Paris at a Certain Age

Nuit Blanche

Last night was Nuit Blanche and the France vs New Zealand rugby match and Paris went wild. Art installations, mostly involving light effects, were staged across the city and open all night. We hopped on the Bat-o-bus,
an ad lib water bus and travelled down the Seine watching Nuit Blanche light projections (onto buildings and into the sky) and the lights of nighttime Paris reflected on the water. It was a crisp and crystal clear evening and it seemed that everyone was out and about. The Bateaux Mouches were tarted up with lights, as was the giant ferris wheel of Paris (La Grande Roue). As the boat approached Hôtel-de-Ville, a loudspeaker announced that France had won the rugby game against New Zealand and folks went wild. Horns blared (including boat horns), lights flashed and people cheered. Folks ran around the streets waving French flags. The Eiffel Tower's on-the-hour nightly light show commenced and glittering lights sparkled and pulsated as if the tower was having an orgasm and about to erupt.
I don't understand the attraction of rugby at all. To me it's another example of testosterone poisoning. This Dieux du Stade Calendrier 2008 is on sale at our little neighborhood papeterie where schoolkids buy their cahiers. But it was fun to be caught up in rugby frenzy that attacked Paris on Nuit Blanche.

A Pregnant Blister

New French Word: Cloque
The metros of Paris are currently plastered with advertisements for this movie.

The term 'en cloque' was unfamiliar to me. But once I saw the companion poster I knew exactly which American movie it was.

It turns out 'cloque' means 'blister' and being 'en cloque' is an familiar (but not vulgar) way of saying someone is pregnant.

Falling in Love

The linguist Steve Kaufmann says that you have to be in love to learn a language well. Maybe that's why I've never learned Spanish, despite living in California where the language is omnipresent. I'm 'just not that into you', Mister Spanish Language. But French, oh that's a different story, a love story.

Sometimes it feels I'm in love with an entity who is out of my reach, like falling for a movie star. But I have the obsession that makes you think about it all the time, trying to tease out its secrets, boring other people with some new facet you've noticed, and wanting to be with it night and day. I want to inhale it, chew it, absorb it through my skin, soak it in, bathe my eyes and ears with it and live on it.

The airplane ride over to Paris was like foreplay. It began with hearing boarding announcements in French, then the flight attendants instructions in French and then fellow passengers chatting in French.

But being in love doesn't make you any smarter. I can memorize like a demon, but the accent is so-o-o hard for me. I think I have to develop a more physical relationship with Mr. French and wrap my lips around him more deeply. I have to work my orbicularis orus, depressor labii oris and levator labii muscles into a frenzy or just watch Mickelino's how to pout and make French sounds video over and over again.

You Know You're in Paris When:

You see this in the grocery market!