When I arrived in France, I was shockingly unprepared for this culture, even coming from another Latin country.

I realised that I lacked the three secret “codes” that are supposed to give you access to a culture: its sense of humour, its cuisine and, of course, its sense of sensuality and sex (humour is the first code; in later columns I’ll talk more about the other two).

Although I had studied this country, first in school and then from books and movies, I only learned general things—interesting, tragic or just funny—called “general culture.” Since I didn’t know about the three codes, I wasted time learning useless things like the latest news, history from a century ago, the design of the Eiffel Tower, historical background of France, syrupy details about Balzac’s or Flaubert’s heroes, the colour of Madame Bovary’s eyes and Proust’s Madeleine.

None of this helps in the real France; all it helps you with is playing Trivial Pursuit.

Why? Because you need to fit into their France—the real France—not the France you learned about.  And here starts the real work.  And it will be funny, don’t get me wrong; I just can’t guarantee the results.

To go from the useless knowledge about France that you gained before arrival to successfully cracking the codes of real France, as a first step you have to understand the French sense of humour in their movies and comic books.  Steps two and three are eating like them and being sensual like them, but we’ll get back to that in a week or two

Steps two and three are eating like them and being sensual like them, but we’ll get back to that in a week or two

So, you have to learn to laugh until you cry watching French movies like Les Bronzes, Le Père Noël est une Ordure, La Grande Vadrouille and Le Gendarme de Saint Tropez.  The list goes on and on. You also need to watch some “must see” French cult movie like Les Valseuses, Les Tontons Flinguers and La Cage aux Folles.  That will be a nice start, so that you can fearlessly face social interaction with real French people.  You may speak with an accent, but talking about their movies will make up for at least half of that problem.

And then you have the comics (which experts refer to as “para-literature,” which might be an overstatement).  How is it that the French have one of the lowest forms of literature—comics—and the highest forms of literature—Balzac and the like—and nothing in between?

Still, whether you like them or not, you should definitely read Gaston la Gaffe, Spirou, Bidochon, Boule et Bill and Bécassine and do your best to have fun at the same time

and do your best to have fun at the same time

As for me, I arrived here directly into my husband’s French family, full of movie and comic book fans who knew all of the lines by heart.  You can imagine how unprepared I was.  But I’ve adjusted.

Let’s just say it: I will always be a foreigner; I just wish I knew that before coming here.