L'argent et les courses

French restaurant prices include service by law. The figure on the bill is the figure you owe, and there is no expected percentage on top.

What people actually leave

Nothing, often. Or the coins from your change. Or a couple of euros after a genuinely good meal, five after an excellent one in a nice place. It is a gesture rather than an obligation, and nobody is counting.

American visitors habitually leave twenty per cent and are surprised by the reaction, which is usually mild bafflement rather than delight. It marks you out. It also, over time, distorts expectations in tourist areas, which is why some Parisian waiters now do look for it.

Ask for the right thing

L'addition, s'il vous plaît at a restaurant. La note is a hotel bill. La facture is an invoice, the thing a business needs for its accounts.

You can also catch the waiter's eye and mime writing, which every French waiter understands and nobody finds rude.

Cher does two jobs

Cher is expensive and also dear in the affectionate sense: cher ami. Context separates them without much trouble, but the double meaning is worth having when you meet mon cher in a letter.

Bon marché is the opposite of expensive and does not change form: une voiture bon marché, not bonne marché. It is a fossilised phrase rather than a normal adjective.

Gagner covers both

Gagner is to win and to earn. Il gagne bien sa vie is he earns a good living. Il a gagné is he won. French sees no reason to separate them, which tells you something.

The market

Le marché is the market. Faire les courses is to do the shopping for food; faire du shopping is browsing for clothes and pleasure. Mixing them up produces a sentence where you appear to have spent Saturday afternoon enjoying the purchase of potatoes.