l'Art, le vin, et le foot

Hello again.

So once again, I tried to write this on Friday, to get ahead of the game and shorten it a bit. But alas, football took precedence. But anyway, voici a (surprisingly well-structured) review of my second week in the city of lights:

Monday, after a bit of reading in a park, I went to the Centre Pompidou, along with my class, to explore their galleries of contemporary and modern art (there's a difference!). I'm no art connisseur, and walking through the galleries solidified the fact that I never will be. Some of the works were captivating, interesting, beautiful, etc, but some were utterly incomprehensible. Others were hideous. And others were very plain. For example, there was a solid blue painting, one that was solid white with a horizontal band of ridges across the center, and another that was solid black, but divided into four squares, each a different shade of black.

One section I really liked consisted of works of a style called l'art cinématique. These were pieces that changed based on the perspective, or perhaps over short intervals of time. For example, there was a painting with three-dimensional ridges with different colors on each side, which produced the effect of gradual color changes as one walked by. 'Twas cool.

That night, we returned to la Tour Eiffel to climb it. Or, more accurately, to ride an elevator up it. The top was closed, so we could only go to la deuxieme etage, which is two floors above the ground (not just one as it would be in the states). The view was incredible, but pictures didn't show up well. Dommage. Good times anyway. Also of note, the tiny 18-year-old Esete managed to save two Euros by claiming to be eleven.

Tuesday, we decided to go searching a less touristy part of Paris for some cheaper food, but gave up and got pizza at a small restaurant. The food was decent, and from there we went to a park, discussing (malheureusement, en anglais) along the way, philosophical questions including the moral differences between picking up and keeping a lost passport, a lost camera, or lost money; the possibility of the existence of morality without God; and the usefulness of philosophy. Needless to say, I enjoyed the afternoon.

That night, I went to an Ethiopean concert with my two favorite Ethiopiennes, Beza and Esete. Despite being unable to comprehend anything that was being sung, I really enjoyed it, much moreso than I expected to. Though played on western instruments (tenor sax, bass guitar, drums, and keys) I was told that the music, singing, and dancing was authentically Ethiopean. Afterward, since it was a gorgeous night, we went to see Notre Dame (which is only slightly more beautiful at night: a bit of a disappointment) and took a promenade along the Seine.

Wednesday afternoon marked my second visit to the Louvre, this time exploring the paintings of the Italian Renaissance, among other things. The day culminated with the [insert 700 million dollar adjective] Mon(n)a Lisa, locally known as La Joconde. She was recessed in her own huge stone wall in the middle of the room, encased in glass, and given a 8-ish foot radius that no one could enter. Of course she was [insert that adjective again], but, as I expected, it was hard to understand why this painting was any more incredible than those around it.

Later that night, we went to Les Halles, a somewhat unimpressive shopping mall, to see Tous Les Mains en L'air, a French film starring la belle-sœur of Sarkozy. It was about adorable little kids hiding away from the police so they wouldn't be deported. You know the thing you used to say and think was so funny when you were little? "What's your name? How do you spell it? NOPE, I-T!" I was very happy to catch a French version: "Banana starts with B, but normally, it starts with N." That is, "normally" starts with N. And this works in French because you're allowed to introduce a subject and then refer to it with a pronoun immediately (something you can't do in English): "Jane, she went to the store." Anyway, despite missing a lot of the dialogue, I really enjoyed the movie.

The lendemain, we watched a film after class, and, Yale students that we are, spent the day studying for Friday's interro / procrastinating. So nothing interesting there. Friday afternoon, I visited the catacombs with Beza, Melissa, and David. It was pretty incredible. We walked underneath the streets of Paris for forty-five minutes, and for about a third of that time were surrounded by the neatly arranged skulls and bones of millions of dead Francais. Afterward, to continue our bright day, we headed to Montparnasse Cemetery, home to the likes of French car-maker André Citröen, playwright Eugène Ionesco, author Charles Baudelaire, and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartres.

That soir, I experienced my first match of foot: France vs Uruguay. I was supporting les bleus, bien sur, even though the Uruguyans were the ones wearing blue, a fact that left me quite lost for at least 10 minutes. It was an exciting 95 minutes of, count them, zero goals! In any case, I spent the time with mes amis at a(n overpriced,) nice cabaret, and had a great time. After the game we wondered a bit, chilled in a random neighborhood, stopped at a bar, looked for a club, and ended up going home.

The next morning, with about 3,5 hours of sleep under my belt, I awoke at 6h30 and headed to the autocar in front of the ecole to head off to Bourgogne. I profiter'd de the 5,5 hours on the bus there and back to fill in that missing sleep and enjoyed a beautiful journee en province. Our first stop was in the village of Vézelay to visit la basilique Sainte-Mary-Madeleine. The church was belle, but it didn't strike me as worth the drive had that been our only stop, given the number of incredible churches in Paris elle-meme. I found the village itself much more interesting. It was located on a ridiculously steep hill that led up to the basilique; getting up there was less than fun. But afterward we had some free time, so we grabbed some food in a legit restaurant. I had chicken, fries, and some sort of green vegetable, and we all split an entrée of six escargots. There was nothing particularly good or bad about them; kinda tasted like shrimp.

Next, we headed to the vignoble of Chablis. We took a promenade outside, and then a tour through the facility where the wine is made. We ended with a tasting of 5 different vins blancs, complemented by cherries, pain, jambon, and fromage to snack on. Tasting the wine was interesting. I could taste the differences, and had preferences, but I probably wouldn't be able to distinguish them very well on my own.

We got back to Paris just in time to have missed the first but of the Angleterre v Etats-Unis game. We descended en mass on a cafe to watch the rest. This game was much more interesting, but, grace à a beautful fumble by Angleterre's goalkeeper, it ended in a 1-1 tie, which leaves me still having never seen someone win a match of foot. Again, dommage.

Later that night, to fêter the birthdays of mon ami Brian and mon amie Esete, we caught the last-ish metro of the night to a club. When we tried to enter, however, the bouncer asked me how many of us there were. I said three, and he replied "C'est pas possible." I kinda stared at him and tried to ask him why, but started getting aggressive, saying "Allez-y, Monsieur" and asking me if I comprend le francais. That left Beza, Esete, and me stranded far from home at 2h00, with no running metros. After calling some folks, we realized we'd tried to enter the wrong club, so we tried the right one, and besides a skeptical look about Esete's age, got in fine. Unfortunately, there was a 20E cover that we didn't know about. But since our options were to pay 20E and fêter with our amis, or be stranded until 5h30, we decided to go for it. Entrance came with a free drink, not that that was much of a consolation, but we had a great time quand meme.

I'm not sure what today has in store for me, but I'll be very !content if I end up staying in the house all day. I'm also pretty clueless about what's up for next week; we may have to become more imaginative with our adventures, since we've knocked out most of the touristy stuff already.

But anyway,

A la semaine prochaine,

Steven (ou Etienne si vous voulez)