At Charles De Gaulle airport, another pretty, young escort joined me at the aircraft and made the process of passing through customs and baggage collection so easy. She spoke English with a delightful accent and I felt in a good holiday mood, ready for whatever the next few days had in store for me. She found a taxi to take me to my hotel and wished me a pleasant holiday.
I had never been to France before and could not speak the language, but had bought a ‘When in France’ cassette a few weeks earlier. The few words and phrases I had learned in that short space of time would, I hoped, be sufficient to make myself understood and find my way around. This was based on the assumption that many French people could speak English. My expectations, however, were a little bit too high and only
