First night in Europe: Paris
My first glimpse of France looks like an autumnal colored quilt. There's a sheet of fog that seems to thin and thicken as it pleases - exposing my new favorite quilt at its own pleasure.
As i realize that we're seconds from landing, my stomach does that little flip it does when I get excited or have had too much wine.
The baby a few rows back makes a squeal that mirrors my own feelings exactly. Him and I are same page I think.
The pilot repeats everything back in French as in English and it's only now I think my lack of French will be a barrier. Probably not though, what even is language. A point and a smile is the same everywhere I think.
The train excursion to my friends aprtament needs no description- other than boring. It's raining and quite foggy so there is no view from where I sit on the red line.
I am quite turned around as I hit my stop and start walking aimlessly through winding streets forgetting the plan to have Bridgette -a friend of my sister- meet me at the metro stop. It's of course after I've walked a good distance that I turn around and walk back. The streets are absolutely lovely.
Bridgette and I speak in Spanish as it's her second language to French and I can say roughly 7 French words and couldn't string them together to save my life.
Her apartment is quaint and the rain makes it even more so. I meet her boyfriend Artur (no it is not pronounced like "Arthur" I asked) and we agree to all take naps yay and then head out to meet her friends over a few pints in the city center of Paris. I do not protest.
The conversation with people who speak each opposite the two languages you speak is wild- Spanish to French to English or English to French to Spanish. I can never really tell if my jokes are understood or if these lovely people just think I'm quite nuts. I've had two very large French beers at this hole-in-the-wall bar covered in graffiti and sharpie messages and now we're off to have a late dinner in the Latin quarter.
After dinner I order a cafe au lait while my French friends order another dish of what looks like slimy onions and large cuts of beef. "Dinner number two" they say in the best French accents ever. We hop back on the metro to Bridgette's apartment in Saint Cloud (pronounced like sen-cloo) and it's a short walk across the Seine to my bed for the night. Night #1 in Paris is a sweet success complete with a couple Parisians who were incredibly hospitable and a French cat named Leon who did not give two shits about me awake but was a secret-snuggler when I was asleep.
Bon Nuit Paris.
