Oh, Them Trains, Them Trains:

I found this entry on my computer..I never posted it...brings back fond memories, enjoy!

This post is simply some random thoughts (gripes) that run through my head about the Metro here in Paris. They have peppered my Parisian days and sometimes provided a whole commute’s worth of pondering...

I like how they announce in English at the train station to be aware of Pickpockets. (I guess my awareness is supposed to make up for the police force in the subways that is basically just “good in theory,” since I can’t recall seeing an officer twice in one week.) Yet when the train has stopped working, or will be sitting at the station for an extra and unscheduled 20 min or (my faaaaavorite) that “we just decided right now that this stop is going to be the last stop, your bad” — that’s when they only make the announcement in French. So you sit there wondering where everyone is going and think, “Look at that crowd of people getting off the train together – I hope they know about the Pickpockets!”

I know some French people consider Americans very rude for our mannerisms: we talk too loud and use too many hand gestures, we speak with our whole bodies, and everyone is aware we are there. Yet on the other hand those same people are aware of NO ONE. They will stop in the middle of the stairwell (probably to talk about us Americans), when there are 20 people behind them trying to get up or down the same steps..people who’ve probably just come from a randomly stopped train and are not happy to now be staring at the back of your head...

Why is it that no one else thinks the people on the metro are crazy. Perhaps I am a country girl at heart and will admit that riding these metals tubes daily, hustling through what are best described as tiled sewers is a new experience for me. Crazy people are also a new experience, everyone else is so used to them that when the disheveled 5 ft 2 woman gets on the train and begins to yell at the pole for being in her way, no one else seems to notice. They also don’t notice the “speakers” that come on the car. My French hasn’t gotten that good, but from what I can tell, these professional subway orators announce to a captive audience that they are poor and unfortunate and just want a good meal (to drink), “So if you would please go ahead and reach into your wallets for some change, I will come along with an 8 year old Dixie Cup and shake it in your face, while dripping my stench on you in visible waves of funk.” WTH?!?! Where I come from, they call this a hold up! It’s the laziest form of harassment I have ever seen and it happens every day. Of course it is a tie with the accordion players that come on the train – that’s right accordions. It’s not that I hate the accordion. I do, but that’s not the point. There’s a lot of musical people here – accordions and guitar players, violinists, and even one guy with one of those tiny Casio keyboards from like 1988. Evidently, they all watch to see which car I am getting in (there’s probably a lottery) and they force me to listen to their crappy jam sessions on some instrument they found in a dumpster. After subjecting me and my companions to a subtle form of torture on my hour ride home, they come by with their own little jacked up Dixie Cups! I am a music lover, I especially love live music, but confined in a train car with 40 other tired people, I am probably not in the mood for even the jazziest rendition of Hava Nagilia or something by Enrique Iglesias sung with a French accent—nope, not on the best of days.
At least some of the displays on the train come with talent, some people are your regular, “find them in any Wal-mart kinda koo-koo”. I have seen blue haired people and punk rock kids – no biggie. The Viking the other day was pretty awesome. I mean he would have been awesome with just the outfit alone, but he had props. Not like “I give him mad props for showing up on a train in tights and knee boots” kinda props. This dude was carrying a sword! I can’t say too much more about him than that because, duh, when a big ass French men, imitating a Norse god of war, gets on your train car carrying a sword and wearing doo-doo brown tights – you switch cars.

The station that I swap trains at is called Auber/Opera. I ask myself everyday did someone die here? If not someone than a whole bunch of someones? It is the worst smell, it’s like mold, on top of rust, and bodily decay, smeared with bodily fluids. It hurts to breathe too deep and fogs up my contact lenses. I think if they open the walls at this stop they will find them filled with all the musicians and oraters that commuters got tired of and boarded them up, Dixie Cup in hand, in a wild fit of Metro-tanic mutiny. Sometimes you can tell they are trying to make it bearable and there’s another scent in the air loosely covering the stench. It never works out right though and a weird un-natural “almost stench” is the result. Like the day it smelled like someone had poured something citrus flavored over the dead bodies. You could tell it was there, but just barely, so you breathe deeper to check and then you really uncover the death of millions waiting to crawl up and settle in your nasal cavity (it’s a cruel trick). Another time, I think my brain was really trying to protect me from the horror – the way people don’t remember what they saw at a crime scene or what happens when they lost a limb in a freak tree trimming accident. I am not sure what the smell was but I describe it as Kool-aid (red flavor) and armpit.
My last train thought but one that occurs most often is:
If you suck on someone’s face that hard, shouldn’t you have to be responsible for their dental work? Can a lung actually be collapsed like this? For a culture that is supposed to be known for their romantic nature, I have been privy to some train-side make out sessions that are just plain pitiful. So many of the advances I have seen, I would not describe as suave, more like creepy. I have been tempted more than once to call the rarely sighted police officer and tell him, “there’s a guy in that train car over there eating a woman, and he is starting with her face.” (Of course, he would Frenchly respond, ‘This is just love, you Americans don’t understand such affection.’ To which I would respond, ‘No, we understand hygiene. We understand personal space. I’ll take my 1.5 ft safe zone over your face pillaging anyday.’ Then I go to jail..can’t smell any worse than the metro.)

By the way, licking is inappropriate in public places; not to mention a filthy place like a metro/sewer. I don’t care if it is above the neck and near the ears, unless you’re the mother of a golden retriever puppy, keep your freaking tongue in your mouth, out of sight and off that poor woman’s cheeks. She has her eyes closed not because she enjoys it, but because she’s trying to pretend she’s somewhere else, Pierre!

Gastro-venturous!

Yeah – so I made up another word, but it fits!

Or maybe I should call this a tale of gastronomic proportion? Or if I was in a scholarly mood I might say en vitae stomachus. In any case you get the picture – I am a dork who is loving my delicious adventures out here in Phat Paris (get it?)

Moving on…

I am writing this post in response to a few of the requests that I have gotten from some of my hungrier friends (suffering from stomachus envious) who are just as curious about what I am putting in my mouth as the randomness that I tend to let fall out of it. So much of my days here revolve around my foody curiosities and although sometimes the first thing I do is wrinkle my nose and think, you are out your damn mind…I tend to stop and tell myself that it is all about the experience, the adventure, and at the very least I will have something to make fun of (cringe) about later.

“What’s the best meal I have eaten?”

I must admit I have yet to have a bad meal in Paris. I have occasionally had on my plate something I didn’t love after the first few bites and perhaps it wasn’t quite as difficult to restrain myself from falling face first into my plate and licking it clean which is more often than not the case. I have gotten really good at restraining myself. I will admit to having stayed away from Escargo (snails), which sounds exciting—in fact if exciting is judged by the level of immediate and instinctual repulsion when something is put in front of you, then snails are very exciting. I would have tried one (followed by a handful of bread and a supergulp of wine) but it’s my severe allergy to shellfish that makes me think twice about food that comes in its own container. I ain’t no punk, just don’t feel like dying.

One of the best meals I have had is at Robert et Louise, an awesome little tucked away joint that a friend found in her travel book. The venue was what I can best describe as Parisian rustic – wooden tables, paneled walls, soft lighting, and just plain cozy. It was a small restaurant by American standards, though it does have an upstairs and downstairs. You walk in the door and almost into the bar. There’s small two-some tables for romantic evenings - the kind where if both you and your companion were to put your elbows on the table, the proximity would put your faces in a position where smooching would be effortless (so very French). You would probably burn your chins on the little candle in the middle of the table but maybe that gets rid of the ugly little "I wanna be a beat-nic" whiskers your date has decided to start growing, so win win, right? There are picnic style tables for bigger gatherings which is where I sat with my friends. We were upstairs and had a view of the gentlemen preparing salads and other things that evidently required lots of flourish with every chop. At one point we watched giant legs and butts be brought up and past our tables, ready to be chopped and prepped for the next customer. I asked the waiter about the carnard du confit – it was a simple question like, “do you like this” or maybe I said “how is this.” He responds with a heavy and French-ly accented sneer, “you know, eh, zis es lik a freench kiz”. Huh? A French kiss? There’s tongue in my duck? I know there’s a lot of fat in it, that part I don’t mind (don’t judge.) He is obviously delighted that I have no idea what he is talking about as it gives him an opportunity to place his grubby paws on the table and lean over to say “Ferse you haf one and zen you wan a-no-zer”. HYUCK HYUCK, my waiter’s a perv. I don’t think I want him touching my duck or anything else, but since I enjoy an innuendo as much as the next gal, I ordered the duck. It was cooked in a brick fireplace that was right in the wall and happened to be only a few feet from our table. This distance allowed me to see the 200 year old piece of metal that was charred and bent with heat and age that evidently every piece of meat Bobby and Lou had ever prepared had at one point sizzled there. It must have been perfectly seasoned and probably part of the reason people continued to walk in the door. The duck was perfect! Maybe at one point it had put up a fight but when it was placed in front of me, it surrendered the most delicious smell. It was a simple presentation, nothing fancy, maybe some lettuce I disdainfully flicked to the side before giving my full attention to the two fat little un-pretentious looking legs. And then they just melted under my fork. I honestly had to close my eyes when I chewed…partly because it was just that damn good and partly so that I could focus on my food and ignore the tiny perverted waiter who was waggling his eyebrows (or should I say eyebrow) at me and saying, “eh, eh, I don tell ze lie, no”? No - he was an honest troll of a man, I did want another as was evident by the desire to pick up the bone and gnaw on it, to use my fingers to sop up the fatty duck juices remaining on my plate (again, don't judge) and then noisily lick them without care or concern for the less than amused snobby women next to me enjoying their cheese plate. They might have been in a better mood if they had gotten the French Kissing Duck (or the French kissing waiter). We had wine and dessert of course, but the duck was the star of that evening’s Gastro-performance, by far. My little cirque du stomach if you will.

Please Allow Myself to Introduce Myself

Hey it’s me! SBSHF (single black smoking hot female) traveling and occasionally attending classes while I study abroad in France!

I made a promise to keep friends and family posted on my adventures in France, and I am sad to say I have truly been lapse in that area outside of a few random and somewhat cryptic Face Book posts. I have decided to get caught up (disregard any spelling and grammatical errors, simply consider them alternative uses of the English language). I am going to tell you about all the things I have learned and learned to love about Paris, not to mention a few things I have decided, “Screw it, I will never be that French.”

For example, and with special loving gratitude to my mother, I will never think it is okay to smell like you ate a hunk of Roquefort cheese for breakfast, used a hunk of Camembert to wash your hair and then went to work in Brie factory for at least 18 hours—then because you have completely trashed your own sense of smell, you decide to punish what is left of the smelling populace with a strategic attack on the olfactory sensations of the rest of the world with what can only be described as mind numbing and a damn near blinding precision. You begin with a calculated maneuver, a near “blitzkrieg-ian” philosophy (yes I made that up). Resolved to launch what little Parisian concept there is on personal space right out the window (with massive force), you place your stinky arse down in the seat across from ME on the 45 minute train ride (when there are at least 20 other open spots else where) in the unfiltered airtight metal container. This is a true story - Last time it happened, after I came to (because I am pretty sure I blacked out for a few minutes) I just got angrier and angrier – it is almost like I can see the funk rising off this person in waves and attaching itself to my coat. Pointlessly, I place my scarf over my nose, because at this point I don’t give a you-know-what if my actions offend him, as far as I am concerned – He started it. I kept wishing the man would get comfortable and stop moving. Perhaps it itches to smell that bad? Every time he resituated himself a new and somehow slightly different smell would waft in my direction. I felt like yelling “hold still, what did I ever do to you!” If the French could figure out how to deploy these people en masse to other countries, they would be considered a wholly new type of bioWMD and the country would rise to a new level of super power…except in countries where there are already funky people, and there are more funky people…hmmm, this plan needs work. Especially since after the first wave of the invasion they would cease all operations from 12-2pm for a cappuccino and baguette break and perhaps a Lucky Strike.

But don’t get me wrong– that is just one thing I have found that I don’t like in France – the stinky cheese people and the non-existent policy on personal space, and to be fair, I would hate that in any country. For me that is a universal dislike. I thought having a super sensitive sniffer was a good thing and it is, in the kitchen, say on Thanksgiving, but not so much on a Metro train. Oh and I have to mention the line cutting issue here – which I have resolved by cutting the person right back and saying “no cuts, no buts, no coconuts” – I do say it in English and even if they speak English they have no idea what I am talking about and usually keep quiet out of respect for my obvious Frenchness and my awareness of acceptable local queuing procedures.

It may seem like I am complaining…I am alittle, but I will take complaining in Paris over a lot of other things in my life. Even the small arguments I make about the cultural differences, are interesting enough to keep me getting out of bed each day and wondering – oooohoho what’s next?! And there is of course the thrill that at any moment my restraint might give way and I really do smack the beejeezus out of the 5 foot tall, 60 yr old woman standing on my foot on the train in her “oh so faux” mink(like) coat – pretending she doesn’t know I am there…do I or don’t I? To bitchslap or not to bitchslap. More than likely, and with thanks yet again to my mother, out of politeness and the fact that I do see myself as an American representative (haha-sorry for you), I probably won’t headbutt her tiny old forehead out of vindictive enjoyment – I will give a gentle shoulder tap and an “Excusez moi, mon pied, si vous plait” and I will point at my foot and she will move and then I will say “thanks heffer” – with a big ol smile.

There is so much more I love about being in Paris, because I do feel fortunate and happy to be here. I promise to talk more about that next time – I just had to first get the sarcastic aggression out of the way…at least this way, you know it is me!

So far the way I see it, it’s all one big adventure - this huge jumble of laughter and smells and mistakes and questionable outfits is called life. I am taking the good with the bad and either way always with a smile while thinking, “I am so making fun of this later.” So I will continue to travel and record always with my tongue in cheek, simply because that is how I feel about it. If you don’t like it, then how the hell did you make it to the last line in my blog?

Smooches,

Linds