CNN journalist Saskya Vandoorne’s video guide for foreign tourists in Paris

The American channel has published a video that compiles advice for a good stay in Paris as a tourist during the Olympic Games.

Nearly 15 million tourists are expected in Paris during the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Several million visitors will discover, some for the first time, the capital. The American channel CNN and the journalist Saskya Vandoorne had fun with it in a video published on its social networks. The clip is aimed at foreign tourists and has accumulated nearly 200,000 views on X since its publication on Tuesday, July 23.

“Paris! Culture, fashion, cuisine… But how can you not be a cliché?”the journalist begins at the beginning of the video. Before stating several small rules to avoid standing out in the Parisian landscape: order your coffee black, your baguette “tra-dee-ssion”watch out for pickpockets… A practical guide for those who have never set foot in the capital. Franceinfo spoke with the journalist.

Originally, the video was intended to be as realistic as possible.“I’ve been watching videos about Paris for a while, where you always hear this accordion music, words like ‘sacrebleu’, lists Saskya VandoorneThe idea was to break these clichés.” Clichés that even some of her colleagues had integrated, without knowing it.For the video, I worked with two producers, one from London, the other from New York. They told me that we should do a section on the style to adopt when you come to Parisjokes the American-British-French journalist. They thought you had to be well dressed, without Birkenstocks, without jogging pants… I told them, it’s not possible: a lot of people dress like that.“

Beyond style, “What comes up quite often is that the French eat snails, that Parisians wear berets”adds the journalist.

“In ‘Emily In Paris’, everything happens in neighborhoods that we know. You have to get out and see more than just Paris within the walls! Paris is not just the center…”

Saskya Vandoorne, journalist at CNN’s Paris bureau

to franceinfo

The video doesn’t focus so much on these clichés, but on good advice for living in Paris. Saskya Vandoorne encourages tourists to avoid the metro, which is too crowded, as well as the areas around the Olympic and tourist sites. Her first piece of advice: discover the rest of Paris, outside the center.

“In the video, we see a bakery in the 12th arrondissement, a bar in the 20th… These are neighborhoods that American tourists don’t know. And yet, there are plenty of things to see and do.”explains Saskya Vandoorne, who has lived a lot in Paris and abroad. “The idea was also to say, but you know, you can go to these neighborhoods in the East without certificates, without QR codes.”.

On the French side, to welcome visitors properly, you have to try to be more expressive. “I think there is a misunderstanding between the French and foreign tourists. The French are not rude, they are just less enthusiastic, less expressive. If we compare to Americans, when I lived in New York, I always remember the Thanksgiving parade, with the big giant Spider-Man going down 5th Avenue, and people are so enthusiastic.”

A culture, according to the journalist, that is less found in France. “But that doesn’t mean that the French aren’t proud of their country, of their cuisine… You just have to try to be more expressive when a tourist asks them for advice, for directions.”advises Saskya Vandoorne.