notes from paris - day 02
So as I sat, digging some jazz at the open air cafe under a footbridge over the Seine, writing the preceding bit about how there's not really this hatred of Americans here, a dark skinned fellow approached and began speaking to me in French (I've an amazing ability to blend in. It's a double edged sword.). I explained that I don't speak much French, and he went on, in English, about how he was inviting me to play pentanque, as his friend--with whom he was expexting to play--never showed up. I downed the rest of my biere, and introduced myself. He was Elias, from Oran, a town in Algeria. I thought I'd heard of it in a Camus novel I read, but I wasn't sure if that would be a nice thing to say. It was a pretty depressing book. We ended up playing against a Columbian couple, who beat us from a 12-12 tie, after which Elias and I sat on a stone bench on the river bank talking about myriad subjects; the world, our place in it, how it's changing, women thereover, and Tuoareg nomads from his native Algeria. He'd been in France for 8 years, studying economics, and was taking his exams in a month or so. He had much insight into the loss of the sense of community that accompanies modernity.
Then, all of a sudden, a New York accent, gruff with cigarettes and shouting called, "Hey, you're American!" I turned to see a 30-40ish fellow coming around the bend, and he invited us to come "rock out" with him. We followed him to an apartment like a cave, carved into the base of a footbridge (I suspected it was a squat, but that didn't seem like polite conversation either), outside of which was a guitar he picked up and proceeded to play for a small crowd who danced, sang, and passed around bottles of delicious cheap wine, cigarettes, and a few joints, late into the night. All toll, it was a banner night in Paris, for a guy whose French goes no further than merci, sil vous plait, pardon, and voulez vous couchez avec mois?, the latter of which is not nearly as useful as I'd hoped it would be. C'est la vie.
Then, all of a sudden, a New York accent, gruff with cigarettes and shouting called, "Hey, you're American!" I turned to see a 30-40ish fellow coming around the bend, and he invited us to come "rock out" with him. We followed him to an apartment like a cave, carved into the base of a footbridge (I suspected it was a squat, but that didn't seem like polite conversation either), outside of which was a guitar he picked up and proceeded to play for a small crowd who danced, sang, and passed around bottles of delicious cheap wine, cigarettes, and a few joints, late into the night. All toll, it was a banner night in Paris, for a guy whose French goes no further than merci, sil vous plait, pardon, and voulez vous couchez avec mois?, the latter of which is not nearly as useful as I'd hoped it would be. C'est la vie.