Métro-Métropolitan

-->

The metro in Paris has become a staple in my life.  For some it is baguettes, others small dogs, but for me, the metro.  The Paris Metro, short for Metropolitan is a symbol for the city not only for the speed and efficiency (usually) for public transportation but also for the Art Nouveau architecture that dominates the entrances and exits around the city.  Using the metro I can get from one point to another in just one transfer (if I plan carefully beforehand, or use the handy “offline” iPhone app I found).  While it isn’t as scenic as the buses that are also a large component of the Paris transport system, the metro has a quality of life that the bus just can’t match.  With about 4.5 million passengers a day I have seen walks of life that you can’t see when you walk from place to place or take the bus.  The metro truly is a unique situation.  Probably the most notable aspect unique to the metro are the “buskers” that hop from car to car hoping to earn a bit of money from each stop to stop.  Not all these “buskers” have a talent to share but they all are desperate for money, whatever their needs or wants might be.  During my first week I was on the metro and a man came on with a guitar, (I had my headphones on as I usually do to avoid the screeches of the breaks and the people on their cell phones) and he began singing and playing a song that I knew.  I took one of my ear buds out and listened, subtlety.  It turned out he was playing The Boxer, written by Paul Simon, sung by Simon and Garfunkel.  I had heard this song many times but hearing it sung by a French man in the subway was not the same and it was all I could do to keep from grinning at his pronunciation mistakes and the missed notes.  Despite my critique, his performance was the most practiced and refined of the Paris metro “buskers.”  Along with the musicians there are also the SDFs, sans domicile fixe homeless people, who hop from car to car explaining their situation and then cupping their hands hoping for some spare change as they pass through the car. 

The activity within the metro car isn’t what I find the most interesting however.  I love observing the people that ride the metro.  Most of them act as if they are disinterested in the activity of everyone else on the metro and so are consumed in their morning newspaper, in their iPhone, or in sleeping.  I can’t imagine, however, that anyone could be able to ignore the number of different people, different languages, and different situations that arise on the metro.  I find it extremely obnoxious when the British or Americans get on the train, usually middle-aged/elderly couples and they proceed to talk absurdly loud about whether or not they have to get off at this stop or the next.  Or at the station waiting for the metro in the middle of the night, loud teenagers who assume that yelling across the tracks is a productive and appropriate use of that space and time.  While I may seem like a social curmudgeon, I actually love it.  These qualities make the Paris metro, the Paris metro.  Without random people wondering where they are going, the doors not opening all the way, the number 4 metro being inhumanely hot, the metro just wouldn’t be the lovely experience it is whenever I hop on.  And while occasionally late at night around midnight, just before the metro shuts down it feels a bit strange as the SDFs get into their sleeping bags on the chairs in the stations, I feel confident and relatively safe.  Back home in Vermont we don’t have the metro, we don’t have efficient public transportation.  Until you live the metro you never really know what it means to “take the metro.”

Paris l'amour

Paris as a city is absolutely wonderful.  While the streets don't align like in Manhattan and the people aren't quite as generous, the overall atmosphere is thrilling, vibrant, and Parisian.  I have spent my first week getting to know the 15th arrondissement (quarter).  My home base is the largest quarter in Paris and has proved to turn me around when I pop out of a new metro station.  One of the great advantages of living in a city for a extended period of time is that you can absorb the everyday life of the natives.  Two days ago I was walking to Montparnasse along a small side street near the Pasteur Institute.  On the opposite sidewalk I saw an elderly woman, probably in her 70s or 80s scootering.  This was not the automatic scooter that the elderly use when they can no longer walk, this was the stand up scooter that little kids play on.  She was extending her right foot to accelerate as she passed the car dealership and grocery store on her way to the main boulevard.  It was wonderful!

Paris is known for many different things.  The City of Love, the City of Lights, etc. but personally I think love fits quite nicely.  I have fallen in love with Paris and the ease in which I was able to become accustomed to life here.  Yesterday I changed my running route and ran to the Eiffel Tower.  Running down Boulevard Pasteur the Tower is in sight for most of the run just until the metro comes above ground.  I turned the corner at one point, keeping the direction of the Eiffel Tower in my head and I ran directly into a market.  I decided to run through the market because at 7:30am it wasn't teeming with Parisians yet.  All of the market vendors gave me slightly strange looks, a) because I wasn't buying anything and b) because I was running through their market.  Finally the Eiffel Tower was again insight but the military academy was in my way.  You cannot run through the military academy and even though my first instinct was to find a way to go through rather than around, I knew that wouldn't go over very smoothly with the French government.  So I went around and I ended up finding the UNESCO building on my left.  Further down I passed an Aston Martin dealership and finally I came to the Champs de Mars and the long park covered with trees and runners!  I ran to the Eiffel Tower which was incredible and then precieded to run around while watching all hte other people surround the structure.  I even managed to see the pompier (fireman) on their morning runs, the second time in a row as they were also in the Luxembourg Gardens.  These pompier, however took it to the next level.  First they were running with me around the park that surrounds the Tower, but before I knew it they were running up the stairs of the Eiffel Tower. 

running in Paris

My second full day in Paris has begun and this morning I started it off with a run.  I live fairly close to the Gare de Montparnasse as well as the Tour de Montparnasse.  Centrally located and from there I can see the Eiffel Tower and I'm only minutes away from the Jardin du Luxembourg, my favorite public park in Paris (so far).  When I was in Paris in 2001 we used to walk around the Luxembourg Gardens and I remember complaining occasionally and generally being disinterested as I tended to have been at 11.  I did however, enjoy see the groups of people practicing tai-chi as we walked past.  While it was quite a long time ago, I don't remember appreciating the open public space the Luxembourg Gardens provides the people of Paris.  Running this morning I was a bit early, at 7:22am most of the gates were still closed (and the people that were running in the park already most of snuck in.  (Note to self: find out how to get in early).  As I ran around the perimeter I was ready to get into the park and run like all the other Parisians.  Not too long after a security guard opened the gate and in I went.  I ran alongside the wall that parallels the roads and with me were many other runners, all at different points in their morning jogs.  I felt right at home.  The Luxembourg Gardens happen to be especially beautiful at 7:30 in the morning because they are not yet filled with the chitter chatter of high school students eating lunch nor the little kids running and playing.  Peaceful, beautiful and calm with only the pitter patter sound of the runners that come up in front and behind. 

community WWOOFing

-->

The farm where I am ending my WWOOFing adventures has become the French equivalent of my Plainfield family.  With two parents who were former members of the commune Hilltop I have extended “family” throughout much of the Plainfield, Calais, Waterbury, East Montpelier area.  Similarly the people that I have encounter at L_ B_ L_ are kind, caring, funny, smart, witty, and most important, interesting!  Recently I learned that more people than I originally thought lived on this plot of farmland.  The two couples who I mentioned in the earlier post are the main proprietors of the farm and the current cultivators of the farmland, which they rent from the owner of the farm.  The son of the owner of the farm O_ lives with his partner in a loft connected to the old farmhouse that he grew up in as a child.  Then there is another yurt in their lawn and another caravan.  There reside two women who have a catering business with organic vegetarian food.  Everyone knows everyone and they have taken me along into their social life as well as their working farm life, which I have been greatly appreciative of and it has been a great way to use my French as well as meet many different people.  Sometimes it seems a bit odd as a WWOOFer to know exactly what your position is when you are working on a farm.  In some respects I am a volunteer worker and therefore these people are my bosses/supervisors.  In another sense they are much like a host family as they provide me with food and a place to sleep.  And in yet another sense, at this farm in particular, we have all become friends.   

This has been the WWOOFing experience that I was hoping for when I thought about spending six weeks working in Normandy.  While the idea of WWOOFing is an interesting and useful method to exchange work, culture, language, etc with many different people, the farm and the people that you encounter define the experience.  While the first two farms were interesting, the vibe was not the same and in the end, not worth my time and energy. However they each have given me a lifetime of stories as well as experiences that couldn’t have been matched anywhere else.  It is quite the experience to place oneself in an entirely different culture, language, and lifestyle, especially during your summer vacation.