Last Weekend I went to Paris!!
So spending time in London, especially with it being so busy because of the Olympics, I have noticed that people here really like their personal space. Back home if you get on a bus or a subway there is no such thing as personal space. Everyone crowds on and gets as close together as possible so that we all can fit as many people onto the bus or subway as possible. Here however, I have found they don’t do that. We all crowd on, but if you get close enough to almost touch someone the space is full. I fell and bumped into someone on the train and she was really offended. I think it is so interesting the importance of personal space here. Is it the same for everyone else?? In Paris more people were able to crowd on. They were not interested in personal space, but they did glare at you if you got to close because they were suspicious of pick pockets!!
I am curious as to what it is with our individual cultures which allows us to be more relaxed and crowd one another, versus here were everyone walks around with their own personal bubbles.
It was also very interesting to visit Paris after a weekend in London. In London the people are a little reserved, they don’t even like to say ‘excuse me’ to a stranger. When we all load onto the bus everyone looks up or down and will not make eye contact, they don’t like to talk to strangers and they keep their opinions to themselves. In Paris, it was really different. I was walking down the street and people would holler out to you, random questions or insights or opinions. Someone yelled across a street, four lanes of traffic, to tell me they liked my bag. Paris was incredibly more relaxed and easy going. Not to say they were really friendly, because my not knowing any French set off a lot of people, which made me feel bad. I had not wanted to offend anyone, but most of the time we communicated through gesture which worked marvelously!!
It was an amazing weekend, and if anyone ever gets the chance to go to Paris, GO!!!!! Definitely check out the Louvre.
Angela
Paris is indeed amazing 🙂 i found being there for a month that if you try to understand them and their culture they will respect you in return. The french are also very open, they love to share there opinions and they love students that are studying in their city. Free entrance to all the museums is the best thing ever. even better is Musée d’Orsay, its a smaller museum, but its in an old train station and it is amazing! and way less crowded. But it sounds like you had a good time in Paris, and that is fantastic.
-lauren
I am studying in Argentina, and the bus situations that you mentioned are very different from here. We had an experience riding a bus for about 30 minutes where we were standing the whole time. The bus was so packed that you couldn’t even turn around. I guess we were all going to the same destination so it didn’t make sense not to pack full. But it seemed weird to me. The only time that I have rode a bus was for school, and there was no standing allowed!
As for personal space, I don’t think we have any here. First of all, when you meet someone you always give them a kiss on the cheek. It was a weird concept at first because in the States we take kissing so seriously. But here it’s different, it’s simply a way to greet someone or to say goodbye.
-Melissa
This is an interesting observation. I’ve always thought of Americans as needing more personal space than some other cultures. I have been practically nose to nose with folks on the London tube before, and the main thing I noticed was that people didn’t make eye contact, though we definitely were squeezed together physically. I would imagine that riding the tube this summer, with all of the crowds there for the Olympics, would be pretty stressful for Londoners.