“We’re Part French, You Know“

Having traveled to 33 countries, someone was bound to ask which trip was my favorite.

My answer, “My accidental trip to Paris”.

Before I moved to Spain, my sister and I traveled to Europe every year for many years.

Each year we chose a different European city to fly to; wander around Europe for as long as we could; return to the city where we had started and fly home.

For many years we had avoided France. We had heard all those stories about how rude, unpleasant and difficult the French people were. Why would anyone want to go there!

One year we chose Amsterdam to begin and end our trip. When we were near the end of our vacation time and needed to head back to Amsterdam, we were in Spain. 

Looking at the map we could see that to avoid France meant we would have to detour around it. It would be a very, very long and time-wasted detour.

It was only made sense to travel straight through France and then on to Amsterdam.

Our train did not travel nonstop through France and we had to change trains in Paris.

Because of a layover until our next train, we decided to ‘take a peek at Paris’.

I fell in love with Paris.

All the touristy reasons to love Paris were absolutely true.

But the reason I fell in love with Paris was because of the way Paris made me feel;

“This is where I’m supposed to be”.

“This is where I belong”.

“This is home”.

I felt as though I already knew Paris.

For all my life, Grandmother Howard told me that we were part French. She took a lot of pride in saying, “We’re part French, you know.”

It was not so many years ago that my older brother Ted, who had traced our family tree back to 1525, told me we had NO FRENCH ancestors!

Why (!) would Grandmother tell me we were part French?

Ted said it was because she like nice things like perfume and silk so she just decided that she must be French!

Or…

Maybe Grandmother knew something that no one else knew?

Several years ago I sent a saliva sample to Ancestry.com for a DNA trace to learn from what countries my ancestors had originated.

Again, no ancestors from France. 

As a side note:

When I was living in Spain, I went to the grocery store one afternoon and arrived a few minutes before the store reopened after siesta. 

There was a Spanish gentleman waiting there as well. When a second man arrived and asked me in Spanish what time the store would open, the first Spanish gentleman said, “She doesn’t understand Spanish. She’s French.”

    He thought I was French! I was delighted.

Paris is my favorite city in the world but when I moved to Europe, I lived in Spain. 

I could not afford to live in Paris but being right next door, I could easily visit.

I visited often.

“We’re part French, you know.”