We'll Never Be Royals

"But Paris was a very old city and we were young and nothing was simple there, not even poverty, nor sudden money, nor the moonlight, nor right or wrong nor the breathing of someone who lay beside you in the moonlight." 

-A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

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     It's officially fall break and now I'm too tired to do anything. I was too tired to plan any sort of travel, so I'm left here in Paris (Horrible, right?). I'm so tired that lately I've been turning on light switches that are already on, getting on the wrong métro line twice and not noticing for a few stops and nodding off in class (that's nothing new). This tiredness is doing nothing for my French skills, either. Today in the St-Michel-Notre-Dame station, a French mother and daughter were asking me how to get to the Eiffel Tower. I knew exactly how to get there--take the RER C southwest and it doesn't matter which branch you take--but I had the biggest struggle explaining it to them. "Euhh...on prend le RER C et c'est pas important...euhhh..." I mumbled and gestured to nothing in particular. Whenever this happens-- I'm tired a lot, so often-- people start that dreaded smirk of Oh, you're cute, kid. You must not know any French. I'm going to go ask a real French person as soon as you walk away. And then I walk away, muttering Dammit, Rachel! out loud to myself and I'm sure if I'd look back, they probably always do stop a French person.
     Most of the time, I think I'm getting the hang of being a Parisian again. I'm doing a good job of wearing 98 percent black, keeping my slightly-pissed-off and disengaged composure in public (and avoiding laughing at all costs), paying in exact change whenever possible, letting my hair do what it wants to and remembering to have an umbrella on me at all times. I must look convincing because I get stopped constantly for directions (see above). The only time I break is when Americans stop me and nervously try to ask me where something is and I smile and respond in English. The look on their face of relief is really heartwarming. I'm always glad to help out a compatriot or two. I also break when musicians hop on my train and play cliché French songs because I can't resist cheesy accordion music. I usually start smiling and pretend I was just reading a funny text on my phone.

I did a great job today. The only color I wore was gray. If I wore a scarf, I'd be golden, but it is too effing hot for that.

     My phone. Hmm. My iPhone was stolen out of my hands in the middle of the night during a fog installation at Paris' annual arts and music festival, Nuit Blanche, at Place de la République (Here's my long-winded complaint about it). I was convinced that I would never, ever be pick-pocketed because I'm always extremely aware of my belongings. Even in my hometown in Minnesota where I'm sure there are no pickpockets, I always carry my bag in front of me and and glance around with shifty eyes. Having my phone stolen out of my hands was a huge blow to my street smarts confidence and kind of put me in shock. Paris is being harder on me than last time. If there is a silver lining, it's that I'm not so caught up in all that garbage--albeit fun garbage-- that you're convinced you need at your fingertips at all times: Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, email, etc. Now that I'm relegated to having the technological marvel that is the Blackberry Curve, I look at my phone only when I get a text. It's actually a little refreshing.
     Instead of playing on my phone on the métro, I've been doing a lot of reading. Right now I'm working on A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway. I read it sometime in college before I did my Paris semester and it didn't really mean much to me, but I knew it should've. At that point, I'd only spent four days in Paris in my entire life, so references to the rue Mouffetard and the Brasserie Lipp meant nothing at all to me. Yesterday I was reading on line 12 and happened to be reading about Hemingway and his wife Hadley's apartment. I then got off at my stop, Notre-Dame-des-Champs, walked down the street of the same name to find their apartment at number 113, which to my disappointment, looks like has been replaced by a new building. I had been reading about how he'd walk down the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs to have a drink at La Closerie des Lilas, so I followed his path, hitting the boulevard Montparnasse. He also wrote about walking through "the little Luxembourg," which is the park below my apartment. It's weird how much time he spent in my neighborhood. I wonder who was living in my apartment at that time and if they ever saw him outside my window walking to Gertrude Stein's at 27 rue de Fleurus. His writing is so modern and relatable that sometimes I forget how long ago he was in Paris. But then he mentions cattle in the streets and Paris being affordable and it's obviously quite a while ago.
     Sometimes I pass tourists and I miss being one of them. They get to live in a wonderful dream, that fantasy that everyone has of Paris. They're immune to reality--I'm definitely guilty of this in other cities--and spend their time contenting themselves with overpaying for water at restaurants, blocking locals on the sidewalks by walking five people across and eating on the street without feeling the shame of eating on the go that you feel if you actually live here. I would love to spend a week in a hotel here just for the maid service and elevator and the possibility of a complimentary breakfast and I would love to stare unjaded at every building. I know there are far, far worse things in life than living in a chambre de bonne, but sometimes I get really tired of ants invading my Nutella jar, stubbing my toes on everything, carrying groceries up seven flights of stairs, being hungry all the time and dealing with water issues (My second water-related issue thus far is that right now I have no hot water so I've been taking ice-cold showers). But I live in Paris, so I can't complain. I've sacrificed a lot to be here, over 4,000 miles from home, because this is my dream. My surprisingly mosquito-infested dream (Yes, the Minnesota state bird thrives in my apartment via the Jardin du Luxembourg).

     Below is my October video that I prefer on Vimeo for no particular reason and pictures from the past few weeks.

Love,
Rachel

Place de l'Odéon

Dangling my feet over my terrace. Balcony. Whatever you want to call it. 

Reading some Balzac

The Canal St-Martin

Jardin du Luxembourg

Jardin du Luxembourg (Fall is admittedly prettier in Minnesota. The trees just sort of die here.)

View from my apartment

Walking in the 10th near the Canal St-Martin

Building in the 9th

Printemps department store

Raining on the Ile St-Louis

The Chemin de Fer de Petite Ceinture (abandoned train tracks in the 15th). I love the contrast of architecture styles.

The Chemin de Fer de Petite Ceinture

Ile St-Louis

Colorful posts on the rue Charlemagne in the 4th

I have a great view of the sunset each day

Enjoying some American time thanks to Skype and the Thanksgiving store

Almost in Paris

I try my hand at video blogging....

Freedom at 21

       The old sayings “dream big” and “shoot for the stars” never had much meaning to me in my early years. In elementary school, my teachers usually had well-stocked classrooms of generic posters preaching virtues like “integrity,” “perseverance” and usually a few dedicated to dreams. Does anyone in fourth grade really have a clue what they want for their future? For example, my nine-year-old self's profession of choice was to be the next Britney Spears (For a Thanksgiving project that year, I first wrote that I was thankful for her, and then for my family.). As a victim of Youngest Child Syndrome (Which I just Googled and is very real), I strove to do everything my sister did- be in Gifted and Talented (I wasn’t chosen), have a super-high ACT score (My score was significantly lower), be in National Honor Society (What was the point of that, anyway?). Name something she did, and I tried my best to do it, too, often with lower results. 

     I really didn't dream much past what Emily had done for herself, so I never quite had any “big dreams” of my own, other than to finish college and then fall off the cliff of Life After College. That sounded about right, considering I had been probably the shyest kindergartner in my class and had cried in fear the first day when my sister wasn't on the bus to go home at noon (“Second graders go to school for the whole day,” My teacher told me.). I even won the prestigious award of “Most Cautious Player” on my fifth grade basketball team, Sharpied onto a basketball and really just code for “the player who is most afraid of upsetting other players.” Lacking any real talent, I still continued until eighth grade. I think I played for so many years because I was tall, liked to run back and forth on the court and, of course, because Emily had done it. Years later, when it came down to mark off a language to study my first year of high school, I put down French. Because Emily did. And that lit the fire of my Paris dreams.

Me in Kindergarten, scared for my life.

            A few weeks ago, I overslept and was in the process of emailing my professor when my phone vibrated. It was an email. I am pleased to inform you that you have been admitted to the MA in Cultural Translation at the American University of Paris for the fall 2013 semester. Congratulations! I wanted to shout it from on top of a mountain, but I didn’t have a mountain, so I called my mom instead. Everyone was extremely congratulatory and now after some time has passed, I’ve really started to think about how far I’ve come since childhood. I don’t think anyone would’ve predicted that little five-year-old Rachel would be living in Paris for five months, let alone another twelve—and voluntarily. I myself can hardly believe it because, after all, Emily didn't go to grad school—though she probably will someday and find a cure for cancer—but after the last several months, it’s to be expected that I would follow this road once again.

            When I left Paris last May, the taxi took me away from the neighborhood I’d just begun to feel comfortable in and I knew it wasn't the right way to go. I sat with my head resting against the window as my eyes dragged over shops I’d browsed through and cafés I’d wanted to try, and for which I'd never quite found the time. We passed memories like jogging and wine-picnicking in the Luxembourg Gardens, impatiently foot-tapping over the copy machines at the shop on the boulevard Saint-Michel, the vélib’ bicycle racks that had saved me from stumbling home in stilettos. My life in Paris was being reduced to the likes of a bus tour and I wanted to shake the driver’s seat and yell “But wait- stop! That’s where I found my copy of Les fleurs du mal! And that’s where I get my cheap pizza! Oh, and we really must stop for the quai!” But instead I just swallowed over the lump growing in my throat as we crossed Le Petit Pont towards Notre-Dame and over the quai where I’d spent so many nights dangling my feet over the glittering water and laughing over bottles of Côtes du Rhône. I closed my mouth and settled into my seat as Louis Armstrong began to sing “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” over the radio. I literally mouthed “Seriously?” to my mom in the front seat. 

            At home in Minnesota, I turned into a true Miss Havisham. I’ve spent the last several months hoarding old receipts that keep coming out of the woodwork from places like Franprix and avoiding the pictures I took because they make me too sad. I’ve been able to successfully watch Midnight in Paris once. My laptop clock is still on Paris time. I’m physically in Minneapolis, but clearly in Paris mentally. I’ve been a real mess.

            I have many fears and doubts about going back, but I can’t really come up with a good enough reason to not go back to Paris. I’ve heard so many people over the years talk about their life regrets and I know I don’t want to wake up in ten years at 32 and think, “Why the hell did I not go?” I want to make the most of this fleeting freedom that I have right now because what scares me much more than moving to a foreign country is living an ordinary life without adventure. I know this is my next chapter and I’m sure the kindergartner in me would be interested in hearing it.

Rachel

Here's to your first job in Paris!

        "That Paris exists and anyone could choose to live anywhere else in the world will always be a mystery to me."
-Midnight in Paris, 2011

     I feel like I'm in a dream. It's like I've been here for ages and I still have to think for a minute that I'm here. Last night I had a dream, a nightmare, really, that the semester was over and that I was home in Minnesota. Not to say that I don't love home, but seeing as I've been waiting for Paris for six years, I try to sweep those thoughts of leaving under the rug.
     I'm ridiculously happy all the time here, too. Despite bad days at my internship, getting my laundry stuck in the machines countless times and more choses à faire than I would prefer, I can't help but find myself smiling on the métro, sandwiched in between the man who needs to stop staring and take a much-needed shower and a sea of Longchamp bags. I don't know if it's the 200-calorie-croissants (And I rarely eat just one) or what, but there's no other place in the world that I'd rather be. I think Gil Pender said it pretty well in Midnight in Paris:

You know, I sometimes think, how is anyone ever gonna come up with a book, or a painting, or a symphony, or a sculpture that can compete with a great city? You can't. Because you look around and every street, every boulevard, is its own special art form and when you think that in the cold, violent, meaningless universe that Paris exists, these lights, I mean come on, there's nothing happening on Jupiter or Neptune, but from way out in space you can see these lights, the cafés, people drinking and singing. For all we know, Paris is the hottest spot in the universe.

     This week is my eighth and final week as an intern for French Travel Partners. Though at times it's been really difficult, it has really been the best way for me to use my French skills in speaking. Our classes at the Catholic Institute are made up of almost all Americans and there's not as much of a participation aspect in French classes, so this is the biggest chunk of my week that I have had to communicate entirely in French with my coworkers and clients. I've also made so much improvement in my ability to write formally, since I send out about fifteen demandes de réservation a day to French hotels. It'll be wonderful to have four-day weekends plus Wednesdays off, but I'll miss lunching in the Place des Vosges, my jambon-beurre sandwich from my boulevard Beaumarchais bakery and my coworkers that have been extremely welcoming and kind to me. Saying goodbye will be a little triste, and I'm glad to have had such a rare opportunity to do something like this. I'll probably never be able to say again that I had to visit the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre for my job.

The Catacombs of Paris

Easter mass at Notre-Dame

     This weekend, after three attempts, I finally made it to the Catacombs, which is in my neighborhood. Some two-hundred steps under all the noisy streets and crooked buildings, the Catacombs are lined with an innumerable amount of skulls and bones from as far back as the eighteenth century. It's surreal to think, as you're taking a flashless photo of a yellowing skull, that this used to be a living, breathing human being that's now anonymous. It's a weird experience.
     On Sunday, we went to Easter mass at Notre-Dame. The line to get in stretched out onto the Left Bank, so we had to wait for a long time to get in. The service was in Latin and in French, so I couldn't understand much of it through the swarms of people taking pictures, but now I can say for the rest of my life that I was there for Easter!
     Starting this coming Saturday, I'll be on spring break, traveling to Venice, Rome and Santorini, Greece until April 25. The Trevi Fountain must really be magic, since I'll be back in Rome so soon after studying there last May! I'll also be celebrating my twenty-first birthday in Greece, which I never imagined would ever happen.

Until next time,
Rachel