A peek into the folds

DATELINE: 04.04.09

Something amazing has happened to me since I've been in Paris. At least, it is amazing to me. For as long as I can remember I have always felt a great deal of frustration surrounding my drawings, and specifically my perpetually failed (I felt) sketchbooks. There would be, from time to time, some painstakingly done drawing that I would feel good about. But they were extremely rare, and usually of something incredibly boring, like a shoe. The kind of thing we all had to do for freshman year 2D drawing classes.

I never felt like my drawings were what I wanted them to be. I was always so intimidated by the question of "what to draw?" and by the vast white space of the page. I've always been really slow when it comes to drawing, and I get hung up on the pointless details. They are (were, maybe??) my perpetual sandtraps, my roadblocks, my kryptonite. I wanted my drawings to have soul, energy, and personality - like Aaron's drawings, or Bethany's.

But since I came to Paris, something has shifted. I am sketching more, and more inclined to sketch than photograph (which is really a total flip), and I actually really like the results. Sometimes the sketches come about frantically - particularly when I'm trying to sketch the woman on the train seated across from me before she notices.

What is more, my sketchbook on the whole has become something more akin to what I have dreamed it would be: A book where the pages are filled with mixes of drawings and text, where the text is winding around and in between the drawings and doodles.

To a degree I've fallen in love with my sketchbook. I don't think I've ever felt this way before... . I don't know what precipitated this change. Maybe it was the book Bethany gave me for my birthday with samples of the sketchbooks of many famous contemporary artists. Maybe it was the mechanical pencil she let me pencil-nap which has become my good friend (never leave home with out it!).

I don't know where these sketches have even come from. But it's something that makes me so happy I can't begin to explain. It is something I am so immensely proud of, though I know that to someone else there may be nothing particularly spectacular about the sketches.

So I want to share them. Here is a selection of some of the drawings I have done since I have been in Paris.

In Italy, near the Duomo in Viterbo.

The quote that was on the crypt read: "What you are now, we used to be.  What we are now, you will be."

Recent self-portrait - waiting in the metro station for my train to come after class last week.

Note to self: buy new sneakers

DATELINE: 02.04.09 PARIS, FRANCE

I've taken to walking to and from school lately.  By lately I mean: this week.  I like it - I like feeling like I am getting to know Paris better.  I like discovering all the little shops, cafes, chocolateries, trendy bars, high fashion stores.  It's good.  

I know it takes me about 15 minutes to walk 1 mile.  It takes me a bit over 45 minutes to walk to school, which makes it roughly 3 miles.  This means that today alone, I walked 6 miles. When I arrived home I was beginning to feel the first tinglings of sprouting blisters on the bottom of my feet, and was surprised.  Until I did the calculations and realized - hmmm.. these shoes maybe aren't so cut out for that much walking.  

If just to school and back is in the ballpark of 6 miles, that means Erika and I must have walked easily twice that on Monday.  Tuesday I walked closer to 4.  Wednesday was just the walk *to* school, but not home.  So add 3.  Then today, 6.  So in the last 4 days I have walked roughly 25 miles if my calculations are even close to accurate.  

My little Puma's were never meant for this degree of work.  I am certain they will not last to the end of July at this rate.

Note to self: money being saved by not buying metro tickets will be used to buy new sneakers.

"Just threaten to take her chocolate. That usually gets her."

DATELINE: 01.04.09 PARIS, FRANCE

Seriously?? Seriously.

Today I had my first session of teaching English, and generally tutoring, a 4 yr old.  Yes, that's right.  A 4 yr old.  Does anybody else find it a little disconcerting that someone might see reason to hire a *tutor* for someone who has yet to reach school age? 

The complaint is apparently partially on the part of the school.  Yes, school.  At age 4.  I have no objections to young children in school-like early education programs, but that is not the case here.  This wee little gal is in actual school - equivalent to what we in the states would consider kindergarten.  And what is expected of her is about kindergarten/first grade level.  The school has complained that her English isn't very good, clearly French was her first language, and that she "has trouble with her letters" - i.e. she can't write them and can't quite keep them straight.  Ok. Um, she's *4*. 

Honestly, how many 4yr olds do you know who can write there own names and say the whole alphabet?  At 4 yrs old, I still expect to see names or words where half the letters are squiggles that only vaguely resemble letters and the other half are backwards.  At 4 I would expect that a precocious child can sing the whole alphabet song and recognize all the letters.  But I would not find it concerning if they couldn't.  I'm not a teacher, nor am I a parent so I don't really know, but to me that just seems a bit unreasonable.  

So I've been hired to help this young gal, we'll call her Princess, learn to recognize her written name, learn her alphabet, and learn her English.  Well, over the course of the slightly more than 1 hr that I worked with her I concluded that her issues were not so much in the knowledge department.  She recognized her written name, she was just bent on that it's not spelled that way.  At the end of the hour she was willing to concede that maybe all of those letters did belong in her name, but not in that order.  

I also concluded that her issues were more in the behavior department then in the intelligence department.  At one point as she was testing my limits and refusing to sit in her chair, her sister came in and told her "If you don't go with Rachel, I am going to give her all of your chocolate."  At which point Princess promptly (but not without a screech -NO!  Not my crack!! -and some pouting) returned to her chair.  It was all I could do to not let my eyes pop out of my head.  At 4 yrs old the major tool used to garner this child's cooperation is candy.  

I'm sorry.. are you _sure_ you're not American?  

I'm just going to venture a guess here, but I suspect this child's behavioral issues may be due at least in part to the level of sugar in her bloodstream.

Erika comes to Paris

DATELINE: 03.31.09 PARIS, FRANCE

Erika blew through Paris this last weekend.  She

arrived on Saturday morning and must, sadly, return to Boston tomorrow (wednesday).

I only got to have her for one day, but it was a fantastic day, and I am grateful that I got to have her all to myself.

We began the day at my place around 11:30am (well, Erika began by walking from Gare St. Lazare to my place in the 9eme arrondissement).  There were a few visits Erika needed to pay to some hotels so we left my house and aimed ourselves for the area near the Sarbonne - over in the 5eme arr. 

Sorry, strike that; *I* aimed us haphazardly in that direction but mostly just generally towards the river, while Erika - more familiar with the city and with a better sense of direction then I, aimed us towards an actual destination.

We meandered the streets, soaking in sun, clear blue skies, amazing weather, familiar company. I hadn't played tourist in Paris yet (I know - shameful), and could not have asked for a better companion or a better day to do so.

So we meandered the streets and eventually found ourselves in a small plaza with a fountain. We stopped for a few photos and to check the map, only to find that we had managed to drop ourselves *exactly* where we needed to be, not even one block from hotel #1 (although I had been aiming for hotel #2).  As Erika said: We could not have taken ourselves more directly here if we had tried.  

We visited the hotel and continued on our way, directly through the Louvre plaza with the Arc de Triomphe (not the main one) and the Jardins de Tuilleries, to the Pont des Arts, and along the Seine, now actually headed toward the Panthéon and hotel #2.  This time, I let Erika lead the way.  

We passed the Notre Dame and some government buildings where a group of (presumably) teachers were gathered across the street protesting the changes that Sarko (as they call him here) wants to make to the French educational system (he wants to cap salaries for teachers, change who gets to determine curriculum - so that he determines curriculum, and change the way the schools are funded).  People are immensely unhappy and the universities have been on strike for more than a month.  We suspect that he was either inside the building across the street or coming through - there was a great deal of security presence, a group of eager protesters, and some news cameramen.

We found our way to hotel #2, paid them a visit, and then had a seat to review our plan.  I ate peanuts. 

We decided to follow through on the original plan: purchase a baguette, a block of cheese, and a bottle of wine and sprawl on the grass either on the Champs Elysée another park, followed by an ascent of the Arc de Triomphe - the one everyone knows.  

One problem with out plan - it was Monday.  Most of the boulangerie are closed on Monday. Sadface.  

We were meandering more or less generally back towards the river and left towards the Arc de Triomphe and found ourselves getting really ravenous.  We found a boulangerie that was open (hallelujah) and bought a sandwich to split and a baguette.  The sandwich: a classic in Paris - Jambon, fromage, et burre dans baguette.  Possibly the most brilliant sandwich ever.  We meandered and ate, and suddenly found we had taken ourselves almost directly back to the Louvre.  I'm pretty sure my sense of direction is not that good, so I am convinced that among the other things stashed in Erika's cleavage there is a compass that has a direct line to her brain.

We walked through the Jardin des Tuileries, stopping for a nap, an orange, more baguette, and some sunbathing in one of the many lawn chairs that live around the man-made pools there. We continued on through the Place de la Concorde and onto the Champs Elysée, stopping for photos of the new roof on the Grands Palais.  This brought us directly to the Arc de Triomph.

We bought our tickets (making an attempt to get the student discount which was thwarted by our birth dates which were printed on the face of our student IDs. dammit.) and ascended the 286 winding stairs, 50 meters, up to the top - being careful to avoid the herd of jostling adolescents from Canada who came hollering all the way up.  You would think that the round and round and round you go up the stairs would have sedated then at least a little.  

At the top of the Arc de Triomphe we violated some of the rules, but not my favorites - no tighty-whities and no tripods.  It's true!  Ask Erika!  Erika seems to believe that the "No tighty-whities" man actually meant "no sunbathing" but I remain unconvinced.  He clearly was wearing tighty-whities.  The "no tripods" rule, I still can't figure out.  

From the Arc de Triomphe we followed Avenue de Friedland to Boulevard Haussmann toward the Gare St. Lazare, where Erika would get back on a train and return to the mystical land of Orly's house in the burbs.  We stopped at a cafe near the church of St. Augustine and spoiled ourselves with more sunbathing (don't worry France, we weren't in our tighty-whities!), good coffee, and a chocolate mousse like none other.  

I dropped Erika at the train with just moments to spare, and followed Ave. de St. Lazare to Rue des Martyrs.  My home turf.  Up the hill, up 6 flights of stairs, and 7 hrs later, I was home. Home and sunburnt.

A perfect day.  I miss Erika already.  

It can't rain all the time

DATELINE: 26.03.09 PARIS, FRANCE

Since my arrival in Paris in mid January the weather has been pretty consistent: grey, slightly rainy, with rapid fluctuations between cold & damp and warm & humid (with a few notable exceptions). The cloud cover has been fairly constant with thick voluminous clouds, often dark and ominous looking. One might mistake this for seattle.  

 

Tonight is one of the few occasions on which the rain has broken free.  It is pounding my windows, whipping back and forth. It's wonderful. I love storms and as I feared, this is all too short lived. As I type it seems to already begun petering off, before I have gotten a chance to snuggle myself in to bed.  

It reminds me of this beautiful song by a Canadian artist named Jane Seibury (I'm sure I spelled that wrong) on the soundtrack to "The Crow".

Last week while hanging out with my friend Massy, an Algerian guy I met a few days after I arrived in Paris, I complained that having long since finished the book I brought to Paris with me (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle), and having gobbled up the book I brought with me from Aaron's place in Rome (Hungry Ghost), I had run out of English language literature.  My textbooks and course readings not withstanding.  I don't know if it is all the Freud or overly self-gratified excessively esoteric literary analysis that is doing this to me, but I feel desperate for books to immerse myself into.  Stories, fiction, leisure reading.  

Massy works at a hotel where there are a lot of books left behind so he brought me one to read.  He gave me Twilight.  I knew very little about Twilight, except that Erika had been obsessed with it, as well as seemingly every other woman around me last fall. I knew they had made it into a movie that was fairly popular, particularly among the high school demographic.  I knew it was a vampire story.  We all love a good vampire story.

Massy gave the book to me last Sunday.  Already I am nearly finished.  I can't put it down.  I have to literally pry myself away from it.  Two hours ago I decided that it would be acceptable to read it while I ate dinner - as opposed to watching episodes of the Simpsons online, or an episode of Lost, for that matter.  I ate, and read.  And finished eating.  And continued reading.  I am a complete addict.  I even caught myself tonight wondering if there is a sequel.  I am going to be sad when this book ends.  All 500+ pages of it are just too few.  How will I get my fix?  I feel like a teenage girl - fantasizing about the leading man in the story.  

Remember that little chant of early teen girls (I must, I must, I must increase my bust... no, we never actually do that guys.  Honest.)?  My chant is now: I must, I must, I must put down this book (and read my psych text instead =( 

I cannot tell you how many nights this last week I have found myself headed to bed, having the debate: It's late already... Do I have time for reading? Maybe I'll just read a few pages.  Then a few pages becomes a chapter. A chapter becomes two. And then I find myself awake at 2:30 IN THE MORNING, with the angle and the demon on either shoulder battling it out, talking myself into putting the book away and going to sleep.  

I think that clearly, I need to meet an insatiably attractive European man to have a nice little European affair... to distract me from the affair I am having with this book.  Though having my nose buried in this book is probably making that harder...

A Tale of Two Arches

DATELINE: 17.03.09 PARIS, FRANCE

Today would have been a good day to be in Ireland.  Dang.  Ah well.  Happy St. Patty's Day to all my Irish.

I have been cooped up in my house studying to my mid-term exam in my Abnormal & Clinical Psych course.  I'm a bit overwhelmed by all the material.  But mostly, it's just made me wish I was a full time student, and that I had the funds to go sit at a cafe, at a table in the sun, rather than in my apt.  But I have faith that that day will come... I just hope it comes soon.

Tonight I will recount for you the very not-so-brief Tale of Two Arches, having nothing to do with my studies except in that you should understand that I am home A LOT reading reading reading, and that I was thrilled for the excuse to do myself up and go out.

At some point in the course of my apartment hunting I contacted an Italian man named Antonio.  Antonio was, like me, searching for a place to live.  I believe that at that point I had made the suggestion that we might fare better if we looked together for a two bedroom rather than each just looking for an open room, as the options for the latter were looking grave from my perspective.  Clearly that didn't happen.

Time passed and at some point I got a message from Antonio, who was still searching, inquiring to my status on the housing front.  I had found a place, but offered to meet for coffee and impart upon this random man all the knowledge I had gained in my apartment hunting experiences here in Paris.  

Somehow we failed to follow through on that as well.

Then one day a few weeks ago, actually, just before I left for Italy, I got another message from him announcing that he had finally found a place to live.  Hooray!  We decided that after all this, and as we are both strangers in a strange land (ok, France is not so strange, but still...), we should still meet up.  I learned that he is from outside of Rome and we decided that after I returned from my trip to Rome we would get together.

Well, this week we finally managed to make a plan.  We set the date: Tuesday (tonight).  9:30pm.  We would meet near the architecture firm he works at, a few stops on the metro from where I live.  He would bring the wine.  I would bring the glasses.  It was a perfectly hatched totally French (in my mind) utterly random rendezvous.  We planned to meet "at the arche in the square".  (The Parisians must love their Arches.  These things are everywhere.)

I was, true to form, running late.  I arrived at the station, exited by the first exit I saw (the stations typically have several), and found myself standing on the street looking for "the Arche".  

Aha!  There it is!   

I very nearly RAN to it, scanning every person in a black jacket that I see in its vacinity.  Are any of them carrying a bottle of wine?  any of them checking their watches? phones?  I have no idea what the man I am looking for looks like.  It could be anybody.  

It's 9:50.  I stand at the arche and wait.  I walk around it a few times, just in case he's on the other side.  No luck.  it's 10pm.  It's looking a bit sketchy around the arche.  I have no credit on my phone and can't call him.  According to the email I received in the afternoon, he is in the same situation.  I see pay phones across the street.  I run over to try to use one.  But they accept only calling cards.  I have only cash.

It's 10:15 and I am looking down the street.  I suddenly notice that there is what appears to be either a fountain or another arche a few blocks away!  Oh crap!  It's another arche!  I quickly walked the few blocks to the other arche, nearly tripping over some guy who jumps in my path and tries to get me to stop and chat.  I arrive at the other arche and there is simply nobody there.  I walk around it a few times.  I look and look, and wait.  That guy I tripped over earlier walks up to me and tries to pick me up.  Sorry kid.  Not a chance.

At 10:30 I decide that Antonio and I have fully missed each other, or I've been stood up.  I head home.  

I arrive home feeling frustrated, a bit annoyed, and disappointed.  I check my email to find a message from him telling me that he waited until 9:50 and then went home, frustrated and disappointed.  

He had been standing all that time at the "other" arche.  

It was a perfectly hatched, totally French, completely random rendezvous utterly foiled by "the other arche".

Le Marche St.-Quentin

DATELINE: 15.03.09 PARIS, FRANCE

Today's lesson: Not all "outdoor markets" are outside, and not all are cheaper than the supermarket.

This morning I visited the market in the 10th arrondissement called Saint-Quentin.  It is about a 20 minute walk from my apt, a little farther than Barbes.  In the hopes of finding cheap prices and good quality in the same place, I have begun exploring the other markets around me.

I had a bit of trouble finding the market because I was looking for a square or a section of road that was filled with the awnings covering each of the little stalls, full of people and produce.  When I finally asked someone to direct me to it, they pointed to a building with large glass doors opening to the street.  Above the doors was a sign that I had completely missed - as I approached from the backside and was looking for tents, not signs.  The sign read in very large type: Marche St.-Quentin.  Doh.

The market itself is very pleasant.  There were not a lot of shoppers, nor a lot of vendors.  It is very small and all of the vendors are permanently installed.  In addition to the produce there are several wine sellers, butchers, a cheese vendor, flower sellers, and a very small hardware shop.  It is lit mostly by the numerous skylights overhead, and in the center of it all I found a small string quartet playing the soundtrack to our sunday morning shopping.

The prices however were less pleasant, and clearly reflected the vendors status as permanent installations, likely paying rent for their space.  I spent 10€ and returned with only three handfuls of un-cracked walnuts, 5 tomatoes on the vine, 2 medium sized eggplants, 7 small blood oranges, and a bulb of garlic.  

I have concluded that the markets are not as a rule cheaper than the supermarkets, and the best way to approach my market purchases is to visit Barbes 1x per week, choosing my purchases carefully, and then fill out the rest with a visit to another market - ideally one that will be less expensive then St.-Quentin.  Beginning next week, I will put this plan into action and run it through the experiment process.  Living cheap in Paris is clearly a very delicate science.