Alas my computer is kaput

So, unfortunately there won’t be many posts for a while. My computer just died! It’s very sad. Anyway, I will try to keep a little journal here and post when I can. I am on Richard’s computer, but I don’t get a chance to use it very often and especially not during the day.

I love you all!

Meet Cinderella

The other day Sydney kept asking me where Cinderella was. I had no clue what she was talking about. Then I remembered that she has Cinderella pijamas, so I asked her if she was looking for her pj’s. She said “no” rather distractedly and kept looking. Then as her eyes fell upon the stuffed gorilla in the corner, she lit up! Yes, she has named her gorilla Cinderella. My heart melted and I started to laugh. I told her that she had picked a great name for the gorilla.

Le 26 août

Last night we had our first Parisian dinner. By that, I don’t mean that we ate French food, but that we ate at 8:30-9pm! We had a couple girls from Richard’s class over for dinner. Jia (and her boyfriend Thierry – pronounced with a more “ch” sound than “th”) and Qian. We spent the whole night speaking French. Jia’s boyfriend is Parisian so he was able to help us with our grammar too! It was a lot of fun. Richard made some great butter chicken and kidney bean dhal and Jia brought a couple of Asian dishes. One with tofu and the other with pork and potatoes. So yummy. I think Richard might like tofu now. Our girls were a little fussy getting to bed with all of the noise. Not that they like going to bed and normally fall asleep once they hit the pillow… but after a little while they fell fast asleep and let us adults chat through the evening.

Qian is actually studying at a university in Michigan for her BA. She is in her second year and is just in Paris right now to study French. So she may come to visit us in South Bend next year sometime. Jia lives here in Paris as she is studying for her Masters at the University of Paris. In the next little while she will be traveling to London, Ontario for a couple of months as part of an internship. Small world.

At the moment the girls are playing nicely together with their lego in the kids area. It’s so nice to see Sydney taking some initiative and keeping herself busy. Usually she just pitches a fit when she’s bored or wants me to play with her. I enjoy reading to her and building boats and whatnot with her, but she rarely lets her own imagination go. Hopefully this happens more often….though Norah is being a little bit of a pest, lol. Norah doesn’t quite understand yet that she is not helping Sydney by throwing lego at her boat or taking pieces off and putting them back on the floor.

Right now the weird lady that lives on a floor above us, is practicing her opera voice again. She isn’t so bad, but it’s funny. It sounds like she sings directly out of her window for everyone to hear.

It’s not a particularly nice day today, it is supposed to rain this afternoon. So I should probably start our day now and get the girls to the park before it’s too wet to go.

We didn’t take any pictures during dinner last night… but here are some random pictures that aren’t attached to any particular event. Really I just want to show you some more pictures of my girls;)

Le 21 août

This morning we decided to bike over to the L’Arène de Lutece, an old Roman amphitheatre built at the end of the 1^st century, and seems to have been abandoned by the 3^rd century. It is located in Paris the 5^th, in a very nice area. The arena has been very well maintained and has a lovely flower garden, a “maison des oiseaux” (we are going back this afternoon to see the birds as it doesn’t open until 1:30) and a great playground. The playground is great and even has a climbing area and slide for very young kids too. The girls loved it of course. We took many pictures. After playing in the park for a little bit, we explored the rest of the area. Some great old steps lead up to the amphitheatre stands where on the one side there are now benches for people to sit and read on. Across the arena still stands the old rows of seating. Now on the one side there are apartment buildings built right into the side of the old arena!

Turns out the Maison des Oiseaux doesn’t actually have birds in it. It’s more like a little kids museum with different rooms with activities. The halls are lined with facts and pictures. They have activity rooms throughout to watch bird films, read kids books and do arts and crafts. It’s a neat little setup, but a little too old for Sydney and Norah and a little too young for mom and dad. So we went back to the park to play.

Notre Dame Highlights

I can’t say “Notre Dame” in Paris. The problem is much like my first few months in South Bend. Then, I couldn’t pronounce the word in the local argot, and drew strange looks every time I scraped the “r” and said the “a” as in “father.” “Nuht[r]eh Duhme.” On cue, South Benders would steal a glance sideways, or even state the obvious that “you aren’t from around these parts, are you?” Now, after a couple of weeks of intensive study of French, I’m usually able to ape an approximation of Parisian accent–except with the name of the great cathedral which still forms the axle around which all the rest of the Parisian wheel turns. Now, I can only enunciate with a thick—yes, thick–midwestern accent: “Notterr DEyme.” Intellectually, I can figure out the difference, and I can even whisper the correct pronunciation under my breath as I practice for conversation. But when that conversation comes, the word inevitably comes out as I’ve been so well trained by my beloved South Bender friends.

Elora has been wonderfully faithful at keeping everyone informed on our Paris jaunts. I had intended to write more, but find that I’m much busier learning French than I had anticipated! This language is genuinely difficult to speak. It’s rather easy to read, I find, which lulled me into some security; but constructing a sentence is the devil. Then repeating that phrase, perfectly formed in my head, ends up my undoing. Moreover, Parisians (more than most french-speaking locales) tend to drop syllables and vowels out of their phrases, which means that understanding them can be an exercise in humility. However, I’m doing homework every morning, then spending 6 hours at school. Two hours grammar, 1 hour lunch, 1 hour phonetics (which is an enormous help!), and 2 more hours of conversation and exercises. After that I’ve been going to the Bibliothèque nationale for a couple of hours. To do a bit of reading and writing. That has been a mind-saver! Finally, home shortly after 6pm, for an evening of hyper children and some conversation (some in French!) with my beloved Elora. Then we try to get to bed early.

Getting to bed early may change soon. Norah has been enormously disruptive at night, partly because of teething, partly because she’s discovered that piercing shrieks will bring her parents running quickly. That makes morning discipline almost impossible to maintain. And then when I try to rise early in the morning, the same child who was awake most of the night greets me. Her mom (who, to be honest, has borne most of the night-time stress) shouldn’t be disturbed before 8am. So I’m It. The Chosen One. He who will entertain. Sydney sleeps more deeply, but she rises earlier too, when I get up early. The plan, therefore, is to start pulling late nights, and then let them wake us whenever they do. At least in the evening hours we can talk, play music, and read with the lights on, without them waking. I might even start writing a little in the evening! That will probably bode well for my blogging habits, since I’ve less self-discipline in the evening, and my attention tends to stray from work . . .

The pictures that accompany this post are from the wonderful visit Andrew and Yutaro made to our humble abode a few weeks ago. I don’t wander the city with a camera nearly as much as I should, so this was one of the few times I took a significant number of photos, nearly all of the Cathedral of Notre Dame. It was marvelous to visit the place with Andrew, because he took a guided tour there last time he was in Paris. And he took meticulous, fascinating notes. So he was able to give us a tour–second-hand, in some ways, but probably more enjoyable for that fact. It was an intellectual feast of details about the iconography, history of parts of the Cathedral, and so on. The pictures are not enough to witness his erudition. Props, Andrew.

I had a revelation today, while scrawling down an outline of the things I wanted to say in a French presentation I was required to give to the class today. I wish I had realized this when I was hanging out with Andrew. My topic was to introduce a few basic things about student life at the University of Paris in the middle ages, the idea that all student were officially classified as clerics, the basic course of study, and so on. But as I was thinking about location, and how these things all took place less than 1 km from where I was to give the presentation, I realized what a magnificent sight Parisians had most weekdays, and particularly on feast days (of which each month had several).

In the 15th century, the University and the Parlement of Paris were the two most powerful bodies. The king officially kept apartments and palaces in the Paris area. But he didn’t live there between 1418 and 1515, for various political reasons. So the people with real political power were the major families, some of whom were old nobility, others of whom were new money, profiting from lucrative banking positions, and the various wars between France, England and Italy. These were the people who filled the Parlement of Paris (as well as the bishopric of Paris, from time to time).

In the course of 1350-1500 (think, from the Plague through the 100-year war between France and England), the Parlement managed to gain a lot of pomp and ceremony. Every morning, they would go in procession to mass at 6am. The Cathedral of Notre Dame is on the “Isle de Paris,” an island at the center of the city, in the middle of the Seine. Immediately across from the cathedral, today, stands the Prefecture of Police, the Pompiers (firemen), and the city courts. But before the Revolution, that’s where the Parlement’s buildings were. They met in the old palace of the French kings (who, around 1350, I believe, moved a couple hundred meters north to the mainland). So after mass, they would carefully–still in ceremonial procession–head out of Notre Dame and across the street, still on the island, in a long line of black robes, impressive hats, gold chains, scribes and messenger boys in tow. This demonstration of power would then meet for business, everyday, until noon. Then a long lunch, and more business between 2 and 4, before heading back home to take care of the family business. It was a noisy group of affairs, with plenty of parlementarians complaining about the people who thought they could just piss in the street, or hold chickens while watching parlementary sessions.

Every morning, and certainly every feast day (medieval calendars often had a feast day every two or three days, especially near the end of the middle ages, and especially in a busy metropolis like Paris) the University of Paris would go to the Cathedral at the same time, to officiate mass (many of the theologians were also priests), and to preach. These sermons were a big deal, and a major requirement of theologians belonging to the University. Jean Gerson, who was the Chancellor of the University of Paris at the beginning of the 15th century–a very important position–, weekly used these opportunities to remind king and parlement of their responsibilities to God and his people. My revelation was simply that the procession of Parisian scholars–from rector, chancellor, through dozens of officials, principals of the various colleges which made up the university, and leading masters of arts–occurred at the same time as the procession of parlementarians! There, for the whole city to see, with quotidian regularity, were the two power structures, ranging from greatest to least, side by side, to participate in the liturgy of word and sacrament. There were complex interconnections between the two domains of power–rich parlementarians often funded the burses and arranged the benifices that allowed scholars time away from their villages to stay at work in Paris. Moreover, the scribes and counsellors who filled the administrative chambers of king and chancellor were–you guessed it–University of Paris grads (or fellows who just happened to stay at the university long enough to land a good job, not get a full degree). But the sight nevertheless must have reinforced the division between powers. The city. The university. Fascinating.

Being in Paris certainly is enriching my education, and hopefully will also enrich my work. Location means something, and certainly spurs insights otherwise impossible.

Demanche après-medi – Le 8 août

The Promenade Plantee, as I have written a little about before, leads to the Jardin des Plantes which hosts a zoo and a huge greenhouse with jungle plants that reach about 50ft in the air! You can also walk around the garden itself and see many large areas with multiple small plant beds with ponds, flowers and some research exhibits.

As we walked through Sydney found some fish and frogs in a pond (so exciting!) so we spent a while watching them together. Of course Norah wanted to get in the water, so we had to hold her back the whole time. After a little fight, she realized that the reeds were exciting too and so had fun in my lap playing with the grasses while Sydney studied frogs.

We had a great time walking through the Jardin des plantes. Next time (when we have more time) we will be taking Sydney into the zoo. She is pretty excited about that.

Samedi Le 7 Août

Saturday was another beautiful day. We decided to go see the Centre Pompidou because they have a large public library there, among many other things, including the Musée National d’Art Moderne – the largest of its kind in Europe. It is a huge building designed in high-tech architecture. Although quite interesting to look at, it wasn’t the interesting architecture that caught the girls’ eyes, it was the Fontaine Stravinsky outside of the Centre Pomidou (pictures below…of course). The art represents the works of Stravinsky, a Russian composer from the 20^th century, though it looks like something from a Tim Burton movie. The girls loved the water and slowly spinning sculptures. It was a lot of fun to watch them looking out at the fountain. They were so excited.

We will have to go back to the Centre Pompidou again soon since we didn’t end up finding the library before it was time to head home for lunch and naps. There are also supposed to be groups that you can meet with there during the week to practice French. I hope to be able to do that come fall!

On the way home we saw a little market lining the street, so we had to stop and walk through. There is always something interesting to see at the markets and each one is a little different. As we walked through we noticed a stand with a Moroccan man selling leather items. Richard’s eye was immediately drawn to a leather messenger bag (I like to call them man sacs… Richard doesn’t like that much…). He has been looking for one that will fit his laptop and some documents for the library so that he doesn’t always have  to carry his backpack around. It looks a little more professional to have a nice bag over your shoulder rather than a backpack too. Anyway, after haggling a little with the vendor and hearing a wonderful (though likely bs) story about the bag being hand crafted by Moroccan nomads in the Sahara Desert, we bought it. We brought the vendor down by almost 50 percent! But that just goes to show how much they up the price for tourists, lol…. I mean… I’m just that good. Richard has not been happier with a purse ;)… though it still smells terrible because it is pretty newly stained with camel piss and pigeon droppings. We have to find some baking soda or linseed oil. Apparently they draw out the leftover “chemicals” from the leather and so help the smell to go away faster. It is a pretty nice looking bag and it will just get nicer over the years.

Vendredi soir. Le 6 août

It was such a beautiful day we decided dinner would be better eaten outside. So after Daddy arrived home from his studies, we packed some potato salad, fruit and juice into the backpack and took off on our bikes for the Bois de Vincennes. This time we followed the perimeter a little farther around and saw a lovely little garden with a playground. So after biking around a little bit more to get a better idea of the area (turns out we were right neat the Parc Floral de Paris – we plan on taking the girls there soon) we rode back to the park to eat. After filling their bellies, the girls wasted no time and ran straight to the park. Norah happily running after Sydney and following her up the ladder. Norah has been waiting a long time for me to let her climb a playground ladder by herself. At the parks near our place she can’t go up by herself because there are many places she can fall off, but this little gym was perfect. There was only the ladder and slide. They also of course, enjoyed playing in the sand. Although the girls get much dirtier playing in the parks around here, we all much prefer the sand over those stupid wood chips that give you splinters at the parks back in North America! I hated those things growing up. Anyway, as the sun started to go down, the girls got a little irritable and the air was getting chili so packed up our sand encrusted girls and made our way back home. I think we will have to spend many more evenings exploring.

Le 1er août

Sunday morning. We all got up early (Norah is teething right now…so we didn’t have a choice) and spent a nice relaxing morning getting ready. We had some croissants with sliced tomato. Well, I should say that I had croissants with tomato. Alas, Richard is addicted to nutella. There’s nothing I can do about it either. He always puts it on his croissants and now Sydney has to too. I know that many of you would not be sympathetic to my cause, but sliced tomatoes on croissants is pretty much heaven, and so much better for you than pure sugar in the morning. Oh well. Regardless, we all had an enjoyable breakfast and then headed out for church.

Today we went to the Eglise Evangélique Baptiste Paris which is the mother church to the Eglise Protestante Evangélique des Ternes that we attended before. Although a little difficult to find, it is a larger church with its own building. It is about a 30 minute bike ride and turns out to be right near where Richard goes to school. So it was nice to see a little of the area that he bikes to everyday. There were quite a few kids at the church so the girls stayed in the nursery for the service so that they could spend some time with other kids. Sydney definitely misses her friends back in South Bend, especially because she doesn’t have any here. Except for when we go to the park she doesn’t see other kids and even then she doesn’t speak French and finds it difficult to interact. This church has a great little nursery in the basement. I took a couple of pictures, but it was after service, so there were no other kids there, oh well. The people are nice, but the sermons so far don’t tend to satisfy. I think we are going to start attending the Eglise Protestante Evangélique des Ternes from now on. Once the summer is over and all the Parisians come back from holidays, there are supposed to be quite a few other kids there for Sydney and Norah to play with too. The preaching is much better and the congregation is younger and more interested in chatting with us, even if we aren’t that good at French. Also, most of them speak English, so even though we have conversations in French they are able to figure out what we are trying to say!

The first Sunday of every month is free museum day in Paris. So along with Adam we decided to head out to the Musée Nationale du Moyen Age. A museum quite close to where we went to church. When we got there we loaded the girls into our backpack carriers and walked into the museum. It was beautiful! Outside (we couldn’t take a good picture because of the fence) you can see the remains of an old Roman (Christian?) bathhouse built in the 1^st-3^rd century. Attached to it is the Hôtel de Cluny which was built in the 15^th century, and this is where the all the art is kept. Of course there were many beautiful pieces of art there, including beautiful old stain glass windows from many old ruined cathedrals.

We took a picture with Daddy and Sydney next to her (sort of) name-sake Saint Denis (said to be the first convert of Paul). It’s not very clear because they don’t allow you to use the flash in the museum. I’ve added a few pictures that Richard took of some interesting pieces.

As we were walking through the museum, we bumped into an aquaintance from Notre Dame. Paul Prezzia. He is also here taking an intensive French class. Since we had a light picnic packed, we invited him to meet up with us after our tour of the museum and have lunch in a nearby park together.

The Jardin de Luxembourg, is a huge private garden that is open to the public. It is just gorgeous and happened to be right near the Museum. Though there are some strange rules…. There are many walking paths you are allowed to follow. Alongside them are green metal chairs and benches owned by the park which you are allowed to sit on. There are beautiful large fields of lush green grass bordered by gardens of flowers and hostas; perfect for laying a blanket down on and having a picnic under the shade of a large old tree. Perfect for the kids to have fun running around on and people to play frizbie or what-not. But, you are not allowed on the grass! They enforce it very strictly too, as there there are guards everywhere. We saw one couple who had done just what I had envisioned, they found a nice spot on the grass and sat down to relax and enjoy a picnic. A minute later a guard came by and told them to get off! We let the girls run around on it a little anyway and they weren’t bothered. Although it is a beautiful spot in Paris, it isn’t the best family place. I was surpised to see so many people there though. Tonnes of locals sitting down throughout the huge park reading a book or basking in the sun. There is a huge fenced off playground for kids there too. Sydney was so excited when she saw it. The whole way over she kept repeating “We are going in there!” with her big eyes bright and excited. But alas when we got to the entrance there was a fee to get in! It was not a theme park, there were just slides and jungle gyms. Granted they were nice, but 2.50 euros per child plus 1.50 euros per adult is a lot of money for a playground that we only intended to spend 20 minutes in! So I kneeled down and told Sydney that we were just going to go have some lunch and she could run around in the grass instead. She took it very well, though her reaction could have broken your heart. With a downtrodden look on her face she said “Oh, okay momma, sniff”. She still had a great time running around and eating a lunch of cheese and meat, baguette, nectarines and plums.

By this time the kids had passed their second wind and were just plain irritable and not listening. Since it was 5pm anyway and the girls were so tired (Norah had only napped for about 20 minutes in the carrier during our walk to the museum), we put Norah in the carrier once more and Sydney into her bike-seat and rode off. About 2 minutes into our bike ride home both of the girls were fast asleep. Richard and I had some energy left and wanted to extend the bike ride so the girls would sleep a bit longer. The Bibliotèque Nationale de France was only a little out of the way, so we decided to make the trip as I really wanted to see the beautiful library that Richard goes to do research in every afternoon after class. Since you need a special pass to get in and we only wanted to make a quick stop we didn’t go inside. It is beautiful on the outside though! The most interesting thing (at least to me… I don’t do research though ;)) is that in the very center of the Biblioteque Nationale is an old forest. They transported it from Normandy, and apparently it is supposed to be representative of that region’s forests since the middle ages.

It was a perfect evening with white billowy clouds, a warm light wind, and the sun making it’s way down (though there were a couple hours of daylight left). As we looked out at the library and down into the forest the warm breeze swept passed us. It was so peaceful. We walked out on the wooden planks (they used wood instead of concrete, which is such a great idea! It looks beautiful, soft and relaxing) hand in hand… as best we could steering the bikes, back to the road. We hopped onto our bikes and rode back home for a last stretch of about 5 minutes.

It sounds like the evening is over, but it wasn’t. That last bit was just a wonderful respite from a long day. It felt like it was just the two of us again.

So anyway, we got home and warmed up some leftover chili and sat the kids down for dinner. Since we had invited Adam and Paul back for wine and cheese, they also came by, popping in just in time for a bowl of chili too. By that time it was time to put the kids to bed, so we tucked them in, sang them there bedtime songs and then met Adam and Paul out in the back garden, with whom we told tall tales and debated theology until the wee hours.

Now the evening is over. It was a very full day, but a very good day. Please don’t forget that you are all invited, anytime, to join us in our back garden for wine and cheese and fellowship.

Love,
Elora