nicole195@ymail.com
“But you don’t love Paris if you don’t love the metro. The city breathes, coughs, vomits and swallows, resists and rebels through the metro; the metro is at once its mouth, its lungs, arteries, veins, and heart.” Bernard Binlin Dadié, An African in Paris
September 10
I’ve been wanting to write but haven’t been in the right place or time. Today won’t be as elegant as I want because I’ve only got time to write on the metro between studying for the final tomorrow. But I don’t want to forget some moments.
Yesterday we did our class excursion to Montmartre, the last one for the practicum. Lots of stairs, lots of beautiful cobblestone streets—nothing new. But I have some disdain for the tourist locations now that taint my perception. Sacre-Coeur is beautiful though and I went inside for the first time. After, we went to look for the Amelie café (don’t tell anyone I actually haven’t seen it yet). Found it, then found Le Moulin Rouge by accident. It amazes me how you can just stumble upon wonders here. There is no wrong turn you can make. And then we looked at a map before we set off to just mindlessly wander and discovered there was a cemetery of Montmarre. We found it, quiet and calm, maybe 500 yards from bustling Pigalle, and it was one of the moments that felt magical and right for Paris. It was K, E and me walking among the trees and beautiful headstones and family tombs. There is something about cemeteries. We sat down at one point, just along this paved road, and ate the rest of lunch couscous and talked. K asked us our expectations for Paris and how it has been so far. It’s an interesting question and I’m not sure I can articulate an answer. E said she didn’t anticipate the “city”-ness of Paris—living and interacting with the millions of bustling bodies every second. And not succeeding in French. K anticipated the solo artist life of doing everything alone, like in the movies, but she’s hardly spent any time alone. I haven’t either, but I think I really needed company these first couple weeks. Now I’m feeling more comfortable on my own and making my own plans for what I want to do, but that was really hard to do in a brand new place with no one I know or love and no familiar places as my home.
My expectations for a place are always different from reality because I think about it so much. J sent me a quote about how overthinking is the writer’s curse. C’est vrai. I also forgot that living somewhere four months isn’t a vacation and there are lots of practicalities that are not so beautiful—the commute, the grocery shopping, tripping on stairs, headaches, laundry—but always try to make them beautiful. You really can’t beat the sound of an orchestra as you ascend as escalator from the metro depths or dads with their kids holding one of his hands and a man-purse occupying the other. Metro sights can be lovely vignettes of humanity.
“But you don’t love Paris if you don’t love the metro. The city breathes, coughs, vomits and swallows, resists and rebels through the metro; the metro is at once its mouth, its lungs, arteries, veins, and heart.” Bernard Binlin Dadié, An African in Paris
September 10
I’ve been wanting to write but haven’t been in the right place or time. Today won’t be as elegant as I want because I’ve only got time to write on the metro between studying for the final tomorrow. But I don’t want to forget some moments.
Yesterday we did our class excursion to Montmartre, the last one for the practicum. Lots of stairs, lots of beautiful cobblestone streets—nothing new. But I have some disdain for the tourist locations now that taint my perception. Sacre-Coeur is beautiful though and I went inside for the first time. After, we went to look for the Amelie café (don’t tell anyone I actually haven’t seen it yet). Found it, then found Le Moulin Rouge by accident. It amazes me how you can just stumble upon wonders here. There is no wrong turn you can make. And then we looked at a map before we set off to just mindlessly wander and discovered there was a cemetery of Montmarre. We found it, quiet and calm, maybe 500 yards from bustling Pigalle, and it was one of the moments that felt magical and right for Paris. It was K, E and me walking among the trees and beautiful headstones and family tombs. There is something about cemeteries. We sat down at one point, just along this paved road, and ate the rest of lunch couscous and talked. K asked us our expectations for Paris and how it has been so far. It’s an interesting question and I’m not sure I can articulate an answer. E said she didn’t anticipate the “city”-ness of Paris—living and interacting with the millions of bustling bodies every second. And not succeeding in French. K anticipated the solo artist life of doing everything alone, like in the movies, but she’s hardly spent any time alone. I haven’t either, but I think I really needed company these first couple weeks. Now I’m feeling more comfortable on my own and making my own plans for what I want to do, but that was really hard to do in a brand new place with no one I know or love and no familiar places as my home.
My expectations for a place are always different from reality because I think about it so much. J sent me a quote about how overthinking is the writer’s curse. C’est vrai. I also forgot that living somewhere four months isn’t a vacation and there are lots of practicalities that are not so beautiful—the commute, the grocery shopping, tripping on stairs, headaches, laundry—but always try to make them beautiful. You really can’t beat the sound of an orchestra as you ascend as escalator from the metro depths or dads with their kids holding one of his hands and a man-purse occupying the other. Metro sights can be lovely vignettes of humanity.