A Little Tired Out....

Every vacation has some down days, and the past two have been like that for me. Perhaps I'm just getting tired of the foreign-ness of everything (especially here, where I can't speak the language), perhaps it's the days getting shorter, perhaps it's not having enough intellectual challenge without the class, or perhaps I just miss Paris, I'm not sure.

Yesterday we went into Porto itself. It is a very unique, unusual city, in a beautiful setting, on hills above a river, but I'm not sure how much I liked it. The older part of the town is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and I can see why it has that designation, because it is very unique, with narrow, narrow streets and interesting buildings. But it is a little run-down, and I found myself feeling claustrophobic, and the buildings seemed like warrens for humans, too many people packed too densely in too small of a place. Then, too, there was the traffic; if you think it's bad in Santa Rosa, try Porto at rush hour (at least Santa Rosa has street signs). A few pictures follow, and more are here, which will give you a sense of the place; as I said, it is on a beautiful location, and the waterfront is lovely, but I found it had a strange feel to it, an oddness that I can't put my finger on.







When I woke up today, I was tired in spite of a long sleep, perhaps because it was cloudy and rainy. I almost just bagged the day and stayed in the apartment, but I forced myself out, and I was glad that I did, because we visited a very pretty and very nice small city about 70 kilometers north of Porto called Viano do Castelo, which had been recommended to us as a destination by the very charming and friendly lady in the restaurant in Guimaraes where we had a late afternoon dinner yesterday. The drive up was short and easy (all freeway, through countryside that looked remarkably like Northern California, with forests of euchalyptus in the lowlands and pine in the hills), as was parking (at a premium, it seems, here). After a brief search, we found a restaurant that was recommended by the Michelin guide, in a 16th-century building that housed the communal oven for the village (our table was on the old hearth, beneath the grand arch of the oven, which looked to be exactly the same as it had been 400-plus years ago). The food was excellent, the best we've had in Portugal so far, served to us by a couple that looked to be the owners of hte place. My dish was a type of pork, which was flavorful and tender, served with a slightly vinigary sauce, whole baby potatoes, and vegetables. The boys had steak and mushrooms, which was great, and Suzie had a lamb dish that was very usual, in that it looked something like the Italian dish Osso Buco, but made with lamb. We finished off the feast with two wonderful deserts, a chocolate mousse topped with cream that was both sweet and slightly sour, and a local dessert made of cream that was somewhat like creme brulee, but different; it too was outstanding. Following lunch we walked around the charming older area of the village, which was unspoiled and lively, consisting of plazas and narrow alleys. Again, a few pictures give a good sense of the place.







We also happened upon an old church (dating from the 14th century) that looked like nothing on the outside, but was fantastic on the inside, with detailed, rich, impressive, gold-painted scenes on the side walls (I'm sure there is a technical, religious term for them, but I don't know what it is).






We also visited the municipal museum, which was small but interesting, although our experience there was darkened by the fact that a woman on the staff there kept following us around the museum as if we were going to steal something. She also seemingly gleefully scolded me when I tried to take a picture; I hadn't known that photography was prohibited, nor could I figure out any reason it should be, given that the museum consisted of old porcelin works and old furniture (very beautiful, I should add, but hardly a state secret). We left the museum and walked down to the river:



By the time we got back to the car, it was almost dark, and our drive back was uneventful except for the now-routine Porto traffic jam that greeted us when we got back to the city.

Tomorrow we are thinking that we may give ourselves a break, a day to do nothing but walk up and down the beach. This is totally off topic, but I'm also getting nervous about the election on Tuesday. I watched McCain today being interviewed on CNN by Larry King, and he was pretty good, and it seems to me the polls are still close enough to make an Obama victory uncertain. It's nail-biting time....

Portugal is Beautiful and Friendly ... and Cold

On Monday we left Paris and traveled to Porto, Portugal.  Our travel day wasn't the best; everything was long -- the RER train to CDG took for ever, EasyJet's computers were on the fritz, which meant that we spent almost an hour in line to check in, the plane did one of those "load and then sit on the tarmac" things, which added an hour to the total travel time, the shuttle to the rental car was late and crowded (although we ended up with a cool car, a Volvo diesel), and, to top it off, we had a little bit of trouble finding our apartment.  But we finally made it, got settled into our apartment, then went to a restaurant along the water that was recommended by the nice woman from whom we rented our apartment, where we had a satisfying meal consisting of enormous, delicious portions.

Now I'm sitting in the living room of our apartment in Canidelo, a southwestern suburb of Porto.  We have a beautiful, large, extremely quiet apartment right on the beach, with a large window that looks out on this:



So far our first day and a half in Portugal has been wonderful.  It is far and away the most friendly country we've ever been to.  Without exception, the people have been kind, accessible, and warm, despite our complete lack of ability to speak in Portuguese.  (I note that one of the interesting things for us has been the sound of Portuguese.  We had assumed that it would sound like Spanish, but it sounds nothing like that.  It has a suite of consonant sounds in it that make it sound oddly like an Eastern European language.  And more so than any other country we've visited, the Portuguese seem able to speak English without much of an accent, even people who obviously have limited English ability.)  We've felt so very welcomed here, and between that and the fact that our place is very, very quiet (we haven't heard a siren yet) and that we are not in a big city, we are feeling very, very relaxed.

Yesterday we had a nice, easy day.  In the morning, we went for a walk on the beach, despite the fact that a cold front had come through the day before, making the day very cold and very, very, very windy.  The flip side was that the day was totally clear and bright, with large, powerful waves, and we enjoyed the beach very much.



We wanted to do something outside of a big city, so we decided to visit a relatively nearby city called Guimarães, which is called the "Birthplace of Portugal" because it was the country's first capital. We didn't know what to expect, really, but what we found was one of nicest, prettiest, most wonderful places we've ever visited -- a middle-sized city with an incredibly well-preserved, yet unspoiled and untouristy, older quarter, a magnificent castle dating from the ninth century (the most genuine-seeming castle we've seen, and totally open, so that you could walk along the walls and climb to the very top of the towers), charming narrow streets, and incredibly friendly, open people. Here are a few pictures; more are available at this link.













As an added treat, prices here are much, much lower than in France. Coffees for .60 euros, a meal for the four of us for 24 euros, tip included, groceries less, gas less, everything less. Our money goes much, much farther here. The only negatives so far have been that our internet access is sporadic, and the pastries in the bakery next door are not the same league as those in Paris. (Also, if we were to stay in Portugal longer than a week, I'm sure we'd gain 5-10 pounds; the food is delicious but not exactly what I'd call light.

A final observation concerns my son Andrew, he of resist-French-at-all-costs fame. Of all of us, he has been the most interested in learning phrases in Portuguese -- how to say hello and thank you, etc. It seems that we've introduced a love of language in him despite himself.

Finally, for you Google Map fans, to orient yourselves, here's a map showing our travels in Portugal so far:

[googlemaps http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=h&s=AARTsJo3wS7L_kUYa3Dc41o4yJqhcRojLw&msa=0&msid=104194220758797817610.00045a6255383142bea4f&ll=41.301539,-8.475952&spn=0.495206,0.878906&z=10&output=embed&w=640&h=480]

A Weekend to Recognize How Good I've Got It, Part 2

On Saturday morning, we followed what has become our Saturday morning routine: Sleep in a bit, drink lots of coffee while lying in bed reading Le Monde, then put on our sneakers and gym shorts and take a run. Suzie found an excellent route, which takes us past two sets of long stairs, which we go up and down four times each, then into Parc Montsouris, then into the Cite Universitaire Paris, a gorgeous, open space with lots of running paths, then back to our apartment for our weekly cleaning. That afternoon we just hung out at the apartment, waiting for the evening, when we met Suzie's friend Stacie and her sister and husband for dinner at a restaurant near the Invalides called Pasco, which specializes in cuisine from the south of France. The food was excellent, but the service was sub-par (there didn't seem to be enough staff), and the meal took over three hours.

Stacie (who is a childhood friend of Suzie's from high school, but who now lives in Luxembourg; it was she whom we were visiting the day of the infamous mad cow incident during our first trip to Paris) spent the night at our apartment, and the next morning, after a breakfast of croissants and pain au raisin and fresh baguettes and jam and coffee, the three of us walked from our apartment all the way to the Marais. The morning was cloudy and chilly, still and very autumnal. Here's a candid shot of Suzie and Stacie, and a close up of the magnificent fountain near Port Royal at the southern tip of the Jardin du Luxembourg:





Leaving the Jardin du Luxembourg, we walked north through the touristy part of Paris; here is the very scenic Saint Chappelle and the Palais du Justice on the Ile de la Cité:



Suzie and Stacey wanted to visit the Musee Carnavalet, the huge museum housing artifacts from the history of Paris, but I had seen it twice, so instead I went to the Modern Art Museum at the Pompideu Center. Of all the museums in Paris, I think this one may be my favorite, perhaps in part because it is so different from most of the others. Housed in a modern building, it manages to be nevertheless somehow very comfortable:



Then, too, I think that perhaps I just enjoy modern art a little more than traditional art. Certainly that's true with respect to the traditional art that is so heavily focused on religious themes; I can only take so many paintings of the Virgin Mary or Jesus on the cross getting stabbed. And this time at the Pompideu Center, I found the section of works from the early 20th century, which were less abstract than more modern works, and yet more interesting and experimental than impressionists. The museum displays its works in very clean, nice spaces, and at least on Sunday, the museum was uncrowded. A few selections that caught my eye:









After a couple of hours at the museum, I met Suzie and Stacie at a tapas restaurant in the Marais, where we had an excellent and relatively inexpensive lunch. On the way there, I passed the Tour St. Jacques, constructed in the early 14th century and the only remaining remnant of the church at the same location.



The boys have 10 days off from school starting today, so we are off on a vacation to Porto, a port city in Portugal, where we've rented an apartment right on the beach. Let's see, the title of this post was....

A Weekend to Recognize How Good I've Got it, Part 1

It's always easy to take whatever it is you have in your life for granted.  This weekend, I had just the opposite experience.  I realized just how good I've got it.

It started on Thursday afternoon. Suzie had to do some "real" work (i.e., work for which she would be paid in real money, rather than in personal-satisfaction credits), so after having a quick lunch with some of my classmates in the cafeteria, I decided to treat myself to a solo expedition to the Louvre. I justified going without Suzie because there are things that I really like to see that don't interest her as much, and vice versa. In particular, I love all things old and ancient. Viewing something that was made by men (or women) 5,000 years ago is, for me, an amazing and humbling experience. So my visit was mostly spent in the wings holding the ancient Egyptian artifacts, with a brief side trip to the ancient Greek wings. I also stumbled by accident on an area that I'd never seen before, which consisted of gorgeous rooms, some of them apparently only recently renovated. I unfortunately didn't have my camera, only my small, not very good video camera, so you'll have to make due with these short videos, which do give a sense of the place.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUj9azCSxUc]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hukThydcp0]

A couple more can be found here and here (a mummy no less).

I even snuck into the Italian wing to see the Mona Lisa, but ended up just walking past it, really, as there were some other paintings in and around that room that caught my eye (although I have to say that the highly stylized religious paintings don't do a lot for me, and there were a lot of those to see).

I left feeling happy and calm. There is something about seeing such amazing works of art, in such a beautiful facility, and in such numbers, that simply makes me feel good.  An example: Many of the large Egyptian sculptures are of couples -- famous-at-the-time men and their wives.  And many in of these statutes, the woman has her arm around the man, or is holding the hand of the man, in a way that looks so affectionate, and natural, that for me it makes the statutes seem not of some ancient, distant, scarcely human species, but of real, flesh and blood men and women, just like those living today.  Those little gestures make the statutes come alive for me; signs of affection from 3000 years ago being just the same as those today.

The next day, Friday was the last day of this session of my classes at the Alliance Française, a particularly sad day for me because (1) the woman who was teaching my class -- a wonderful, enthusiastic, meticulous, professional, organized, warm, and very, very funny dynamo of a teacher -- won't be continuing with our group next month, and (2) several of the students I like very much are leaving.  So we had a little mini-celebration; one student brought flowers, another chocolates, a third homemade bread, a fourth various pastries (that was me).  Here is a picture of all of us:



It's amazing how close you can get to feel to people in a short period of time. I consider all these people my friends, and I've learned a lot about some of them, and I'm sad to think that it's almost a certainty that some of them I will never see again (although I do have hopes of staying in touch with them all).

I also have to take a little time out here to brag about this:

These are the results of the exam I took a few weeks back.  Since this is what I'm putting energy into now, I'm proud of these results, especially given the fact that I've come to the conclusion that I'm not particularly naturally gifted at learning new languages.  My low mark is for continuity of speech, and is unfortunately dead on accurate, and I think it happens because I try to express things in French in as complicated of a way as I do in English, but I don't have the skills in French to do that, and so inevitably I come at some point to a dead end, where I can't summon up the words or the construction in French to say what I want to say, and so am completely blocked, and have no other option than to just fall silent.  A terrible experience for someone who loves to talk as much as I do, and embarrassing, too.  Hopefully that will get better with practice.

I know, I know, I'm a nerd, what can I say?

Later that afternoon, Suzie and I went to one of our favorite places in Paris to have coffee:

This is Le Danton, which is on Boulevard St. Germain at the Carrefour de Odéon, just outside the Odéon Metro stop. We've gone there several times, and I've gone once alone. The staff is friendly and efficient, the prices are reasonable (both for coffee and for omelettes, if you want a snack), and the surrounding area is bustling and interesting. We sat and spoke French for an hour or so while Suzie was waiting for another friend (her French conversation partner). Afterwards, I took the Metro to the Place de la Concorde, and then took a long, long random walk, up and around the Champs Elysees. It was cloudy and cool, and dusk was approaching when I started and completely finished when I was done. I watched the natural light slowly disappear and the lights of the city become prominent, I watched the crowds of tourists ambling down the streets and disappearing into stores, I bought a French magazine at a kiosk (the Nouvel Observateur, which dedicated most of the issue to the U.S. election), walked some more, and finally took a terribly hot, crowded, uncomfortable, long Metro ride back home.

From the Bedroom Balcony This Morning

This glorious sunrise....

You Couldn't Make This Up If You Tried

More evidence that McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate was perhaps the single worst Presidential campaign decision ever made, this story from the New York Times:

Who was the highest paid individual in Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign during the first half of October as it headed down the homestretch?

Not Randy Scheunemann, Mr. McCain’s chief foreign policy adviser; not Nicolle Wallace, his senior communications staffer. It was Amy Strozzi, who was identified by the Washington Post this week as Gov. Sarah Palin’s traveling makeup artist, according to a new filing with the Federal Election Commission on Thursday night.

Ms. Strozzi, who was nominated for an Emmy award for her makeup work on the television show “So You Think You Can Dance?”, was paid $22,800 for the first two weeks of October alone, according to the records. The campaign categorized Ms. Strozzi’s payment as “Personnel Svc/Equipment.”

Even assuming Ms. Strozzi worked (or was available to work, since you can't constantly apply make up during the day) 60 hours per week, that's still a rate of $190 per hour; pas mal as they say here in Paris.  And if she's paid by the job, assuming Ms. Palin gets made-up four times a day, each and every day (that has to be bad for the skin, no?), that calculates as a little over $400 per job.  Not too shabby, especially since Ms. Palin presumably does some of the work herself.

Ms. Palin-of-the-People, how are we supposed to take your rhetoric about all the evil elitists in Washington D.C. seriously when, with your $150,000 in clothes and your $400 make-up jobs, you apparently either already are a member of the elite, or have serious aspirations of joining?

Memo to John McCain:  Next time, take more than fifteen minutes.

A Very Sour Mood

This today from the Pew Research Center:  Only 11% of Americans are satisfied with the way things are going in the U.S. today, which is the lowest figure ever recorded.  Here's a graph of the trend.  By the way, who are these 11% of people who are satisfied with the way things are going nowadays?



Also today from the Pew Center, especially for my friend Jill, additional confirmation that Republicans are happier than Democrats.

Why I Voted for Obama-Biden

I went to the office of La Poste on Rue d'Alésia and mailed my ballot on Monday.  Even though I am solidly in the center of the political spectrum, this decision was not even a close one.  Thinking about my decision, I realize that it was based on three separate but related fundamental notions.

Trite and tired and cliched, maybe, but a big part of my decision was grounded in the belief that the country needs a change after many years of conservative ascendance.  Aside from the centrist Clinton Presidency, for more than 25 years, dating from Reagan's election in 1980, conservatism has more or less dominated American politics and government.  All things get stale after a while, and once you add in the devastatingly horrible Bush Presidency (which did more to kill real conservatism in the U.S. than all rowdies on the left could have ever done), it's necessary to do a switch (even though, as noted below, I'm not convinced that a unified Democratic government won't blow it).

The second element is Obama himself.  As has been noted many times by others, not only is Obama a gifted orator and politician, but he seems to be genuine leader.  His demeanor throughout the campaign has been one of calmness and decorum.  He never seems to get overly perturbed, but rather seems to have the ability to take himself out of a crisis situation and view it with a little bit of distance ... an excellent trait, it seems to me, in a President.  Note the repeated use of the word "seem," because it's not a sure thing; I'm taking a bit of a flyer on Obama, to be sure.

The third element is the performance of McCain during the campaign, which made taking a flyer on Obama an easy thing to do.  I had genuine respect for McCain before the campaign.  But his bizarre and questionable decisions during the campaign lead me to doubt that he would be the best head of state.  Combining the unbelievably stupid choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate, his strange "I'm suspending my campaign" response to the financial crisis (and then not), and his angry, all-too-easy resort to classic right-wing slimes, despite having been the victim of them himself in 2000, and I ended up at a definite "no thanks."  My views on McCain were perfectly expressed in this post from George Packer of The New Yorker, quoting from an e-mail from Ken Adelman, an active neoconservative:

Why [am I voting for Obama], since my views align a lot more with McCain’s than with Obama’s? And since I truly dread the notion of a Democratic president, Democratic House, and hugely Democratic Senate?

Primarily for two reasons, those of temperament and of judgment.

When the economic crisis broke, I found John McCain bouncing all over the place. In those first few crisis days, he was impetuous, inconsistent, and imprudent; ending up just plain weird. Having worked with Ronald Reagan for seven years, and been with him in his critical three summits with Gorbachev, I’ve concluded that that’s no way a president can act under pressure.

Second is judgment. The most important decision John McCain made in his long campaign was deciding on a running mate.

That decision showed appalling lack of judgment. Not only is Sarah Palin not close to being acceptable in high office—I would not have hired her for even a mid-level post in the arms-control agency. But that selection contradicted McCain’s main two, and best two, themes for his campaign—Country First, and experience counts. Neither can he credibly claim, post-Palin pick.

This absolutely nails the problem with McCain.  Instead of cowtowing to his right-wing political advisors, he could have held his ground in the center, and had a chance of defeating Obama.  But once he selected Sarah Palin, it was hard for me to take him seriously anymore.

As noted above, I have some trepidation about a federal government with both the executive and the legislature in the hands of the left.  I'm convinced that the the "center" of the Democratic Party (which has tacked further and further left in the past 20 years) is fundamentally out of touch with the majority of Americans, even those of us in the center.  Using a November victory to take retribution for having to spend the last 25 years in the wilderness will be an enormous mistake.  (In another post, I'll give some examples.)  I very much hope that Obama, if elected, will see himself, not as the President of the left, but as the President of the entire country.  The political fabric in the U.S. needs some repair; it does not need more tug-of-wars over the same old, same old issues.

Oh My God, Is That What They Think?

Silly, funny, and slightly scary and sad poll this weekend in the Femina supplement to the French paper Le Journal du Dimanche.  The poll, carried out by the French polling firm Institut français d'opinion publique (IFOP), asked 1006 people in France various questions about the United States.

Not all the news was terribly bad; for example, 62% of the French (and 68% of those under 35) said they appreciated the U.S. a lot or some.  But some of the other answers were less satisfying.  For example, when asked for the first word that came to them when they think of the U.S., these were the most frequent responses:



Not very satisfying to think that "liberty" is below "Bush", but there it is.  (Interestingly, the biggest difference in response between French men and women was the response "New York" -- 11% of the women said that was the first word they thought of, but only 4% of French men.  I can't be sure, but I believe shopping has something to do with this.)  Even sadder are the items that got only a 1% response:



Sad, here, to see that the frequency with which Barack Obama is associated with the U.S. is the same as for "arrogance," "violence," "pollution," "consumerism," and "obesity."  Perhaps that will change after November.

Worse are the "everyday" associations.  For example, when asked to give three words that best characterize the U.S. in connection with everyday life, these were the (often horrific) responses:



Fast food, number one.  Ouch.  Some are cool, though ... basketball, jeans, popcorn.  Some are bizarre and, to me, almost inexplicable.  Mobile homes?  Motels?  Cheesecake?  Maybe I've missed something.

Sad and a bit bizarre, too, are the popular singers associated with the U.S.  Note that for this question, it appears that the respondents had to choose three names from a list.  How the list was constructed, I haven't a clue.  Here are the results:



I guess I can live with this, although seeing Louis Armstrong and Madonna back to back makes me shake my head, as does any list containing the two words "Britney Spears."

For those of you interested in more details and a few extra questions that I didn't mention, the entire survey can be obtained here.

Opposite Ends of the Spectrum

On Saturday, Suzie and I, craving the outdoors, took the Metro to the Bois de Vincennes, the huge mostly natural park on the east side of Paris.  It was an absolutely glorious fall day: Cool but not too, a blue sky with a few puffy white clouds, a warm but weakening sun.  The trees here are in the middle of turning color and losing their leaves, which made the walk a very pretty one.  We first walked past the huge Chateau de Vincennes, constructed in the 14th century.



Then we headed for a small lake, via a route which took us through a forest left completely wild:



The lake itself, small and manmade, had well-kept walking paths all around it.  A couple of pictures show how pretty the lake and the day were:





After walking around the lake and stopping for a coffee at the always-seeming-present park cafe, we took another route back to the Metro. This route wasn't quite so pretty; the bois is the home of a number of of sports-related facilities, including the French national athletic training center, and is also traversed by a number of roads. In addition, the walk back was long. We figured we walked a little more than 5 miles, which wouldn't have been a big deal to us, but for the fact that we'd both gone out for a run that morning. We were happy to get on the Metro and sit down, something we don't often say. (I followed this with an outing with someone from my class on Sunday, which involved more walking, so by the end of the weekend my feet had had it.)

This pretty excursion in the country was a great contrast to my outing with the boys a few days earlier, to the 2008 Mondial de l'Automobile, the world's largest automobile show, which was being held in Paris at the Porte de Versaille, just a short tram ride away from our apartment.

The exhibition was pretty much what expected, except for the fact that I've never been to anything so large in my life. It was huge. We stayed for almost 4 hours, and saw only 2 of the 7 exhibition halls. The other funny thing about the Mondial Auto was that it was in some ways almost a caricature of itself, as evidenced by these Jetson-esque young ladies; all the different car companies had their own fleet of hostesses dressed up in matching attire, ranging from elegant to ... well, to what you see below. (The best were the hostesses for the Smart cars, very cute in matching colored jeans and sneakers.)



The cars were pretty cool, even though I'm not really a car guy. In addition to all of the new the stock models by all the car companies (some of whom I'd never heard of), each also had one or more "concept cars," highly futuristic prototypes not yet in production. For example this, a car for the very thin:



Or these:





Lots of "green" stuff, too ... hybrids, all-electric, etc. One concept "green" car really was:



Ouch, it makes my eyeballs hurt. Actually, after a while, the whole scene started making my eyeballs hurt; too much light, too many flashes, too much glitz. I felt the same way I feel after I have to go into the Windsor Wal-Mart. Still, I'm glad I went, if only for the experience, and the kids got in for half-price.

Oh Say Can You Get Worked Up Over Some Whistles

Big controversy here in France this week.  During a so-called "amicale" or "friendly" soccer match at the Stade de France on Tuesday between the national teams of France and Tunesia, a large number of the Tunesian fans decided to whistle (the equivalent of booing) during the singing of La Marseillaise, the French national anthem.  This caused a strong reaction (one could say, an overreaction) from the French government, as noted here:

[President Nicolas] Sarkozy has demanded an investigation, and has called Jean-Pierre Escalettes, head of the French Football Federation to his office to explain the incident.

Interior Minister Michèle Alliot-Marie has asked for a judicial investigation, using images from the security cameras in the stadium. Anyone arrested will be banned from the stadium.

Prime Minister François Fillon said that the booing was "insulting to France, insulting for the French players" and said that the match should have been called off. He added that it was up to match organisers to find solutions to such problems.

Health and Sports Minister Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin and Junior Sports Minister, Bernard Laporte said in a statement that they were "shocked by the jeering...notably during the playing of the Marseillaise, symbol of the French Republic"

Laporte, former trainer of the French rugby team, went as far as to suggest that matches against north African countries should no longer be played in the Parisian stadium, recalling similar incidents when France played Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia in the past.

Underlying this, of course, is the fact that many of the countries in the Magreb were former French colonies, not always well-treated by France during colonial times, and many residents of France of from North Africa face discrimination in France.  But some of the government proposals coming out of the incident seem way over-the-top, including the idea that matches should be immediately called off if the La Marseillaise is booed before the match.  Hard to imagine how that plays out -- 60,000 people have paid good money and traveled all the way to the stadium to see the match, and now you call it off, and they do, what exactly?  File calmly out the exits?

The best comment I've seen in response came from a former French national player who is now the head the European Soccer Union.  Interviewed in Le Monde, he hit the nail on the head:

Je ne vois pas dans les sifflets qu'on a entendus au Stade de France un manque de respect ou une insulte à la France mais simplement des manifestations contre un adversaire d'un soir, en l'occurrence l'équipe de France, que l'on veut battre. Dans d'autres occasions, je suis certain que les mêmes jeunes qui ont sifflé La Marseillaise, mardi soir, chantent l'hymne national quand l'équipe de France dispute un match de l'Euro ou de la Coupe du monde.

The Tunesians weren't booing France, they were booing the French team, because they were rooting for the Tunesian team.  If those same individuals were in the same stadium watching the French team in the World Cup against another country, they'd be singing the national anthem like everyone else.  Probably true.  (He also noted that he never sang La Marseillaise before a match, because it's a "chant guerrier et que pour moi, un match de foot, c'est un jeu et pas la guerre" -- it's a war song and for me, a soccer match is not a war.  Perhaps this gent should be President of France.)

I could be wrong, but it's hard to see such a reaction gaining as much traction in the U.S. nowadays, although I recall the strong reaction that followed the "black power" salute of U.S. Olympic athletes Tommy Smith and John Carlos during the 1968 Mexico City games.  I suspect that the reaction of most folks would be the same as the reaction of the man interviewed by Le Monde -- it is, after all, just a game.

My Kind-of-Sweet-and-Charming-in-an-Odd-Way Classmate "J"

Well it's not often that I have to say (publicly, anyway) that I was wrong, but I maybe do owe a little j'avais un peu tort to my classmate "J" for the slightly, shall we say, unflattering rendering in my earlier post.  And how did I arrive at that point, you ask?

On Monday we were informed in class that on Thursday we would be required to take an exam, to evaluate our level of competence in French.  Notwithstanding the fact that we were also told that the exam didn't really count for anything in terms of our studies, most people in the class naturally wanted to do well on it.  So on Thursday before class I was sitting in the cafeteria before class looking over some materials, when who should walk over and start up a conversation with me but ... my classmate "J."  In a very friendly way, she asked me what I was doing, and from there we were in a conversation.  I found out an awful lot about her in a short period of time, some of which clarified a few things for me.  For example:  I thought she was living with a French family while studying at the Alliance Française, but in fact she is working for the family as an au pair.  Which explains why she often seems tired during the class -- she spends her evenings cooking, cleaning, and watching two young children.  The fact that she was working in order to be in France, rather than simply boarding with a family, made a big impression on me, and made me view here in a totally different light.  And far from being reserved or distant or odd, she was completely completely charming.  When Suzie arrived at the cafeteria, I introduced her, and she was just as charming to Suzie.  Suzie and I both laughed that evening at the situation; we had both been more or less disarmed by her, even though there was still a little something about her that made us wonder.

When I arrived at the cafeteria the next morning, "J" was sitting in front of a computer by herself, so I decided to return the courtesy.  I asked if I could join her, and we had another extended conversation, during which I learned more about her -- about her parents and her family, about her work as an au pair, and other things which, in deference to her, I'll keep private (no, it's nothing earth-shattering, but I imagine her stumbling on this blog some day and figure it's bad enough already).  Once again, she was perfectly open and charming.  I started to realize that perhaps I had judged her a little too harshly.  There was something a little odd about her, and she continues to do some odd things in the classroom, but they now seem to me to be due to an excess of naivete, an excess of enthusiasm and openness and, perhaps, due to her particular personal history.  More importantly, the oddness is sort of endearing, because it doesn't seem to spring from any kind of anger or malice or bad motives, but rather from an unfiltered eagerness.  Maybe, too, I think, her prior inconstancy was simply due to a mix of the foregoing and shyness.

Once again, I am reminded of the great fallibility all we humans share, the error of judging another before we really know of them, of summing them up before we have really explored them, of not considering how their life and their history may have shaped them, of failing to even try to place ourselves in their position.  So I write an unflattering blog post about a young woman of 18, whom I barely know, without once putting myself in her position, or giving her any sort of the benefit of the doubt.  How would I be if I were her, so young and so far from home?  You want unflattering?  Try asking people about me at age 18.

After class today I had lunch with "J" and several other of my classmates.  And I learned even more about her.  So here is my interim, very much subject to change, view of her -- intelligent, diligent, shy, funny/goofy, good-hearted, slightly clueless, very young (but promising), charming, and, yes, still a little odd in a way I can't quite put my finger on, but which I think is probably harmless.

Oh, yes, I forgot to mention that I have regained "J" as a neighbor in the class, as she arrived this morning and sat next to me once again.  Perhaps hemispere-of-residence still matters after all.

A Most Relaxing Weekend

It's Sunday night, time for a quick post.  We had perhaps the most relaxed weekend we've had since we've been in Paris, thanks mostly to the fact that the boys have found a new friend to hang out with, a boy in Andrew's class named Kory.  They spent the night at Kory's house on Friday night, which gave me and Suzie an entire afternoon and evening alone together, which we took advantage of by lazing around the house and then going out to a bistro for a late dinner (Suzie, scallops and eggplant in a wonderful sauce, me, chicken and wild rice in an equally wonderful sauce, with a dish made of goose to start off [Suzie called it "pulled meat," it was goose meat plus some other ingredients that ended up soft, almost like a poor man's pate, absolutely delicious] and, to finish, the most rich, delicious, dark, sweet, moist-runny chocolate cake I've ever had -- a huge portion that was almost too big for the two of us.  We decided to walk home through the pleasant Paris evening, with a three-quarter moon overhead.  Just wonderful.  As evidence of how relaxed I was, I slept until 10 the next morning, which is something I almost never do.

Saturday morning Suzie and I lazed around for about an hour reading the paper, then we motivated ourselves to go out for a run through the neighborhood and through Parc Montsouris, which felt really, really good (I have not been getting enough exercise lately, I realized after this weekend).  After having a small lunch and showering, we went to the Luxembourg Gardens to meet Suzie's friend Sophie.  Suzie met Sophie through Craigslist Paris (of all places), where Sophie had posted an ad for an English conversation partner.  Suzie and I took the Metro to Saint-Placide, then walked to the gardens.  Saturday was an almost perfect fall day ... sunny, cool, clear, crisp.  In the past week, the pace of the trees turning yellow and brown and dropping their leaves has greatly accelerated; in a week or so, I expect most of them will be bare.  Here's a couple of pictures of the Luxembourg Gardens; you can see for yourself that fall is definitely here in Paris.





We had a great time with Sophie, us helping her with her English, and she helping us with our French. We were there over two hours, sitting in the sun next to the pond. Very, very civilized. After returning home I did the weekly grocery shopping and then Suzie whipped up a delicious quick dinner (pizza and salad and bread). Suzie was fighting of a cold so we went to bed early.

The next day was also beautiful. Suzie wanted to go to the gym, so I walked part way with her, then grabbed a Velib and went on a long, long, long ride, from our apartment to Notre Dame, then over to the Etoile, then back to our apartment, which took about two hours. Here's a picture from the Velib (stopped).



I also made a little video along the Seine to show that after all this time in Paris and after all the French classes, I can actually speak a little bit of French, but after looking at it I realized I had made multiple mistakes, plus I looked like a dork, so I expect that it will hit the recycle bin on the computer soon.

After returning home, we did our weekend chores. The kids' friend Kory came over and they all went to a movie, leaving Suzie and I free once again. We took the tram west, then walked over the Seine to the 16th, and then walked all around it, through some beautiful neighborhoods, including some surprising and interesting buildings, like the Algerian Embassy:



After walking for about an hour and a half, we found a cafe and had a coffee and watched the people go by and talked about various and sundry things, before taking the metro home. It's now about 10 p.m. and I'm ready to call it a day, so I am.

My Funny Classmate "J"

I've had some experiences with classmates here in Paris that I would qualify as somewhat odd (and sometimes disappointing), but I'm just at the end (I think) of one that still has me scratching my head.

My class now contains 6 women and 2 men. There are three older women (i.e., more than 25 years old) from Russia, Serbia, and England, three younger women (from Mexico, Germany, and Albania, the last being the first person I've ever met from Albania and also a dead ringer for a young woman I know in Santa Rosa, all the way down to the smile and the expressions), an older guy from Ireland, and me. This post is about the woman from Mexico, who, for purposes of anonymity, and because I've never been able to figure out or remember her name, I'll call "J."

J is 18 years old, and a very young 18 at that. She's all make-up and cell phones and IPods and bright, cute clothes with many different pairs of shoes and at least three different pairs of very mod glasses. She's tall and very slender, with long dark hair and eyes. Not my type, but not unattractive.

When J first arrived in class, she took the seat right next to me. We sit at long tables, arranged in a "U", so someone who is right next to you is ... well, right next to you. The way the class is structured, there are multiple times that you are required to do exercises with others in the class, usually in pairs. Since there was no one on the other side of J, that meant that she and I had to do assignments together all the time.

Those who know me will confirm (I hope) that I tend to be pretty good in situations like this -- friendly, helpful, courteous, deferential as necessary -- and also that I enjoy situations like this, having to work with someone being a pleasant and unobtrusive way to get to know someone. But working with J was a little like going to the dentist. She is bright enough, and her French is excellent, but for whatever reason we just didn't seem to work very well as a team. When we'd have to do something, such as writing a one- or two-paragraph story or letter, we would never talk enough to be able to agree on the content.  And we pretty much had nothing in common to talk about, since she didn't seem to give two hoots and a damn about politics or current affairs or anything else I cared about, and I didn't have much to say about teen fashion.  Finally, as people tend to do over time, we sort of came to an agreement (never really explicitly stated) that when we were paired together to do assignments, we'd simply divvy up the assignment, each do our respective parts, and then check the work of the other. A workable arrangement, if not exactly a cordial one.

As the first week went on, I began to think that J simply didn't like me, for whatever reason (my nationality, my clothes, my handwriting, my age). When she would see me outside the class (in the cafeteria for example), she would usually simply ignore me altogether; she would only really acknowledge me if she was in a situation where it was absolutely necessary. When she was forced to acknowledge me (whether inside the class or outside), things were even more odd. Sometimes she would be very, very short and curt, not unfriendly, exactly, but not warm either. At other times she would look me directly in the eye, and her face would light up in a warm, genuine smile for just for a moment, before shutting down again. As the week went on, the same thing would happen we were doing assignments -- at rare times in the mornings she would be charming and talkative and sweet, then in the afternoon she would be aloof and cold and prickly. Odd, too, was the fact that she seemed to sit conspicuously close to me, so that her books and materials would spill over into my space, creating a kind of joint work area.  So gradually I changed my opinion. It could be that she didn't like me, but it could also be that she was just extremely shy, or just plain odd. (As evidence of the latter, from time to time she would simply put her head down on the table and ignore what was going on in class, something that may pass muster in a large lecture hall but is quite noticeable in a class with only 8 people.)

She also did other odd things. She would take the handouts passed out by the teacher and, during class, meticulously trim them with a pair of scissors, fold them into the shape of a small square accordion, label them with a subject, and then tape them into her notebook. Other times she'd decide that it was time to touch-up her makeup, so she'd pull out a mirror and various and sundry cosmetic items and proceed to carefully, obliviously apply them (mascara seemed to be a favorite). As would be the case with her putting her head down on the desk, this action would usual cause the teacher to look over at her, look at me, and roll her eyes.

In any event, towards the end of the week I came to the conclusion that I'd rather work with someone else, rather than have to try to deal with J's odd, inconstant personality. But an unexpected thing had happened: Even though I didn't really enjoy sitting next to her or working with her, and even though I didn't really like her, I felt an odd sort of connection with her, a strange kind of loyalty to her even. The only way to get another partner was to sit somewhere else (since each day J would arrive, often late, and dutifully sit down right next to me, more or less happily), and I didn't want to hurt her feelings by obviously sitting somewhere else, so I decided to wait until the next Monday, because the composition of the class changes a bit week-to-week, so I wouldn't be taking someone else's spot.

On Monday, I arrived early and staked out a new spot, directly across from my old spot, and waited. J actually arrived on time this day, and walked over to her usual spot, and put down her things. I thought to myself, 'That was easy and painless, and it probably matters not one bit to her that I moved.' But just as that thought was passing from my head, J stood up, picked up her belongings, walked across the room in front of everyone over to my side of the class, and sat down in the seat directly next to me. I was so surprised and discombobulated that I didn't know what to make of this. Had I been able to retrieve the correct words in French at 9 a.m. that morning, I would have been tempted to say to her, "You don't like me. You don't like working with me. Why are you following me around the room?" But my politeness and my poor French restrained me, and instead I just turned to her and said "Bonjour."

Now I was faced with something really strange. What was going on? I found absolutely incredible the idea that she was fond of me, or that she liked working with me, or that she liked me at all. So I had to conjure up other possible explanations. The other person now on the other side of the room, who would have been J's partner, was pretty odd, too; maybe J saw me as the least undesirable choice she had. Maybe it was some kind of weird hemispheric solidarity thing, she and I being the only ones in the class from the Western Hemisphere. Maybe she was, after all, incredibly shy, and preferred continuing to work with someone she already knew a little (although truly, to describe our interactions as resulting in anything approaching a relationship would be a stretch). Maybe it was just plain inertia. Or who knows, maybe she is fond of me, after all. She is a little odd; maybe older unattractive married American guys appeal to her, and she is so smitten that she just doesn't know how to express it properly.

While trying to derive a rational explanation for the fact that she was sitting next to me in spite of my efforts, something else very happened. That odd feeling of loyalty I had felt the week before grew. I still didn't really want to her to be sitting next to me, but a part of me started to feel strangely protective of her. She had, after all, rather publicly manifested her desire to sit next to me, which doesn't happen every day, so even if she's 18 and all make-up and cell phones and IPods and bright, cute clothes with many different pairs of shoes and at least three different pairs of very mod glasses, and even if she does nap and put on makeup during class, maybe ... well, maybe I owe her a little more courtesy and consideration. Then, too, there was a part of me that felt a bizarre kind of affection for her; she's an odd and difficult and sometimes unpleasant partner, but, hey, she's my partner.

But those affirmative thoughts lasted only to the first joint exercise.  Then, once again, I found myself thinking that another partner would be more interesting, more useful, more pleasant, and more fun.  And I realized that at this point, unless I wanted to be really, pointedly impolite, I was completely trapped:  If I changed my seat in the class again, it would be painfully obvious to her and everyone else that I was trying to avoid her.  I hated the idea of having to do that.

The next day, J wasn't there.  So I was able to work with someone else, a smart, pleasant, personable young woman from Germany, with whom I enjoyed working immensely.  She enjoyed talking about politics!  We could write short joint letters without angst!  A real improvement, which made the class much more enjoyable and productive.  But the next day, J came up with yet another, unexpected twist: When she arrived in class, she did not sit next to me.  Instead, she went and sat next to a new friend, the other 18-year-old in the room, the woman from Albania.  I guess the bond of being the same age ultimately trumps the bond of residing in the same hemisphere.

Human nature being what it is, of course, I felt a combination of happiness ... and pique.  Hey, J, I'm not good enough for you now?  Not really, of course, but in a way, I am going to miss sitting next to J.  Even with all of her oddness, or perhaps precisely because of all her oddness, I ended up feeling a little bit fond of her.  She is, after all, just 18.  I should probably cut her a bit more slack.

Pictures from the Weekend

I feel a bit guilty posting this, while the markets are crashing, but there's nothing much we can do other than go on doing what we are doing, which is enjoying our time here.

Friday was a French-intensive day.  Four hours of class in the morning, plus three hours of tutoring from 5:30 to 8:30.  In between, Suzie and I took a walk around the town on a very windy, cloudy, blustery day.  Here's Suzie being blustered:



And here's a dramatic sky:



One of the more interesting things to see in Paris is the various ornamentation on the buildings.  We saw this on the Grand Palais as we were waiting for the rain to end.



After our walk, we found a great little relatively-inexpensive cafe on Boulevard St. Germain at the Carrefour d'Odeon, where we sat for about an hour or so drinking coffee and speaking in French almost exclusively.  Then off to the tutor, a very interesting guy named Nicholas who probably deserves a post of his own.

Sunday was the first Sunday of the month, which meant that there was no admission charge at all public museums.  We got up fairly early and decided to go to the exquisite Musee d'Orsay, located in a beautifully and functionally renovated gare, containing a large collection of works, including many, many, many impressionist paintings.  We stood in line for about 30 minutes to get in, then had to brave some large crowds in some of the salles, but we had a wonderful, wonderful time.  As Suzie said, something about being there, among such amazing works, just makes you happy.  In addition, the space itself is remarkable, absolutely beautifully redone.  I can't say more than these pictures can:













A not-to-be-missed stop if you are ever in Paris.