How to Be Nice to
Tourists: A New Manual for Snooty Parisians
Do you speak Touriste?
By Mackenzie Yang June 24, 2013
Are the French
finally feeling the pinch of their struggling economy
and embracing the concept that “it pays to be nice”? Tourism offices in Paris–a
city notorious for being unwelcoming to foreigners–are hoping to avoid losing
tourists to friendlier destinations by distributing a handbook on being more
courteous, reports Reuters.
Titled, ”Do you
speak Touriste?”, the small pamphlet has friendly greetings in 8 languages,
including Spanish, Italian and Chinese. It also offers suggestions to help
locals better understand how visitors from various countries prefer to be
addressed. “The British like to be called by their first names,” the guide
explains, while Italians should be shaken by the hand, and Americans like to be
reassured on prices. Regarding the Chinese, which Reuters describes as
the fastest-growing group of visitors traveling to France’s capital, the guide
describes them as “fervent shoppers” and advises that “a simple smile and hello
in their language will fully satisfy them.”
Brazilians
apparently pose a special challenge to a city known for exchanging the ultimate
air kiss as a greeting. According to Reuters, the guide suggests
offering to speak English to Brazilians — who are described as warm, “readily
tactile” and keen on evening excursions — by telling them: “Nào falo Português
mas posso informar Inglês.” (Rough translation: “I don’t speak Portuguese, but
I can speak English.”)
With tourism
supplying 1 in 10 jobs in the Paris area, 30,000 copies of the manual are
currently being passed out to taxi drivers, waiters, hotel managers and sales
people in areas ranging from the banks
of the Seine river up to hilly Montmartre as well as in nearby Versailles and
Fontainebleau, according to the report.
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