Another fun French family moment

I don't mean to always be slightly critical of France. Really, I'm in love with France, but I guess the eye-rolling, "oh, the french" moments are easiest to point out since all of the lovely things that I love about being here are more general: everyday attitudes and pretty places.

With that disclaimer, I had another funny little encounter with a French family.

This time it was a hot, fancy French mom with two trendy little girls in the H&M underwear section. The littlest girl was sort of shifting back and forth to the music in a kind of heavy, more like imitating a monkey than dancing way. At first her mom just asked sort of flatly "what are you doing, are you dancing?" The girl didn't answer, just kept going with her caveman moves. The mother looked at her again and said "c'est atroce" (that's atrocious.")

Fête de l'humanité

(1) This year was the 80th fête de l'humanité, a giant communist festival outside of Paris where each region's communist party sets up a booth with petitions, speeches, pamphlets and cute communist puns. But it's also just a big music festival with a lefty spirit, basically more disgustingly innovative dreadlocks, Palestinian flags and nice people than the Euro-bro summer music festival I went to last month.

(2) So, in this setting, this makes perfect sense: an old French rock star, Jacques Dutronc, starts singing one of his classic songs called "J'aime les filles" or "I love girls." From the extreme distance of where I am sitting from the stage I can't see much, but suddenly notice a small red blob on the stage that is not in any of the shots projected onto the giant screen. It kind of looks like a midget? Well, yes it is. Finally, Jacques introduces this tiny woman in a ridiculous red dress as Stéphanie, his "porte-bonheur" and "mascotte" (good-luck charm and mascot). Then she tells some jokes.

The only clip I could find is the end of the song, where, gotta show love for the Corsicans by holding up that Corsican flag your midget keeps in her pocket?
So I guess its just cultural differences, but even the crunchiest of the Frenchies didn't seem to find this a little fucked up. I guess France is a little behind the US, what with all our more enlightened little people entertainment. Or keeping midgets as mascots has always been more of a European thing.

My latest repeat song

This is a song that I discovered thanks to my roommate. I love it, I listened to it all day, at least 15 times.

Party Pumpernickel

I had two very cultural moments this weekend during or surrounding my roommate's birthday in the village where her parents live.

1) One of my roommate's neighbors from when she lived in LA came all the way to France for this party. Whenever they said his name, I couldn't imagine what it would be in English. The way I heard it in French was Eeroueen, I thought his name might be Heroin, but that seemed too ridiculous to be true. Turns out it was Irwin. Anyways the American cultural moment was this. Irwin was telling me about his three daughters, about how well they got along, how old they were, their relationship status etc. Then he asked me, "would you like to see a picture of my pride and joy?" I answered sure, and he pulls out a laminated photo of a bottle of pride laundry detergent and a bottle of joy dish soap.

2) On the train on the way back to Paris, I was sitting across the aisle from a mother and her daughter. The little girl was about 4 and very chatty, the mother seemed a bit tired by the constant chatter from her daughter, and answered her sort of exasperatedly. Getting off the train, the mother told the daughter they should just wait until everyone got off, that they were in no hurry and that she didn't want to get crushed by the crowd. The little girl responded "maman, t'es un amour de maman, et je ne veux pas que tu sois coincé par ces gens' (you're a love of a mother, and I don't want you to be crushed by these people). Then she continued, "Maman, t'es un amour de maman et tu vas me manquer." (you're a love of a mother and I'm going to miss you.) Her mom was confused by this and said that they were going to get off together and that she was not leaving her, and the little girl answered "tu vas me manquer quand je serais adulte et quand je quittera la maison pour habiter avec Alexandre" (I'm going to miss you when I'm an adult and I leave home to live with Alexander). Her mom laughed and said that she was sure she still had a bit of time left before that happened.

Barefeet in a heartbeat

This is a silly fun group from Quebec that we saw at the Eurockéenes festival. I can't say that I really like penny-loafers or deck shoes though.

Where are the messy european boys?

I went on vacation to Berlin. Thought it would be a nice respite from the fancy Parisian long windblown wavy-haired, sharply dressed skinny-boys. I was expecting a substantial population of taller, slightly grungy, slouchy jeans-wearing, dirty haired types. Instead, all I saw were slick blonde, hip hair-styled, long shorts rolled up above the knee, bike-riding pretty boys. Do I have to go back to the states? I just want a nice, I look like I don't give much of a shit, but secretly I do, but only just barely enough, type of fella.

I really am very superficial.

Arrête de me bousculer

Last night I had a (maybe slightly drunken) moment of being so fed up with French (Parisian?) attitudes. I know there's a cliché that Parisians are rude. As far as my experience goes, whatever, that's not really true. To me it's sort of the opposite, people are too stupid polite. Mostly what pisses me off here is the expectations people have of others' behavior, and how patronizing and condescending people are when someone doesn't behave "properly."

Being the rude American that I am, I don't usually acknowledge or apologize if I brush by or bump someone in the metro. This is wrong. Even if the metro is crowded, people tend to expect an apology if you touch them.

Then last night we were out, on the eve of Bastille day there are dances at firehouses. And another Parisian thing is not being terribly neat or patient when it comes to forming a line. So the line to get in was a pushy mob of drunk people, fine. Except some smug jerkface with a stupid superior grin told my friend, who as far as I could tell was in "line" before him, to "arrête de me bousculer." (stop crowding/pushing me). She was drunk, and cursed in a foreign language, which didn't help.

First of all, it annoys me so much that someone in that situation, like on the crowded metro, feels entitled to not be touched. Second, after my friend cursed, the girl dude was with, who understood what my friend had said, reacts in the worst possible way. Instead of having an understandable reaction, like saying " Fuck you, I understood what you said," or something like that, the woman starts lecturing my friend. She started telling her that she was going to teach her a lesson on how to live, and that she needs to learn how to behave and blablabla. Ugh. Like one drunk asshole has so much wisdom to impart to another.

Then we got groped by some super creepers in the crowd and decided to give up. Too angry. Then we were treated like assholes for pushing the slimeface that touched my ass. These are the things that make me so angry. Guess life is pretty good then, generally. Plus we had so much fun dancing, when not having ass grabbed.

also because I love Adrien Brody

But mostly because I forgot about this song and a friend reminded me of it today. And it is so nice.

strange things

I never would have thought that I'd find a goat skin in my bed. It never even occurred to me to have never expected it. But my friend steens stopped in for a surprise visit, which explains it.

Perfume

Sparks, "Perfume". A song for non-girls like me.

Pas une vraie fille

My roommates keep telling me "tu n'est pas une vraie fille." It's actually usually more of a reflection/question, "tu n'est vraiment pas une vraie fille, Kamilla..." (Kamilla, you're not a real girl, are you?).

I get this kind of comment whenever I admit that I haven't washed my hair in a few days, or that I don't like Sex and the City. I think its pretty funny, because I think I'm very girly. I won't make any generalizations about French girls, I have no idea if my roommates are typical or not. They're pretty, kind of fashion-y girls, and to them, being a real girl involves spending SO MUCH time. Our bathroom is filled with devices, creams and goops whose purposes I have yet to figure out. Mysterious hours are passed with doors locked and machines running. And the outcome is obvious, they have gorgeous, perfect eyebrows and professional-looking manicured toes. Thinking about it is boring, all that stuff is so boring. Maybe because I already keep myself well occupied with boring pursuits: work, internet, I just can't imagine being bothered to care to that degree. I miss my grimy, sweaty dirty americans, I think I prefer slightly smelly people.

*don't really get how blogs are supposed to work, but I edited this post so that I would like it more*

Some facts of life

I have been in France for one year, and still, every time I try to bake anything, it comes out pie-shaped. Which is not surprising because, for lack of baking sheets, I make cookies in pie tins.

In one year, I haven't managed/ bothered to go to my bank and change my address. The place I sub-letted last summer probably still gets my bank statements.

My french has gotten to the point that people don't always laugh when I use slang. "Je me casse" (I'm headed out) is most often not met with giggles, still don't dare say "c'est un truc de ouf!" (it's crazy/nuts/ outta control) Too French. But I do think that sometimes I sort of blow air out of my mouth in that huffy, scowly, bothered way that French people do.

That's all I can think of for now. I've been here for one year, and I'm starting to think of this as my life, not just a little aside that doesn't really count. Turned 24 and all of a sudden realized that I can do what I want, if ever I figure out what that might be. It may just end up that I bake more pie-shaped cookies, but if it is more interesting than that, maybe I'll write about it. For posterity and because I could always use a little more time to self-indulgently reflect on my incredibly fascinating life. Lord knows I don't spend enough time over-thinking everything.

well,

I might have a bit more to say, maybe I've gotten over thinking writing a blog is useless for the time being. It's summer in Paris, its chilly though. I'm trying to eat more vegetables and less pain au chocolat. I've been riding a few more vélib, getting a lot more bruises, shaving my armpits more frequently. This sort of deliciousness is a regular occurrence when it gets nice out in Paris, how could I not be cheery?

Lazy

I have no patience, I'm easily bored. I don't know if I like to write.

Surprise!

I'm in Cairo. Back to Paris and poetry and various other happenings on Monday. Not that I updated regularly anyway...

Learn some French

I'm going to share some phrases/ expressions that I like. It's a way to fill space, since I've been bad at posting, and hopefully interesting.

The first one is actually from a story my roommate told :

" J'te coupe la tête, j'te chie dans le corps"

I don't know if I would call this a threat or an insult. It literally means "I'll cut of your head and shit in your body," but I think it sounds better if you say " I'll cut off your head and shit down your throat." This is not something that French people actually say, at least I've never heard it. I think this is more just a creative/angry person expressing themselves in a grocery store.

Wowza, maybe should have chosen something more pleasant to start out with. Oh well, bedtime.

Adventures in Poésie, the beginning

I swear it must be true: there is poetry in the air we breathe or this crazy wind we're having or something. This is how I explain my newly developed interest in poetry--more specifically in open-mic, slam type poetry events. I go to them all the time. It all started a while back...

A few months ago, my friend Saskia discovered this Meetup called Spoken Word. It's a group that meets weekly at this sweet bar in Belleville called Culture Rapide.

I must have started going well into my hater phase (actually, I confirm, I did), because most of the time I was just cringing or trying hard to pretend to pay attention. I tend to get nervous and embarrassed on behalf of friends, family, and strangers reading poetry, apparently.

I can't deal with a poem that's too self-aware and has to prove that it's a real live poem.

I get annoyed with that clichéd spoken-word style. Hopefully you know what I mean, I'm good at imitating the cadence, but I can't figure it out in blog form. This one dude tricked me for a second with his repetition, rhythm and emphasis, then at the end my friend and I both realized that his entire poem was nothing, it was just about sounding like spoken word. Maybe that's the point, but whatever it annoyed me.

Then there was the zaaaaany guy who called himself an italian surrealist toaster poet. I just made that up, but it was something similar. His poems were just like "zap bam I ate the stars, pizza" type of stuff.

The only thing that I really remember liking was this girl with an incredibly husky, deep (and not so great) voice who sang the Tori Amos song "Leather" and a song I had never heard of, but loved. I remember roughly the way her voice sounded, but it's another thing that I can't imitate in blog form. If only I were more poetic...

I really tried to be more open-minded, and I am seriously impressed that people are brave enough to go do that in front of a lot of strangers who could be secret, hypocrite jerks, like me. Cause I'll criticize until I turn colors, but I'm definitely not brave enough to write poetry.

Discobitch

Ok, I've gotten lazy. But here's a funny song that I really like. I love the way she says champagne

vday promenade

Obviously, being in Paris, I had a super romantic valentine's day, filled with champagne, quirky, sweet gestures in dingy but somehow romantic places, an elegant meal, sprinkled with truffles. Oh, and the diamonds and fur. That's how we all do it here in Paris.

But before that, I was a little mopey. It had nothing to do with the fact that it was Valentine's day, I swear! I'm just a natural-born moper. And it happened to be a Sunday, a day on which nothing ever happens, and I tend to stay in bed way too long, lazily think of half-assed ideas to get out of the house, and in general think to much about most things. Then I usually take a walk.

I took a really long, cold walk. I found this Caribbean restaurant I went to once that I had been trying to re-locate. then walked along to La Chapelle, a neighborhood with a lot of good Indian and Sri Lankan restaurants. I ate a tuna roti that I bought from a carry-out window.

Eventually found this really funny little shop and spent a while talking with the Egyptian man who owns it. I liked it because it reminds me of me, or of other things I like; a little shop filled with too much stuff. Some pretty or interesting, some just ridiculous. It also reminded me of Khan el Khalili in Cairo, sort of for the same reasons. I'll go back someday soon and take some pictures (what is better than pictures of junk?), chat with Yusuf while ignoring the potential old man quasi-hitting on me vibes and maybe buy a tiny blue fake crocodile purse. Anyways, for now I took a lil' screen capture of the google maps streetview.

I don't really know why the shop is called epicerie, which is usually a little grocery store. This place is at 92 rue Maubeuge in the 10th if anyone is interested in checking it out.

Getting situated

Well, I live in la Goutte d'Or according to this site (you have to click on the "visiter" link on the left to see the map of the neighborhood). But yesterday, my little heart was bruised (and so close to Valentine's day!) when a guy from the neighborhood association told me that where I live is not actually considered part of la Goutte d'Or. It's just "Marcadet."

I sort of had a lurking feeling that this might be the case, because rue de la Goutte d'Or is not that close to where I live. Plus the vague notion I had of the neighborhood told me that my apartment complex is just not part of that sweetly-named little neighborhood. I could just sense that, in the hearts and minds of the people who live there and are into the fact that the Goutte d'Or is a real neighborhood, we're just not quite part of it. I know, it's tragic, I hope no one feels too let down.

Marcadet-Poissoniers is my metro station and the name of an intersection. As far as I can tell, it's just a little buffer zone between neighborhoods- La Chapelle to the West, la Goutte d'Or to the South and Montmartre to the East, without a real neighborhood identity like the surrounding areas.

I bet if I hadn't shared, no one would have noticed, since you probably don't know where I live, but whatever. So I guess there's no point to this blog anymore. Just kidding! I'm still going to appropriate this neighborhood because the Internet still says I live there. Plus, where I live is kind of considered part of the neighborhood as far as renovation purposes are concerned... Legit.

Ok, I'm going to stop now, because my coworker made fun of me for how boring this is. Here is a google map of where I live. Right next to train tracks.


Agrandir le plan

Aack.

The worst dog ever, I used to see it all the time this summer, when I lived a little bit to the north of here. Unfortunately this picture doesn't give you a great idea of just how creepy and footstool-like this dog was. If you say it's cute I'll kick you.

Why

I came to Paris. It was summer, I drank wine by the canals, I sat in parks and watched kids play badminton. Then winter came, I went home, got sad, came back, got cold. And needed a project. So I decided yesterday to start a blog. Though I plan to go out and learn stuff and then post about all of the fabulous experiences through which I learn so much about other people and myself, this is probably just an excuse to spend even more time on the internet than I already do (which, if we gchat, you know is already so much).

This blog will probably taper off once it starts getting nicer and my enthusiasm for this idea wears down, but now I have a little catching up to do, so at least it might start out strong!

Hmmmmm

I'll start with a picture I took yesterday, right across the street from where I live. Yesterday was Valentine's day, and this made me laugh because it seemed too fitting. A dying bouquet of roses in an empty lot on Valentine's day. This picture goes right along with the (unfounded) stereotype I have of french people being fickle but excessive lovers, who exaggerate their feelings because pain and brooding look so good on them.

This also probably proves that after 7 months in Paris, I still don't actually know anything much about the French.