There was a lot going on this past weekend: la journée du patrimoine, fête de l'humanité, techno parade and, according to one friend, Paris Design Week. I was lame enough not to have gone to any of those—wasn't feeling too well anyway. But on Saturday Cécile and I went to Boulevard Saint Michel for shopping and a nice promenade.
We took the No. 27 bus and stopped somewhere near Ecole des mines. Cécile pointed to me all the traces left by bullets/canon balls during WWII and I was amazed by the number of metal plates on the street commemorating honorable soldiers who sacrificed their lives for their country, with fresh flowers at the side. At a bio shop Cécile and I bought what we needed and I learned the phrase "m'a-tu-vu," a word to describe someone who's obnoxiously bourgeois.
It was a really nice walk, past Jardin de Luxembourg and down the boulevard. The French chain Gibert-Joseph has this smart idea of having its different specialized shops crawling all the way down the boulevard, creating a string of shops. At the crossroads and standing near the fountain of St. Michel, you can see four bookstore of different themes spread into four directions.
We then walked up towards the Notre Dame. We rested on an unnamed wooden bridge and Cécile looked into the distant telling me how she loved Paris for its many places with a touch of eternity. I would usually twitch when someone utters a word like eternity, but Cécile was sincere; she asked what my dreams are as a young person, commenting that she really believed she could "refaire le monde" when she was younger. She told me of another young girl who used to live with her, an English girl who studies medicine and who chose it only because it's a major that would get her jobs more easily. "That's just really sad," Cécile signed, "the world has changed so much."
Perhaps the world has changed indeed. Perhaps it has nothing with where or when we were born, we've grown more practical as men. Who knows. I for one know for sure that I wouldn't want a life like the one Cécile leads right now. I'd want to be with someone when I'm 34, with kids and everything. It's not because it seems the right thing to do. I know I'd just prefer that to working and living alone, no matter how meaningful my work is.
Anyway, Cécile and I returned through the narrow streets of the Latin quarter and we took the bus back home. I also discovered with Cécile all the little crêperies on the way—gotta try some next time I go.
***
Brent and I visited Paris 7 together yesterday and he introduced to me roughly the two main buildings of the campus. The district was originally a storage place for old Paris. The old buildings were preserved, hence the names "Grands Moulins" and "entrepot". The cool thing is that in Grands Moulins there are different entries and by coincidence A is for Accueil, B for bureau (damn, I'm not sure of this one now, maybe it's another word starting with B) and C for Cours.
I had only enough time to attend Evelyn Grossman's first lecture of Littérature et Psychanalyse. Oddly there wasn't any cultural shock in terms of class ambiance. Students weren't as many as I had expected and there were plenty of foreign students to make myself feel normal.
Grossman explained the last assignment of the class and said we could write on anything and everything we like that's related to the themes of sexual identity/differences—film, dance, photo exhibition, cultural political events, you name it. As some local students gave examples of possible subjects, I realized how integral the Parisien intellectual circle is and how meagre my knowledge on other forms of expression is: I never went to see a dance or photo exhibit nor did I ever understand much of these art forms. Good thing that Cécile is taking me to a photo exhibit this Wednesday. That'll be a good start, though I think I'll still end up choosing some literary citation and use that for my assignment in December—we'll see.
Exploration is the key. Way to be open to shows and dances and everything!
We took the No. 27 bus and stopped somewhere near Ecole des mines. Cécile pointed to me all the traces left by bullets/canon balls during WWII and I was amazed by the number of metal plates on the street commemorating honorable soldiers who sacrificed their lives for their country, with fresh flowers at the side. At a bio shop Cécile and I bought what we needed and I learned the phrase "m'a-tu-vu," a word to describe someone who's obnoxiously bourgeois.
It was a really nice walk, past Jardin de Luxembourg and down the boulevard. The French chain Gibert-Joseph has this smart idea of having its different specialized shops crawling all the way down the boulevard, creating a string of shops. At the crossroads and standing near the fountain of St. Michel, you can see four bookstore of different themes spread into four directions.
We then walked up towards the Notre Dame. We rested on an unnamed wooden bridge and Cécile looked into the distant telling me how she loved Paris for its many places with a touch of eternity. I would usually twitch when someone utters a word like eternity, but Cécile was sincere; she asked what my dreams are as a young person, commenting that she really believed she could "refaire le monde" when she was younger. She told me of another young girl who used to live with her, an English girl who studies medicine and who chose it only because it's a major that would get her jobs more easily. "That's just really sad," Cécile signed, "the world has changed so much."
Perhaps the world has changed indeed. Perhaps it has nothing with where or when we were born, we've grown more practical as men. Who knows. I for one know for sure that I wouldn't want a life like the one Cécile leads right now. I'd want to be with someone when I'm 34, with kids and everything. It's not because it seems the right thing to do. I know I'd just prefer that to working and living alone, no matter how meaningful my work is.
Anyway, Cécile and I returned through the narrow streets of the Latin quarter and we took the bus back home. I also discovered with Cécile all the little crêperies on the way—gotta try some next time I go.
***
Brent and I visited Paris 7 together yesterday and he introduced to me roughly the two main buildings of the campus. The district was originally a storage place for old Paris. The old buildings were preserved, hence the names "Grands Moulins" and "entrepot". The cool thing is that in Grands Moulins there are different entries and by coincidence A is for Accueil, B for bureau (damn, I'm not sure of this one now, maybe it's another word starting with B) and C for Cours.
I had only enough time to attend Evelyn Grossman's first lecture of Littérature et Psychanalyse. Oddly there wasn't any cultural shock in terms of class ambiance. Students weren't as many as I had expected and there were plenty of foreign students to make myself feel normal.
Grossman explained the last assignment of the class and said we could write on anything and everything we like that's related to the themes of sexual identity/differences—film, dance, photo exhibition, cultural political events, you name it. As some local students gave examples of possible subjects, I realized how integral the Parisien intellectual circle is and how meagre my knowledge on other forms of expression is: I never went to see a dance or photo exhibit nor did I ever understand much of these art forms. Good thing that Cécile is taking me to a photo exhibit this Wednesday. That'll be a good start, though I think I'll still end up choosing some literary citation and use that for my assignment in December—we'll see.
Exploration is the key. Way to be open to shows and dances and everything!
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