came across this wonderful cartoon on this entertaining page about France and the US, and it inspired me for a blog post. What an accurate picture, eh? ;)

People are always asking me which I like better, France or the US, and this is an impossible question to answer with a Yes or No because there are so many nuances to both, and I find various bits of each more or less desirable than others. So, in the interest of cross-channel debate and a bit of fun, here is the start of my 100% biased (but observed through direct personal experience) observations on who is better at various topics:

Movie Theaters
France wins, hands-down. I stopped going to the movies in the US because I always seemed to be spending my $6 to sit next to some fat, loud mouthbreather who spent the entire film describing it blow-by-blow to his buddies on his cellphone, while cybersex-texting his girlfriend with his other cellphone. The last movie I saw in the US was Fellowship of the Ring, just before moving, during which I had to walk back and threaten the spinal cord health of a pack of teens who somehow couldn't resist talking in full volume about their friends and their date scene throughout the film. IMAX may be nice, but I don't think I could put up with an American theater audience just to see it. Over here, theaters are lower-tech (Our favorite just has two vending machines instead of a concession stand, for instance) and they thankfully haven't discovered the concept of selling chicken wings and steak dinners to moviegoers. Instead, you buy your little bag of malted milk balls and then go in and try your absolute damnedest to not rustle the plastic as you munch, because if you do, it will be the only sound in the theater. We went to see V for Vendetta a few months back, and there wasn't a cellphone buzz through the whole movie.

Cheese Variety
This one is closer but I'll have to go with USA, simply because you can get all the French cheeses there also, and you can actually buy cheeses from other countries as well. I don't know if it's economic protectionism or simple snobbery, but it's hell trying to find cheese from anywhere outside France here - Where do I get my Stinking Bishop? Doesn't seem to be an issue of taste, as every French person we've had over who has tried our imported Nacho cheese & chips has loved the stuff (Unlike their consistently horrified reactions to peanut butter). I'm prone to guess that there's a regulation out there somewhere spurred by the French cheesemakers to keep out all those dangerous imports that might actually compete with them. Who knows?

The Child Factor
Sorry to all my American friends, but France just has better-behaved kids. The old saying, "Better seen and not heard" is still in force here, and I am often amazed at how polite and deferential French children are. Our friend Claudie's teenage son breaks off from street soccer games with his friends just to come over and shake my hand when we visit, whereas it seems US kids have to be forcibly pried from their Playstations just to elicit a grunt. I've forgotten what it's like to go out for a nice dinner and have to contend with the undisciplined sprogs of mass breeders stampeding unchecked through restaurants. Between this and the movie theaters, it's like heaven.

More to come....