2007.02.07  First Impressions

Bonjour! We made it to Pareeehhhh!!  And we're up and running with our blog!  I've done a bunch of journal
entries in my usual compulsive way, but haven't gotten around to posting them since Rod was working on the
lovely visual (gargoyle from the top of Notre-Dame) and design to make my techie-deficient life easier ;) 

Impressions so far?  Oh my God, this Paris thing is pretty cool.  We're staying in the Maison des Étudiants
Canadiens of the Cité Universitaire.  The "Cité" as it's known locally is a gathering of about thirty international
"maisons" to house students and researchers from around the world.  We did an architectural tour of the Cité
on Sunday and learned that several of the buildings were designed by big-name architects of the early
twentieth century.  The Collège Néerlandais was made by Dudok (never heard of him, but apparently a big
mover and shaker of Dutch architecture).  During the tour, Rod commented that the big chef d'oeuvre
reminded him of the Pinoy slums around Matsubaradanchi station-- grey, washed out cheap-looking
constructions.  There was even a big pine tree in front of the building so it really had that effect.  Anyway,
the other masterpiece of the Cité is the Fondation suisse which was done by le Corbusier.  It was actually
pretty cool as furniture from his workshop filled the common areas.  Bright primary coloured benches, etc. 
There was even a Picasso-inspired mural that he painted on the wall (they were buddies, apparently). 
We both wondered in a city of pickpockets and purse snatchers, how these little treasures of the Bauhaus
movement manage to not get stolen! 

We also went to the Louvre, which like all museums in Paris, offers free admission on the first Sunday of
each month.  The Mona Lisa has her own Da Vinci code tours now, which on that particular day was quite
popular with the Japanese tourists.  You can no longer take pictures in her room as thug security
dudes will now scream out "Pas de photos!" if you try.  But we have this on stock from 2005.  She is an
alluring little lady, so coy and cute.  Otherwise, we just wandered numb past hallway after hallway of
Renaissance paintings of Christian scenes.  There really is too much to see in that place...

Other than the inevitable cultural assault of walking around Paris, we've been finding our way around
the grocery stores.  So much cheese and wine and baguette and chocolate!  We also went to
arrondissement 13 to the "China"town there.  We picked up a big bag of lychees, some brown
organic rice from Thailand, some veggies and sauces.  Our last two nights for dinner, we ate
Indian curry and fried rice.  We were surprised to be able to find this stuff so accessible and cheap.
And they have organic food, and lots of seafood.  So our meat-free diet should be possible here. 

Work is quite another story.  Rod was told by a rude government official that his working-holiday
visa won't allow him to work.  "Pas chez nous" were her exact words.  Whatever.  We called a more
friendly guy in charge of the Canada-France youth exchange program (most people have no idea
what this is) and he is sending us a list of English schools in Paris.  We're also going to post an ad
to try to get private students here in the Cité. 

Quoi d'autre?  Oh yes, I registered for the Sorbonne yesterday.  What a place!  It looks like a giant
church down a side-alley.  It was surreal.  The classrooms are old and small and smell like moulded
paper.  But it's cool to be somewhere so steeped in history.  We'll see how a p.c. T.O.er fares
in this bastion of European.. ah.. superiority complex... now, now, I shouldn't judge before the first
day of classes (next Monday).  I wrote to M. le professeur Crouzet (who has his own spot in Wikipedia)
about my course of study. 

Et c'est tout pour l'instant!  Grosses bises tout le monde et à bientôt! 


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