2009.22 The First Time I Saw Paris
Places: Minneapolis, Bellevue, Seattle, Berkeley, Mill Valley, Fresno,Costa Mesa, Newport Beach, Iowa City, San Antonio, Eagle Rock, Highland Park, Manhattan Beach, Silverlake, Montecito Heights, Simi Valley, Van Nuys, Venice, Paris, Bordeaux. Every place I've lived has a separate and distinct vibe. What creates a vibe?
Air quality and odors, noise level, population density, architecture,advertising, language, regional accents, expressions of people on the street (where there are streets and people on them). Also, the relations you have with people from those you pass on the street to neighbors to those with whom you live. The look you got on the street in say, Mill Valley where every single resident would say "hello" and smile and nod to everyone they met would be so much different than the experience in Chicago, L.A. or Paris.
I recall the first time I set foot in Paris, for example, in the late 1970's. The first sensory impression was the very heavy odor of diesel fumes. Paris is very polluted by cars. Cars bring noise, too, and myfirst morning in the Hotel Boëtie, a symphony of car horns was my wakeup call. Paris is densely populated, so there's lots of street noise and activity as well. Delivery people calling out to each other, buses, pedestrians. Out on that street, when you pass a café, you can smell the espresso. Often, walking by a bakery you can smell the bread or croissants fresh from the oven. All this in spite of the diesel fumes.You used to see teams of men sweeping the water by in the gutters with"brooms" with bottoms which, although plastic, were green and made to look like branches in a fractal sort of way.
Life in Paris was radically different than the one I had left in L.A.and every day was a new discovery. The first days in the hotel, before Ifound a place to rent, were quite an adventure. Much of my French practice was done in the tiny bar there in the hotel, because I quickly discovered that in order to overcome the sensation of expressing oneself at the level of a four year old, some kind of anti-inhibition method was needed. Either sex or alcohol work well for this, but at that point in time I was limited to the latter, so in the evenings I often spoke tobusiness people passing through. It was great fun, and my French improved considerably during the first week by the total immersion. The staff was great, too. At night, there was an Egyptian student who patiently helped me improve my vocabulary in areas the books don't usually cover. During the day, the Spanish clerk was friendly and helpful and the maids were adorable.
In the second week, a tech was sent to help me and he was ready to accept the offer of a "girlfriend" that one of the night staff had been suggesting we try since he'd arrived. The call was made to arrange this.We were sitting in the bar when a lovely Eurasian woman came and sat down next to me with a big smile. She asked in French about my astrology. Since I'd lived through the L.A. days of people asking that, I should have had no trouble understanding it but I knew she was D's "girlfriend". I will call her W for woman. Here's the rest of that conversation in my improving by the moment, but still not ready for prime time French:
W: "What's your sign, baby? "
R: "I do not have any children."
W: "No I mean like Goat, Fish..."
R: "I do not have animals, either."
W: "What is you as-tr-lo-gi-ca-l sign?"
R: "Ah. Yes. I have been a Cancer, but it is only that my friend who he telephoned for yourself. You are for me not here."
W: "So, how does one do?"
R: "Fine. How do you do?"
W: "No, I meant, how can we make the switch politely?"
R: "What Switch. The light switch?"
W: "Are you being stupid on purpose, or what?" (Smiling)
R: "Ok, I see what you are meaning. I will erect myself and move myself to the bar of whiskey. Then you will move yourself over on the leather thing to be next to my friend."
When they went upstairs, I felt lonely but oddly fulfilled by mylinguistic experience. I like the idea that languages used to be called "tongues". That's what ties together the experience of the four of usand makes it coherent. I'd never forget Paris. Maybe that's why I moved back and lived there for over 25 years.
