Quick notes from the trip!

Paris is not a city but a world

-Charles V

For the young Parisian, smoking is not relaxation but work, gambling is not a passion but a business, eating is not a pleasure but a science

- Madame de Giardin

[On Parisian women]:

She is the essence of wit, grace and feeling, an inexhaustible source of charm, the dazzling proof of the superiority of France over all other nations, the woman dreamed of at sixteen and the only one remembered at sixty

- Leon Gozlan

[A Parisian woman on her daughter]

She is the angel of sweetness, a demon of wit, a household treasure, perfection in all things. The man who marries her, however good he may be, will not deserve the happiness that awaits him

-Leon Gozlan

The Parisian makes an adorable mistress, an impossible wife, and a perfect friend. She dies in the odor of religion, to which she has never given a thought.
-Leon Gozlan

I was sufficiently emphatic. Paris! I cried. Paris! Good God!
-Carl van Vechten

Look into Van Gogh's eyes . . . . you are getting sleepy . . . maybe from the absinthe . . .

Villefranche near Nice

What has become of me? I have a mohawk/mullet crossbreed, a moustache, and a piercing. Have things gone downhill?

i'll organize this better later.

fev 17: Nice to Paris by plane. Met Méli aux Halles, super-crowded, still managed to find each other. Took RER train out to Sartrouville to stay with Laurent.

fev 18: Sartrouville with Laurent and Amanda. Played on the farm.

fev 19: Went to Ben's apartment early in the morning near the Champs-Elysées, Rue de Banasso. He lives in a converted maid's chamber on the top floor of a very steep staircase in an building dating to the late 1800s. Saw Arc de Triomphe for first time coming out of Charles de Gaulle Metro stop. Met Méli at Trocadéro, saw Eiffel Tower; Champs de Mars, Les Invalides; St Germain-des-Près, café Nesle, old couple in a lover's argument. Notre Dame. Quartier Latin, Panthéon; Eglise St-Etienne du Mont; met Pierre and Carmen (Amanda's friends from Texas) at Place Monge. Bar. Laetitia (Méli's friend) and Méli left early that night. Albert, as he is wanton to do, happened to be in Paris the same week and met us randomly that night in his big van. Drove us to a wine and cheese bar open til 4am. Drunk piano player. Beatles.

fev 20: Champs-Elysées à Concorde, almost cried walking down the Champs. Me and Méli, playing hide-and-seek. au bord de la Seine; Louvre from the outside, Méli talked to mounted gendarmes about how to be a cop on a horse. Les Tuileries café. Notre Dame again to meet everyone. Quartier Latin again. Blanche metro stop. Moulin Rouge. Bar with football match. Pizza with Méli on the Champs-Elysées, returned late to chez Ben.

fev 21: Méli left to go to Laetitia's. Metro from Charles de Gaulle Etoile to drop off my bags at Pierre and Carmen's rented apartment off Blvd Clichy. Tour Eiffel with Amanda, Arc de Triomphe. Walked to Montemartre and Sacre Coeur - long walk. Ave Wagram to Blvd Courelles to Batignolles to Ave Clichy, passed by Cimitière Montemartre. Met Méli and her friends, sat on bench and made home-made videos with Méli. Met Amanda later at a café. Met Pierre and Carmen at Bastille metro stop. Blues singer in bar at Blanche. Slept at their apartment.

fev 22: took bags to a hotel I got for me and Méli near the Marais. Drank absinthe with the Texas crowd in a nice hotel near Moulin Rouge. Went to Musée d'Orsay, saw the big Impressionists, had to hurry to meet Méli at Odéon. Had café on St Germain, expensive but velvety seat made up for it. Spent night with Méli in hotel.

fev 23: Awesome breakfast with Méli in hotel. quick shower, an hour late checking out. took bags to Ben's again. Catacombes with Ben and Méli. ate KFC at the Place d'Italie, can you believe it? Quartier Latin with Méli, met her friend Fabien at the Café Nesle again (our café together on that Monday). Stayed at café for 5 hours. Walked back along Seine. Finally got into Ben's at almost 6am. Had to catch train from Gare de l'Est at 748AM. Very close call. Slept with Méli on train to Strasbourg. She was like a little songbird chirping in my ear when we arrived, and I could barely keep my eyes open. Met Méli's sister Geraldine in Strasbourg, drove back to Annecy through the Vosges. Slept like a rock at Méli's mom's house. Ate a lasagna dinner with her family, celebrated her mom's birthday the next day with fondue and a nap. Méli's dad drove us back to Thonon. Here I am!

some more quick notes:
[while walking back at 4am along the Seine]
"Do you want my scarf?"
"No chérie ça va."
"Are you sure? I can close my jacket over my cheeks like this [demonstrating]."
"No chérie, thanks, it's OK."
"Mais tu trembles!"

Méli's simple and sweet answers: "What's the verb to experience?"
"To have an experience."
[at the coffee machine, at the rest stop on the drive back to Annecy from Strasbourg].
Geraldine: "How does this thing work?"
Méli: "You put your money in and the coffee cup comes out."

[wrote this on the road trip home]
Driving in Geraldine's little red hatchback, backseat with all the bags, leaning against my backpack, windows up, radio on, Méli holding my leg, playing with my fingertips, eyes tired, just ate, no longer hungry. Geraldine's recent break-up with her boyfriend, Méli consoling her, telling her what she thinks is best for her, her advice. The rain on the windshield, the warmth of the interior of the car. The gray sky and gently rolling hills of Alsace. Making our way to Besançon, then Macon and Bourg-en-Bresse. Green fields with brown patches. Far off blue sky and shiny coulds. Little villages whose names I don't know and their red roofs. The TGV this morning! Sleeping in Méli's lap. Passed through Nancy and Metz but didn't see any of it since I slept. It's flat here with hills. I imagine the time that has passed, the people who makes their lives here. Walking past the Tour Eiffel in the rain last night. The Seine reflecting street lamps and the drizzle and sidewalk puddles. The floor of Ben's apartment, Méli in my sleeping bag. Put more air in the tires at a rest stop near Switzerland. Méli and Geraldine making fun of the Parisians and Belgians who can't figure out how to park at the rest stop.

Me to Méli: "If a tree falls in the woods and nobody is around, does it make a noise?"
Her: "Of course it does!"
"How do you know?"
"Because, regarde! [making image of a tree falling with her hands, imitating sound with her mouth]. Of course it makes a noise!"
"But if you're not there, how do you know?"
"Because it makes that sound!"