Today: as one of only two non-french speakers in translation class, I get called on to read what can only pass as the worst french translation in history.
Tonight: Mardi Gras, France style. I am so seriously ready for bread and cheese and Belgian beer. I plan on getting flashed.
Phrase du jour: Vous parlez Française comme un vache espagnol. (You speak french horribly.)
PS: CONGRATS TO TRINA ON HER NEW STATUS AS THE ONLY ENGAGED PERSON FROM MY GRADUATING CLASS WHO ISN'T CRAZY!
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Brace Yourself
Not for the faint of heart.
At each corner I think I might find a cure for my heart sickness and then I check my email and find another reason why there is no word for home in French.
My great-Grandmother, who is, in some ways, like that tin box of secrets, acorns and pennies that you never tell anyone you have because it's too precious, is slipping away as time passes. The news from home is that she has forgotten my great-grandfather, her husband of seventy years, and that she is having... dreams.
I've known for a long time that our desire to keep others alive is mainly selfish; we want them to survive not because their lives here on this mortal coil are particularly grand anymore, but because they represent for us the past of black hills, and dusty bare feet that slips further and further away from us which each breath, and their presence keeps us from feeling that we're slipping violently off the face of the earth. It is for partially selfish reasons that I regret not taking Tim to meet her at Christmas; I want him to know the family we were before we became the family we are and, inevitably, become the family we will be. But partially I juat want him to be able to see through a tiny curtained window the way her hands still know things about life and children and checkered fabrics, even though she hasn't sewn a stitch in years.
Though she cannot remember my name, she once told me the story of the day she knew she was going to marry my grandfather, as he helped her from her horse. She told me about putting a penny under the skin of a wounded horse to heal the muscle and I wonder where her penny tricks will go when she is gone.
I should have learned when my great-grandfather died that the regret you feel for not sitting at their feet and learning their stories never goes away and cannot be resolved.
She's not gone yet.
We go away so that we can know where our homes are, only praying that our homes are still there when we return.
At each corner I think I might find a cure for my heart sickness and then I check my email and find another reason why there is no word for home in French.
My great-Grandmother, who is, in some ways, like that tin box of secrets, acorns and pennies that you never tell anyone you have because it's too precious, is slipping away as time passes. The news from home is that she has forgotten my great-grandfather, her husband of seventy years, and that she is having... dreams.
I've known for a long time that our desire to keep others alive is mainly selfish; we want them to survive not because their lives here on this mortal coil are particularly grand anymore, but because they represent for us the past of black hills, and dusty bare feet that slips further and further away from us which each breath, and their presence keeps us from feeling that we're slipping violently off the face of the earth. It is for partially selfish reasons that I regret not taking Tim to meet her at Christmas; I want him to know the family we were before we became the family we are and, inevitably, become the family we will be. But partially I juat want him to be able to see through a tiny curtained window the way her hands still know things about life and children and checkered fabrics, even though she hasn't sewn a stitch in years.
Though she cannot remember my name, she once told me the story of the day she knew she was going to marry my grandfather, as he helped her from her horse. She told me about putting a penny under the skin of a wounded horse to heal the muscle and I wonder where her penny tricks will go when she is gone.
I should have learned when my great-grandfather died that the regret you feel for not sitting at their feet and learning their stories never goes away and cannot be resolved.
She's not gone yet.
We go away so that we can know where our homes are, only praying that our homes are still there when we return.
Monday, February 07, 2005
The score is inconsequential
What is the last day in a series of bad days? Usually it is the day that beats all others with the sheer scale of it's horridness. It is the one that blows all other bad days out of the water, and also it is typically the day before things start to get better. I prefer one truly horrid, greek tragedy sort of day to this anti-channakah-like eight days of small, ruinous distasters.
What does it mean when all your adventures of late are only bad adventures? Unlike pirates, cowboys or even shipwreck survivors these adventures don't end with burried treasure, the badguy behind bars or even getting the boy-- because the boy lives in Washington DC and a plane ticket costs nearly five-hundred American dollars.
Friday night was borderline good, just crazy kids hanging out and talking over the music until the wee hours. The high point was Alexis and Mamadou rapping followed by Cody and Josh beating Wisconsin-Erin and me at a club-building contest. If you've never built what our frightening brittish hostel-mates in Barcalona called "a club," you just stack beer bottles one on top of the other and hope they don't fall over and splatter you with residue (residue= beer and cigarette ashes in France, ALWAYS). Cody beat his own personal record of seven bottles and I beat my own personal record for time spent staring at a map of Europe. The entire world has an opinion about where you should go, but I find lately that the entire world is drunk and should not be trusted.
Saturday also had a strong start, as we tracked down my bank card at H&M and happily retreved it before heading to Dunkerque for the Mardi Gras/Carnaval fesitivities. Once there we traced the line of colorful and slightly-smudged cross dressers to it's source at the ciy hall where the band played, the people danced and sang with their umbrellas and feather dusters and many a pickled herring was tossed. Beads? Who needs beads when you can have a pickled herring sealed in plastic? Directly after this colorful display of the french roots of some good ol' Louisiana culture, a nearby ATM proceeded to sequester my newly found bankcard, leaving me hungry, cashless, cardless and in a strange, strange land full of cross dressers.
Saturday night we narrowly caught the last train home where we met a man with Algerian parents who explained that if he had been born in America, he would be considered an American but because he was born in France, racism prevents him from being considered French. The common trend seems to be that in the north of France, where people are comparatively warm and friendly, anyone who strikes up a conversation will mention two things: how much they hate the current American government but how, despite that, they believe in American ideals and wish that they had been born there. Everyone's been there somewhere. Everyone wants to be from California. Nodody doesn't want to be a Californian.
Sunday, nothing is done all day accept the reading of "House of Leaves" and the eating of marvelous European Kabab, which is not shish-kabob and should never, ever be confused as such.
At midnight, a group of Americans+Amélie (french)+some remarkably football-savy Quebecois go in search of a superbowl. As Matthew put it "It's shown in 189 countries around the world, what the hell is wrong with this one?" We considered renting a hotel room to watch the game on the cable but figured that the receptionist wouldn't respond well to 12 people who just want a room between the hours of midnight and four am. The extensive search leads to Gino's (home of the best coffee on earth) where the bartender agrees to let us watch until half time (3 am) as long as we buy drinks.
The Superbowl, in France, is watched sans-commercials, sans commentary and amidst the cat calls of drunk australians who believe that Soccer is clearly the manlier sport because no soccer played in history could ever take a football player in a fist fight. Regardless, the halftime show with the great Sir Paul (which I like the call America's-Last-Ditch-Effort-at-Respectability) was entirely over the heads of everyone there, who just wanted to see Janet's other one (except Michigan-Geoff, who, like me, was waiting for Ringo to jump out in his Mr. Conductor suit). All I really wanted was just one chicken wing.
Phrase du jour: Vive la Vélo! (Long live the bicycle! Chanted by car protestors, ching-ching-ching!)
What does it mean when all your adventures of late are only bad adventures? Unlike pirates, cowboys or even shipwreck survivors these adventures don't end with burried treasure, the badguy behind bars or even getting the boy-- because the boy lives in Washington DC and a plane ticket costs nearly five-hundred American dollars.
Friday night was borderline good, just crazy kids hanging out and talking over the music until the wee hours. The high point was Alexis and Mamadou rapping followed by Cody and Josh beating Wisconsin-Erin and me at a club-building contest. If you've never built what our frightening brittish hostel-mates in Barcalona called "a club," you just stack beer bottles one on top of the other and hope they don't fall over and splatter you with residue (residue= beer and cigarette ashes in France, ALWAYS). Cody beat his own personal record of seven bottles and I beat my own personal record for time spent staring at a map of Europe. The entire world has an opinion about where you should go, but I find lately that the entire world is drunk and should not be trusted.
Saturday also had a strong start, as we tracked down my bank card at H&M and happily retreved it before heading to Dunkerque for the Mardi Gras/Carnaval fesitivities. Once there we traced the line of colorful and slightly-smudged cross dressers to it's source at the ciy hall where the band played, the people danced and sang with their umbrellas and feather dusters and many a pickled herring was tossed. Beads? Who needs beads when you can have a pickled herring sealed in plastic? Directly after this colorful display of the french roots of some good ol' Louisiana culture, a nearby ATM proceeded to sequester my newly found bankcard, leaving me hungry, cashless, cardless and in a strange, strange land full of cross dressers.
Saturday night we narrowly caught the last train home where we met a man with Algerian parents who explained that if he had been born in America, he would be considered an American but because he was born in France, racism prevents him from being considered French. The common trend seems to be that in the north of France, where people are comparatively warm and friendly, anyone who strikes up a conversation will mention two things: how much they hate the current American government but how, despite that, they believe in American ideals and wish that they had been born there. Everyone's been there somewhere. Everyone wants to be from California. Nodody doesn't want to be a Californian.
Sunday, nothing is done all day accept the reading of "House of Leaves" and the eating of marvelous European Kabab, which is not shish-kabob and should never, ever be confused as such.
At midnight, a group of Americans+Amélie (french)+some remarkably football-savy Quebecois go in search of a superbowl. As Matthew put it "It's shown in 189 countries around the world, what the hell is wrong with this one?" We considered renting a hotel room to watch the game on the cable but figured that the receptionist wouldn't respond well to 12 people who just want a room between the hours of midnight and four am. The extensive search leads to Gino's (home of the best coffee on earth) where the bartender agrees to let us watch until half time (3 am) as long as we buy drinks.
The Superbowl, in France, is watched sans-commercials, sans commentary and amidst the cat calls of drunk australians who believe that Soccer is clearly the manlier sport because no soccer played in history could ever take a football player in a fist fight. Regardless, the halftime show with the great Sir Paul (which I like the call America's-Last-Ditch-Effort-at-Respectability) was entirely over the heads of everyone there, who just wanted to see Janet's other one (except Michigan-Geoff, who, like me, was waiting for Ringo to jump out in his Mr. Conductor suit). All I really wanted was just one chicken wing.
Phrase du jour: Vive la Vélo! (Long live the bicycle! Chanted by car protestors, ching-ching-ching!)
Friday, February 04, 2005
American Werewolves in Paris
Military-time makes it feel like you're just counting down 'til the end of the day.
Slay, Lady, Slay
Perhaps it was the migrain headache, or the days spent without talking to Tim, or the fact that my bankcard is lost... or maybe it was just the rain and the day's ceaselessly gray sky... but yesterday was something else entirely.
But scratch all that. I finally got to talk to my Dad and I spoke more french yesterday than I've ever spoken in my life. Such is the benefit of the french kitchen, where people kiss you and then tell you who they are.
Luckily, Mamadou is a very patient and clear french-speaker whose first language is something African that I could only hope to understand in my wildest dreams. Although the fact that he told some french guy whom I've only seen a couple of times that I speak french well might have had better results had the following not happened:
Phrase du jour: Est-ce qu'il un problème quand un homme français vous dit que vous parlez bien la francaise, mais vous ne comprennez pas ce qu'il vous a dit? (Is it a problem when a french guy tells you speak french well but you don't understand what he said?)
Speaking of speaking in your wildest dreams, I've discovered that the reason I can't sleep at night (beside the bizarre feeling that I'm dizzily falling off the face of the earth), is because I've been translating all my night-time thoughts into french. Every night, without failure, I keep myself awake translating things in my head, like some sort of wine-and-cheese induced trace that carries on from midnight until I "wake up" from never having really been asleep.
I'm honestly looking forward to a weekend settled in with my piles of translation homework. I hope everyone enjoys sufficient debauchery for Mardi Gras. If you're the one who stole my bank card, please give it back.
But scratch all that. I finally got to talk to my Dad and I spoke more french yesterday than I've ever spoken in my life. Such is the benefit of the french kitchen, where people kiss you and then tell you who they are.
Luckily, Mamadou is a very patient and clear french-speaker whose first language is something African that I could only hope to understand in my wildest dreams. Although the fact that he told some french guy whom I've only seen a couple of times that I speak french well might have had better results had the following not happened:
Phrase du jour: Est-ce qu'il un problème quand un homme français vous dit que vous parlez bien la francaise, mais vous ne comprennez pas ce qu'il vous a dit? (Is it a problem when a french guy tells you speak french well but you don't understand what he said?)
Speaking of speaking in your wildest dreams, I've discovered that the reason I can't sleep at night (beside the bizarre feeling that I'm dizzily falling off the face of the earth), is because I've been translating all my night-time thoughts into french. Every night, without failure, I keep myself awake translating things in my head, like some sort of wine-and-cheese induced trace that carries on from midnight until I "wake up" from never having really been asleep.
I'm honestly looking forward to a weekend settled in with my piles of translation homework. I hope everyone enjoys sufficient debauchery for Mardi Gras. If you're the one who stole my bank card, please give it back.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
Pictures I Didn't Take
In the year that I spent gardening and breaking up with my high school boyfriend, between high school graduation and college, my best friend, Trina, moved to San Diego to attend PLNU. After about a month there I noticed something about her when we talked on the phone: the same bursting laugh that I had listened to for more than five years had changed. I've noticed this phenomenon in a number of my friends who move away or are otherwise displaced.
In the process of leaving yet another home behind, and finding another part of an already remarkably small world, people infected with something called "Wanderlust" are losing their laughs every day.
It's not about laughing less; it's about laughing differently. I notice this in myself most recently. I'm well aware of the fact that I pick up other people's ticks like picking a ten-dollar bill up off of the sidewalk. But the lost-laugh is something that happens to a lot of people who must fully adapt to a place in order to live there happily. I'm not too concerned about losing it though... it's a relief that at least there are a lot of things to laugh at. And I'm relatively certain that, like Tim's rediculously loud yawn, which I emulate unintentionally only when I'm around him, it will pass with another change of scene. (Which is not to imply that I don't miss the Tim-Yawn. I miss the Tim-Yawn.)
In further French News yesterday was apparently some sort of National Crèpe Day because the Résponsables of our residence made and distributed a stack of crèpes that rivaled le grand Tour Eiffel itself. My recipe back home never called for beer in the mix but now I see why crèpes are a french national treasure. Never have I seen so many college students cook at one time. Every one of twelve burners was being used and every table was full. The french are indeed on to something with the importance they place on cooking and eating together. It might actually be my favorite thing about them.
Daily, the Americans roll into the kitchen around seven, along with Lee, the singlular Chinese student in the building (who prepairs four-course meals for one that look like something out of a book of beautiful foods). Lee has unfailingly already turned on the radio which plays mostly Beyoncé. We begin to cook and about the time we're ready to eat the french kids start to flow like banquet caterers, with loaves of bread, potatos, eggs, stacks of meat, pizzas, cheeses and all sorts of beautiful envy-breeding foods. From then until ten (when the spanish swarm in a hot rain of tapas, which they share) the kitchen is filled with food and sweaters that are cooler than any sweater ever owned by an American in the history of sweaters.
Speaking of which, I hate shopping. But comparing shopping in France to American shopping is a little like comparing a wine tasting to the trying out of slurpy flavors using the "layer method." Wherein you mix the flavors in the same cup and the melted bit at the end is all brown and syrupy.
The fabrics are the same everywhere in the world but it's how they cut and arrange them that makes all the difference. Not to mention that the "Soldes" here are actaully quite amazing as far as "soldes" go. If you know me you know I wouldn't be bringing this up if it wasn't phenomenal.
Also: see "Garden State" if you like movies that are near perfection in every way except when the baby deer gets eaten by the crocodile.
Don't see "Garden State" if you liked "The Wedding Planner" or some other equally horrible movie with a bad soundtrack.
Phrase du jour: "Maybe that's all family really is. A group of people who miss the same imaginary place." -Largeman
In the process of leaving yet another home behind, and finding another part of an already remarkably small world, people infected with something called "Wanderlust" are losing their laughs every day.
It's not about laughing less; it's about laughing differently. I notice this in myself most recently. I'm well aware of the fact that I pick up other people's ticks like picking a ten-dollar bill up off of the sidewalk. But the lost-laugh is something that happens to a lot of people who must fully adapt to a place in order to live there happily. I'm not too concerned about losing it though... it's a relief that at least there are a lot of things to laugh at. And I'm relatively certain that, like Tim's rediculously loud yawn, which I emulate unintentionally only when I'm around him, it will pass with another change of scene. (Which is not to imply that I don't miss the Tim-Yawn. I miss the Tim-Yawn.)
In further French News yesterday was apparently some sort of National Crèpe Day because the Résponsables of our residence made and distributed a stack of crèpes that rivaled le grand Tour Eiffel itself. My recipe back home never called for beer in the mix but now I see why crèpes are a french national treasure. Never have I seen so many college students cook at one time. Every one of twelve burners was being used and every table was full. The french are indeed on to something with the importance they place on cooking and eating together. It might actually be my favorite thing about them.
Daily, the Americans roll into the kitchen around seven, along with Lee, the singlular Chinese student in the building (who prepairs four-course meals for one that look like something out of a book of beautiful foods). Lee has unfailingly already turned on the radio which plays mostly Beyoncé. We begin to cook and about the time we're ready to eat the french kids start to flow like banquet caterers, with loaves of bread, potatos, eggs, stacks of meat, pizzas, cheeses and all sorts of beautiful envy-breeding foods. From then until ten (when the spanish swarm in a hot rain of tapas, which they share) the kitchen is filled with food and sweaters that are cooler than any sweater ever owned by an American in the history of sweaters.
Speaking of which, I hate shopping. But comparing shopping in France to American shopping is a little like comparing a wine tasting to the trying out of slurpy flavors using the "layer method." Wherein you mix the flavors in the same cup and the melted bit at the end is all brown and syrupy.
The fabrics are the same everywhere in the world but it's how they cut and arrange them that makes all the difference. Not to mention that the "Soldes" here are actaully quite amazing as far as "soldes" go. If you know me you know I wouldn't be bringing this up if it wasn't phenomenal.
Also: see "Garden State" if you like movies that are near perfection in every way except when the baby deer gets eaten by the crocodile.
Don't see "Garden State" if you liked "The Wedding Planner" or some other equally horrible movie with a bad soundtrack.
Phrase du jour: "Maybe that's all family really is. A group of people who miss the same imaginary place." -Largeman
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
l'amour et l'argent
It took fifteen minutes to move Carrie into my room. It's taken me a month to move myself in. Discuss.
After spending three weeks at near-arctic tempertures I punched my radiator a few times and now it kicks out the heat of an atomic blast. The fact that the photographs in my room are melting should indicate something, but even though I've since turned the heater off and opened the window it's like one of those Finnish saunas will all the fat, naked men, only it's just me. In my undercrackers. Listening to the Beatles.
I have experienced not a single interesting thing in the past 24 hours.
Phrase du Jour: En tragedie, le roi ne peut pas partir pour un autre monde. (In tragedy, the king cannot leave for another world.) USE IT TODAY!
After spending three weeks at near-arctic tempertures I punched my radiator a few times and now it kicks out the heat of an atomic blast. The fact that the photographs in my room are melting should indicate something, but even though I've since turned the heater off and opened the window it's like one of those Finnish saunas will all the fat, naked men, only it's just me. In my undercrackers. Listening to the Beatles.
I have experienced not a single interesting thing in the past 24 hours.
Phrase du Jour: En tragedie, le roi ne peut pas partir pour un autre monde. (In tragedy, the king cannot leave for another world.) USE IT TODAY!
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