Paris

Paris + Paris + Paris + Paris = Paris
A great weekend, specially with Italian company ;-)

Finally a la tour Eiffel

I can finally say that I have climbed it - and the view was beautiful. Only to the second floor, but it was nice. With a nice fotography exhibition on the first. Paris from above, although nothing will ever beat the views from a low flying plan ready to land at Charles de Gaulle.

- Parisian Kisses-

Unconfortable Views 4 - Student Flats

This is an Email that I send to my flatmates - being the author of the mail I feel in full authority to publish the story of the tomato spaghetti and chicken that were having a party in my kitchen for a week. If u dont speak spanish I suggest you get a translator- the email has had quite a sucess. If you are thinking wether to live in student flat or not...I suggest you read the mail :)

Que onda? Espero que tu viaje ande bien por Escocia. Por aquí Paris todo anda muy bien, te escribo por que me a sucedido un hecho inédito!! Si inédito!! En fin, es una historia que creo que aun que no te conté tu misma ya la conocerás pero en caso contrario te la explico.

Un mañana un tomate, pollo, queso, spaghetti, bueno en fin ya me entiendes varis cosas quedaron en una cocina! El siguiente día las chicas empezaron a cocinar y luego salieron de la casa, dejándolo todo allí. En fin, todo el mundo tiene derecho a tener prisa un día o otro. El tomate quedo allí en la cocina. De hecho no me siento mal por el, ya que estaba acompañado por un poco de carne y sopa. Mas lejos, en la mesa tenia a su amiga la lechuga que nunca había salido de la bolsa amarilla del supermercado. Que suerte tenían el tomate y la lechuga estaban bien acompañados! Siguieron allí toda la semana, todos juntos! Mientras una chica española y otra italiana pasaban cada día haciendo café y lo miraban. Supongo que al tomate no le sintió muy bien el hecho de estar allí abandonado y tener una muerte tan lenta y dolorosa. El tenía la ilusión de descubrir el sistema digestivo del ser humano. Pero todos sabemos que no tenemos siempre la suerte de tener la muerte que deseamos. En fin! A mí el que mas pena me dio fueron los spaghetti que después de casi dos semanas se endurecieron en un pote en la nevera. No solo se endurecieron sino que tuvieron que estar acompañados por un olor fuerte y repugnante ya que había otros vegetales allí muriendo lentamente.

Se que en estos momentos tu mayor preocupación puede que sea el hecho que es la noche y te estoy escribiendo un mail. TRANQUILA, ya vi que aun que no tuvieses tiempo de limpiar la cocina, y todavía menos de por lo menos pensar en decirme que sentías dejarlo todo literalmente en proceso de desintegración. En cambio tuviste muchísimo tiempo para esconder tu computadora y preguntarme donde estaba tu Ipod. Cada uno tiene sus prioridades, tampoco pensaba utilizar tu ordenador.

No te preocupes. Te escribo esto en Microsoft Word y luego lo voy a copiar y pegar en un email desde el trabajo a escondidas. Mas que nada para que sepas que por mi parte el proceso de desintegración de la comida esta aprendido. Y tu, has tomado buenos apuntes?

Mis músculos te agradecen eternamente que lo hayas dejado todo sucio. De esta forma han podido pasar una hora y media ejercitándose fregando tus platos. Todo y eso me dicen que prefieren ir al gimnasio donde cada músculo recibe una atención personalizada y la hora y media no se basa en mimar un solo músculo.

Solo nos quedan 6 semanas mas de vivir juntas. Durante ellas te darás cuenta que yo no soy la persona mas limpia del mundo – seguramente eso ya lo has visto. Solo les pido a todas 3 (y por eso todo el mundo esta en copia) una cosa – lo que se usa se limpia. Me hubiera encantado pasar la tarde leyendo o escribiendo en mi blog. De hecho por eso hoy salí del trabajo a las 17.30. Pero ahora son las 21h y aquí estoy terminando de limpiar.

Te escribo ahora en caso que hubieras dejado la sopa o el arroz en la cocina por que deseabas ver en que color se transformaba al cabo de una semana. A mi también me interesaba saber si la sopa tendría tonos mas naranjas o amarillos, pero tenia miedo que vinieran bichos sobre MI comida por eso lo tire. No te preocupes a tu arroz y tu sopa les he hecho un enterramiento digno. Hasta he puesto dos o tres velas.

Hablaremos del tema cuando vuelvas y estemos las cuatro chicas. Solo eso, por favor lo que se utiliza se limpia.

P.S. Te recomiendo que cierres la luz de tu cuarto si te vas durante una semana, que cierres la puerta ( o por lo mínimo me pidas si puedo cerrarla yo), que no te olvides las llaves en casa (ya van tres veces).Ah, y por ultimo, solo para que quede claro, gano [....]al mes, ya sabes cuanto pago de alquiler o sea no me vuelvas a pedir cantidades superiores a 20 euros si no es para una emergencia rotunda. Todavía menos si el día siguiente vienes con una nueva memoria externa.....

Con todo el respeto del mundo. . .

Buenas Noches

G

THANKS FOR COMING OVER!!!!!
FOR WHEN THE NEXT MEETING????

Unconfortable Views 3 - The temporality of international communities.

Dinner again at Strasbourg St.Denis, French, Brazilian, Mexican, Spanish, Turkish, Austrian. . No matter when you go there the apartment is always full of different nationalities. Fun and convivial dinners, with the few people who are left from the HEC times, some of us hadn’t even met at HEC, ironic huh? We end up always confronted with the same question “when are you leaving?” Response: Xmas, February, maybe march. The furthest that I heard was – “maybe April”. Its good to see that like me, many are full of international plans, moves and crazy adventures ahead. The same goes around my apartment “ 22^nd December”, “4^th of January”, “sometime in February”. . . . Yes, hanging around international people is what I am used to we are all in the same situation- new in a foreign country-, however this temporality makes it hard. I’m constantly being reminded that every single person with who I spend my weekends and evenings – except for red cross Tuesdays- will be gone within the next 3 months. I will probably be the last one to leave. And if I stayed? New friends all over again?? I do have some French friends- not many, some also left. In order to avoid all this temporality and sadness of friends coming and going are we meant to stick to local communities? Will we then be assured that nobody moves away from the city within the next 6 months? No. However, maybe then, we will be the ones that will move the fastest and like this feel less the impact of the movement of others on our lives. But let the concept not trap us, at the end nothing is permanent, and even in more local communities things move and change; maybe at a slower pace- but they change too. However, when trying to find a stable life the international community of expats exchange students and international interns might simply move too fast.

Unconfortable Views 2

It was windy on the boulevard, a grayish winter Parisian midday as I was walking back from the gym, after an astonishingly long work out. Suddenly the old woman with a red coat, make up, and shaking hands that hold a black umbrella and purple bag shouted at us. “Madame Madame, vous savez ou c’est la maison de retraite, je suis perdu”. She was looking for the house of the retired people, she was lost and did not know how to get back home She told me she didn’t know her street name, so I asked her for an ID card to try and figure out her street. She didn’t have one, but told us that once she was in front of the retired peoples home she could find her way around. We had no idea where it was. All we knew was our house, the cinema, the gym , the supermarket and the metro stop. We told her to hold on as we asked somebody else for directions. Luckily we got a response super quick as she was not too much in the mood to wait in the cold air. We walked with her the two blocks till the elderly peoples house. Her slow pace due to her age of 92 allowed us to have a nice talk, she didn’t remember her street name, she had a son, no grandchildren, she lived in the neighborhood, usually had lunch at the retired peoples home which was near her house and came from outside of Paris.

We reached the retired peoples house. Outside the building it clearly said that it was opened only from Friday to Saturday, but luckily the door was open. We encountered two women who must have worked there. With a very pissed of face they said that she got lost usually, and then they asked her in the most rude and uncaring tone ever Why she didn’t spend Sundays at her house rather than going out. They told her that she always comes to the elderly home with random people from the street (like us). When she said that we were her friends they could only answer in a continuous rude tone that we were not her friends but just some people who she had crossed in the street. Rude comments continued which did nothing more than underline to the old woman that she was mentally loosing control of herself and getting lost. The woman was nice, kind and thanked us for helping her and told us she would like to see us again some time. I didn’t want to leave her there with the two bitches who clearly had no patience or empathy for older people- and who ironically worked at an elderly home. I told the woman I could walk her home if she wanted, but she decided to stay there and watch some tv and reassured us by explaining that now she knew where her home was. The elderly home was her guiding point. She clearly had some guts to stay with those two bitches. Will we meet again?