12 Things NOT to do in Paris (by a Local)!

I’m French and these are the things you should NOT do in Paris!

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Here is the advice I give all my American friends who come to Paris for the first time. From where to find the good food to how to not have Parisians hate you and also essential questions like “why do they keep serving me tiny coffees?”.

#paris #france #lifeinparis #firstimeinparis

I’m French and today I’m going to tell you 12 
things you should never do in Paris the first one is to grab food near major Monument if you’ve 
just visited the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre do not eat in the neighborhood the restaurants start tend to be 
terrible with awful food terrible service and all that for a very very expensive price all of 
these places have something in common is that they cater to tourists who will only go there 
once and then never come again so they do not care about you or giving you good food what you 
should do instead is work for 15 minutes away from the major monuments and try to find a place 
that has a lot of locals in it so personally when I see a restaurant that has only signs in English 
I tend to be a bit suspicious because it’s a sign that locals don’t actually go to this place and 
this also works when you’re doing your research for restaurants try to use the English version 
of french-speaking websites like the fooding with this you’ll actually find places locals actually 
go to and you’ll increase your chances of eating delicious French food when in doubt just grab a 
bite at a bakery but don’t go to any Bakery you see in France we take bakeries very very seriously 
there’s even laws regulating them and you’re only allowed to call yourself a boulangerie which is the 
French word for Bakerie if and only if you fully make your bread from scratch the places that don’t 
make their own bread are just called Pain which means bread so going to a boulangerie will guarantee you 
good bread and a good sandwich which in Paris tends to cost between four and €6 but when 
it comes to croissants and pastries getting a good one actually gets a tiny bit more complicated 
unless you know what I’m about to tell you not all bakeries make their croissants and pastries sometimes 
it’s just frozen food and we do not want that so bakeries do have to show you that they’re using 
frozen food by just putting a little store next to the name of the pastry you’re buying but you should 
learn how to recognize a good pastry if the bakery you’re in has a very wide offering of pastries 
that all look the same they’re all beautiful and exactly even then it’s definitely suspicious 
and you should run away so most people who live in Paris me included have their own Bakery that’s 
close to their home they usually go to for bread and pastries and one sure way to find that for you 
is to look for long lines of locals in the morning and at lunchtime and you should also stay in the 
right local areas to make sure you’re close to the good food and one big mistake I see people making 
is either staying in the super touristic Center or super far away so for all the reasons I told 
you before we don’t want to be staying only in the tourist centers next to the major monuments 
if you’re doing that I feel you really miss out on what makes Paris so unique which is the local 
life all the people who live here and of course the delicious food also if you stay in local areas 
you’re just going to discover random local hidden gems that are super super cool and not mentioned 
in any blog or guide or YouTube everyone has their favorite local areas but a few of my personal 
favorites are the 20th and the 17th for local life and the neighborhood feeling I also like the 
11th and the part of the 10th that’s next to the Canal Saint Martin they’re pretty cool for going 
out they have a lot of bars and restaurants and I used to live there back in the day I sometimes see 
people staying super far away like really far away it’s not always cheaper and I personally believe 
you should try getting a smaller place in a local area instead every person who lives in the Paris 
area will tell you that taking the commuter train called RER every single day is not fun and you’ll 
also miss out on my favorite thing to do in Paris which is walking around if you’re visiting 
Paris and you’re not walking around aimlessly to discover the city you are missing out it’s 
really super enjoyable to walk in Paris because the architecture is so beautiful and everything 
is so dense so there’s a lot to see and also for my American friends who love driving and cars 
let’s know that it’s the worst way to move around because Paris is such a big city and there’s a lot 
of traffic jams so it’s actually way faster to take the metro and I’d personally only take a taxi or 
Uber if I’m coming from the airport and I have a lot of luggage because a lot of Metro stations 
don’t have elevators and I don’t want to be carrying my luggage up the stairs actually none of 
the people I know who live in Paris on a car and I don’t see why you should need one another thing 
you should avoid doing in Paris is not speaking a word of French and if you have to only know one 
word Let It Be bonjour it’s super important to say hello to people when you start speaking to them 
more than that in the next section you can get away with just saying bonjour and then speaking 
English a lot of people in Paris speak English if people don’t speak English I recommend just being 
patient with them and using Google translate but if you really want to have a good experience you 
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description below to save 30% or use my code LUCILE2024 for an additional €20 off so I was telling 
you that saying bonjour to people or even hello if you don’t remember it is super super important 
different countries have different ways to be polite and inference basic politeness like saying 
hello and thank you is super super important if you’re for example asking for directions starting 
your sentence with a bonjour will reg guarantee you a way friendlier response than just asking for 
it directly another way you can accidentally be rude is by being super loud in places where you 
should be quiet like in the train for example I know because I tend to speak very loud myself 
people will actually shush you if you’re being too loud and also if you’re very loud and don’t 
speak French people might actually think you’re yelling at them this makes me think of a very 
awkward interaction I had at the the bakery so you know my local Baker doesn’t speak English 
obviously and there was this American lady who was asking for something in English and instead 
of just understanding that my Baker didn’t speak English she just repeated it louder and louder and 
louder until I had to intervene because my Baker was really scared that she was getting yelled 
at and not understanding what was going on and when I intervened I noticed that the American 
lady was actually just asking for coffee and she didn’t understand why she got this tiny tiny 
European coffee and that’s a very common mistake people tend to make so when you ask for coffee 
in France you’ll get the tiny European coffee you’ll get the espresso if you’re like me and you 
prefer your coffee to come in a big cup like this one you should be going to an actual coffee shop 
where you can have fil coffee or American style coffee and another thing you should not do in 
Paris and a sure way to have parisians hate you is not being aware of your surroundings so Paris 
is really dense and there’s not a lot of personal space so if you’re stopped in the middle of the 
road and you’re let’s say blocking the sidewalk of the Metro people will get frustrated at you 
Paris is a city where people actually live in so we have to go to work we have to take the metro 
we have to be on time for job interviews and that type of stuff and it tends to be sometimes a bit 
frustrating when you live in a tourist area and people are just uh blocking the way so remember 
Paris is a big city and even though it’s re safe being aware of your surroundings and avoid having 
your bags open and your valuables out is most of the time the only thing you need to prevent you 
from getting robbed but overall you shouldn’t worry too much when you’re traveling to Paris and 
you should absolutely not overpack your schedule I just really recommend you just embrace the 
lifestyle just enjoy the City walk around spend hours eating with the people you love sit at a 
cafe and people watch or picnic in a park your trip to Paris should not be an endless to-do 
list of things to see because it’s real City you experience instead of just ticking the boxes 
and by the way if you’re in a rush do not go to a sit down restaurant especially if it’s outside 
of normal eating hours French service is known to be slow because we want it to be slow we want 
to actually enjoy being in the restaurant and we don’t want to be rushed even midday work lunches 
will take around 45 minutes to an hour if you’re at a sit down restaurant also don’t go to a 
restaurant right before closing time because they usually tend to stop serving people around 
30 minutes before closing Time closing time is the time they actually close the gates overall I 
found that people who tend to be very disappointed by Paris are people who come with very very high 
expectations and you know there’s so many movies that paint a perfect romantic image of Paris like 
Emil in Paris Amélie or even my favorite movie about France ever which is Ratatouille which is actually 
about a rat cooking French food so pretty close to what happes in some Paris restaurants Paris 
is a big city with everything that comes with living in a big city like trash annoyed people 
who have to go to work and a lot of traffic also as I was telling you it is very touristic 2 
million people live in Paris and for 4 millions of people visit each year that’s 22 people per 
Parisian you know you will then go to New York and expect to have a chill relaxing vacation and 
have the subway smell good and be full of happy people so it’s exactly the same thing in Paris 
and if you don’t enjoy the down to earth realities of being in a big city that’s totally okay France 
has so many other cool places to visit and maybe you should try going to a smaller French city 
or going to the countryside which is a lot of fun which leads me to my next Point France is 
not Paris it’s actually a super diverse place there’s so much to see you’ve probably already 
heard of Provence and Côte dAzur but there’s so much more to explore a few of my underrated favorites 
are Britany, the Pyrenees mountains the Basque country and obviously Toulouse where I grew up and also 
you don’t even need to be in Europe to travel to France check out this map of oversea France like 
this is France and this is also France and also this is France too so go check out these 
places and I’ll see you in the next video