Sara Version 2.0

Fall has always felt like a time of beginning to me. It seems that our school-time calendars become a part of who we are and how we imagine time, even when books and pencils are but distant memories.

Today I felt the beginning of the end of our precious time in Paris. Of course our “remaining time” is more than most people ever have the chance to enjoy—so this is all said in a wistful and grateful tone. Sometimes as I think back to past visitors, or some of the extraordinary everyday adventures we’ve enjoyed, I think, “surely this has all been a dream.”

Yesterday, I was walking through the Luxemberg Gardens enroute to meeting a friend for lunch when this notion struck me: I remember the first time I walked through these gardens in January and boy was I terrified!

It has been eight months since we arrived with four suitcases full of clothing and a whole trunk load full of hopes. As I look back, we could have packed a little lighter on the clothing and we might have even not hoped enough because this year has given us so much that it would take a cargo ships worth of containers to fit all the experiences and lessons.

I promise not to spend the next four months already reflecting on Paris, but I thought a glimpse of “Parisian Sara” after eight months of expat life seemed worth sharing.

I am still the same Hoosier-born, DC lovin’, Indigo Girls listening, polka dancing girl, but I’ve now added a bit of Paris to my geographical identity. I love black clothing as I’ve always have, but now I know you can actually make an entire wardrobe out of it.

I’ve rediscovered my appreciation for the bicycle after the Parisian Velib Bike rental program gave me another way to zoom around town. I’m really grateful that my dad thought “girls should know how to read maps too” when at least once a week as I find my way around town using my now tattered, multi-page Paris map.

I’ve rediscovered my love of a really good book now that the TV is a mostly useless tool (it's all in French) and its ok for me to stay up late just to read. I think I could be a bit of an internet addict and I’m convinced I’m a bread snob now that I’ve declared even French baguettes that happen to be more than four hours old not worth eating.

I’m still scared of some really smelly cheese, but can at least manage one bite. I still don’t like to see the heads on animals at the butcher, but I can get past it. I still wish I had the French gene that let me eat and be a size 2. I wish I could speak better French, but I’m still not good at doing my homework.

Gratefully, I’m reconvinced of how far a smile and a lot of humility will get you in any language. I’m also entirely convinced that Paris is truly one of the most beautiful places on earth and that Josh is the best Parisian tour guide I could ever imagine. (It goes without saying I think he is also the best husband I could imagine too!)

I think that there is always room for ice cream and always time for coffee with a friend. I think I dance better than most French people (which isn’t saying much for the French) and that wine at lunch is one of the most civilized practices I can imagine.

I believe I’ve learned really important lessons about hospitality and friendship—they are a gift to give and to receive and both have made a huge difference in my year. I’ve also realized I’ve underestimated my parents and brothers who really are better world travelers than I imagined. I’m grateful I still love spending time with them (and I think they would say the same). I also realize how much I love to shop and even window shop or “window lick” as its called in French, which I learned with Bobi—one of the best mother in laws I could possibly imagine (and not just because she loves to shop). I could even go as far to say I appreciate beauty in a new way, between the art and fashion and markets full of beautiful food and beautiful people.

I also have realized I am truly a coffee addict and a tea aficionado. I think cloth napkins dress up even the simplest of tables and small apartments can feel big enough if there is a lot of laughter, good company and people can be flexible about when they shower (since there is only hot water for a two short showers at a time). I believe any meal with champagne is a celebration and that flowers are an important part of a home.

There is more and I apologize if this post seems a little dreamy or even overly self-indulgent, but I took a moment to realize the Sara who arrived in France and the Sara who traipsed across town are the same person, but it would be more accurate to say I might be becoming “Sara Version 2.0”.

sPg

Crime of Fashion

I think it’s fair to say that my name and the word “fashion” have never been used in the same sentence (unless it was something like “One of Josh’s rare artistic talents is his ability to fashion a tiny café chair from just the wire and metal cap that goes over a champagne cork.”) I’m not caught up in Fashion Week, I’m caught up in fashion weak. I’m not what acclaimed French rapper MC Solaar calls a “Victime de la Mode,” or a “Fashion Victim,” I’m a victim of the absence of fashion.

So, you can imagine how excited I’d be if, by pure dumb luck, I ended up accidentally and temporarily being in style. I had to contemplate this very real possibility the other day.

I was minding my own business, listening to local news radio, when a story on summer fashion came on. I mostly ignored it, hearing only snippets, but then at the very end, I hear (in French) " [inaudible] are floral shorts and shirts, like Hawaiian shirts." Now I love Hawaiian shirts, and I’ve been wearing them all summer--slightly to Sara’s chagrin--so this was key information. (Hawaiian shirt pictures are intermingled with this blog. Kids: how many can you find?) But I missed the first part of the relevant sentence—what if any initial adjective was involved in their statement? Did they say these shirts were in, out, or indifferent? Should I not be caught dead in one, or without one? Inquiring minds want to know!

I couldn't find the story on the radio station’s website, so I was half-listening to the radio the whole rest of the day, hoping it would be repeated that night. Sure enough, a few hours later, it was.

What I found out was this: apparently, in France, on the beach as well as in the clubs, surf clothes are in. Stripes for everyone, pink and khaki for women, open pink T-shirts (whatever that is) for men, surf shorts (with belts, not elastic) are in for everyone, clothes with small bits of 70s/80s-style fluorescent...all are in.

Then came the final sentence that I'd been waiting for. [In French] "Completely out, on the other hand....are floral shorts and shirts, like Hawaiian shirts." They actually said, in French, "completement 'out' " !!! Well, as we fashion mavens know, "completement 'out' " just means "on its way back in"! So, while I may not be fashionable, I’m really more “pre-fashionable.” It’s just a matter of time.

While summer may not have been my season, there is hope for the fall and winter. I’ve always loved the black velvet/velour sports coats that all 20/30-something French men seem to have been issued at birth. They’re somehow snazzy, casual, and “cool kid,” all at the same time. I finally broke down and bought one a few weeks back, for a great price at one of Paris’ excellent vintage stores, and I officially love it.

So, imagine my “even a broken clock is right twice a day” joy when I was reading “A Nous Paris,” the free newspaper published by the Paris Metro system, and read the following [translated]: “Last year was that of the velours/velvet sportscoat, rolled out in every color. This winter, it’s still present (on the scene), so you can take it back out of the closet without any problem.” So, maybe I’m a year late, but I’m still going to ride this unintentional fashion wave as far as I can!

Hopefully, another positive step in my fashion rehabilitation also took place this week, when my mom made a welcome visit and treated Sara and I to some nice additions to our fall wardrobe. My mom, Sara, and I also hit the Opera, conducted a failed experiment in cooking cow tongue, and Sara made a fantastic dinner under much self-imposed stress for her mother-in-law and Iris, (my junior year abroad host mother and Sara’s French cooking guru). I guess the good news is that even if my clothes are "completement out," we're all still "completement in"...love with Paris!

Josh

PS: Enjoy the photos, each featuring my mom and/or some of my dubious garb. Find these photos, plus the highlights of the others I've taken all year long, at http://www.flickr.com/photos/7531775@N04/ Let me know if you have any trouble.

Cheering Against the Irish

Today, I cheered against the Irish. Not my beloved Fighting Irish from the University of Notre Dame, regardless of how badly the season is going. But rather, I was cheering against the Ireland rugby team. (with apologies to all of my Irish friends) Tonight, France beat Ireland in an important game in the rugby World Cup preliminary rounds and I couldn’t help but cheer for the French.

I really do miss American college football though, and every Saturday I keep track of when kickoff is for Notre Dame. Anne and I are already plotting to attend a game next season and I still religiously read The South Bend Tribune for any scrap of news about even this really terrible ND football season. For unrelated and unexplained reasons, I even find myself humming “Hail to the Redskins” as I walk down the street—a rare departure from the Notre Dame obsession.

But I have to say, its just not as much fun to watch a Notre Dame game when you are one of six people in the worst room of a bar at 11PM trying to see the game—the circumstances in which I saw the only ND game I’ll see all season at an unfortunate bar called "The Fifth Drink". The game was pretty terrible (the 38-0 loss against Michigan), but the circumstances were even tougher. A game of beer pong, embarrassingly drunk Americans and the TV propped up just inches from a trash can were enough to make me change my mind on which sport I would follow the remaining time in France.

So, I’ve decided to give Rugby a whirl. While seemingly not as international as the soccer World Cup, the rugby World Cup is a big deal, and France is hosting it this year. A quick bit of background: the tournament is every four years, the USA does have a team that’s not that bad, and the game is fast and makes American football look tame. There is a lot of hard tackling and there is virtually no protective equipment. I like that the rugby refs say things like, “No, you cannot kick him in the head” or “I saw that, don’t do it again”.

Rugby is much faster (and in my opinion, more interesting) than soccer and the players are fascinating. Most of the players have necks the size of their heads, which seems unnatural, and there is one particular French player who looks like a caveman and is super fun to watch play.

Sometimes I need a map to find the countries playing—does anyone know where Tonga is? I still don’t, but I know the US lost to them in an early game. The New Zealand team (knows as “The All-Blacks” because of their uniforms) is really great and the French are hanging in there.

Tonight’s game against Ireland was broadcast on a big screen right in front of a 16^th century church just a couple of minutes from our apartment. We went and watched it with a crowd of people, which makes any game more fun. It was unclear if the two carloads of cops were there to control the crowd or just so they could watch the game. Everyone seemed to be having a good time and the crowd ranged from teenagers to middle age women.

During today’s game, when there were breaks in the action, the TV flashed pictures of the French president throwing his head back and cheering and also a group of about seven beautiful women clad only in black bras and lace underwear in the stands. Guess which got a bigger cheer from the crowd…

The tournament wraps up in a few weeks—and I suspect a few more games are on our agenda to check out. Perhaps a few pieces of French Rugby Gear will even make it onto our shopping list and maybe, just maybe, the French National Anthem will replace Hail to the Redskins as my sidewalk song of choice to hum for the next few weeks.

sPg

PS: Here's a photo of a Scottish rugby/football (soccer) rally at a bar near Josh's office.

My Favorite Things, Paris-style

First, as seems to happen at least once every month or two, a quick apology for the lag time between my blog posts. And thanks to Sara for filling the blog vacuum while I was MIA (now, if only I could get her to empty the actual vacuum…)

One quick plug: more photos are online now at http://www.flickr.com/photos/7531775@N04/ . Check out the Paris Artsy, People, and Touristy pictures for shots of our last few visitors plus sites like Mont Saint Michel, Chartres, Versailles, and others. If you’re not a Flickr member (free and easy!), just e-mail me and I’ll add you.

Now, the blogging…

As we get older, certain line items that were once on our resume eventually get bumped off, since they are too outdated, not important enough, etc. Other items are so laughably offbeat or absurd that either you put them at the end of your resume as a fun conversation sparker, or you wouldn’t put them on your resume for a lifetime supply of ice cream (the basic form of currency in Joshland). Want an example of the latter? Here you go: in the spring of 1990, I was the Props Master for my high school’s production of “The Sound of Music”

[Yes, this is very far afield from Paris 2007, I know, but stick with me, I’m coming around the bend…]

Maybe it doesn’t get more lame/obscure/bizarre than Props Master (it’s just one word away from “Dungeon Master”), but I have to say, I had a hell of a good time working on that play (despite one late-night closet-wood-stain-fumes prop preparation incident that probably insured that any future Gibson kid(s) will all be born with “Dark Walnut” colored skin and/or internal organs…)

As a result of that Sound of Music gig, I had to hear the (in)famous song “My Favorite Things” a zillion gajillion times, over and over and over again. This is why, seventeen years later, the idea popped into my head to periodically use this blog to highlight some of my favorite things in Paris. (Ah, good segue, Grasshopper!)

Now, a list of “macro” favorite things would help no one, because any schmuck can give you that list (Eiffel Tower, tasty bread, saucy Parisiennes, etc.) No, I want to give you, Maria-style, a list of the “micro” level, everyday things in Paris that I think are great. And rather than just hitting you with a mega-long list all at once, I’ll just post a couple at a time, when the spirit moves me (or when the other “spirit” reminds me that I’m not holding up my end of the blog bargain…)

Just to refresh the memories of those of you who didn’t have these song lyrics mercilessly drilled into your skull during several months of your hormonally-active late high school years, let’s go to the audio tape:

"The hills are alive...with the sound of Gibsons!"

“Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens, Brown paper packages tied up with strings…Cream colored ponies and crisp apple streudels, Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles, Wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings…Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes, Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes, Silver white winters that melt into springs, These are a few of my favorite things.”

So, my take-away from this is—weird chick, probably wouldn’t know what to do with a Circuit City gift certificate, so a couple balls of twine, a McRib, and one of those “Hang in there” kitty-hanging-from-a-tree posters would probably make her whole damn year.

Similarly, my Paris “favorite things” list tells you something about me—I’m detail-obsessed and still have lingering “urban life” interests from my last couple of jobs.

If it’s any reassurance at all, I’ve shared most of these “favorite things” with our visitors, and they seem to go above and beyond their normal level of humoring me in response, so despite their obscurity, maybe these things are actually worth noticing by normal folks too.

With those prefaces and warnings, enter the dark recesses of my brain, where we can discover together tiny details that continue to entertain me here in Paris. Here’s one quick “favorite things” example, look for more to follow, a couple a week, for the next few months.

FAVORITE THING #1 (numbers here are for counting, not for ranking)
BI-BOP STICKERS
Back in the spring of 1993, as I was wrapping up my junior year in Paris, a bunch of blue, white, and green sticker bands started appearing on tall, metallic objects (streetlight poles, building downspouts, etc.) throughout Paris. I was entirely clueless about what the purpose of these stickers might be, until shortly thereafter when the modern miracle of carpet-bombing saturation advertising brought one word to everyone’s lips: Bi-bop.

What was happening, it turns out, was that the French national phone company was rolling out the nation’s (and one of the world’s) first comparatively low-cost, comparatively widespread, cellular phone program. The phones only worked, however, when the user stood next to a special Bi-bop antenna, which was, you guessed it, marked with a blue, white, and green sticker band. (A quick correction to past visitors—I’d told you, and I’d always thought myself, that any tall, metallic object would work as a Bi-bop antenna, but thanks to French Wikipedia I know know that only the selected poles with stickers got the job done.) From what I’ve just read online, apparently it worked a bit like a wifi (in French we say “weeee feeee”) hotspot, but for phones: you had perfect reception, as long as you didn’t wander too far off from one of those stickers.

Obviously, the Bi-Bop phones are history (except a few in museums), but the stickers remain, the sign of a technological era gone by. All I can think of whenever I see them is: what a crappy job placing those stickers must have been: hauling a ladder around, climbing up, sticking on the Bi-Bop band, climbing down, scooting your ladder a few hundred feet down, repeat. Definitely a job you would take off of your resume as soon as you got a chance!

Josh

PS: Proving that the Bi-Bop stickers are not just omnipresent, but also found everywhere, when I realized I needed another picture of one, I found three on our somewhat obscure street, within a couple hundred of yards of our door.

PPS: One of the Bi-Bop pictures includes a sneak preview of another of my favorite things...

This Call is Interrupted

A longer blog entry is forthcoming from both of us, but this “bloglet” seemed worth sharing.

Summer is officially over. We had a blast with our August round of visitors. The Sitar Gang, former colleagues from the Sitar Arts Center--Maureen and her husband Chris and even a quick visit from former Board president Heather and her husband Justy--were great fun. Having a visit from Kim, a Chesterton friend and former college roommate, made Paris feel even more like home. We saw many sights and walked over 75 miles as we toured Paris with them. I especially loved Mont Saint Michel (an island town and church built a long time ago), Chartres (with its amazing stained glass and medieval prayer labyrinth) and the Rungis Market (which has replaced Les Halles and is now the centralized market for Paris--http://www.rungisinternational.com). It was also just good to talk and hang out with good friends over coffee and an occasional glass of wine.

But just as our visitors left, the promised Rentree (French for "Back to School") happened and, as predicted, our lives have gotten busier. Paris has awoken from its summer nap and wherever Parisians were for the entire month of August, they have returned in force. We’ve been working on catching up and starting our own fall schedules here.

Today, as I scurried back home on the metro after a few appointments, Josh called and a funny moment worth sharing occurred. This is how the conversation went with Josh:

Josh: Hi, how are you? Do I need to pick up bread for dinner?

Sara: Hi there…I’m running late, I was at the school longer than expected and I need to call Diane at 7:15PM. Is there any way you can also….

STATION STOP—Man with accordion enters the metro train and begins playing loudly

Sara: …pick up 250 grams of ground beef and onions and red…

Josh (in an angry/annoyed voice): Where ARE you? What do you need? I can’t hear anything over that accordion. I’ll call you back in 10 minutes. [and then he hangs up]

Needless to say, when the musician came around asking for tips, I did not give him any change, but perhaps I should have because I found myself laughing at the absurdity of the situation—I mean, only in Paris (and maybe on Dyngus Day, but that’s different) is it even remotely likely that a conversation is interrupted by accordion music.

Maybe next time I need to have a rare metro phone conversation, the puppet show guy will be on the metro instead.

sPg