You can thank insomnia

So thanks to my bad sleeping habits I've decided the best thing to do, possibly the only thing left to do, is write.  Didn't go to bed last night until it wasn't really night anymore and the crows that haunt the trees of Pere Lachaise were beginning to caw.  Got up just in time for class and then after Eren invited me back to his place in the 13eme arrondisement near the Bibliotheque Francois Mitterand for a traditional Turkish lunch - or late lunch - or early dinner.  It was absolutely delicious.
He lives in a little studio on the 8th (that'd be the 9th) floor of some mini-high-rise that is maybe half the size of my place, but also about half the price.  It's rather pleasant, but Eren may have decorated with a bit too much red (bed sheets, table cloth, place mats, napkins yes even the napkins, paintings, curtain, utensils, and I could go on).  That's not to say I don't like a good color scheme, but I'm more of a blue guy myself.

Really, this post has nothing to do with that.  What I was meaning to say is that after dinner we walked along the water, through the park, the bibliotheque (beautiful) and at about six o'clock I went home.  I laid down without a moments pause onto my bed, sprawled out a bit bloated and defeated - and then lost the battle for sleep once again.  It's now eleven o'clock and I'm suspecting the vacant black-eyed stare in the mirror tomorrow is laying in wait.

My head is in a dull trance, but as I said - not what this post is about.  It's about Normandy.  And a little about helping me sleep.

I think it's been about a week, yes a week or more, since I decided to take the train out of the city to Caen, then to Coutances, then take a bus to Avranches.  I left after class on the 11th, later in the day from Saint Lazare.  I waited around the station as train after train was announced and my time for departure drew ever closer but my train was no where on the ticking board above those hundreds of Parisian suburban fugitives elbowing and teething their way through the six o'clock rush.  I paced up and down the station trying to decipher what to do, which train was mine.  Departures were only being posted mere minutes before the trains were scheduled to pull from the quay and I had no idea where my track was.  Ten minutes to go, I start to panic ever so slightly, more of a subdued "proper reaction" let's say.  I went to each track and looked to see if any were headed to Caen, tracks one through fifteen, before it clicked.  When I was in the Munich train station with my dad I remember that the trains departing for other countries or for further reaches of the same country left from the remote far end of the station, and where at first glance it would seem that the station ends in fact it curled around a wall and opened up to a completely different array of tracks.  I started running.  Five minutes.  I made it from one end of the station to the other and there it was.  A partial wall that when you walk around reveals an entirely different section of the station.  Three different trains were set up to depart, and after quickly checking with the board (a completely different departure board for this section) I found my track and boarded my assigned car.  Two minutes to spare.
It was four and a half hours of travel.  Transferring at Caen to Coutances, a smaller well kept commuter style train not unlike the one that takes you over the border from Germany to Strasbourg.  Night fell soon after that and there was nothing to see out the windows except for my own glassy, shadowed reflection looking not unlike an emaciated Marlon Brando at the beginning of The Godfather.  I kept to Pynchon and furrowed deeper into the beautiful black mess that is Gravity's Rainbow.  Coutances arrived and I transfered to a bus, smashing my forehead into the dangling television screen above the seat, and then spending most of my ride to Avranches trying to figure out how I did that.  It seemed almost impossible unless I really am taller than I think.  Or just clumsier.
The bus dropped me off at Avranches "train station".  I use this term lightly, hence my compulsion for quotation marks.  The "station" was really more of a white, weather worn facade of some Hollywood western set piece placed on the wrong side of a very active highway to the actual city of Avranches, which, to my travel logged dismay was on top of a very imposing hill.  I hadn't eaten, and when we pulled in I saw a McDonald's so I walked over ordered a number one (same thing in any country) and plotted how to get across that very inconvenient high way.  Some of you, the responsible ones, may have been wondering if I had a map with me.  The answer to that is of course no, because otherwise what would be the story?  Actually there may still be a story even if I had a map, but that comes later.  Sitting there, eating my Big Mac I decided that there were two possibilities.  One, this was not my favorite idea, was to try out this highly active mega bridge that spanned across the highway next to the McDonald's and see if I might get lucky and not be hit by a truck from behind then thrown over the guardrail to the equally active highway below like some kind of spongy pinball.  The second idea, this was not as "proactive" but definitely not as bad, was to walk back towards the "station" and see if there was some other, smaller bridge that I could use to cross (though I hadn't seen one when I was there).
I went with the latter.  I took my fruit pack to go (no I didn't order the fries) and headed back out into the dark.  A single light hooking out from the edge of the "station" to illuminate the clock there was the only thing that made the road visible.  I stood there in the parking lot, doing my best comic 360 spin-around, before finally spotting a bit of black cutout from the Avranches city lights.  A thin pedestrian bridge a little ways down a dirt path from the station crossing the highway below.  Success.
The whole time I was working my way down the path and then turning up the bridge which was built with high solid walls on either side to impede jumping (or falling I suppose) I couldn't help feeling like this was a very pleasant spot to mug somebody.  Now, Avranches is no "big city" but it wasn't hard to notice that the whole lack of light, proximity to "train station" feeding out beleaguered easy targets, and the high walls of the bridge to block any hope of a would-be good Samaritan seeing a mugging going down and then alerting the police made that spot a bit sketchy to say the least.
Luckily nothing happened that I know of, but after crossing the highway I was forced to climb perhaps the steepest road I've ever seen, forcing me to in fact use for the first time the plumber's pipe handrail that had been installed into the blacktop just not to fall backwards upon myself.  At this point I was regretting bringing my computer, which in a situation like this is much heavier than advertised.  I followed the signs to the city center, passed the tourist information desk, and being that it was well into nine o'clock at this point (almost ten really) the whole town was shut down.  Made some lucky guesses and found my hotel just before ten o'clock which was also lucky because that's when the front desk closes.
The room was nice, small, something that would resemble a Comfort Inn or (my personal favorite motel pun name) Americ Inn.  The real treat was the Granny and Pupup sized flatscreen that was crowning my bed.  Ah, French Tv.  My first exposure really, and it was...disappointing.  Not only was the TV the same size as Granny and Pupup's it seemed to have the exact same tastes.  The only thing on were old reruns of NCIS dubbed over in French so that even if I wanted to watch I wouldn't be able to bare it.  And then a French music channel that was far too confusing and bizarre to explain here.
I took a shower and went to bed.
In the morning I went to a cafe, got a coffee, a pain au chocolat and started writing a letter to Em.  A letter that just today I received back in my mailbox because apparently I didn't do it right or something, which is a little surprising since I followed the instructions on La Poste's own website as to how to label and send the letter.  But that's neither here nor there.  Well, no I suppose the letter is right here, but it certainly isn't there and that's where this story is supposed to be so let me get back to that.  This is the very thing my high school english teacher would have highly disapproved of - digressing.
Right, so, after a time (this was just after ten thirty or so) I found my way back to that tourist office I'd passed the night before and went inside.  Now, some of you are wondering (those of you that don't know French geography or haven't already broken away from this stunning narrative to google search "Avranches") may be wondering why I was even there in the first place.  As my past tense self walks in slow motion through the blue framed doors of the tourist office I will now reveal the secret: Le Mont - Saint Michel.  A UNESCO World Heritage Site plotted out on a little sometimes island surrounded by a quaintly soggy area that is in itself so beautiful and unique that it also made it onto the UNESCO list.  That and I hadn't left Paris even once since I arrived and thought that now was better then later (for once).

Now, very quickly before I go on and describe in detail how I used my wonderful new mastery of the French language to ask the clerk if she spoke English I would like to make a small disclaimer.  I'm alive.  I wouldn't be writing this if I wasn't.  I survived the following and despite the overall stupidity that may have initiated these events I actually used a lot of common sense and skill to get myself back safe and in one very sore piece.  And also I would just like to say for the record "oops".  Now, Mom, if I hadn't already told you this story, this would be the part were I would have said "it's probably best if you sit down for this and prepare to cringe".  So for everyone that cares about my well being I'm passing that message on to you.  Take a seat, get comfortable, and bask in the knowledge that I am in fact all right.

Okay, on with the show.

You see, though Avranches is in very close proximity to Le Mont Saint Michel it still requires that you take a bus to a town some twenty or so kilometers away and then take another bus another ten or so kilometers to actually arrive at the monastery.  When I asked the lady at the desk how I could take a bus to get there and then return I was met only with the crinkled nose of bad news.  As it so happens, this not being prime tourist season, the buses were running rather infrequently and I could get to the next town and then transfer and get to the monastery, but I could not return to Avranches.  Basically I would be trapped on the island almost thirty kilometers from the hotel I'd already paid for.  I walked outside for a breath of fresh air.  This was not good news.  Idly I glanced at a map hanging in the window checking out the terrain between me and the monastery when I noticed something rather interesting, a little dotted trail labeled GR-22 that followed along the the whole of the coast starting at Saint Michel and continuing on past Avranches, but not before meeting up with that same dirt path I had happened upon the night before when crossing the bridge.  I went back inside and asked the woman about the path.  She informed me it was a hiking trail that was very rarely used but could be taken all along the coast of Normandy if you wanted.  I asked her if she had a map and she gave me a look as if I had just inquired about her private banking information before saying that I could buy one at the bookstore down the street.  That's it then.  I'll take the bus to Saint Michel and then I'll just walk back.  I was not going to be defeated by their shoddy bus schedule.  And besides I wasn't traveling with anyone I had to convince other than myself.  This kind of thing usually would turn into some kind of back-and-forth about how it's too far or it's stupid or it's not worth it, but not this time.  No, I was going to Saint Michel, and I was going to walk back.  I'd done enough hiking with my dad not to be afraid of a little GR-22.  Scoff.  (You might slowly be coming to realize the purpose for the disclaimer now)  The next bus didn't leave until noon so I took the time to buy a map (if I was going to do this I wanted to be prepared) and to walk down to the Jardin des Plantes and catch a quick view at Saint Michel off in the distance before returning to the tourist office and boarding the bus.
The bus took me to an even smaller town south of Saint Michel.  I had to wait almost two hours for the next bus to arrive and take me north, so I stocked up on some provisions for the walk and ate a pizza at a local restaurant.  Then the rain started.
About thirty minutes camped out underneath that town's ""train station"" (one set of quotation marks would not be enough in this case) overhang shivering to the bone before I finally boarded up again and headed north.
It was a short trip and I was the only one on the bus except for the driver, passing through the Normandy countryside small beige farmhouses, endless expanses of green always with a thin layer of mist hovering just above the surface.  Finally we turned onto the long land bridge that connects Saint Michel to the mainland and I was there.  I departed, with a quick Merci to my private chauffeur, and got in line behind the hoards of Japanese tourists funneling their way into the entrance.  It is always tourist season for the Japanese.


The walk up to the monastery takes you through a street of vendors and miniature hotels, boarding rooms, bars, restaurants, speed lightening French, banner colors, and cobble stones.  Up on the ramparts in just a moment and the whole bay is opened up looking not so much like land but the solidified twistings of milk poured into tea.  It was beautiful.  I took my time getting into the actual structure capping the island, barely able to break away from the breath taking view.  Though I had come there to see the church itself, so after a time I did finally break away from the walls make my way up those long steps to the top.
The interior is spectacular.  It's no Sacre Coeur, but that's not necessarily the point either.  Instead the majesty of the building is not so much found it its main church, but in the endless switch-backing stairways opening up to yet another balcony or courtyard over looking yet another stunning portrait of the bay.  The place seems never ending.  Once you think you've descended your last set of steps into your last giant chamber making you wonder what these people intended to do with so many big empty rooms you only ended up finding yourself in yet another.  On and on.  It reminded me in many ways of a castle and less of a church, which makes sense considering its strategic position on the island and the fact that it was attacked several times and never fell.  As I was getting to the end of my visit I came to the room of the "Big Wheel" - cunningly named.  It was a literally a big wheel in an elaborate pulley system to bring things from the base of the Mont up.  Or at least that's what I gathered.  I decided not to buy the fancy audio guide for seven euro.  I walked over to the window where the chain from the wheel disappeared out, but as I leaned from the ledge I spooked a pigeon that was roosting just below the frame causing it to spring up and crap on my shoulder as it disappeared into the beams above.  This should have been a sign.  Well, the real sign should have been all the pigeon poop on the floor of that room, but still lets all stop for a moment and consider how many ways this was a sign of all the literal and figurative crap I was about to encounter in the next several hours.  Though I didn't know it.  No.  Instead I just pulled my ticket from my pocket and scraped off as much as I could and then found a bathroom to deal with the rest.  As you might have imagined that little treasure was a bit of buzz kill, and so I decided that was a good as time as any to leave.  Besides I knew I needed to leave soon.  I had already been there for an hour and it was getting close to four o'clock.  If I didn't leave soon who knew how long it was going to take to get home.  Not to mention that tiny itsy bitsy problem of well: night.  A thought that had crossed my mind fleetingly and now might be crossing yours seeing as I brought it up.  Okay, so it's spring - or the very end of winter - and sun sets around what?  Seven o'clock?  In fact I wasn't really sure.  It wasn't something I'd really paid attention to in the last couple of weeks.  I had noticed the days were getting longer, but how long could they really have gotten?  Who knows.  Either way it was time to leave and as the rain had slowed to a drizzle it was feeling like now or never.

So I left, pack slung over my shoulder, boots strapped tight.  I had with me as follows: One pair of Steve Madden leather boots that were already falling apart along the inside, one pair of jeans, socks underwear that whole lot, a black wool sweater over a t-shirt, my gray spring jacket with a hit of bird crap still on the shoulder, my trusty messenger bag containing two books, a crossant, an apple, a bottle of water, three journals, an entire art store of writing utensils, my multi-tool (a last minute idea but a good one), a box of matches, a map, and my iPod.  Bulletproof.  Basically as well equipped as that guy that got his arm stuck under a boulder - but my knife was sharper.
I wasn't sure exactly how the trail started.  On the map it said it led right down the landbridge and then turned east towards Avranches, but I didn't see any signs the whole walk down the bridge and thanks to the low tide it was hard to tell when the "land" started and the "sea" began.  But I kept walking and kept my eyes open.  I was used to spotting trail markers thanks to my dad and I figured I know it when I saw it.  The road went on for a ways and eventually opened up into the town on the other side and a small dam on the west side of the road.  I stopped and took out my map.  Best I could tell, the trail was supposed to start right where I was standing just north of the dam, but looking around all I could see was farm fields and some kind of Saint Michel Supper Club already filled with patrons looking for a little aperitif.  On the west side of the road was a small fence and some kind of head stone so I crossed to get a better look.  The stone, as I got closer, had written in French the instructions for deciphering the trail markers of the GR-22.  Okay, that's a good sign.  This must be the start of the trail.  But where is the trail?  The only thing that could have been a path was blocked by a large gate that was chained and padlocked.  Not a good sign.  On the other side of the gate was a bit of field leading towards the supper club and bordered on the north by a low dyke.  I contemplated my options.  Head towards the road see if I can follow that towards Avranches or see if I can hop this fence.  I knew the road was bad news so I walked left, away from the supper club and parallel to the low dyke.  There was a fence here as well, a low one maybe just past my waist but armed with barbed wire.  Perhaps this is why that tourist lady gave me that look.  Would have been nice to have been given a warning.  But was this the trail?  Was I expected to jump this fence?  Probably not.  But I did anyway.  A found a post that was sticking out a little sideways and climbed up and over it without much of a problem.  Okay, so I'd either started my journey or committed a crime.  I wasn't sure so I climbed up to the top of the dyke and what should I see but a small post hammered into the ground with a yellow horizontal stripe painted on it identical to the one marking the GR-22 on that headstone.  Alright, I guess I found it.  Time to walk.
I followed along the top of the dyke for about a kilometer before I came upon my first farmhouse.  You see the way the trail is designed it follows along the top of this dyke which acts as a kind of natural wall for sheep that the farmers let in and out depending on the tide to eat up all the lush grass on the north side of the dyke.  As it was getting later in the day the shepherd at this particular farm was already letting his flock home and the dyke followed (as well as the trial markers) all the way back to the barn with his flock.  I felt as though I was just another sheep being herded in by those yelping dogs, following after the lead with its little clanging bell all glassy eyed and thoughtless.  Once I'd followed the signs as far as they would go a small fence (marked in yellow) needed to be hoped before I could get out of there.  The only problem was now I was on the road and there weren't any more trail markers.  I looked around confused.  I knew I was supposed to hop that fence.  I was sure of it.  It was built low with a little foot step so you just clamber right over but the sheep couldn't escape, but then where was the trail?  The map did me no good.  It said the trail just kept on going along the shore.  Okay?
I started out onto the road continuing east looking around for where the GR-22 was supposed to cut back onto the dyke, but nothing.  As car after car whizzed by me at daringly sociopathic speeds I decided that I needed to do something.  This was stupid.  There was no way this was where I was supposed to be.  This is not a trail.  This is the shoulder of a road.  I looked north across a corn field and saw the dyke running parallel to me.  That had to be my trail, but I had already gone too far from the farm where I'd gotten lost so it wouldn't do me much good to turn back.  I would have to cut across the farm.  It seemed simple enough.
I waited until there seemed to be the clearest bit of land in the field, a small ditch running straight through towards the dyke - I didn't just want to go marching across some one's property willy nilly.  I figured this was my best bet, so when there was a break in traffic I made a break for it.  Crossed the road, jumped the ditch and started walking.  The ground was drenched and the mud made it difficult to walk.  By this point my pants were already soaked from all the grass on the dyke and I was wishing I had a raincoat.  The best thing I could was pop my collar and try and keep my balance.  Just as I arrived at the dyke I discovered my new problem. The little ditch I was following was full of water, some kind of irrigation system I assumed, but it cut me off from the dyke which was also surrounded in another barbed wire fence.  It would be one heck of a jump if I could make it and then even still the ground being as wet as it was my just give out underneath me if I made it.  I looked around and realized I wasn't wrong, but there weren't any other options.  Okay, all those years of climbing on my house, jumping off of things, running and creating a nuisance of myself at local children's parks was finally going to pay off.  I found the thinnest part of the stream and aimed myself towards the a post in the fence, took a couple steps back and went for it.  I hit the other side and quickly grabbed at the fence post, stabilizing myself so that I could quietly celebrate.  A moment later I'd hopped the fence never once getting caught in the barbed wire and climbed back up on the dyke where (as I'd hoped) was another trail marker.  Time to keep walking.
This went on for kilometers and kilometers.  Switching through and back towards more and more farms, more flocks of sheep, more farmers and their dogs.  Marker after marker, sheep poop after sheep poop I walked.  I kept taking glances behind me at Saint Michel gauging it against the far-off image of it I'd seen from Avranches' park trying to determine how close I was getting.  Not very.

Almost seven, I had made it to La Pointe de Roche Torin which the trail markers had been clicking off the distance to since I started.  The Pointe was spectacular.  I took a moment to walk out to the very tip where someone had stacked up a column of rocks thinking from a distance "Are those rocks?  I bet they're rocks.  Yup, they're rocks.  Awesome."  I finished off my water and took a look at my map to see if I could find where this spot was exactly.  Where is it exactly you might ask?  It's only half way.  I had been walking for over three hours and I was only half way.  Holy crap.  That's not good.  You see I wasn't particularly tired (though I was covered in mud and crap up to my knees and no that's not an exaggeration - some ways back I had stepped on what looked like just another bit of ground but turned out to be a quicksand like spot of mud that nearly swallowed me whole) but I was noticing the time now.  Almost seven?!  I looked up at the faceless gray sky and noticed for the first time that it was darkening.  This wasn't good.  I'm only half way, maybe less than that and it's almost night.  I did some quick guess work in my head and figured if I humped it I could make it to Pontaubault (the next town) by eight, but that the way things were going it was likely going to get too dark to see out here before then.  I figured I had till 7:45 before total black out.  The sky was too covered for stars and the moon was only half-full that night and wouldn't do me much good.  Not to mention the fact that I shouldn't be expecting any kind of lighting out along the coast between bleak farmland and nothingness.  No this wouldn't do.  I needed to think.  The map showed that just after the Pointe the trail curled back momentarily along a country road before heading back out to the water.  Okay, so I'll start walking, gauge the coming of night against my speed, do my best to hurry, and make a decision when it comes to that.  What else could I do?
I was on the road in a minute and I started walking with that renewed sense of determination that can only be urged from the conscience oncoming of disaster.
I kept to the shoulder of the road, still following the trail markers that were now painted on to telephone polls and quickened my pace.  This wasn't time to sight see.  This also wasn't time for panic.  It's good to use fear to encourage yourself but its foolish to let it get to you so much that you don't think straight, especially now.  Especially now that I'm haunting the shoulder of this country road while the sun sets invisible behind me.  No, this is the time to move and keep moving and keep my head.  And laugh a little.  Things that I remembered my dad telling me about hiking: never do it at night, French trails are the worst marked trails and some of the worst trails in the world, and never never never walk along the road if you can help it.  It's hard not to laugh when you're blatantly doing everything you're not supposed to be doing.  Things I suddenly came to realize: I didn't have a phone, no internet for my iPod, I had told no one, and I mean no one, where I was going, and if I died out here the maid would definitely steal my computer.  Keep walking.  I only had one goal.  Get back before the bar closed at 10 o'clock.  There was no way I was going to beat the sun.  I was going to be walking into the night and that was that, but I could get back to Avranches in time to buy my first drink at a hotel bar and say cheers to not dying anonymously in some French ditch with bits of somebody's headlights stuck into my back like the aftermath of some homemade bomb.  It seemed like a good goal at the time.
A small farming town appeared ahead - a collection of maybe three or four homes - and the trail banked north back towards the water.  It wasn't night yet, but it was getting very close.  I'd already had a few close encounters with some cars on the other hand and I stopped at the crossroad to think.  I took my map from my bag and squinted through the deepening dusklight to see if there might be an answer there. The trail would cut north and head that direction for some time before meeting back up with the water and then heading east again, the direction I needed to go.  The road on the other hand stayed a country road, never meeting up with any of the other major roads and yet was basically a straight shot to Pontaubault.  There was no choice to make.  Stay to the road.  I closed my map and put it back into my backpack.  It wouldn't do me any more good now.  It was getting too dark to see.
I kept up along the road, walking as fast as I could lighting matches every once in awhile to keep myself busy though it wasn't so bad yet that I couldn't make out ground or the road, but I toyed with the idea that doing so would somehow alert cars to my existence should they not see me.  I kept to the wider shoulder, switching sides when a bend in the road came so I'd be more visible to traffic coming around, but luckily didn't run into much at all.  As the sun finally set I walked under the outlying streetlights of Pontaubault.  Perfect timing.
It was eight o'clock and by the sign I'd seen on the road it was still over ten kilometers to Avranches from here.  I would need to cut through the town and then head cross the bridge that connected this side of the river from the one Avranches was on.  With the help of the streetlights I could read my map again and see that after I crossed the bridge the road continued straight to Avranches, actually turning into the street my hotel was on oddly enough, but was definitely no country road like the one I'd been on.  This was a major road connecting these two towns.  What to do, what to do.   I thought for a moment of taking some of the more winding smaller roads to avoid traffic but decided my odds of having streetlights  and guardrails to protect me were better than anything I could get from those old back roads.  Besides I know how people drive on those roads.  Flash backs to high school were filling my mind of friends of mine (me sulking in the back seat) throwing pumpkins from the windows of their cars as they zipped up to 90 miles per hour.  No, at least on bigger roads there is some kind of law.  At least on major roads I can get home sooner.
The bridge came up ahead and was equipped with a sidewalk.  I continued as far as the town would allow before I plunged back into darkness, now keeping well to the right shoulder but with enough space not to fall into the ditch that had grown aptly deeper than the last one I'd walked along.  Thanks to a bit of luck and some common sense I hadn't been listening to my iPod and so had full battery.  I took it out now for the first time and switched my lock screen to the brightest picture I had on file, then held it to my back pressing the home button every couple of seconds so that it would stay on and I would be visible to cars.  I didn't have any reflectors so this would have to do.  It was better than nothing.
This went on for over an hour.  Me trucking along, keeping to the outside of guardrails when they were available and waving my iPod around behind my back.  Secretly I was hoping that a car would stop and offer me a ride.  I kept practicing what I would say in French over and over to keep my mind busy and away from thinking about all the things that could go wrong.  My biggest fear at the time was actually not the cars.  I figured my little iPod trick was a good one and cars were giving me a wide birth when they came by.  No, instead I was worried that in those moments when the traffic thinned and I fell into complete darkness that I would lose my footing and slip into the ditch.  I was in a bad enough jam without having a twisted ankle or worse and so when I could I brought my iPod out in front of me and used it like a flashlight to light my way and make sure I hadn't wandered too close to the drop-off.  You see I have a bit of a history of falling off of things.  As some of you may know when I was younger, back in Tennessee with the family I absently walked right off a bridge and into the water below while up in the Appellations, which ended with me walking back wearing only my skivvies and an oversized sweater.  Then there was that time that I fell off my bike in Colorado, flipping right over the handle bars and skidding along the pavement, which ended with me walking my bike back into town and then pouring disinfectant on my arm for a week afterwards.  But not this time.  I was going to keep my balance and I was going to remain intact (of course this was still my secondary goal, if I could make it back to the bar before ten o'clock with a broken leg it'd still be a success though albeit less of one admittedly).
More walking and I was almost there.  Some seven kilometers from Avranches and signs of civilization began to appear.  The most interesting one to me was some kind of weird TGI Fridays like steakhouse with a symbol above it looking not unlike the Mooby Cow from the movie Dogma.  You see at this point my light snack was a thing of the past, a kind of minor ancient biblical text that had all but been forgotten and I was looking for a new thing to worship.  The Mooby Cow here I come.
I crossed the road and stumbled into the filled parking lot of French autos.  As I went inside I was met with a kneejerk hospitality as well as a far more revealing French glare at my boots and overall appearance.  I must admit I wasn't exactly dressed for the occasion, bird crap on my shoulder, sheep crap on my feet, stinking of my own manly musk.  Clearly I'm not their usual patron.  But I had money and they gave me a seat away from the other patrons and served me quickly.  I ate as much as I could take.  A big burger and fries, an entire carafe of water, and then I thought (why not) order desert.  I ordered the rice pudding and called it quits.  I asked for the check and wasn't until I was back out on the road still seven kilometers from home now painfully aware of every muscle in my body that I realized it wasn't such a good idea to have ordered the rice pudding.  In fact it was just stupid.
Fighting now through stomach cramps and the sudden surge of fatigue that follows any oversized meal I carried on.  An hour later I was back on sidewalks and streetlights were shining above me.
My hotel appeared up ahead and I walked in with five minutes to spare.  Without a moment's pause I turned to the woman working the front desk and asked her if the bar was still open.  She smiled and I ordered a cognac.  A big one.  Plopped down in front of the hotel lobby TV and drank every last drop slow and smooth while watching some special on ancient peoples in Mexico reenacted with painful authenticity even going so far as to show the cave man peeing on the ground and then picking up the soggy dirt in his hands like it was some kind of miracle.
I'd like to say that after this I went back up to my room, collapsed into blissful sleep, and that was that.  But the truth was that after I payed it was another hour of me cleaning my boots and pants in the shower with the complimentary towels that I now fear to think what the maid thought of when she found them the next day after checkout.

But I was alive.  I was exhausted as well, but I still had to set my alarm early so that I could make it back to the city the next day on the bus scheduled to leave at eleven.  Back down the steep hill, across the bridge, down that dirt path mocking me with its little yellow trail marking.

See really this whole story is an explanation for why when I finally did make it back to Paris it was of the upmost importance to buy new shoes and why it was okay in fact to buy two pair and then go to Zara's and spend my life savings on an entire new wardrobe to go with my cool new shoes and it's not really my fault after all then really, so yeah.  I didn't have a choice really.  That's not entirely true.  I did spend a lot at Zara's and Andre's but not my life savings.  On the bright side I look smashing and I didn't die.  Which really only leaves me one last thing to do.  Go to bed...

Oh, but before that I have a quick announcement.  For all those that actually read this entire thing and made it to the bottom (can't believe there isn't a character limit on these things) I would like to let you know that I am going to Africa.  Morocco actually, Marrakech.  I will be there for a week in April and if there is some nick-knacky thing you want me to pick up for you from the souks just let me know!  Here's where I'll be staying:

http://www.equity-point.com/en/hostels-marrakech/equity-point-marrakech/general-information-marrakech-hostel.html

New Shoes

So I had to buy some new shoes after last weekend...long story, which I will get to in my next blog.  Expect something long and filled with pictures in order to lighten the narrative ennui.

Went to an André after class today and after about forty minutes and several pairs of shoes I found a pair I liked.  Just so happened to be the low market version of some Dolce-Gabbanas (my tastes never change, if anything they get more extravagant it seems).  Luckily they were, like I said, not the real Dolce pair and they were marked down on top of that to make room for the new spring collection coming in, so I walked out with these leather shoes for only 58 euro.  Not bad, though the picture doesn't do them justice.

I've got my eye an a pair of light brown leather high-tops from Hugo Boss next, but I'm shopping around for better prices.  I saw at another André location a pair just like them for less than half the price of the real deal (and they're last season according to the guy at the store) so I might pick those up as well just to (perhaps the first time in my life) own two different pairs of shoes at the same time!  Paris is changing me...

Very quickly

In the past couple of minutes since I put up my last post I have managed to do some damage.

While nonchalantly stirring that curry I was telling you about the overhead chandelier ejected one of its bulbs with a pop and flash, where it rocketed into the air, landed, and bounced underneath the couch sending the apartment into complete darkness except for the little red light on the hot plate where the sounds of my curry had begun to boil.  I felt my way over to the bedside lamp and switched it on, and while I was looking for the bulb I moved some things about on the table.  In the half-light I didn't see the glass, some wine left on the bottom, sitting near the edge and so when I brought my hands back to my side I struck it full on, sending it flying onto the floor behind me where it smashed into pieces.

Brilliant.

So Eren lost his phone today And my wounds are healing nicely

My french is coming along, or at least Eren and I can talk more easily.  We've started spending time with another classmate, Greg, after class.  Yesterday we all went out to get food and we sat around and practiced our French very slowly.  Greg is American, and it's nice to break away from French periodically (though not long so as not to ostracize Eren) and speak plainly, or express myself exactly as I mean to.  Greg moved to France with his mother, sister, and cousin and plans to stay here for three years until his mother's contract is up.  She works for a bank in the US that's owned by BNP Parabis (a french bank) and they hired her to come over to Paris to help with set up some new location or work on some project of that kind.  They packed up right after he graduated high school and he's here studying French at the Sorbonne, after which, he says, he plans to transfer over to the Paris school of economics and study business.  He lives now in the 7th.
Eren asked him to join us a few days ago just before my bleeding adventure.  We went to a cafe and spoke for some time with English-French and Turkish-French dictionaries splayed open on the table, sipping espresso and commenting mostly on the past while speaking in the present tense.  A tense, I've finally managed to escape from into the future.  I cannot properly express my joy of being able to say with confidence what I'm going to do as opposed to what I'm doing.  It brings hope in many ways not just metaphorically.  After we parted ways I headed off alone to Chatelet as usual, bandages hidden beneath my socks.

For as you see, the day before I had thought it was time (I had run out of long-necked socks you see) to try out Grandpa's shoes and answer the question once and for all if he had ever worn them outside the store.  He had not.  I made it to Nation, four stops south on the blue line (Metro 2), on my way to class that morning before I noticed anything was wrong.  I was running a bit late as usual and so when I stepped from the train, moving my feet casual and unknowing, I had no option but to continue on to class as I felt the leather, never broken in, cut into the back of my heel.  By the time I made it to class my knee was shaking slightly and it was only through rigorous determination that I arrived at all, focusing as much as I could on bending my knees and walking forward like I hadn't crippled myself for the sake of appearance.  I sat down to class just starting and didn't dare look at the damage done, but only managed to convey to Eren sitting next to me that I would be going home straight after class.  No coffee today.  This was Friday I believe, because I was supposed to attend one last session of Phonetics before the week was out, but not before I wobbled home and switched back into my boots.  A stroke of luck coupled all of this with a wicked allergy attack of some kind undetermined or maybe a product of too much or too little sleep.  Either way Eren thought I was just sick and so he didn't ask why I wasn't planning on sticking around.  Which was good, I hadn't learned how to say I've rubbed the skin off my feet so badly because I thought it would be safe to walk in these shoes and now I need to go home and curl into a ball, yet.  Once class was over I stood up, feeling the sores still fresh and begging for reprieve, and slowly (no, quickly to keep in stride with Eren who seemed that day determined to half-run to the Metro) made my way home.  Riding north to Chatelet - Les Halles, transferring east to Nation, heading up and down stairs that seem to stretch off into infinity with a whole parade of impatient Parisians in train behind heading home to slather up a baguette or two, transferring north again to Phillipe Auguste and then walking the block from there back to my apartment.
When I sat down on my bed and carefully peeled off my shoes and socks I saw the damage done.  A total of four blisters burst and bleeding, a whole heel caked in red, three more blisters not undone but bloating, and not a band-aid in sight.  Some wet paper towel to clean the wound and then a jimmy rigged bandage of more paper towel and masking tap wrapped around my heel.  I slipped on a pair of dirty socks, because they were thicker, and slipped my boots back on over that.  And I got to blow my nose.  Success in its own way.
I looked at the time and saw that my Phonetics class would be starting in about thirty minutes and it would take me almost an hour to get there.  On top of that the class only lasts an hour at best so I decided it wasn't worth showing up in the middle of.  Hope I didn't miss anything too important.  They like to drop tests into your lap on Fridays here.  No matter because it wasn't happening and I was recovering from a self induced trauma.  No, instead (determined not to use this as some excuse to lie up) I got back on my feet and headed back downtown to see if I could gather something useful from the shelves of Gilbert Jeune, the massive bookstore where I'd earlier purchased my textbooks.
A train ride back and a much more pleasant walk, I found myself in the poetry section, fourth floor.  I was looking for the work of Yves Bonnefoy who I'd recently discovered online through some searching of French poets.  A work in particular called In the Threshold's Lure or Dans le leurre du seuil.  Luckily I found it, they have nothing in translation, and only a section of English language novels on the fifth, so I bought myself a copy in French and then found a new more comprehensive dictionary.  That in itself was a treasure to find.  Try looking for an English-French dictionary in France, ha.  No, but plenty of French-English, which is not the same thing.  Luckily I found a rather comprehensive one (some 70,000 entries) that was impartially bilingual and picked that up as well.  So far I've translated five pages of a fourteen page poem, but it's difficult and I wasn't completely confident of my results.
So Sunday (I seem to sleep through my Saturdays) I decided to do some research on English language bookstores in the city and see if I could pick up the work in translation (something I maybe should have done from the get go).  There are tons of English language bookstores.  They're all secondhand stores, buy and sell, and privately owned.  It's not surprising really, not even considering the amount of ex-pats, but just by shear volume of bookstores in Paris alone there are bound to be several in other languages.  It seems like every street has a bookstore, and most are of the secondhand, musty, sporadically shelved variety that I adore.  I quick internet search gave me the location of about twenty or so English language stores in the 1st-5th arrondissements, so I took up my bag, bandaged up my feet (yes I finally bought band-aids), and was off.
The first place I looked was the Red Wheelbarrow (a William Carlos Williams reference I'm guessing) but couldn't find anything by Bonnefoy.  Not all a miss, the place was darling and the woman working the counter was very kind, climbing up on a radiator to see if there were any books by Bonnefoy up and away from sight at the top of the shelf.  I picked up a copy of collected poems by Neruda just to own something by the man and was off again.  That day was beautiful (not unlike today in fact) blue skies, warm sun, and people were lined up along the banks of the Seine (or the northern bank exclusively which was drenched in sunlight) reading, eating, napping, smoking, talking and the streets were filled to the brim.  It seemed to be the day Paris discovered spring.  I walked along the water myself for a time, then passed Notre Dame, crossed south, and weaved through the narrow streets of the 5th until I found the Abbey Bookstore, but found it closed for the day.  Not surprising, most things shut down on Sunday and most Sundays are not as pleasant as that one.
It took me some time before I found my next stop, east down Saint Germain then south off of Odean where the street forks twice and you have to keep all the way to the left in order to get where I was going.  The San Francisco Bookstore.  The place was no larger than the Wheelbarrow had been, one room smaller than my last apartment, jammed to the trimming with used books, the glue in the bindings gone yellow and stickless with age.  I asked the man at the desk where the poetry section was and he pointed it out for me.  What should I find?  One single copy of Bonnefoy in translation, selected early works including In the Threshold's Lure with the French on the facing page, old and the pages bent but only a couple of euro.  I went up to the counter without a moment's hesitation and bought it, striking up a brief conversation with the shop owner.  We talked about his store, France, San Francisco of course, and Gertrude Stein.  I asked him what brought him to Paris and he said he had read Stein's work, all her prose and some poetry, though it was her prose that attracted him.  That seemed to be answer enough.  Why move to Paris and open a bookstore?  Because I read Gertrude Stein.
We talked about her life and her writing for a while and he told me where the old Shakespeare and Company had been, just around the corner in fact, where Stein, Hemingway, and others would exchange books, pick up their mail, etc.  He said he felt fortunate to own an English language store so close to the original site of that oh so famous librarie.  I wished him a good day and I headed off to a sandwich shop on Saint Michel where I bought a salmon panini that I took with me across the quai to join in the throngs of people shored up along the Seine.  I sat there eating and reading for about an hour as the sun began to cool, and then I walked back intending to walk the whole way back to my apartment, but unable to because of my feet.

I spent the next day reading and checking my translation (finding it surprisingly accurate for the most part) and writing.  If you get a chance and enjoy poetry at all (though I'm not sure anyone reading this actually does) find yourself a copy of Bonnefoy's work.  It really is amazing.  He's done a lot of prose work as well, critical writing on poetry, sculpture, and painting - art in general typically, and I want to pick up a copy when I get home.  In the short time I've been here I've now purchased about eight or so books, so I think I should leave all other purchases for when I return.  Mom, expect a package of books at some point because there is no way these are all fitting into my suitcase.

Today when I got to class Eren was not there waiting at the door like he always is.  I'm not sure when the man gets up in the morning, but he always seems to be the first one outside the door.  I figured I had simply beat him today because I had gotten up around nine in order to make it to my cinema lecture which turned out not to be my cinema lecture but an art history lecture instead.  Very confusing.  I checked the schedule and made sure I hadn't made a mistake, but no it said that the lecture was supposed to be cinema and art history was in the afternoon.  I'm not sure what the mixup was about or if the times were switched or what is really ever going on with the French higher education system, but I sat through it for about an hour and a half as the woman at the front jabbered away about some nonsense rolling her cursor over the oeuvre of Courbet noting this or that or maybe talking about her personal life, her husband leaving her for a twenty year old woman named Ginger, her favorite cats, the way she best prefers her tea for all I know.  Needless to say I left early and grabbed an espresso while I finished my homework before my practical course.
When class finally started Eren showed up looking grim and explained that he had just come from his Phonetics class and couldn't find his phone.  He had looked around for it, but it wasn't anywhere, and it contained all the numbers of his friends and family here in France and back home in Turkey.  He was appropriately upset.  I asked him what he was going to do, and he said he didn't know.  Even if he got a new phone he wasn't sure of anyone's number (the downside of any contact list).
After class, in order to cheer him up slightly, I paid for his coffee at a cafe over near Forum des Halles, and we people watched and talked about life back in the US and his plans for the future as far as journalism goes.  That future tense coming so nicely into hand already.  We parted ways, him in search of a new phone and me off to reheat some vegetable curry I'd thrown together last night.

Pop on the hot plate, clean out a bowl, and voila - lunch.  I should have enough for dinner tonight as well, but I picked up a baguette and two pain au chocolat (those for breakfast) just in case.  I went to the local cafe after that, got another coffee, read some poetry, wrote, and went for a walk around Pere Lachaise as the sun began to set.  Now I'm here.

So Eren lost his phone today and my wounds are healing nicely, and you, well you're all caught up.

Je ne suis pas mort

As the day comes to a close, so marks the end of my first month in Paris.  A short month I'll admit, but a month gone by none-the-less.  This feels like a good a time as any to talk about general impressions or catch up on my overall mood while my fingers gain back some tingling sense of warmth.  Perhaps I should have worn gloves today.  C'est la vie (perhaps the most profound cliche I know in French other than "Je suis").  France as a whole - well I can't comment - but Paris I know something about.  I thought living in Chicago was a rather grand adventure, or at least I thought I knew what it was to say that I lived in a "big" city.  True, Chicago is large, massive compared to those two rivers I grew up along but nothing compared to Paris.  Paris makes Chicago look like downtown Milwaukee on a Sunday.  Anyone who as ever been downtown Milwaukee any day of the week will understand what I'm trying to say.  The streets here are packed throughout the day and into the night.  The cartography was invented along the rivers and the expansion of living and the only city planning was done around large monuments and round-abouts surrounding large monuments with very little attention being payed to the streets webbing from those points.  There will be at times grand boulevards fed into by countless minor streets and avenues some too small to fit a grocery cart and yet somehow big enough to merit their own name.  There are no alleys and yet arguably there are hundreds.
Montmartre is a ratted nest of uphills and downhills that ranges from sites of romantic era beauty to modern-day pornographic schmooze.  Which affords its own beauties I suppose, but something more appropriate for the walls of the Pompidou than the Louvre.  The downtown, the central arrondissements (1-4), are a never ending examination of grandeur and excess topped in a mansford roof.  There is hardly a turn that doesn't lead one to a picturesque living gallery: a quaint cafe along the quai, the impression of a palace, and La tour eiffel faint but always upon the horizon.  There is no question about the magic of the City of Lights.  Though as far as romance goes - I'd prefer the country.
The Latin Quarter is under frantic practical use by several universities and institutions, yet it is dressed up like a painted dancer for tourists.  Maybe that can be said of most of Paris but the Latin Quarter most of all.  I spend a lot of time there, the Sorbonne is located just south of the River Seine in the fifth arrondissement.  My practical course is just off Rue Dante with a view of Notre Dame out the window and only a block away.  I cross the courtyard of that famed cathedral at least once every day on my way to class coming from the metro stop at Chatelet - Les Halles.  After class it has become my habit to go with Eren to some cafe, a new one every day, and share a meal over some confused French conversation.  Confused mostly on my part I admit.  In the time it takes to shuffle down a street and find another I've already seen the entire color spectrum possible to the human eye (perhaps a bit limited in my eyes, but that's another matter).  Expensive, colorful, and frantic.  For all that is said of European leisure I've never in my life seen so many people running.  Running to what? for what?  I don't know.  My play-it-cool rule about never running unless it is life threatening seems a bit out of place here, and I'll admit I've dashed after a train or two when I know missing it would only mean waiting two minutes for the next one.
To the west in the 7th arrondissement there is not much to be said.  It is what you might expect of an area inhabited by that bridge to nowhere.  Expensive, chic, and even more expensive.  That's not to say that the rest of Paris isn't, but considering that the 7th is more strictly (high-class) residential than others in that middle band of the city makes you wonder if the price is exclusively warped for the sake of tourists or the chic homeowners of Paris.  Either way, it is what it is, and there's not much to see.  I would never go there again if I didn't intend to see the Musee d'Orsay a few more times and finally reach the top of the Eiffel Tour.  It does, though, lead one to suspect (as many forgettable neighborhoods do) what fine restaurant is hidden away in those trés chic streets.  Maybe none at all.
As for my own neighborhood (the 20th) I find it absolutely pleasing.  I wouldn't have liked to be anywhere else.  It's labeled as a "working class" area, but like all of Paris it doesn't look like work at all.  The attitude and the lack of flash on the other hand give it away, and the only tourist attraction happens to be in my backyard.  On the weekends when the supermarché Franprix is closed they hold a huge open air market in the middle of the street.  I've looked at several guide books and none of them say anything about the 20th other than Pere Lachaise, and honestly, that's a good sign for me.  If I was in Paris for a week I would get a hotel downtown (with God's money) and never leave the single digits.  But I'm here for four months, and this is the perfect place to be.
My only experience with the outer rings of Paris has been a brief and fruitless trip to the upper northwest in search of a package.  Several days ago I found a slip in my mailbox - how long it had been there I do not know but I only saw it that day - from UPS letting me know that they tried and failed to reach me and my package would be waiting at their main facility way out on the opposite side of the city.  If I didn't pick it up by May 1st it would be shipped back to the US.  What package?  Good question.  My mother had said Uncle Terry had sent me something, and I was suspecting this was that (though exactly I still don't know).  I had the good sense to leave behind my bag when I left, as I soon found out the trains were packed to the brim that evening.  Attendants at major transfer stations were forced to shoving people into the cars and manually closing the doors.  To watch each train leave was like seeing twenty people crammed into a speeding telephone booth with their eyes bulging up to the glass.
At the end of the line, I departed (or was released) out onto a rather ordinary looking street.  The multi-story apartment buildings were still though less ornamental, there interspersed with beleaguered cafes and empty lots.  I walked down Victor Hugo and kept my eyes to the ground.  On my right only factories.  It was dusk, and soon it would be night, and I had it in my mind to get out of there before it got too dark.  It took some luck to find the UPS station, it was settled back among the factories, mixed in with forty or so other loading docks in a less than pedestrian friendly zone.  After talking briefly to a worker smoking against the building I found the entrance and was buzzed in.  The man working spoke no english, but he spoke slowly enough for me to understand.  I showed him the slip I'd found and he asked why I hadn't come sooner.  I don't know.  I just didn't see the notice until today - I check my mailbox daily.  He took my slip and disappeared for almost an hour while I waited listening to another worker talking to her girlfriend on the phone.  There was an automatic coffee machine in the waiting room and workers filtered in and out to fill up a cup for fifty cents a pop.  When he returned he explained (or I gathered as much) that the package had already left to be sent back to the US, because it had been at the dock for the maximum five days.  He had called and placed a hold on it (it would be somewhere in Germany by that night), and asked for it to be sent back.  I gave him my email address and he said he would contact me when it arrived.  Okay.  Despite my best efforts I ended up walking back to the station in pitch black.  I would not recommend visiting northwestern Paris if you can help it.
For life, day to day, it doesn't amount to much.  I do very little.  I wake up, eat breakfast, and shower (on a good day) then head off for class in the early afternoon.  After, I have lunch with Eren and go home.  I sometimes pick up food from the Turkish restaurant down the block or (on a really good day) I stop by the grocery store to make myself dinner.  When I get back to my place I settle in, watch TV, read (I finally finished The Savage Detectives), write (so far only 14 pages), watch more TV, and sleep.  Rinse repeat.  The weekends I go for walks, take my reading and writing to the local cafe, and consider going to a museum.  When it rains or if I'm feeling cramped I take a lap around Pere Lachaise and then come home to shower.  Cold water, hot water.  I've been inside the cemetery four times now and still haven't found Gertrude Stein.  The streets of the cemetery are a confused labyrinth not unlike the rest of Paris, but more confined and more poorly labeled.  I don't know what will happen if I find her tomb, probably nothing, but I've been reading Tender Buttons online and feel the need to see her resting place as a sign of respect. Along that same vein I have stopped by the shared tomb of Eloisa and Abelard every time I've been in if only to recite the lines "How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!  The world forgetting, by the world forgot.  Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!" within my head unashamedly.  There's a dog carved onto the grave to represent fidelity, but considering that the guy was castrated you have to wonder if that lessons the gravity of the commitment (at least on his part).  I mean what else was he going to do?  Not to cheapen the story, it is one of the greatest loves of all time.  If you haven't read Alexander Pope's poem I'd recommend it.
Poorly masked transition.
Classes are in three parts.  I have a practical course every week day for two hours with Madame Chamblas.  She's in her early forties, but looks much younger.  She has orange hair and heavily emphasizes her nazzle R's.  I'm really happy she's my teacher actually, and I enjoy going to class.  She's fun and she makes jokes that sometimes I don't understand, but she's always so animated and lively that it usually makes me laugh anyway.  I sit near the back of the class next to some Americans and Eren.  Nothing much to say.  We're working on articles of speech.
Every Tuesday I have two conference courses that are not even worth speaking about.  In my cinema class last week we watched two films by Cedric Klapisch, the second of which I'd already seen so I skipped out early.  The first one was very good, it was called L'Auberge espangole, a comedy about a French guy moving to Barcelona to study economics ends up sharing an apartment with like five other people who all speak different languages so there was thankfully enough English for me to gather the plot.  Anna, you'd like it a lot.  As far as my French Art History class goes I'll have to let you know once I actually attend.
Lastly, every other week (today was my first class) I have phonetics.  It's surprisingly short, the woman is kind but clearly frustrated, and I sit in the back.  Today I was about the only person who spoke for the first ten minutes while she asked us what a syllable was (fun) and then had us list as many words as we could of each increasing syllable count in French.  I was forced to use ridiculous verbs like nous fleurissons (we flower) because I couldn't think of anything, and she kept looking at me like I was nuts.  Little did I know that after we made that list we had to go into the next room and put on headphones and repeat all the words we'd come up with into a microphone to listen to our pronunciation.  So, thanks largely to me and my random word choices, the whole class ended up having to repeat over and over again the most slapdash assortment of French words ever compiled.  If you've never taken a class like this (and I'm assuming most haven't) the idea is that the teacher speaks into a microphone the word you're supposed to say, then you speak into your microphone, and then she repeats the word for clarity, then you move on to the next word.  Once you go through the whole list you press a little button on the board in front of you and you listen to the two recordings that have been made.  One is the teacher talking and then overtop of that you hear your voice.  Very eery.  So once it reaches the end you can hear how your individual pronunciations either match up or don't match up with the teacher's.  Even weirder is that while you're reviewing your recording the teacher can listen with her headphones at the front of class and turn on and off her microphone to speak to you individually about the word you're on.  So, as you're listening to a thoughtless recording, fading in and out of half consciousness, suddenly the voice in the headphones comes alive! and speaks to you and demands that you try that word again.  It's very unsettling.  You feel like you're in an oral bubble of sorts and you don't know who's listening to you or what anyone else is saying.  And you're in a cubicle.  I wasn't a huge fan.  On the upside I'm sure it will help with my pronunciation.
Right now?  Drinking wine and eating chocolate.  I know, I'd be jealous too.  It's great being able to order alcohol whenever I want.  It's like my birthday already came and went.  I don't even get carded, which is good, because I'm not sure I'd even understand the question if some one asked me.  I know this is a very cliche coming of age sentiment: Ooo, I can drink legally now!  But it's the little things, you know.  It really is.
One last thing quickly - Some one commented today that I looked really dressed up.  It would have been a compliment if I hadn't been dressing this way because I literally have no other clean clothes to wear.  I'm not fancy, in fact I'm a slob, it's just that my laziness has taken on a new level of class for the time being.  I'm unnaturally unnerved by the laundromats here.

For my next trick I'm going to go take every classic cheesy tourist picture I can around the city with a big smile on my face.  Okay, that's all for now.

-John

Turkish Endeavors

So, I guess my "radio silence" has got my mother fearing for my life.  Radio silence being the term used when I do not put up a post for a couple of days I suppose.  But, in an effort to be a good son, I've decided to sit down and solve the problem.  A new post.

Since last we spoke I went to the Musee d'Orsay, and the Eiffel Tower, walked up and down the Seine at night, went back to that library to find it overrun and uninhabitable, taken my phonetics exam, and gone to class repeatedly (and on time).
The Musee d'Orsay was everything I could have hoped it to be.  Beautiful paintings all around, hitting hard my love of Impressionism with works from Renoir, Manet, Monet, Degas, and countless others.  Or I suppose they're countable, but that fact flattens the effect I suppose.  After that, a cafe allonge, and after a brisk walk I found a nice cafe near the base of the Eiffel Tower and had dinner.  Then, as the sun was setting, I walked around and took some pictures.  I decided not to go up in the tower, because it was getting cold and I had already been to the museum that day and am trying to conserve my money for important things like: food.

Quickly on the subject of food: I was apprehensive to buy a baguette.  Hear me out.  See, I had been eating plenty of sandwiches, trying different kinds, paninis, etc.  All of them are made with baguettes, so it wasn't so much an issue of the bread.  Instead it was a question of what on god's green earth are these French people doing with all this bread?  Every day and night I would see people walking home with two, three, four baguettes slung under their arms like they were going to feed the homeless masses.  But even one baguette is a lot of bread.  Those suckers are really long, and to be honest I didn't grow up in a house where bread accompanied every meal.  I just don't know what to do with it.  Eat it obviously, but in my mind I thought that would mean making a meal, cutting up the bread, pouring some wine, lighting candles, etc.  A hassle in plain english.  But, as I was considering the prices of Parisian cafes the other day I decided it was time I just pick up a baguette (I had butter) and for that night I would have bread and wine for dinner.  My literal bread and butter.  So, that night (along with the rest of Paris) I went home with a baguette under my arms.  Cost?  One euro.  Okay, that seems reasonable.  What did I find out when I got home?  Baguettes are to kill and die for, especially when they're fresh from the local bakery.  Absolutely wonderful.  That night I ate standing up, slathering butter onto slices of bread and pouring hubris amounts of wine down my gullet to wash the whole feast down.  Fantastic.  Enough about food.
So like I was saying, I didn't go up in the Eiffel Tower.  Last time I'd been to Paris we only made it to the second tier so one of these days I will need to go all the way up just to say I did it.  But not that night.  No, instead I headed down to the banks of the Seine and walked all the way back to the opposite side of the city as the sun finally settled behind the horizon and the City of Lights finally earned its name.  Every building was lit up, some of the government buildings were set aglow with blue and red across their facade.  Each bridge had a string of lights and tour boats with spotlights and flash cameras glided along the black water passing the shadows of trees along the buildings and people strolling by.  A repeat experience is most definitely required.
By the way, the reason I'm being so ambiguous about which days these things were happening on is because I have a terrible memory and no idea.  So let's just pretend it's only been a day since my last post and it was a very busy day.  That way I can keep saying "yesterday" when I really mean one of the five days since I last posted anything.  Okay.
So yesterday...went to class, a lot.  I feel like that's all I did yesterday.  Though after class I did finally take my phonetics test.  As I walked into the room where it was taking place, a one on one conversation with a french language teacher, I knew this wasn't going to take very long.  In fact I cut it short with my response to her second question.  Je ne parle pas francais.  She looked up from her checklist of questions with a sort of pleased shock on her face.  I guess after a whole day (possibly more) of interrogating people's unpleasant French skills she was happy to see someone who knew the most important phrase of all.  I don't speak French.  With that I was assigned into a beginner course for the afternoons after my practical course.  The phonetics tests are every day Mon-Fri every other week.  They start next week.  After this I was able to sign up for my conferences, which I guess are basically just large lectures.  Being a debutant I was only able to pick from a couple of options, so I chose History of French Art and French Cinema.  Obviously.  It was either that or a lecture about food that took place at 8 am, and there was no way I was going to sit through a two hour lecture listening to my stomach grumble knowing that I would have to run to make it to my practical course with no time for breakfast once it let out.  No thanks.  I'll stick to what I know.
Only problem is that my Art History course is at the same time as my phonetics course, so once a week I'm going to skip my lecture.  As it was described to me (finally) it's a big room, lots of kids, the teacher talks, you take notes, and at the end there is a test you can take if you want.  I'm picturing back of the room blank stares and doodles a plenty.  Yes, what was this whole trip needing?  A man speaking to me in droll elongated French with complex sentence structures and multiple tenses while I sink into the oblivion of hundreds of strangers.  So excited.  Maybe I'll get to watch some Godard.  At least that way if there are no subtitles I may already know what they're saying and it won't matter so much.

What else...oh yeah I just remembered "yesterday" I went back to that library.  No dice.  Full to the brim with students. I couldn't even think in there.  Instead yesterday (a different yesterday I think) I went to the local cafe by my place where I once spent those three hours on those two verbs and read Bolano for about four hours.  I left in a trance kind of stumbling about like a somnambulist trying to find the kitchen.  I guess I'm not used to reading so much.  Honest I only drank one coffee.
You'll be happy to know I've been doing my homework.  And today I finally hoped a turnstile.  Now, in my defense, I did intend to pay.  It was just an act of passion.  My pass has been acting up this past couple of yesterdays and sometimes it won't let me through and I have to use another turnstile and rub the thing around the sensor for awhile before it lets me through.  Well today I was in a hurry (okay not really) going to class and I tried swiping my card on the sensor but it didn't work.  A business guy passed through the turnstile to my left so I followed after him and tried swiping my card at that turnstile.  He was polite enough to hold the little gate back at the end for me, and it just felt like an invitation to jump.  Besides my card didn't work immediately and the guy was holding the thing for me.  So I jumped it.  The guy looked a little shocked.  I seem to be doing that to people.  Je ne parle pas francais; oh, thank you mister, now watch as I break French transit law as you aid and abet.  Au revoir!
As you might have guessed I'm doing just peachy on my own (except for the law breaking).  I'm quite liking it, but that's nothing new. J'aime la solitaire.  But, knowing that my mother would simply die and then turn over in her grave if she knew I wasn't trying to actively seek out friends I decided to make one today.  A Turk from Istanbul.  He and I have sat next to each other every day since the beginning of class so I decided to ask him to lunch after class today.  What did I learn.  He speaks no English and I speak no Turkish, so we would have to speak French.  Ha ha.  Oh cruel fate.  Whatever, we made it work.  Our French is at an equally bad level and so we're understanding.  We even managed to communicate that tomorrow after class we are going to go to Sacre Coeur together because I hadn't been yet.  He's nice and we talked about books and authors and French and waiters and where we lived and how old we were and anything else that can be expressed with a limited vocabulary and a basic mastery of the present tense.  Okay, one friend down.  Now maybe I'll find me an English speaking one and really be in business.  So there you go mom.  I had my first meal with another human being, and possibly my first unobligatory conversation.  Voila.  Looking at the positives I think it will be good to keep hanging out with Eren (his name).  It will really force me to speak French and will probably bring up my conversation skills to a new level, level one.

What else did I do yesterday?  I watched an unhealthy amount of TV.  I wrote a little.  I've got a test tomorrow.  Maybe I'll make myself dinner tonight.  Really spoil myself with a nice bowl of cereal.  Who knows.

Okay, I'm pretty sure I've run out of things to say for now.  Hope all is well state side.  Make sure to leave some comments, or send some emails.  This radio silence thing does work both ways.  I'm not just a source of unending joy, I'm also a human being who likes to hear about your lives.  Send some updates people.  Or just talk about how much you miss me (Emily).  I'll take anything.  That's all for now!

-John

Rimbaud and The Flowers of Evil

Friday I slept in, packed up some things, and was off.  My apartment was ice cold so I made sure to layer, but when I got outside the sun was shining and I was sweating.  I got off the metro at Chatelet-Les Halles and made my way over the bridge to Notre Dame.  Over the Seine and I was in the Latin Quarter, took a turn east and popped out on Rue Dante (a literal inferno that particular afternoon) and made my way into the building where my classes were to be held.  Up to the third floor, a little nervous, with class about to start (an ever increasing habit of mine) I reached for the handle on the door and pulled.  It came off in my hands.  I looked around to see if anyone had seen me (this wasn't a good start) and then proceeded to try and screw it back on.  After a couple of turns I thought I'd gotten it, but after giving it a tug there I was with a broken handle and a stripped screw sticking out of this impenetrable door.  Was this a trick?  Perhaps the first of many tests meant to weed out the less intelligent students?  Probably.  Either way I wasn't having it, so I slide the handle back on and pulled at an angle this time and got the door to prop open wide enough for me to slip my hand in get it the rest of the way.  In the hallway (which was rather small) were a whole group of students standing around holding those little white cards they'd distributed the other day marking where our class was to be held and who our teacher would be.  I found an empty slice of wall and leaned against it.  Empty probably because it was right next to the bathroom door where people kept squeezing in and out of with regularity.  An American came in through the door I had just entered holding a door handle in her hand and looking a quite worried.  She went up to the classroom door and peaked in to see it was full of students from the previous class and she panicked, checking her card to be sure this was the right room, and then trying to get into the bathroom only to realize that wasn't the door she'd come from and maybe it was best if she stood where she was and wait like the rest of us.  After a few minutes had passed and the students of the previous class filled out we were ushered in by a very cheerful 38-year-old French woman.  I found a seat near the back.
The rest of class went smoothly, speaking only in French, we were stressed with the importance of etre and avoir (those two verbs I'd spent three hours on a couple of nights ago) and made introductions - Je m'appelle John.  Je suis americain.  J'ai vight ans.  And that's all I got.  Even in France I wasn't the only John in the room, but I was one of only a handful of Americans.  We had people from Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Sweden, Norway, Korea, Japan, Turkey, Iran, Armenia, Guatemala, and England of course.  From what I could tell we all spoke some English and no French, and then a mix of everything else.  Most people were in their late twenties, some in their thirties, a couple of eighteen and nineteen year olds and then some lady in her forties who looked more like she was in her fifties either through the heavy intake of cigarettes or sunlight or both.  Class ran for two hours from noon until two and then we were out.
It was nice, easy going, we were told to buy some books from Gilbert Joseph on Saint Michel for next week and that was it.  Simple.  I can do this.  I walked around the block and took off my jacket and sweatshirt and rolled up my sleeves and then checked out the bookstore.  It wasn't hard to find the language section as it was overrun with foreigners buying up all the textbooks in sight.  The one I was looking for was labeled for my level "Niveau Debutant".  I never thought I would be considered a debutant ever in my life, and I mean ever.  But I guess that's what I get for not learning more French.  On the way down (after elbowing my way to get a copy of my textbooks, which were incredibly cheap) I decided to stop on the literature floor.
Online I'd been reading and painfully translating some of Rimbaud's work (A season in hell) and I thought I'd get myself a copy in French.  Here's something I don't get about French bookstores: Why are all the bindings white?  The entire floor for literature was shelved in white bound books, I literally felt the life draining from me when I got off the escalator.  And it wasn't just that bookstore, this is something that I've noticed of bookstores around the city as well.  The covers aren't white but the bindings are, and when you line them all up like that it's not only unpleasant, it's unsettling.  If the French ever find that their literacy rate has started to plummet I think one cause could be attributed to the hospital-like atmosphere produced by the bindings of their books all shining their bald monk heads from the shelves like boring little death rays.  This also suggests that there is some kind of law or standard set where all books of literature must have this white binding, which to me is even more puzzling, because who wants a bookshelf with all white books?  Racists do, but not many other people, not me.
I kept my head down and wandered over to the poesy and shivered as I glanced around for names I recognized.  The complete works of Rimbaud (not very big, he died young and didn't think much of his work) and Les fleurs du mal by Baudelaire.  Okay, all done, time to leave.  The line was immense - or so it appeared, but as it turns out everyone had formed a line around one register which was causing the other registers (nearly empty) to be blocked off.  Don't worry, the French didn't stand for this very long and they started pushing each other and things got figured out.
I was feeling a bit hungry so I wandered around and found a nice off the beaten path Creperie and stopped in.  I ordered some baked "thing" (I don't know, they said it was the house special) with pork and chicken and potatoes and a thick layer of cheese overtop and an egg.  A glass of Chardonnay and I was feeling pretty full.  But, being that I was at my first of what will be many Creperies, I decided to eat a Nutella crepe for desert to top off that already way-too-heavy lunch, and then hemorrhage internally and collapse beneath the table where the EMTs would find me in a food coma, smiling, and muttering incoherently about cheese (not brie this time) and Nutella.
Back on my feet I waddled off to the train station at Chatelet and went home.  Lying on my bed I decided to (moving only my arms) reach for my bag and pull out that little yellow card I was given about a week ago telling me when I was supposed to go in for my phonetics exam.  Oh, look at that.  My test was scheduled for that very morning.  And look at that.  The school's offices closed ten minutes ago and wouldn't open until Monday.  Bravo, me!  Just when you thought you were doing so well you managed to screw up.  A recent memory popped into my head of my teacher holding some one's yellow card up for the class and saying something about it being tres tres important.
I tried looking on the bright side, which was that I wouldn't have to eat for at least another six hours and that phonetics classes don't start until the 21st so I had a week to get this figured out.  I still didn't and don't completely understand how these whole lectures are supposed to work, but I know they have something to do with the phonetics exam I just missed.  All I really know is I haven't signed up for any lectures yet, and I don't know when they start or how they work or where they're held.  Basically I know very little about it, and everyone I've posed the question to hasn't given a straight answer either.  "Just take the phonetics test," one lady said.  "Sure no problem, or I'll maybe just sleep right through it" (you see at the time of that conversation I hadn't decided whether I was going to be a good student or just my regular old self - guess I went with the latter).

Okay, so today's Saturday...what did I do today?  Slept till one o'clock. Check.  Ate another chicken curry sandwich from that place around the corner that knows my order so well the guy has stopped bothering to ask me what I want (and I've only been here for two weeks).  Check.  Watched an episode of Fringe.  Check.  Written half a page.  Check.  Showered!  Check....
Guess that's it really.  But if it makes anyone feel better (I know it does wonders for my self esteem) I was planning on going to the Musee d'Orsay today.  I really was.  Even thought of stopping by the Eiffel Tower just cause.  And both are open tomorrow, so screw you Thomas Jefferson, I don't need your fancy phrases and sage-like wisdom.  I'll just do it tomorrow.  And if not tomorrow than maybe Monday or Tuesday or if it's raining or something there's nothing wrong with Wednesday or Thursday that Friday can't fix or Saturday for that matter.  Besides I have at least a year and ten months before the world ends, so really there's time.

Okie Dokie (like the cheese powdered popcorn).  That's all I got.

-John