sort of the last day

For the last time, I sit in my apartment and look out the window at the Eiffel Tower doing its Christmas-tree impression. The perishable food is thrown out (I visibly cringed when the Camembert went in the garbage). My clothes are rolled and in the suitcase. My shot glasses—one from each country I visited—are nestled securely in the pockets of my thickest coat.

I’m not done, though. I have more blogs to write.

There’s the one about museums and the people who frequent them: the lingerer, the checklist aficionada, the person who needs to use the toilette (say it in French; it sounds prettier), and the photographer despite the huge sign with the red X over a camera. And I still haven’t decided if shaving one’s legs once in three months is a character flaw or an adaptation to another culture (I can’t even write that with a straight face). What about my on-again-off-again affair with the Metro? Stairs? Cheese? Loire Valley? Visitors? I’ll stop now.

The point is that just because I’m going back to California doesn’t mean I’m done with Paris. My plan—and I wouldn’t be me without a plan—is to write one blog a week until I run out of things to say or my fall semester begins, whichever comes first. This experience has been too big for it to end, at least for now.

So I will cheerfully indulge myself for a bit longer, and if I knew a cool, pithy French phrase, I would insert it here. Yet another topic to blog about.

After ten minutes and mucho stairs, voila (going to miss that).

soccer, scotland and sisters

My apartment is cold again. 

I’m sitting in front of my computer dressed in my trusty REI socks, sweats and worn-in UCSB sweatshirt, stuff I didn’t wear at all when my sisters visited me over a week ago. During their visit, we even frequently opened the windows to let in the cool air. I could attribute my now cold apartment to cooler weather, but the change is only by several degrees. Some would say that, of course, three extra bodies in a smallish living area will produce more heat. It’s not the heat so much that I miss but the warmth. I like to think that I’m living a temperature metaphor with these changes signaling one thing: I desperately miss my sisters. 

It wasn’t just a regular visit with them this time. For me, it was special. We haven’t travelled just the four of us in over ten years, and it took some major schedule shifting for this to happen. We are so busy, everyone going off in a multitude of directions and at different times in their lives, so just my sisters getting here was a challenge. Understandable anxiety on both sides of the Atlantic and Pacific ensued—as most of you know I have two sisters living in Hawaii and one in California—but once they were here, it was lovely. 

It began with me crying at the airport. Enough said. They came in late on a Friday evening, and I had waiting at home my version of the expected French dinner: baguettes, croissants and quiche from my favorite boulangerie, great cheese, salad and wine. The funny thing is that my sisters hardly drink at all, but we began the trip right with a toast, and things just got better after that.
  

We went to see Paris St-Germain, the city’s professional soccer team, play. In true Susan fashion, I led my sisters to the wrong metro stop. After bothering three decent Parisians for directions (I will be forever grateful for the Marriot employee who finally gave us a great map) and walking for over an hour (I will be forever grateful for my sisters who didn’t get mad at me for screwing up), we finally saw the Parc des Princes stadium. Funny thing was that we didn’t see any people. The stadium holds up to 50,000 fans, so something was wrong unless the Parisians are so well-mannered that they don’t make much noise even at a football match. The mystery was solved when we found out that the game had been re-scheduled for the NEXT night. Being with anyone else would have resulted in a disastrous evening, but with my sisters, we just laughed, really hard. We then found the nearest café—the first but not last time we went to one—and had a great time. 

The soccer game that we went to the following evening was even better for the wait. While we were getting ready, my sister, Lori, found the PSG team song online, and we sang along with the 45,000 other dedicated fans at the appropriate time. Waving PSG flags, booing bad calls, getting patted down (tight, tight security), imitating some of the cheers (our cheerleading abilities came in handy) and commenting on the many heavily-armored robocops circling the stadium all added up to a memorable night (we tied 1-1). 

Picture the whole stadium waving flags.

That same day, I took my sisters to my favorite place in Paris: Jardin du Luxembourg. It was at the end of a Notre Dame, Left Bank, souvenir-buying excursion, and I kept urging (okay, they said being pushy) to just keep doing one more thing. Eating something kept getting pushed back, so when we finally got to the gardens, there was an ice cream stand in front of the entrance. “We can get something to eat here,” I said brightly. You have to remember that for the last eight weeks I’ve been Rebecca-conditioned, my colleague who once told me, “Are you hungry? If we wait a while, it will pass.” What happened next were jokes about how now we can go for many more hours, pictures taken pointing to the bag of “sustenance” (peanuts), and references to how Paris has influenced Susan (the word starvation kept creeping in here). I still smile when I think of this. 

Is this Paris or what? Jardin du Luxembourg on a sunnay day.

I can’t leave this blog without mentioning Scotland. My sister, Erin, said the people rivaled Hawaii for niceness, and that’s saying a lot. From the time we picked up the car to when we boarded the train back to Paris, it was lovely. We couldn’t have done anything without Lori’s great driving ability on the left side and my sister Terry’s fantastic navigating skills (I still don’t know how she got us un-lost as we hurried to return the car). The Highlands were Braveheart-worthy, and even if we did tourist stuff—Loch Ness, Urquhart and Edinburgh Castles—it was still outdoors, still fresh and beautiful. True to our dog-loving family tradition, we got way too excited over the Highland cows, who looked like really big shaggy dogs with horns. Throw in fantastic hotels (remind me to tell you about the room with four beds), great food and my consistently bad Scottish-accent imitation, and you can see why we all would love to go back (although my sisters would insist I practice my accent more, which usually sounded like a weird combination of Indian, German and Filipino).

Urquhart Castle with Loch Ness in the background sans monster.

Going to the top of la Tour Eiffel, lighting candles for our mom and dad, so many other memories. À bientôt my sisters. It’s never soon enough for me.

minor triumphs

I’m more than halfway through my Paris experience. Yikes. It is the traditional time for reflection—I grew up with only sisters, so really anytime is a good time for reflection, a.k.a. analyzing the heck out of anything—and what I’ve come up with is chili. Homemade chili. Feeling pretty cocky about this one because it’s a minor triumph. 

Remember when I had trouble getting my stove to operate? (Read all about it in the “pictures and appliances” blog). Well, other than having to scramble my eggs in a pot because my frying pan doesn’t work (don’t ask), I’m able to use my stove and the three pots of varying sizes that come with the apartment. For those who really know me, I’m not a good cook, but I do have my repertoire of peasant food like my mom’s super easy recipe for chili. Hamburger meat (silent cheer to all you carnivores out there), stewed tomatoes, kidney beans, and voila. Of course, here the challenge is getting the ingredients without knowing French. The first time I made chili, I congratulated myself on getting all the ingredients from my local Monoprix, only to discover that what I thought were kidney beans (looked like them in the picture) turned out to be some sort of seasoned legume one-third the size of what I wanted. I, of course, made and ate the darn thing anyway. Interesting but definitely not Mom’s chili. 

Segue to my most recent shopping trip when, through brilliant deductive reasoning and knowing about seven more words of French than the last chili-ingredient hunt, I bought two cans sans picture of what I believed to be the elusive kidney bean. When the time came to open the cans, I ever so slowly peeled back the tops and there, in glistening glory, were regular red kidney beans, real ones.  It is truly ridiculous how cool, dare I say accomplished, this made me feel. 

But for every triumph, a fall must come. Riding the wave of mastering French language—or at least being able to navigate the bean aisle at the supermarket—I went to a chocolate shop in Chartre, a charming town that features a magnificent cathedral.  My standard, “Parlez-vous anglais,” was met with a polite, “Non madame.” No problem. The language of chocolate is universal, and I had shown brilliant fortitude in the chili incident, so I launched into a really horrible mix of French and English (okay, mostly English spoken slowly) to communicate. Luckily, the proprietor was a lovely woman, and we figured out everything. In gratitude, I wanted to say something nice about the chocolate and her delightful shop, but all I could get out was, “Je t’aime chocolat.” She smiled, thanked me again, and I left in a glow of I’m so getting the hang of this. A few minutes later, though, as I was walking through Chartre’s narrow streets, I realized exactly what I had said. Not “I love chocolate,” as I had intended, but “I love you, chocolate.” I laugh and cringe all at the same time whenever I think about it, but bless this wonderful French person for understanding the intent behind the silly blunder. 

I have five and a half more weeks of adventures. Can’t wait.

A silly American in Paris

omaha

As far as I can see. White crosses. Not just white crosses, though. White grave markers. Mostly crosses, but also the occasional Star of David. Most markers had names, but also the occasional “HERE RESTS IN HONRED GLORY A COMRADE IN ARMS KNOWN BUT TO GOD.”   

Omaha Beach is the stuff of movies and history classes. When people say, “I’m going to visit Normandy,” the immediate response is, “Are you going to Omaha, Utah, or both?” As we drive up to the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial, Mirek, our oh-so-qualified tour guide, announces that we are now on American soil, that we have just entered the United States. This pronouncement is as unexpected as the quietly spontaneous cheering from all of us on the bus.    

Of course, everyone wants to hit the beach first. The path leading down to the sand is that deceptively easy walk that makes you wince inside thinking of getting back up the hill. The students get to the beach ahead of me, and many continue walking toward the water for the novelty of touching the Atlantic. Funny thing, though, soon the twos and threes have given way to individuals wandering around the beach. Friends who have been attached since February are now yards apart, looking at the sand, staring out at the horizon. The water doesn’t hold a fascination for me, Pacific Ocean snob that I am, but I walk toward it until the sand’s texture changes under my feet. 

And then I turn around.  

There. That’s what gets me. The cliffs. Those damn cliffs. I haven’t seen Saving Private Ryan, having been warned about the intensity of the opening sequence, but it doesn’t take a movie to imagine those cliffs stuffed with guns. I take several pictures, trying to capture what a soldier might have first seen, but hastily give up.  

Walking up the steep pathway, I focus on not stopping rather than what happened on the beach. The emotional part is over anyway. Now it’s on to the Memorial and Visitor Center, aesthetics I’ve seen a bunch of times before. I reach the top of the bluff and with a last, quick look at the beach turn firmly away to get my bearings. Signs give me a choice of whether to begin at the Visitor Center or the Memorial complete with a 22-foot statue, reflecting pool, and The Garden of the Missing. I decide to be ornery and choose neither. Instead, I wander in the opposite direction, lured by well-kept grounds and the promise of open space. Didn’t Mirek say there was a chapel somewhere around here? Manicured trees block my view, so I’m not exactly sure where I am, but a few more steps will bring me to an opening, and I should be able to see the chapel. 

Crosses. Grave markers really. As far as I can see.

Total: 9,387

bruxelles

I have three pieces of chocolate from Brussels left in the box I brought for myself (it was a small box…sort of). Since I vowed that these fantastic, luscious, chocolate-coma-inducing delights will not be eaten until I post a blog about Brussels, I better get to it.

And we thought we would have time for a side trip to Bruges. In The Traveling Professor’s Guide to Paris, Professor Stephen C. Solosky characterizes Brussels as “one of my favorite day trips” that is an easy 1 ½ hour train ride out of Paris. It was an easy train ride, but I’m not sure I could or would want to do Brussels in a day.

Solosky also says Brussels is “funky” and “gothic.” The professor was probably talking about the architecture, but Brussels funkiness extends to almost everything in the city, people included. The first night there we had to have the Belgian special: beer, moules (mussels), and frites (twice-fried fries, absolute heaven). Our waiter, who flirted a bit with Rebecca and me but then really turned it on for the single, beautiful young woman eating alone at the next table, practically ordered for us. “Beer, salad, mussels, and frites,” was what was said, but who said what first is still fuzzy. The mussels, frites, and beer were fantastic as expected, but it was the salad that I especially remember. There was lettuce there somewhere, but it was covered with shrimp, chicken, sliced beef, and I think ham but am still not totally sure. After all that protein, yet another beer, chocolate cake (we were in Brussels after all), and flirty waiter who helped me on with my coat while upping the charm with beautiful young woman, we could only laugh at the whole experience as we sauntered back to the hotel.

So, so good

Even the museums have a certain funkiness that is wonderfully charming. At the Royal Museums of Fine Arts, the René Magritte exhibit is funkiness personified, the young woman at the museum who dissed Magritte was quite hip, and the Musical Instrument Museum, where each visitor is supplied with earphones to plug in and listen to the instruments, was the coolest ever. Mix in Mannekin Pis, the statue of a young boy doing exactly what you think he’s doing, a huge clock complete with bells and figures that does not chime at all, as well as chocolate shops everywhere, and bottom line is that this is my kind of city.

I can’t even begin to describe the waffle topped with chocolate.

Doesn't it look like it should do something?

If you look closely....

barcelona

I tried to think of a catchy title for this blog about my weekend in Barcelona. Nothing worked. Alliteration, some Spanish words (thank you Google translation), even rhyming were tossed aside. Titles aren’t usually hard for me, so what’s going on here? To tell you the truth, I’ve also been putting off writing this particular piece, which is also new since I was getting a kick out of writing again, because, well, I don’t really know why.  

Maybe it’s the contrast to Paris. Barcelona was warm, warm enough that I didn’t have to wear socks to bed for the first time in three weeks (and growing up in Hawaii, that’s something to celebrate). Maybe it’s the food that while not Mexican (my students and I keep having Mexican food moments of silence in Paris) was familiar, and the gelato shop I went to twice in three days didn’t hurt. Maybe it was the slower pace and not having to take the metro, or the men that reminded me of my handsome uncles, or the harbor’s ocean smell, or the winding, narrow streets that led to a plethora of surprises. I don’t know. Too much to process? Maybe, but I do know that, for me, I’ll be back. 

The Barcelona harbor

Mucho great things occurred, but one of the highlights was a visit to the Basílica de la Sagrada Família, designed by Antoni Gaudí. This is one of the most beautiful and awe-inspiring structures I have ever seen. Yes, it’s a church, but unlike any place of worship in my experience. The inside was organic (I stole that word from Rebecca, a Gaudí fan), and the columns were designed to be reminiscent of a forest. There’s room for 1000 singers at the top of the basilica (that’s not a typo folks, one thousand), and the stain glass is not only beautiful in its own right, but the interplay with light throughout the day is impossible to describe. Soaring towers punctuate the outside structure, and Rebecca and I thought it would be fun to take the elevator up the 65 meters to the top. Alas, no one mentioned that it was elevator up, narrow spiral staircase with a hole in the middle that left nothing to the imagination down. After about three flights of tentative walking, the church bell clanged—loudly—and I froze, clinging to the wall, like a cockroach caught in the light (I know, another Hawaiian reference, but oh so apt). Only the crowds on the ground floor kept me from kissing the ground, but even this only added to the majesty of la Sagrada Família.

The pitcher of sangria sans paella with the servers packing up around us was another highlight, but that’s a story for another time.

Inside of Basílica de la Sagrada Família

Natural light show

beauty and dead people

I saw a lot of dead people this weekend. Of course, not exactly dead people, but a lot of graves (so technically they are dead). Montparnasse Cemetery and the Pantheon are the final resting places (why am I smiling as I write that phrase?) of such literary greats as Samuel Beckett, Susan Sontag, Simone de Beauvoir, Victor Hugo, Voltaire, as well as various artists and photographers that my colleague, Rebecca, swooned over as I did with these famed authors. 

In Montparnasse, it was like a treasure hunt looking for the graves. Luckily, Rebecca can read a map, and I’m pretty good at being anal and stubborn when faced with a challenge, so we found everyone we set out to discover. For someone who really doesn’t have a history of visiting gravesites—and for you cynics who are right now thinking, “Who does?” there are lots of movies and TV shows that have people doing this—I was ridiculously awed when coming upon Beckett’s site. Why?  It was pretty unassuming. There were other nicer graves, works of art really, but it was an interesting moment for me. I don’t know if it was the contrast of a priest singing among a small group of women at one gravesite, the silence of the cemetery, the coldness of the day, or the kisses on Beauvoir and Sartre’s headstone (they are buried together), but I did have a moment of beauty and thankfulness for, well, life really. Thank you, Rebecca, for taking me there.

Can you make out "Beckett"?



Works of art really.

The kisses got to me.

I also have to thank Rebecca for something I’ve never quite experienced: walking around with someone who always has her “head camera” turned on. My colleague is a professor of photography, and I can’t tell you how many times this past weekend (we walked a ton and also visited Notre Dame and Jardin du Luxembourg) she would stop in mid-sentence, strike her shooting stance, and click a number of pictures. Always cool images. Always something I hadn’t noticed before. I couldn’t help but pick up a few tips. I now know how to turn my camera flash off, and even once (pause for dramatic effect) took the same picture with the flash on AND off to see what the different effects would be. I’m such a word person that the visual stuff doesn’t get much of a workout in my head, but it’s impossible not to be more open to images around Rebecca (thanks again my friend).  

So even if my pictures are still terrible, at least I feel more artistic taking them, especially if I’m wearing my beret.

How cool is she.

Yup, Notre Dame in the background (couldn't resist posting this).



pictures and appliances

My daughters have been asking for pictures, but who are we kidding? I’m the worst photographer ever. Too much head space, a picture where a forehead is cut in half, blurry images, too much flash, can’t even make out the subject, you name it, I’ve taken it. So up until now I do what I do best: avoid the unpleasantness of failure. However, I can’t not take pictures while in Europe, so below are two of my neighborhood. Please note that I was trying to capture the snowfall on Sunday, but you have to do a Where’s Waldo to see it. All I can promise is that I’ll try.

How can I not take a picture of this?

Street down the hill from my apartment, Rue des Abbesses.

I’ve also included here a picture of my kitchen. Small but oh so logically organized in a way that I consider to be very French. My latest snafu involved the stovetop. I’ve been slowly trying out my appliances and decided to boil water for tea. My burners are those flat ones that are really easy to clean. Chic, naturellement, and easy to use; just push the button. I ended up pushing the button until a callus began forming on my finger. The burner would go on, and then after a few moments, the burner would go off. I’d press again with the same result. And again. And again. (What is the definition of insanity?) Finally, accidentally, I put the pot on the burner and then pressed the button. It worked. Of course. 

You don’t even want to know about the trouble I had with the toaster.

My kitchen.

cop shows

While I’m not exactly lonely, I am alone a lot of the time, so I do what I do at home: watch TV. Of course, the difference is that everything is in French—no English-speaking channels for moi—and my hope of being able to watch the Super Bowl has been dashed. C’est la vie (that’s the last pseudo-French phrase I’ll do in this blog, I promise).

Mostly the TV is on for friendly noise, but last night after a wonderful dinner at my colleague Rebecca’s fabulous apartment, sans view of la Tour Eiffel (okay, I lied about using French phrases), I couldn’t sleep, so I actually sat on my couch and watched some TV. Lots of cop shows. It could be the channels that I get, but I noticed the police dramas even the night before. My favorite so far is Alerte Cobra, which originated in Germany (I watched two episodes of this back-to-back). The main characters are a shortish, slim, grizzled, keep-his-wits-about-him older officer and the Ashton-Kutcher look alike whose height only adds to the contrast. The only thing I understood was Ashton continually yelling, “Quoi?” and the occasional ici or mais non, but I got the gist of the story. It is super interesting comparing Alerte Cobra with American buddy cop shows, but last night on my way home, my experience gave me a probably-not-accurate reason for the seeming prevalence of police dramas.

Pickpockets and scam artists galore. On the metro ride back to my apartment (and it was a major victory that I did not get lost once on the metro yesterday), I was approached three times for money. It could have been the suitcase I was dragging behind me or the fact that despite my boots, scarf, and gloves, I’m guessing I scream “American,” but three times in thirty minutes seems excessive even for a big city. The most memorable scam artist was the supposed English woman who began the conversation with, “Do you speak English?” and proceeded to explain to me—in halting English—that she, too, was from America and needed just a bit to get by.

I’m a nice person, or so I’ve been told. But all three times, requests were met with a steely glare (my inspiration came from my coaching days). Add to that the two times earlier in the day when I was approached—once was by four teenage girls who wanted me to sign something; a loud “No” and hand gesture (not the one you are thinking) had them doing a Red Sea impression—and I was a regular meanie. Maybe that explains the cop shows on French TV; at least for me they serve as a toughen-up primer.

I just turned on the TV…Law and Order in French.
http://www.alertecobra.info/

the first day

I'm sitting in my apartment, looking at a lit-up Eiffel Tower (the view through my living room window), and listening to Miss Congeniality in French. The end of my first day.

I was right. Hunger and a premonition that I should make a trial run to find the metro (meeting at 10:00 a.m. tomorrow) drove me from my apartment. My first adventure was getting out of the darn building. Ten minutes to figure out how to open and lock my front door, another five minutes to discover that I had to push a button to get out of the glass door in the lobby, only to be stumped by the door to the street for another five minutes (it probably took longer, but this is getting embarrassing).

Once on the street, I took a wrong turn and ended up climbing a bunch of stairs to find myself at the foot of Sacre Coeur. I still have a bunch of even more stairs to go to actually enter the basilica, but that's for another day. Retracing my steps, not unlike the u-turns I normally do whenever I have to drive somewhere new, I went in another direction, all the while keeping a lookout for a grocery story where I could pick up something to eat with no talking (throw things in the basket and blindly hand over money). Of course, not a grocery store in sight, but there was a boulangerie that I passed twice before making yet another u-turn and going in (it was the quiche in the display case that changed my mind). Not only did I get a slice of quiche lorraine and piece of gateau au chocolat, but I encountered my first irritated Parisian. Young girl, and I kind of don't blame her for being peeved. She asked me something in French, duh, simply trying to verify my quiche order. I finally figured it out and replied exactly like this, "Ja, yes, si, I mean oui." I'd be irritated too.

It's midnight and the Eiffel Tower just went all sparkly like a Christmas tree on steroids. I'm definitely in Paris.