Brr

I am very cold and sick. I will write about last night later.

Sans domicile fixe means "homeless" in French, but it translates literally to "Without fixed domicile"

What a joyous weekend. Hmph.

Friday night I was supposed to meet Chris at eight for dinner, so I went back to the apartment to take a shower. Of course, there was no hot water and no electricity, so I took a shower in ice water in the dark. Needless to say, there was water all over the floor of the bathroom because there was also no shower curtain. I am hoping it will evaporate by tomorrow.

I met Chris for dinner and we went to the Falstaff. I had a backpack full of stuff (pajamas, clothes, etc) because Scott had said I could stay in his dorm room if I didn’t want to sleep on the floor of a freezing cold apartment, which I didn’t. It was an interesting night - Chris and Katie got into a fight about things that Chris said to other people about Katie’s boyfriend, and I got trapped, unable to leave the table while they had said fight. Eventually they went for a walk and I was released.

I was sitting around with some friends. I had asked Scott to make sure not to leave without me. I was going to walk Vaune back to the apartment so she could get her stuff to go stay at Luis’s, and then when I came back Scott and I would leave. I came back and didn’t see him, so I sat down. Deborah went to get a drink and I asked her, if she saw Scott, to tell him we would be leaving in about half an hour. She came back and told me Scott was making out with some girl. Twenty minutes later I checked and he still was. Then he went outside, giving me the “one minute” sign with his hand. Ten minutes later I went outside and he was still making out with/talking to this girl. I was pretty mad, because he was leaving me in the lurch here, but he was drunk and I just didn’t want to deal with him so I went home with Kris and stayed in her room for the night. She lives with a host family, though, so I couldn’t take a shower there. So Saturday morning I walked back to the apartment and took another freezing shower.

Chris and I met up at 1:30 and went to lunch with his friend Siobhan (pronounced like “Chevonne”) and her friend Willa (who I found out later was actually the girl making out with Scott). We had pizza, and it was really lovely. Then Chris and I wandered around trying to find a sweater, a long sleeve shirt, a hat, mittens and a scarf, and shoes for me. We only succeeded in finding a sweater and a shirt, but at least we got those. Then Chris took my laptop home to charge it and I went back to the apartment and put on two pairs of pajama pants, jeans, a tank top, a shirt, a sweatshirt, my winter coat and my hat and took a nap.

At 7 I met Chris, Vaune, Christine and Katie at the Chinese restaurant and we had dinner. We were walking to the Falstaff and I stopped to call Alexis and told them I would meet them there. When I showed up a few minutes later, none of them were to be found, and they didn’t show up for another hour. A wonderful way to start the evening. I decided not to drink that night, so I just had water and cranberry juice as everyone around me got slowly drunker. Scott promised me (again) that I could stay in his dorm room. I would’ve said no out of spite if it weren’t for the prospect of a hot shower. We saw Justin and Emerson and generally had a good time, except for some people being jerks, but that is another story and also not mine. I was tired and coughing and wanted to go to bed, but of course I had to wait for Scott unless I wanted to freeze. He went to walk Katie home, which should have taken twenty minutes, so when it had been 45 minutes I started to get angry. If he ditched me again, he was not getting off so easy. But he got back, having gotten lost. He said he wanted to sit for two minutes before he left, which made me wary, and it should have - he was immediately appropriated by some drunken girls. Ten minutes later we finally left. We went back to the apartment to get some of my stuff and then walked to his dorm. Scott did definitely redeem himself by sleeping on the floor of his own room and giving me the bed, and making me toast this morning. And I finally got to take a hot shower this morning, with lights! What a novel idea.

Tonight is the Halloween party at the Falstaff (i.e. the whole reason we came back). There will be pumpkin carving and Rocky Horror and The Exorcist and candy. Yay! Tonight I may also actually sleep in The Apartment of Ice.

I don’t have my camera cord with me right now - I will post pictures from the weekend later.

Angers, again.

Back in Angers for the weekend - to see folks, to go to Kat's pumpkin carving party, and, apparently, to do laundry.

Vaune and I left at 7 this morning for the train station after a breakfast of Fluffernutter (me) and brioche and jam (her). At 7:45, as we sat waiting for our 9:00 train, I realized that we didn't have our cartes 12-25, which we were going to have to show when the conductor came to check our tickets, in order to prove that we were, in fact, allowed to have a %50 discount on our tickets. We had an hour before we would even know which track our was going to be on, so I volunteered to go home and get them. I ran the ten minutes through Montparnasse train station to get to where the line 4 Métro stops, took the fifteen minute trip home, ran upstairs, and got our passes. Then I backtracked. All in a t-shirt and jeans in 35 degree weather. Some guy in the Métro actually said to me, "J'ai froid pour vous," meaning, "I am cold for you." Since I absolutely cannot get past the French habit of talking to complete strangers (especially in the subway) I ignored him, assuming that it was some kind of weird pickup line. It wasn't - he was just concerned. But I was sweaty and could barely breathe (chest cold developing - again. Yay) and unhappy so I just gruffly told him that I was in a hurry and I was fine. He kept talking but I disappeared onto the #4 train.

I got back just in time, and we got on the train. Thankfully the conductor did, in fact, ask us for our discount passes. If he hadn't, if that trip had been in vain, I would have been deeply unhappy. Now we are in Angers, and it is damn cold. This is where we are staying:



It is Kat's (the bartender/bar owner who is having the pumpkin carving party) boyfriend's former apartment. It has no furniture (read: mattresses), heat, or electricity. It does have water, walls, a roof, and a floor, so I'm good (Sorry Mom - I know you hate that phrase). Which is what matters, as I will probably be sleeping there alone while Casanova whisks Vaune away to Loveland. Fine with me - I'll run around naked and sing ancient chants while smearing the walls with bodily fluids. Vaune, you're missing out.

I ended up bringing all of my laundry to Angers, because it was all in my suitcase because it needed to be done, and it seemed more convenient to just bring the suitcase of dirty clothes and wash them at the nicer, easier to use laundromat here than wash them at the crappy, tiny, stressful one near the Cité, take them out, and repack the suitcase. So I did all of my laundry today (how satisfying!), and now I am at La Catho charging my computer and downloading episodes of House to keep myself company later (I left my book in my room when I ran home to get the discount passes). Later, I will probably enjoy a doner kebap and pass the evening at the Falstaff, drinking and being merry.

GO SOX!

Don't get me wrong, I love France, but...

I have been corresponding with a girl in Sweden. Recently we have been talking about languages – of course. She mentioned that she thought that most French people were happy to speak with you as long as you make the effort to speak French. My experiences to the contrary prompted me to write this response, which got a little out of hand, and then I figured I would post it here and expand upon it.

“I don't know, I have found that as soon as a French person finds out I speak English, they automatically assume that my French is horrible and that their English is much better and they begin speaking to me in embarrassingly bad English. It's very frustrating, as we would understand each other a lot better if they would just speak French with me. I love France, but I am quickly getting tired of French people. I don't mean to put you off - but they are the most racist, elitist, self-entitled, ignorant, and completely closed-minded group of people I have ever met. There are some great ones, but they don't make up for the great majority of rude, egotistical people who care about no one but themselves. I know a girl who was hit in the face by a stranger because she is black and she was walking down the street with a white guy. I know a guy who got pushed into the side of a subway train, fell down, hit his head on shards of glass - and people walked on him. The guy who pushed him made eye contact and said nothing. No one tried to help him. I come from a big city, but that would never happen there. No one would stand for that. These people are so self-involved. Their attitude toward immigration is, "You can immigrate to our country if you speak perfect French, listen to Vanessa Paradis, eat baguette, and keep quiet about your religion." Their idea of "successful" immigrants are people who you can't tell are immigrants. It's very hard for me to come to terms with because in the US, at least where I am from (and it is the "ideal") individuality is appreciated and encouraged. You are supposed to embrace people's differences, not try to make everyone exactly like you. Here, they don't even understand that. I try to explain that to a French person, and they can't wrap their head around it. It drives me crazy.”

Now I would like to write about French middle-aged/old women. They are screwed up. My theory is that they were starved as children and teenagers by their screwed up French middle-aged mothers, they became anemic-looking young women, were attractive for a brief period of time, and now they are past their prime and have nothing to show for their miserable lifetime except premature wrinkles, bad dye jobs, and fat husbands. And then the rest of them, the non-stick-thin ones, are miserable because they have spent their entire lives being held up the ideal set by the stick-thins. These women are almost all insane. They need to control everything you do. They complain about everything, loudly. They do not trust me, ever. They blame me for bizarre unreasonable things. This latter trait seems to be especially prevalent. Examples:

-Madame Gilot blaming me for things her husband did
-the cleaning woman here blaming me for the kitchen being dirty

Her: “The other woman came in here this morning and said it was clean. Now it is disgusting. What happened?” sighs loudly and exasperatedly
Me:: “I don’t know, I just got here. I didn’t do this.”
Her:: “I don’t know that. I didn’t see it this morning. It’s disgusting. Why are you cooking in here?”
Me:: “…It’s the kitchen.”
Her:: “Well finish up. I need to clean.”
Me:: “I need to cook for ten people. It’s going to be a while.”
Her:: Exasperated sigh

* an hour later, she comes back, with a man *

Her, to man: “Why is she still here? She hasn’t finished yet?!?”
Me, in my brain: "I can hear you!!! This is a kitchen! People cook in them! Leave me alone"

-the woman at the bank blaming me because they spelled my name wrong on my bank card

It never ends. I would write more but writing this made me too pissed off at French people. Also - old French men, stop trying to help me use machines at the grocery store. I know how a scale works, as well as automatic checkout. Learn about personal space, and get the hell away from me. French people in general: STOP TOUCHING ME AND LEARN ABOUT PERSONAL SPACE. AND HYGIENE. YOU ALL SMELL LIKE ONIONS AND ARMPIT.

Whew.

Métro book of the moment:

J'ai des arbres dans mes poumons!

Our wifi is out. Somehow it’s a lot easier to concentrate on writing a blog post in Word while the internet is not available. No wonder I got so much more written in Angers. Of course, whenever I post this, the internet will be back up. Alas, alack.

The veggie burgers last night were pretty good. Some people had seconds, including a French guy who had never even heard of a veggie burger. I don’t know if I will make them again though – it was a lot of stress and work for something that was only “pretty good.” Unlike the fajitas, which were delicious, and not as much work. But I think people were sick of chicken, so I was glad to offer something else.

Today was my “visite médicale” – the last step in obtaining my “titre de séjour” which is what legally allows me to live in France. I have a visa, but unlike people who are only staying for a semester, mine expires in November and stipulates that I get a titre de séjour. So I went to my medical visit today. The day, of course, began ominously with what sounded like a fire drill at 8 AM. It only lasted five minutes, so I went back to sleep, but this morning the internet wasn’t working and all the fire doors were closed. Hmm.

I got there at 10:30 – half an hour early. In French bureaucracy, early is usually bad, but I figured early is never bad for a doctor’s appointment. But I brought a book anyway.

They called me almost as soon as I sat down. I went in and they measured me and weighed me – even with all my clothes on as well as my shoes and a sweatshirt, I appear to have lost 5 or 10 pounds. Interesting. Must be the poverty. Then I had to go wait in line for my chest x-ray. This was very awkward and uncomfortable, as I was standing with about five other people who were also waiting to be told when they should go in and strip down in front of a stranger. Eventually it was my turn and a very kind woman showed me into a little room where I changed into a gown. The technician pushed me up against the apparatus and gave me one of those giant heavy smocks to wear around my waist, so as not to radiate my ovaries, I suppose. She grabbed my elbows and my chin and smushed me up against the machine and yelled, “Inspirez!” My brain froze for a second but my lungs remembered that that means “inhale,” so I did. Thank you, lungs. Bien joué. Then it was over and I sat in the waiting room for half an hour.

Finally the doctor called me in and we looked at my x-ray. She asked me for immunization records. I knew I was supposed to have them, but I didn’t, so I just said that my director had told us we didn’t need them, because our immunization records in the U.S. are not the same as the French “carnet de vaccination.” This is true, but both the doctor and I knew it was not an excuse. I just told her what I could remember of my vaccines. She nodded after all of my answers – I guess they were what she was expecting. Luckily I stepped on a nail in New Orleans in May (Alexis tried valiantly to carry me home that night) and got a tetanus shot, so at least one of my answers was somewhat definite. The other responses were, “A long time ago,” or, “One time…” I told her about my endoscopy and she asked some questions about family history. She did ask me if I had any serious illnesses – I just said no. They just want to make sure that I am not going to infect other French people with illnesses from South America – they don’t need to know about my anaphylaxis. It would only freak them out. If I have an actual doctor’s appointment with a doctor who is concerned with my health and not with that of the patrimoine, then I’ll bring it up.

A highlight of this meeting with Dr. Bosque was that I got to keep my chest x-ray. “Un petit souvenir!” she exclaimed to me. Whoohoo! It is now hanging on my window. There are trees in my lungs.



It's an interesting decorating choice.


As soon as that was done I could walk right down the hall to the “délivrances des titres de sejours” room. The woman looked through the same two piles of papers ten times before she found mine, which had been there all along. I would have been pissed off but she looked genuinely terrified that she had lost someone’s titre de séjour and that she was in big trouble. But she found it eventually, I signed for it, and I was off! I am now a legal resident of France! Until… September 26th 2008.



And now I am off to the computer lab downstairs to obsessively check my e-mail.

P.S. -

I am now back after Grammar and History of Language. We met up with Irish Alan and a couple of his friends before the class and all suffered together. We were the bench of sharp-shooting English speakers. Afterwards, Alan, Vaune, Donal (sp?) and I sat and had 50¢ hot coffees in the Malesherbes café. It was very nice. I do enjoy the company of the Irish, I have learned.

Also, the Fondation is in anarchy because nobody applied to be part of the Student Committee. Should I apply for president?

And as a final note: Tulane, I miss you. Specifically, I miss monsoon season:

I'll get inside your face

I live in a pigsty.

Yesterday morning, Vaune came over and helped me clean up my room. I feel much better now. Mom, you can thank her later.

My incentive for cleaning my room was that afterwards, we were going to go to “Thanksgiving,” a Cajun restaurant/American grocery store that I had accidentally found online. It’s in Le Marais, which is a very interesting and beautiful area of Paris, so I knew that even if the store were lame, the trip would be worth it.

We set out, I with my new Carte Imagine R in hand (my new Métro pass that I just slide over the little reader and it magically lets me through, lighting up green arrows pointing the way) and took the Métro straight to St. Paul St. We found the store very quickly, and gleefully went inside.

Vaune was unimpressed, but I merrily catalogued every item in my brain for later use. I pored over each shelf, making sure not to miss anything that I would want later. I ended up buying several necessities that are not widely available in France: Kraft Mac n Cheese dinner, Bush’s baked bean, and B&M barbecue baked beans. And a root beer for Vaune.



After that, we took advantage of the beautiful weather and beautiful neighborhood and wandered around the Marais.



Bob Design!


We walked down to the Seine. I found a piece of a Camembert wrapper on the ground.



For a while, we just sat there and listened to our music. You have to choose just the right song to listen to while sitting by the Seine. I chose Ashes in Your Eyes by Deb Talan.









After a while, we decided to walk down the Seine, iPods in hand. It was a lovely walk.



Perhaps the highlight of the walk was the tent. People were camping out on the Seine. I have no idea if this was allowed, but it was funny. They had jokes about Belgians written on their tent, and they had a kitty. And they were sleeping outside in their sleeping bags as we took pictures of them. At 1 in the afternoon.





Kitty!


After that we went home, and I made my Kraft dinner. It was the best Kraft mac and cheese I have ever had. Then I lazed around and read Philip Pullman novels until dinner. Dinner was a little chaotic, but delicious as usual, grâce à Emily. I am, in fact, at the moment steaming 10 cups of cubed eggplant for veggie burgers tonight. In a wok. With no cover. Cooking for ten is always interesting.

After dinner Vaune and I watched Blades of Glory. Always hilarious. My favorite line: "I was on Qualuudes. I don't even remember Oslo. But I remember Boston. And that victory was as sweet as the cream pie for which the town was named."

All in all it was a good day. Today, on the other hand, has been crazy stressful as I navigate malls and eggplant and immunization forms. Whew!

Ann Coulter is speaking at Tulane tonight. Someone MUST tell me how that goes.

"Ann Coulter will be at Tulane today, October 22! Come see what all the controversy is about. Ms. Coulter will speak on "Why Liberals Are Wrong About Everything." She will be at McAlister Auditorium and will speak at 7 p.m. Doors open at 6:15 p.m. and bags will be checked.

Please, no video or audio recorders. Food, drink and weaponry are also prohibited in the auditorium."

Seriously? Cause I was going to bring my bow and arrow.