WHAT THE FRENCH HAVE OR LACK

The French have this thing with phallic symbols and Carte Bleu. It's surely all about frenchness. Everyone should have either or both. And that's it.

The average tourist is not French, but still has to brandish a Carte Bleu to pay for a RER ticket from the international airport to town -- mais non, you can also pay 8.40 Euro, in coins only, mais oui, a feasible option indeed if you are not travelling light (and you can "oublier" the visa/mastercard/amex).

On the first point, from stating the obvious (Tour Eiffel) to the more subtle (all the poles that line every single street in the capital), there is clearly a point that the Parisien are trying to make, and I am not going to go back to the toilet dispensers mentioned earlier...