Au Revoir, Paris

And so closes a too-short chapter of ma vie. I can't help but wonder where I'll go from here. Will I ever flâne through your streets again, rainy Paris?

I cannot even begin to describe the emotions I'm experiencing right now. It's a little bit like leaving behind a friend, or a lover, for an indeterminate amount of time, but it's more than that, even. I'm leaving behind a part of myself - because I discovered so much about myself here, and I have discovered that so much of me is here.

It's very similar to the way I felt when we moved from the only house I'd lived in for 18 years. Except in that house I spilled oil on the rug, I drew a self-portrait on the wall, I chipped off part of the countertop when I busted my lip on it. Here, I don't feel like I've been able to leave my mark, so the departure is more like ending a relationship to which I'm just beginning to devote myself.

I cannot imagine who I would be, what I'd be doing, where I'd be going today if I had not studied in Paris. Being here, away from every jugement, every sticky-situation, and every important life-changing decision, is like being stuck in time - time allotted specifically for me and my self-discovery.

I feel so incredibly lucky to have had this experience, and I know it will affect the way I live the rest of my life. I love Paris.

Yes, this is real. and creepy. and so very French.

Latest ad:
Orangina on a soda machine. I didn't really take note of it until a few days ago, when a friend pointed out how ridiculous it was. Just goes to show how little is shocking here. Click on the image to get the full, close-up effect.

Ô, comme j'adore le français

Paris, je rentrerai bientôt...mais à ce moment, j'ai besoin de soleil, j'ai besoin d'amour, j'ai besoin de ma ville, alors même qu'elle est ennuyante, c'est toujours chez moi, et j'en ai besoin.

On dit qu'on ne parle pas couramment avant qu'on commence à rêver dans la deuxième langue, mais moi, je ne rêve jamais de rien; mais l'autre nuit j'ai rêvé; j'ai rêvé en trois langues, et je n'en ai aucune connu.

Paris, tu me fatigues, mais je suis dévouée, je suis attachée à toi. Pourquoi est-ce que tu ne m'aimes pas? Ou ai-je tort? Tu ne me montres jamais ton soleil, et ma peau change à l'orangé, tes nuages pleuvent comme je pleure quand je pense au départ.

"The Waltz" Auguste Rodin

J'avais des liaisons, des aventures, avec tes écrivains: tes rues que je connaîs si bien. Et mes amants me manqueraient si je les avais quitté, mais ils voyagent mieux que toi, Paris, ils ne me laisseront jamais.

Paris, je comprends pourquoi tes écrivains sont si solennels - c'est la pluie qui crée cet effet, c'est ta pluie qui crée tes grands écrivains.

This is where it's at, my friends, this is where it's at.

Continuing on my "french ad" theme...here's a new one I found in the metro. This is one of my personal favorite types of cheese, and the ad alone makes me salivate every time I walk by it.

School Spirit

Umm, yes please.

Response to "5 types of Facebook Trolls"

5 Types of Facebook Trolls, and what to do with them

Troll type: Old-time Nobody Confirm or Ignore? Confirm

Agreed. It's actually kind of fun, in my opinion, to look up people you haven't seen since before they hit puberty, just to see what they look like now, if for no other reason.

Troll type: New service addict Confirm or Ignore? Ignore

I can't honestly say I've ever had this problem, though I agree with the verdict. Can't have too many pointless web-related emails spamming my inbox - I draw the line at requests to join vampire fb games.

Troll type: Bar friend Confirm or Ignore? Confirm

Hmmm...this is a hard one. Confirm, but added to a list that doesn't include my address or AIM. Besides, you could even argue that fb profiles are created for these types of people - those you hardly know, but that you would like to think of you as "sexy." This is why photos are carefully tagged/untagged in a selective form of self-promotion aimed towards those people who don't know "what you're really like."

Troll type: The stranger Confirm or Ignore? Think first

I've only gotten these types of requests a handful of times, and usually I send a very polite message apologizing for forgetting where we met. If they respond with a reminder, I confirm, if not, I ignore.

Troll type: The ghost Confirm or Ignore? Remove

I have to admit, when I first read this label, I thought it meant those people who you are fb friends with and have since passed away. The kind of ghost the author refers to, though, is someone completely different, and I agree with the verdict. However, I think we should consider what to do about my version of "the ghost." It's very strange to see them pop up on your friends list or especially "birthday reminder" sidebar, but I particularly find it interesting that their walls and pages become an homage to their lives. I think for that reason, these "ghosts" should be a "keep."

Any thoughts?

we apologize for that brief interruption...

we will now return to your regularly scheduled broadcast.

l'homme nerveux

You can always tell who are the tourists on the metro: those grey-suited businessmen nervously clutching their fanny packs, glancing suspiciously at the other occupants of the car. They never can anticipate the jerks of the train, and they make uncomfortable faces when they inevitably tumble onto the people they previously expected to pick-pocket them, and they check their fancy American watches every minute or so to make sure they're not running behind - to make sure the metro isn't running behind.

But then, that's how we all started out, I suppose. I remember holding tight to my zippered backpack, glaring at anyone who got too close. I suppose the man could have been starting a new job, a new life, in Paris, and was in the first stages of the adjustment period.

And then he got off at Trocadéro. Clearly a tourist.

love the french

French ads never cease to amuse me...this one is just pretty:

Looking for a new game?

latest chuckle-worthy french ad:

This is how much I love my school...

Okay, as boring as the following "poll" and subsequent text sounds, read it, and let me know how you feel after you find the blatant back-woods uneducated mistake made by this university supposedly "on the same level as the ivys."

Halloween/Thanksgiving in Paris

-------B
>{()}/"> <----Thanksgiving Turkey
--/ \

Hopefully that turkey turned out okay. I suppose it doesn't really look like a turkey, but, you know...HAPPY THANKSGIVING...en retard. Since (obviously) Thanksgiving is not celebrated over here, there is no word for it in French, so instead my host family just pronounces "Thanksgiving" with a french accent, "tangzgeeveeng" which, in my opinion, is raucously hilarious, and I had to struggle to control my water-up-the-nose laughing reflex at dinner when they said that. Because I don't want them thinking I'm any weirder than they already think I am.

That having been said, our school (being all-American) hosted a "tangzgeeveeng" dinner in a crypt (no joke) at a local church. I almost informed them that they were mixing their traditional American holidays, but I figured it would at the very least be interesting to see how a French Thanksgiving/Halloween goes down.

But as it turns out, the "crypt" was really just a large, echoey basement filled with bats and cobwebs (well, not really, but it was echoey and large), and we got to have a "traditional thanksgiving meal" which consisted of a French take on the most well-known American dishes - turkey, dressing, cranberry jelly, carrot soufflé (though I must admit, I like the soufflé dhall makes better), and, of course, pumpkin pie. To top it all off, a couple of guys I know dressed up as an Indian and a Pilgrim, sporting a fake bow and arrow & a fake gun respectively. I'm sure they got a lot of looks on the Métro. ...I'm surprised they didn't get arrested on the Métro (especially considering a few weeks ago a friend of mine who is black was sleeping on the metro on the way home, and the next thing he knew, a crazy lady had accused him of trying to steal her purse, and he was arrested and brought to the police station. true story).

Anywayyyyy....the rest of Thanksgiving evening passed uneventfully, my friend Maria and I tried to find a hookah bar (unsuccessfully) and instead ended up in a train station after 11, trying to find a phone book to look up hookah bars. But we lacked several key elements: 1) an open news kiosk 2) knowledge of the area 3) how to say "hookah" in French. All of which posed a problem. So we ended up dusting off a Paris travel guide we found in the only open bookstore in the Gare Montparnasse & just looked up bars that sounded like they might have hookah (how racist are we? - judging a bar's likelihood to have hookah by the name - pfft). A scolding from a cranky bookstore lady and a ride on the metro stop later, and we arrived at the Café de la Mosqué.

Unfortunately, the only thing we found there was aladin-boot fabric, 5 middle aged/eastern men squeezed around a table for two, and the best mint tea you can buy for 2 euro. But no hookah.

The next day, Maria and I played tourist and climbed the Arc de Triomphe, and then walked down the Champs Elysées, where I bought the best waffle of my life, covered in Nutella and whipped cream - definitely worth the stomach ache, even though it took me a while to figure out exactly how to eat the mountains of whipped cream without getting it all over myself. Afterwards, we went to a playhouse near the Grand Palais and saw an absurdist play called "Les Diablogues" - which was full of hilarosity (which apparently is a word, as it is not being underlined by Mac auto spell-check...oh, wait....there it goes...drat).

So that night we actually DID find a hookah bar (looked one up online, fancy that). It was in the center of the city, too, so you'd expect it not to be sketch, right? Wrong.. There was a creepy bouncer-type guy standing at the door who moved out of our way as we passed, and a glassed off room for the "smokers". The bouncer man met us at the register & ushered us down a creeky, narrow, winding staircase to a hallway that had a big rubbermaid tub filled with water underneath a leak in the ceiling. After offering to turn on the tv, he took our order and left.

Later, some friends met up with us (took a while, though, since the place seemed like such a hole-in-the-wall) and we played that game where you write down the name of a celebrity or somebody everyone knows and then pass it to your neighbor and then you go around doing a "guess who" type round of questions until everyone guesses who's on their card. Yeah, it was muchos fun. Particularly since I'd never played before.

Anyway, that's how my Thanksgiving weekend went down - not particularly eventful, but fun nonetheless.

I am so sick of parisiens

The good thing about failure is that it makes me work hard enough to prove them wrong.