I'm On My Feet, I'm On the Floor, I'm Good to Go

{Saturday, September 13}

Okay, so I haven’t written in a while, but it’s not for lack of trying. I’ve been sort of busy and, joy of joys, I’m sick again. Cyprien and I suspect that it’s the cold he had last week, but we can’t be sure because I seem to have every symptom under the sun. Last night, I slept from 8 PM to about 9:30 AM, so I’m really hoping my body gets a clue soon.

So Wednesday morning, I had my first class, or Propédeutique {a crash-course in French that students take in groups of 14, based on how well they did on the test}. I felt for sure that my group was being punished, having to go in at 9 rather than 11:30 or 1:30, but I guess someone’s gotta do it. When I arrived, there were three or four other girls there, and we all introduced ourselves; each one had out a notebook and interacted in French {unlike most of the students when they first meet}, so I knew that I was most likely among fellow geeks, and we had all done well on the test.

The professor, Dominique {female}, mentioned translation and used the words “étudiants avancés” {“advanced students”}, which we figured indicated that we would be in the highest-level French course, Translation. Directness does not seem to be important here, so that’s about as much confirmation as we got. We did two hours of grammar study, which wasn’t too painful because after this coming Thursday, it will be all translation, all the time. It was, however, occasionally patronizing, because she seemed to think that none of us was familiar with the passé simple, or when to use it {the answer is never. More or less.} My frustration with her is also probably based on the fact that she is extremely enthusiastic at an hour in the morning during which I would rather not be in class, let alone having already been awake for 2 hours {it takes me about 45 minutes to get to IES by metro}.

Fortunately, there was someone in my class that I knew – Cody, so we wandered around till we found a fairly cheap lunch at a Chinese restaurant {though, thus far, I am unimpressed by the Chinese food that Paris has to offer…which probably shouldn’t be a surprise}. Cody is cool; he goes to DePaul and studies French and religious studies, and appreciates puns and horror movies, which means we at least have some things in common. Unfortunately, I find myself getting frustrated with other people’s difficulty communicating in French, so I often let them switch to English – bad habit.

I made the mistake of returning home before my 3:45 academic meeting instead of going to buy my grammar book {I’ll explain that shortly}. Back at IES, I ran into Monica, who lives near the same metro stop as I do, and had nothing to do for the weekend, so we made plans to meet up on Thursday sometime. Then I had my rendezvous with Marie Paniez about my schedule, which was fine except that I had double-booked myself on Tuesday/Thursday afternoons with drawing and art history. As incredible as the art history course sounds, I opted for drawing because it gives me the chance of getting into Julie & Johnny’s photography course back at LU. Besides, I found another course that sounds pretty sweet – a cultural/sociological/historical look at the effects of comic books in France. I asked about signing up for a French course, and she said, “Si tu es dans le cours de Traduction, tu es dans le cours de Traduction” {“If you’re in the Translation course, you’re in the Translation course”}. I guess that means I’m in the Translation course. So, for the time being, my theoretical schedule is as follows:

Monday/Wednesday 9:00-10:30 Theatre in Paris
10:45-12:15 Comic Books & Society
4:00-5:30 The Word and the Image {i.e. looking at the translations of ideas between media, like from a book to the big screen, from a painting to a play, etc.}

Tuesday/Thursday 9:00-10:30 Translation
12:30-2:00 Drawing

Needless to say, Tuesday/Thursdays will probably be relatively relaxing. But we’ll see.

On the way home from my meeting, I stopped at the FNAC {it’s like the Borders-meets-Best-Buy of France} nearest my neighborhood {15 minutes by metro} to find L’expression française écrite et orale, the book Dominique had asked us to purchase for the next day. I walked around leisurely, found Darkly Dreaming Dexter in French for some light reading, then went to find the book I needed. I was deeply perplexed when I found the corrections, but not the grammar book itself, and the clerk informed me that they no longer carried the normal version of the book, and I would have to go to the “Quartier Latin” {“Latin Quarter”}…back in the direction of IES. Not to be deterred, I walked back down the four flights of stairs that I’d climbed in my high-heeled sandals and hurried back to the metro station. No worries. I would go three stops, change to Line 3, go the two more stops to get to Line 12, then travel seven stops to Rennes, which should be on the same street as the other FNAC. However, I was not aware of the fact that a. switching to Line 12 at Saint-Lazare means about 10 extra minutes of walking and b. the station at Rennes was closed for repairs, meaning I’d have to get off of the metro one station earlier and find the FNAC from there. So, leaving the first FNAC at 4:30, I had no idea that I would not get to the other location until approximately 6:00, at which point my feet were ready to fall off. And as I took the escalator to the fourth floor of the FNAC, I was unaware that I would find only the corrections book because, according to the salesman, lots of students had come in that day, and they wouldn’t have any more for another week.

I found a closer metro station and rode home, defeated and exhausted, switching lines only once but arriving home around 7:30 and vowing never to wear those shoes for an entire day again. Lesson learned. The girls and I were supposed to go to a jazz club in Montmartre, but Amanda never signed onto Skype {our clever way of avoiding using precious minutes on our cellphones}, and thus plans were never made, for which I am now somewhat grateful, considering that I woke up the next morning with a sore throat. I promise to look back at this incident and laugh…just as soon as my nose stops running.

On Thursday, I spaced out a bit in French class, but survived and even managed to find another cheap lunch with Cody at “Good Times Restaurant”. Then, he ever-so-generously showed me where he had purchased his L’expression française book, and all was well. Monica and I met up at 3 outside our Louise Michel, our metro station {we both live close to the same one; who knew?}, and went to the café “Au vieux Châtelet”, outside one of the great theatres of Paris. We ate a croque-monsieur {her} and escargot {me}, then wandered the city for approximately 5 hours…without exaggeration. We found a great hippie shop on the rue St Denis, a book store called “Mona Lisait" {a pun, obviously, that means “Mona was reading”},

...near which we found the nymphs of La Fontaine des Innocents {The Fountain of the Innocents}, carved in the 1540s

and both the garden "Les Halles", built above the three-story underground mall

The garden itself isn't that impressive, but it has some fun elements.

and the old cathedral Saint-Eustache, commissioned by François I in the 1500s and modeled on Notre-Dame.

...but also influenced by the Renaissance

and with a random statue in the courtyard.

You probably can't tell, but this is a giant sundial, which we thought was awesome.

And finally, one of Paris' many Arcs de Triomphe. I like the panting lion.

After that, we literally just walked and talked and then started to head back in the general direction of the metro stop at which we had started our exploration {the one in the middle of the city, not the one near our apartments}. Fortunately, we are both firm believers in the philosophy that you are never lost in Paris, because you can always find a metro stop and figure out how to get back home. Around 7:30, we decided to start looking for one, because it was starting to look like rain. We took shelter in a small, empty café which was soon filled with others seeking refuge from the downpour. Using our handy-dandy maps of Paris {this book has seriously been my best friend; thanks, Dad and Pam}, we located ourselves and headed to the nearest metro stop, Gare de l’Est…and realized we had covered about a third of the Paris metro Line 4 during the course of our meanderings.

We both returned to our respective homes due to the strict ‘no visitors’ rules and general fatigue, planning to meet again at 3 the next day to go back to Île de la Cité and try to see the Pope, which, to avoid making this entry any longer, I will tell you about later. To be continued…