Je suis deborde de bonheur. Je suis tres, tres heureux.
I really am. My computer works; the reason you haven’t heard from me these past few days is due neither to excessive work nor to laziness: Saturday night, it was raining hard, and my laptop was in my backpack. Upon returning to the youth hostel, I found that I could not turn the power on; even more worrisome was that when I plugged in the computer, the light on the keyboard indicating that the console was receiving electricity did not light up. I went to bed sick with worry (the fact that I had to take the 9:07 train to Paris the next day didn’t help, either), and had two dreams that night about waking up, and finding that the computer worked, after all. I leapt out of bed the next morning in order to see if, then, the power worked -- no luck. I dragged my suitcase and my oh-so-heavy backpack to the train station, arrived 30-40 minutes early, and waited, having purchased my ticket two days in advance.
I sat back with Les Fleurs du Mal and my pocket dictionary in my seat: the train was not due to arrive until nearly noon. I had already read several poems from Les Fleurs du Mal -- “Correspondances,” ‘L’albatross,” and “Au Lecteur,” as well as “Le chien et le flacon,” from Le Spleen de Paris -- but I now realize that the book is best read as a single work of art. Reading it now, it is easy to see what attracted the French poet to the creepy, crazy, and spectacular works of Edgar Allen Poe, which he translated into his native language. It’s such a shame that Poe died so young (he was barely thirty, I believe), and Baudelaire wasn’t much luckier, dying while still in his forties. Les Fleurs du Mal delves into the vile, the stinking, the aberrant, the frightening, the terrible, the essential, the sublime. Baudelaire can write a wickedly enjoyable poem about a moldering corpse, swarming with insects bursting through its stomach wall. There is also a fair streak of Platonism in Les Fleurs du Mal (the jist of “Correspondances” is that human beings wander through a forest of symbols which surround the temple that is Nature), but Baudelaire never writes anything as absolutely incomprehensible as Yeats’s Neo-platonic poetry. I rather like “Le Chat,” in which the poet, upon stroking his cat, is reminded, in a very, very sensual way, of his absent wife.
I arrived at the Austerlitz train station, located in Paris’s 13th arrondissement, and walked for what seemed like much too long to the Place d’Italie, where I thankfully found the hotel where EDUCO reserved rooms for all incoming students from Duke, Emory, Cornell, and Tulane without too much difficulty. I had double-checked the address and arrondissement of the hotel before I (thought I) lost my computer, but I had not written it down. I inquired at the wrong hotel, at first, by accident (a most unfriendly reception), but quickly found the right one. I checked in, without much difficulty, to the most luxurious hotel I have ever visited -- my room had a kitchenette, a shower and bath, and a roommate, Peter Daniels. We learned that we would both be living in the foyer, aka the university dormitory, rather than in an apartment or with a host family. I had been hoping to be living with a French roommate, to yell at me in French when I came home every day about how my Camembert was making the refrigerator smell bad, but at least I’m living in a building of international students, and not in the “American House” (thank you, EDUCO, for not lodging us there)! I also received an information packet, and, most importantly, the 2012 Edition of Paris Pratique Par Arrondissement, the most useful map or guide I have ever seen. The little booklet is really a work of genius, and it has already saved me multiple times, in my few days in Paris.
Sunday afternoon, we (that is, the EDUCO students, who number in the neighborhood of 50 or 60) took a bus tour of Paris, passing all of the best-known spots, such as the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the Tuileries, Notre Dame, the former location of the Bastille, the Arc de Triomph and les Champs Elysees, the Pantheon, etc. Virtually every EDUCO student is female, and they’re all of the hedonistic sorority-girl type who delight in forming in cliques in order to look down on others. The bus as filled with empty chatter, and whining, as some noisily voiced the opinion that they would just rather “chill in a park.” Naturally, nobody sat with someone as unfashionable as me, and everyone I’ve so far met detests me, if they’ve notice me at all. I’m used to this by now, however. At least Nick Chen is here, who really is a kind, reliable, confident person. Still, I feel guilty spending time around anyone with whom I speak English.
Monday morning, I awoke at around seven, everything packed in either my backpack or my suitcase. We only had one night’s stay at the Hotel, but we were allowed to leave all of our baggage in the conference room until that evening: this meant that I was obliged to carry everything of any value on my back, lest it be stolen from my suitcase. We had a mandatory meeting at the Institute of Charles V, in the 4th arrondissement, and although EDUCO gave us directions as to how to use the Metro, I decided that I preferred to walk the distance, seeing on the map that it was not long at all. I strolled for about forty minutes, and arrived, having crossed from the Left Bank of the Seine to the Right.
I read Baudelaire for a bit, until the rest of the EDUCO students arrived. We had a 2-hour meeting on the orientation period, which will last for the next three or four weeks. Some of the highlights include visits to several Parisian museums, a trip to the Comedie Française to see Moliere’s l’Avare, a weekend visiting 5 castles in the Loire Valley (the selection is a secret -- maybe now, I’ll finally see Chinon and Villandry?), and daily grammar classes, lasting three hours every afternoon. Not only will I receive free entrance and reduced tariffs to many museums in Paris, but I will also soon receive a pass granting unlimited access to the Louvre. During the two-hour gap before our courses began, I took a quick trip to visit Notre Dame, which is very, very close the Institute of Charles V. The architecture -- amazing! I didn’t have enough time to enter, but I took as long a circumambulation as the construction zone permitted. I also visited the statue of Charlemagne, right outside, which is huge. Classes were a drag, and I won’t bore you with details. I trudged back to the hotel, picked up my suitcase, and dragged it over to the eastern half of the 14th arrondissement. I moved in, did my laundry, met three fellow-residents (all PhD candidates, and from the Ivory Coast, Togo, and Romania, respectively), walked to the movie theater in the Porte d’Orleans in order to watch Les Femmes du 6eme Etage (obligatory for class), discovered that the movie is only showing at two theaters in Paris, trudged back to my room, had a bite to eat, did my homework, and crashed. I was very, very tired by this point.
This morning, Tuesday, I walked to Charles V again, which is only a little bit of an hour away. I really detest all cars, subways, trains, airplanes, etc., preferring so much more to stretch my legs. By walking instead of taking the Metro, I hope to learn the Parisian streets, and to get a little exercise. On the way, I bought a croissant from a baker, and an apple from a fruit vendor. Another meeting, this one about academics: four-course minimum, with no more than two courses from EDUCO allowed (I hope I won’t need to take any with EDUCO). Maybe, just maybe, I’ll be allowed to take a course at Paris IV, Sorbonne. There is a preference for 1) students who do exceptionally well on their language tests (I’ll be taking mine on Monday), 2) students whose majors correspond to the topic of the course they wish to attend, and 3) students staying the whole year. I might fulfill #1 if I study hard enough, I fulfill #2 for all History courses, but I do not fulfill #3. I took another quick trip to admire Notre Dame, also passing the absolutely gargantuan Hotel de Ville, then more class. We made a plan to buy the comedy on DVID (EDUCO will reimburse), and watch it together. After class, I walked over to the 6th arrondissement, first to speak to the EDUCO rep, who referred me to a repairman to help me with my computer (we made an appointment -- I hope I can alert him in time that I won’t be arriving), and bought the comedy from a store called fnac. It cost € 19.99, on sale, so I’m glad that EDUCO is footing this bill! I walked back to my room, buying some fruit and other groceries on the way, and, at around 7:40 PM, decided to try one more time to turn on my computer before meeting Marc the computer-man. I don’t literally jump for joy too much, but I was extremely excited, and settled down to write this entry, rather than pick up some items that I need over at the Porte d’Orleans. Among other things, I need napkins and towels, which conveniently have the same name in France. Unfortunately, an EDUCO student lives in the room next to mine, and I can hear every “like” she and her friends drop. Right now, they’re talking about dresses.
Well, if you’re reading this, it means that I’ve managed to get online. In the next week or so, expect me to publish on the last chateaux of the Loire that I visited.
~JD
“Je vois ma femme en esprit. Son regard/ Comme le tien, aimable bête,/ Profond et froid, coupe et fend comme un dard” [I see my wife in spirit. The look in her eyes, like yours, amiable beast, profound and cold, cuts and splits like a sting]. ~ Beaudelaire,”XXXIV - Le Chat.”
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