22 octobre 2011
Writing this on the train to Auray, 8:08 am. (The sun still hasn’t risen today. No doubt he’s a socialist and doesn’t like to work either.)
So much has happened in the last 11 days and I’ve been a little bit too busy to waste my time in front of a computer screen, judging from the number of visits to my blog, however, you haven’t been busy at all! Amazing numbers come even when there’s nothing new. Well, hope you’ve got some time, because today I have multiple blog postings! Luckily, for me, I’m currently trapped in a lovely little (well actually quite sizable) French train, and I have nothing better to do than write. Or do readings for homework. So I’m writing.
After getting home from my weekend in Normandy, I had a few days of relative normality in my life. Nothing really exciting happened, and it was a nice little rest. My chic, hip, and ever-so American grandmother arrived on Thursday and I started right in on the daily death marches. The day she arrived she went off on a walk of her own in the morning, leaving at 9 and getting lost until about 12:20. Well, I was only in class until 11, so after calling her hotel about 7 times only to learn that she wasn’t there, I decided to waddle on down and wait her out. (I realized while I was waiting that I’ve watch far too much Elmer Fudd if I find it to be a perfectly acceptable pastime to wait out a wascilly wabbit or, in this case, a lost grand-mama (I hope you read that in the most New England WASPy fashion possible. We’ll try it again: graaaaannndd maamaaaaaa.)
Since the rest of my Thursday was open, we did a fairly good cover of the area: Luxembourg Gardens, lunch near the Sorbonne, a visit to Trinity College, lots of walking, and God only knows what else. Suffice it to say that her ass was grass when I put on my UPS hat delivered her back to her hotel. That night the hostess with the mostess, Mme duH-C, was planning on giving a dinner for her first ever host student, Gabe, who came to France in 2001, I think. He’s now a lawyer in Washington, and came with his friend-girlfriend-pasthookup-wannabewife-now”justfriends”-female traveling buddy, who was from Maine, of all wonderful places. We also had a Brazilian, whose name escapes me now, who was a complete dink and incredibly rude, and Juliette, the French girl who lives in Mme duH-C’s top floor studio. With the exception of the Brazilian, who showed up on time or even ahead of time, was loud, spoke with his mouth open, called Mme du H-C by her first name, was just overall an unpleasant waste of fresh air, it was a great time. Side note here: when invited out in France to a person’s house, it’s incredibly rude to show up any earlier than 15 minutes later, and you should probably be even a bit more “en retard.” By 8:20 or so everyone had arrived and we were seated in the living room eating the smoked salmon on some sort of basil cream sauce and foie-gras appetizers that Béatrice, Mme’s ironing lady/favorite Spanish helper had prepared earlier after shining the crystal to within an inch of its life and giving the silver a healthy polishing too. It was clear, even before anyone arrived, we were putting on the Ritz.
Getting the Ritz on
Appetizers were good, and lasted until a bit after 9, including a few rounds of pommeau and a very good white wine. From there we meandered (some people definitely didn’t walk in a straight line) to the dining room where we received our assigned seats for dinner. I was placed at the head of the table because I’m family, dontcha know, with Juliette on one side and the lady friend of Gabe on the other. Mme du H-C was therefore surrounded by guys. Gotta love a French person who is still practicing seduction after 70. Dinner was a nice big chunk of veal, almost raw enough to moo when it hit the table and vegetables (some sort of beans in cream sauce). It was pretty damned good. After round one, we went on to salad (and of course more bottles of wine), followed by quite a lot of cheese. (My kind of meal!) After the cheese course we went on the lemon bread that I made on Wednesday. It was incredible. Not exactly like Nanny’s but, for a first timer, I had a lot to be proud of. It was bit over cooked on the outside, but since I had plenty of the juice-topping, it was no problem at all. The inside was nice and moist. (Great word, moist). Anyway, after dessert we went back to the living room to have some coffees and to socialize a bit more. All in all, the guests didn’t leave until midnight or so, and then I helped Mme du H-C clean up a bit, but we left most of it for the next day.
The next day, bright and early, I was on a Train for Chartres with my Medieval Architecture Class, to take a look at the famous cathedral there. I’d been there before, in high school, and it was rainy and crappy when we were there. This time was totally different. Bright blue sky, not a cloud to be seen, and the Gothic desire for big open windows was epitomized in the incredibly bright and airy interior. Near the choir of the cathedral scaffolding was set up with men on it doing some cleaning, and WHAT A DIFFERENCE! The ceiling, which in most places was jet black, was absolutely buttercream in color and reflected so much more light. It was really amazing. After men spent weeks and years up there with dental picks and scalpels scraping off centuries’ worth of dust, dirt, and smoke, it was worthy of admiration.
Chartres from afar
Clean and dirty
Back in Paris, I met up with the Gimm-ster (grandmaaaamaaaa) and we did a nice tour of the city. Hitting up some of my favorite sites, we went to Trocadéro to see the Eiffel Tower view, and then we wandered down to my apartment for initial introductions. That completed, we went over toward the Eiffel Tower again for a bite to eat. The next day we went all over again, marching high and low, from Montmartre all the way to the Champs Elysées. That night we did dinner, with the host madre, at Paris’ oldest restaurant: À la Petite Chaise, on rue de Grenelle. Founded in the mid 17th century, it’s really a great restaurant, and we were very lucky to get reservations. Unfortunately it took a bit longer than necessary for our taxi to get there because of the damned Occupy Wall Street strike arriving in Paris. I don’t care if want to occupy Wall Street, because really it’s not going to do much, but to occupy Paris and double the cost of my taxi ride: screw off! I’m not made of money and I don’t want to spend any more than necessary. Bastards.
The next day it was the the Saint Chapel, which was definitely mind blowing and beyond beautiful. The stained glass windows soar far over the floor of the little chapel, and it is definitely a great 13th century marvel. Words can’t do it justice, so I won’t even try to waste your time, or mine.
The Saint Chapelle
From there we wandered over to the 3rd, to a couple of my favorite places: the Place des Vosges, Louis XIII’s little pet project and current home to the infamous DSK, followed by Paris’ best museum: Le Musée Carnavalet. Free, and covering all aspects of Parisian history, this place is a must see for anybody in the City of Lights. After that we walked back to the ancient Île St Louis to indulge ourselves in a bit of ice cream from the famous Bérthillion. That night Mme du H-C had us for dinner, and made a flat-out amazing quiche. Sooooo light and airy, and with the best flavor known to man-kind. That’s saying a lot for somebody who doesn’t really like eggs.
The next day, her last in Paris, I had a morning tour of Les Invalides with SciencesPo, and after that I met up Grandmother dearest to spend the afternoon with her. Despite the threats of rain and the fact that my umbrella remains in Honfleur, we braved the Musée Rodin, with its immense gardens. There in the circa 1730 house, we looked at countless beautiful bronzes and marbles, and many plaster models. Although the house was in horrible condition, with big plywood patches on the floor, it was a great stop with lots to look at. We even got to do the majority of the gardens before it started to really pour! That night, for the last supper we went to the Parc aux Cerfs in the 6th, and had a great meal. My favorite part of that evening was when I got to take the crappy umbrella back home with me. After all, even a shitty umbrella is better than no umbrella at all. Nonetheless, I’d like to have MY umbrella back from Honfleur.
Over the course of these events, I have to say that it’s interesting to me that Alexis doesn’t dine in the dining room when there are guests, and instead has a tray of food and takes it to his room. I think some of this is at the request of his mother, who would rather enjoy her guests than deal with her son, but he still makes his presence known. The night that we were having the dinner party, I think Alexis felt a bit dejected, so he came to my room to tell me about his day, something he’d never done before. Just when I was wondering whether he was going to go on forever, he finished. Story done. Thank God. I went back to whatever I was doing, and a few minutes later I heard him trying to sneak down the hall to my room. Normally when he does this it means he’s going to “secretly” turn off the overhead light in my room, which is about as inconspicuous as a fat person in Paris. I was ready for him when he slinked (slunk?) into my room, but he didn’t touch my light switch. Instead he told me about his lunch. The poor guy eats at 10am, but what did he have to wash down his lunch this day? I couldn’t have been happier when he told me that he had a “biere.” Good for you, dude, I hope that was a solidly fantastic brewskie! When Priscilla was meeting with my host mother, though, Alexis really gave me a good laugh. We were in the living room, having a glass of pommeau, when Alexis walked from the kitchen toward his room galloping like a horse. I mean, seriously, he was making horse noises and everything. This was too good for me! If you don’t already know about my Alexis/Horse association, I refer you to the September 11th entry, Chapter 2: Living with Barbaro.
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