There’s something so embarrassing about going to Paris. Like, I wish I didn’t dream of going to a 10/10 boulangerie and having a life changing pain au chocolat or sitting outside at an aesthetically quintessential cafe having wine in the middle of a work day but I do.
But my boyfriend and I can’t stop going to Paris because we’ve finally figured out how to order in French and are pretty sure we found cool go to spots, and, if anyone asks, I can say that I have friends that live in Paris so I seem cool and chic and international vs. Emily in Paris. And maybe once we’ve reached a point where French people don’t immediately reply in English the second we say bonjour we can move on to another city.
Being an international restauranteur and all, I try with all my might to find quality restaurants that are in demand enough to be featured on Conde Nast or Timeout (as cool as I try to be I have not figured out any other way to find restaurants other than taking to Conde Nast, Timeout or Tiktok) but hip enough to be clear of overhearing Americans pronouncing Notre Dame like the University. My main criteria is a neighborhood that is cool and residential, menus that change seasonally, tasteful decor and staff you feel like you could hang out with. If I find it on Tiktok it can only have been in, like, one or two posts. Bonus points if the cuisine isn’t necessarily French. Nothing feels cooler to me than eating non-French food in France. Admitting that may be very uncool but I enjoy the feeling of being like, no I don’t need to have a croissant and a steak tartare every five minutes, I’ve been to Paris before.
The night we arrived I booked us a table at Soces in Belleville that I believe I found on Conde Nast but can’t really remember because I made all of our reservations and a long list of Google Maps favorited places in the middle of the night when I couldn’t sleep. Now Paris on my Google Maps is covered in little hearts and I can’t remember what’s what.
The second we sat down at Soces the waiter asked us if we wanted a ‘little margarita’ which I found super off putting considering the food wasn’t Mexican, I just got there, I didn’t know what kind of margarita it was or how much it cost or what he meant by little and I genuinely didn’t want one but I suddenly felt like I was in middle school and all of my friends were drinking little margaritas and not drinking one would cost me a lot socially. This pressure made me seriously consider having a little margarita even though I only ever want to drink a bone dry gin martini, a negroni, a nice glass of wine or maybe a beer if I’m at a bad pub or it’s really hot outside. (That might sound uptight but I think that’s just what happens when you’re an international restauranteur and have taste.)
But in response to do you want a little margarita all I said was, ummm uhhh ummm hmmm I’m not sure... And the waiter said okay, think about it and we never saw him again. As if our attempts to speak French being met immediately with English wasn’t enough, our social anxiety jumped from maybe a five to one hundred. I simultaneously judged and envied the table next to us who were having a blast with this same waiter. They were ordering more wine, espresso martinis, laughing, even giving intense bedroom eyes to one another and I couldn’t help but think that that must’ve been because they said yes to the little margarita at the beginning. Is ‘do you want a little margarita’ code for are you fun or are you a fucking embarrassing tourist who can’t speak French and puts on special outfits just to come here?
And the worst part was, I did have a special outfit on. I love to identify and critique a Special Paris Outfit, or an outfit you can tell someone would never wear if they weren’t in Paris. It’s usually things like houndstooth skirts, wrinkled little dresses fresh from Shein, headbands, berets, breton stripes, neckerchiefs, ill fitting ‘preppy’ outfits, etc. (You can see this in any city, I’ve seen Special London Outfits, Special Marrakech Outfits, etc.) And, of course, I would never touch anything like that with a ten foot pole but I did have a new vintage dress burning a hole in my closet and if I’m really really honest I did think to myself: well, if not Paris then when?
I’m challenging myself to actually wear the vintage dresses I’m addicted to buying and saying, I’ll just throw this on and immediately feel cool and pulled together like Carrie Bradshaw or Carolyn Bessette, only to throw them in my closet and forget I have them. But I decided that this summer, things were gonna change. So I packed my new white dress that I bought off of a really chic woman at Second Life Markets in London and was unsure about until Anoushka made me buy it (she’s usually right). I thought it would be extra but it was actually kind of chill with the flats of my dreams that I finally found (my mom found and bought them for me and they’re literally just black flats).
As much as I tell myself nothing is embarrassing unless I let it be embarrassing, if something socially uncomfortable happens to me when I’m in my special fucking outfit that I planned to wear days before actually wearing it and when all I want is for my boyfriend to accidentally and subtly take a really banger picture of me I’ll crumble like a flaky baguette. So when Mr. do you want a little margarita socially doxxed us for not wanting a little margarita my new white dress went from feeling Carrie Bradshaw to Pillsbury Doughboy real quick.
While Mr. do you want a little margarita was flirting with the table of loud alleged New Yorkers next to us (I overheard a woman say ‘we’re all from new york’ with a desperate emphasis that I know to be native New Jerseyan) we had to ask three separate people for our second round of negronis which didn’t show up for over half an hour. And, of course, the person who finally sorted it out was the only woman working there. She not only got our negronis in a normal time between asking for them and actually receiving them but she took the third round we never ordered off of the bill.
I thought about adding a list of least embarrassing spots in Paris that still give you that I’m in Paris feel but the thought of someone from Paris (or my friends who live there) reading it and thinking, you fucking tourist, makes me want to combust. But maybe if someone begs me for it I will write it.
you may also like…
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.