I must be homesick

Hey all,

I know I just sent out an update yesterday, but I'm trying to keep my average to one a week. That and noone replied so I'm thinking that it may have been a little boring. I've also discovered that I need to write these things quick before the memory fades. I'm getting on in years you know...

Last night I finally gave up on the whole French thing. I was craving the sound of English. I would have even taken American English.. that's how hard up I was. I fought it a bit... I went on the hunt for a jazz club that is supposed to be in my neighbourhood. Unfortunately the bar isn't around anymore but the prospect of an evening spent with CNN or BBC (my only English stations) was not going to work for me. Mulling about the 'hood, I thought I came across a neat little bar with some great music playing. The site of a couple of women dancing by the window didn't hurt either. Once inside, I realized that I was kind of crashing a gathering of the bartender's friends. Feeling a little conspicuous if I turned around and walked out, I took a stand at the bar and ordered whatever everyone else seemed to be drinking. Don't ever do that. I had to choke back a glass of 150 proof rum mixed with something that was way to sweet but not enough to water down the rum. I toughed it out with that and was greeted with a shot of vodka when I tried to pay. Normally, my sense of adventure would have told me to stick around and see what could happen next, but the crowd (all 5 of them) had obviously drank to many of the rum concoctions and the dancing women looked way better through frosted glass than in person. Back on the street and I couldn't help accosting a couple of American students. I really needed to hear English. The upside of that is I learned that my neighbourhood is where the Natalie Portman segment from Paris je t'aime was filmed. It adds a little something knowing that she was walking these streets. From there, I am ashamed to say that I made my way to " The Moose". A true Candian bar where I could order a Moosehead or an Alpine.... no Export or 50 though. C'est domage. I held back my disapointment when I was greeted by an Australian bartender, but I made believe that I was in Whistler and all was good. I thought I would be there for a quick drink or two, but ended up in deep conversation with a group of Aussie's (ok... it wasn't that deep.. .it started with comments about the fact that their poutine was made with gruyere and not cheese curds as is the proper fashion). Fast forward to 4am and I'm in a cab taking me back home. I'm not sure why but I don't seem to have the same sleep requirements in Europe.

I had the foresight to set my alarm before crashing. Today I decided that I finally had to accomplish another of the Paris tasks that Ryan has set out for me. His first was to send me to Neuilly. I had asked around at work and nobody could really understand why I would want to go there but Ryan was insistant. I was told that the only thing I would find there would be rich expats. Thinking that Ryan must have found himself a 'sugar-momma' in Neuilly I gladly hopped on the metro. I was thinking that this would be a better alternative to starting the job search back in Vancouver. It wasn't until a week later that I found out that Ryan has never actually been to Paris. I'm thinking he must be trolling the Lonely Planet website. Neuilly was like suggesting that a tourist in Vancouver had to make their way to Kerrisdale. Oooh... and while there don't forget to visit the Starbucks!

I can mock him now because Ryan's second task lived up to the expectations I have of him. Hungover as I was, I still dragged my ass out of the apartment at the ungodly hour of 10 to head to the Bastille area and the Cafe Phares, which, every Sunday morning at 11 hosts the Cafe des Philosophes. A weekly coffee meeting where philosophical debates are held. Reading about it online, I had the suspicion that I was going to walk into an Emily Carr student union meeting or something. Cynically, I was anticipating that the smell of pacculli would be overwhelming, but I was more than a little suprised that this was real people, of all ages, without pretention, that just happened to enjoy talking philosophy. It's improvisational in that people are encouraged to suggest topics for the day's debate and the moderator choses which one he thinks would be most entertaining. No surprises that Gunther, today's moderator, would chose the only topic that contained the word sex in it. Let's face it, if you want to get a conversation going for a couple of hours, sex is the easiest one to start with. Loosely translated, today's 'resolution' was "Sexuality is a politcal value". Some guy named Frederic explained his concept but it didn't seem like anybody really listened to him because the conversation never strayed off sexuality to even remotely mentioning the political aspect. Damn me for not taking Phil 101 at Acadia. Socrates was brought up on a handful of occcassions and it would have been nice to know if any of these people were citing him properly. I'm sure they must have been though, because Gunther was interjecting regularly and he struck me as the professor type. For a visual, he was wearing a camel-hair blazer, jeans and turtleneck... only thing missing was suede patches on the elbows. The end result is that it was a Sunday morning well spent, Ryan has regained his 'cred' with me and I hope to go back again and hopefully overcome the self-consciousness of my french abilities to muster up the nerve to take part in the discussion. You all know that it must have called me to listen in on a debate without venturing an opinion.. especially when no facts or data were required!

On a parting note, I know I bring up food on too regular basis, but I want to revel over the fact that I bought two big handfuls of chanterelles tonight for 1 euro 70 (would have been somewhere around 8 bucks on Granville Island). Oh.. and Nutella fucking rocks! I have a new addiction.