Bon Appétit !

The French love saying bon appétit. Just not when everyone's sitting around the table. In fact, it's considered pretty gauche to say anything at all--once the maîtress de maison begins, everyone's just supposed to dig in.
So when do the French say bon appétit? At 10:00 o'clock in the morning when they spy you eating a banana at your desk. "Bon appétit!" they'll chime as they walk past your office, smug at having caught you in the act. Or in the afternoon as you munch hungrily on a baguette sandwich in the park. Elderly couples won't resist acknowledging your newfangled conception of a meal with an amused "Bon appétit!" as they pass by your bench.
If you dare eat in public in France, then you're asking for feedback.

Meryl Streep as Julia Child. [Online image] 2009.

Salad "à la Française"

The French have quite a vague notion of salad. It can be something as summery and well-balanced as a salade niçoise or as satisfying and gourmande as a salade au chèvre chaud.
Yet, when served as a side dish--just salade in its naked form, no adjectives or fuss--you realize that to the French, salad actually means one thing: lettuce. We're not even talking mâche (lamb's ear lettuce) or baby spinach. A few limp leaves of iceberg, and that's it. If you're very lucky, you might get a couple slices of tomato, too. But don't count on it. It's not like you ordered the salade de tomates.
But what about everyday meals in the comfort of their homes? The French must be doing something with all their cucumbers and carrots and cherry tomatoes. Well, that's what apéro's for. They put all their raw veggies in little bowls on the coffee table and nibble away as they nurse a glass of wine. No wonder there's nothing left but lettuce to put in the salad. But somehow there always seems to be plenty of wine to go around.

Jack Nicholson as Bobby Eroica Dupea. [Online image] 1970.

Home

There's no French equivalent to "home," except maybe, chez moi, but the sense of unconditional belonging is lost: chez moi is temporal.
In French, a homing pigeon is a pigeon voyageur, or traveling pigeon. The home base idea doesn't seem to be important.
Perhaps France is too small a country for people to feel disoriented enough to need an abosolute home. They can go chez les parents or chez les beaux-parents or chez les cousins whenever they like.
They don't have to subtract nine hours every time they dial "home" or fly twelve hours to get there.
But then they don't have the promise of "home" either.

Vivien Leigh as Katie Scarlett O'Hara. [Online image] 1939.