Camping in Paris: October 2014

Hey there, remember me? I know, it's been awhile. I can only say that, as I may have mentioned before, this city never stops. Even if you beg, even if you purse your lips and shrug until you turn blue, there is always something else happening in Paris.

SO the first big thing I have to mention is that my dear friend Rebecca Trembath came to visit my last week, bringing with her a lovely package of stroopwaffles from her new home in Amsterdam. Stroopwaffles are now the tithe for visiting me, so be warned: if you show up without them, you can't stay here. And this is mainly because I have already eaten all the ones Becca brought.

Now, as I might have mentioned in the blog post featuring my last guest, I'm not the best host. It doesn't help that I'm living in a place where the bathrooms look like something out of the Saw movies, but I could make it a little better by doing things like having food in my fridge when my guests arrive, and owning more than one towel so that they are not forced to dry off with t-shirts.

However, Rebecca braved all these challenges with grace and we had a fun and food filled weekend, stabilized by the fact that we walked and velibbed our faces off. Some highlights included dinners at Cassenoix, a nice restaurant near my office, lunch at Marché des enfants rouges, where I got yelled at for sitting on a chair, another dinner at Café de l'industrie in the 11th arrondissement...and you get the point. I won't belabour it, the food in Paris is pretty alright. Especially if you eat it with wine, and a great pal.

Another one of the places we patronized. Very logical sign, I thought.

On the vélib note: vélib is the communal bike system in Paris, similar to Bixi in Montreal and whatever Vancouver will one day get once they solve the helmet law issue. I got my vélib card a couple of weeks ago and decided to vélib home from work (note: vélib is both a noun and a verb. incroyable!). One hour and 3 sets of directions from strangers later I was home...lesson being that sometimes the métro is the better option. But the vélibs are a great solution for short distances and have already come to my rescue once when the train broke down on the way to work!

Going backwards in reverse chronological order without a segue, the nuit blanche happened a few weeks ago as well. When you faire une nuit blanche in french, it means you have a sleepless night, generally due to merrymaking. The Nuit Blanche festival in Paris is a night of interactive art exhibitions, supposedly open until the wee hours (although many close indecently early). I went to the park right across the street to check out some interesting flashing lights, a band playing in a tree, and a man playing the keyboard and synthesizer going on and on about how he doesn't believe in love...I think.

Band in a tree!

Synthesizer man.

Anyway, it was pretty cool, and it also involved a french lesson for one of my new non-francophone friends I have made here in France. We were passing by the lake within the park, and she saw a sign that said something like 'Nourrissez pas les oiseaux'. I think most of the Canadians reading this can sympathize that learning french in school is kind of hard - the grammar is tricky, the pronunciation is very specific, and there is an exception to absolutely every rule you spend hours memorizing. So when you are able to apply all that knowledge that you work so hard for in practice, it's pretty exciting, as was proven when my friend yelled:

'Hey! I know that word! It means birds! WOZZOX!!! WOZZOX MEANS BIRDS!!'

You would have been excited too right?

I'm sure that there is more to be said about my life, but it's already past my bedtime and I haven't even added the photos yet. There are a few cameo appearances this week, not least my absolute biggest blog fan, whose comments are always very appreciated:

Grandpa Dusting with a well-earned brewskie after a hard morning of apple picking on Galiano.

And, of course, the Birthday Boy (18!!!!)

Das ma bro.

And a few more things:

A rainbow! How lovely.

One very good use for this fall's apples.

And finally, some words to live by for the week:

Happy Monday everyone! Allez, soyez gentille à quelqu'un!

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And now back to our regularly scheduled programme...

Eid Mubarak! As I write this there are four very organized Algerian men cooking up a storm in the kitchen down the hall, because today is Eid, and Muslims everywhere are cooking and sharing food together as part of the celebration. There are lots of people from Muslim countries in my residence, and lots of excellent cooks, so I think the couloir is going to smell heavenly for the rest of the weekend!

Pre-meal Eid preparations - this is a small fraction of the meat they are preparing.

Now, Eid is an important holiday, but it does little to explain the title of this post, which is in reference to my oft-mentioned softball team, and their all-encompassing takeover of the RER last Sunday. We had a practice that lasted for all of the afternoon and evening, giving a whole new meaning to the term beer league - it was more like picnic party league by the end of the night! And then kids, parents, friends, etc all made the trek to the RER, the train that goes between Paris and the surrounding suburbs, and with all the players and hangers-on it really was as though the RER turned purple with PUC colours (our uniforms are purple shirts and white pants).

RER violet!

As I have mentioned before, the majority of women (and a few men too) on my softball team are from Latin American countries - the coach is Venezuelan, the manager is Peruvian, and the Dominican Republic, Colombia, and Mexico are all represented as well. I had just gotten accustomed to the rapid pace of Parisian french, and then I was quite literally thrown a curveball when I realized Spanish is going to be the most commonly spoken language at practice - although my wonderful teammates always translate for me, and I’m slowly learning. Primero, segundo, tercero. Esso!

But that’s kind of how things seem to work in Paris - yes, there is the french culture that I wrote about last week, that is new and exciting and sometimes confusing, but Paris is a majorly cosmopolitan city with a hundred other cultures swirling around. me Last night after saying goodbye to my Korean, British, American and Australian colleagues, I ate French quiche with my Peruvian, French, Colombian, Dominican, and Venezuelan teammates, and then I came home and had a long discussion about life and love and culture with my neighbours from Turkey and Morocco. Now I’m listening to sizzling mutton as the Algerian guys in the kitchen prepare their celebratory feast. It's fantastic!

A few other things that happened this week, as a matter of course:

A start of year dinner at the Maison des Etudiants Canadien, where I applied, but am not living because they sent me to another house as part of the campus ‘mixing policy’ or policie du brassage. It was nice to see the inside of another building, even though that other building is approximately 500 million times nicer than mine. The MEC was featured on French news, along with lots of shots of the Cité Universitaire, the campus sort of area where my residence is too. You can watch it here: http://www.6play.fr/#/m6/66-minutes/11396334-grand-format-emission-du-28-septembre (hopefully this link will work outside of France!). If you do watch the show you’ll notice that it follows a nice boy from Quebec in his journey from Montreal to Paris, and that it puts subtitles on anytime anyone from Quebec speaks…

I was called “sportive” so many times that I eventually lost it. The temper tantrum went something like this: “I’m not ‘sporty’. I’m NORMAL! WOMEN CAN PLAY SPORTS TOO.” The recipients of my tirade were slightly taken aback, having just expressed interest in the fact that I was playing both soccer and softball, but unfortunately their interest came on the heels of what seemed like too many people going “Wow, you play a sport! You are so sportive! Good for you! (metaphorical pat on the head).” Maybe it’s Emma Watson’s UN address getting me all riled up, but I think people here are a little less used to women playing sports - which I find strange, because there are so many strong french female athletes, and also strong female athletes from other francophone countries.

Today I went to the market in an adorable suburb that’s only a 10 minute walk away, but really felt like we were outside of the city in a small town. The marché was huge, and it was really nice to feel like we were outside of the hustle and bustle for a bit.

Enroute to marché Gentilly

Anything and everything you could want
is sold at this market!

Did you want this?

And I got a haircut! From my amazing friend Alejandra, who formerly was mentioned because she called parisian garbage romantic. She is an engineer, and her haircutting skills reflected that attention to detail!