Punching, Pigeons, and Pizza

{Wednesday, September 17}

Yesterday's entry was getting a little long, and I figured I was at a good stopping point. But the story continues...

Samuel felt bad about the beer being so expensive, so he paid the difference for all of us, saying, "Vous n'avez pas su; c'est à moi" {"You didn't know, and it's my fault [because I asked you to come here]"}. So, in turn, we felt bad about having to leave early to go to bed; Elissa and I decided to try and stay until the end of the first set, when Samuel was supposed to play. At 11:15, when the first set had still not ended, we gave up and left poor Samuel there {though he said later that it went really well, and that he had a lot of fun}. On the metro, some strange high school kid talked to us while his friends yelled insults at him, then wished us a good night before exiting the train. It was quite odd.

The next morning, we dragged ourselves out of bed and made it to class, where it was time to talk about relative pronouns! Yay! Fortunately, there was a light at the end of the tunnel: a small partner exercise wherein we got to write a hypothetical synopsis from the back cover of a book. Elissa and I chose the second option, the story of a great love between a boxing champion and a singer. Prepare yourselves.

Un Vrai Coup de Foudre

Jacques est un champion de boxe. Caroline est une chanteuse ravissante. Qui aurait imaginé qu'un jour, par accident, Jacques se tromperait de son adversaire, le costume duquel ressemblait beaucoup à la robe que portait Caroline? Au moment où Caroline a ouvert ses yeux au beurre noir, devant lesquels se trouvait Jacques, elle a été encore frappée...par l'amour, le grand sujet sur lequel elle avait chanté pendant toute sa vie. Mais quand Jacques part pour la guerre, est-ce l'amour quelque chose sans lequel elle peut vivre? Tombez amoureux de ce livre, dont le texte vous donnera un véritable coup de poing!


Note: "coup de foudre" is used to mean love at first sight, but coup is also the word used for hitting or kicking, e.g. "un coup de poing" {literally, "a stroke of fist", but we call it a "punch"}
Also note: I didn't choose the names. Really.
So! Bearing that in mind, we will call this vignette...

Punch-Drunk Love

Jacques is a boxing champion. Caroline is a ravishing singer. Who would have imagined that one day, Jacques would accidentally throw a punch at Caroline, mistaking her dress for the costume of his competitor? The moment Caroline opened her black eyes, she was hit once again...by love, the sweet subject she had sung of all her life. But when Uncle Sam calls Jacques into duty, will love be something that Caroline can live without? Fall in love with this book whose text packs a lot of punch!

Classic.

Later on, as Cody and I returned to IES fro lunch in the midst of a good discussion, we got a little surprise in the courtyard. The exchange went something like this:

Caroline: Have you seen 'Stranger Than Fiction'?
Cody: YES. That's a good movie.
Caroline: I know; it's so...that's a pigeon in a cage.
Random man sitting in courtyard with a pigeon in a cage: Yeah, it happens.

Paris really is full of surprises. The rest of the day held reading, writing, and a well-deserved nap for me, and today I had more French class {the professor of which is slowly driving me insane; I'll probably rant about it at some point}, beef carpaccio at the Café du Maine for lunch, and wrote my lovely homework essay - the infamous story of the men's bathroom at the Mairie {Town Hall} in Brest. Monica, Cody, and I concluded our day with a visit to Hot Pants pizza - which is delicious, by the way, and not badly priced. The owner even speaks French with a cute Italian accent.