AliThinks

Ah, Welcome To France, Alison

I knew there was a transportation strike before I arrived in Paris. Aimee, Jennifer, and Kylie Mac had informed me of it during our back-and-forth messages to arrange a meeting place and time. If worse came to worst, I thought, I could take a cab from the airport.

I checked online, saw that the RER B, the suburban train that runs to and from the airport, was still running, with limited trains. But first, I decided to try the Air France bus that runs between the airport and the Gare de Montparnasse, which, conveniently was kind of where I needed to be.*

*I was leaving Paris the next day from the Gare de Montparnasse.

The flight from Atlanta arrived in Paris late, and my luggage was among the last off the plane. I walked into the airport hall, withdrew some cash, and went toward where the bus usually is. No bus, just hundreds of people in line at the taxi stand.

So I walked from Terminal 2E to the train station. It's not too far. The moving sidewalks help one speed along. I had to laugh at the moron who pushed a luggage cart onto the rolling metal. (One time, same airport, I watched as the wheels of a luggage cart got stuck on the way off the moving sidewalk. The logjam was impressive. Like the proverbial train wreck.) I scooted around the sidewalk and kept going.

Once I reached the train station (I was still in the airport, mind you), I got in line to buy a ticket for the RER. There were no sales windows open, but stations are full of machines where you can buy any number of kinds of tickets.

I stopped at a cafe for a jambon-beurre and to regroup, then made my way to Quai 11 for the RER B. An electronic sign informed me that the RER was running only as far as certain banlieues, and would not go further south. And because there was no way I was going to take the RER only to have to disembark at La Courneuve, I headed for the nearest taxi stand.

Fortunately, there weren't hundreds of people waiting.

Fifty euros later, I was at my hotel.

I went to check in and realized I'd left the printout of my reservation in the cab. And not just my hotel reservation, no; I'd left a wad of paper with important numbers and codes for the train and the car rental.

The hotel staff kindly let me check in anyway (not that they wouldn't have; I'd already paid for the room.) Then they apologized that the electricity was cut off, and the elevator wasn't working, all due to a fire alarm the previous day.

My room was on the 6^th floor.

If you've been to Europe, you know that means it was really on the 7^th floor. Granted, I had help, but I still schlepped my suitcase up seven flights of stairs. My room was cute, with a nice little eave or gable, and I was lucky that there was still some hot water.

There was, however, no air conditioning, because of the aforementioned panne d'électricité. After my shower, I sweated while I pondered how best to meet up with Kylie Mac. (Aimee and Jen couldn't make it to our rendezvous because of the strike and other mitigating circumstances.) I didn't know which metro lines were running, or how often. Being as tired as I was, I was having trouble wrapping my brain around what to do next.

Fatigue + humidity + sweatiness = brain fog.

Oh, did I mention? After months of chill, if I'm to believe my Parisian friends on Facebook, summer had arrived. It was HOT.

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I'm going to cut this short. I wrote the above on the train from Paris to La Rochelle. I haven't really had time to write since I got here, and I think I'm out of whatever it takes to make a blog entry interesting.

I'll save the good stuff for another entry.

Earworm

Some of you reading this are aware that Allan and I are currently in France. We're in Paris with my kids for their fall break.

In the mornings we take our time getting ready. My daughter turns on the TV; there's cable in the apartment, so she flips around the various video channels and I roll my eyes and think of my mother, who was quite vocal about my watching MTV back in the day.

And if you know me, you know I don't listen to Top 40 or commercial radio. Ever. At home it's streaming radio; in the car it's Sirius satellite radio. So I'm out of the loop of what's popular as far as music goes.

Thank goodness for the video channels. Between them, it's possible to hear the same song three times in the course of however long it takes us to all get ready. I've compiled a list of the catchiest tunes out there. One of them I already knew and liked, and I'll leave you to figure out which one that is. In no particular order, here's what's going through my head, all day every day. The links are to the videos of these songs on YouTube, and they will open in a new window — and that's my disclaimer: click at your own risk. Don't blame me if you get any of these stuck in your head.

Rihanna - Disturbia

Madcon - Beggin'

Kenza Farah - Au Coeur de la Rue

Erik Prydz - Pjanoo

Coldplay - Viva La Vida

Britney Spears - Womanizer

One Reason I Love The French

Lip Dub IUT SRC Rouen 2008
Uploaded by arcanes-prod


The best thing about this video might be the fact that it's one continuous shot. One. Shot. Chapeau, les gars, chapeau.

And the boys in the game room? I taught them. Not them, but boys who looked just like that at the IUT and ESC of La Rochelle. That scene brought a smile to my face.

Des Bloggeuses à Paris

Yesterday (this would be Wednesday, July 2; I'm not changing the time stamp on my blog just for three days, and it's nearly 5 am in Paris right now) I had lunch with one blogger and dinner with another.

Polly and I connected recently, and I was delighted to meet her at the same café I had a Perrier with Jeorg at last year. (And it was a total coincidence, which makes it even better). We had each had a tarte salée, salad, and a glass of rosé for lunch, then coffee. Then another coffee. The second coffee we had out on the terrasse, because the rain had stopped, and coffee on a café terrace is one of life's better pleasures. See here:

Polly's lovely daughter and her adorable friend joined us for a while, then we all went off to do other things. In my case it was a reconnaissance mission at La Droguerie.

Samantha and I arranged to meet at 7 for dinner somewhere. She crossed the Seine and we met at Les Halles, which was kind of her, since it meant I only had to walk about 300 meters. She'd heard of an Italian restaurant with great ravioli; I knew there was one on the rue Montorgueil. It turned out the be the same place, so we had ravioli (hers with figs and Parma ham, mine with truffles, Parma ham, and button mushrooms) and the house red.

By 9:30 I was back in my room, exhausted. An hour later, I was asleep. A dream woke me at 3:00, and here I am.

But what matters here is the people I met. Blogging is such an amazing thing. (YES. I know I said I thought about quitting.) You encounter people via the blogosphere, and if you're lucky enough to meet in person, you automatically have a connection. My jetlag-addled brain can't think of a better way to say that.

In any case, spending time with Polly and Sam was a great way to spend my first day in Paris. (My second day in Paris will actually involve fast trains, the city of Bordeaux, and picking up my children.)

Merci, les filles !

(Now, do I try to sleep a little more, or do I hit up the hotel breakfast in 40 minutes?)

I Have Backup!

In case you didn't believe me:

Vive la différence: dispelling French myths

The French say “Ooh-la-la” a lot

Indeed they do, but not as we imagine they do. First, they say it quite quickly, as one word (with a long first syllable, a long third syllable and a rapid “la” in the middle), not slowly and as three separate words, as we tend to parody them. Second, it is not necessarily, or even usually, an expostulation of delighted surprise at some frothily extravagant naughtiness. It is used much more often to indicate that one is impressed — by anything at all: a fine coq-au-vin, a particularly crunchy rugby tackle or the extent of the damage to someone else’s car. Quite how the phrase acquired its salacious overtones in our minds, I’m not sure. Certainly not from the French. Unlike us, they aren’t surprised by sex. Nudity (indeed, porn) on television, whores on country roads, adultery in high places: they’re all just part of the landscape.

From The Telegraph, hat tip to SuperFrenchie.

Also, I ate foie gras and a salade de gésiers confits for dinner, but that's another story.

Non! Je Ne Repasse Rien...

...rien, rien, je ne repasse* rien**

The place we are staying has a washing machine, Dieu merci, but no dryer. This is okay; there is a drying rack in the garage, and I just brought it in and set it near the radiator***.

I got to thinking about many French women I know. They iron things. Things like socks. Underwear. Dish towels. And you know what?

I don't. I don't iron anything if I can avoid it.

I think I'd rather poke my eyes out with chopsticks than iron something.

Granted, ironing things means that you can store them more neatly. A crisp pillowcase is a joy to behold. But really. I can't be bothered.

So it was with some trepidation that I folded a clean dish towel and put it away in the cupboard next to the stiffly pressed ones. Will the owners care? Will they rent this house to me again?

I had to laugh as I was hanging the wet clothes on the rack; all of the clothespins were grouped according to color. And as I said to my daughter, this place makes me a little nervous, because it is so CLEAN. I'm thinking that someone's just a little obsessive-compulsive. It makes me smile to think that an unironed dishtowel or mixed up clothespins would make a person shiver.

But I really want to be able to rent this house again, so perhaps I'll keep everything just so.

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* Je ne repasse rien = I don't iron anything

**with apologies to Michel Vaucaire, Charles Dumont, and Edith Piaf.

*** for those of you with no dryer, here's a trick I used to do: Hang your clothes on the rack. Set it in front of the radiator. Cover the rack with a sheet, so that three sides are enveloped. The heat from the radiator is held in by the sheet, and the clothes dry superfast!

Over And Out

We're heading over the pond tonight for a short visit. When we come back, we'll have my offspring in tow. I sound really excited, don't I? I am, but I just want to get there.

Our access to the internets may be limited to time spent in cyber cafés, so let's just say I'll be incommunicado for the next week.

Have a great weekend!

Gobsmacked

People. It took three minutes and thirty-two seconds for me to clear up something with the French administration. The. French. Administration. And at least thirty of those seconds were taken by the phone ringing at the Hôtel des Impots.

At first I wasn't hopeful, with the ringing-ringing-ringing-and nobody-picking-up-ing. When someone finally answered the phone, I said I was calling about the tax bill I'd received.

"Patientez, s'il vous plaît."

Oh, shit.

Somebody, Please

Explain to me why I woke up singing Foreigner's "Double Vision"? And no, it's not because I overindulged at the launch party for 24 Hours of Flickr. 

(Now you hate me because you're singing that song too, now, aren't you?)

The Flickr shindig was a lot of fun. I went not knowing a soul, and got to meet a number of VERY cool people, including some of my Flickr contacts. It was a great way to spend my first night in town. Also? Yahoo! knows how to throw a party. The venue was intimate without being crowded, the food was spectacular, the wine was delicious, and the music wasn't overpowering.

This morning I'm having coffee with Jeorg. We live in the same damn town and never see each other, so I'm laughing at the fact that we are meeting here in Paris. And this afternoon I'm having coffee with Gentry, although she has also told me we'll be eating cakes as well. In between the two coffees, I have no idea what I'll do. The French have a great word, flâner. Je vais flâner dans les rues. I'm just going to mosey about.

I love this city. My children are the reason I came to France, and I can't wait to see them tomorrow. But I'm glad to have this time in Paris; I visited only a handful of times during my marriage, and that was early on.

There's more to say (there's always more to say about Paris), but I'll leave it for now.

Why I'm Not Sorry That Sarko is Prez

First, thank you all for your comments to my last post. Many of you have opinions similar to mine.

Second, let me say that my politics are different in France and in the U.S. Here I'm a bleedin' liberal; in France I am more conservative.

While I think France is great for some things like health care and elementary education, I think it needs to change as regards business and unemployment. Other people have talked about these things with much more clarity than I can.

Thirteen years in a country gives you time to observe things. I remember busting my butt working three jobs (and I had two kids under the age of six) while my neighbor across the street pretended she was a single mother. Her welfare family allowance equaled the sum of my wages.

I watched my ex-husband struggle to build a business under the crushing weight of taxation.
I listened to my students tell me they wanted to be fonctionnaires, because "at least "it's a stable job." Twenty percent of the workforce in France works for the government.
(Full disclosure: I am a fonctionnaire, on personal leave from my teaching job.)

I was part of the forgotten middle class of France: those who earn "too much" to benefit from any aid (other than the standard family allowance that every family with two or more children receives regardless of income), yet who struggle each month to make ends meet. I prefer not to go into any more detail than that on my former situation.

Sure, taxes have to be paid, so that people can benefit from the great health care (I will never forget either of my 5-day hospital stays in a private room, when I gave birth), so that children can attend all-day preschool from age three on, so that the unemployed have something to fall back on, and the destitute are not left on their own.

It's nearly impossible to make any money in France. I know money is not the be-all and end-all of life. But it sure would be nice to get ahead when you work hard. It would be nice to have a job that paid a living wage, and not just *that* much more than your unemployment benefits. ("Hmmm, I get 1000 euros a month in unemployment, and this job is going to pay 1200/month before taxes? Can you say 'no-brainer'?")

During my time in France, I never felt like I was getting ahead, not even after I got my teacher certification and just had the ONE job. I was earning more, but that extra money was being eaten up by my car, because I was posted to a job 45 miles away from home (once you're in the system, you don't choose where you work). I was spending more than 200 euros a month on gas.

I feel like France is stagnating, and something has to change. Nicolas Sarkozy seems to be the only person who is ready to help France change. As for his politics about immigration...well, I was an immigrant in France. And I worked hard to integrate into French society. Granted, I had a college degree (but that got me nothing but teaching jobs: "Communications? But what can you DO? Oh, you speak English? You can teach!") and hey, my skin is white. As my ex-husband once said, when I pointed out that I was an immigrant, "Oui, mais t'es pas une bougnoule."  Nice, huh? (Non-French speakers, bougnoul is to (north) African as wetback is to Mexican.) Anyway, I still had an uphill climb.

Now I'm not sure where I'm going with this. I know that lots of French people are afraid of what Sarkozy will do. His talk of eugenics was a bit out there, I agree. But, and please pardon the analogy, the French need to learn that they can't have their cake and eat it, too. On ne peut pas avoir le beurre et l'argent du beurre!

France needs jobs. Point barre. France needs jobs that pay well, so that the economy can function. Some things are going to have to change, yes. They sure can't continue the way they've been going.

A Pre-Internet Pregnancy*

Before the existence of parenting websites and mommyblogs, we had to cope with our pregnancies the hard way. Motherless and in a foreign country, I read What to Expect When You're Expecting and wrote in my journal during my first pregnancy. I was the first of my family or friends to have a child, and boy, was I clueless. It all worked out, of course. I had a healthy baby girl three months before I turned 25.

For my second pregnancy, not only was I more experienced, but I was also fluent enough in French to feel comfortable reading parenting magazines. My favorite was famili, and I bought it every month. One of the rubrics I enjoyed was "La Future Maman du Mois," which profiled a different woman every month.

I started thinking about all this recently because at least three of my "Lost In Francelation" bloggers are pregnant. Riana, Aimee, and Deb are all expecting their first child. These future mamans have an advantage I didn't: a built-in support system via the internet. I think it's wonderful that they are able to tap into the rich source that is the interwebosphere, and that they are blogging about their pregnancies. Oh! If I'd only had a blog when I was expecting. (Sample entry from my journal: March 31, 1995. I can't believe I'm going to have a baby! Here I am with my huge belly, two weeks from my due date, and I just can't fathom the fact that a real live baby is going to come out of me. I know it's in there, heck, I can feel it moving! But it's a little person and it will grow up to be a big person and I made it! With some help from J, of course.)

But I digress. So I've been thinking about these three American bloggers in France and how lucky they are. And I got to thinking about how I dealt with being pregnant, eons ago. I thought of famili magazine, and how I sent my photo and a description in to the magazine. I thought of the phone call I received from Anne Wieme-Dufour, inviting me to be a Future Maman du Mois. I thought of that November Wednesday that I spent in Paris, being dorlotée by famili. I thought of that March day in 1998, when (with my baby son in his sling) I bought famili and opened it to this page:

Good Morning, Jetlag!

I've been awake for 45 minutes. It's 6:30 in the blessed morning. I'm trying to stream some music here, but it just ain't workin', and I'm thinking I should just go back.to.bed.

Nope. There's the music. RealPlayer. Who knew it actually worked?

So. I arrived safely, but I'll tell you, getting here was quite the series of bumbles and comic events. I can't remember a single damn thing, either, except the mess of chewing gum on my wallet. Caterpillar-gut green chewing gum, stuck to my wallet, because I'd placed the wad of it in my luggage tag from the flight. I wrapped it up, stuck it in my purse, because hello, this is France; good luck finding a garbage can when you need one. Well, my wallet fell on top of the tag in just the right position to "open" the fold I'd made in it. Gum. All over the corner of the wallet. 32° heat. Sticky!

The good news is that Hertz gave me a really hott car to drive. I'm the proud renter of a Peugeot 1007. (Entre parenthèses, why did Google default to a search in Brazilian Portuguese? Um, whaaaa?). This car was designed for apes and creatures with superperipheral vision. I kid you not, to put on the seat belt, I have to turn around, get on my knees, and reach back for the strap. I can reach the gears okay, but that drink I put in the cup-holder? Not. (I know, I know -- it's more important to shift than to drink). And the windshield? Has these things in the corners that make it hard to see. Unless you're an ape with super-peripheral vision. 

Oh, remember the bumbling and comic part? I remembered another thing: at the toll-booth, I couldn't see how to open the window. So I opened the space-age sliding door and took my ticket. Fortunately, no one saw me, ass. Unfortunately, the surveillance cemeras probably did. Fortunately, I figured out how to put down the window before I got to the next tollbooth.

But I made it here in one piece, and have had a lovely weekend with my friends. I hope you are having a good one, too.