For better or worse, stereotypes often do have a basis in real life, like the bewilderment as to why you can’t get a decent bagel outside of New York or a good gumbo outside of Louisiana.

     When it comes to people and national stereotypes, the slope becomes slippery, unless the stereotype happens to be one enjoyed by a particular segment of society, like rocket scientists and brain surgeons.

    There are, however,  such things as national traits, even if they vary by region––Texas leaps to mind––so when making comparisons between American and French restaurant waiters I admit that there are some on both continents who epitomize the highest standards and others who are totally inept at their jobs.

    Let’s start there, with jobs: In the U.S. a waiter is more often than not just doing a job––the stereotype of the aspiring actor who waits tables, which includes Jennifer Aniston, Sandra Bullock, Lady Gaga and Madonna, is absolutely true. (It’ s interesting that a Google search for French actors who were waiters turns up just one name: Alain Délon.) In France (and most of Europe) being a waiter is considered a profession, and it is one that is based not on tips, which are minimal, but on a good salary with benefits. France does have a 35-hour work week (known as the Loi Aubry) but waiters may choose to work overtime. Minimum wage is between €8.43 and €11 per hour, or €1,300 to €1,750 per month––the average French person makes €1,000––but that includes health insurance, retirement and other benefits, which would be a rarity in a U.S. restaurant, where the federal minimum wage is $2.13 and the average income for a waiter is about $35,000 a year, based on an hourly $17.70, including tips.  

         In large cities like New York, DC, Houston and Chicago, however, a waiter at a higher-end restaurant where the cost of a meal can run over $100 per person can easily make $70,000 to $100,000 a year, which would be highly unlikely in France.         Nevertheless, except for long-time waiters who have committed to the job as a profession, waitering is for most Americans a first job or a way-stop until something better comes along. For that reason, many who take the job are not well trained or even all that interested in the rules, niceties and nuances of a job that takes skill, stamina, psychology and a sure degree of stifling anger. Rudeness and insults by customers are frequent, sexual harassment always lurking, and the threat of losing a good tip can deflate even the bubbliest of personalities.

    These abuses happen in France, too, but to a lesser extent because European customers have more of a rapport with their waiters and a respect for their profession. The stereotype of the snooty mustachioed French waiter owes more to Hollywood comedies than reality, but many Americans abroad bristle if a waiter doesn’t speak or understand English or bridle at one who seems icy, rather than an American waiter who pretends to be your pal. You never hear French waiters announcing their names or saying, “That dish is one of my favorites!” or “You guys still working on that?”

    The stereotype of the “sassy” American waitress is just as much a stage character as a reality, and some restaurants even have a winking pride having staff who can playfully insult a customer aware of the game. Remember the waitress Flo “Kiss my grits” Castleberry in the 1970s sitcom Alice and Max Black on 2 Broke Girls?

    French waiters are well trained to perform many tableside tasks that would stymie American counterparts, such as deboning a whole fish, cutting a roast chicken or flaming a dessert. They also don’t wear silly outfits.

    Then there is the question of the hours worked: in France it is rare that guests arrive before one PM for lunch (two PM in Spain) and eight for dinner. But they may also arrive as late as ten or ten-thirty (in Greece that would be early). So the work hours extend from seven (for prep) to eleven or midnight in France. In the U.S., lunch might begin at 11 AM and dinner at 5 PM––Early Bird Dinners are appalling to the French­­––and trail off by 9:15. Nevertheless, I’ve found it all too often the case that around nine o’clock American waiters simply disappear like frightened birds from the dining room, seemingly to take a break or to make phone calls, whatever. In France I have never found that to be the case, because by nine o’clock service is in full swing and keeps going full tilt past eleven.

    I have always believed that if I owned a restaurant I’d post a sign in the kitchen saying, “If you’re not ordering or picking up food, get out of this kitchen!”

    Being a waiter is hard work––and I’ve done it––but in the U.S. it slows down after nine o’clock, when the busboys kick into high gear to clear plates. By then waiters have finished taking orders for the night. Outside of big cities, many restaurants empty out by nine. In Los Angeles movie people are famous for heading home by nine to be on the movie set by six the following morning. In fact, most American cities are not late-night towns.

    All things considered, I’d rather have a knowledgeable, attentive waiter with a professional demeanor than one who is overly chummy, interruptive and often gone from the dining room. I’ve had many of both  and all kinds in between, which is the best of both world. I wish everyone should have the same.

    Catherine went back to the office to edit the footage with her producer—she was very relieved Bazarov had spoken English—and by the late afternoon the spot was on the air. The fact that hers was the only interview any journalist had garnered from the Russian gave her an enormous boost among her colleagues, both in and out of CNN.
         Katie called to congratulate her and offered to take her out to dinner, wherever Catherine wanted to go. Not surprisingly she chose her friend Jacques’s restaurant, so, with David along, they made a date for eight-thirty.
         “Bazarov looked like he was trying real hard to charm you off camera,” said Katie.
         “Oh, God, yes. ‘How about dinner when this is all over, Madame? Let’s fly off to Russia to see them scoop caviar out of the fish, Madame.’ It’s not the first time one of these ambassadors—who have very high opinions of themselves—has tried to put the moves on me. They do it with all the women journalists. But then, so do all the French dignitaries. The Italians are the worst.”
         Jacques brought out some canapés and a bottle of Champagne. He and David started chatting.
         “What I did find really weird,” said Catherine, “was all this inquiry about poutine. Y’know, those gloppy Canadian French fries? He said he’d had them in Montreal and asked where he might find them in Paris and that he and I should really go eat them sometime.”
         “He said all that off-camera?” asked Katie.
         “Yeah, all he wanted to talk about was poutine poutine!”
         David turned his head to Catherine and said, “Sorry, what about Putin?”
         Catherine laughed, “Not Putin, poutine.”
         And then it dawned on the three Americans.
         “Bazarov was trying to send you a message,” said Katie.
         “Oh my God,” said Catherine. “Of course that’s why he kept talking about poutine!”
         “He’s trying to signal you that his glorious President, Vladimir Putin, is involved in the crime, and that he was just the fall guy and wants out.”
         “And if he is able to get out of the Embassy and have dinner with me at some Canadian bistro, he’ll tell me more.”
        “If he gets out of the Embassy and meets you at a bistro, he’s going to bolt,” said David. “He’s going to want asylum because he knows that Putin will hold him responsible for botching the crime, or at least for allowing the finger to point back to Moscow.”
         Katie chimed in, saying, “And you think that he thinks the French will let him off the hook for the crime?”
         “He’ll still be protected by diplomatic immunity,” said David, “although I don’t know exactly how that would work if he defects. Sure as shit he’s going to offer the French a goldmine of information about Putin and how the hotel jobs were arranged. The trick now is how to get him out of the Embassy.”
         “Send in Inspector Clouseau!” said Catherine. “Somehow he always gets his man.”
         David smiled broadly. “That is not a bad idea.”
         “What?” said Katie, “hire Peter Sellers to come back from the dead and break into the Russian Embassy?”
        “No, no, no, but what this game needs is someone who’s a bumbler, someone who can disrupt the Russians’ plans while Bazarov gets away.”
         “And how do you propose we do that?” asked Catherine.
         “First, you entice him out of the Embassy for dinner.”
         “And why would the Russians let him do that?”
        “Because your interview got him on the record explaining and denying his role in the crime. If you were to say you would like to do a follow-up because you had new information but that you did not want to do it in the Embassy because it’s too restrictive, they might let him dine with you, albeit with Russian security men in tow.”
         “So, I do my interview without cameras and sound crew?”
         “Yes, just you and him in a bistro eating those stupid potatoes with gravy or whatever. They’ll probably have him bugged so that he doesn’t say anything compromising.”
         “And if he knows that he can’t tell me anything we don’t already know, what’s the point?”
         “The point is,” said David, “that the interview is not the point. Allowing him a way of getting out of the bistro without having the security guys on top of him is the point.”   
         “And what if the security guys are really good at their jobs?” asked Katie.
         “Just have Borel’s men waiting outside with an unmarked van. Leave the rest to me.”

         Catherine wasted no time the next day trying to reach Bazarov, who, as she expected, returned her call within an hour. Without indicating in any way that he was being held against his will at the embassy, he suggested meeting the following evening and asked if they might go to that Canadian restaurant she mentioned. The time was set for eight o’clock.
         That done, David called Borel to tell him Bazarov might be trying to defect and that the dinner with Catherine was a pretext for surrendering to the police.
         “We can’t just dash into the restaurant and arrest a foreign diplomat,” said the detective. “He’s going to have his security men there to make sure that wouldn’t happen.”
         David then told Borel of his plan, which he believed would give Bazarov an opportunity to exit the restaurant and willingly give himself over to Borel’s custody. The detective said it sounded like a very dubious and quite risky plan that assumed a lot on Bazarov’s part.
         “Just have a van outside the restaurant ready to go. What have you got to lose?”
         Borel agreed to the plan, believing that Bazarov had every reason to want to defect, and, if he did, he would probably not face criminal charges for the hotel attacks.
         Catherine had already asked Bazarov if Katie could join them at dinner, describing her as “a very attractive American journalist who had won many awards for her writing.” All Bazarov said was, “How could I resist?”
         David still had not filled in Katie and Catherine on the details of his plan to allow Bazarov to escape, because he said it needed an element of surprise. He said only that Catherine should give clues to Bazarov in conversation, then, at the right moment, tell him to leave the restaurant.
 
       The three Americans got to the restaurant an hour early to assess the exits and to watch for the possible early arrival of Russian security, whom David said he could spot with his eyes closed.
        The Moose Bar & Grill was in the Sixth Arrondissement near the Sorbonne, the better to draw a clientele of students. Its décor would have fit quite easily into any corner of Montréal or Québec, with a wall of rough, rustic stones, another of red brick, with a long bar, tall tables with stools and regular dining tables with chairs. The menu was pub food and included eighteen variations of poutine. It also featured several Canadian beers and whiskeys.
Katie and Catherine were well received by the staff, while David went to the bar, ordered a bottle of Molson and watched one of the large-screen TVs. The women chatted with one of the owners, who was Canadian, about America and Canada, then, around 7:30, took a table close to the exit and pretended to nurse a round of beers, saying they were expecting a guest within the hour. Katie told Catherine it might be better if they took an outdoor table, and Catherine said they’d better let Bazarov decide. Both noticed a black van parked at the curb.
        A few minutes later a tall, brawny man who looked Eastern European entered the restaurant and looked around—David spotted him immediately—taking in every corner, doors to the rest rooms and the proximity of tables. Right at eight o’clock Bazarov entered, followed by another tall man who joined the first at the bar.
    Catherine greeted the Russian ambassador cordially, saying, “It’s such a beautiful night, Mr. Ambassador, should we eat outside? It could get very busy in here. There’s an important soccer match playing tonight, and the place will get jammed.”
    Bazarov glanced at the two security men and said, “A good idea. I have no interest in soccer, especially when I have two such lovely American ladies like yourselves to dine with.”
    The conversation began with small talk, Bazarov asking questions about Katie’s background and how Catherine thought their last interview had gone over. Catherine flattered him, saying it had very high ratings throughout Europe and had played on CNN in the U.S.  They then looked at the menu, and Bazarov was amazed at the number of poutines listed. They ordered three of them, some other pub fare and beers. David was nibbling on a plate of poutine at the bar, while the security men pretended to be drinking beers they ordered but barely touched.
    “Have you ever thought of asking for an assignment in America or maybe Canada?” asked Katie. “There are many places that are very similar in landscape to Russia.”
    Bazarov laughed and said, “You are talking to one Russian who hates the cold. I have never been to Siberia and”—he leaned in slightly—“I have no interest in going there.”
    Katie thought that was a subtle sign of Bazarov’s desire to defect.
    “Of course, I know all the American and Canadian diplomats, and we get along very well.” He then reeled off several names, as if to suggest the Americans might contact the embassy’s offices about the prospects of being re-assigned by Russia to one of those postings.
    “Are there any openings?” asked Catherine.
    “I am very hopeful,” said Bazarov, “that there will be an opening and I hope it may be very soon.”
    “I’ll snoop around and see what I can find out from people I know.”
    “That would be very good of you. . . may I call you Catherine? And you, Katie?”    The women said of course he could if they could call him Ilya. The security men kept their eyes on the table from the bar, even though their view was often blocked by an increasing flow of people coming into The Moose. Bazarov was seated with his face visible to them, the women with their backs to them.
    As the conversation continued along friendly lines, Catherine removed a small piece of paper from her inner pocket and placed it in front of her. Then, she slowly turned it over. On it was written, “THE BLACK VAN.” Bazarov looked at the two women, his eyes slightly widened, then to the side, where he did indeed see a black van with its rear door ajar. He knew what he was being offered. He then looked at the bar where the Russians were straining to see above the crowd. Katie caught David’s eye, smiled and simply nodded, twice. With that David got up from his stool at the bar and started to speak loudly in English, shouting curses at the soccer players on the television. He nudged against a couple next to him, and the man said, “Watch yourself, eh?” David flicked his hand at the man and said, “I’m not going to stand here and watch this crap,” then, visibly stumbling, walked towards the door and seemed to lose his footing, crashing against the two Russians.
    The two men picked him up and shouted something in Russian and David shouted back at them, grabbing one by the arm. From the outside table Bazarov could see what was happening and looked at Catherine.
         “Go!” she said quietly. “Get to the van.”
         Bazarov’s mind was flooded with bewilderment but realized that with the Russian guards momentarily detained by David that he could bolt for the van, whose rear door was now fully open. Bazarov had only three long steps to get to it and he was helped up by two men who followed him in and slammed the door. The van took off and sped down the street.