Holy heat. This country needs to install air conditioning. I don’t even think the taxi I took into the city had A/C. I did, however, get to hear all about the incompetencies of George W. Bush, the mistakes of Obama, and a bit on the French health care system, while I tried to figure out what meal I was supposed to be getting ready for and as sweat came out of places I didn’t know could sweat. I’m referring to my knuckles in case you were wondering, you perv.
My apartment is beautiful with a nice courtyard both in the front and the back. I have a nice big room and my own private shower, and two enormous casement windows, which let in a lot of light and fresh air. My host mother is adorable and so sweet. She is trying her hardest to make me feel welcome and not pressured into anything. I did, however, pick up on her innuendo to take a quick shower. I guess the smell of geriatrics and communal air wasn’t just something I was smelling… Thanks, AirFrance for my new fragrance: Eau d’Avion.
After my shower, and feeling like a new man in fresh clothes, I had a chance to look around the apartment, which is super French and very beautiful, meet her son Alexis, and have a bite of lunch. Or maybe breakfast. Either way it was tuna salad placed inside of a hollowed out tomato. My very first whole tomato… and not something I’d like to repeat. Unfortunately I can’t claim the allergic card now, otherwise she’d probably start feeling really bad, so I guess this will be the semester when I learn to eat tomatoes- happy joy!
After lunch Madame et moi had a chance to sit and talk while Alexis went to take a “siesta” (his words, not mine). I learned about her, her family, her life, and lots of other interesting things while she fed me two coffees. Note to self: French coffee is like drinking watered grounds. It was seriously stronger than turpentine - but I left with a fresh outlook on life. I gave her some gifts, and the biggest hit was probably the book about Petite Plaisance, the house of Marguerite Yourcenar. Finally, somebody old enough to give a damn about the first woman elected into l’Academie française.
I went to the Trinity College site where I met up with Susan, the directrice and 1981 Trinity alum, and Mary, another kid in the Trinity/SciencesPo program. We got our cell phones, metro passes, and some notes about Parisian living. Unfortunately something was amuck with the internet at the site, so no email for Willie. After our meeting and snacks - by now it was getting near lunchtime in our stomachs - we took a quick walk to SciencesPo, where we will both be studying, and then I came home. It was a pity that Maggie and Tori couldn’t join us as the other two Trinity/SciencesPo students, but I guess they were preoccupied with the Guinesses (Guinni?) found at the Dublin Airport, where they were stuck.
Back at home I put away my clothes and settled in. My host mother told me upon entering her house that she had a lot of furniture in her house, and my room is no exception. Along with the bed I have a desk, desk chair, lounge chair, wardrobe/closet thing, a two-drawer cabinet, credenza, television stand, end table, and a tall modern open shelving unit thing that fits in with nothing in this house. I’m not exactly lacking in the département des meubles.
Dinner was veal and pasta, along with a piece of baguette, and a peach for dessert. I knew I was tired, and it wasn’t until she looked at me and asked I understood her (to while I gave a mumbled ‘oui’ and then proceeded to tell me that my French was much better in the morning that I realized it was really 9pm and time to make sleepies, as Mr. P used to write on our Model UN itineraries. So sleepies I found.
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