Chez Yves Saint Laurent

I had an iconically French experience on Saturday. I had the privilege of seeing the side of Paris that is everything that myth and lore has led up to and built up. Films such as The Devil Wears Prada showing Meryl Streep as a kick-ass Vogue fashion editor: FASHION.
Although it wasn't a fashion show I got to see, it was the auction of the Yves Saint Laurent Collection at le Grand Palais. As everyone knows, the great French designer YSL, (yes, the genius man who gave women pants in the form of a business suit for which I am eternally grateful) just passed away last summer. His partner Paul Bergé hired Christie's to sell the chef-d'oeuvres they have been collecting since the 1950s - we're talking masterpieces, statues, sofas, and priceless works of art that YSL has collected during his life as a prolific fashion designer. The show is to be held over the course of two and half days at Le Grand Palais, an exquisite glass dome built at the turn of the 20th century and absolutely magnificient.
Emma, Lindsay, Brayden and I arrive at noontime, thinking we're gonna wait in a quick line to get into the auction. No. The entire city of Paris is here, waiting in a five hour wait to pay homage to famous French couturier. Looking at the line though, I feel like I'm watching "Paris's Best-Dressed". Everyone, and I mean everyone, is dressed for the occasions. We're talkin' fur coats, beautiful designer bags, expensive shoes. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the capital of fashion. I saw so many women who are fifty and older and looking killer with silvery hair, great shoes and chic glasses.
Well the 4 of us decide not the wait in a 4 hr line, there's plenty of other things to do in Paris. But Emma, always one to take advantage of the fact that she's handicapped, saunters up the front of the VIP line (and also where the wheelchair ramp starts) and just waits there. Doesn't say anything. The four of us just kinda stand around, surrounded by press and VIP passes, looking awkward in our sweatshirts and Converses. Before I know it, without saying a word, the bouncer is ushering the 4 of us in, without asking questions. Umm...what?? No bullshitting necessary, just assumes that we're important enough to cut in front of hundreds of people. HA! We go right in, past sore and achy people who have been waiting patiently in line for 5 hours. Oops.
Emma is treated like a queen and we cut past all the lines once inside the Grand Palais. The building is a dream. I remember seeing the Chanel Fashion show here at the MFA exhibit back in Boston, and how magnificient this place is.
The first of many, many rooms is le Salon Apollon: filled with Greek marble statues and ancient Egyptian sculptures from hundreds of years ago, valued at around a million euros. But, you know, no big deal. In le Salon Ingres (yes, he owned an original Ingres sketch) there's an Italian Renaissance mirror from the XVI century, and sofas from the Austrian Empire in the 18th century. Even the lanterns are valued at half a million. And this was actually all of his stuff! People sat on these works of art! The next room, Salon Duquesnoy is filled with bronze statues, one from a Chinese dynasty from hundreds of years ago. Salon Mondrian (yes, the original painting that inspired his checkered dress) is filled with priceless works of art, such as an original Picasso painting, original Matisse, Braque, Gauguin, Goya, de Chirico, Seurat and my favorite, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. On the first day of the sale, Henri Matisse's work Cuckoos on a blue and pink carpet broke the previous world record set in 2007 for a Matisse work, selling for 32m Euros; auctioneers said the collection could fetch up to 300m euros. Imagine sitting in a sofa chez Yves Saint Laurent and a Matisse painting hanging above your head. No big deal.
I felt like I had just stumbled upon Aladdin's cave all filled with hidden treasures, original paintings that the world has not yet seen. Above, cool lounge music played, the kind of music they would play at a fashion show (which I guess would be utterly appropriate for a YSL exhibit). Overhead in one showroom, they had opera music eerily playing overhead.
This was one of those events that people dress impeccably well for; I have never seen so much designer clothing and well-dressed, chic men and women. Is that fabulous event that you dress to be seen. Fur coats, red lipstick, edgy glasses. Even the security guards here are six-foot slim top models. There were a lot of buyers there, working either for Christie's or for big-name clients, such as the Louvre or Musee d'Orsay, taking a look at YSL's collection to buy it for the auction the following day. And a LOT of stuffy, richhhh people. After hearing a lot of English speakers around me, I realize that this event isn't only for upper-class, fashion-oriented Parisiens; there are a considerable amount of Londoners here. I even heard one elegant British woman say to another "So when did you arrive darling?" "This morning". People have flown from all over the world to this event; I even spotted a couple from China and one from Japan. Good thing we only waited 15 minutes to get in, as opposed to 4 hours like the rest of the world....

What a dude

Les Sans-Abris

Alors I'll address two ubiquitous themes here in Paris: the city covered in dogshit, and la grève. But it was when I was walking home from school the other day that I realized what else this city is filled with: bums! This day that I walked home though was no ordinary day; it must have been crazy people day because I literally ran into four of them on my way home, and had to check the news after to make sure it wasn't a National I-Am-Homeless-and-Crazy Day.
I'll start with the woman on the bus who was having a lovely conversation with...herself. Every person who would get on the bus, she would comment and criticise them (to herself). Ok, off the bus, run right into a guy who looks decently normal, just bought his lunch at McDonalds. Except, I think he has Tourette's, because he's violently cursing at someone invisible. Ok, crazy person number two. Then I walk to Monoprix on my way home to pick up some groceries. A homeless guy is cross-legged on the side of the road, bald shaved head and big Woody Allen type glasses. On a piece of cardboard with impeccable cursive, he writes something like "I am 53 years old without a job..blah blah" I never got a chance to read the whole sign because he was cursing and talking to himself, this time it was something about vélos. As I walked past, he got more worked up and starting shouting.
After three encounters in a row with crazy people, I have to wonder what the French government does for these people. Are there centres for somewhere to sleep? To eat? What choices do they have?
When you take the metro home at night, there's are always loads of dirty, barefoot homeless men just sleeping on the benches. Sometimes they even make a little nest with sleeping bags and found blankets. The word for homeless in French is either sans-abri or SDF (sans domicile fixe). I think the city has some centers around for them to go to, but honestly, the situation is pretty bad. Especially when you have immigrants coming from all over Africa, who can't find work or a place to live, and therefore just call the metro home.
There's a lot of criticism for example for the Sarkozy government because he made a lot of promises when he was campaigning for Pres in 2007. One of those promises was to ameliorate the living situations of SDFs and improve social work. But of course, just like all campaigns, it's all talk until they're elected. Now the French are looking at Sarkozy and asking themselves, Where are all these measures he promised us? Why is he helping big entreprises and not the little people? Why are the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer? Some even compare him to Bush, saying he's France version of W.
Well, for the moment, I look with pity on the homeless folk who clog the metro and want to somehow help them. Although the task is a bit intimidating.

'Système D' They Say

I've recently discovered something I both love and hate at the same time, for which France is quite popular: la grève. For all you non-French speakers out there, that's a strike. But we're not talking soccer-moms-with-pickets-protesting-outside-the-local-townhall, I'm talking about a full-on strike. Well, in France, this means that in order to go on strike and protest for better wages/conditions/union rights blah blah blah, that your job is to a.) not show up to work and b.) manifest at La Bastille as our famous ancestors did back in the day (you know, like the French Revolution, where they systematically dismantled the royal prison). We're talkin' parades, posters, angry people yelling, calm people singing, barbecues (!) and a variety of colorful balloons. I find this whole process iconically...French. Why? Because they really love their liberties and rights and take them very much to heart. That's why when the French are unhappy about something (which is usually...all the time, concerning Sarkozy, transport problems, Sarkozy, schools, the EU, Sarkozy) they'll protest it. A friend in Rennes (in Bretagne) even participated in a parade-type strike where angry moms and children sang and yelled about how much Sarkozy sucks.
This is just a little intro to the reason we had all our classes cancelled last Thursday: la grève. Except that this was no ordinary strike, we're talking a national strike where all public transportation is shut down across the country and people basically manifest and yell about everything they're pissed off about. This ranges from union rights (hence, transportation) to angry students protesting Sarkozy's reforms to angry professors protesting their students on strike to angry moms protesting the professors on strike.
Basically, Thursday was predicted to be a mess.
Actually, it reminded me a bit of the weather report of an ominous snowstorm; everyone predicts the worst, freaks the shit out of everybody else, and by the time the thing rolls around, it's never half as bad as we expect it to be.
That's kind of what this strike was like. Newspaper stands (called "La Presse") are laden with papers predicting the worst for Thursday. Strike reports (yes, reported exactly like the weather) say that the entire country will be immobilized, paralysed, you name it, on Thursday. And why would a country do this to itself and harm an entire day of precious work and income? For liberty's sake. To prove "Yea man! We worked hard for this right to protest and goddammit, we're gonna USE IT!"
My professors cancelled all class on Thursday.
Turns out, it really wasn't that bad. One out of two metros were running on most lines and three out of four buses were running throughout the day. Helllllo? Told you they were freaking out. So this day was OK because most people could get to work, unless you worked at La Défense (the Wall Street of Paris) which is on the outskirts of the city and were totally screwed (the strike shut down the main RER B line.)
However, in the case of a bad strike-storm, that is when all modes of transport are paralyzed, how does anyone get anywhere? The Parisiens have a term for it called "Système D." It's just one of those phrases people throw out there when you're stuck in some shit (literally) and need to get yourself out. We call this démerder, which literally means to de-shit yourself (goes well with my dogshit entry, doesn't it? An ubiquitous theme here in Paris). A less vulgar word is débrouiller, which doesn't translate directly (philosophically-speaking, anglophones don't technically need a word for it..) but is something along the lines of "to figure it out, to manage."
So when I asked a fellow Frenchman how does everyone get to work all across town on Thursday if there's a grève, he simply replies, "Systeme D." Voilà. Everyone is stuck in the same shit as you, and therefore you are just as responsible to se démerder, get yourself out of the shit and get your ass to work. Even if it takes you three and a quarter hours to get there, you made it. Even if traffic is hell and you can't get a cab. Walk. The système D way.
So I may have had a ball on Thursday with no class (Marion and I checked out the Picasso/Manet exhibit at le Musée d'Orsay, frolicked around Montmartre, ate ethnic Thai dishes in Belleville) but there will come a day when I have to get to my internship across several arrondissements on a grève day. Let's hope that day doesn't come soon.

Some little anecdotes about words not to mix up between French and English:
exhibition actually means to expose yourself in French. You can imagine the reaction when I said I was going to an artist's exhibition at the Louvre. The word is exposition en français.
plein- in English, we say we are "full" when it's time to stop eating cuz there's enough food in our bellies. In French, to say "Je suis pleine" means you're pregnant, not full. Again, please imagine your host family thinks you're breaking the news about an unwanted pregnancy randomly at the end of a big meal.
*more to come later on! I have to embarrass myself fully before learning them the hard way.

Playing Hookey the Parisien Way

I did something bad today. Very bad.
I skipped class and played hookey all day. But needless to say, it was one of the best things I've done in Paris so far. (!)
So, just a quick a word of advice for the folk out there who want to explore a new city, especially Paris : GET ON THE BUS (no, I don't mean that figuratively, but literally). One of the best ways to get a (cheap) tour of a city is not by some crappy tourguide company charging you up the wazoo or to take the metro from one end to another...but the bus. That's right. Buttttt the only thing is deciphering the bus map. At some major intersections, such as La Bastille or La République, there are so many buses lines crossing in one spot that it looks like a tarantula map. But I reluctantly bought myself a handy little fold-up to see where I'm going (discreetly that is; I find it quite embarrassing to pull out a map in public....why don't you just scream " I'M A TOURISTTTT, ALRIGHT?!?!?!")
Although, this day I wouldn't need a map.
It began with my field trip for my Econ class; plan was to meet at Trocadéro metro at 9h30 Wednesday morning...except that I slept late and forgot this metro station was closed on the 6 line. So once I get there, and don't find the group, I ask some extremely unhelpful people where I could possibly find L'Union Europeen de L'Europe Occidentale - it even sounds like a big building, but of course, NO one knows where it is. Merci, buddy. Welcome to Paris, where everyone is as unhelpful as they come.
I find the building and once I get through the coatcheck, I ask where I can find the Boston University group that just walked through here. After thoroughly looking me up and down, the pretentious snob of a woman at the front desk of this marble palace kindly reminds me this is the European Union of Western Europe, not Boston University. Thanks lady, got it. I then try to explain that I'm here for my economics class and we're here for a field trip ( thinking, "Shit, how do you say 'field trip' in French?!) and again, she kindly reminds me this is the European Union of Western Europe. For freak's sake, I got it. "Big group? Came this way? 10 minutes ago? Hello in there?!" She clearly doesn't understand.
Finally, the light bulb goes off in her head and she recalls there was quite a large group of loud Americans that came rumbling through here about 15 min ago, naturally, but they're in the next building. Right. I've just about had enough of this, and am getting so fed up with pretentious unhelpful snobs, and en plus I'm now half an hour late for this goddamned field trip...Putain!

As I'm walking outside, I realize I don't even care about going in the first place and realize how utterly uneventful this whole thing is gonna be, so I...hop on a bus!!! Yup, that's right. Hop on a bus, didn't even wait at the stop but just got on a random one and saw where it took me.

This was the start of a very good day I decided- I found myself a little place to stand on the packed bus and leaned against the window to take in all the sights. There was an open-air market selling fresh fruits, old wrinkled women walking their springy dogs (both wearing Chanel), a worker standing outside for a refreshing cigarette, and newspaper stands with papers predicting the worst for tomorrow ("C'EST LA CRISE! PIRE CHAQUE JOUR! LA GREVE! GETTING WORSE EVERYDAY, EXPERTS PREDICT").
I'm like a little kid on the bus; wishing I had two sets of eyes so I could look out both sides at once. My favorite this about riding all around the city is that the Eiffel Tower is always there, gleaming in the distance. And, of course, the Amélie soundtrack is blasting from my Ipod because the music just brings out all the flavors and sights of Paris; it magnifies the light, intensity and sound of the city and describes it in notes, not words. It's the soundtrack of my life here. It even glorifies the metro- if I'm listening to the beautiful piano or accordion in the songs, even the metro seems ultra-Parisien and therefore glamorous.
One thing I noticed about the particular bus I was on is that I seemed particularly young. Oh yes, quite young. Oh wait, everyone on this bus is OLD! Where are all the young people? Apparently, like bats, they only emerge at night, ready to drink until dawn and terrorize the streets in a belligerent states. But during the day, this city is old-people land. At least in my quartier. Seriously, I think I saw maybe 3 young folks on the street during my little bus tour to Odéon. Otherwise, little old ladies hunched over a cane, a fur coat that weighs more than they do and far too much makeup roam the streets. Most of them have little pooches (yes, the little shits that are determined to cover every inch of this city in merde) and a caddy in tow with a baguette poking out.

We wind through the 15th, my 'hood, past the old restaurants and brasseries, up through St. Germain Ave and the quartier where Seb and I got quite tipsy one afternoon off Trappistes Belgian beer, past all the wonderful shops and markets and boutiques selling haute couture, past the Louvre and old men selling magazines from the 60s on the sidewalk, over Le Pont Neuf that crosses La Seine. Did you know that Le Pont Neuf (The New Bridge) is actually one of the oldest bridges in Paris? I realized that this city is filled with ways to spend money- that's why I'm so goddamned broke! Because that's all there is to do around here! Where's the good, quality-time FREE stuff to do? (besides riding the bus around..) Remember that? Helloooo it's called a PARC and a FRISBEE! Nope, apparently Frenchies don't do this. Just spend loads of money partout and complain about government.

Another wonderful thing about riding the bus in Paris is that out of nowhere, a famous monument will pop up. We'll ride and roll and jerk and stop and plow through the tiny streets of Paris and then Op! Notre Dame will appear out of nowhere, just like "Oh heyyyy girlfriend, remember me, y'all?" and then Op! there's the Pantheon, but like, no big deal.

So my bus tour comes to an end at St. Germain-Odéon, which I briefly recognize because I had been to a cinema around here before...the street is Maubert-Mutualité, a quartier near to the Latin Quarter, which I've been dying to discover and explore. I walk and walk and walk, down this street, up this street, until I find by intuition Rue de la Sorbonne- I think I smell the Latin Quarter. Oh wait, that's the nerdy students I smell. The windy, cobblestone streets house some of this city's oldest bookstores and quirky cinemas. I was on a mission to find one of these and see myself an old, weird-ass movie. Well, I discover three or four down this old road that I'll probably never find again, and they're all playing horror films from the 60s and Lolita and old scandalous movies from back in the day. Parfait. Unfortunately, none are playing until 14h and I have like 3 hours to kill...
I stumble upon Le Panthéon at the top of this huge hill I've just mastered, a sort of temple dedicated to the Revolution (I mean, how much more French do they get?!?) where folks like Voltaire, Rousseau and Emile Zola are buried. The Greek– (or Roman? One of those.) inspired temple is magnificent, my new favorite monument in Paris.
I duck into some old bookshops and a Tibetan store just to kill time. I've got all the time in the world! Sushi for lunch, and then I treat myself to a lovely piece of Belgian chocolate from Jeff de Bruges, while the Amélie music ringing in my head the whole time. Off to UGC Cinema to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, or at least buy my ticket. I still had another hour to kill so I ducked into the Horse's Tavern for a café noisette and some good solid writing time. The movie was genius by the way. GO see it if you haven't. I emerged at 5pm the afternoon, quite content with myself that I got farrrr more out of this day of exploration and appreciation for Paris than the L'Union Européen of Occidental Europe. Take that, snob.

Three Words for the Day? Poodles, cigarettes and baguettes. Because they're everywhere !

Lady made me a free omelette at Tour Montparnasse when Marion and I saw the sunset! Who says there aren't sweet people in Paris...