Pendant le week-end

Lyrics: "Turn around take a good look now 'cause I'm leaving" - Graham Colton

This weekend saw a solidifying of what I love about this city: conversations. Or rather, what I love about the life that I have come to find in this city, but that I am certain, exists elsewhere in the world.

On Friday I joined Asia and Jose and spent some time wandering around the Louvre. I find it difficult, and Asia agrees with me, to visit museums with friends, because you spend more time talking than admiring, and there is always an implicit pressure that doesn’t allow you to just stare at a Vermeer for 30 minutes. In any case, we wandered for a bit, then headed out to the Quartier Latin, buying two bottles of cheap wine along the way [2.8 and 4 Euros, respectively]. On the way, we stopped at the Great Mosque of Paris to buy some of the most finger-lickin’ good baklava I have ever tasted.

We had dinner at Evan’s apartment – pasta with a delicious sauce that reminded me how much I love zucchini. This was my first time meeting everyone other than Asia, but, as has happened everywhere I have been here, I felt instantly welcomed. After dinner the night turned to be one of the most enjoyable ones here, as we sat in a the cloud of smoke that usually accompanies late-night gatherings in Paris, drank Stella-Artois and debated, in a cockeyed mélange of French and English. We talked about politics – both national and global – philosophy, cultural identity. We debated not along left vs. right or correct vs. incorrect, but about the actual definitions of the ideas that bolster such breakdowns. It was a stripping to the raw ingredients of moral and intellectual debate and, despite being partly lost during the French portions, I felt immeasurably alive sitting in such company. We were a Pole, a Brazilian, a Dutchman, an American, and myself, haggling out the fine points of La Republique. At one memorable point, we also listened to what John Mckenna would probably classify as “undergound hiphop” – clashing, powerful rhymes based on politics or true stories, set to inspiring classical backdrops and elaborate beats. It was incredibly intense, beautiful, unexpected for me, especially because of my limited exposure to the genre.

In short: the night was a great combination of the disarmingly mundane and the thankfully exceptional.

We wandered outside, walking up the alleys of the Latin Quarter to buy a crepe, chatting along the way about topics as varied as freedom of speech and monogamy. Then we came back, because it was too late to take the metro, to talk some more, listen to Evan play the guitar, and fall asleep, sprawled across couches and mattresses, floating entities in a darkened room, breathing hard from a long week, a long day, an even longer night. Before finally falling asleep,

I realized that these are the experiences that had kept my mind unquiet for a while now, anxious with the distinct hunch that somewhere, someone was having the kinds of conversations that I wanted to be a part of….with people who pushed and pulled my logical mind and required me to defend my convictions, with people who made me feel ignorant in the most wonderful of ways [the kind of ignorance that opens your mind to the possibilities of new knowledge]. I have no doubt that they are simultaneously happening back home, in small college dorms, on rooftops, at Sunday brunches [and probably, thankfully, with less cigarette smoke], but for now, they are here in Paris, with me. And I feel lucky.

AND THEN:

Saturday witnessed lazy morning coffee around a crowded living room table. And coming home to run errands and buy groceries. And a long run around Parc Monceau.

On Sunday, I just wandered around the city, since I like Paris in the rain. The other day Asia described it as having a magical moment around every corner, and though I frowned at the use of the word “magical,” I agreed with her that there is something inherently Parisian that escapes even the most general definition. Sundays in Paris are lazy, family days, when all the shops are closed, and it takes an hour to get a cup of coffee at a café. In part, this is meant to prepare you for the coming week, but mostly it is a slowing down of the heartbeat of life, which runs so wildly here on Friday and Saturday nights. And walking these streets this Sunday, especially in the rain and listening to Graham Colton and Jack Johnson, was peaceful, even as halfway around the world a myriad of loud and important things were happening.

Sinead had invited me and her friend Hannah for brunch at her apartment and, as has happened often lately, we ended up sitting on her carpet, eating homemade crepes, and talking. Another breath of fresh air. Six hours later, we had barely moved.