Welcome to Paris!

Despite what you have read, gentle readers, over the past few weeks, I do pride myself on a certain level of competency in life. Certainly, this trip has tried and tested that pride on a number of occasions…

Wednesday, 1 February was the big day: the move to Paris. I had lived in Paris for ten weeks in the winter of 1992 when I did my dissertation research. It was amazing how little I knew and how naïve I was then. I arrived with only a one-night stay booked in a hotel near the airport: after that I was on my own to find a place to stay and live, not knowing French much better than I do now (no laughing, please). After three-day stay at a fleabag of a hotel on the Ile de la Cité I did find a ‘hotel’ that rented out rooms for the long stay resident ($700/month then for a ten by ten cell) and I was there for the duration of my trip. The situation worked but it was scarcely ideal.

This time I had no desire to try to find something on the fly. In late November, working through collegial connections I arranged an apartment just to the east of Paris proper in Vincennes, a middle-class residential neighborhood adjacent to the largest park in Paris, the Bois de Vincennes. The price was right and the location was quite good: three blocks from the nearest Metro stop, a good sign in the eyes of most Parisians.

I had my usual breakfast with the Puissant family and my two fellow students and at 9:30 Monsieur Puissant helped me load my suitcase in his car and I bade a sad goodbye to Madame Puissant and the household-she invited me to come back on any week-end that I wished during my remaining stay in France. I had a rather civil departure time of 10:30 from the Tours train station. Because of the high-speed French train network, the TGV, one can now go from Tours to Paris in little over an hour as opposed to nearly treble that on the standard trains. It is a blurring experience, traveling a few feet off the ground at nearly 200 miles per hour. The cows and trees disappear before one can focus on them. The TGV has certainly changed living patterns France, allowing long-distance commuting never before imagined. Of course, it comes with a price, not just the new elevated train lines, but the cost, nearly double that of the regular train.

I was in no particular hurry that morning and I actually like taking the train at a more sedate pace through the countryside. French trains are not only comfortable but roll smoothly and have large windows perfect for watching the world go by. Besides, I had already taken the TGV to Tours on my day of arrival--but then I was in I hurry as I had been in planes or airports for nineteen hours when I had arrived in Paris. It was a foggy and cool morning with most of the trees and grass covered with a light rime. We passed a number of small villages, little different than the one I had stayed in the previous weekend. The impression one gets traveling through France is that despite its physical size (France is roughly equal to Texas in square miles), France with sixty million inhabitants is still, compared to the rest of Europe, relatively under populated.

About thirty miles from Paris the countryside disappeared abruptly to be replaced by concrete and asphalt: we were in the Paris metropolitan area, a behemoth of some eleven million people. One in six French can in all actuality claim to be Parisian.

A little before 1 p.m. the train pulled into the Gare de Austerlitz, one of the six Parisian train stations. I pulled my rolling suitcase from the train and made my way to the street. Metro lines run below all train stations in Paris but I had little desire to try to wrestle my bag through the turnstiles and down and up escalators—a taxi would be well worth the cost. I certainly found a pleasant and helpful taxi driver right outside the station and I praised myself for my timing—arriving in Paris without a hitch. I gave the driver my address (not for my apartment but for a realty office where my apartment owner had left a key for me as she lives in London) and we had a swift fifteen minute drive to the agency. To make the day even better the fog had burned off and the sun came out warming the city up to a pleasant 40. I was so pleased I gave the driver a 30% tip as I got out of the cab.

Then, things started to go not quite as well. As the cab sped away on the busy Avenue de Paris I opened the agency’s door. The door that would not open. A tiny, handwritten sign said: out to lunch, back at 2:00. I ruefully looked at my watch and it was scarcely after 1:15. So much for my planning and my fine timing. Of course there could be worse things than to have to wander around Paris but I was on a busy street with a lot of pedestrian traffic with my giant suitcase in one hand and my satchel in my other hand. I looked for a temporary refuge of a café or a restaurant but in typical French fashion the two that I found were crowded for lunch with tiny chairs with about ten inches between tables and no place for a giant rolling valise the size of a small rhinoceros. I decided instead to walk the neighborhood, off the main street, and to find my new apartment anyway.

Of course, my apartment building was all of three blocks away, and even walking slowly this only took me about six minutes. The neighborhood, at least, was pleasant, a solidly residential area of mostly five-to-eight story apartment buildings. No signs of cars having been on fire anywhere! My apartment was scarcely a block from a large day care center (called a maternelle in France) and a bakery that my colleague highly recommended. I returned to the Avenue de Paris. It was 1:30. I peered through the glass of the realty willing someone to return from lunch early. My psychokinetic powers failed. I made a larger circuit of the neighborhood returning back to the agency at 2 p.m. Empty. Maybe on Wednesdays they did not come back after lunch? My head was starting to hurt and I began to feel pressure behind my temples. I was also starting to feel a bit footsore and my arm was tired from pulling my valise. Food also sounded good at this point.

I did one more circuit as I did not want to just stand outside the agency on the street with passersby bumping into me…at 2:15 I returned and there was a light on inside. I happily entered and was greeted by a woman behind the desk. I explained my situation: the owner of the apartment had left the key for me to pick up today for the apartment. The woman’s reaction: I don’t know what you are talking about. My head began a legitimate pounding at this point. I had the phone number of my colleague’s friend in London someplace in my bag but did not want to have to dredge that up and find a payphone to call London (and maybe not even get a reply). I had visions of opening up my valise and crawling inside to take a nap.

Then the women said, “I’ll check with my colleague.” At least my French training was paying off as I could understand her. She returned in a moment and said, thankfully, “Oh, yes, we have your key here.” Sweeter words have rarely been spoken to me. She handed me an envelope (now this was ridiculously easy—she did not ask for my passport or name but just handed me the keys to someone’s place) and smiled. The throbbing began to reside. Of course, it was a quick walk to the apartment (I am sure some resident snoop who spends his/her day looking out their window wondered who in the world I was on my fourth circuit of the neighborhood) and I entered the number code I had been given into the exterior door. The door opened. So far, so good.

The owner had emailed me in the previous week—go to the second floor and to the first door on your left as her apartment. Parisian apartments typically do not have numbers, names, or any sort of identification on them. Most likely a sign of the privacy people wish in a large city. I took the incredibly tiny elevator (about as large as a phone booth) up one flight as I did not want to wrestle my bag up the stair. There were three doors to choose from and I chose the one of the left. I opened up the envelope the agency gave me and inside there were three oddly shaped keys that looked little different than medieval tools of dentistry.

You may recall my first sentence where I wrote about my pride in my competency. One thing where I admit I do not excel (besides foreign language skills) is the handling and use of keys. For some reason I have always had some trouble in their use and manipulation. I had three keys in my hand and the door had two keyholes. I began to work on the first keyhole with the molar scraper but nothing worked. Then, I used the canine gouger to the same result. And then the third key. Nothing. My headache returned. Maybe it was the wrong door, maybe I had written down the wrong directions. Maybe it was the door to the left of the elevator, not to the left of the stairs?

Then, three of my remaining brain cells recalled one of the most basic things of French civilization: the first floor to them is our second floor. I had been trying for five minutes to open up the wrong apartment. I can only imagine if someone had been in there hearing me try to hack away (of course, maybe they are still there, paralyzed with fear at the attempted break-in). I turned from the door and walked up the stairs with a breathless silence that would have impressed a wraith. The stairs did not even creak.

I came to “my” door that only had one key and opened up the door with no problem. I was home. Certainly, I would have to say that I am pleased with my apartment. It has one bedroom, a living room, a small galley kitchen, and hardwood floors. While spartanly furnished, it certainly has enough for my simple needs. The owner has also left behind a collection of some hundred books in both English and French for me to read. I’ve been here for two days and I have found it to be pretty quiet. I do not have much of a view as my apartment looks over an interior courtyard and the matching rear of a similar building. It certainly has some quirks (not very many lights, no oven, no television, and a stereo that does not work) but I was able to get situated and figure out how to turn on the gas to the stove and turn on the electricity. Maybe I was not so incompetent after all.