The French Are Like Coconuts

Molly & Scout in their new home
 (France not the chateau).

They have a saying here in France: Americans are like peaches, and the French are like coconuts.  Meaning that Americans are super friendly and sweet, but once you get beneath the surface, they have a hard center. The French on the other hand, have an almost impenetrable exterior (i.e. difficult to get to know), but once you get through the hard and coarse shell, they have a sweet, soft interior.

The Americans we've met so far have been quite eager to become fast friends.  However since moving to France, it's been our preference to interact with non-Americans.  It could be my Peace Corps mentality, but we wanted to move to Europe so that we could learn and experience a new culture and not creating an anglo bubble in Paris.  So given that we live in a country full of coconuts, if we want to get to know the French, it's necessary to find opportunities to interact with them in their own language.