AL in Paris

Bonjour! Well, it’s been an exciting week. . . err, ten days (sorry about that). I can’t believe I’ve been in Paris for six weeks now. In some ways it feels like I’ve been here longer. It feels like I’m getting used to everything, and when I come back from travelling I get that same feeling I get whenever I go back to Providence. It’s not quite the same as when I go home home, but I just recognize everything and feel like possessive (?) of the neighbourhood. I don’t really know how to describe it. But at the same time, I feel like everybody back at Brown should still be in shopping period when in reality, Columbus Day Weekend is coming up.

So last, last Wednesday (back when it was still September), I went to Bruges with a tour group. Bruges is a very small, medieval city in northern Belgium that was a major habor for trading from the 12th to the 15th century, until the canals got silted over and the town went into total decline until it was more or less abandoned until the late 19th/early 20th century, when in became a popular tourist destination. Nice little history lesson there, but the point is that the city has remained more or less architecturally untouched since the 16th century. So I found a guided tour of the city online—actually, I found it a few weeks ago when Madeline and I were trying to find day trips for Sundays. She didn’t want to do it because the tour was in English, and I didn’t blame her—I’m trying to, or at least meaning to, eliminate as much English from my life (with the exception of watching The Colbert Report, which I’ve begun buying through itunes—I’ve gots to get me my Colbert). In the end, it turns out that nobody speaks French in Bruges. Well, some of them must, but they really don’t like it. Like, they have a memorial in the middle of their main square dedicated to the one time they defeated the French. They speak Dutch first, then German, then English, and if you speak none of they above, then French. Everyone was warning us not to go around walking into stores and saying “Bonjour,” but instead say the Dutch “Gddnkchhffgt” (I don’t know exactly how to spell it so I just wrote it out phonetically). I just shook my head, refused to speak a language without vowels, and stuck with English.

So it was a long day, the bus left Paris at 7:00 am and it took about five hours to get to the city. The weather was awful—cold, rainy, ick. We get there, and despite the weather (or maybe a bit because of it) the town is just beautiful. It looks exactly like a Khnopff painting, such as the one below (ah, we get to the real reason I went to Bruges—at the end of the 19th century it was a hub for avant-garde, specifically Symbolist artists, such as Les XX—wikipedia it). I would include my own photos just to show you want the town looks like today, but. . . sad story: So, I was taking a ton of picture because neither Madeline nor Kam was there, so it was all up to me. And even though I was consciously being careful to keep my camera under my umbrella, I don’t know what happened. It made sounds like, like what I imagine ET would sound like if you stepped on him and it never turned on again. Goodbye Cammy, I hardly used thee.

The tour guide was just OK—I think English was her fourth language, so. . . . But the best part was when we all went on a boat tour of the city (Bruges has more canals than it does streets and is called the “Venice of the North”). Not only was it gorgeous and did the rain stop for just those 30 minutes, but the guide/boat driver/captain was very good, very informed and funny, too. We then separated, and I found this place for lunch that was great because it was filled with heating lamps and was like. . . warm. I stayed there longer than I should/would have otherwise because of the weather. I then had time to buy some postcards, check out sole lace stores, and run around trying to find the store that was selling wooden shoes (those would have made such a great present for someone) but with no success. At the end of the four hours (yeah, I only got a total four hours in the city), we went back on the bus for another five hours back towards Paris listening to Edith Piaf for the entire ride at a volume of 11.

The weekend was very travelly, too. Every semester, Brown-in-France sponsors a trip to somewhere in France for the kids in Paris and the few kids in Lyon as well. This semester, it was Toulouse, the fourth or fifth largest city in France (depending on who you ask) in the South-West of France. So Friday, once again I woke up before 6:00 am to make my early, early train. The trip was again five hours (ugh), and we got into Toulouse early afternoon. Later in the day, we had this awful tour guide. So bad the adults in charge later apologized to us. The next day we left Toulouse for a small, small town called Cordes-sur-Ciel. Small like the population is about 1,000 people, small like my high school graduating class was the same size as the entire population. It’s another medieval city known for leather work and embroidery. I can’t say which was prettier, Cordes or Bruges. Cordes, definitely had the good weather working in its favor. Bruges was probably the more beautiful city, but there is not beating the views from Cordes. For those who don’t speaking French (or if yours is a little rusty) Cordes-sur-Ciel translates to Cordes on/above the sky. It got this name because it’s at the top of a very steep, very tall hill (very steep—like cars can’t drive into it, so the bus dropped us off at the bottom and we walked up), and every morning the valleys fill with fog and it looks like the city is in the clouds (pictures below provided by google images since my camera died).

Sunday, we left Cordes for a slightly larger, but still small village called Albi, where the cathedral is thought to be the world’s largest all-brick structure, and even more importantly where artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was from. They had a very lovely museum dedicated to him, with more and better works than I would have expected. A few hours later we went back to the Toulouse train station. I had forgotten to charge my ipod before leaving for the weekend, so facing another five hour train ride with absolutely nothing to do, I splurged and bought some American/British magazines. Yes, I should have bough reading material in French, but 1) I was tired and 2) French magazines talk about French celebrities and I don’t care about French celebrities. This is when all the girls on the trip became my best friend. Even the most. . . stereotypically Brown girls were coming up to me on the train and asking to borrow my Cosmo. Sure go ahead, I’m reading about Kate Moss’s wild night out in Reveal.

So then Monday was the first day of my first week at the Louvre. So far it’s been going well and getting better. Working under three different people and not having a set desk/computer is a little harder than I thought I was going to be. So far, everyday I’ve come to the office and have no idea where I’ll be or what I’ll be doing. This will change once I get lore settled into the office and more familiar with all the projects going on. Right now my favourite phrase is: “Est-ce que vous avez quelques choses que je peux faire pour vous aider?”—do you have anything I can do to help you. Monday was a shorter day, and I just took a tour of the office met everyone (half the women are named Sophie the other half amm have names that start with the letter A, so basically I know close to no one’s name). Tuesday I got my Louvre ID (hells yes!) and took advantage of it right away because I spent all of Tuesday (the closed day) in the Louvre. I was helping out a woman in the office, named Sophie, who’s helping to organize a show that will take place in the Louvre this weekend featuring student musicians and dancers from the Paris Conservatory. Sure, sure I’m all for helping out, especially if it means hanging out in the Louvre, but really there was no reason for me to be there and all I did was a lot of babysitting while the woman ran back and forth from the office. Babysitting means sitting around and occasionally translating the kids’ (and by kids I mean my age) American music for them. And I must have taken at least four 25-minute long “bathroom breaks” and just ran around the Richlieu wing.

Thursday was the best though. I got to the office and had nothing to do but check all my e-mail accounts. So I went to the next room and asked another woman (Anne, Alice, Angès—I don’t know) if she had anything for me to do. Not really, she said, unless I felt like taking a tour of the museum. Uhh, I guess I could, I mean if you really need me to. So I tested out the new audioguide designed for the handicapped—and listened as she and another woman debated for 6 minutes whether I should do the test in a wheel chair or not (they decide on not, phew!). I spent the afternoon correcting someone’s Power Point in English. I don’t think that IFE would be too pleased that I was to something in English, and I don’t really want to be either. But since it’s the beginning I don’t mind as much since I do feel like I’m actually being helpful. I think I write good in English. And today was just more filing/general office work.

À bientôt,
AL

PS Travellerspoint isn't letting me add the pictures that I mentioned above. You'll just have to google image them on your own.