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I'm a little embarrassed to admit it, but I've led a safe life. I haven't jumped out of a plane, or off anything with a bungee rope attached to my leg. I only have one tiny tattoo because I grew up being told by adults that if I wrote on my hand too much I'd end up with ink poisoning. And the closest I've come to reckless injury is the time I broke my little toe on an ornamental rock at my yoga studio.
But somehow, I become a little less cautious every time I visit France, a country with a slightly different attitude to rules and safety. As a French teacher and card-carrying Francophile, I have orchestrated my life to spend as much time here as I can. But it's not the cheese or the wine that keep me coming back - it's the people, who I've always found to be the perfect blend of sincere, generous and a little bit naughty. You only have to look at the way the Louvre thieves accessed a first-floor window during daylight opening hours to understand how brazen they can be when it comes to breaking the rules.
If you've spent time in France, you might have noticed a few things. For starters, bicycle helmets are far less common. You might even have witnessed a bare-headed cyclist hurtling towards you at a pedestrian crossing, politely yelling "Attention, Madame!" without bothering to slow down. In the Paris Métro, you might see some of the more daring locals jump over turnstiles to avoid paying a fare, sometimes with tiny dogs zipped inside their jackets. And until hefty fines were introduced for déjections canines (that's dog poo to you and me), it was common for people to slip on them and injure themselves in spectacular fashion. I once had to throw out a pair of cotton shoes after stepping into a pile of dog faeces the size of a small birthday cake.
My first inkling that the French had a different relationship to safety was when I got into a taxi, aged 25, and noticed the older male driver giving me an odd look. "Is there a problem?" I asked, wondering what faux pas I could have committed in just 20 seconds. "We're not going anywhere near a freeway, you know", he laughed, pointing to my fastened seatbelt. Admittedly, this happened some time ago, but I doubt that taxi drivers in Australia were laughing at their passengers for wearing seatbelts this century.