A Friend in Town

“SALUT” IS ABOUT EVERYONE

In French, the word “salut” is like “hey!” It’s a casual hello and also a casual goodbye. Convenient. It can also mean a salute, like in the military. Up until recently, these were the only definitions of this word that I was aware of. I was walking home from Monoprix (like French Target) and there were a couple clean looking, middle-aged guys with a big sign that said "pénitence = salut." People walking past them were keeping a big wake, but didn’t steer as clear because I was puzzled by what their sign meant. They caught me staring and reeled me in. They asked me what I thought about "salut." Something about the way they asked made me think this was some sort of survey, so I said "I don't know if my opinion counts, I'm a foreigner." They said "salut" is about EVERYONE. Oops, they were evangelists. Turns out it also means "salvation." It was too late to turn and run, so I talked with them a little about the different meanings of the words "pénitence" and "penance" in French and English. They claimed that in French it's not so much about "punishment," i.e. whipping yourself or wearing a barbed wire garter like the dude from the Da Vinci Code. They said that in French it was a very good thing. Hmmm. Then they pulled out pamphlets for their church and I decided not to stick around to hear all the details. I told them I had my own faith and wished them a good day. Now I’m kind of regretting not grabbing a handout though, you don’t see a lot of evangelists in Paris (I’m told it’s illegal) and I want to know what it said.

Pick a key, any key, for a fee

         Chris Welsch needed a new mailbox key after a stroke of bad luck on Pont des Arts. His landlord was making it almost entirely impossible to find a replacement, so Chris said he’d throw a little cash my way if I could help him figure out a solution. It turns out that the mailboxes/mail keys for apartment buildings in France are privately owned by outside companies. Anyone can go to a mailbox headquarters and give an address and a mailbox number and get a pair of keys by paying 11,30€. No questions asked. It’s probably bad for me to be putting this information out into the world, but there you go.

YOU COULD SAY OUR PATHS HAVE CROSSED BEFORE

         Katherine Jacob and I have coincidentally ended up in France together through the same programs twice now. The last time I was in France, studying in Avignon, it turned out that I was not the only Marquette student at my school, despite it not being a Marquette program. Katherine had found the same school in the same town independently. We also knew each other because we had been in the same French classes every semester since I started taking French at Marquette. That’s less shocking because Marquette has a small French program, but ending up in the same town for study abroad was pretty remarkable. This time we both found the TAPIF teaching program independently. Katherine’s in a high school in a small town outside of Rennes, up north. This week is the Toussaint (All Saints) vacation all across the country. We don’t have classes, so she decided to come hang out with me in Paris for a few days. She got in on Monday afternoon (despite her original train being cancelled) and stuck around until this morning (Friday). We managed to get in a lot of picnicking, pain au chocolat (so good it hurts), a ballet, and some sight-seeing. It was a good ol’ time.

A NIGHT AT THE OPERA

Katherine is a ballet fan, so she wanted to see one while she was here. Tuesday she went over to the Opera house to see what the options were and found that there was one happening that night and that she could get us tickets with “restricted visibility” for 8€ a piece. We’re both working with the same sorry budget, so we decided to give the 8€ seats a try.

         I had never been to the Palais Garnier before. You normally have to pay 12€ just to go inside. It’s beyond ornate. You could spend an hour staring at the ceiling and only be able to take in a fraction of the detail. I was silly and didn’t bring my camera, so you’ll just have to take my word for it. Or google image search. Or go there. 
The auditorium has a chandelier that’s as big as my house. There are huge faces sculpted at the border of the ceiling that watch over the stage and the audience. I wonder how many shows they’ve seen.

         The one downer is that the whole place smells exactly like homeless Parisian people. It’s weird. Being in Paris for a month, I’ve only recently learned to recognize that scent. I’ve never smelled it anywhere else. It’s distinctive and if it is a bodily smell, then it is not one that I’m familiar with. I’m not sure what it is, but I can assure you, it’s not pleasant. I don’t understand why a luxurious Opera house would share the same smell as the people who sleep in the subways here, but it is undeniably the same scent.

         Our restricted visibility allowed us to see half of the stage. It was kind of a bummer when they danced stage right. We could tell from the crescendoing music and applause that they had just done something really sweet. But half the stage was still enough for us to catch some impressive dancing and to piece together the majority of the plot. Paquita is a gypsy woman who’s running with a rough crowd. She’s the hot gypsy of this particular clan and has a gypsy pimp who isn’t being very good to her. A prince charming shows up and they fall in love, of course. The Gypsy Pimp is not down with this and decides to kill Prince Charming, but Paquita warns him and they run away together. Then they go to a ball and they find out that she’s actually his long lost cousin and so she’s of noble birth and they can get married and be happy forever. In the ballet, this last part was demonstrated with dramatic gesturing towards a painting of a man, followed by a lot of celebratory dancing. We had to look on Wikipedia afterwards to figure out what the heck was going on with the finale.

PARISIAN DINING

After the Ballet, we went to dinner and I decided to try Steak Tartare for the first time. For those of you who don’t know, that’s raw beef served with a raw egg on top. Protein central. It’s a really typical Parisian meal, you see people eating all the time. The waiter, noticing that I am a foreigner and a girl, responded to my order with a french “You know that comes raw, right?”

I assured him that I did, but I think he still assumed I was making a mistake. When he brought out my plate, he gave me every kind of condiment they had. I liked it. I probably won’t order it again because I like other things better, but it’s definitely worth giving a try.

         When they cleared our plates, the guy heard us speaking English and asked us, in English, if we wanted anything else to eat. I responded in French and I think that pissed him off because he mocked us when we asked for the check and then didn’t come back to our table for about 30 minutes. We stared and followed his every move and he actively ignored us while he smoked a cigarette, stocked the bar and flirted with a table of annoying American girls sitting a little ways from us. We finally had to ask a second time. The waiters here are either awesome or the stereotype of a rude Parisian, there doesn’t appear to be much in between.

That’s all I’ve got energy for at the moment. I’ll write some more later. Probably tomorrow. later y’all 

Joie de...ne pas travailler

WE could all use a little change

         I decided to make Wednesday a super productive day because I didn’t have to work. The plan was to start by busting my bum to finish all my French administrative business. Then I was going to come home and go to the Laundromat across the street from my place and kick it with a book while my stuff got clean. I had to go to the bank and get them to send me a checkbook (I didn’t get one before, my bad. You NEED a checkbook in France, it’s weird). And I had to go to the social security headquarters and get signed up for healthcare, despite not having some of the needed documents. I figured this was an optimistic plan. In my past France experiences, going to either the bank or the Social Security office can take the better part of a day on its own. But biting off more than I can chew is kind of my thing, and I don’t see why being in foreign country has to change that.

         The bank visit took a total of 2 ½ minutes. I said I needed a checkbook, gave the clerk my name and she was like “okay, it’ll be one week, have a nice day!” I was half expecting them to ask for a blood sample or something, but it was easy as pie. I walked out feeling super awesome and efficient at France.

         The Social Security visit took a little longer because no one felt like helping me. That's about right for French customer service. The office had an awkward set up. Their cubicles are out in the open, so the whole staff is visible from the waiting area. This means that I could see and hear them chatting and choosing not to help me while I waited. After about fifteen minutes, the front desk woman walked over to them and was like “hey, guys….eh, can someone help her?” She even had to persuade them a little by telling them I had all my papers and it’d probably be super easy. When the woman who reluctantly accepted this assignment called me up to her desk, it took about A minute. I handed her my stack of papers and she was like “okay, it’ll be 2 weeks, have a nice day.”

         I’m a little scared to type this because I might jinx myself, but, here goes: it appears that I am done with all the paperwork stuff for getting established here. Whew.

         The first part of my day was quick and easy, but laundry ended up being a royal pain. Figures. I got all my stuff together and lugged it over to the laundromat by my place, only to find that they won’t accept anything but coins. And they have no change machine. This is exceptionally ridiculous because all of their services are over 5€ (laundry is pricey here!), so you have to pay with a fat stack of coins. What a bunch of boobs. I decided to go home and wash by hand instead. Not quite the leisurely experience I had been hoping for. I only had enough hanging space for half my dirty clothes, so I only washed half and I’m saving the rest for when I find more motivation or loose change.

STEREOTYPES

         On Thursday, I got up at 5:45am again to get to work for my first class at 8am. I arrived on time, but the students were doing another strike “demonstration” out front. For the high schoolers at Villaroy, strike demonstration means dragging trash cans in front of the main doors and then yelling or singing for an hour or so until they get bored and catch a bus elsewhere (probably to a movie or something). So none of my kids came to class.

         For my second class, all of three girls showed up. We had a really good time talking about American/French stereotypes. We also talked about the differences between body images for the two countries. I’d say that in America there’s definite appreciation for the petite girls, but we tend to celebrate a busty hourglass shape when paired with a rock-hard abdomen. Women are supposed to be curvy with as little body fat as possible. This is achieved by diet and spending endless hours at the gym, probably doing sit-ups and butt exercises. I’ve found that French girls don’t really do the gym, because that’s not the body that they want.

          They expect different, but, of course, equally ridiculous female dimensions. The French female ideal isn’t too far from a high fashion model. Maybe not as tall, but definitely as skinny. Women want to be thin, long, and relatively curveless. For example, the mannequins here have A/B-cups with barely any butt. This body type is achieved by dieting and smoking. My students thought this was probably because the high fashion industry is such a big deal in Paris. It was an interesting conversation.

         When the bell rang they actually stayed through their passing time to get some extra chatting in. No students showed up for my next class either. I started heading back to the teacher’s lounge and the same girls from my last class saw me and asked if I could spend a little more time in English with them. They had an open hour so I didn’t see why not. We played Celebrity. It’s the game where everyone gets a slip of paper with a celebrity name on it. You put the paper on your forehead so that everyone but you can see it and then you have to ask Yes/No questions to determine who you are. I was surprised by some of the celebrities didn’t know. For example, they didn’t know Le Petit Prince or Lance Armstrong.

         I only had one other class where students showed up that day. We also did an exercise with American/French stereotypes. They were calling stuff out and I was making a list on the board. We had all the basics: fat, war-mongering, loud. This kid in the back goes "They party."

me: “like… what sort of party?” (I was expecting him to say fraternity or something)

kid: “like 'In the USA.’"

me: “Like, do we have parties in America?”(I was still a little confused)

and he goes: "no, like Miley. Like, I put my hands up, they're playing my song..."

For those of you who don’t know what that is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M11SvDtPBhA

I couldn’t help but laugh. I told him that we do sometimes. That whole situation made me smile so hard my face hurt.

        

         When we got to French stereotypes they were shocked and hurt that people think they smell bad and that the women don’t shave. They wanted to know where this idea had come from and I had to admit that I really had no idea. I guessed that it’s because we think of France as really liberal and so we make the leap from liberal to hippy, and hippies are known for not showering or shaving their armpits. They were like, “Hippy?? That’s your thing!”

          They also didn’t know that we consider the beret a typical French thing. Because no one actually wears them, you only ever see them in tourist shops. And sometimes on an old man. Marina spotted a guy in a shop that appeared to be wearing one in all seriousness and we got excited, but then we realized he worked there and that was part of his uniform.

         Another thing they were surprised to learn was that we don’t casually kiss in the streets. I told them that making out on a public park bench leads to stares and maybe even someone saying “GET A ROOM!” Here, people makeout in public all the time and nobody even notices. Except, today there was a couple in their late 60’s/early 70’s making out in the middle of a metro station. That seemed to surprise people, so there was some blatant staring.

         Anyways, it was a relatively quiet school day. I ended up with a total of 10 students for the whole day. So far, the administration has no plan for punishing kids who don't come. Technically students have the right to skip for a political demonstration. The faculty seems pretty divided on that issue. The high school has a new Proviseur (principal), who's in her first year and she's been getting intense criticism in the last couple days. It’s just such a different way to look at rights and freedom for students. The students do not have the right to wear a hijab, a cross or any other religious icon to school. They do have the right to skip class for weeks on end in the name of political protest. In the United States, we wouldn’t dream of telling students they couldn’t wear anything remotely related to their faith in the classroom. That would seem oppressive to us. But if someone was upset about a political decision they could MAYBE strike for a day without consequences, but then they had best find a way to demonstrate outside of school hours or they will be getting marked absent.

          On Thursday evening I went to a Japanese restaurant to do a language exchange with a couple of French girls that I met a bit ago. It was cheap and awesome. Way more food than I could eat in one sitting. I had my first real bowl of ramen. Who knew that it could be so much more than what comes in those instant packets? I will definitely be going back there.

TGI FAT

         On Friday morning, when I got to my bus stop it said the next one wasn’t coming for 10 minutes because of bus “perturbations” (perturbation = they’re making us late on purpose because of the strike). If I didn’t make my train, the next one wouldn’t come for an hour so I wouldn’t make my first class. I would be cutting it close, but I didn’t really have any other options. We pulled up to the train station 2 minutes before my train was due to depart. I RAN and just made it to my seat before the doors closed. 

         I got to school on time! But there was yet another “demonstration,” and none of my students came. So, I went and got some coffee and read a little Calvin et Hobbes. I was hoping no one would come to my next class and I could just go home early, but they came and they were jerks. We did some of the stereotypes and talked about American eating habits. I explained that there is an obesity problem, but that not everyone is super overweight and eats McDonalds for every meal, that that’s a stereotype. There was a girl who was convinced that I didn’t know what I was talking about and just kept challenging me and repeating what she’d heard. Whatever. Now it’s vacation, so I get a little bit of time to build up a stronger sense of humor about the less loveable high schoolers.

         On the way home there was trash all over the streets, I’m guessing because the trash collectors were either on strike or having trouble getting around due to the strike. It lasted for a day or so, but things appear to be picked up at this point.

         

         After work I met with another man who is interested in private English lessons. He’s less charming than the other two. I’m definitely only meeting him in a public place. We’ll see how it goes.

KABOOM!

         Then I went to see this movie Kaboom with Marina. They have posters all over the metro for it so we decided to check it out. SO weird. Just looking at the IMDB page should give you an idea of how weird it is. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1523483/

It’s described as a sci-fi story centered on the sexual awakening of a group of college students. That is accurate. Here’s a handful of character names to give you a better idea: The Messiah, Drug Fairy Nymph, Cult Victim.

         We thought it was going to be a weird French movie, but it turns out it’s a weird American movie. I really can’t imagine this having much success in the US. Maybe ironically. Irony is really its only hope.

FRENCH AND COUSCOUS AND BEARS, OH MY!

         On Saturday, I went to lunch at one of my coworkers house. She lives not too far from our highschool in Guyancourt with her husband and super cute little girl. We ate and talked for around 5 hours. It felt good to be solidly immersed in French conversation for such a long time. Her friend Claire was there too and she had just been in a national park in the US this summer. We talked a lot about grizzly bears and how you can’t really do anything good to avoid being eaten. Other topics of conversation included motorcycle permits and crazy neighbors/landlords (everyone had a good story to contribute).

         When I left their house it was sunny, but sometime during the train ride the sky darkened. By the time I exited the metro stop on my street, there was a downpour and thunder and lightening. It was cool.

LOCKS OF LOVE

         Today I went to the same organic market as last week and got some foods and then I went to the Pont des Arts over the Seine. It’s a pedestrian bridge that has a longstanding tradition of couples attaching locks to it as a symbol of their love. It was busy with tourists and couples and tourist couples. I was standing and watching the sunset and this dude came over and asked me if I was Leonardo Da Vinci’s daughter… Because I look so contemplative. That’s a new one. Barf. I let him go for a while because it was an opportunity to speak some French and because I wasn’t ready to walk away form the sunset. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to pick me up or pick my pocket, maybe both. Who knows? Either way, it didn’t work out for him.

         In other news, I got 4th student lined up for private English lessons. On Wednesday, I got a phone call from a woman who saw my ad and wants to learn English to help her switch careers and start renting apartments to foreigners. We’re meeting next week after the vacation ends.

         Also, one of the students at my high school gave me his sister’s information so that I could go running with her (I had mentioned in my introduction that I’m a runner). I called her last week and we set up a running date for this Tuesday at a park south of the city. So, I’m looking forward to that.

that’s all I’ve got for now. à+

La Grève et La Gourmandise: A Super-French Week

It’s real hard to be mobile during a “mobilisation”

         On Friday, I showed up at the train station at 7:45am to catch my train from Paris Montparnasse to St. Quentin-en-Yvelines (not far from my high school). The metro transit strike was still on, but it was not as bad as last Tuesday. Technically the schedule was “quasi-normal.” “Quasi-normal” means that they’ll run most of the trains and buses, but they will intentionally make you late. My train was late enough that people who normally take the next train were already there. This meant we all got on the same train, which meant a lot of people (including myself) got to stand the whole way down.

         My bus from the train station to the school arrived with only a minute or so to spare, so I was speedwalking around the block to get to my students on time. When I got to the front of the building, there was a huge crowd of students outside. Some were playing around or chatting on benches, but the majority was crowded on or around makeshift bleachers, yelling into megaphones and waving signs about the retirement reform. It reminded me of the student section at a Marquette Basketball game. They had blockaded all but one of the front doors. I made my way around them and got up to my room. Inside the school was almost empty. Only one of my kids had decided to come to class, so she and I got to have a one-on-one conversation about the French education system. It was really fun actually, I think we both learned a lot.

         By the end of that hour, there was nothing left of the demonstration out front except for a yard littered with fliers and abandoned noisemakers. However, the building was still empty. Most students had opted not to come back to class. Not a single student showed up for my next class. Instead, another teacher who had no students showed me the school library. I really like their collection and am excited to explore it more during the rest of my stay. To start, I borrowed Calvin et Hobbes: “Complètement surbookés!” (aka “The Days are Just Packed”).

         For my next class, I was supposed to take out 6 students from a normal class and lead them in a discussion. Only six students showed up to that teacher’s class, so I just took them all. We talked about movies and music. That reminds me, Dad: if you’re reading this, one of my students said that since you love Saving Private Ryan, you should watch Tom Hanks’ miniseries “The Pacific”.

         I had plans in the evening to go do a dinner/language exchange with 3 girls I met my first week here at an event at Cité Universitaire (where Clare Longendyke lives). Both of the French girls live south of Paris right off the RER B line. The RER B is probably the worst to try to use during a metro strike. We ended up canceling because of the ridiculously limited schedule. If they even made it up to Paris, their chances of making it back home were slim to nil. So, my friend Marina and I decided to go out to dinner just the two of us.

BAR HUNT AND “POT CÉLÈBRE DE NUTELLA”

         She did some research and suggested that we go to Chez Germaine, which is known for good traditional French food at a decent price. It’s a hole in the wall that fits maybe 10 tables. The food was pretty good. Not quite as mind-numblingly good as that Steak au Poivre was at La Bourse ou La Vie, but definitely good. I had fish with leeks in an awesome cream sauce. They had the best bread I’ve had in a restaurant here. Sopping up that sauce with that bread made the whole meal worth 17,50€. Afterwards, we decided to go grab a drink somewhere, but we weren’t sure exactly where. Marina knew some neighborhoods where younger people hang out, so we went over there and tried to follow large groups of young people in hopes that they’d lead us to a hotspot. It was too early though, things don’t get started in Paris until 10:30 or so (I guess it's the same in the US, but I'm kind of a grandma).

         While we were trying to find a good bar, we walked past a crêperie that had the biggest jar of Nutella either of us had ever seen. It was enormous. Marina started taking a picture and the guy behind the counter invited me back there, so I could be in the photo with him and the jar. It was so ridiculous. We made such a scene that tourists noticed and started taking pictures too. By the time we left, a little crowd had formed and the guy was talking about his “famous jar of nutella.”

         Anyways, we finally decided to just ask someone where a good bar was and they recommended we go to Rue des Canettes, over by Saint-Germain-dès-pres. This is right by the Temple, the bar that I had been to earlier that week on my diabolical night with Rochelle. We decided to go over to that area, but to avoid The Temple because neither of us wanted to risk getting shwasted. We found another Irish bar nearby that had a huge crowd of young people and a bunch of beers on tap. We had a good time even though we didn’t get to mingle with any frenchies.

        

GOURMANDE

         Saturday, Marina invited me to go to an annual farmer’s market event called Pari Fermier. Once a year, a bunch of farmers from all over France come up to the city for a weekend to sell their goods. It appears to only be the best of the best. Normally, you have to pay 8€ to get in, but Marina had found a coupon for free entry online. Just about every stand was giving out samples of some sort and we made the most of it. We had so many awesome cheeses, olive oils, dried figs, numerous varieties of honey and a couple different kinds of incredible foie gras. Foie gras like I’d never imagined. There was also champagne and alcoholic cidre. We ate and drank until we simply couldn’t consume anymore. I never thought the day would come when I would turn down free foie gras. It was awesome.

         After that, Marina had to babysit so we went our separate ways, each very content with our purchases. I went for a night run around the Jardin du Luxembourg and then I didn’t have any plans for Saturday night. Clare was at a wedding and Marina was babysitting, I’m still building my social network here so I don’t really have anyone else that I would contact last minute to go do something. I was thinking about going for a solo expedition to a concert or something, so I went online too look up options and saw that both my parents and Mike were on. I got to skype a little with my parents and then with Mike for hours, so I didn’t end up spending Saturday evening alone after all.

         On Sunday morning, I met up with Chris Welsch and his friend Joanna to go check out the Raspail organic market. I got a bunch of good fruit, veggies, cheese and butter for the week. We also got galettes de pomme de terre et oignon. The galettes I was familiar with before that were just savory crêpes made out of potato. This was so much more than that. It was a thick pancake made out of shredded potato with sharp cheese and grilled onion. They came hot off the grill, so the cheese was still melty inside. It was really incredible. The quality of food that I consumed at those markets on Saturday and Sunday may have ruined me. I can honestly say that nothing I have eaten since has really been the same.

         It was chilly outside so we went to a café and got some hot chocolate. Joanna got onion soup and Chris and I ordered Croque Monsieurs (which is something like a French grilled cheese sandwich with ham). The sandwich was mediocre and it tasted especially mediocre in comparison to the heavenly galettes we had just eaten. I also had my first experience with a rude Parisian waiter there. He straight up rolled his eyes at one point. Towards the end he warmed up to us though, I don’t know what his deal was.

         Chris invited me over to have dinner with them that evening. They made a tasty stew from their market findings. That really hit the spot for a cool fall night. Joanna lives in Athens and was just in Paris for a couple days. We discussed conflicts in Greece and in journalism and in life in general. It was a good time and I ended up staying pretty late.

COURS PARTICULIERS

         Monday was my first private English lesson and today was my second. I wasn’t sure what to expect because both students were guys I’d never met that had responded to ads I’d posted around town. You never know who you’ll draw with that sort of thing. But, so far, my students do not appear to be sketchy at all.

         On Monday, I met Mikail at Cité Universitaire (where Clare Longendyke lives). He’s 24 and a produce manager at a grocery store. His dad lives in the US and he has friends there, so he’s trying to be more comfortable speaking in English.

         Today I met with Antoine. He’s 21 and currently unemployed, but he's worked for years as a chef at a bunch of prestigious fine dining restaurants. Including one in London, where he worked and lived for a while. Since being back in France, he's been losing his English so he wants to work on it. He lives not far from me in an apartment with his parents and a cat. There is a serious shortage of animals in my life, so I may have overreacted a little bit when I saw the cat.

         Both lessons seemed to go pretty well and I’m feeling hopeful about the future ones.

A STRIKE A DAY KEEPS THE CAPITALISTS AWAY

         In the last couple days the protests and political demonstrations have continued. The big news yesterday was a riot at a high school in a northern suburb. The newspapers here showed pictures of streets full of torched cars. Another big one was an “escargot” demonstration on the highways, where groups of truckers drove super slow and caused huge traffic jams.

         Today, apparently there was another demonstration in front of my high school. The high schoolers had blockaded the doors again. I didn’t see it because by the time I got there (10am), they had all lost interest and moved on. But not to class. No one showed up for my first class, so I had to hang out in the teachers’ lounge and wait until my next class at 1pm. Normally the teachers’ lounge is pretty boring, but today a lot of other teachers were hanging out there because they were in the same position with no students. People were pretty upset and the day was full of passionate conversation and argument about how the school and teachers should be reacting to this. The general sentiment among teachers is that students were just demonstrating to skip class. The teachers were frustrated with the students for their lack of commitment to their education and frustrated with the administration for allowing them to skip in the name of protest. They also voiced a lot of concern about this generation of high schoolers and the effects of computer technology on them. People were all in agreement, but there was a lot of debate and they talked about many of the same problems that we’ve been talking about in the US in recent years.  
         There were also more demonstrations on the major streets in Paris today, including right by my place on Boulevard Montparnasse. At one point, I heard a protester's proclamations so clearly that I thought he was inside my building. After a little investigation, I realized he was just on Boulevard Montparnasse with a high quality megaphone.

         As far as the protests go, the American news makes it sound like there’s rioting all around Paris. I know there was that high school riot up in the northern suburb, but all the demonstrations I’ve seen in the city in the last week are parades (like the one in the video I posted).

         A lot of the momentum is due to the young people getting involved. The New York Times quoted a man explaining that the youth are excited to participate in the protests because in France it’s “a kind of generational rite of passage.” From the conversations I’ve had with my high schoolers and with the other teachers, this definitely appears to be the case. In the streets, the overwhelming energy isn’t anger, it’s excitement about banding together for a common cause. There’s a lot of disagreement about whether or not the protests are going to have any effect on the retirement reform. Half the people here are up in arms and the other half is trying to continue like nothing is happening, hoping that it’ll end soon.

We’ll see how things turn out, I’ll try to keep you guys in the loop.

à la prochaine!

Some first hand grève footage

Protesters marching down Boulevard Montparnasse

I have a lot of catching up to do

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE

            On Wednesday, I opted out of going down to the English Assistant training session because it was going to be time consuming and unpleasant with all of the strike stuff. Instead, Marina and I decided to go do some Parisian exploration. She suggested Parc Monceau and I was all for it because Rochelle had just been telling me about how much I needed to go check it out. We headed out after noon so our first stop was a boulangerie to get some lunch. I love how easy it is to find a good sandwich in Paris. Even the simple ones end up being a treat because of the high quality ingredients.

It was a beautiful day. The chill of fall is starting to show up, but the days have mostly been sunny since I got here. Paris is pretty but, as is the case with just about any metropolis, it is made up of mostly of buildings and cement. It gets away with that because of the fantastic architecture, the river in the middle and because they have managed to maintain some gorgeous green spaces, despite the dense population. Parc Monceau is one of them.

            Parc Monceau reminds me of something you would find at the down Alice’s rabbit hole. There’s not a lot of rhyme or reason to it. The park has a patchwork feel because there are tons of different varieties of trees and flowers and not much transition between them. Within a couple meters, you see palm trees (I kid you not) and trees that you’d probably find in the Northwoods. Keeps you on your toes. They also have random monuments scattered all over that appear to be from all different time periods. Some of the statues look like they’re from the last couple centuries while there are columns and a big stone pyramid that appear to be ancient. We kept searching for plaques but there are no explanations of what they are. In the United States these would certainly have plaques and would probably be roped off. Then again, we celebrate enormous balls of twine.

The only sign that we saw was tucked away by an unremarkable bush. It said “First Parachutist 1797.” That was it. I guess the place has wireless too because we saw a british girl skyping with someone on her laptop at a bench.

            After Parc Monceau, we went all over town to universities and bookshops putting up ads for English lessons, because I am in need of more income, pronto. On our way to one of the bookstores this strangle little postcard store caught my eye. It had a carefully arranged display in window, but the rest of the store looked like it could have been someone's basement storage space. The sign on the door listed the hours for the month. It was only open on 3 different Wednesdays from 2pm-7pm. It turned out that we had stumbled across it during one of those small windows of availability. So we went in. An older guy came out from behind the stacks and explained that he collects postcards from different times and places and sells them for one euro a piece. That’s what was filling up all the boxes. There were so many cool ones. I bought a card from 1911 that someone had sent on April Fool's day. It has a picture of a woman on the front riding a giant fish (in France, instead of "April Fool" they say "April Fish," dunno why). On the back it says in french: "guess who sent this to you..."

A LOVELY DINNER

            After I had managed to get signs up in a number of opportune spots, it was time to meet Rochelle and Chris Welsch (the old travel writer for the Star Tribune) for aperitifs and dinner. It was a short train ride from where I was, but the metro workers were making sure people knew the strike was still on, so they held my train at Chatelet for like 5-10 minutes while they “regulated traffic” or some other BS. So, I arrived at the brasserie late, but I couldn’t spot Rochelle anywhere. I asked the waiters inside and they kindly offered to be my dates for the night instead, but I decided to do another quick walk around the patio. This time Chris recognized me as Maureen’s daughter and called me over. Yet another reason it’s handy to have my mom’s face. Rochelle showed up a little later, she’d been held up in some of the same metro BS. On top of that, she’d gotten a lot a late start because she had assembled an enormous bag of goodies for me! She was leaving for Rome the next morning, so she had cleaned out her fridge for me and filled a bag with sausage and Roquefort and yogurt. She also donated her copy of  Rick Steves’ 2010 Paris guide as well as a bunch of French magazines. Super generous! I am actually eating one of the yogurts she gave me as I write this. She sat down and we drank some wine and all talked about our collective French experiences. My favorite was Chris’s story about accidentally dropping his keys through a bridge and having to climb out of his neighbor’s 7th story window and walk the roof to get back into his place. After that we headed over to La Bourse ou La Vie, the restaurant that Rochelle had been telling us about.

            La Bourse ou La Vie is a narrow place with only a handful of tables. I think that set up is typical in Paris. The inside is decorated with vibrant colors and  but the food and the staff at this restaurant made it memorable. The inside is decorated with vibrant colors, they play Edith Piaf and Patrice, the owner, walks around making conversation with the diners. When we showed up, there was no one else there yet. It was a Wednesday and we were probably a little on the early side for Europe. Rochelle had already been there once so Patrice remembered her and allowed us to sit at a table in the back, behind the regular dining room. Rochelle called this the “seat of honor” because you have to be in the know to ask for that table. She had seen some regulars sneak off to it the last time she was there. They let people sign the walls and ceiling back there, so there are all sorts of greetings and words of wisdom to read while you eat. We ordered the foie gras as an appetizer. It was awesome. We studied the menu a little bit, but Rochelle had been talking up the Steak au Poivre (steak with black pepper sauce) and we each ended up ordering that. It was completely worth all the hype. Thinking of that steak will keep me warm at night. We ate until we were in a wonderful food coma and then we said goodbye and went our separate ways. I had to be up early to catch my buses & trains for work, so I set my alarm for 5:45am, put my earplugs in and went to bed very content.

DISTURBANCE

            I woke up at 3am to YELLING. I could hear a guy’s voice yelling angrily through my earplugs. I have some young neighbors, so my first thought was that the guys had drank too much and had gotten into an argument. I waited for it to stop, but it didn’t. So, I sleepily took out my earplugs and tried to figure out where it was coming from. There were no signs of life from the next door neighbors and I realized that it was coming from above. I couldn’t make out all of the words because it was muffled by the walls and because it was in French, but there was a lot of cussing and “SHUT UP, SHUT THE F*** UP!” and those sorts of pleasantries. There was no yelling in response, just a woman sobbing and pleading. This was alarming and I wondered if someone had broken in and my upstairs neighbor was being attacked. I listened for a long while and determined that this was a domestic dispute of some sort. It went on and on and on. I wasn’t sure what the protocol was in this situation. In the US, you call the cops, in France… I just don’t know. I couldn’t imagine that none of the other neighbors were hearing this, so I waited hoping that someone else would know how to deal with it. Nobody ever intervened. After an hour or so of him yelling violently and her sobbing pathetically, the argument died out, but the whole thing was so upsetting that I couldn’t get back to sleep. So, I was already awake when my alarm went off at 5:45am.

SOMETIMES, DESPITE THE ODDS, THINGS JUST WORK OUT

            On Thursdays I have to catch a train that leaves at 6:55am, so that I can make it to work by 8am, so that I can teach 6 back to back classes. With such a weird night and only 3 hours of sleep, I was worried about how well I would last. I made myself some tea and listened to upbeat music to psyche myself up and it worked. I stayed in a good mood for the whole day. It was magic.

            My first class is my youngest group. They are Florence’s group of students (she’s the young first year teacher that’s been helping me out), and she had warned me that they talk and misbehave. They definitely did some chatting, but in general they were really engaged. At one point, I asked them if they had any questions and a kid asked if I would explain the title of a song for him. It was “We be steady mobbin’” by Lil’ Wayne ft. Gucci Mane. They love love love Lil’ Wayne. I had to work at it to find words they knew, but after explaining that “We be” = “We are” and that “Mob = Mafia,” we arrived at “We are regularly doing crime.” Since so much of the American culture that comes over is hip hop music, I ended up talking about gangs with some of my classes and was really surprised to learn that gangs don’t exist in France really. They were equally shocked to learn how prevalent gangs are all over the United States.

            Over all, it ended up being a pretty good day. My last class got cancelled, so I got to go home early. I went for a run around Jardins du Luxembourg and then grabbed a half baguette from a boulangerie near my place. I’ve been on the hunt for a neighborhood boulangerie to frequent and so far the ones I had tried were mediocre. This one is definitely the winner. I’m probably going to go get some bread from them today.

            I called my landlord about the 3am disturbance and she said to wait it out and see if anything else happened. She’s been renting this place out for years and has never heard of anything like it. She thought it was probably a fluke, but recommended that I go talk to the guardienne about it the next time I see her. If it happens again, we can consider more serious action. I haven’t seen the guardienne because our schedules are opposite, but I haven’t heard anything remotely like it since. So, for the time being, all is well on that front.

            I’m actually going to go for a run now. If I have time later today, I’ll write about the weekend. I have my first English lesson this evening with a guy named Nikail. He found my posting at Cité Universitaire (where Clare Longendyke lives). Hopefully this goes well and 1) he is not a creeper and 2) he wants to keep taking lessons, because I need the monies.

In further news, I saw two men with incredible handlebar mustaches yesterday. Some of the best I have ever seen ever. One was playing ping pong in a park, the other was standing on a metro platform and wearing... a beret. I need to start carrying my camera at all times.  

Click here to see my pictures so far.

My next installment will include a high school strike, lots of eating in excess and drinking moderately.

à la prochaine!

Christmas!

I will be coming home for Christmas! I get in Saturday, December 18th and I have to leave midday on New Year's Day. The departure will blow, but I'm just glad I get to come home at all. Can't wait to see you all!

Weekend Part II and Such a Ridiculous Day

BUDGET GOURMET

            On Friday I went out to dinner with Marina, she’s the English Language assistant that I befriended at our training session last week. We’re both kind of poor on account of us trying to live in Paris on our limited stipend. But, we decided that we wanted to go out for a Parisian meal, even if it had to be a budget one. We went over to the Latin Quarter and there were a bunch of restaurants advertising menus (menu=multiple course meal) for 10 euros. That price was right up our alley, but we were a little skeptical of what kind of meal you could get for 10 euros. We chose one with a large sidewalk patio facing a cathedral. The waiter was serving something like 25 tables all at once, it was remarkable. I’ve never seen anything like it. He messed up our first course, but he kept our bread basket full, so we were happy campers. The food was actually pretty decent, too.

            After we had filled up on baguette and beef bourguignon, we decided to walk around a little. During dinner there had been a panhandler wearing a sea captain’s hat walking around with a wheelie suitcase. Atop the suitcase was a beautiful little long-furred dog wearing a red sweater. Marina fell in love at first sight with this little dog. We went over and she gave the guy some money and the dog posed for photos. As in he actually did poses. He must have been trained to, it was unbearably cute. His name was Poopy.

SPECTACLE

            We saw that there was a big crowd gathered at Place St. Michel and we went to check it out. A guy was scaling the fountain in his boxers. He appeared to be intoxicated, so I was concerned that we were about to see this half-naked kid slip and tumble to his doom. He managed to get up to the top ledge and then turned around so that his back was facing the crowd. He pulled down his boxers to give the crowd standing there a view of his bare ass. People applauded. He pulled his shorts back up and gave a little bow. Not long after he had made it safely down, another guy climbed up in his boxers and repeated the same routine. People were less enthusiastic about the sequel, especially since cops were starting to gather along the street. People were kind of shifting around nervously and expecting the whole thing to get broken up.

            It turned out the cops weren’t there because of the mooners, they were chaperoning a parade of hundreds of rollerbladers that were blazing by on Boulevard St. Michel. Apparently, this rollerblade tour is something that happens every Friday night in Paris. A group of people get together and skate all over the city. It has grown into such a big deal that they get escorted by public safety vehicles like a legitimate parade.

            After the rollerblade parade had passed, we decided to keep wandering and we stumbled across a big used bookstore that had tables and tables of paperbacks for 20 cents. We combed through the boxes and I ended up getting a French kids book about a rowdy child (maybe like a French Ramona Quimby). Growing up in Paris, Marina had read it when she was little and said it was a fun one. I also found a copy of the Fellowship of the Rings (La commaunauté de l’anneau) in French! In the French version, Bilbo Baggins = M. Bilbon Sacquet and the Shire is called “Cul-de-Sac.” Weird. I’m looking forward to seeing what else they changed.

NEW FRIEND

            Saturday, I made another exciting purchase. I had been complaining about how there wasn’t that much basil in France, so I invested in a basil plant! I’m excited to have fresh basil and I’m lonely living alone, so it’s kind of like having a little friend. Yes, I realize that’s pathetic, but we all do what we can to get by. You could do a whole lot worse than an edible plant.

LITTLE PIECE OF PEACE

            Sunday, I launched a solo field-trip to find a church that I had happened on the last time I was in Paris with my mom and aunt. We had split up at Invalides and from there I just wandered off and ended up at this church. I kind of remembered what direction I had gone and that I had passed some embassies en route. I didn’t know the name of the church or what else it was by, so I just hopped on a train to Invalides and hoped the route would come back to me. It was unseasonably warm this weekend, so there were tons of people wearing t-shirts and picnicking out on blankets and playing large, unorganized games of soccer. I wandered on past them and I managed to find the church within 10 minutes without any turning around. I barely remember what I had for lunch yesterday, so it was crazy to me that I was able to find my way back so easily after 2 years.

            Turns out it’s called Basilique Sainte-Clotilde. I’ve seen a lot of churches, gothic churchs in Europe are a dime a dozen. It starts feeling like if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. That being said, I am no sort of expert. I don’t think that experts would say that there is anything concretely special about this particular church. I just love it. I think that because it’s a little less than spectacular in a city that’s so full of flashy sights, it doesn’t make most people’s short lists of things they have to see in Paris. It’s a bit of a paradox, but I think that’s exactly what makes it special. It’s like a secret.

            It’s in this really quiet corner, despite being a stone’s throw from some major destinations: Hôtel des Invalides, Musée Rodin, Musée d’Orsay. There’s a playground across the street, so the only sounds you hear are kids playing. Once you get inside it’s serenely silent though. It seems like there’s no more than 5 people in there at any given time and the most you hear is a sniff or light footsteps. The basilica is surrounded with big stained glass windows of different saints all the way around. They’re made up of vibrant colors and when sunlight shines through them they pop in a way that makes them almost look alive. It’s not the sort of place that makes a good postcard, it’s just peaceful. Peace can be hard to find in a city of 10 million people.             Monday, I started the process of getting on the social security system here. Pain in the arse. I won’t go into all the details, but let’s just say that their website is so un-user friendly that it took me an hour just to find which office might be the one in charge of my neighborhood. I went there and the woman told me I was in the wrong spot but gave me a map of all the other offices. Why, oh why, is that map not on the Internet? Come on, France.

            I made ads for English lessons and only managed to get up one copy before I had to run home to change before meeting my mom’s friend Rochelle for a beer. Before I even got out the door, I had a phone call from a student and set up a lesson for next week. Hopefully he will be the first of many.

DIABOLICAL DUO

            My mom’s friend Rochelle has been in Paris for the last month soaking up some joie de vivre. She takes off on Thursday so we decided it’d be fun to meet up before then and grab drinks at a bar she knew called The Temple over by Saint-Germain-des-prés. It’s an Irish pub, they have beers on tap and play American music and some of the dreamboat bartenders speak English. We were planning on having a really mild night since I had to get up early this morning for my first day teaching classes. But, when we finished our first round, we decided to go for a second because Sonny, a british bartender who Rochelle has befriended, was on his dinner break and he was sitting and shooting the shit with us. Rochelle told Sonny that I would keep coming back in her absence and that next time I would have to order the 10 shot special. It’s a set of 10 different flavored shots for 20 euros, all the flavors are secret house recipes. He smiled and ordered a set for us right then and there. We decided we’d share them. Both Rochelle and Sonny said that since they were flavored, they probably weren’t that strong. You can see where this is going? Nowhere good. 

            I cannot, for the life of me, remember why I thought this was a good idea. Don’t get me wrong, it was really fun at the time, as debauchery always is. Rochelle and I had a lot of fun and played this big all-bar game of music trivia. They’d start playing a song and the first one to name it won money. We were way too impaired for a “think fast” sort of game and felt like bad representatives of the US, as most of the music was American. At the end of the night, Rochelle walked me all the way back to my door and we made plans to go out to dinner on Wednesday. No booze, just food. I managed to get myself to bed and even remembered to set the alarm for this morning. This morning. I don’t even want to think about this morning again, but here we go.

DAY FROM HELL

            Today was my first day teaching classes. It was also the day of a huge metro transit strike in Paris. My first class was at 10:10 and normally the ride down there only takes 1 ½ hours. Because of how limited trains were, I had to be up at 6:30am to catch the bus that would get me to the train station on time. I felt like a puke zombie.

            The bus was super late and packed full when it finally showed up. I managed to wedge myself on, but by the time we got to the Montparnasse station, the train had already left. The next one wasn’t for another hour. I found myself a seat and managed to sleep a little while I waited. The train got me into Guyancourt at 9:30am. I had 40 minutes until class, but I still needed to get to the actual high school. One of my coworkers had offered to give me a ride from the station if I needed it, but my cell phone was out of battery. Luckily, when I got out to the buses there was one just arriving that I was familiar with. I’d taken it before and it took the long way around, but it ends up right in front of my school. We’d been going for about 10 minutes and I was zonking out when I realized that the driver was yelling TERMINUS! Turns out that today this bus was only doing half of its route. If there was any indication of this on the bus or at the busstop, I failed to see it. We were in the middle of this corporate headquarters area, a long ways from where I needed to be. The next bus wasn’t due to come until 10:20, 10 minutes after my class had already started. So, I decided to walk.

            I was so focused on trying to get there that my queasiness temporarily disappeared. I wasn’t entirely sure how to get there, so I asked a woman for directions. She was super nice and walked the whole way there with me, about 20 minutes out of her way. I finally got there at 10:30, just in time to see the bus that I had opted not to take pulling away from the stop. Whatever. I got up to the classroom, but if any students had come, they had already left. My next class wasn’t until 1pm, so I went down to the teachers lounge. The other teachers were very understanding about me being late. We got some lunch, but I was barely able to eat I felt so nauseous. I kept looking for the teacher I was supposed to be working with at 1pm, but I didn’t see him anywhere. He’s kind of shy though, so I wasn’t shocked by that. However, when I got up to his classroom, he wasn’t in it. I went to the office to ask about it and they told me that he wasn’t there today because he was participating in the strike. Alright, so I could have slept in a lot later. I still had one more class at 2pm. So I spent an hour trying not to barf and then I went to the room they had assigned me. I was fiddling with the key in the door for a while and having some trouble when a teacher opened it from within. She had a class full of students who were all laughing at me. I explained that I had been given this classroom and she said that it must be an error. I had no way of finding the students I was supposed to be teaching and I felt pretty sure that the effort would make me vomit. All of that was for nothing. Complete bust.

From there it was smooth sailing. I walked outside and caught the first bus to the train startion. When I got to the station, I only had to way 10 minutes for a train going directly to the Montparnasse Station. There were people everywhere in front of the station doing strike demonstrations. When I got back to my spot, the street directely beyond mine, Boulevard Montparnasse, was packed with people chanting and parading. I went upstairs, put on my pjs and passed out.

Tomorrow’s supposed to be the next round of English Assistant training, but the strike is still on and it’s going to be pretty much impossible to get there and back so Marina and I are planning a Paris outing. Then I have a very non-alcoholic dinner with Rochelle and the old travel writer for the Star Tribune. My first class on Thursday is 8am. I hope so bad the strike is over by then. Either way, it’s about to be a long day. But, after today, just about anything will be easy in comparaison.

That’s all I got for now folks!

MN = Timberwolves, France = Strikes

There have been a number of tell-worthy things in the last couple days and I have been bad about keeping up. So I'll write a chunk now and then I’ll get back to y’all on the rest. If it’s not short, I’ll at least try to keep it sweet.

Thursday I went around to more classes to observe and introduce myself. Being in front of French high schoolers is such a confidence booster. I’m automatically cool x 2 because I’m in my 20s AND I’m American. Like a real American. Like the ones they see on Gossip Girl and stuff. So cool. So cool I even say “cool” with an American accent.

Les sports

I’m surprised at how many people here recognize the state of Minnesota because of the Timberwolves. When I say where I come from, the response is generally a blank stare or “Oh! like the basketball team!”

Yeah….like the basketball team… that’s notorious for blowing chunks.

No one has heard of the Twins. Except, a girl was wearing a Twins jersey in one of the classes that I talked to. I was like HEY! Big game today! She just shrugged, but it made me smile. In France, any level of Twins loyalty is exciting.

Nouvelle camarade/amie

Another exciting part of school on Thursday was that I met Florence, who is one of the real English teachers (as in not an assistant). She’s 25 and in her first year teaching. She sympathized with me a lot because she’s only been at the school a month, so she’s still a little lost herself. She also understands the chaos of the foreign language assistant deal because she did the same program teaching French in Ireland a couple years ago.

She’s living in Paris not too far from me, so we went out for drinks in Saint-Germain-des-près yesterday. We’ve got ourselves a nice little symbiotic situation: I’m happy to have her around to be a guide in France and in teaching, and she’s happy to have a native English speaker around to keep her fluent. Though, I told her we’d have to speak French some of the time, as I am here to learn as well.

Eazy-Squeezy

I also got my work schedule at long last! I know that my mentor had been stressed trying to accommodate all of the English teachers’ needs. I was worried that the only way it would work was for me to come for 1 or 2 classes everyday. That would mean about a sizeable chunk of my time in France would be spent commuting. But, she did really well for me! It’s looking really cushy. I only work 3 days a week: Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. On Tuesdays I don’t have to be in until 10am and on Fridays I’ll be done by noon.

The teachers in France only have classes 15-20 hours a week, is that normal for the US? I feel like our teachers have to do a lot more than that.

Le Food

I went to the cantine for the first time this week and their lunch is pretty awesome. The food is below average for French food, but it is head and shoulders above the average American high school cafeteria. In some ways it’s really familiar: you get in line, grab your tray, get your food and look for a place to sit. The menus are entirely different.

With the American lunch menu, you got

- 1 Piece of fruit (a red delicious or an under-ripe banana)

- Hamburger, chicken patty or slice of pizza.

- 8 oz of milk or juice

At South High, if you paid extra you could also get a pop, a carton of fries, a bag of chips or a set of 4 huge chocolate chip cookies. Then you step out to the condiment counter and choose from ketchup, mustard or bbq sauce.

The French school lunch menu has multiple courses.

- You start out by taking as many chunks of baguette as you want.

- Then you get your choice of appetizer. They have little plates with different kinds of salad or paté, something along those lines.

- Then you get to choose a dairy product. There’s a couple different kinds of cheese or yogurt.

- Then you get your choice of dessert. They like to have some healthier options, like yogurt or fruit, and then they’ll have chocolate mousse or religeuse pastries.

- After all that, you get to assemble your main plate. There’s veggies, some sort of side (couscous, potatoes, etc), a protein (meat, fish etc.) and usually some sort of sauce/gravy.

Oh, and as a teacher I get an espresso at the end of my meal. 

This all costs me 3 euros. I will be eating lunch there are much as I can.

Le Public Transit Strike

The gov’t here just moved the retirement age back 7 years and people are understandably pissed. In typical French fashion, the reaction is a strike. So, next Tuesday is the beginning of a huge public transit strike that will last until who knows when. Tuesday is also supposed to be my first day of classes. I asked my teachers if I am expected to come in since I have such a long commute. I am. Since strikes happen here so often, life must continue as normally as possible. I guess since this happens so much, the law requires that they have a handful of trains that still run. If I have to walk to Guyancourt, it will take me a day. Please keep your fingers crossed for me.

That’s all for now folks! Stay tuned, my next installment will include some rollerblading, mooning, and French hobbits.

Le caca c'est délicieux

            Today we had our first of two orientations for the incoming English Language Assistants. It was in Orsay, which is about an hour out of Paris. I took the train down and, because I was unfamiliar with the place, I had googled it and drawn myself an intricate (but seriously off-scale) map. As I was exiting the train station a girl asked me for directions. Side note, at least one person a day has asked me for directions since I got here. Sucks to be them. I give myself a little pat on the back for passing like I know what the F I’m doing, but I’m always brought back down to earth by the “you are SO not French” look on their faces when they realize their mistake. Anyways, this girl asks me for directions and, it’s funny because she dresses very chic so I would have pegged her as French, it turns out that she is another language assistant looking for the same building. I was feeling pretty confidant with my super sweet map so we set out together. We still ended up having to ask for directions because there was a stairway that we weren’t privy to. I must find a way to make my next map topographical.

            We shot the shit a little on our way up to the school and had ourselves a bit of a small world moment. Despite teaching in the Versailles school district, we had both chosen to commute to work and live in studios in Paris that are actually within a couple blocks of each other. We also both hail from the American Midwest (she’s born in Paris but spent her adolescence/college years in Champaign, Illinois) and that made us a minority among the other English Assistants because there aren’t actually that many Americans and the Americans there are pretty much all from the coasts.

            We got to hear about all the paperwork we should be doing or should have already done. I felt pretty good about that because I’ve already checked a bunch of stuff off of my list. Plus, it was reassuring to meet some people who were running into the same problems and stuff.

            The ride home took forever, I think because there was concern about a bomb on the trains. A bunch of us assistants were sitting together and talking, so it took us a while to notice that the train was going really slowly and kept stopping for long periods of time. Our train stopped at one of the suburban stops closer to the city and we waited while passengers from an oncoming train exited and crossed over the platform to board our train. Theirs was being inspected by a uniformed man with what I presume was a bomb-sniffing dog. When we got to one of the first city stops, there was an announcement saying that the alert was over and trains would continue now as normal. We didn’t hear the original announcement, so I don’t know exactly what the alert was, but I’m guessing it was terrorist related and I’m hoping to read about it in tomorrow’s paper. I know there’s been a lot of publicity about a potential terrorist attacks on Americans in Paris. I will keep my antenna up as best I can, but I’m in Paris to enjoy Paris, not to hide in my studio. And I depend heavily on public transit, so I don’t know how much I can really do besides not hang out under the Eiffel Tower or on the Champs-Elysées. Though they are opening a new H&M on the Champs-Elysées this week. But I’m tight on funds, so hanging out there would be dangerous for a number of reasons.

           

            A couple days this week they’ve had me at the high school introducing myself to students and speaking in English with them to give them a taste of the convo classes I’ll be leading. Most kids have been super friendly and curious. When they found out I was living in Montparnasse in Paris, this kid who is clearly the class clown asked me if I had seen "La Tour Montparnasse Infernale." I hadn’t. I asked who was in it and he said "Éric et Ramzy." I mentally scanned all of the names I could remember from the French Film classes I’ve taken, and those didn’t sound familiar. I said I didn’t know them. Class Clown found this super offensive and insisted they were really famous French actors and that everyone knows who they are. I’m no expert, but I know a fair amount about French films, so that stung a little. I decided to look it up when I got home. This is Éric et Ramzy. Some vocab to know:

“Je suis un con” = “I am an asshole”

“Le caca c’est délicieux” = “Shit is delicious.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35qUdu_AE2Y&NR=1

            Turns out "La Tour Montparnasse Infernale" is a comedy that's about 20% fart jokes. Soo highschool boy dumb, but I actually laughed a lot when I finally realized what it was. I watched the whole thing so now I can quote some fart jokes to that kid if he ends up in one of my classes. Can’t wait!

Fun Fact

One of my landlord's generous food donations was some French Onion Soup, so I had that for dinner yesterday. Today I learned that if you put French Onion Soup into your body, everything coming out of your body will smell exactly like that for the considerable future.

This is my block.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEoYgXG8r-8&feature=related

I found a home!

            The last couple days have been bizonkers. Going into Friday I had 2 leads on possible housing arrangements: there was Célia, a French girl looking for a roommate in her 2 bedroom apartment in Guyancourt (where I teach). Then there was a woman looking to rent out a studio in Paris. She usually rents to the Middlebury College study abroad students and her girl had decided not to come at the last minute. 

           Friday was also my first day of work at the high school. I had been told that Friday I should come in to Lycée Villaroy at 9am. I would be introduced to my mentor teacher and would sit in on a number of English classes to get a feel for what I’d be doing. It's about an hour ride between Paris and Guyancourt with all of the different modes of transport. I figured while I was down there I would go see Celia’s apartment and then come back up to Paris and see Mme Noble’s studio.

            I had to get up at 6:30 to catch all of the transport that would get me there on time. That felt real early. I used to get up at 6:30 for work all this past year, that last month off must have made me soft.

            When I got there, they started with all the forms and were adamant that I really needed to find a place to live quick so that I could get a bank account. Otherwise, I wouldn’t get paid and I would get behind on all of the paperwork that I need to make myself legal in France.

            Then they brought me up to my mentor teacher, who appears to be one of those embittered teachers who doesn't really like kids or what she does anymore. She wasn't mean to me, but she's clearly uninterested in being a mentor. As soon as I was escorted into her room she tried to tell me to go back down to the office to do paperwork and she'd talk to me later. I’d just done all the paperwork I could do without a “domicile fixe.” The office people had been unsure what to do with me and had insisted that I come up to her room. So, I said I would just sit and watch her class.

             Afterwards, she led me to the breakroom where she introduced me to another english teacher and then disappeared (I'm 95% sure to smoke a cigarette). And the other teacher was like "I'm not in charge of you, I have no idea what to tell you, you need to find her again." When my mentor finally showed up again, she asked me if I had a bunch of stuff to do like find housing, etc. I said yes. She said then I should go because I’d just be wasting my time there that day. I asked her when they'd get my schedule together and she said I could be around for observing classes next week. The week after that they'd have me start leading a supplementary english conversation class for students who are taking an oral exam at the end of this year to graduate. 

            That's what's up with school. I'm curious how that will be. In the breakroom, some of the English teachers were talking about having a bunch of disciplinary problems. I feel like I won't have to deal too much with that. Either because students won't mess around too much because I'm young and american and that's interesting to them. Or because, when they do mess around, it won't be my responsiblity to deal with it.                       

            Anyways, I was all done by 10:30am. It seems like a pretty relaxed faculty, which is frusturating while I'm getting started, but will hopefully make for a much less stressful year. 

            After all that I went to meet Célia and see her apartment. She was 21 and in her last year of school. She was super nice and the apartment was decked out with a dishwasher, washing machine, flat screen and I would get a queen sized bed. It was ideally located on a busstop with a line that goes directly to my school and another that goes directly to the train station to Paris. Parfait, right? BUT, I said I was willing to rent until the beginning of June because I'd probably be leaving mid-May. They're looking for someone who will take it for the whole year. Because it’s in a university town, if I left in June she would almost certainly not be able to find a subletter and her mom would  have to pay the extra rent in the summer. She said she'd have to talk it over with her mom and take a look at all of the other offers she's got (she got 5 calls in 24 hours so I am NOT alone in the housing search). We left that saying it seemed like a good fit, but the dates are off so we’d be in touch if the studio didn’t work out and if she couldn’t find anyone for the year. 

            On the way home from that, Mme Noble called and asked if I could come take a look at the studio at 9am Saturday morning instead. I was ready for my day to be over so I said that was fine. It was rainy and cold so I went home and put on sweatpants and Clare and her boo and I made some dinner and drank some wine.

            
            I got up earlyish on Saturday morning and met Mme Noble outside the studio in Montparnasse. I did a tour and decided that, despite being a little out of my price range, the place was too awesome to pass up. I’ll have to pick up a second job, but I’m only working 12 hours a week at the school so I probably should have picked up another job anyways. So, I have a place to live!!! And it’s cool too!

            Before going in, she prepared me to think the studio was super small, but it’s actually a pretty nice size and it includes a toilet and shower and a little kitchenette. Since she normally rents to students studying abroad, the studio is set up with everything I need: wifi, sheets, towels, plates and silverware, frying pans etc. It was really clean, but she left lots of traces of past students. Postcards and keychains and things. It’s clear this place has quite the history. I inherited a futon for guests, oodles of tea and spices and a half full bottle of cognac.

            The location is really cool, too.  I don’t have to walk more than two blocks in any direction to get to: two major metro lines, a grocery store, a post office, a bank. Not to mention all the cafés and things. I'm in the 14th arrondissement, in the Montparnasse neighborhood and there's all this cool history attached to this area. There’s been numerous famous artists that lived on my block. Man Ray used to have his studio up the block from me in this crazy building that is occupied by some rich guy now. In À bout de souffle, the dramatic final scene with the extra long shot of Michel running down the street with a gunshot wound was filmed on my block. He dies at the end of my street by one of the very conveniently located metro stops. So unreal. I’m excited to explore and read up on it all.

           It has a lot of history, but there is still a lot going on here. There are a number of active artist's studios on the block still. I'm surrounded by cafés and cinemas. There are markets up the block from me a couple days a week. I wandered through one today and it was like a huge yard sale. Everyone had blankets and tables and had laid out all of these old books and vintage jackets and airsoft guns and ceramic buddhas. There were shit tons of people. There were a lot of people. There are pretty much always a lot of people everywhere. I’m starting to realize how many people there are in Paris. I’m glad I got myself a little hidey-hole because it can be pretty overwhelming.

           As soon as I sealed the deal with Mme Nobel, I ran over to the bank and set up an account and then moved all of my stuff in. Moving on public transport is a pain in the arse, but it went about as well as it could. The worst part was probably dragging my bag up 5 flights of narrow winding stairs. My muscles still feel a little weird.

           I got done moving at like 10pm on Saturday night and then went to meet Clare and co. Yesterday was Nuit Blanche, which is a big all night festival in Paris where they have events all over town until 7am. We popped around to a couple different exhibits and ate some street meat from a vendor out on the sidewalk who had the biggest wok I’ve ever seen. I saw the Eiffel Tower light up for the first time since I moved here. It was actually more exciting for me this time than the last couple times I was here as a tourist. I wonder if that’s because I didn’t expect anything from it this time. It caught me by surprise. 
           There was a Native American performance happening and I realized how exotic that must be to people here. We got some pints of 1664 at the Palais Tokyo. There weren’t any exhibits in it at the moment, but it seems like a really cool space. I hope to hit it up again sometime in the next year. Anyways, we made it until about 2:00am before we were all exhausted and started riding the metro back. I was so tired from such an emotionally exhausting day that I was kind of nodding off while I was on the train. I was genuinely worried about staying awake long enough to get off at my stop. I managed to make it home though and I slept like a rock until late this morning.

           So, things are kind of coming together. The housing is a huge weight off my back, but I have a number of other hoops to jump through before I can really breathe.  Right now, I’m stuck in another Catch-22. In order to get housing you’re expected to pay the first month’s rent plus “caution” (or security deposit), but my American bank account won’t let me take out that much money, they’ve put a bloque on my account. So I need a French bank account, but I had to get the housing before I could set up the bank account. Basically, it’s like no housing without the money and no money without the housing. Great. 
           Mme Noble was really nice and helped me fill out the stuff for the bank and let me just pay her the first month's rent until I’m able to transfer funds. It looks like transferring is going to be a serious pain and I can’t wait until that’s all taken care of. I’m really short on funds for the time being.

It was so nice, Mme Noble came by and gave me some food today to help me get by until things get sorted out. It was really sweet of her.

           Things are definitely looking up, but I’m excited to be done with all of the establishment stuff. Then I gotta go find some French friends.

à bientôt!