Tolerance

On Saturday KT, PL, Ninja M and I stopped through the Prado Market, from where Ninja M determined to buy our supper for Sunday. He led us through a maze of stalls hawking swimsuits, underwear, jewelry, sunglasses, kitchen utensils, live fish, dead fish, skinned rabbits with their heads still attached, and - finally - rotisserie chicken on a spit. It smelled delicious and golden potatoes cut into coins smoked beneath it. This was to be Sunday's meal.

At first I was extremely excited. The chicken smelled amazing and I could not wait to take a picture to send around to my friends so they would be jealous of the feast to come. I waited impatiently in line, watching the chicken man deftly pull the roasted birds from their skewers and wrap them in paper for the people ahead of us. Right before we reached the front he emptied one skewer completely of chicken and reached for raw replacements.

He did not wear gloves.

He did not wash his hands.

He threaded the chickens on the skewer and replaced it in the pit, where it began spinning with the others. Then he picked up the spoon and began serving potatoes. Then he picked up a cooked chicken and put it in a bag for another customer.

He never washed his hands.

I was disgusted but fascinated and mentioned the raging dichotomy of my emotions to Ninja M. He reminded me that in France, people tolerate many more things than in, for example, the US.

We put together the beginnings of a working list.

Not washing your hands before placing raw chickens on spit to be grilled, in a van, parked on the sidewalk
Oh yeah, it was out of a van.

Parking on the sidewalk
Sometimes there are little barriers on sidewalks to prevent cars from parking there, but not usually. Actually it's frequently quite difficult to traverse the sidewalks by foot because so many cars park there.

Installing commercial ovens in vans that are then parked on sidewalks to sell pizza
For example, the way the pizza man van does. I would like to note that his pizza is darn delicious. Then again, so was the rotisserie chicken - yeah, of course I ate it.

Driving motorcycles on the sidewalk

Parking in bus stops
I guess comparatively I should not be surprised about the bus stop thing.

Running red lights on Sundays
Ninja M submitted this one. Personally I'm pretty sure they run red lights on days that end in "y".

Closing your store whenever you want
I pass the grocery store down the street from Ninja M's flat several times a day and have discovered no rhyme or reason to its hours.

Having a pop star for a first lady
The first lady of France, Carla Bruni, is a former pop star who married the prime minister. Ninja M played me some of her music. Check it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carla_Bruni

As I mentioned in today's earlier post, they do things differently in France.