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New words I've learned
since arriving
tromper
interrompre
remporter
le choc
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April 21, 2002, 0900 hrs
Election Day. After a couple of months of campaigning (how refreshing!) the French go to the polls today to cast their first ballots. All signs suggest that there is great apathy at the moment and that perhaps as many as 30% will not cast their vote today - the worst previous percentage was 20% (which I believe was the last election). But Jospin and Chirac appear to be much the same (hard to tell between right and left) and both the far right (Le Pen) and the Communists have gained significantly in this election campaign. I read yesterday that there are 16 secondary party candidates. Lots and lots of choice! Friday was interesting. I am now making a point of seeing French tourist sites - I know, you're asking yourself, "What is he talking about?". Well, I've been so taken up with "la culpability Judeo-Chretien" that I've felt bad enjoying myself seeing monumental Paris while I still have to find a job. But on the advice and counsel of me mum, I'm casting that guilt to the winds and trying to enjoy as much of Paris as I can while I'm here. So Friday I went and climbed to the top of the Arc de Triomphe and took these pictures: )
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There is a museum in the top, and I spent some time reading the captions and checking out the old photos. One original design for the Arc had it looking like a giant elevator, with an internal elevator to the top. Actually, I don't know that it doesn't have an elevator now, but I took an awful lot of steps to the top. My aerobic fitness still seems pretty good as I wasn't breathing hard when I got to the top, in spite of the back pack and what must have been a couple of hundred stairs. Awkward height too.. made for the days when people were Napoléon-sized I think. Our descendants will probably average over 7ft tall and think of us as mighty midgets. As I descended, I got voicemail from my new friend, Angus. He is a researcher at Sony and he sat next to me on the 777 over from Kennedy. So after our films were over (personal TVs in the back of each seat, very cool) we talked a bit about Paris. We had lunch Friday afternoon in the Contrescarpe neighborhood (where he works for Sony!) and talked for probably too long. After I attended class, I headed over to St.Germain de Pres (nice area, though a bit expensive) and bought a Cuban at La Casa del Habano. I sat in the outside terasse and wrote some notes while smoking my cigar. The scarcity principle is never more evident than when one travels - Cubans here go for quite modest prices (4-10E on average) as opposed to what they command in the States or Canada. The selection isn't terribly large in any of the stores I've visited, but all are well-kept in nice large humidors. The chap at La Casa actually tested each one of half a dozen cigars before approving one for my consumption - nice! I went and saw "Nous étions soldats" afterwards. It's the new Mel Gibson film (yeah, I know Dad, he hates the British!) but it was still very good. Very anti-war for a war film about Vietnam. One actually got to see a little bit of the Vietnamese side of the conflict, which in itself is quite rare. Disturbing, very violent, probably the best pure war film I've seen outside of Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" - though as someone pointed out to me the other day, for cinema verité it's hard to beat Spielberg's first ten minutes of "Saving Private Ryan". I hate French public bathrooms. There, I've said it. They really, really suck. Not a single one of the automated bathrooms that dot the streets (very occasionally now) that I liked on my last trip appear to be functioning these days. I've checked five or six and all are "hors service". The French public bathroom is generally a disgrace. And I'm not talking about what one might find on the street, but rather in the "mall". The Forum des Halles is one of the largest multi-level malls that I've ever seen. It goes down four levels underground and sprawls quite a bit laterally (it includes something like twenty movie screens and a full-size Olympic pool in different parts of the complex) and I found ONE public bathroom in twenty minutes of looking. No signs anywhere. It's like they don't WANT YOU to use the bathrooms. I used to think it was terrible that people would piss in the streets - now I understand why. There is nowhere else! Obviously, I make much of it. But I've had to plan my afternoon around where to find a bathroom and that can reach the level of absurdity quite quickly. Luckily, most establishments have some accomodation - it's just that after seeing a movie in Le Forum des Halles they funnel you back out into the complex, not past any bathrooms inside the cinema mini-complex. So you have that "movie bladder" and you're stuck looking for a place! Enough. Yesterday I got a bit of a late start (my alarm clock has been acting up of late) and had a plan of seeing the north part of the city (Place de Clichy, Stalingrad metros), the covered passages (in my new neighborhood!), Sacre Coeur/Abbesses area, and the Tuileries. A lot for one day and predictably, I ran out of time. I also had two parties to attend last night. One at my friend Damien's, the other a jazz evening on board a bateau in the Seine, moored at Quai Malaquais near St.Germain de Pres. So a great deal to do. It turns out that my new apartment is walking distance (I would guess about 1500-2000 meters) from Sacre Coeur and the Montmartre area. I ended up walking from the Place de Clichy (where I had been looking for a potential Cuban cigar store) over to the Abbesses area (much busier than I remember nine years ago) where I found the rue des Abesses had a absolute ton of fresh food stalls on it. It was great.. I could see going shopping for groceries there. Tres congénial. Rather than climbs the stairs or take the funincular to Sacre Coeur I continued my walk to a fairly close Metro station (through the raw fabric district apparently). Lots and lots of nice bolts of cloth for designer fashions on sale by the metre. I gather that there is a very large market for clothing elements in the area due west of Sacre Coeur. Past Tati with its huge sale (the April sales are in full flight) and into the Metro. I must have been in four or five Metro stations that are being hit by pickpockets yesterday (they announce this over the PA). I guess since its not "violent" crime they don't really make a huge effort to stop it (I saw no police). I saw a couple of individuals from what I thought was a team operation get on my car as we were leaving the station but you never know. They could have just been bosom buddies. I walked through my new neighborhood (10th) along the Grands Boulevards, checking out all the stores (there is a Hard Rock Cafe and a Virgin Megastore close to where I live) and stopped at a cafe next to the "covered passages". I don't know the history of these (yet) but they are a series of three or four blocks of covered alleys through buildings, filled with shops that have been there for quite a while. Paris wax museum (Grevin's) is next to the Passage Jouffroy where I sat in the cafe and consequently, between these two attractions, the tour buses never stopped coming. At this time of year, they appear to be filled with German tourists, who seem, if anything, more obnoxious than I remember. Actually, American tourists aren't really bad. They are just ignorant of polite behavior. This appears to be compounded by an unwillingness to even attempt the French language and this just offends the French. Given the number of tourists they see each year - mostly fellow Europeans these days - it's not surprising they get tired of it. I've actually only had good experiences in my first couple of weeks - though my stumbling French immediately leads everyone to assume I'm American. It's almost funny. I guess the day when they don't guess I'm American is the day I've succeeded in learning how to speak French decently. I ran into a couple of Brazilian girls from my dormitory in the cafe. They had been exploring the covered passages in anticipation of seeing a movie at the Rex shortly afterwards. So we talked for a while (they're only here through the end of the month) and I invited them to come to the jazz event I was attending in the evening. After another movie (La Vengeance de Monte-Cristo, not bad at all) I headed from the Champs-Elysees to Damien's place. I was a bit early (on time) and most of his guests really started arriving about 9:30 (for a 2000 start time). Both his parents were there and I had an opportunity to speak with both and to practice my conversational French. I also met his brother (for just left an Internet consultancy business) and we agreed to get together later in the week. Unfortunately, I had to leave just as the party was in full swing to attend my second invitation of the evening. What a bummer. Next time, I'll plan to stay through the whole party. I hate leaving early. Took quite a while to get down to the Quai and then to find the party. I suspected it was on a bateau but couldn't hear anything when I walked by on the street above (they have to keep the windows closed so as not to bother then very wealthy people who live on the edge of the Seine in the 1st). But I finally found it after about 40 minutes of stumbling about and greeted a second set of friends. The first band was quite terrible (a Japanese jazz band complete with crooner) but fortunately I was so late I was only regaled with about 10 minutes of it. The second band (latin jazz) was much better and I enjoyed them a lot more. Everyone had been told that I was trying to learn French so they were supposed to speak to me only in French. We mostly succeeded, though my looks of incomprehension were swiftly followed up with a quick explanation in English occasionally. I had to leave after only about 45 minutes to catch the last train home. Le Kremlin-Bicetre is near the end of the line, so the last train leaves downtown about 12:30. Bummer, life will be easier when I'm living prés de centre ville. Had a really nice conversation with another party guest on the way home - he lives in Villejuif (city of the jews) at the very end of the line and works for Citroën as an efficiency consultant. He told me that the Smart car that I so admired was designed by Swatch (the Swiss watch people) and built my Mercedes-Benz. That is was very safe ("It's a Mercedes!") and very efficient for city life. I may yet buy one.. have to get a job first and test drive it. Today is my relaxing day. I'm off to the Marché public to buy some nice cheeses and bread and then maybe off to St.Germain to watch Arsenal play in late afternoon. Bon journée to all! 2415 Well.. it wasn't as relaxing as I imagined. Ran into the Brazilian girls and they invited me to the Louvre with them. We went and spent most of the day there (and it exhausted all of us). I did see the Mona Lisa (disappointing), the Raft of the Medusa (loved it - Gericault), the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Venus de Milo, and a collection of fabulous paintings by Le Brun. Tons more to see.. I need to find out if the Louvre has some sort of monthly pass.. ridiculous to pay 5E every visit when it's going to take me 20 visits to see what I want to see. BTW, the British Museum appears to be far superior when it comes to things Egyptian. Not a surprise really. As a "choc" (shock), the French election is down to two candidates. One from the right, Jacques Chirac, and the other from the extreme right, Jean-Marie Le Pen. Le Pen got second place in yesterday's voting and the French appear to be in shock that this near-fascist might win election. It just proves that while the left sleeps, the right prospers. |
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