Indecent Proposals

Two quick vignettes:

A few nights ago, I'm walking Panda towards the Parc de Belleville, up a typical Belleville street. All the buildings are white/stucco-colored and there's a locals-only brasserie every few feet. The whole thing is brightly lit, but it feels a little "dark" because the street isn't mobbed like the one we live on. As I pass a few guys joking loudly while lounging on a railing outside one of the brasseries, one guy drops his voice and asks - super sketchily - something that sounds like, "Un show?" I just keep walking. I have no idea what he was actually offering me, but he's done it twice now. Weird.

Yesterday afternoon, Maggie and I were walking Panda toward the part of the Canal St. Martin where it broadens and becomes the Canal Ourcq, at Métro Jaurès. On the Avenue Simon Bolivar, at a stop light, a middle-aged woman points out Panda to her son - in French-accented English. We smile at both of them, so she asks us what kind of dog Panda is. I say, "Bracque," because I'm pretty sure that means German short-haired pointer. The woman asks, "English?" I say, "Americains," playing the game where I speak French to someone who speaks English to me until they give up and switch back to French. Except this woman doesn't give up. She explains that she teaches French to foreigners. Then she asks if we want French lessons. In the middle of the street. "Non, je crois pas," I reply, "mais merci, et bonne journée." The nerve.