Thursday, 25 September 2008
I feel I should begin by describing how I have arrived here this evening. This description will not flatter me, but somehow recording it seems vital to beginning whatever it is I am to say, explore, or discover this evening while addressing a somewhat formless and indefinite audience (Oh Internets, will we ever truly come to know and understand each other?). I woke moments ago after drifting off for what may have been half an hour. I had a tissue stuffed into one nostril, my face propped up with one hand, and a thick drool of sickness rolling halfway down my forearm. In my lap, my computer; I'd made it halfway through an interview with David Foster Wallace, which I say not as commentary on the quality of his writing, but to reveal something about which and what kind of sentences may have helped usher me here.
All of Paris seems to have caught cold. Everyone is sniffling and coughing. Unfortunately I am no exception. My head feels swollen with snot, I can't stop sneezing, and I feel miserable enough to wish I could stay in bed, but not miserable enough to feel justified in doing so. I took notes on Southworth and Hawes in art history this morning, met some girls in my program for lunch, then attended grammar at the Sorbonne, where things began to fall apart. Madame Berthier spied me looking pathetic halfway through her lecture on les adjectifs, and declared, Vous êtes vraiment malade, ma chérie, and advised me to arm myself with more than a bag of honey-flavored cough drops. After grammar I descended the twelve flights of stairs to phonetics to explain, Excusez-moi, je suis très malade--trop malade pour parler le joli français.
I write this not for pity, but for context.
Earlier this week I went to speak with my program director in her office. Primarily, I went to collect paperwork for my trip to the prefecture tomorrow, but I stayed longer to chat. She asked whether my room mate and I got on, if I was enjoying life in Paris. I told her a little about the people I've met, my plans for travel, how every day living here is like a gift. She confessed that even after thirty years of life in Paris, when she wakes up in a bad mood, a trip to the park or a stroll around the neighborhood can quickly lift her spirits. I'm inclined to agree with her.
Certainly there are experiences I grumble about--this cold, for one, or the long line I must wait in at the prefecture tomorrow. I share my hardships with other students, who suffer many of the same experiences. Over lunch, two California girls and I made light of forking over what seems an exhorbant amount of money for shampoo, which comes in tiny bottles. We anticipate our next trip to Sam's Club with both excitement and dread. I know that when I return, everything in America will seem ridiculously large--the cars, the roads, the buildings, the people. The fact that you can stock an American bathroom with gallons of shampoo and a year's supply of toilet paper with a single trip to one location baffles and excites me. The idea of not returning to Monoprix each week for a tiny 5€ bottle of shampoo appeals to me. Simultaneously, there is something to be said for living life one liter of milk at a time.
When I studied creative writing in high school and lived from workshop to workshop, critique to critique, we spent a lot of time thinking about our lives as creative writing students. The more we progressed with our expression, the more it seemed we wrote about the same thing over and over. I often felt like a broken record, and often said so. Here's an excerpt from one of my favorite poems that I wrote (was it sophomore year?), "On Finding the General Vicinity":And I wonder when we will resign ourselves
Though it hasn't quite happened yet, I'm beginning to feel the same way when I write here. If I come to write something personal rather than informative, it is always about the way Parisian life doesn't seem real. Even small things seem the stuff of dreams--the afternoon light, the collective murmur of softly-spoken French in a crowded park, the cobblestone pedestrian streets lined with specialty shops that sell globes, tea pots, or some other equally marvelous and unusual thing. If there is one thing I feel is difficult to capture, it is the sense of well-being and excitement in everyday life, since nearly nothing seems mundane in this city. I hope you will forgive me as I try again and again, with increasing sentimentality, to wrap my brain around the fact that I live here.
to the fact that we write the same poem
our whole lives,
that our existence is a poem
that merely revises itself;
no matter how much we change
we have only twenty-six letters
and a teaspoon of punctuation.
We are our own memories
rearranged.
The feeling only grows, since daily life is growing larger than Paris. I have booked a trip to Prague the weekend of my birthday, and this weekend I will purchase tickets for a visit to Istanbul mid-November. I've asked my parents to consider allowing me to stop in Reykjavik on my way back to the States next year. My program director encouraged me to see Croatia, to visit north Africa--Morocco, Egypt. There are still dozens of places in France that I've yet to see. I have never been to Spain. Though I've been to Austria, I have never seen Vienna. Even with a small budget the possibilities seem limitless. The world seems closer and more accessible than ever, and there's hardly a place I don't want to visit. Ayelen and I are counting the weekends we have left together, syncing our calendars, and creating lists of places near and far that we can squeeze into one weekend and a meager budget. The Canadian man who owns the Abbey Bookshop, an English-language bookstore with a sizeable travel section, is beginning to recognize me. I am leafing through guidebooks and reading literature to accompany the cities I plan to visit. I started The Unbearable Lightness of Being this morning, and have some books by Orhan Pamuk, who writes extensively about life in Istanbul.
It's becoming apparent how quickly I should find employment that requires me to travel. Life as a flight attendant sounds miserable. Do travel guide companies hire undergraduate interns with mediocre writing skills and minor ability to operate a camera?
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
Every September dozens of sites across all of France open to the public for one weekend. The public is invited, often for free, to visit some of the governmental institutions, private residences, old mansions, and other national treasures generally inaccessible during the year. For example, the Hôtel de Ville is open for tours. At the Eiffel Tower demonstrations are given to reveal how the elevators work. Unfortunately, with only one weekend, it's hard to squeeze everything in, since by the middle of the day lines can be long for the more popular sites. If you ever find yourself in Paris during September, try to time your trip to coincide with the Journées du Patrimoine. However, Paris isn't the only city that participates; sites across all of France open to the public for the same weekend.
Ayelen, my Argentinian friend, and I only made it to École Militaire before seeing tremendous lines elsewhere and eventually wandering up to the Marchés aux Puces (a HUGE flea market in the north of the city, report coming soon). The best strategy, perhaps, is to visit the more popular sites during the early morning, and the lesser ones later in the day. Oops.
You can read a little more about the history of École Militaire on Wikipedia. Today it is an institution for military higher education. I believe students actually live on the premsises, since during our visit we noticed a cafeteria. There are also stables, a library, and lots of fancy offices decorated in typical 18th century style.
Tuesday, 23 September 2008
After speaking briefly with a friend tonight, it occurred to me that those without French class are not familiar with the geography of Paris. As Joachim said, one forgets "how natural it's for a french person, yet how strange it must be for a stranger, just to know how everything works." So. Une petite leçon, mes chéris.
Paris is divided into twenty arrondissements, or little neighborhoods. We might call them "districts" in the U.S. Sort of like the boroughs of New York, except les arrondissements are much smaller. The arrondissements begin with the Louvre, and continue by spiraling outward, like a cinnamon bun (or, if you want to be French-y, comme un escargot). Notre Dame is essentially the heart of Paris (geographically, at least), since Paris's first inhabitants lived on the île de la Cité, and Notre Dame is nearly at the center. The "cinnamon bun" arrangement makes sense in the context of such an old city; Paris's larger streets and boulevards are arranged circularly, rather than on a grid system.
Often, when asked where you live, you reply with the number of your arrondissement as well as the metro stop nearest your residence. Où habitez-vous? Dans le treizième (13e). Above every street sign in Paris is the number of its arrondissement. You can also discover a location's arrondissement by examining its zipcode. 75005 is in the fifth, 75014 in the fourteenth, etc.
A fun fact about les arrondissements: each is required by French law to have an open-air market at least two days a week. This means that you're never too far from fresh produce. My room mate and I visit our market every week to stock up on cheap produce, which is often half the price of what you can find in supermarkets.
See a map and lots more information about les arrondissements here.
Monday, 22 September 2008
Click the photo to visit flickr and learn everyone's names/nationalities.
Monday, 22 September 2008
There are a few golden rules to getting by in France, and as one might guess, those rules deal primarily with etiquette and food. In most cases, manners will serve you well and you will be well served if you use them. Though the French aren't known for their friendliness, they are very formal and very polite. I would argue that the snooty French waiter cliché is born mostly out of language barriers and cultural misunderstanding, though as with any other country one is bound to encounter a few sales cons every now and then.
So. Some facts, some advice, and some tricks for your French foodie experiences.
Sunday, 21 September 2008
Things are going better than when I last wrote. Unfortunately I'm still trying to find the rhythm of living in Paris and regularly updating a blog. By the time I make it home every evening my brain is usually exhausted, and what little mental stamina I have left I use to study French and read for my art history class. Plenty of fun stuff this weekend to write about--the Marché aux Puces, a photography exhibit at the Pompidou, and a techno parade at the Bastille. Just because Paris offers some picturesque parks and cafés as perfect locations for study sessions doesn't mean one can get by without working hard. Today I read for several hours over coffee, then moved to the Luxembourg Gardens to soak up some sun along with the dense material.
Wednesday, 17 September 2008
Before I left the States I often wondered how much culture shock I would experience upon my arrival in France. I suspect that, as friends who have studied abroad tell me, the reverse culture shock will be much more severe, if not nearly unbearable. Because I have visited France before, I figured my grasp of French culture would more or less fall into place, and that I would begin life in Paris without too much trouble.
I come from a truly Southern university saturated with Greek life and American football culture. Our stadium is one of the largest college stadiums in the nation. According to Wikipedia, it currently has a seating capacity of 92,138+, and is the seventh largest on-campus stadium in the nation and the 17th largest stadium (by seating) in the world. During the fall, the town population grows by thousands each game weekend. People from all over the South come to see the games. They cook out on the quad, and often the entire campus smells like hamburgers and hot dogs. Sometimes people set up televisions on the quad if they don't have tickets to see the game in the stadium. Hundreds of RVs park all over town. The interstate backs up for hours with bumper to bumper traffic as people go to or leave the game.
I left a campus full of res-rats, sorority girls, boys in polos and baseball caps, students wandering campus early morning in pajamas and flip-flops. I left Friday nights of beer-pong, Waffle House, bowling. I left behind "y'all" and "ROLL TIDE!" and Gordo, Alabama's yearly "Mule Day" craft fair with a parade of livestock. I left behind bluegrass house shows and Mexican grocery stores. I haven't heard the Alabama fight song or Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Sweet Home Alabama" since early in the summer. One of the last nights I spent in Tuscaloosa was July 4th, when I went with some friends to a giant field to watch a fireworks show. We found ourselves engulfed in stereotypical Tuscaloosa culture--all the things most people think of when they picture residents of the rural South. But also there was my South: twenty-something men in plaid shirts with full beards, tattoos, and deep Gulf Coast accents; dudes who play in folk-punk or bluegrass bands; twenty-something crafty women in vintage dresses and cowboy boots.
I think it's hard to capture the South as I know and experience it--the South that is truly my home. I find it difficult to explain things that I find uniquely Southern, but that don't fit into the stereotypical picture most outsiders have of the region. The South has given me such a rich life, and such rich experiences, and yet I find its charm and influence impossible to capture verbally. I feel closest to revealing My South when I use images, but they are images entirely informed and brought to life by my own experiences and sentimentalism that I often wonder if non-Southerners can tap into the same magic if they lack the direct experience. My South is full of childhood--catching fireflies in my neighbor's backyard, playing in the creek behind my house, riding bikes through the neighborhood for hours until dusk, baking pumpkin muffins and sleeping over every weekend at my best friend's house a short walk away. It is the heavy summer air and the cicadas singing in the backyard. It is a cookout at my uncle's. It is the pet caterpillar, Wooly, that my sister and I kept for an entire season. We kept lizards in empty strawberry containers. One summer we kept tadpoles in one of the bathtubs, and the neighbor's cat broke in for a snack. The South is driving through the same streets I played in as a child, with the windows down. It is breaking away from a party and sitting on a trampoline in the dark. I am nostalgic and sentimental about the South the same way I am about these memories, and the two are inseparable for me, if not the same thing.
So much of that South--My South--is present in Tuscaloosa, even if it's sometimes eclipsed by the more stereotypical Southern culture of football games and hounds tooth hats. When I finished summer school in July, I felt relieved to abandon that for a little while. It was the people as much as the place--an inexplicable separation from someone I loved, crumbling friendships due to busy schedules, a strange and disheartening short-lived romance. I lived alone in a dark apartment for the summer semesters. I often felt lost, hardened by my fierce independence. The things I created frustrated me further. My photography seemed totally incapable of capturing what I needed it to, yet I often retreated to the dark room to develop sheets of film late into the night, hoping to feel the same catharsis I had during my first photo class in the fall. My work moved from vibrant figure studies to vacant documentary landscapes, from 16x20 high-contrast prints to muddy 4x5 argyrotypes.
When I finished summer school in Tuscaloosa, I was anxious to leave. Just as I tie so many of my memories to their setting, I associated much of the frustration and loneliness I felt with the place I experienced it--with Tuscaloosa--and leaving in July felt liberating, like a gasp of air after a long struggle under water. Leaving the country felt even better. Life in Paris is the genesis of a new character--one that, by the time I return to the States, may eclipse the person I was when I boarded the plane in August.
Last night, I wrote to a friend I've known since kindergarten. College has separated us by five or six states, and we do well to see each other a couple of times a year. When we're able to meet, it's usually for grandiose conversation over coffee; we summarize six months of events and emotional experiences, and try to have time left over to address the philosophical questions that plague us simultaneously. Last night I wrote:Isn't it sort of strange where life has taken us? I suppose that seems
like a pretty obvious question--cliché, even. But I have so few true
friends that have known me so well through so many stages of life, and
vice versa, that it really is an odd experience to reflect on. I feel
sometimes as though we're now living the epilogue of a movie about our
lives. The scenes stopped years ago, and now we are mere sentences in
the final frame of the film. "Glynnis went on to study at the Sorbonne
in Paris." "M. and S. continued to date in college."
Things like that. I don't mean to say that a movie about our lives
would have already ended by age twenty-one, just that our lives as
we're living them today seem removed by epilogue-distance from what
they used to be. Yet we knew each other when. I think I always have that sense with you, perhaps more so than with other
friends, because we really do see each other rarely, and when we do, we
converse in big, sweeping updates about all things philosophical,
grand, and confusing about life, and sometimes lack the time for simply
"hanging out." C'est la vie.
For now, I feel that is the best summation of my experiences in Paris: I am living in the barely-conceivable sentences of the epilogue following a film about my adolescent life.
Just as Tuscaloosa overwhelmed me in the summer--rendered me nearly useless, sucked life out of me--Paris has overwhelmed me today. Though primarily I have good days, I'm beginning to see how the city can get to me. If I were keeping score, Paris would be winning. This, my friends, might be a bit of culture shock. Most of the frustration stems from French bureaucracy, and obtaining all the documents I need to apply for my temporary residency card. I will write more extensively about la carte de séjour later, but essentially I have been using what little energy and free time I have to commute to every corner of the city looking for offices and photo studios, often with very bad or wrong directions. Frequently when I finally arrive at a destination, the people I need to speak to are out to lunch, the location is closed for the day, or the usual office hours aren't being kept.
This, my friends, is France. Where nothing is open on the weekends, everything closes for lunch (sometimes at irregular hours), and the laundromat down the street locks up without warning or explanation while all your clothes sit wrinkling in the basin of a dryer. Thankfully, after several hours of returning to the same locked door, I have pants to wear tomorrow, but it may be several more days before I can wait in line at the préfecture to get my residency card. If you imagine the hassle, wait, and disgruntled workers of the United States' DMVs and multiply it by foreigners, students, twenty more documents per person, taxes, and language barriers, you might have some idea of what I have to look forward to. All this plus the water in my apartment shut off without explanation for most of the day, two repair men who mocked me because they thought I couldn't understand them, and you have a picture of my day. Oh Paris.
But I did score one against Paris today. The lady who works in the pâtisserie next door stopped me before I left with my chausson aux pommes and baguettine to say that she thought my hair was vraiment jolis, très très jolis. Red hair will always have its perks.
I hope that as my relationship with Paris blossoms and my French improves, my score will be higher than the city's. As Hemingway said, "If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then
wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for all
of Paris is a moveable feast." If Paris renders me unfit for life elsewhere, I will consider my year a smashing success. But tonight, I long for the comfortable--for a snuggly couch with a friend on it, for a familiar face across from me at a café, or for a little of my father's cooking.
Sunday, 14 September 2008
Five vignettes: The Pope Comes to Paris from glynnis on Vimeo.
The pope was in Paris this weekend, which on certain occasions made the city a little nuts. Several metro stops shut down for most of the day surrounding the various pope-related events in the city. Friday night after class I went to Saint-Michel to find a textbook I need for French class, only to stumble upon masses of people (see the first vignette) crowding around the Seine and Notre Dame, where the pope was giving a private mass.
Saturday morning he gave mass at Les Invalides, a giant field/park in front of the building by the same name, which houses Napoleon's tomb. An estimated 200,000 people showed up, including my room mate and I, who were curious about the spectacle. We arrived around 8AM, and the pope arrived in the popemobile around 10AM. After his arrival and a few prayers, we headed back to the apartment to catch up on sleep.
Perhaps it's revealing of my small-town roots, but I think that's the most people I've ever seen before in one place. Many people brought chairs and picnics with them, which they ate as we all waited for the pope to arrive. I'm sure for the rest of my life, I'll never see as many nuns at once.
More photos on flickr.
Sunday, 14 September 2008
Last night my room mate and I went out for some jazz. There's a little club in Saint-Michel called Le Petit Journal. It opened in the 1970s and features primarily New Orleans style jazz. You can eat a two-course dinner from a set menu for 48€, or buy your first drink for 17€. Or, if you're students and know the secret password ("nous sommes étudiantes"), the first drink is 11€. Pretty good jazz, and we managed to run into Ayelen, my Argentian friend from French class. They have jazz every night of the week. More info on their website.
Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Tour of my apartment in Paris from glynnis on Vimeo.
Tuesday, 09 September 2008
Tuesday, 09 September 2008
My class at the Sorbonne is very traditional, with only a chalkboard and long rows of slender tables. There are about sixteen or seventeen of us. This is the view from the classroom. You can see the Eiffel Tower!
Tuesday, 09 September 2008
I've already said that I feel like I'm standing in for someone much more qualified--that living in Paris doesn't seem real. Even mundane things seem to bloom with life and excitement. Eating cereal alone at the breakfast table while it's raining outside is, in Paris, a delightful experience. Though I take pleasure in things like carrying groceries through the métro (carrying a baguette under one arm is so far the most delightful--like a food accessory), the thrill will be something I struggle with.
Certainly Americans romanticize Europe. We idealize the study abroad experience, but that's precisely what makes describing life in Paris somewhat difficult. On the one hand, we can all agree: Glynnis living in Paris is probably the most exciting thing that's ever happened to anyone on the face of the planet. Nevermind winning the lottery or skydiving. Pssh. Small potatoes, those. And the fact that it's Paris, one of the most mythologized, romanticized cities in all the world, merely compounds the problem. When I say I have been on picnics beneath the Eiffel Tower, there is a resounding chorus of "I bet that was awesome! I'm so jealous!" When I waltz through the Louvre for free with my art history student ID, the masses sigh and say, "We wish we were there!" When I'm stuffed full of crêpes and wine, everyone's keen to congratulate me. Though I enjoy these interactions, each for different reasons, their occurrence often means things remain unsaid. In living up to its reputation, Parisian life--and perhaps any study abroad experience--allows plenty of room for people to fill in the blanks, and little room for me to explain my own experience. Yet, if given the opportunity, so many of my explanations would fall flat as stereotypes.
I feel kind of like I'm arguing in agreement. "You always assume things! But your assumptions are correct! STOP IT!"
I suppose the trouble is that with clichés, stereotypes, or even unique explanations of my experience, it will be hard to communicate the authenticity of my general excitement or the satisfaction I feel when a shop keeper understands a few sentences of my garbled French. You may comprehend some semblance of what I mean, but it will be much harder to evoke those same emotions in you using words; everything seems more grandiose, more genuine, and more weighty than any language has the ability to convey.
Perhaps this can help. A friend of mine has returned to the University of Alabama for summer and fall classes after a semester abroad this past spring. In a letter I recently received, he wrote: Even though I was here [Tuscaloosa, AL] during the summer when I knew close to no one on campus, returning for the fall still seems a bit hollow. Perhaps it's the fact that slowly friends are moving across town and schedules are becoming decreasingly intertwined; perhaps there's some nostalgia residual from Wales, of being a moment's spontaneous decision from endlessly interesting, exotic places and of doing literally everything with a coterie of my countrymen in a foreign place. It seems attractive--if a little self-centered--to think of the detachment between myself and friends as a result of being gone for so long or that someone has changed, dramatically or otherwise. And when I say detachment, I don't mean anything overt, but there exists a subtle sense of removal, a sense that I have to try harder to keep up with friends than before. Now, it may not have anything to do with any underlying sentiment or grand reason; probably it has much more to do with the mundane tangibles: [several friends have] moved to a place off-campus; [one] spends more time out of reach with [his girlfriend]; [one] is working in Birmingham this semester; [one] switched majors away from Mechanical Engineering; Nick Saban [UA's football coach] won't return my phone calls; and you're well out of reach in Paris. (PARIS!!! Am I jealous? Maybe a little more than a little.)
When he and I crossed paths briefly this summer, he tried hard to convey how hollow things felt upon returning home to the States. Though I already anticipate a little of that for myself, I can say that the opposite is true now: things seem much more full here. Life in Paris is sharing a rich cup of coffee with friends, whereas life in Tuscaloosa was a weak cup of luke-warm tea in an apartment, alone.
Tonight after finishing our first phonetics class, my fellow students at the Sorbonne began to scatter just outside the building. I lingered for a moment and caught a few of them--just a handful--and asked if they had any plans at present. Each replied "no" quite eagerly, and we walked together to a café on the corner. So began an evening of excited conversation between two Americans, a Colombian, and an Argentinian--three languages twisting like threads of braided bread. Over coffee we made plans to go out Thursday night, discussed destinations for possible weekend trips together--Istanbul, Prague, Amsterdam. Coffee became shopping at les petits marchés, then a picnic under the Eiffel Tower.
Already I feel I share more with these students than with some of my acquaintances back home. And why shouldn't I? We all chose to live in the same city for the same reasons, to learn the same new language at the same school. The eagerness and excitement with which we converse is something I haven't experienced in a long time. It mimics the excitement felt when getting to know someone with whom you hope to be romantic--a crush you've had for weeks that you finally find yourself sitting with at a dinner table. You both lean in as the conversation gets deeper, and you feel you must have absolutely everything in common. Yet somehow, I don't feel this excitement living life abroad will expire the same way crushes can by the time the second date rolls around.
So. The cast is developing. Meet Julian, a Colombian-American, Rob from L.A., and Ayelen (pronounced ash-uh-LENN), from Buenes Aires.
We had a grand time this evening. Next time we will remember a bottle opener.
Sunday, 07 September 2008
Our second full day in Paris (03 September 2008), Abroadco booked a bike tour for everyone studying with the company. There are twenty-six of us all together this fall--twenty-four girls and two boys. We live all over the city in apartments, home stays, and in the dorms at Cité U, an international student center with public facilities and lots of student services (but no regular curriculum or faculty, to my knowledge). Cité U houses hundreds of Paris's international students in a number of dormitories organized by language. Most American students at Cité U live at the Fondation des États-Unis. More photos from the tour on flickr (some forthcoming). So, in short, don't dismiss city bike tours. The tour was one of my favorite things that I've done in Paris as a tourist.
Our bike tour was with the Fat Tire Bike Tour company, which has a work force composed primarily of post-undergrad sporty Americans who have been living in the city for many months and don't speak a lick of French. They are the type you would find playing frisbee or tossing a football on the quad, except now they've graduated and do so in some of Paris's most beautiful parks. Oh. And they give these bike tours. This is not a tone of criticism, but of pure delight and amusement. They were quite lovely and gave a very entertaining and informative tour, peppered with terms like "bro," "cat," "chick," and "totally awesome," referring of course to famous people and events throughout French history. If you go on the tour any time soon, see if you can get Ned as your guide.
Friday, 05 September 2008
Rarely have I been in a situation or lived in a place where I can't stop myself from thinking how lucky I am. Certainly I have led a beautiful life, and have had more than my share of undeserved blessings. Life in Birmingham--especially as I completed high school--was a dream, and considerable time must pass before any other place can become my hometown. I have had my share of nostalgia for a number of cities in which I've never lived, Paris and New Orleans among them. But never have I lived somewhere that required confronting disbelief multiple times a day. I feel as though I am an impostor standing in for a more-qualified absent character of a romantic, idealistic novel.
My classroom at the Sorbonne looks out onto clay roof tops. In the distance the spire of the Eiffel Tower stands tall above them. The library at the American University of Paris (AUP) sits practically under one of the tower's legs. Monday I begin studying the history of photography in the country that was its birthplace. Even as I've stood awkwardly in discotheques before the crowd warms up, I've wondered how I landed myself here, how I am now a person who catches taxis late at night to go home to my studio apartment with high ceilings. Though some of it may be the "honeymoon stage" of culture shock, and some of it may originate in the starry eyes of a small-town girl in a big city, I think more than anything I'm just excited to be here. It has been a little while since I've been this excited about something.
My professor at the Sorbonne is perfect. She is the ultimate French professor. I might venture so far as to call her Mme Super. Everything I've ever loved about French professors and their classes is amplified in Mme. Berthier and her classroom. And if you've ever heard me talk about my French professors, you know that I love me some French professors. If any of you have had different experiences or disagree with my assessment of les profs de le français, it is probably because you haven't had the joy of experiencing a true French class. Please don't hesitate to share stories about French profs in the comments. Let's all take a moment to worship the French classroom, shall we? For you non-francophiles out there, French professors go something like this: they are French in appearance, whether by small detail or by mannerism. This means they dress well, have a wide grin, are perfectly accessorized, make French thinking noises (you know, blowing air out of their pouty French-lips, making whistle-y sound effects). They have a sharp wit, which they exercise frequently with students. They are strict, but warm. They adore their students, which for women manifests itself via frequent use of mes chéris. And lastly, but most importantly, they are a little nuts--some more than others--but all of them have a silly or forgetful quality, which makes them all the more endearing.
Last semester I had to drop my French class, both because it conflicted with photography class, and because the graduate level was a little too advanced for me. I spent several weeks mourning the loss of M. Robin, the professor, who was perhaps the loveliest French man I have ever seen. He always wore dress shoes with jeans and a button down shirt, had a sophisticated haircut that also brought to mind Tintin. Because he grew up in Tours, his French sound effects were the best of all my profs, and his mannerisms the most authentic and entertaining. Believe me when I tell you that I've scoured YouTube looking for some video example of the noises and effects I'm talking about. I know there are some via Kevin Kline in French Kiss, but can't find any clips. Anyway, M. Robin's French was immaculate and mesmerizing to hear, since the Loire Valley offers some of the purest spoken French known to man. Parisians, on the other hand, speak a little more sloppily, more quickly, and with more slurs.
Anyway. Mme. Berthier is my prof à la Sorbonne. During class, when she wants to be sure we're listening, she says very French, very funny things. For instance, when she looked out the window this afternoon and saw that it was raining (unusual weather for Paris in September), she said, "Ooh la la. Il pleut!" It's raining! My classmate, Steven, responded, somewhat somberly, "Oui, il pleut sur la ville." Yes, it's raining in the city. Without missing a beat, Mme. said, "Il pleut sur la ville comme il pleut dans mon coeur." It rains in the city like it rains in my heart. A few moments later, when she spilled her cup of water onto a pile of papers, she said very nonchalantly, "Ah, il pleut dans la classe aussi."
The French are charming in a way I have trouble expressing. M. Robin and Mme. Berthier are both the type I'd like to carry around in a little box. I'll do my best to come up with some "French mannerisms" video clips, even if I have to make some myself.
Friday, 05 September 2008
Club Erasmus is a Thursday night club that's free for international (non-French) students who show their passports, and €12 for French students.
Observations:
It's almost three, I'm exhausted, my feet hurt, and I have an orientation meeting at the American University early tomorrow. That is, in a few hours. Bonsoir, mes amis.
Wednesday, 03 September 2008
I'm pressed for time these first few days in Paris, since I'm still learning the names of other students studying with my program, taking placement tests, seeing the city, grocery shopping, and scouring the stores for all the little things I neglected (or didn't have room) to pack. I'm lucky to get a few hours of down time each day, which I use to cook meals, nap, and generally recover.
I begin French classes tomorrow à la Sorbonne, and Friday I have orientation at the American University. Tomorrow evening there's a social event with French students and other international kids, where I'm sure we'll be mixing wine with dancing and a little franglais. Keeping up with folks back home (and not to mention the internet) is a little difficult so far, but I suspect after a week or two of settling into a school schedule, things will be a little less crazy around here.
The amount of information thrown in my general direction has become overwhelming. In my few days here I have accumulated piles of little booklets and brochures with maps, lists of activities, and I've made dozens of little notes to myself about which market is where, which stores carry what, and which metro lines or bus stops will take me where I need to go. Add this to finding ATMs, keeping up with money, setting up a monthly metro pass with an ID photo, and things like buying a bag of groceries become large ordeals.
It probably goes without saying that, despite having a brain full of rusty French, I am still confronting a language barrier. I know enough to read and comprehend, and am able to speak well enough to sound like a blathering idiot, or perhaps a robot that strings words and phrases together into incomplete sentences. "Excuse me, there are two things of pine nuts and cinnamon here. I have bought each. Just one. See? I would like some money." "I would like here. Do you have here? For fifteen euro? What? I don't understand. Yes. I pay with paper." Me Tarzan. You Jane. Me want hair dryer.
Because I didn't receive keys to my apartment until tonight, I've been attached at the hip with my room mate, who does not speak or read a lick of French. She's Jewish and just spent three months completing a music internship in Israel. On our shopping adventures today, we stumbled through Chinatown and bought what we could find, speaking Hebrew, Arabic, and what French I could muster.
Some observations, until I can write a better recount of the events in Paris so far:
That's all I can muster for now. I'll tell you about my apartment and my neighborhood soon enough, and I'll have plenty to report tomorrow after I attend my first class at the Sorbonne. I'm already exhausted and can't wait for the weekend.
(Pssst....could someone throw in a test comment here? I'm still concerned they're not working properly.)
Wednesday, 03 September 2008
I received an email from someone indicating that the commenting system is a little spotty--that in order to comment they were required to register. This shouldn't be the case! I've tested everything and assume it works properly, but if you run into any problems like this, please send me an email at my gmail address, glynnish, and let me know what you're experiencing.
Does anyone else have the same trouble with commenting?
UPDATE: I believe I've corrected the problem. Let me know if any of you still experience difficulty or receive an error indicating you must register to comment.
Monday, 01 September 2008
It's hard to know where to begin. That has kept me from writing--from trying to write--for some time. There are the facts: September 1st, 2008, nine days in London, a flight from Heathrow, enrollment at the Sorbonne, an apartment in the 13eme. I've been collecting these facts for almost a year, anticipating the first week of September by wading through bureaucracy and paperwork: an ID photo here, a bank statement there, a visa, transfer credit forms, a new phone number, a new address.
I thought for the longest time I wouldn't feel ready--that I'd board the plane in a minor state of panic, wondering how I could think I am capable of a year in Paris when my French is rusty and I've never lived in a major city. But I'm here, waiting at gate A20 in Heathrow, and it doesn't seem so big. As school started at my home university, I didn't feel I should be there, even as all my friends were examining class schedules and buying textbooks. Though I might not say I'm ready, this does feel right. And I suppose that's the most one can hope for.
I arrive in Paris this evening and go straight to a restaurant to meet other students in my program (not even to my apartment to drop off bags!). There's a week full of orientation activities ahead, which may prove to be very busy, but until I arrive I've no real idea what's in store.
'Til then.
