the hardest part about living abroad...

So, I’ve been putting off writing this post all semester because I’m afraid I won’t be able to do it justice. I’m not entirely certain how to put this into words that will allow someone who has not studied abroad to understand what studying abroad or living abroad really means. So bare with me…

The hardest part about living abroad…
No, it’s not that dinner collides with my usual bedtime, nor is it the fact that after four months I still need to carry around a map, it’s not even the fact that public restroom use will cost you as much as a coffee, rather it’s this word, this word that’s been floating around in and out of class all semester long and has always had a bit of a shady meaning. The word in question is ideology. According to dictionary.com ideology is “the body of doctrine, myth, belief… that guides an individual, social movement, institution, class, or large group”. Ideology creeps into the way people think without their knowledge of a. the fact that it’s there, b. the way in which it attached itself, and c. exactly how it is influencing their thought processes. There are times when ideology gets conflated with phrases such as “differences in social customs” or “cultural barriers”. But I feel that phrases like that don’t really address the issue. “Cultural barriers” make me think of differences you can adapt to – such as the consumption of bread with EVERYTHING (how are French women so thin?). But ideology takes a longer time to notice and even longer to adapt to – it is much more thickly veiled than the fact that oh, for example Parisians seem to value their dogs more than their children.

Anyway, as someone living abroad not only do you not fit in, but you can’t fit in. Why? Because you can’t acquire years of “the common knowledge of a typical French twenty-year-old” in several months…and so you, or in this case I, notice ideology. I mean, think of what makes you whatever nationality you are – it’s an incredible amount of knowledge. And not the kind you can memorize either. What contributes to the “communal experience” of a 20-year-old living in America in 2010? Anything from watching Rugrats in the nineties to stereotyping the French as smelly cowards to enjoying receiving an allowance. And not having this “communal” knowledge of another culture makes it very difficult for you to understand this culture. If you live around liberals no doubt you’ll hear “just keep an open mind” but it’s not that easy. Because to accept social differences or better yet, to not get angered by seemingly annoying French things, you have to understand them, and by that I mean, understand from where they are coming.

So, to turn this into a lengthy example that will hopefully explain things more clearly than my theoretical nonsense…

…when someone compliments me, I say “thank you”, when someone sneezes I say, “Bless you!” when was I ever taught these responses? I imagine I had to be. But whether explicitly or implicitly the fact is, I picked up these “habits” and now they are instinctual. But in France they are instinctual only to me. Saying “thank you” to a compliment is pretentious-sounding in French. Instead of the American thought behind “thank you” – such as… “Thank you, I’m glad you like it!” it’s “Thank you, I know it’s awesome”. So despite the fact that the word “thank you” in French will not give you any problems, it’s the meaning that’ll get you. And I can’t quite tell you why the French don’t say “bless you” – maybe because they are very good at being laïque (google it!) on a daily basis and maybe it’s because they live in an urban space where that’s just not done…but the fact is it’s this meaning between words that takes a long time to pick up. In the end, you’re speaking the same language, but understanding it in a completely different way. And of course that makes perfect sense because you’ve been taught through culture the way your society interprets that word. So when it comes to using the same word in a different culture, you’re at a loss. And though this is all nice and dandy, the problem is realizing that word has a meaning different from the one you attribute to it. It’s realizing that not just what you think, but the way you think is heavily influenced by the culture you’re surrounded by.

Once you notice this, you have a choice. You can either attempt to assimilate slightly into the French culture and say nothing at all when someone sneezes, or you can decide that as an American you have every right to say “bless you!” when the need arises.

Museums, Exhibits, and Parisian Art.

Madame-my-host-mother-Petillault has this book called Musées Insolites and it's all about the cute little museums Paris has that nobody knows about. So here are the ones I've been to in no particular order...

Dali Espace (18th arr.) : Ages of Dali's work.
Victor Hugo - House Museum (4th arr.) : You can see his desk!
Gustave Moreau - House Museum (9th arr.) : Nearly everything Moreau did that wasn't big enough for the Louvre.
Musée de Montmartre (18th arr.) : odds and ends all related to life in Montmartre during the late 1800's. You can see where Renoir's studio was located!
Musée Cognaq-Jay (4th arr.) : 18th century French art and furniture.
Musée de la Poupée (3rd arr.) : a doll museum!
House of Nicolas Flamel (3rd arr.) : technically, this is not a museum, but it's a. Nicolas Flamel's house turned into a restaurant and b. the oldest house in Paris.
Musée du Thé, Marriage-Frère (4th arr.) : It's a strangely colonial-reminiscent tea shoppe with a museum.
Musée Fragonard (9th arr.) : a perfume museum!
Musée Jacquemart-André (8th arr.) : A rather large 18th century French art house-museum.
Catacombs (14th arr.) : bones. lots and lots of bones piled on top of each other in caves.
Musée Préfecture de Police (5th arr.) : police records, posters, etc. especially around the time of the Commune of Paris - 1871.
Musée du Vin (16th arr.) : wine tasting plus a guided tour!
Musée Nissim-de-Comondo (8th arr.) : Rich Parisian hôtel particulière with a lovely kitchen.
Musée des Égouts (7th arr.) : So you don't get a boat ride through the sewers like in the 1860's, but you do get the same odor-experience!
Musée de l'histoire et d'art de St. Denis : So, technically this is outside Paris, but it's a great museum of art relating to St. Denis and the Paris commune.
L'Orangerie (1st arr.) : Monet's panoramas! ...what more needs to be said?
Musée August Rodin (7th arr.) : beautiful gardens with sculptures throughout! Of course, the real ones can be found inside.
Musée Zadkine (6th arr.) : another sculpture museum...he's a bit cubist, I'd say...
Musée de la Vie Romantique (9th arr.) : Just like the name, this really is a perfect house museum - cute garden outside the cute house-museum next to the cute tea house. And it's all romantic art inside, with a focus on George Sand and Frederic Chopin.
Maison du Balzac (16th arr.) : You can see Balzac's self-edited manuscripts inside and enjoy reading one of his books in the lovely garden outside!
Musée Marmottan (16th arr.) : Monet, Monet, and more Monet. Plenty of water lilies here.

Of course there are many, many more. Next on my list is the Edith Piaf (11th arr.) museum, the Musée de Barreau de Paris (1st) ...think lawyers!, and perhaps the Musée Dupuytren - ancient bottles of medical equipment.

And in case you need a refresher, Paris' biggest and most popular museums are...

The Louvre (1st arr.) : believe it or not, there are many works of art more interesting than the Mona Lisa.

Musée d'Orsay (7th arr.) : one of my personal favorites thanks to the ages of impressionism and avant-garde art.

Beaubourg/Centre Georges Pompidou (4th arr.) : modern art museum with the crazy piping decoration.

Quai Branly (7th arr.) : this museum is hard to define, but in any case, it contains art from Africa, Asia, and Oceania.

Petit Palais (8th arr.) : lots of goodies including Courbet's Ladies by the banks of the Seine.

Grande Palais (8th arr.) : now mainly used for exhibitions.

Palais du Tokyo (16th arr.) : where the Picasso was stolen!

Carnavalet (3rd arr.) : technically, this isn't a particularly big museum, but I'm fairly certain most people know about it - it's the museum of the history of Paris. Lots of odds and ends as well.

Musée du Moyen Age/Cluny (5th arr.) : see the chopped off kings' heads from the Notre Dame!

Also, some lovely exhibitions I've seen while in Paris (and near Paris) ...

Yves St. Laurent collection at the Petit Palais

Crîme et Chatîment at the d'Orsay

Meijer de Haan exhibit at the d'Orsay

From Greco to Dali at Jacquemart-André museum

A Paul Klee exhibit at the Orangerie

A Chopin exhibit at the Musée de la Vie Romantique

World Fair Exhibit at the National Archives

Bretagne: Voyager en couleurs photography exhibit at the Albert-kahn museum in Hauts-de-Seine, suburb of Paris

Normandie Impressionism Exhibit in Giverny (think Caillot)

Impressionism Exhibit in Rouen at the Musée des Beaux-arts

The Pear-King expo at the Maison de Balzac

Next on the list...Willie Ronis photography at the Hôtel des Monnaies.

Macaroon Photoshoot.

 

La Langue Française: Les Argots

Conversational French is not learning a bunch of phrases and saying them when necessary. So if that language book assures you that you will be fluent in French upon completing its grammar exercises, it’s lying. The first problem you’ll run into when speaking a foreign language is the speed. No matter what language it is, people speak quickly. The very act of talking does not require a particular amount of thought – resulting in very rapid speech. Once you get over that, you have to account for how many people are speaking at once, if they have accents, and if there’s interfering noise. But even if you manage to conquer that, you’re left with the one most difficult thing, the one thing you can’t learn from a textbook: slang. La language familière or les argots if you prefer are the least pleasant variety of words a language contains. Why? Because they’re always changing and you can’t find them in a textbook. The thing with slang is that you really can’t learn it until you have a good grasp on the language. Slang is a form of language whose meaning is never particularly clear because often one word can have many meanings and only certain situations in which it is appropriate to use said word (even if the meaning may seem to fit the situation). Then there’s the problem where certain slang words such as the French “putain” can be thrown into any sentence just as a filler-word, but of course you’d better be careful around whom you use said word – filler for some, but not for all. What’s more, slang changes very quickly – timewise and regionwise, it also gets abbreviated, and there is rarely a direct translation. You just really have to get the feel for it – and when it’s used by someone who’s speaking three times faster than you can think, in a crowded and thus noisy room, with an accent you can’t quite grasp, referencing a culture you don’t quite understand, and of course with a sense of humor you still have to figure out…well, it makes learning French rather difficult.

...

So, I’m due to leave in slightly over a week. And I don’t like this at all. The thing about leaving is that I’m leaving more than just Paris behind. Paris, well, Paris will last. I can go back and visit Paris (although, no doubt if I come back I’ll have plenty of complaints to make about how Paris will have changed). But I can’t go back and visit this particular moment in time; not in this particular setting. Once I close the door on this experience, that’s it. It’s done. It’s like visiting childhood friends or your old high school. Sure you can come back and “catch up”, but it’s not the same. You no longer talk on a daily basis, you don’t have any new inside jokes, your experience of being friends has essentially ended. It’s become a memory. This memory becomes the only connection between you and this experience or person. And it’s this memory you can try and recreate, but it's a memory that rarely works as well the second time around. These are the memories better left as just that, memories. As you will never be able to recreate it, it’s better to leave it as a sweet something to look back on. But I’m not sure I’m ready to leave this experience just yet. No, I’m not quite ready to turn this semester into a memory.  

On the other hand, I called home today, and my brother picked up. I haven't talked to him in ages. I didn't realize how much I missed his voice until I heard it.

The 20 Arrondissements of Paris.

So, I’m not entirely certain if what I’ve been doing can be classified as a derive, given that derives are all about getting lost, and I’m all about not getting lost. But anyway, every weekend, or rather every weekend I can, I’ve been trying to wander my way through Paris, arrondissement by arrondissement, and street by street. I have a very systematic way of doing it, which can admittedly get a bit banal, however it is a fail-safe way to see just about every part of the arrondissement. My secret to getting to know an arrondissement is really fairly simple: walk up and down every single street. However, since that is quite the daunting task, I do it slightly differently. I pick the streets that allow me to access every regional part of the arrondissement, every possibly interesting monument, square, or garden, and the streets that intersect with tons of other streets. This way as I’m walking down the street I can see half a dozen others at the same time, and if they are of interest, I can take a closer look. This plan also forces me to remember street names, as I am always looking at the map (and thus always looking like a tourist…) and I thus become quite familiar with the quartier (that’s quartier with a q!). This is rather useful because it allows me to develop my map of Paris – aka the places I enjoy, something that can prove to be difficult unless you purposefully venture out to explore the huge city of Paris. And so, these are my impressions/discoveries thus far…  
First Arrondissement: Despite the fact that this is the oldest part of Paris, I find this arrondissement to be slightly over the top. Everywhere you turn there is a monument, or a church, or some square of importance. Granted, most of Paris is like this, however, the First just wants to show it all off – heck, it’s got the huge Louvre leading to the Tuileries with a visual perspective passing through the Arc de Triomphe and all the way down to La Defense. You could say it certainly attracts the tourists and the expensive store-fronts on Rue St. Honore.  
Second Arrondissement: this quartier often goes unnoticed amongst some of the other more-important-and-closer-to-the-Seine-ones. Quite unfortunate because this quartier is home to the Rue Montorgeuil (which I have mentioned countless times before…) and its surrounding Piétons area. This area possesses all the charm of Paris and almost none of its tourists. Well, at least less…it’s got cute little alleyways of cobblestoned streets and rows of fromageries, boulangeries, and cafés just begging for your attention. It also happens to be here, in the Passage de Grands Cerfs that I found my lovely doorknob. Jjust stay away from the northeast side of the quartier…it loses its charm and quickly takes on the smelly personality of the 10^th there.

Third Arrondissement: Although it is not as popular as the fourth arrondissement, the third partially houses the Marais, the liberal, bohemian-ish hippy part of Paris. The third however, is rather less gothic and more medieval in architecture, something you don’t see particularly often in Paris. It makes for quite the pleasant walk around town on a sunny day (assuming you run into one of those needle-in-a-hay-stack wonders known as sunny days).  
Fourth Arrondissement: This arrondissement is one of two contenders for my favorite. It has cute little alleyways, plenty of ivy covered windows, the Place des Vosges (making for a very Parisian Sunday afternoon), and the Jewish Quarter on the Rue de Rosiers with the best falafel of Paris. Its inhabitants are of the bobo variety (boheme-bourgeouis), much like the third, as this arrondissement is also a part of the Marais and thus speaks to my Ann Arbor soul.    Fifth Arrondissement: This is the rather well known Latin Quarter taking its name from the students studying Latin here. It is a rather lovely part of town – nice and old, complete with the Sorbonne and Panthéon. Just walking through this arrondissement makes me feel like I’m acquiring bits of knowledge. There’s also a market street that runs through it: the Rue Mouffetard. (Fun fact: Part of Amélie was filmed here!!!)  
Sixth Arrondissement: The Catho, my Parisian university, is located in this area along with the St. Germain-des-Prés quartier and Le Luxo (Luxembourg Gardens). St. Germain-des-Prés is what used to be a village centered around an abbey. Today it still retains some of its village-like characteristics and is one of the most expensive and chic neighborhoods of Paris. The Café de Flore and the Café de Deux Magots – the two cafes of famous writers and intellectuals – is located here. Now they charge, like, 6 euros for a coffee or something ridiculous like that. Other expensive and lovely places that can be found here: Pierre Hermé on the Rue Bonaparte, unless of course you prefer your macaroons from La Durée on the other end of Rue Bonaparte, for the best bread in Paris – PoîlaneRue Cherche-Midi, then there’s half a dozen amazing chocolatiers located near the Sevres-BabyloneLe Luxo, also an inhabitant of this arrondissement, is the favorite place of Parisian families, so much so that it’s impossible to find a seat when it’s sunny outside. – on the metro stop – just what I need to see on my walk to school…Anyway, point being…this place is expensive and very lovely.
Seventh Arrondissement: The seventh is the arrondissement with the Eiffel Tower, making for some incredibly expensive real estate and equally rich proprietors. This quartier isn’t interested in the small boutique high fashion of St. Germain-des-Prés or the expensive yet eclectical bobo look, no this quartier is quieter, full of people whose names would either come up on the donor list for concerts held in Les Invalides or who flock to the Expiatory Chapel every January 21st. (Wikipedia the reference!) 
Eighth Arrondissement: So, we’ve had fashionistas in the 6^th, bohemians in the 3^rd and 4^th, student in the 5^th, white-sneakered tourists in the 1^st, leaving us with the high fashion, for rich foreigners Champs-Elysees quartier. Yes, the eighth is where you can find the Arc de Triomphe (although that’s technically also in the 16^th and 17^th), the Champs-Elysées, the Madeleine in the east, and the several streets of a Russian area around the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.
Ninth Arrondissement: The ninth seems to be a mix of other arrondissements. Near Anvers, it’s a bit more Monmartr-y feeling, but the part around St. George or Notre-Dame de Lorette makes me think of the seventh mixed with St. Germain des Prés. Then there’s the Opera quartier – Haussmann at his best. This feels a bit more like the first – in your face wealth.   
Tenth Arrondissement: I hate to say it, but Paris has an annoying habit of smelling like urine. And where you might notice this every once in awhile elsewhere, in the tenth it just seems to be much more concentrated. Like, to the point where every ten steps you crinkle your nose in unpleasantness. Apart from the Gare de l’Est and the Gare de Nord, the tenth is probably most well known for its Canal St. Martin. Despite its pictorial representations, the canal is not that lovely…it’s actually kind of dirty and polluted. However, people like to picnic around that area and it’s attracting some of the eleventh arrondissement bobos, making it “hipster-y” I imagine. 

Eleventh Arrondissement: The eleventh is centered around Republique and Oberkampf from what I know. I’ve only been there a few times and hardly enough to really form an opinion/informed observation on it. However, from what I’ve seen, it’s rather immigrant-y, has lots of furniture shops, and is apparently quite the nightclub scene. Also, bobo-y.
Twelfth Arrondissement: I don’t know much about the twelth, but I know it’s rather industrial and has two train stations – the Gare de Lyon and the Gare de Bercy. There’s also the Village de Bercy – a rather cute and what looks like a man-made village type place with lots of cute cafés and shops.     Thirteenth Arrondissement: If I were to buy real estate in Paris, I would look here. The thirteenth is nothing particularly special – it’s not rich, it’s not historical, and it’s not poor. Its highlights include Mitterand’s enormous library, the cute and villag-y Butte-aux-Cailles, Chinatown (which I haven’t seen yet), and the Gobelins factory. So okay, maybe I was wrong, the thirteenth does have attractions, but what I think makes it a good real-estate investment is that it’s growing. Quartiers like the fourth are really limited in terms of what they can build, given that the fourth is super old. But the thirteenth has space. And it is slowly but steadily transforming itself into a New-Yorkish like area. I bet, ten years from now, the real estate value here will double in value. 
Fourteenth Arrondissement: This is basically the Montparnasse area. Opposite from Montmartre, Montparnasse was also an artist/writer/musician-type hang-out. I haven’t really seen this part of Paris, but I can say that it has a lively café culture around the Montparnasse metro stop.   
Fifteenth Arrondissement: I’ve only been here once and for a total of probably twenty minutes at max, so I can’t really give a decent description. But my knowledge of it can basically be summed up by the word “residential” and, I suppose, slightly less rich than the sixteenth.  
Sixteenth Arrondissement: This is my arrondissement. It is usually thought of as rich, conservative, residential, and intimidating. It’s main attractions are museums, international embassies, Trocadero/Palais Chaillot, the Arc-de-Triomphe, and technically the Bois de Boulogne. And though this image is not necessarily incorrect, one should note that it is a lovely place to wander about – lots of art nouveau architecture as well as the lovely Musée Marmotton and Balzac home. If I had a dog, I would walk it in this arrondissement.
Seventeenth Arrondissement: This neighborhood is way off the radar for a regular tourist as it really has nothing touristy to advertise. However, its main attraction is what used to be a village – Les Batignolles – and still retains its villag-y charm. Cute and also rather bobo.  
Eighteenth Arrondissement: This quartier is possibly the most interesting of them all just by how diverse it is. There’s the obvious Montmartre part of it – picturesque, artsy at one point, and charming (think Amélie!). Although also touristy and expensive. On the back end border of Montmartre is the most expensive street in all of Paris: Avenue Junot, apparently the hideout of many celebrities. There’s Pigalle – Paris’ red-light district. And then, just a few metro stops away, Barbés-Rochechouart: possibly the biggest slum in Paris.
Nineteenth Arrondissement: This neighborhood is really quite cute. It has lots of little streets lined with one-story houses and alleys of ivy; lots of hameaux – closed off little subdivision-y type neighborhoods. But much smaller, and much cuter than their American counterparts. There’s also the huge park Haussmann basically built – Les Buttes-Chaumont – filled with manmade attractions, families, and partially nude sunbathers. Then there’s the other Chinatown combination Montmartre, known as Belleville, part of which is in this arrondissement. It has a great graffiti alley. 
Twentieth Arrondissement: The other half of Belleville is in the twentieth, along with Pere Lachaise, the enormous cemetery. Pere Lachaise looks like a village of its own, with gothic housing, street signs, cats…

Green Doors and Ivy.

So, I don't know if I've made it obvious yet, but I like cute things. Specifically ivy, green doors, cute window shutters, flowers, lanterns, cute architecture, and broken bits of whatnot. Thus, almost all of my pictures include ivy or interesting buildings. These pictures showcase some of my favorite doors and ivyness found in and around Paris (two pics are from Chartres)!